Party Pilgrim Style

Major Lazer "Keep It Goin' Louder" featuring Nina Sky and Ricky Blaze

Diplo and Switch keep the party going with this ditty.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Recycling Beauty

Yesterday I went to a discussion about fashion, luxury, and our economic climate. There was much talk about the future of luxury and ecology. Will ecological consciousness become chic and be considered luxurious? What the panel failed to talk about was the idea of creating beauty that surpasses style and trends. Well, they touched on it, but maybe I didn't find their standards of beauty strict enough. I think a lot of fat could be trimmed off their definition. The best use of our resources is to make beautiful objects that people will want to keep for a long time and pass on to their loved ones, or are desirable enough to be resold. The ideas embodied in designed objects are what create the integrity and the substance that make it valuable. This thoughtfulness is what should inform the outward aesthetic.

In some ways this notion of fashion being "responsible" to our earth goes against all of fashion's values. People want the newest styles to feel relevant and fresh. The fashion world must constantly reinvent new styles, bring back forgotten ones, or remix familiar ones into new ones. It also means that we as consumers need to shed our old identities for new ones. It seems that designer's resources would be better spent making things we believe in, things that affirm our inner selves. I always find it funny that people look at old pictures of themselves throughout the decades and are embarrassed about their style. Why can't they accept that this is who they were at that moment in time? Why is it that their hair and clothes were not an extension of themselves and not just a product of their time and environment? It seems silly that all of these things have such an negative impact on our self worth past the point of humiliation and well past the time of intervention. Making things that are integral in our lives is how we can make responsible work. In some way, ultimately, it is not about the look of the object, but what it brings to our lives that make it valuable and beautiful.

Maison Martin Margiela has for a long time been promoting the idea of recycled clothing and objects with his artisanal line denoted with a encircled zero. All "0" products are made by hand in limited quantities in the Paris atelier breathing new life into common objects. He even rejected the notion of throwing away old styles by injecting his new collections with "replica" pieces that are existing garments that he finds beautiful and reproduces them as part of the main collection. Many designers take from the past but rarely admit to copying a design. What is great about what Margiela is doing is that he is creating a framework for clothes from different decades and seasons to coexist. Which means bigger wardrobes and lest waste.

This is a video of Maison Martin Margiela spring/summer 07 artisanal line.

Audio/Visual Psychedelic Soundspace Odyssey

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you, the Boredoms- "visual creation newsun."  Please enjoy.

Naughty Bride

Jean Paul Gaultier had the best spring 2009 Haute Couture show this past season.  The collection showed off Gaultier's creative imagination and skill along with the couture artisans rarified abilities.  He also had the best "La Mariee" to end his show.

Fuck Buttons, Use Zippers

On the last day of 2008, I was granted a wish.  I finally found out the name of the song that I kept on hearing on KXLU.  Dj Sean was playing it for a while and low and behold, he played it again today.  This was the first time I thought of calling in and finding out what it was.  Why didn't I think of that earlier?  I'm pleased to present to you "Sweat Love for Planet Earth" by Fuck Buttons from the United Kingdom.

Japanese wunderkind Junya Watanabe wins for best use of zippers from his Spring 05 collection.  I love how he turns the zippers into gold jewelry and makes it all look strangely Egyptian somehow. 

 

Christmas Angel

This is the finale of the Fall 06 Alexander McQueen collection entitled "Windows of Culloden" dedicated to the late and great Isabella Blow.  Model: Kate Moss

Beam me up Kewpie

I remember sneaking off to a Bikini Kill concert when I was in high school.  I told my mom I was just hanging out with a friend because she was afraid of concerts (she's an immigrant and thought they always ended in a stampede).  Emily's Sassy Lime and F.Y.P opened the show.  I saw F.Y.P several times after that show because they have a great stage presence (lots of antics involving spit and swallowing microphones).  Here's the "You'll Hear My Voice" video from Todd C. of F.Y.P., Toys That Kill, and Bible Children.  It's set to a Tarako (cod roe) Pasta sauce by Kewpie commercial.  Charmed?  See more Tarako here.  Curious?  Learn more about Kewpie and Tarako here.  Fascinated?  Dress up Tarako here.