My favourite NY Spring/Summer Collections

Marchesa

Show-stopping dresses drenched in glamour, high drama, nude, rich embellishments

 

Marc Jacobs
70s, big hair, big colours, big prints, big floppy straw hats, glittery gold wedges

3.1 Philip Lim

Favourite colour combinations of NY, redesigned layering and shapes, leather / sheer / nude

 

      

                                      

Juan Carlos Obando

Sexy, a touch debauched in places, acidic, raw & tough, galactic, anti-nude

Plus a few other favourites that almost made the main list: 

A Détacher (left) and Richard Chai Love (right)

There's no smoke without fire

For some unknown reason, I have recently become obsessed with smoke, clouds, dust etcetera. The shapes that they create, the gradation of colours, the ethereal impermanence... So, here is a journey through my latest fascination!

The view from my bedroom window one evening

Leon Diaper, photographer from Bournemouth

Ampara, Sri Lanka: Army commandos march past coloured smoke during a passing out ceremony at the Ampara air force camp

From The Guardian '24 hours in pictures' feature

The Red Arrows in action

Smoke dyes

Smoke dyes again, often used in warfare

Dust cloud, Texas 1935

Series of photographs from www.helmo.fr

Smoking: aphrodisiac?

Lou Dalton. Menswear SS11.

LFW Menswear Day today, and I was lucky enough to have tickets to see the emerging menswear designer Lou Dalton's SS11 collection. Lots of sawn-off shorts and chunky boots plus a mixture of prints and a palette of cub scout vs. the odd summery burst of colour.

Photo kindly borrowed from Fashion 156

P.S. I love the model Thomas Penfound (first picture)

I loved the style of one male guest stood in the corner. Forgive my awful camera image but you can see the gist of his outfit: thick fringed leather jacket, chunky boots, mid-thigh shorts.

Marc Jacobs Fall 2010 Campaign

I'm sure that this has come hideously late in the day, but I love the MJ Campaign for Fall 2010! It all seems a bit spooky - the ghost-like pallor of the first two models, the grey and brown colour palette, the laid down positions of the models in the second and third images. The shock of seeing such different images to the usual glamour of fashion means that you stop and look. Clever MJ (or his marketing team) to use such psychological games!

Inspiration from the photographs below by Edouard Boubat (1923-1999) may have helped to create the sense of resplendent glamour and beauty that Jacobs only hints at. The first is entitled Lella, Brittany and was taken in 1947. The photograph sold at Christies for a gigantic $3,750! The second is Deux Fillettes, Paris and was taken in 1953. Obviously, I am no expert, but I feel that a hint of Boubat's ambiance would help to elevate MJ's campaign to greater artistic effect.

Beware the Squirrels

Beware the Squirrels, Claire Rosen, USA.

Squirrel Lamps. From an advertising campaign for Alex Randall Bespoke Lighting.

A simple quote that makes me smile

"He was bookish, she was not; he was theoretical, she political. She called a rose a rose. He called it an accumulation of cultural and biological contructions circulating around the mutually attracting binary poles of nature/artifice."

Zadie Smith, On Beauty

A lesson in dressmaking.

When I was younger my Mum gave me a stack of 'dressing dolls' roughly thrown into a paper bag. They hadn't been touched or played with for over a decade so I had great fun discovering them and working out which outfits went with which dollies. The principle is: you have a cut-out cardboard or paper doll, often complete with shaky paper stand, decked out in modest underwear and classically feminine. Each doll comes with a 'book' of outfits and accessories - paper outlines that you have to cut out and secure to the doll using paper 'tabs' that wrap around the cardboard figure.

As I grew older and my motor skills improved, I found great enjoyment from drawing my own scale outfits, complete with tabs, and using those to supplement the characters' wardrobes. The liberty of being able to create my own designs was akin to the freedoms of being a fashion designer, minus sewing and expensive materials, and I feel that I gained and learnt a lot from the creative yet precise nature of such games.

Left: Traditional dressing doll, Right: a variation on the dressing doll - stickers rather than paper cut-outs

Dressing dolls, although still available and greatly modernised (think Disney, a lot of pink and unrealistically skinny and long-legged figures) have long been usurped by the more convenient and versatile dolls such as Barbie. Try making an outfit for a Barbie doll? For an eight-year-old... impossible.

My verdict: give me a dressing doll any day!

Wow, Wu

Jason Wu's Spring '11 Collection caught me eye and will definitely be catching some of my hard-earned cash. Sheer shirts con you into thinking that shirts only come in 'see-through', and the striking turbans' religious connotations make an interesting contrast with the semi-nudity. The sheer striped tops add an interesting new dimension to the Breton stripes of the British high streets. Clashing prints blend femininity with androgyny, and the cocktail dresses and resplendent gowns are simply to die for.

'Room' by Emma Donoghue

This novel incites our inherent human curiosity with atrocities such as kidnap and imprisonment, putting the reader in the position of 5 year old Jack who was born and raised in 'Room' where he and his mother are imprisoned. Although the subject matter is very dark and troublesome, the novel does not become a horror story. Instead, the plight of Jack and his 'Ma' becomes an ambassador for the positive side of human nature - the love between a mother and child, courage and creativity among other qualities.

Donoghue consulted with child psychologists to ensure that the novel adheres to the expected effects of isolation and confinement on the development of a child. When Jack enters 'outside', the fascination is transferred from Jack and his Ma's adapted life in 'Room' to how he can cope with his new freedom. Donoghue may not be an expert in the field of child development, but she cleverly highlights seemingly simple and arbitrary elements of our life that Jack finds most difficult when thrown into the 'outside'. This provokes the reader to question their own society, very much like 'Martian Poetry' causes us to look at our everyday behaviour in a new light.

Although the ending of the novel disappointed me slightly due to the neatness of the closure gained, the catharsis of the initially horrific situation was refreshing. I would recommend this book to anyone.

To read an extract, follow this link to the Guardian website:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/aug/06/booker-prize-emma-donoghue