A new book that presents “a lyrical portrait of Susie Cave” is on the way, and it will feature words from Nick Cave and photography from Dominique Issermann.
SUSIE will be available to purchase on hardback from September 16 via Thames & Hudson, and is a visual and lyrical portrait of the British designer, entrepreneur, and model.
Contributions come from writer and musician Nick Cave, who has been married to Susie since 1999, as well as from photographer Dominique Issermann, book designer Irma Boom and Susie herself.
Issermann is a longtime friend of the couple, and the photographs put forward in the book come following years of photographing the two of them. Nick Cave contributes words and lyrics too, inspired by his partner over the decades and dating back to when they first met in 1997.
As well as following Susie’s creativity and relationship with the ‘Red Right Hand’ singer, the book also comes as a testament to motherhood – capturing both the devastating loss of a child, as well as the deep comfort she found in the one who remains.
In July 2015, Susie and Nick’s son, Arthur, died after falling from a cliff near Brighton at the age of 15. The 2019 album ‘Ghosteen’ was written in the aftermath of the tragedy.
“This is a book about love, in all its shades,” Susie and Nick shared. “We are so grateful to our beloved friend, the brilliant photographer Dominique Issermann, who quietly documented our relationship from its earliest days and has made it possible for us to tell this intimate story of family, loss and transformation.
“We are also thankful to iconic designer Irma Boom and Thames & Hudson for creating this
deeply personal book with such care and respect.”
Tristan de Lancey, publisher and creative director at Thames & Hudson shared: “As a lifelong fan of Nick and Susie, it is an absolute privilege to publish a book of such importance to them. With personal recollections as moving as the photographs themselves, it is a gem of a book, appropriately conceived and realised, and one which will captivate their many fans.”
Visit here to pre-order and for more information.
Nick Cave has often spoken about the inspiration he has drawn from Susie over the years, and told fans back in 2018 that he had spent two decades trying to capture the essence of her in his poetry and songwriting.
“Twenty years on and I am still trying to define Susie… but it’s a losing battle. I have come to see that there is a wild and mercurial energy within her that my words will never contain, and that this bright energy is connected to her own singular and restless fascination with the world. It has little to do with me,” he wrote at the time.
“Once I married Susie, I set about trying to capture her,” he added. “To write about Susie feels like trying to break a code that is constantly rearranging itself. Most of the time, I fail. My songs end up as scraps of paper rustling around the feet of a 60-foot woman.”
In 2024, the ‘Into My Arms’ songwriter took to his Red Hand Files website to share his admiration for his partner after she decided to close her fashion brand, The Vampire’s Wife, and explained how the venture helped her to process the loss of their son.
“The Vampire’s Wife was Susie’s ‘Ghosteen’,” he wrote. “Just as I tried through music to create a place for Arthur to be, real or imagined, Susie’s dresses were an attempt to give her grief form by throwing fabric over an invisible boy, as an act of love, an act of mercy, and an act of contrition.”
“That is the truth of it – as softly spoken and dream-like as the dresses themselves – the clothes Susie created were objects of devotion, sacred things that will live on regardless of the brand’s fortunes,” he added.
The high-end brand was worn by the likes of Florence Welch, Kate Moss, Kylie Minogue, and the Princess of Wales since it first opened in 2014.
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