Kate Moss by Irving Penn

Going, Going…: Christie’s will auction off a 135-piece collection of glamour photography by Richard Avedon, Diane Arbus and Man Ray which will include tastefully nude shots of Gisele and Ms. Moss. The Irving Penn cheesecake pics will likely go for $30,000 or so?about the same price as a night with Kristen. [Vogue UK]

Advocacy Journalism: A popular men’s fashion magazine contributes to a major shift in American foreign affairs. No, it isn’t The Economist. [Jezebel]

Cat’s Out of the Bag: Paul Smith is having a sample sale, just try to keep it on the down lo… crap… never mind. [Racked]

Four Eyes: Pull out your prescription lenses because cute/wacked nerd-chaser Verena Von Pfetten admits, “I just love me some myopia.” [Huffington Post]

Man’s Man: Jason Preston is everything women could want - fashionable, attractive, connected and willing to throw down to defend a lady’s honor. Too bad for them he’s engaged to Marc Jacobs. [NYPost]

All Aboard: By the next decade, New York Fashion Week may have a new home on top of the West Side Rail Yards, forcing poor Conde Nasters to walk more than half a block to the tents. [NY Daily News]

No Accounting for Taste: Dolce & Gabbana may be the most famous Italians slammed for tax evasion since Al Capone. [DNRNews]

The good people over at Hypebeast, God bless ‘em, keep a closer eye on once-and-future designer Hedi Silmane’s photoblog than we do. With pictorials like this, from the possibly engaged (What? Again?) Kate Moss, who can blame them?

Per usual, Ms. Kate appears in various states of smoldering undress. More photos after the jump»

Banging the Gavel: With the recent sale of Carla Bruni nudes and the new offering of this Michael Comte Gisele shot, it’s clear that British auction houses are becoming the place for top-drawer spank fodder. [Vogue UK]

Penny Pusher: Every time blue-eyed, honey-blond men’s fashion blogger Amanda Brooks writes a tribute to a male dress staple, we fall a little harder. [Men’s Vogue]

More Cushion for the Pushin’: If you’re using padded underwear to get laid, there’s really nothing we, or anyone else, can do for you. [NYMag]

Supercops: English bobbies may soon have cool designer capes. Maybe it would be cooler if the government gave them firearms, but what can you do? [BBC]

Big Bubba: Bill Clinton uses big fat, dies to distract the eye from his big, fat mouth. [HuffPo]

Stupid is as Stupid Does: England’s premier scientific journal, The Sun reveals that the more educated a woman is, the harder it is to satisfy her sexually. Well, duh. [The Sun]

Preppy is as Preppy Does:Brooks Brothers debuts their Black Fleece collection. [Luxist]

Showing up too early for a Rolling Stones shoot has proved fruitless for many a young photographer, sent away with a sneer from a certain famous pair of lips. For John “Hoppy” Hopkins however, it was the beginning of something big.

When he arrived to take some pix of the band one day in the summer of 1964, the former physicist and the recalcitrant Stones frontman hit it off. Hopkins later recounted that Jagger said he was the only photographer whom he’d ever allowed to take his picture before lunch.

The moody result, above, is included in Hopkins’ genius new book, From the Hip: Photographs by John “Hoppy” Hopkins 1960-66.

More on Hopkins’s new masterpiece»

Photo courtesy of Taschen

43 years ago adventurer / photographer Peter Beard published a landmark book on Africa, The End of the Game.

The pedigreed Yale grad - whose dashing grandfather, tobacco heir Pierre Lorillard IV is credited with popularizing the tuxedo - had met author Karen Blixen (aka Isak Dinesen) in Denmark, who sparked his interest in the Dark Continent.

Beard, pictured here in Kenya’s Aberdare Moorlands in 1966 displaying some of grandpa’s flair, went on to become not only one of our most interesting and accomplished cultural characters, but a true style icon as well, marrying Cheryl Tiegs and discovering Iman along the way. Taschen has just come out with a revised edition of the End of the Game, with a new foreword by Paul Theroux, a seasoned adventurer in his own right.

More on the new edition of Beard’s classic»

Photo courtesy of Steidl

A precious glimpse at one of the world’s most incredible photo collections from the golden age of Hollywood is to be found in Robert Dance’s opulent new book, Glamour of the Gods. The pix are all from the archives of John Kobal, who was one of the first to collect studio portraits of stars like Greta Garbo, Marlon Brando, Marlene Dietrich, Humphrey Bogart, Grace Kelly and Rita Hayworth, realizing they’d one day be equally important, if not more so, than the movies they made.

Above is Clarence Sinclair Bull’s incredibly elegant study of Gary Cooper, done for MGM in 1934, one of our favorite photos of all time. Further evidence, as if we required any, that they don’t make movie stars—or even photographs—like they used to.

Most analog technologies have gone the way of the 8-track by now, but film is making a decent stand, based largely on lomophile tricks like this one.

The above picture is “red-scaled,” meaning the film is inserted backwards and shot through a protective filter that cuts out most higher frequency light. A few clever folks have started making film specifically for red-scaling—meaning you won’t need quite as much technical elbow grease—but what they’re selling is really just pre-filtered film. It takes a good picture, though, as you can see.

Swashbuckling photographer Peter Beard’s work isn’t getting any cheaper—quite the opposite in fact—but we consider it fairly recession proof as these things go. We recently told you about the re-release of his classic 1965 book on Africa, The End of the Game. Then we reported on his shoot in Botswana for the 2009 Pirelli Calendar featuring naked supermodels and an elephant named Cathy.

Now he’s finally hitting the auction circuit»

British-born photographer Ronny Jaques, who died earlier this year at the age of 98, never achieved the fame of contemporaries like Richard Avedon and Horst P. Horst. The cognoscenti however have long admired the brilliant work he did for the likes of Harper’s Bazaar, Town & Country and Holiday (along with Slim Aarons) in the ’40s, ’50s and ’60s. His images, like this one of Robert Mitchum from 1947, resonate with all the glamour and sophistication of those lost days, made more compelling by the fact that Jacques never glossed over his subjects.

Better late than never, Jaques’ work has now been collected in an alluring new book, Stolen Moments. He worked solo and without set-dressing of any kind, capturing his subjects in unguarded moments - hence the title - with only their raw style on display. Soak it up, son, soak it up.

Rabbit, Run: Surreal photography continues to scare the crap out of us. [NotCot]

Winter Sports: A friendly face introduces us to the terrifying world of snow polo. [Luxist]

Going Minimal: Does good design flourish during a depression? It depends how you feel about the barrel-top. [Unbeige]

Going Gray: The enduring appeal of the gray flannel suit. [A Suitable Wardrobe]