Sunday 25 July 2010

I HEART: Gap's new shoes.

I find it quite impressive that the shoes that caught my eye and found their way to the 'must-get-the-moment-they-hit-stores' list I keep at the back of my head at the recent Gap press day were not the latest designs by The Maestro Pierre Hardy (as part of his ongoing collaboration with the American mega-brand) but these ankle boots from their main collection. I know that chunky wedge boots are meant to be going, going, gone and I must admit, I have found myself looking at previous pairs that I once swooned over with a new-found, quizzical look but these, with their mustard/gold panel, have a geeky-college-uniform feel about them that I will always remain partial to. Plus, don't you too love the fact they instantly make me think of cozy, cable knit socks, all scrunched up and ready to carry me through muddy-London-puddles and whatnot come autumn?

Thursday 15 July 2010

I HEART: Acne put roots down in Ol' London!

Today can be easily renamed London Acne Day and if you happen to walk down Dover Street later this evening you will find - along with the odd confused sufferer of said skin condition and a long guest list of the Stockholm-based label's favourite fans - myself and T celebrating (is there a better word?) the arrival of their first London store. Or studio, as it's officially called. I will be celebrating because I love the label and my dislike of department stores, excluding Liberty, has so far meant a limited access to its goods. Not such a bad thing, mind you, because easy access to some of the best leather jackets this side of the universe would not make my bank account happy. Is it ever? T will be celebrating because he will no longer need to order online and have to trot to the post office for any returns to Stockholm. We're reasonable people, really!

This being Acne, the store alone would not suffice as enough excitement for one day so with London Fashion Week's provisional schedule out today the secret is finally out: Acne will be showing as part of the London schedule. I found out at another Acne party at Harrod's and somehow managed to not tell anyone. I think this feat deserves a second cocktail tonight!



Back to the store. Picked by Acne's Creative Director, Jonny Johansson, during a reccy, it is a former art gallery and in order to counteract its white walls Jonny and his team have installed a fantastic collection of art pieces that bring back a sense of the building's age. Acne favour old buildings and this one, with its unfinished and untreated light wood floors that scream Sweden, may be the most modern one of them yet. The ground floor is dedicated to menswear and a piano that may or may not see some key action from Jonny himself at some point.



The first floor is all womenswear with three large canvases by the artist Jeremiah Goodman, known for his interior renderings for clients like, oh I don't know, will Greta The Great Garbo and Diana The One Vreeland do? The paintings are renditions of Jonny's Stockholm office. All fittings, mannequins, at least one of which is a wonderful brushed dirty gold suede, and show pieces are custom made for the store.





The third floor is cleverly all about denim so you can focus entirely on stocking up on your favourite pair of Hex, Flex or Kex!



The fourth floor is a light-filled spaced that currently houses a menagerie of shoes, jewellery and other accessories but will also play host to various small exhibitions and events. It also has a double-storey ceiling, a staircase to nowhere and access to a sweet terrace garden - quick, try and think of other London stores that have a terrace garden? With plants!









So, there. The store opens this Friday. Go and visit. Admire the Helmut Lang art pieces. Stroke the winter jackets. I'll be there tonight enjoying that cocktail we talked about!

(The difference in the light of some of the images is easily explained by the fact that all crystal-clear images are by Acne and all weird-yellow ones by myself.)

Friday 2 July 2010

BLOG BLESS: Beauty is all around!

The fantastically dazzling tour-de-force that is Liberty London Girl was kind enough this week to give this silly little blog...an award! I know, I know, you may keep your, uhmmm, compliments to yourself but this happens to be a 'Your Blog is Beautiful' one and well, this blog's very first so I'm accepting it in the only way possible - exaggerated and inappropriate glee! Thanks S. I now have to give up seven "mind-numbingly boring facts" about myself. Easy peasy. Seven? I hope she means seven hundred, I've got a few waiting to be aired! Hold on to your seats, put down that cup of tea, finish chewing that burger already - here it goes:

1 - As a teenager, I started what has now developed into a fully blown addiction to magazines, which reached such ridiculous levels I resorted to a highly sophisticated and elaborate routine of smuggling copies of international Vogues and Elles into the house without my mum noticing! Said routine involved walking around the back of the house - while sneaking in the next door neighbour's side entrance into the garden, taking the incriminating evidence out from underneath my sweater/jacket/back of my jeans, positioning it in between the shutters to my bedroom window, walking back into the house from the front entrance and, at an appropriate time, opening the window to get the magazine. It baffles me how I thought I could hide the ever-growing piles of mags developing underneath my desk. My mum, by the way, had no issues with my spending habit. I think I was just being...what's the word? A drama queen!

2 - I spent my summer holidays during my teen years travelling around Greek Orthodox churches with my grandmother and her friends. I know a lot about the lives of Saints and too much about what goes on in a coach full of Greek grandmothers! Just don't give them the microphone.

3 - I love the smell of printed paper. I will instinctively open and smell each newspaper/magazine/book I get my hands on. In fact, when someone develops the equivalent perfume I will most likely bathe in it!

4 - I once memorised and then recited back to a school-friend all the season's trends according to some magazine - obviously to the sheer delight of my poor friend - and felt so exhilarated I did so that I decided I should have a go at working in a fashion magazine one day. I clearly remember saying the words - and remember, this to what must have been a 15 year old school girl in Rhodes, Greece in 1995 - "floral prints will be big this season"!

5 - My older - and yet not much wiser - sis secretly believes I'm the Antichrist after assembling my horoscope map, printing it out and realising all my planets, stars and what not fell in the same half of the page. I frequently bring this fact up. She then retorts that as a small child, we once spent a summer playing 'hotel', an activity which mainly involved me paying her for sleeping in my own bed, eating my mum's food and visiting my grandmother.

6 - I could easily and happily survive on a diet of spaghetti or noodles. Nothing else. Toppings, of course but just that will be enough.

7 - And talking of food, I once nearly ate a drawing pin while dining at a seaside restaurant in Indonesia's Gili Islands. It somehow found its way in the delicious chocolate cake I was offered as dessert. Miraculously, it got stuck between my front teeth. After overcoming the shock, I proceeded to step into a live nest of fire ants!

But enough about me! I know have to "pass on the love to ten or fifteen more bloggers, who have to “link back to my good self (either to thank me or shower me with curses), and then reveal seven fascinating facts about your own magnificent person and pass on the love to ten or fifteen more bloggers.

Et voila!

and for some good ol' non-human action:

Your blogs are beautiful ladies - and cats. Now, bring on the tales!

Sartorialisms: On the fold!



How simply perfect is Garance's vintage Delvaux bag with the fold being just right? And how perfect is Garance herself in her washed jeans, white tee and camera? And did I mention perfection already?

Image by Jak &Jil.