POP 214 Thursday, 28 January 2010

Today’s POP is Dasha. If you’ve wondered what she’s been up to, this’ll shed some light…

Hanging out at Shamrock tattoo

The guy in the middle is Mark Mahoney, genius tattoo artist. Last night Shamrock tattoo on Sunset Blvd hosted a party for ‘Visionaire’ issue “2010″ which I was one of the curators for.

We could all use a little shamrock in our lives!

POP 213 Wednesday, 27 January 2010

Today’s POP is Mad Max: kaledioscopic picture phone postcard poster part II. This time Paris. Again, click on ‘read more’ to see all the pics…

PAAARP IT’S PARIS!

Paris was cooler than Ross Kemp’s head on a windy day. Forget the Left bank, we need to contact Barclays bank and take out a loan so we can buy ALL of this A/W 2010 menswear. Continuing our top 5 countdown like crazy Jimmy Saville at the end of those old TOTP’s you sometimes see on BBC2, we’d like to point out our Paris highlights if you don’t mind? Thank you.

1. LOUIS VUITTON; Grown up and looking good, Louis Vuitton’s collection of oversized shirts, sheepskin jackets and clogged boots (YES!) just felt RIGHT. Plus the hand painted bags by German artist Christian Schoeler were simply beautiful. This is a stick up, we want it ALL!

2. COMME DES GARCONS; Comme on in, the waters fine! We love Comme, and this was a collection that continued our infatuation. Boys with wet matted hair wearing tweed lifejackets underneath heavy suiting with shorts layered over trousers and re-enforced neon shoes stomped down the tight runway. Then came the big fake fur jackets, and we wet ourselves with excitement.

3. RAF SIMONS; Yes yes yes PLEASE. Skirts for men ( more than a trend now, just a fact, in fact, in a few years time everyones gonna be wearing them, including everyones DAD, it’s coming on that strong. Fact ), spliced trench coats and modernist blocks of colour made us feel all happy inside.

4. YSL; Started with a specially made Bruce Weber film, which featured all sorts of nudity and Bruce Weber beautiful-ness, followed by a grey-heavy collection that was far from dull. Stefano Pilati took inspiration from pleats in the YSL archive and incorporated them into an utterly modern collection that embraced heritage and said hello to the future at the same time. YSL also introduced a new range of wardrobe staples at their Paris showroom, including some of the best flight jackets we’ve ever seen. Nice one Stefano!

5. RICK OWENS; Saving the best till last, Rick Owens rocked, shocked and was haaauuurt! (hot). Featuring the best Bowie soundtrack of the week ( FYI; Bowie featured on nearly every other show soundtrack ), snakeskin wedge boots, really really long gloves, gold, an amazing croc skin jacket, and some of the scariest casting of the week, everyone was really pleased that they’d come to see the show, and left feeling really happy about life and all that. In fact we looked a bit like the bloke in the Valentines poster below.

Other PARIS highlights included hanging out with Zinedine Zidane at the lovely Y-3 presentation, getting SCARED by the INCREDIBLE George Condo masks at Adam Kimmel’s casino themed hang-out, listening to the soundtrack at DRIES VAN NOTEN bouncing out of the hand-held sound systems clutched by the models, JEAN PAUL GAULTIER’S heavy hitting boxer based show, the centerpiece of which was a boxing ring featuring two tattooed ladies kickboxing; INCREDIBLE, Walter Van Bierendonk’s statement show ‘LOVE = WAR ON HATE’, with some stunning 3-D animal based corsets and massive oversized hats by Stephen Jones, GENIUS, fur and feathers at Ann Demeulemeester, LANVIN, LANVIN, LANVIN, LANVIN, LANVIN, LANVIN, Roland Moret’s first foray into menswear, called ‘Mr’ (it’s his initials backwards, geddit?), featuring some great fabrics and some seriously clever cutting, the boots at Stone Island, even better boots at DUNHILL, a wicked stone flint circular catwalk at Dior homme, with some really great MASSIVE coats, and Sherlock Holmes-goes to the orient based madness at John Galliano, the casting at Paul Smith, from young hippies to old skinheads, all plucked from the streets and casting calls by POP favourite Mr Ronald Dick.. Phew!

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POP 212 Tuesday, 26 January 2010

Today’s POP is Max. He’s come up with a his own way of reporting on fashion weeks: kaledioscopic picture phone postcards. Here’s the one he sent us from Milan. Be sure to click on ‘read more’ to see all the pics…

Fred from iconic 90′s band Right Said Fred came with us to Milan for the menswear shows, honest, look in the gallery below if you don’t believe us. He runs a roofing company out the back of a pizza cafe on the outskirts of Milan. That’s why our mens Milan round up has landed a bit late. We got hammered on pizza and prosecco with Fred from Right Said Fred. Totally true. He even helped us take some of these pictures whilst we were running between shows. We asked him for his highlights, but they were rubbish, so here’s our top 5;

1. BURBERRY; Best sheepskin flying jackets this side of WW2, and they had a coat that made you look like the Honey Monster. Nuff said. The devil is really in the detail with Burberry, and we were grinning like Cheshire cats once we got to feel the fabrics. Beautiful leathers, washed canvases and perfect military boots, as Christopher Bailey goes from strength to strength.

2. GUCCI; Simple and sexy, we loved Gucci’s straight up approach to dressing. Cashmere v-necks worn next to skin, gold cross chain necklaces, camel overcoats and leopard-print blazers moved down the catwalk with a new, chunkier take on their classic snaffle loafer. Not to forget the shearling biker jacket spotted later at the showroom. Ummm-Um!

3. DOLCE & GABBANA; Returned to their Sicilian roots with a wholesome collection inspired by the soon to be released Italian film Baaria. While scenes from the Italian epic (it’s almost three hours long) played in the background (alongside live backstage footage) 90, yes 90, boys to their turns down the catwalk in dusty velvet suits, battered boots and distressed long johns. Pure Dolce & Gabbana, and really really good clean Italian family fun. Pass the pasta.

4. PRADA; Providing a welcome pause for thought, Mrs Prada played with lengths, patterns and history, as if she’d challenged herself to make a collection more Prada than ever. Cue beige pressed flares, re-opted 60′s esque camo prints, wipe clean plastics, smart shoes with fringe detailing and clean cute shirts, all shot through with some killer casting. Plus there were girls, which is always a good thing.

5.TOM FORD; Also carried on doing what he does best, and then some, packing his Italian showroom with beautiful suits, amazing embroidered slippers, the smartest jeans we’ve ever seen, perfect wallets, about a million velvet bow ties, and fur snow boots, continuing that honey monster vibe. Perfect clothes for the perfect gentleman!

Other moments of fashion fun we enjoyed; Hogan’s presentation, including some great hiking boots, also seen at Bally and Salvatore Ferregamo, warning = hiking boot trend alert, the blood orange juice at Tom Ford, EVERYTHING at Marni, including some great crepe sole boots and a reversible blazer we really would sell our grandmother for, embellished sleeves at Trussardi, World cup bracelets at Tods, checks at John Richmond, CHECK PLEASE!, the hair at Jil Sander, the MADNESS at Frankie Morello (dancing goblin leaping down the catwalk anyone?) and the cyber-dog like spikey jumpers at Emporio Armani. Finally, Moncler’s INCREDIBLE camp bed stomp thrilled all, as models awoke, jumped to attention, dressed themselves, stood for inspection and went for a march before saying goodbye. AMAZING.

STAYED TUNED FOR PARIS!!!

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POP 211 Monday, 25 January 2010

Today’s POP is Paul. He’s just back from Paris with a bigger bounce in his step. Perhaps this is due to his encounter with eleven legs…

LEGS ELEVEN

Aitor Throup is a name that’s been hovering on the margins of menswear ever since Fashion East picked him up for their MAN platform during London Fashion Week. In fact, he’s deliberately remained outside of the fashion bubble whilst carefully preparing his official debut into the market.

The press have picked up on his earlier presentations – a series of installations with intriguing titles and equally detailed explanations – because they are only too happy to support burgeoning talent as unique as his. But they haven’t always understood why, beyond the space and timeframe of an exhibition. If you’re unfamiliar with his work, go visit www.aitorthroup.com for examples of a singular vision at work (and play).

Now it’s time for Aitor to demonstrate how ideas can extend into commercial realms. Last Saturday in Paris, he did just that – offering a debut collection simply entitled, Legs.

Being Aitor, he has dispensed with the idea of a fully rounded collection of separates. Throup is the ultimate purist and it is not naivety that motivates him to start with a collection of just three trousers. Rather, a justifiable pride on his work output over the past five years. Yes, he is starting with a retrospective of designs that have been carefully honed into three designs. Essence refined.

This isn’t to say he’s not strong on shirts, or jackets. Or even shoes. Throup has covered

POP 210 Weekend, 24 January 2010

This Weekend’s POP is Shala. She soo reminds us of the Joy Division tune ‘She’s lost control’…

“She turned around and took me by the hand and said, I’ve lost control again. An how I’ve never felt just why I don’t understand, she said, I’ve lost control again. And she screamed out kicking on her side and said, I’ve lost control again. And she’s upon the floor; I thought she died she said, I’ve lost control again”.

Remarkably though – Shala’s never ever lost any control, she just gains it. Look at this exclusive Marc Jacobs story she gave us. New Power, new power, give it to her…

Marc Jacobs after receiving the Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres/Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters. Paris France January 22nd 2010.

POP 209 Friday, 22 January 2010

Today’s POP is Julia Knolle and Jessi Weiss from LesMads and Whereisberlin. They’ve brought us this insider video from Premium – the Berlin fashion exhibition. If you’re not there yourself, you can experience it vicariously.

Premium Young Designer Award from Mary Scherpe.

POP 208 Thursday, 21 January 2010

Today’s POP is Filep. We know we posted an interview he did just a few days ago, but he’s kindly done a POP music mix just for us. We had to post it – and you make sure to download it!

iDEAL MIKS VOL.II for all iDEAL POPERS

Dear POP darlings, click here to open the page, scroll down and find the orange box that says DOWNLOAD, click and save!

POP 207 Wednesday, 20 January 2010

Today’s POP is Lurvemag. The word Lurve comes from the Woody Allen movie where he is so in love with someone, he doesn’t just love her, he lurves her. That’s the kind of love we like…

Tilda Swinton as Lena the prostitute in Derek Jarman’s Caravaggio (1986)

“All art is against lived expression. How can you compare flesh and blood against pigment?!!….I have trapped pure spirit in matter!”
Italian masterpiece artist Michaelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571-1610)

Dear Derek,

Jubilee is out on DVD. I found a copy in Inverness and watched it last night. It’s as cheeky a bit of inspired old-ham, punk-spunk nonsense as ever grew out of your brain, and that’s saying something; what a buzz it gives me to look at it now. And what a joke: there’s nothing one-eighth as mad, bad and downright spiritualised being made down here these days this side of Beat Takeshi.

There’s an interview with you at the end of the thing: a face-to-face. Very nice to see that face, I must say. Jeremy Isaacs asks you, last of all, how you would like to be remembered, and you say you would like to disappear. That you would like to take all your works with you and… evaporate.

It’s a funny thing, because the truth is that, here, eight years later, in so many ways, you never could disappear, but – it has to be faced – in so many others you have. It has snowed since you were here and your tracks are covered. Fortunately, you made them on hard ground.

Well, I could tell you that we got some things right back then, sitting round the kitchen table in Dungeness, projectile-vomiting with the best of them: you were indeed the great Thatcherite film-maker – for every £200,000 film you made, real profits were seen (by someone or other) within at least the first two years; and all those royal circus brides did end up cutting themselves out of their wedding dresses and

POP 206 Tuesday, 19 January 2010

Today’s POP is Tavi. Our daring, our blogger extraordinaire, our afflutus. We say she’s ours, but she of course belong no-one and everyone… She brought these wondrous Andrew Yang dolls to our attention.

For some reason, I really LOVE mini versions and interpretations of THINGS…fashion illustration, dolls of movie stars, etc. So these photos made my week, pretty much.

Andrew Yang is a doll maker I found out about through the ladies at Six Six Sick. He tailored Spring 2010 outfits and created dolls for this editorial from The Block Magazine and HOT DOG, lemme have em.  Yes, Ken, I really do say HOT DOG.

Here are more of his dolls, which are wonderfully morbid and terrifically bizarre, and very different from the Spring ‘10 ones (though the Spring ‘10 ones stay true to the somewhat creepy feel of his other creations):

Cora and Clarice

Evelyn Mercier

Ingrid St. Claire

And, there is a story about each doll on his site-how cool is that? One day when I win the lottery I am buying all of them for my children. Then stealing them. Not really, that would be mean to the kids! HAHAHAHA …JOKES..OF COURSE….