Virginia Postrel

Virginia Postrel is an author and columnist known for her ability to weave together cultural, economic, and technological themes to reveal new and striking patterns. Her books include The Future and Its Enemies (Free Press, 1998), The Substance of Style (HarperCollins, 2003), and The Power of Glamour (Simon & Schuster, 2013). She is a regular columnist for Bloomberg View, the opinion section of Bloomberg, where she writes on a wide variety of topics, including technology, retailing, and public policy.

She also writes a bimonthly column for Reason magazine on history and material culture. She is currently writing a book, The Fabric of Civilization, exploring the connections between textiles, technology, and trade, from pre-history to the near future. It will be published by Basic Books in the U.S. and Hachette in the U.K. She has been a columnist for The Atlantic, The Wall Street Journal, and Forbes. From 1989 to 2000, she was editor-in-chief of Reason. Her website is at vpostrel.com.