Broke out my new Balenciagas for lunch with some friends. I stopped by Nordstrom afterwards to look for shoes for a friend, and one of the sales associates complimented them and then asked if I was trying them on. I almost laughed out loud. How I wish Nordstrom was cool enough to carry Balenciaga. In any case, it was pretty warm so I didn’t get to get creative with layers or anything. Warm weather makes dressing such a boring task. Or maybe I should look at it as a challenge, something to test my creative skills.
I’ve seen two of the new Chanel ads fullsize, and I have to say I kind of like it. It’s not absolutely stunning, but it’s a different direction than the shiny high-polish feeling I get from their older ads. What I like about these new imagines is that they’re kind of gritty and pretty in that not-quite-so-perfect way. The images aren’t so squeaky-clean and glossy, they’re a little grainy and hazy-looking, which I love. It’s a different aesthetic, but I’ve always been drawn to that style of fashion photography. And I like how they took the lace motif and really ran with it. Smart of them, since lace is going to be big for fall. And I loved those gloves (are they gloves?) and tights on the runway. And the short hair. Kind of makes me want to cut even more of my hair off.
image: source
I found this fun little bit of information floating around in various places and thought I would share it because my roommate is a ballet fanatic. It seems that designer Magda Berliner created special costumes for a piece in the New York City Ballet’s first annual Dancers’ Choice program. The performance was last night, and raised money for the Ballet Dancers’ Emergency Fund. The clip doesn’t really have anything to do with the costumes, but I thought it was kind of cool.
P.S. S- One of the pieces they did was Gerome Robbins’ “Dances at a Gathering.”
Filed under: My Closet
I’ve finally motivated myself enough to snap a picture of what I’m wearing on this particular day. I love seeing other people’s style diaries, but I’ve always been to lazy to do the same. And I’m not like the now reclusive Agathe of Style Bytes, who always managed to take pretty pictures with interesting backgrounds. Anyway, I’m not even wearing anything at all interesting or nice, mostly because I’m probably not going to even leave the house today. But I wanted an excuse to debut my new Fendis. Please excuse the horrible photography skills, lack of hairstyle, and general mediocre-ness of it all.
I am a little addicted to Jeopardy. So I was overjoyed yesterday when one of the categories was “Christian.” Msr. Lacroix was one answer, as was my favorite Christian, Msr. Louboutin! None of the contestants got the answer. They obviously know nothing about shoes. Tsk, tsk.
Yesterday I made a little run over to San Francisco to do some late afternoon shopping and have dinner with my parents. Well, a couple quick hours of shopping turned into a veritable shoe-fest, and I did something unprecedented in my shopping career: I got four pairs of (amazing) shoes in one night. Here they are in all their badly photographed at 1 in the morning because I just could not stop obsessing over them:
A pair of gorgeous gorgeous Lanvin sandals in a dark navy blue. I finally have some Lanvin in my life! Joy! They’re a lot darker than they appear in the picture. Did I mention they’re gorgeous?
A pair of awesome Pierre Hardy neoprene sandals. They’re fun and a little crazy, just the way I like them. And I just love that signature architectural heel.
A pair of cute but (especially compared to the others) basic Fendi sandals. I’ve been searching for a nice pair of sandals to wear during the summer months, and these fit the bill perfectly.
And, last but certainly not least, a pair of Balenciagas with the crazy neon floral-ish print! They are so amazing that I changed into them last night so I could wear them to dinner. Hooray!
They make me want to play around with my wardrobe to see what kind of fun outfits I can come up with. All in all, a pretty triumphant day for my shoe addiction. As Miuccia Prada says, shoes are the new bags! It’s so true.
I cringed a little when I found out that American Apparel is starting a line of “jewelry”. As a jewelry designer, I am always a little appalled by how much really, really crappy jewelry is being made these days. I always wonder who makes this cheap (and i mean cheap-looking, I have no problem with inexpensive stuff) jewelry and thinks it is actually good in some way. And that’s what I kind of feel about the American Apparel line. It seems like a waste of good resources. As Racked aptly put it, it’s less a jewelry than just metal chains. Heck, AA didn’t even make them, the “found them”! What does that even mean? Why?! Just…WHY?!?! Even if you wanted chains for your awesome Mr. T costume, why would you pay close to 50 bucks for them? Please, hipster “I’m so ironic I’ll wear ugly jewelry because it makes me more hip” kids, stay away! Go to a thrift store or something. Those are hip, too, I think.
I happened upon this site and discovered that The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is having an exhibit on Yves Saint Laurent’s work, which is perfect, because I’m visiting Montreal this summer! I’m excited that I have at least one thing to do, because although I’m sure Montreal is an awesome city, I didn’t exactly know what specifically there is to do. But victory! I have the beginning of a list!
I have a confession to make. This week, I have been dressing so incredibly badly, and I decided I have to fess up. You see, it’s been sweltering hot here in Northern California (my computer says it is currently 91 degrees. ugh.), and in between frequent trips to the gym in a desperate effort to get back in shape, running errands, unpacking the prodigious amount of stuff I brought back with me from college, and sitting around the house in a dazed, sweaty stupor, I have not been at my sartorial best. When it’s this hot, all I care about is wearing the least amount of clothes possible. It’s really no excuse, I know, but I have difficulty enjoying clothes when IT IS SO GOD FORSAKINGLY HOT. I look something like the picture above, except my white dress is much less cute, I look a lot less perfect, and I can’t be bothered to wear shoes. So I basically look nothing like this, except for the fact that I have taken a liking to lying on the floor. Marble floors are very cold. It is quite nice. But I’m praying that it cools down even just a smidge so I can again care about what I am wearing.
image: source
I consider myself to have a very minimal knowledge of fashion, especially since I’m not exactly in the business. So I don’t really have a lot of exposure or information about the really emerging designers, because even the designers I am familiar with but the average non-fashion-obsessed person doesn’t know of are pretty famous in the fashion world. I’m no Susie Bubble, who always seems to discover tiny little emerging brands or designers fresh out of design school. But I recently stumbled on the designs of Qiu Hao, a Central St. Martins-educated designer from Shanghai. You don’t hear a lot about designers from China and, in the East, Japan really dominates as the fashion superpower of the region. But Qiu Hao’s designs are interesting because they are a good mixture of wearability and concept. His clothes gently push the envelope without sacrificing wearability and they seem to have great details and lots of subtlety. I found this interesting interview on YouTube. I love when he says that people don’t understand his work, because he doesn’t do it in a drama-laden, suffering artist way, so it really just makes you pay more attention to his clothes and try a little harder to figure out what kind of message he’s sending out through his work. I kind of wish I could go to China and see his clothes now. Feel free to check out the video.
