Cycling Promo

Alex

Catwalk

The last runways from men's fall 2011collections have taken place, and now it is on to haute couture in Paris and then the fashion month starts in February. Here are is my last edition of my favorite looks for the guys. Au revoir.

Acne

Vocab Project

Just a first slide of a project Im planning to finish this month.



Alex

Catwalk

Men's Fall 2011. Paris

Balmain

Catwalk

Here is the last batch of the men's fall fashion shows from Milano. On to Paris after this!

Bally

Catwalk

Men's Fall 2011 continued

Canali

a self portrait

Combined a photo I took of my beloved puppy poodle and of my own body.
Here is what turned out.


Alex

Michael

Catwalk

Men's fall 2011 continued.

Bottega Veneta

De Construction

 
Beth Ditto is coming out with a new EP, that is gonna be available oh so soon. The EP, titled De Construction has four songs on it; Do You Need Someone, Goodnight Good Morning, I Wrote The Book, and Open Heart Surgery. If any of you are familiar with her voice and style, there is a lot of that on every song. It is produced by Simian Disco Mobile which means that the awesomeness just got multiplied.

If you want to have a little preview of the songs, you can check them out here. For those who enjoyed the other joint effort by the artists, Cruel Intentions, will not be disappointed!

Catwalk

The men's fall 2011 fashion shows have started today in Milan. So far, there has been a lot of knits, turtlenecks, and a big mix of neutral vs. bright colors. Check out some of my favorite looks of today.

Costume National

Fou Drummers

It’s been some time now that the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing have ended, and I don’t remember that much about them, except that China won pretty much everything, Russia didn't, and that my hero Roger Federer finally got his Olympics Gold in doubles with fellow Swiss man Stanislas Wawrinka.

I recently came across a photograph from the opening ceremony in Beijing, and I was blown away by the performance by the drummers. They are called Fou Drummers specifically, and there were exactly 2,008 of them to commemorate the year of the Olympics. The photos are pretty impressive, so I can only imagine how amazing it was to watch them live while they do their sequence in unison. Unfortunately, I did not manage to find a video of the performance, but I did learn that the Fou Drum is an ancient Chinese instrument that is pretty big in size and was used to play in rituals, until it became widely used during the Confucian times. 

Check out more pictures from the ceremony after the jump!

Catwalk

Because I'm a lazy shit, I did not post about the pre-fall collections as they were coming in. Therefore, this is going to be an extra long post with a gazillion pictures of my favorite looks from different collections that i have failed to post about previously.

Balenciaga Pre-Fall 2011

Love Is...

Milan Vukmirovic

“It’s so important when you are young to fill yourself with culture, art, music, movies, fashion, travels. It’s fuel for life” – Milan Vukmirovic

Fashion is a very curious business when it comes to celebrity. On the one hand it is a very public business/profession to be part of because everyone in it is constantly trying to cater to the people and guess what they want. Then, there are people and companies in this industry powerful enough to influence what people will want and how they will act. But, then there is the other side of the coin, where, there are many who choose a completely secluded lifestyle and prefer not to be bothered for anything except work. Martin Margiela is a wonderful example. Taking into consideration the level of influence he had on the fashion world and consequently on society in general, he never showed his face. And then he left the industry, just as swiftly as he entered it. Pretty much no one has seen the guy. Nevertheless, MM managed to create a significant following and high level of admiration all the while working incognito. Very much like Banksy, except Banksy, I believe did show himself to an extent in Exit Through the Gift Shop, if that was in fact him.

Then there is another facet of the fashion world that is also very interesting. It’s the idea of a brand versus the designer. While even those that do not take fashion seriously, know, or at least have heard of houses like Chanel, Gucci, and Dolce & Gabbana, the actual creative directors appointed to carry these brands and attract customers with their work are often left unknown. There are designers whose names are arguably just as well known as the brand, and it especially helps when the name of the brand matches that of the designer. But, there have been people that managed to create a name for themselves, no less influential, within an established brand. Karl Lagerfeld and Marc Jacobs are great examples.

Today, I wanted to talk about one of my most favorite people in the world, and the man whose achievements I hugely admire. His name is Milan Vukmirovic, and he plays a very significant role in the fashion world. Unfortunately (and surprisingly to me), every time I mention his name – and I mention it often – very, very few people have even the slightest idea of who he is. I went to a Trussardi 1911 store in Barcelona in order to find out the problem behind this. You see, I have a very silly habit; I’ll go into fashion stores, walk up to a store clerk and start inquiring them about the brand they work for. They are simple questions such as what the name of the fashion director is, when and where the brand was founded, etc. It’s just that I feel somewhat reluctant to shop at a store that carries a name like Gucci or YSL when the people working there do not know that Frida Giannini and Stefano Pilati, respectively, are the people who design the clothes they are trying to sell. However, thankfully, that is usually not the case, and the employees are well aware of the important names and facts that have to do with their work place.

Angry Giraffe and Co

A delightful afternoon I spent with an angry Giraffe and a Friend

Catwalk

Pre-Fall 2011 continued. Alexander Wang.

 All photos from www.style.com

Ivy League Fashion

I have recently purchased a book called Take Ivy published by Hachette Fujingaho. The book was originally published in 1965 in Japanese, and, therefore, was naturally intended for the Japanese. It maintains somewhat of an educational tone, and I was left with the impression that the principal reason behind the book was to inform Japanese youngsters about the lifestyle of students in the best institutions in America.

Needless to say, the reason it was recently reprinted in English had nothing to do with the above. Rather, the book ended up a huge success as a refernce to style of that era in that particular part of America. Looking through the photographs, I was fascinated by the sharp style that the students in these Ivy League schools had at that time, and how much that style has been influencing American fashion ever since.

I notice that this preppy style of clothing is especially loved by many of the relatively new designers that will most likely be dictating fashion to the style-minded people of the world for the next few decades. Looking through the spring summer 2011 collections by such designers like Billy Reid, Michael Bastian, Thom Brown, Simon Spurr, and Band of Outsiders' Scortt Sternberg, I couldn't help but notice just how much this style has become a root of American wear today.

I went through some of my favorite looks from the spring summer 2011 runway shows, and tried to compile a collection of photographs that would show just how much similarity there is between what the students photographed in Take Ivy wore and what the most exciting designers today are creating.

Love Is...

New Lacoste Ad

Lacoste featuring Anja Rubik

Following some of my other advertising-related posts, I thought I'd share the new ad campaign for Lacoste. I think it's a cool idea, mixing what is their signature white polo and crocodile logo with formal evening outfits. I don't know if they are trying to say that they are planning on taking Lacoste to the next level, that the Lacoste polo can be worn with anything, or maybe it's a goodbye statement from Christophe Lemaire, who has left Lacoste to take on the role of creative director at Hermes, a much, much more high-end and expensive brand. Check out the rest of the pictures after the jump!

Most Stylish

Producer/DJ

Mark Ronson has this strictly British approach to dressing. He is always sharp and his suits fit him impeccably. Yet, he still brings something new to the table, whether it's a colorful shirt, or colorful hair. Even when spinning, Ronson somehow always manages to keep his cool. It seems like no matter where he is or what he is doing, he is always dressed to the nines. Props for that. Check out more pictures after the jump.

Androgyny 2.0

“Every man likes to dress in a skirt every once in a while” – Andrej Pejic

Fashion's male model of the moment, Andrej Pejic. Photograph by Rebecca Michael.

It’s a well known fact that androgyny has been huge in women’s fashion for quite a few seasons how. In fact, like anything that creates a huge boom, it seems to be passing, and "Victoria’s Secret" body types are being seen more and more on the runway and in editorials instead of tomboys.

What’s very new and exciting though, is not androgyny in women’s fashion (because I’m sure that if you google the two together, you will get 82376582635713057102758937586245724 hits), but in men’s fashion.

I’ve been seeing many thinner, smaller boys, with long flowing hair walk down the runway, and now with the growing popularity of Croatian-born model Andrej Pejic, I think it is safe to say that men’s fashion designers are as much fans of androgyny as female fashion designers have been for a while.

I find it a very interesting phenomenon. On the one hand there is this big emergence of re-invention and looking at things from different perspectives, and on the other hand, there is a clear movement of people trying to become equal in every meaning of the word. At first, women fought very hard to be treated the same way men were, but then spent quite some time complaining about how the idea of courtship has died and men no longer see women for the fragile and delicate beings that they are, but rather as total equals, who are perfectly capable of opening their own doors.

I suppose that after listening to women not being able to decide on whether they wanted to be adored or given the same work opportunities, the men have also decided to take a stand. After all, maybe men want to feel fragile and be courted as well? Maybe they would like for a woman to hold the door for them? Most would still say no, considering men being significantly bigger and stronger than women, but fashion has always been a few steps ahead in terms of changes in society, and it seems that it is on a totally different page all together at the moment. Pejic’s measurements, for example, allow him to walk in women’s shows, which he has done on several occasions. Meanwhile, popular fashion magazine Candy  has been playing with the idea of dressing boys up like girls for a while now, and, having a damn good time with it. If you don't believe, please check the pictures out after the jump!

Five Reasons to Watch 'The Fighter' (Excluding Mark Wahlberg's Torso)

1) Great acting.

2) A real guy movie. Now, I am a girl myself, but I really enjoy these kind of films. Maybe it's because I know that being a girl, I will never get to experience and have to go through some of the things men go through, for better or for worse. The Fast and the Furious, as much as I love that movie, is not a guy's film. This film is. Because, despite how much most men would want their life to be about outrageously fast cars and exotic women, it usually isn't (unless you are a Rolling Stone or Cristiano Ronaldo).

3) Christian Bale being his wonderful weird self again. Seriously, how many times has this man put his body through hell in order to deliver a performance? He lost about 30 kilograms to play his character in The Machinist. Then he went straight to working on Batman and buffed himself up to where he was 15 kg more than what he was before his diet for The Machinist. To make a long story short, it seems like there is nothing he won't do to make his character more believable and his performance more powerful. Here is a visual to prove it. In this film, he plays Dicky Eklund, a retired boxer - and current crack addict - known as a legend in his home town for going the distance against one of the best boxers of the time. Christian Bale once again lost a lot of weight to realistically portray a person struggling with a serious drug addiction, and his acting is great, where he manages to capture small nuances of the real Dicky's behavior and habits.

4) It's a true story worth being told. Before I go any further, i am not a big boxing expert, and I am not sure exactly how accurate this film is. But I did go on the savior of human kind, YouTube, and looked at some real fights of Micky Ward, and those seemed to be pretty spot on, so that's good news. Besides the accuracy issue, that I, unfortunately do not have much to say about, I did feel like I connected with the characters and believed that they could be real people. It's a great story to make a film about because it has all the ingredients: family, love story, drugs and jail, boxing.

5) The message this film sends. Despite the main theme of the film being boxing, and the film inside the film being about drugs, at the end of it, the story is about family. I thought the relationship with the two brothers and their mother was very well shown. In movies about the pursuit of greatness, I find that parents are always depicted as either extremely supportive or extremely unsympathetic. This film doesn't try to do that, which I really appreciate. Melissa Leo gives a wonderful performance as a mother of nine children, who tries her best at raising all of them equally, but inevitably struggles. She is by far not the perfect example of a mother, but neither is she a failure as one. That is what speaks to me as a viewer. Families are always tough to portray because the emotions that happen between people bonded by blood are often a challenge to show between actors that may know each other for a few weeks. It seems to me that the director David O. Russell and his team paid a lot of attention to this aspect of the film, and I think it really pays off.