ACNE x EAST 17

 

Acne AW11 (£80)

I quite love this reversion to wearing beanies perched on the top of your head (pioneered by East 17 in their 'It's Alright' video/artwork) because it the literal antithesis of the grim X-Factor contestant/off-duty 00s male model/David Beckham saggy hat. Also because it is completely stupid and therefore amusing.

My brother has been wearing his hats like this for a while now and on some level I think it's okay because he's thirty and I can imagine that it's difficult to shift the habits of your youthful heyday.

LOUIS WAIN

Louis Wain is an Edwardian artist best known for his paintings of cats. His paintings, which progress from realistic depictions of cats to anthropomorphic images to abstracted psychadelic representations are often cited as proof of his mental decline as allegedly he was schizophrenic. (Posthumous analysis tends to diagnose him with something closer to Aspergers). This notion of decline is particularly contentious issue as he produced realistic images alongside the horror vacui felines throughout his life, including the last fifteen years of which he spent at Bethlem.

Whatever the truth may be considering the recent popularity of so-called Outsider Art (Museum of Everything), this is surely the time for a reappraisal of Wain's work.

PYJAMAS FOR ASTRONAUTS

Wish wish wish these kids pyjamas from Couverture and the Garbstore were adult size. They're not actually that expensive, perhaps worth getting and squishing into the top? Discomfort is a small price to pay to feel like an astronaut.

ROSA vs. LANA DEL REY

Rosa kinda did this ages ago... just putting it out there Lana.

I do actually really like her music but don't quite understand why she actively chose 'Lana'. Worst fake palindrome ever.

7 DAYS OF OUTFITS...

I took a picture of my outfit each day last week for Josie's gr8 blog, HERE IT IS

OILSLICK DMs

Initially I thought these DMs (exclusive to Selfridges) made up in greatness what they lack in subtlety. Pondering further they made me think of sticky seagulls and the 1996 Tenby oil spill which I saw at a particularly impressionable age and made me cry a lot. No new DMs for me. 

THE BUS DRIVER'S PRAYER

 THE BUS DRIVER'S PRAYER , Frith Kerr made it into a poster for London Design Festival 2009 - such brilliant typography. The one below is Jonathan Ellery.

A GIRL CAN DREAM...

VIVIENNE DOES AFRICA

Don't get me wrong, I love Viv but does  her latest campaign remind anyone else of Russell Brand's 'African Child' in Get Him to The Greek?

CATHERINE MARTIN

Catherine Martin. Wow.

LEAVERS HOODIES (OR NOT)

Josie's pyjamas! In year thirteen (partially down to my precocious insistence) instead of the leavers hoodies our textiles class printed these for everyone. Although it's slightly ridiculous surely it has to be better than an endless list of forgettable names on your back?

YOUNG DAVID HOCKNEY

with Celia Birtwell. Cool men have been wearing the same thing for literally decades.

METAL CLOTHES

I have been cruising the internet for a chainmail tshirt because I thought I wanted one. Off-puttingly the internet is rife with the most varied selection of chafed re-enactment aficionados, belly dancers and posers in S&M bras.

Medieval Russian armourNoughties Balenciaga armour

LOUISE GRAY SS12

My write up of the Louise Gray show for Time Out...


http://timeoutshopping.tumblr.com/post/11056015126/time-out-at-london-fashion-week-ss12-louise-gray




[Gif from tumblr 'fuckyeahvintagediary']

DONATELLA'S TIME CAPSULE FOR DAZED AND CONFUSED

DONATELLA: "The ability to make fire has always been a sign of human ingenuity. In Greek mythology, fire is what the intelligent Prometheus stole from Zeus and gave to mortals. This lighter, covered in white Swarovski crystals and bearing the Versace Medusa-head motif in gold - a reference to another Greek myth - is a portable fire-maker and that is why I have chosen it for the time capsule. It's both useful and symbolic of the human spirit."


For Dazed and Confused's twentieth birthday issue they have invited fashion's finest to choose an object to put in a time capsule for the next twenty years. There are a lot of wanky and annoying contributions as well as some thinly disguised press releases [*cough cough milliner Stephen Jones] but I loved Donatella's, pretentious chat about the Greeks and all... a pleasing combination of pyromania, mythology and, staying true to Gianni, gold and diamonds.

SNAP!

CAMERAS, GOOGLE

Recently I discovered the google search image with image feature  (If you go to google images you can drag an actual image into the search box and it can usually identify it and provide an selection of 'visually similar' images). I can't understand how you'd even begin to teach a computer to do that.

But returning to my purposes... from the impressive hairline stuck on my wall and it came up with the original Hedi Slimane shoot and these, clever huh? 

DOLCE! GABBANA!

Oh wow. Even though I have pretentions of myself as the sort of person that if bestowed with great wealth would dress head to toe in chic Jil Sander/Margaret Howell-esque outfits, this is what I would wear everyday if a combination of factors (including climate, extreme weightloss and some sort of financial injection) conspired to allow me.

It's like a modern baroque fairytale, as though a doll fell out of her Polly Pocket into some superglue and rolled around in the best craft box ever.