Princeton Architectural Press, $29.95

The coveted prix de rome scholarship, awarded yearly by the American Academy in Rome, took a young Michael Graves to Italy in 1960. Over 250 sketches and photographs from his two years of architectural studies in the Eternal City, and his subsequent travels through Europe, are the subject of a new book called <i>Michael Graves: Images of a Grand Tour</i>. Brian M. Ambroziak notes in the introduction that throughout his long career, Graves has honored architectural precedent not merely by “treating or employing history, but rather by participating in its continuities.” Thus sketches and photographs—a view of the Forum framed by a narrow doorway, the oculus of the Pantheon, Stonehenge—not only record the vernacular architectural language of an ancient time and place but suggest how, in his work, Graves has extended the architectural dialogue. <i>Images of a Grand Tour</i> stands on its own as an inspirational collection of beautiful and visually compelling renderings. (via Elements of Living)