Posted by Bethan Holt, Junior Fashion Editor at Large
Hurrah, not long until January is over, you're nearly there! To boot, here's all the fashion need to know news from this week.
It's been couture time in Paris this week. Besides all the beautiful dresses (pay special attention to Valentino and Christian Dior) it seems like long-time couturiers were in the mood for mischief. First of all, Karl Lagerfeld made a statement about gay marriage by sending two brides arm-in-arm, subverting the usual final look sequence on a couture catwalk. Then there was Jean Paul Gaultier's finale trick; a skirt full of children. Hidden under a huge skirt, four brightly dressed Indian children emerged from underneath and scampered down the catwalk. For the couture lowdown, see the New York Times.
Jean Paul Gaultier's skirt full of children (image via latimes.com)
In support of gay marriage at Chanel (image via glamour.com)
Oh so pretty... Valentino (style.com)
Petals and blooms at Dior (style.com)
The Cut also got their knickers in a twist about the potential fanny flashing in this Dior look. Let's hope any actress thinking about this for the Oscars foresees THAT issue...
Flowers of every kind, er (style.com)
In Washington, Michelle Obama was doing what she does best; mixing it up, flattering her figure and being both modern and incredibly occassion appropriate. She did it in J Crew, Thom Browne and old favourite, Jason Wu. Most of us were pretty happy to see her consolidating the signatures she's laid down during her husband's first term. WWD's Bridget Foley's had a few bones to pick though. Meanwhile, Beyonce may be being lambasted the world over for possibly miming her rendition of the US national anthem, does anyone really care? What we do care about is her earrings. Until, that is, you hear they're worth $1.8 million. Ouch. Not so diplomatic, but VERY Beyonce.
Showing off those arms in Jason Wu (image via usmagazine.com)
In foulard inspired Thom Browne coat and J Crew accessories (image via latimes.com)
Beyonce's earrings, plus Pucci dress (image via jezebel.com)
Prepare for more royal reminiscing. Buckingham Palace unveiled the concept for their Summer exhibition this week as a look back at the coronation, marking 60 years since the Queen was crowned. The gown and robes she wore on the day, as well outfits worn by the rest of the royal party including Princess Anne and Prince Charles will be on display. The exhibition will open on 27th July.
Cecil Beaton's portrait of the Queen at her coronation (artlyst.com)
The latest incarnation in the "Letting Your Fashion Opinions Be Known Via Your Tee" trend... just $90
Congratulations to Holly Fulton, David Koma and Michael van der Ham who have won Fashion Forward sponsorship for AW13. The award, sponsored by eBay and the Mayor of London, follows on from NEWGEN and should help the designers in their quest to establish successful fashion businesses.
Designs by Koma, Fulton and van der Ham on the SS13 catwalks (via artinfo.com)
Yulia Kondranina, Yeashin and Patrick Li will be Fashion Scout's Ones to Watch at the upcoming London Fashion Week, an early tip off for future fashion talent.
We're loving...
Yeashin's eccentrically modern take on traditional Korean costumes...
Yulia's delicate handiwork and gothic vibes
And Patrick's clean lines and colour panels.
Forget Teen Vogue, it's all about Miss Vogue, a new venture from the British edition of the Conde Nast publication. It will come as a 124 page supplement to the main magazine. Oh, how my teen self would have rejoiced. Rather appropriately, Cara Delevingne makes her cover debut for the March issue. She seems like ultimate Miss Vogue.
Cara Delevingne on March Vogue (via thefrontrowview.com)
In fashion week related news, ACNE is moving to Paris after years showing in London while H&M takes London's influx of high street shows (Whistles, River Island) international with a show in the French capital. As small consolation for losing our favourite scandi brand, London is getting a whole exhibition- Fashion Scandinavia- of labels to know from our North Eastern neighbours.
Acne are leaving London for Paris (style.com)
Put 25th February in your diaries now. High Fashion Society will be hosting an auction of celebrity's pre-owned treasure for you to snap up with all proceeds going to the very brilliant and worthwhile Kids Company. Nigella Lawson and Sienna Miller are among the well-known names who have dug deep in their wardrobes for this excellent cause.
In case your anticipation for the launch of VB's website had subsided then she's making sure you don't forget with a few obscure teaser videos....
Finally if the post-snow sludge, colourless skies and chilly temperatures are getting you down, you'll be needing a reminder of sea, sand, sunshine and bare legs, courtesy of True Religion
Think Benetton and you might think about Barack Obama snogging Hu Jintao, or a new born baby covered in white suff with umbilical cord still attached or even heart organ specimens. The Italian brand is best known for its provocative, campaign based advertising which tends to cause great debate/ shock/ consternation (delete as appropriate). In a new set of images just released, the effect is far more celebratory as the likes of Alek Wek, Charlotte Free and Hanaa Ben Abdesslem represent not only their quite fabulous individual style but also their unique achievements- Wek has campaigned to bring attention to the plight of her homeland Sudan while Abdesslem has made a stand against common perceptions that you cannot be a Muslim and a model, particularly in her native Tunisia. Then there's transgender supermodel Lea T and my new beard crush, Matias Perdomo, a Uraguyan chef who has been making waves on the Milanese restaurant scene with his menu at Al Pont de Ferr.
Colour is the campaign's theme, with the stars layered up in a rainbow effect variety of Benetton knitwear. Alessandro Benetton, the brand's Chairman, points to "the iconic value of colour" and how it is a perfect tool for showing "diversity as a value", a concept which is evident in everything Benetton does. That includes, of course, the UnHate foundation which is the charitable arm of those values and "seeks to contribute to the creation of a new culture against hate". You'll be able to get t-shirts emblazoned with campaign pictures, the proceeds from which will be going to the foundation. If that doesn't make you feel a bit brighter on a dismal January day, who knows what will....
Posted by Bethan Holt, Junior Fashion Editor at Large
Between Christmas and New Year, I decamped to New York for a week where we (eight members of my family, aged 2-78) did lots of the standard tourist stuff, saw a few great exhibitions including Matisse at The Met and generally soaked up the festive atmosphere. I filled up my half-empty suitcase with J Crew and Anthropologie bargains. It was great fun, but mostly the kind of things which any of you going to NY will know to do anyway. One excursion which I am so happy I insisted on doing was to Williamsburg. I didn't drag everyone there, just my brother and my Dad- not a prime candidate for loving any kind of hipster activity, but he did manage to find himself a good shirt in a vintage store. Williamsburg is often compared to East London's Shoreditch or Dalston in that it's a once run down area which is now achingly hip but is not so gentrified that you can't tell how it once was, indeed that's part of the charm. It's also been made a teeny bit more famous by Girlswhich will probably put Williamsburg on the tourist map in the same way SATC did the East Village.
Admittedly we went on New Year's Eve so probably got a slightly subdued version of the real deal- lots of places were closed. We got off the subway at Bedford Avenue after getting a super-quick L-line from Manhattan then walked west to look out across the river, which is a really incredible view. A sure sign the area is still on the up is the contrast of little wooden clad houses which mostly line lots of the streets, with huge loft conversions lining the river front. The one we saw at 184 Kent Avenue even had its very own bijou coffee shop at the bottom of the building. We ventured further into town in search of morning coffee and found a veritable hipster paradise complete with a ratio of at least one Mac per person.
In terms of vintage fashion, the junk shops do have rails of stuff at the back and around the sides which is super, super cheap but perhaps not the kind of thing you are going to deem a really glamourous addition to your wardrobe. The specifically vintage fashion stores were much better, but in the words of one girl I spoke to in the coffee place, "ridiculously overpriced". Her definitive list of the best in the area we were in went like this:
3. Buffalo Exchange- though this was much more a kind of nearly-new place and the menswear seemed much better than women's but definitely still worth a trawl.
I also found Monk which is right next door to Buffalo Exchange and had the best selection I saw all day. I got some fluffy, sparkly jumpers for $20 each, still being in a festive mood at the time obviously. Brooklyn Charm was another lovely little find, full of trinkets and chains and beads for making your own jewellery, as well as a few lovely (but quite cheap-y) pieces to wear straight away- I stocked up on rings.
Finally, we had a delicious lunch at Trix, with stunning stained glass windows and lots of jolly staff preparing for their NYE party. The boys got mussels and frites while I went for fish and grits- all fresh and tasty. Even though it was bitingly cold and windy, we walked up to Williamsburg Bridge and crossed back to Manhattan that way. The views, graffiti and general oddities- a smoking Santa asking for tips?- made it one of the highlights of our trip.
Posted by Bethan Holt, Junior Fashion Editor at Large
Victoria Beckham for Marc Jacobs by Juergen Teller
"It was really important not to laugh at her, we had to get her laughing with us" Juergen Teller recounted this morning of his picture of Victoria Beckham in a Marc Jacobs carrier bag. "she is a product of her own making" he added. The photographer, who has created for some of the most fresh and fun fashion images of recent times, was introducing his new exhibition- Juergen Teller: Woo!- which is his first in Britain for ten years. As Teller speaks about how each of his works comes about, the common thread becomes clear. That he must get to know his subjects, make them trust him and, in the words of ICA Executive Director Gregor Muir, make them "complicit" probably should be obvious when you see Teller's work; Bjork in a blue lagoon with her son, Kate Moss in a wheelbarrow, Charlotte Rampling naked in front of the Mona Lisa. He says, quite simply, "I know everyone well". The sense of connection is the thing that separates him from his peers.
Juergen Teller and Gregor Muir at the ICA this morning
Woo! shows a comprehensive selection of the Teller oeuvre from the familiar to the new and surprising. There's a 1991 portrait of Kurt Cobain, head bowed towards his guitar. Teller toured for a week with Nirvana and felt "a sense of something great" as he documented his time with the band for an American music magazine. Several works have been scanned- he always works with film, never digital- and blown up to massive proportions, one of these is a precisely (well, it looks precise) composed shot of Marc Jacobs sitting at desk in front of a blazing red and orange background which became an Arena Homme cover. Then there's the personal side of Teller's work, which has hardly been seen until now. It quite possibly helped that Muir met Teller in Sussex, amongst the friendly surroundings of mutual acquaintances. He has been persuaded to include pictures he's taken around Sussex, of his children Ed and Lola as well as a work called Irene im Wald which was created from a trip back to the woods near his childhood home in Bubenreuth, Germany with his Mum. It's really touching, and if you go make time to read the story accompanying the images.
In the Juergen Teller reading room...
A really powerful component of the exhibition is the reading room which Muir called the "brain of show". I reckon it's more like walking into the bedroom of a Juergen Teller super fan; it's a huge and haphazard collage of all his work, campaigns for Helmut Lang, Celine, Marc Jacobs, himself in all kinds of states of undress and intimate pictures of some of the most famous people in modern culture including Yves Saint Laurent and Vivienne Westwood. It's quite spectacular, don't bypass that on your way upstairs. Oh, and don't go thinking it's called Woo! just because that's a kind of cute, celebratory expression. It apparently refers to the TV series Eastbound and Down which Teller and Muir both love. The character Ashley Schaeffer, played by Will Farrell, says Woo a lot, apparently.
Ever since Hedi Slimane re-joined the worshipful Yves Saint Laurent company last year he has been stamping his pointy black-booted feet all over the traditional conventions of the fashion industry, and in particular its media.
Only last night at his comeback menswear show at YSL (he previously designed YSL menswear from 1996-2000) he broke unwritten catwalk rule number one. Namely: Do Not Hire Underweight, Anorexic Looking Men (or Women) as Models.
This guy needs to eat (photo: style.com)
Back in the old days before social media a very very skinny, ill-looking male model, such as the one above, would cause raised eyebrows amongst those actually present at the show, and not much else. Last night this boy caused raised eyebrows in the catwalk theatre and beyond. Simon Chilvers of the Guardian said Slimane's skinny musician boys looked "dated" compared to the way the majority of brands including Prada and Margiela are using male models today. "When you start to see clothes on a wider variety of male bodies," says Chilvers, "you cannot help but hone in on models that are particularly thin, such as some of those boys in the Saint Laurent show last night." Tim Blanks even mentioned the elephant in the room in his Style.com review saying "You don't even want to go there with the skinny." But it was left to writer and former LOVE editor Isaac Lock to say what everyone was thinking, and it went viral.
Lock (@IsaacJLock) highlighted the above photo of this emaciated boy on his Twitter feed last night asking the question: "This is aspirational, right?" which prompted hundreds of Retweets. The former LOVE magazine editor also Tweeted "Hedi's Home for Hungry Boys. Fashion, you're pretty fucked up sometimes." Which fairly summed up the thoughts of everyone who put their twopence worth in overnight on social media. Yes, fashion can be fucked up, yet we all know Hedi Slimane is an agent provocateur. He has always used skinny models. But this skinny?? Could he be using fashion's biggest taboo to gain press coverage? By lunchtime the photo had prompted stories on the New Statesman and Daily Mail websites among others and interested parties knew Hedi Slimane was back at YSL menswear causing a commotion.
When I emailed Isaac Lock this afternoon to ask him why he felt strongly enough to publish his thoughts on Twitter he sent me the following. What Isaac has to say strikes at the heart of the matter of why social responsibility remains relevant in fashion.
"I reacted so strongly because I think there’s an unhealthy
silence around men’s body issues both in and out of the fashion industry. Women, of
course, are subjected to extreme body pressures all the time, but there is, at
least, an ongoing conversation in the media about it. That’s less
the case when it comes to men and it can be embarrassing for a
lot of men to talk about the way they feel about their bodies. The way the
fashion industry often works is to pile shame on people then invite them to buy
their way out of it. For men, or boys, since with this show we really are
talking about boys, to say that an image or an ideal is shame inducing can be
very difficult - it opens the door to more shame - that they’re not manly
enough, they’re not tough enough, they’re not cool enough to just get on with
it like the boys in the show.
"More than any other men’s
designer, Hedi Slimane trades in hype. He trades in saying, "This is it, this is
the coolest, most relevant idea there is." When he’s saying that, and then
presenting that idea on a series of boys who have a body that it’s unhealthy
for the majority of the male population to aspire to I think it’s important to
say ‘Hey, what the fuck is up with you? Are you ok?'
"In
the years between Hedi Slimane’s time at Dior and his time now at YSL there’s
been a change which means there are a lot of teenage consumers of
fashion. They don’t consume it by buying it, though, they consume it in image
form. They obsessively gather images of shows and shoots on their Tumblrs and
send them around. They respond to fashion in the way that some of their peers
might respond to music or sport. These are kids sitting at home in their
bedrooms pawing over the internet probably dreaming, like a lot of us did,
about escaping to a new, metropolitan, exciting life. They are kids who are at a
vulnerable age and whose stock in trade is trying to work out what they can do
to realise their fantasies. For those kids who are interested in fashion,
something like the Saint Laurent show must seem like the epitome of excitement
and escape. The thing is, those kids, like the kids of the Dior era can’t buy
the clothes. They can, however, emulate the bodies the clothes are shown on. I
don’t think Slimane can ignore his teenage fans and say it’s not intended for
them because, by appropriating the language of youth culture to sell stuff,
he’s talking right to them, and what’s he’s saying is hollow, disempowering,
crap."
The Fashion Editor at Large blog is the independent work of Melanie Rickey, the views are my own. The Fashion Junior at Large is Bethan Holt. PORTRAIT: Neil Haynes
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