Michael Fazio – författare

Want two orchestra tickets to the latest Broadway hit? Call Fazio. Or a bathtub full of melted chocolate to impress your girlfriend? That's right. Call Fazio. He began his career as the harried assistant to an L.A. casting agent ("What do you mean Charlie Sheen called and you didn't tell me?!") and used what he learned to become a concierge at New York City's Intercontinental Hotel. In this delightful tell-all, Fazio reveals what people really do, what they "need", what they want to hide, what they will pay for (and what they won't - "Oops, I must have rolled over on the remote and it turned on the payporn. Could you take it off my bill?"). And it's all rounded out with great insider tips on how to get the service you want.

Buildings Across Time brilliantly explores the essential attributes of architecture by uniquely combining both a detailed survey of Western architecture, including Pre-Columbian America, and an introduction to architecture from the Middle East, India, Russia, China, and Japan. Authors have searched out the stories these buildings have to tell, considered the intentions of the people who built them, and examined the lives of those who used them. The text contains extensive descriptive narrative leavened with focused critical analysis, which both allows the book to stand alone and invites lecturers to impose their studied interpretations on the material without the danger of undue ambiguity or conflict. In a world that grows smaller by the day, it presents a global perspective, and in a discipline that concerns built objects that are often beautiful as well as functional, it is copiously illustrated, intelligently designed, and consistently usable.