I can’t be bothered to drone on about the usual fuss that preceded this event, but I’ll just say that my standing ticket offered zero VIP service. Inside I stood in a herd of people five rows deep, aiming my Canon zoom lens through heads while those around me took terrible photographs on point-and-shoot cameras, iPhones and iPads. There’s a whole other piece I could write here, touched on much more eloquently than I could by Michael over at Anastasia Duck, but I will say this: I’ve invested in a decent camera and pride myself on taking decent images that I hope offer a slightly different insight to the normal catwalking shots we’re all familiar with. This is why I continue to work with Amelia because we share the same values when it comes to documenting the shows, but it seems to be getting increasingly difficult to do the job and I left feeling somewhat frustrated.
I probably say the same thing every season, but I’m always reserved about Topman. Aesthetically they’ve upped their game, and whoever is in charge seems to know what they’re doing in the hope of offering a collection akin to the strong contenders on the LC:M schedule. This season relied heavily on a palette of black and red with an injection of pale blue pieces. Box-shaped overcoats offered a different silhouette, sharp tailored blazers worked effortlessly with plaid shirts and heavy knitwear pieces adopting a variety of techniques were exciting.
As usual there were some slightly off pieces – a red tee with graphic lettering (above) looked like something you’d buy on a whim in Kavos after two fishbowl cocktails and some of the double-breasted coats looked awkward on slight-framed models, but overall this was a coherent collection. A reasonable price point means it does offer something more interesting than the rest of the High Street without an outrageous price tag.
For the finale, the heavens (well, the rigging) opened to soak the models as they reappeared for the recap. Not for the first time in history but it was a spectacle none-the-less, but I sure as hell don’t fancy getting caught in the rain in one of those chunky knits. I’m not sure if there was a message here, or how it related to the clothes. Perhaps it was an unsubtle way of saying LOOK OUR THREADS WITHSTAND RAIN, WE’RE NOT CHEAP; maybe it was merely for the aesthetic, but I bloody enjoyed it and everybody else seemed to.
Written by Matt Bramford on Tuesday January 14th, 2014 9:58 am
Last week I ran an exclusive preview on Zeynep Tosun because last season her collection was one of my highlights. For Spring/Summer she did not disappoint, leaping into warmer weather with a range of summery fabrics that included sporty netting, floaty chiffon and swinging panels of silk in a gossamer light colour palette of creams, dove grey, mint, on trend powder pink and caramel, accented with glossy navy and black. Out of three Turkish designers showing in London this season she was the only one not to be inspired by the effects of recent turmoils on home soil, instead inspiration was taken from the androgynous sexuality of the 1920s and transformed into a series of sport luxe garments fit for the modern day minx. The flared cut of the cape was a key shape, with capelets integral to tops and dresses, as were peek-a-boo cutout details, revealing appealing glimpses of belly and back. Delicate glass beads provided a focal point for evening wear, either fringing the sides of net panels or cascading in geometric designs down the front of slinky dresses. Styling by Tamara Cincik was kept simple: sleek ponytails were accessorised with sultry eyes and simple rope flip flops. Keep your eyes on Zeynep Tosun, she’s making big waves over at Fashion Scout.
Marina Spetlova ‘The Print & The Jacket‘ by Dom&Ink.
You are a textile innovator – what is it about different textures that you find so appealing? Texture is like print for me, juxtaposing diferent textures together gives my designs the power I like to achieve in my collections. I tend to experiment with contrasting colours and opposing textures. I am always trying to find ways to treat standard fabrics to give them different structural properties – for instance by bonding, pleating and weaving satin through leathers – which helps me create a point of difference. That is how I can make my designs stand out but I also have lots of fun creating new collections. I am minimalist in shapes but maximalist in texture.
Your colour palette is also always very distinctive – what inspired this current season’s colour range?
My selection of colours is always little bit random. I usually start with 3 or 4 colours I like and are available and add more of them while working on my fabric samples.
Where did the graphic patterns come from?
From a photograph of my mum in the 70s.
How do you source your fabrics?
This season I mainly worked with leather. My supplier in London has certain sustainable policies: I am concern about environment and I try to be as eco friendly as possible with my label.
Who creates your pieces?
All the knitwear is created in my studio in London, which does all samples and production at the moment. We work on domestic knitting machines.
What was the inspiration for the abstractions in your S/S 2013 film?
I wanted to create a land of Martina Spetlova. Shooting the collection froma microscopic view, showing the collection as a diverse landscape of bold colour and glistening mountains of fabric. It captures the detailed focus of this collection.
Looking forward, what can we expect from the new collection?
The new collection is entirely leather and knitwear and features lots of textures and colours again… My simple twisted yarn knitted dresses and neckpieces accompany every look of 15 silhouettes and are a great compliment to raw edged, un-lined leather jackets, tops, skirts, shorts and trousers. Collars are created by patch-working fish skin leathers and off-cuts of sheep skin and no piece in the collection is flat. Amongst the techniques used are the playful exploration of accordion pleats on leather, cuts punched through soft leathers to create grids on the surface and my satin tape hand-woven technique from last season combined with graphic pattern (seen also on knits). I’m using softly twisted stretchy yarns for knitted neckpieces and dresses in black, light grey and graphic patterns. A/W 2013 uses soft colours of pale blue, moth green, mustard orange, white and black together with acid yellow and orange. I use a high quality of craftsmanship, making pieces by hand in the studio.
You are currently seeking funding on Kickstarter – what will these funds go towards and what can contributors expect in return?
I have set up Kickstarter to help me fund my film presentation in Somerset House during London Fashion Week, which will pay for the space to showcase my film in the Portico Rooms. Everyone who sponsors this event will be invited to Somerset House, and pieces from my collections will be gifted to generous backers. Of course there will also be a BIG THANK YOU to everyone who supports me!
There are six days left to help Martina Spetlova raise £1000 for her film presentation at the LFW – help out on Kickstarter here.
Written by Amelia Gregory on Monday January 21st, 2013 4:48 pm
Ireland’s Orla Kiely has firmly established her eponymous London label over the seasons with 1960s silhouettes, playful prints and rich fabrics. While the look book each season is never going to shock or win any awards for pushing the boundaries of fashion, style fans head to Orla for staple vintage pieces that are playful and pretty. But to judge Orla against the likes of Azzedine Alaïa or Hussein Chalayan would be missing the point. Always a nod to decades past, previous presentations have included film screenings directed by Gia Coppola and Mercedes Helnwein.
This season’s presentation took place in the intriguing Elms Lesters Painting Rooms, a gallery off Denmark Street that often hosts fashion press days; its labyrinth of rooms lend themselves well to presentations of this nature. A long arm of the upper floor had been transformed into a retro working-girl’s space that could have been lifted straight from a scene from Mad Men or working-class hero flick Made in Dagenham.
Numerous models appeared at the entrance to the elongated space wearing this season’s take on Orla’s signature looks, as an unobtrusive soundtrack made up mostly of the clatter of a typewriter played. Beehive barnets piled high atop models’ heads. Orla’s girls were superbly cast, more as actresses than runway models: loading typewriters, filing paperwork, nattering quietly and changing ‘shifts’ regularly to allow other models to enter the showcase.
Attention to detail was key, with design perverts like me eyeing up mid-century Scandinavian furniture, Smiths‘ clocks and old graphic signage as much as the outfits themselves.
Statement features this season include high-waisted dresses with girly a-line hems, flocked coats with swirling patterns, pleated and pointed collars, embroidered squirrels and a-line overcoats using Orla Kiely‘s signature shape.
This kind of thoughtful, preciously executed presentation is the way forward. With never-ending developments in technology and record numbers at catwalk shows, presentations allow you to fully gage the nuances of collections and document them effectively, rather than the scramble to photograph, tweet, Facebook, Vine, MySpace, tumblr, Foursquare and Grindr your way through a catwalk show.
This season Fashion Scout‘s Ones to Watch featured two designers that I spotted some time ago, and two that were new to me. Somewhat impressively, three are also alumni of the London College of Fashion.
All photography by Amelia Gregory.
First up Youjia Jin introduced an elegant and sophisticated predominantly monochrome collection that was sent down the catwalk to a backdrop of tribal beats. Draped pleats, belts, flared waists and cable knit were used to spice up an elegant selection of suiting worn with flat two tone shoes. The use of see through voile and steel grey dip dyeing brought further interest to a collection that was very commercially aware.
Next up Min Wu did not disappoint. In fact I think this was definitely my favourite collection of the lot; somehow combining an avante grade use of fabrics and silhouette to create a very wearable and fun collection. Billowy tops were worn with suiting striped shorts, billowing chiffon bounced from hips and trompe l’oeil plastic provided additional interest. As always Min Wu accompanied the collection with marvellous accessories: curlicued headbands, colourful oversize beads and bright buttons.
Smoke City’s classic 90s track Underwater Love accompanied the second collection from Keiko Nishiyama. In her preview interview the Japanese designer explained how she was inspired by aquariums and collections of objects. Fluid fabrics were layered with more structured garments, printed tights adding to the busy effect. This collection was as highly patterned as her first; featuring shells, coral and fishes aplenty, but I wild have liked to see a bit more variety in her print designs.
Finally, Cassandra Verity went for a clubby feel with body con t-shirt dresses, cut out leggings and a variety of acid knitted textures. Brightly coloured wigs and fluff on collars, stoles and low heeled shoes added to the party atmosphere, with rigid plastic backpacks and clutch bags adding a very 90s air to the catwalk. Patterning was circular and optical in nature. Certainly not a collection for the faint hearted!
Written by Amelia Gregory on Tuesday September 30th, 2014 6:21 pm
Katie Eary pretty much started the current leopard print menswear trend. Back in 2010, she had boxing models head-to-toe in it. Her love affair with the design continued on Monday at her S/S 2014 offering.
As is standard at Katie’s shows, it seemed like everybody in London had descended on Victoria House. I’m always sceptical when you’ve got a standing ticket and it’s a printable email – there’s no way of policing who presses print and tries their luck. I actually saw one guy with about 12 fresh print-outs in the queue, dishing them out to his pals like they were Wonka’s golden tickets; their eyes lighting up at the sight of the pink-flamingo-in-a-wig design. When we finally did get inside, it was by far the busiest I’d ever seen that venue.
Standing next to a speaker is one of my favourite things during fashion week*, and as a preview of one of Kanye West‘s forthcoming tracks from new album Yeezus penetrated my eardrums, I wondered if I’d even get out alive. At least it wasn’t Coldplay.
Anyway. A mixture of models began to appear and there was no hidin’ that pink flamingo. Each print induced flashbacks to a Charlie le Mindu show that I had since managed to supress – have a look here and you’ll see why. Emblazoned across shirts, isolated on tees, this flamingo was a versatile motif that seemed to work across all garments that it was applied to; I’ll be damned if I’m not sporting a flamingo-in-a-wig t-shirt by the end of next summer.
Other print patterns included the aforementioned leopard print, Katie’s signature, this time in red and black with a linear gradient application, fading to translucency on slim-fit polo shirts and fading to black on oversized rucksacks.
Both patterns appeared on trousers and shorts with combat pockets and were styled with Nikes in similer colours and Katie Eary-branded skateboards.
Peppering the mens showcase were a bunch of super sexy ladies with candy floss wigs and poker faces. They sported designs not dissimilar to the mens’ range – flamingo head scarves, racy leopard-print translucent kaftans and coral bikinis that they could actually fill.
I’ve left some shows baffled about what season I’ve just witnessed, but there was no mistaking at this show – Katie Eary predicts a red hot summer.
*it isn’t.
Written by Matt Bramford on Friday June 21st, 2013 9:43 am
If you try to describe this to someone (which you shouldn’t, this websales don’t give anything away), doctormedications you will sound like you are conjuring from memory a nonsensical and fantastical dream; not something remotely tangible that actually happened in a 25-minute journey through a Shorditch warehouse.
Enter the ride and find yourself wheeled through 15 distinct scenarios with over 70 artists acting out micro-performances. “Designed to mentally and visually astound”, check; “leaving you overwhelmed and exhilarated’, check and check; and finishing the ride “in a totally different emotional state from the one you were in when you embarked on the journey”, most definitely true: utterly elated, mesmerised, and psychologically discombobulated.
The You Me Bum Bum train represents a new branch of experimental live art where the line between performer and audience is not just blurred, but utterly turned on it’s head; interaction is integral to the experience, and how far you take this is up to you. It’s creators Kate Bond and Morgan Lloyd, intend to strip individuals of decision-making, giving passengers the would-be ordinary experience of somebody else’s shoes. You are left with fleeting slices of alternate realities, one moment you might be a drummer, the next a translator (I really don’t want to say much!). It’s real human experience through the prism of the utterly surreal, and it will take you some time to reclaim your grasp on the two, a most marvellous and novel experience.
The venue is essential to the experience, and they describe Cordy House as their dream venue, lending itself to the most ambitious event they’ve held yet.
There isn’t much time to go, and I whole-heartedly recommend it as an unforgettable experience. It runs every Saturday from now until the 20th of December between 7pm and 11pm.
Hip Parisian fahion and electro label, buy Kitsuné, what is ed are fast becoming as well known for their associated music as they are for their fashion. In fact, there is a clear cut three-way divide at Heaven tonight: scenesters, dressed for the fashion blog photographers collide en masse with those who know Kitsuné for the music and are quite unprepared for the additional rooms full of said scenesters, and with the regular Heaven clubbers, used to G-A-Y Camp Attack on Friday nights and probably the most bemused of everyone here.
Within the four rooms there’s a frustrating mix of real djs and acts like Autokratz, whose Pet Shop Boys go big beat set was a joy to behold and left me humming ‘Stay The Same’ for the rest of the night. Hearts Revolution, Punks Jump Up and Kitsuné house band Digitalism all turned out in force to impress and did so, although at times the acts felt a little repetitive. Alas, alongside these quality acts, we also got a number of vanity djs, including various models and boutique owners, which all blurred into the same set as the night progressed and seemed to play to rooms full of people aiming to get to the bar and move on.
It transpired that the ‘Don’t Panic’ room was the place to be. Inspired by K-Tron, blasting bass heavy No-Wave, they held me and the room in near divine rapture. The highlight of the night however, was Matthew Stone who dragged us back to 1985 via The KLF, his effortlessly sublime musical compass taking us on a seemingly random adventure, fitting perfectly with the tone of the night. There were some true high points tonight, but Kitsuné are probably best enjoyed via one of their compilations than live, based on tonight’s evidence.
Global Day of Action
6th December 2008
This will be the Saturday midway through the next round of UN Climate Talks and our best chance to influence the decisions of delegates ahead of the critical UN talks in 2009 at which a post-Kyoto treaty agreement will be decided.
LONDON
Climate Bike Ride 2008
Assemble 10.30 am Lincolns Inn Fields for a mass bike ride around Central London joining up with the National Climate March at Grosvenor Square (see next listing for National Climate March info)
The three stops on the route are:
-Outside Greenergy, 198 High Holborn – for an agrofuels protest organised by Biofuelswatch
-Outside E.On 100 Pall Mall – for a speaker on NO NEW COAL
-Outside the Department of Transport – for a speaker on sustainable transport
Everyone welcome; decorate your bikes, bring whistles, bring music!
Want to help out for this action? Contact Jeremy Hill on 07816 839883 or jeremy.hill1@btopenworld.com
National Climate March and Global Day of Action on Climate
The march starts at 12noon at Grosvenor Square and will move via Carlos Place and Mount Street to Berkley Square and Berkley street to Picacadily, Picadilly Circus, Lower Regent street, Pall Mall and Cockspur street to Trafalgar Square and Whitehall to Parliament Square.
We will bring the UK issues of Aviation, New coal and Biofuels to the streets of London, along with a call for more investment in renewable energy, more energy efficiency and more green jobs.
Speakers will include Nick Clegg (leader Liberal Democrat Party), Caroline Lucas (leader, Green party), Michael Meacher (ex-Environment Minister) and George Monbiot (Honorary President, Campaign against Climate Change).
Contact: 020 7833 9311 www.campaigncc.org
There will also be an After-Party in the Synergy Centre from 5.00 pm till late.
The March on Parliament has four main themes –
1) NO to a 3rd runway at Heathrow and the runaway expansion in aviation expansion.
2) NO new coal – no new coal-fired power stations as planned at eg Kingsnorth in Kent
3) NO to the expansion of agrofuels – with negative impacts on forests, the climate and world food supply.
4) YES to a renewable energy revolution and green jobs – a “Green new Deal”
Come with your own banners, costumes on one of these themes and join up with others pushing that theme……
The March on Parliament for the Climate marks the Saturday midway through the UN Climate Talks in Poznan, Poland and we make our demands on the UK government in solidarity with the world’s poorest and most vulnerable communities that will suffer worst and most immediately from climate change caused overwhelmingly by the rich long-industrialised countries.
We need the government to act now on climate, to stop building coal-fired power stations and new runways – and to begin the renewable energy revolution. We need a tidal wave of people outside parliament to make them act to stop climate catastrophe now! Be part of that tidal wave, be there! Next year may be too late.
BUST is a magazine devoted to the female. Providing an unapologetic view of life in the female lane, they break down stereotypes! Based in the US and established in 1993, the magazine addresses a variety of different issues within pop sulture, including music, fashion, art & crafts and news.
Editor-in-Chief, Debbie Stoller, decided to call the magazine BUST, because it was “aggressive and sexy and funny… It was a title that could belong to a men’s porn magazine.”
For Women With Something To Get Off Their Chests! Click here for the Christmas Craftacular’s Facebook Page
Jumble Fever Under the bridge on Beck Road, E8 Saturday 6th December
Midday-4pm, Entry £1
A fabulous jumble sale with a boogie twist! There will be a great deal to see and do and buy.. See you there!
ETSY
An online shopping bazaar; Etsy is a cross between eBay and Amazon with a humble handmade twist. Launched in June 2005 by Robert Kalin, for sale Chris Maguire and Haim Schoppik, the site has grown to be incredibly popular, with tens of thousands of people selling their handmade goods (90% of whom are women!).
As Christmas draws nearer and greener, we have chosen our favorite handmade things to inspire your presents list. www.etsy.com
“The Kelsey”; a pleated clutch in paisley mocha
This handmade clutch is one of many adorable bags created by GraceyBags; get in touch through etsy.com to custom order a clutch and choose from a rainbow of fabrics.
Featured is ‘The Kelsey’ in a paisley mocha print on the outside in greens, blues, pinks, yellows and browns. The inside has been sewn from a silky brown fabric and the bag closes with a small magnet.
Recycled Journal – handbound Find a lovely selection of hand bound recycled books by Rhonda; bookbinder and book artist.
This particularly wonderful journal is made with a variety of recycled scrap papers ranging from large envelopes, posters, junk mail, blank paper, lined and graph paper, covers from old sketch books, old maps, discarded photocopies, misprints from the computer printer to paper bags.
Perfect as an art journal, the book is covered with an old map of the world, the one pictured above showing the islands of Guatemala, Nicaragua and Costa Rica.
There are 256 pages (when you count both sides of each sheet). The pages are handbound using green and brown linen threads, visible on the spine in 4 rows of chain stitches.
The book size is approximately 4″ x 4¼” and 1″ thick (or 10.5cm x 11cm x 2.5cm).
This adorable cotton tote is the perfect carry-all for any occasion. BellaBlu Designs signature French Bulldog silhouette has been cut from Heather Bailey‘s ‘Sway in Brown’ Pop Garden print and appliquéd to this cotton canvas bag. It is 100% 10 oz. cotton, measures 15 x 13 x 3 inches and can be customized with most other dog breeds.
We’ve also had a browse round treefort.myshopify.com, for some gift ideas for those of you with little ones in your life!
Dreamlets Dolls These cute little creatures would make an adorable gift this season, and as a product that gives 1% back to Artworks, Bridges to Understanding, or Poncho, they’re doing a lot more than making a loved one happy! The dolls come in a variety of shapes and colours, each with their own quirky personality. You are also able to choose which organization will benefit from your gift by registering your doll online.
Nikki McClure’s Mama & Baby Things Treefort also sell many of Nikki Mcclure‘s prints, books, cards, and calendars. Nikki McClure creates complex, yet natural designs by cutting away from a single piece of black construction paper with an x-acto knife. Her works are printed on 100% Recycled, 100% Post-Consumer Waste, Processed Chlorine Free paper that was manufactured with electricity that is offset with Green-e® certified renewable energy. Her work is printed by a small family-owned press in Portland, Oregon, US- and uses soy-based inks.
Kids On Roof “House” is made of Eco friendly-100% recycled cardboard and is 100% biodegradable. These houses are the perfect gift for creative children, as they’re meant to be decorated and personalised! (see below for examples from treefort) Kidsonroof donates 5% of its profits to specific Unicef projects; €24,000 has now been collected for the Unicef project for building better, small-scale housing for HIV/Aids inflicted orphans in Russia.
Beyond Retro Christmas Party!
This evening Beyond Retro is throwing it’s annual seasonal gathering – in both it’s shops, viagra buy the original Cheshire St warehouse and new sibling store in Soho – from 6pm – 8pm, there’ll be lots of exclusive goodies for you to browse through and they’ll even throw in some mulled wine and mince pies. Good times.
Made In Clerkenwell
This evening and all weekend, the Clerkenwell Green Association open their studios for Made in Clerkenwell, an event that showcases the work of over 70 designers they support through providing them with studio space, mentoring and business advice to help them create their work.
The fruits of their labors are exhibited and available for purchase, so you can hunt out that unique Christmas gift and buy all kinds of original and creative wares – ranging from fashion designs to jewellery, accessories, textiles and even ceramics.
What makes this shopping experience so different is that you can mingle with and chat to the designers and find out about their craft, inspirations, working method, becoming a designer, anything you want to know! So pop down, get a great gift and support new designers.
Open 6pm to 8pm, Thursday 27th November 2008 and
12pm to 6pm on Friday 28th, Saturday 29th and Sunday 30th November 2008.
£2.50 entrance – free to the under 16s.
It’s no secret that Brooklyn’s the place to be for smart indie pop these days, view but look a little closer to home and you might be surprised. Take tonight’s superb support acts, advice for example. First up is Pens, erectile a cute lo-fi local trio who, despite playing to only a handful of people, put on a wonderfully frantic and ramshackle performance – think Karen O‘s kid sisters gleefully bashing at snare, guitar and synths.
Fellow Londoners Chew Lips are up next and are nothing short of a revelation. The threesome cater in captivatingly melancholy electronic music and boast a bona fide icon-in-waiting in singer Tigs; she prowls and creeps around the venue, all black bob and wide eyes, unleashing powerful vocals and jumping on the bar to serenade us, while the boys whip up a glitchy synth and bass storm in the background. ‘Solo’ is the band’s set-closer and an undeniable highlight – scuzzy and danceable yet strangely sad, it will be one of your anthems of 2009, no question.
This bunch are hard to follow, but Telepathe just about manage it. Dave Sitek-produced debut ‘Dance Mother’ is on the way in January, and recreating its majesty live is clearly still a tricky undertaking for the Brooklyn duo. They do their best, unleashing a stream of cluttered soundscapes, layered harmonies and clipped rhythms, and while the effect is hypnotic at times, barely a word is uttered between songs – resulting in a distinct lack of atmosphere. This could of course be due, in part, to the fact that they are playing to a room full of typically disinterested Shoreditch types. Whatever the reason the performance falls a little flat, until final effort ‘Chromes On It’ that is, its spine-tingling beats waking the crowd from its stupor and climaxing with speakers shaking and half the band hanging from the ceiling as the hysterical throng down the front excitedly punch the air. It’s just enough to convince us that we’re not quite prepared to give up on Telepathe as a live proposition yet. More like this please.
Nuclear: Art and Radioactivity discount -4.064941&sspn=16.764146, visit this site 39.418945&ie=UTF8&ll=51.524712,-0.079694&spn=0.008598,0.019248&z=16&g=E1+6PG&iwloc=addr”target=”_blank”>Nicholls and Clarke Building, 3-10 Shoreditch High Street, Spitalfields, London E1.
‘Half-life’ Chris Oakley, 2008
High-definition video, 15 minutes
The Nicholls and Clarke Building hosts an exhibition that explores the changing perceptions of nuclear power. In our rapidly deteriorating climate, the effects of nuclear development from the past have come to haunt us. ‘The Nightwatchman,’ by Simon Hollington and Kypros Kyprianou, captures this disturbing predicament.
As we entered the installation there was something immediately unsettling about it. A board-meeting table situated in the centre of a large dilapidated storeroom indicated recent activity, and as we crept further through the exhibition space there was more evidence of some night watchmen. But they are no where to be found…
Together with the film ‘Half-life’ by Chris Oakley, there was a sense of being caught in a crossfire of two different eras: the naïvely optimistic 80′s and the knowledgeable cynicism of the present day.
The film showed a series of paradoxical images of nature vs. technology, and through it we were reminded of how our idea of what is progressive has been turned on it’s head.
If you’d like to have something of yours across the chests of music aficionados throughout the country, viagra you might like to apply for this. 100% music, cheap 100% recycled paper (well done), sildenafil Bearded Magazine is preparing for the re-launch of the printed magazine on January 29th, and they’re throwing in a t-shirt as well.
When it came to deciding what should go on the front of said t-shirt, they mumbled gibberish into their beards and drew blanks, and so they’ve put the task out to you the reader to help them out. In fact, they might be so filled with indecision that there could be four winners, so better chances for you! Have a look at the criteria and send in a design soon, you have until the 15th of December.
The Wellcome Collection’s new temporary exhibition is entitled ‘War and Medicine’ and focuses on the individual human consequences of war rather than the overall statistics of death and destruction that impersonalise and almost glorify military combat and which we are most often presented with. Soldiers are heroes when they die for their country but uncomfortable representatives of horror when they return wounded and disfigured.
Installation artist David Cotterrell‘s film, sales specially commissioned for the exhibition, salve attempts to rectify this. Covering three walls of a darkened room, more about the film shows wounded soldiers, with varying degrees of injury, being loaded onto a flight back to England from Helmand Province in Afghanistan. The only soundtrack is the constant hum of the plane’s engine, an eerie backdrop to the calm, efficient activity taking place on screen. There is an unsettling disjunction between our inclusion in the scene through the way it is presented to us and the alienness of the sight before our eyes. This slightly dreamlike atmosphere helps separate the artwork from the realms of documentary photography and helps us understand the confusion of this homeward flight, which we are told in the information outside, is often only partially remembered by the soldiers.
What is most striking about this piece is the individual humanity behind the uniforms of the men and women depicted. On the left are the walking wounded with a variety of arm slings and facial injuries being tended to by medical staff and waiting patiently for their journey to begin, on the right, more distressingly, a person is carried in on a stretcher, connected to breathing apparatus. It is heartbreaking to realise that although most of these people will probably survive, and so not register in the public consciousness, they will have been scarred for life both physically and emotionally. I began to see them as people beyond whatever my personal attitudes to their profession and the war they are fighting in was.
A harrowing counterpart to this work is Cotterrell’s written diary, where he describes with civilian horror, the daily minutiae of life amongst the medical staff in Camp Bastion. The exhibition’s mission statement is to explore the dichotomies in a society that is simultaneously developing ever more sophisticated means of destroying life and protecting it. The stalemate futility of this situation is given a human face by Cotterrell’s work.
David Cotterrell is featured in issue 10 of the magazine, out shortly.
Hurrying through the lights and sounds of Soho, stuff the words ‘bloody hell it’s cold’ rattled my skull. I was heading to see the Canadian singer and illustrator Chad VanGaalen, this known for rarely leaving his basement. In this weather, who would blame him?
Once inside Borderline I was able to thaw out and to take in the cosy surroundings. Kindly folk in chequered shirts patiently waited as they sipped Guinness. But there was something odd about this fresh-faced crowd. Moustaches, I realised. There were loads of them.
It’s Mo-vember, apparently. The time of year for all socially conscious gentlemen to grow out their fluff to raise money for testicular cancer. ‘That’s nice,’ I thought.
This playful and boyish act of sincerity seemed fitting for the night in store as there’s something of the fourteen-year-old boy about Chad VanGaalen. Deceptively awkward and immediately charming, he’ll break your heart.
Together with a hairy-faced accordionist he delivered a homemade and reflective sound. It was as if we had wandered into his basement, and he seemed a little surprised to see us there.
His hesitancy on stage draws you nearer, and his tight and masterful song-writing capabilities took a hold of my senses like a sedative.
That uneasy fluidity reminded me of Beach House and the unexpectedly punchier tunes provided an excitable energy that twanged some of those moustaches.
Listening to Chad is like putting on a pair of earmuffs and skate boarding down smooth suburban streets.
There’s a yearning to be free and limitless but it only slightly ventures out of the comfortable. A girl behind me whispered excitedly ‘It’s the kind of music I’d ride my bike to.’
It is difficult for any set at the Borderline to not feel intimate and Chad VanGaalen’s was by no means revolutionary.
But the evening was all together thoughtful and enchanting, and as I braved the bitter London streets once more, the words of Electric City wrapped me up like a duvet.
At 8am on Friday 28th November on a wet and grizzly morning, stuff the Greenwash Guerillas and a band of allies rallied together outside the E-On Head Office at 100 Pall Mall. We were there to protest against the planned government-approved scheme to build 7 new coal fired power stations. E-on will be responsible for the first of these havoc wreaking death chambers (no hyperbole here) at Kingsnorth, Kent. This power station alone will emit between 6 and 8 million tones of CO2 every year. If all 7 are built, treatment their collective emissions would be approximately 50 million tones of CO2 a year. This would make the Climate Change Committee’s proposal to cut back on CO2 emissions an average of 2% per annum so that by 2050 we’ll have an 80% reduction well… impossible.
Browsing through E-on’s website, it might be easy to be fooled into thinking they are an environmentally conscientious company promoting ‘clean, green energy that never runs out.’ But it doesn’t take long to realize that their wind farms and claims of boosting local employment are cleverly marketed to cast a rosy sheen over more profitable projects that use coal.
Coal is the grimiest of fossil fuels. It’s carbon-intensity is higher than oil and double that of natural gas. Yet, as the driving force behind the industrial revolution, it has been the primary source of power for the electricity generation. Gathered outside the E-on head office, we are no longer in the 19th century but in the 21st century and in the midst of a climatic crisis. With sea ice disappearing at a never-before-seen rapidity now is the time to use new greener sources of power, not to revert to the practices of the past.
So why is the government supporting what seems a disastrously archaic project?
The government’s answer is that by increasing the cost of carbon, power stations will be forced to use a process of carbon capture and storage (CCS) whereby the harmful carbon dioxide produced by coal is extracted from the air and buried underground.
However, a presentation made by the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee concluded that this reasoning is implausible. Voicing research from the U.K. Energy Research Centre and Climate Change Capital, it showed that using a process of CCS would in fact be the least cost effective option for power stations. The research they gathered predicted that CCS will cost power companies like E-On 70-100 or 90-155 Euros per ton of CO2, while the government estimates that the price of carbon between 2013 and 2020 will be less at approximately 39 Euros per ton.
It’s fair to say that it is extremely unlikely that power companies will go for the more expensive option, especially when the margin is as large as it is. In short, the government’s criteria for approving E- On’s power station at Kingsnorth is worryingly unsatisfactory.
If our government is failing to alleviate the catastrophic predicament of climate change that is costing lives then it is up to us as citizens to take action against the construction of Kingsnorth and others like it. For more information on what you can do please click here and please go to the national climate march on Saturday 6th December, bring your mates and make it fun. This is a serious issue and we need to get the message across but optimism is always the best the way of creating change, in my view anyway. Klimax is a network for climate activists that started in 2007 by environmentalists who wanted a platform for people with more radical ideas about direct actions. Well known in Sweden for their campaigns against private motorism and the meat industry, viagra sale the group has spread to a number of Swedish cities, cialis 40mg and in Gothenburg they consist of 20 active members.
Members of Klimax initially wanted to protest on the 13th October, which is the actual date of the anniversary, but after finding out there were no meetings that day, postponed to the 12th November. This allowed them the much needed time to plan their action in detail; the first few weeks consisted of a few hours of planning and as the time drew nearer members were working five hours a day to make sure everything was finished. Among writing speeches, making banners and establishing contact with the media, they had to prepare their costumes!
Our contact at Klimax said “We do not always dress up for events but we believe that it is a good way to spice up an action! We sometimes dress up as penguins or polar bears because they are the two types of animal that are severely affected by Climate Change; it is also fun and looks nice!”
Their aims with the action was threefold; firstly to pay tribute to the work done by the suffragettes- strong women fighting for women’s right to vote, secondly to make the politicians aware that there was strong opposition to the building of another tunnel under the river in Gothenburg; Miahabo Berkelder from Klimax in Gothenberg says that the group believe this to be an awful way to spend a large amount of money, just so that more cars can be on the road; asking ‘What if the money was invested in buses instead? New roads simply lead to more traffic and that is a disaster for our climate.’
The third reason for the protest was to make sure that politicians knew that climate change isn’t just a moral topic, it is a political topic.
On the day, members were shocked to see the six activists storm the meeting,
but after the action Klimax joked that if they had been politicians sitting there during long and boring meetings, they would have been happy with the distraction!
They certainly created a buzz, and definitely caught the attention of the council! After a short while the six were asked to leave the building and did so with little fuss.
In reaction to the protest, a woman from the Swedish environmental party said Klimax had a valid point, but a man from the conservative party was more concerned about security, wondering what would have happened if terrorists had stormed the meeting instead!
The plans for the tunnel are still up in the air. The initial decision to build the tunnel was made solely by Göran Johansson, the chairman of the Municipal Council. Because this wasn’t a democratic way of deciding, the case has been reported to the county administrative court.
According to Miahabo, there are a lot of plans in Klimax’s future; new actions will take place during the spring and there will be a new regular event called Climate Café- where anyone can attend to share coffee and discuss climate change, sometimes including an expert on the subject to answer any questions.
The next big event for Klimax is on the Global Day of Action, taking place in cities all over the world on the 6th of December. At the same time as the leaders of the world will be discussing the climate problems, demonstrations will be arranged all over the world including London and of course Gothenberg. Klimax have come together with several other groups to arrange a huge demonstration, Miahabo says that Klimax are organising a “Climate Clash” which is a wide spread Klimax phenomenon; they will walk out in the middle of a busy road and block the traffic; a perfect and simple way to make people aware of the climate problems.
Anyone who is interested in joining Klimax is welcome- it is a flat organization with no board of directors, anyone who wants to be a member is simply one.
For more information about Climate Rush, please visit: www.climaterush.co.uk Monday 1st Dec
The Ashni Art Gallery specialises in Indian Art that is both contemporary and of the past. They will be exhibiting the best of their collection from now until the 19th of December.
Tuesday 2nd Dec
Live in Bristol? Feeling somewhat alarmed by the continued transformation of the city centre to all things consumerist (with 120 new shops having just opened)? Slipping between the gap of reality and fantasy, andSomewhere Here are hijacking advertisement space to provide shoppers with a brief respite during the fall of capitalism. Nine artists take nine advertising hoardings (billboards) until the 3rd of December only. Catch them before they are swallowed by Advertisement Beast.
Wednesday 3rd Dec
Opening today at the ICA: Dispersion; an exploration by seven artists of the appropriation and circulation of images in contemporary society. They examine money, desire, and power in our accelerated image economy. It runs until Feb 1st.
Thursday 4th Dec
First Thursdays of the month is here! But aren’t galleries open most Thursdays anyway? It would be silly tell you a single thing to go and see, 100 galleries will be opening their doors until 9pm, so there will plenty to satiate your creative appetites, but if you perhaps feel so inspired that you are driven to the pencil yourself, The Princess Studios will be hosting free life-drawing drop-in sessions throughout the evening.
Friday 5th Dec
Vauxhall’s best kept secret-art-laboratory, Beaconsfield, curates Late at Tate this Friday, adapting Tate Britain’s Duveen Galleries and transitory places to create a terminal space, with an array of arrival and departure points, in which only the surreal applies …
Satuday 6th Dec
Colin McKenzie senses that art ought to be more like a day at Woodstock, or at least what he imagines Woodstock to be like: electric, dynamic, smooth, and mind-expanding. At the Red Gate Gallery. McKenzie strives against order and sense, aiming to manoeuvre without restriction.
Monday 1st December
The Lady: A Tribute to Sandy Denny, page Royal Festival Hall, treat London
An evening of songs from the back catalogue of one of the most influential female folk singers, approved Sandy Denny. Various artists including Marc Almond, P.P. Arnold and Johnny Flynn will be performing songs from her Fairport Convention days as well as her solo career. Should be a really interesting night in light of the current trend for new female folkies and a timely tribute to one of the godmothers of the genre.
A lovely gentle way to start the week with this folky-country duo who will hopefully be celebrating the first day of December with a performance of their Christmas single, released next week.
In the UK for one night only, this much-loved San Francisco band’s staccato, rough-round-the-edges punk pop is even better live.
Ten Kens, The Duchess, York
Anyone who has a blurry picture of people snogging on their record sleeve is a good bet for a messy live show and these Canadian grungers are reportedly no exception. Should be good in this small venue too.
New album produced by Will Oldham, harpist on Anthony and the Johnsons first album and with Andrew W.K. providing bass on her new record, this transsexual musician’s musical pedigree is assured.
Wednesday 3rd December
Kitty, Daisy and Lewis single launch, Madame JoJos, London
Snappily dressed, hearse-driving siblings playing rockabilly at their single launch party.
Liam Finn, Night and Day, Manchester
Introspective folk.
The Wave Pictures, Club Fandango, St Aloysius Social Club, London
Thursday 4th December
Vivian Girls, The Social, Nottingham
Uber-hyped Brooklyn girl group bring their shoe-gaze tinged grunge-pop to the UK. Time to see if they live up to their recorded promise as a live act.
Really bummed about breaking up with some girl called Emma, he headed into the woods alone and wrote an album about it. He must be feeling a bit better as he’s spreading the heartache on a UK tour.
Lovely duets from surprisingly compatible artists.
Pretty Taxing is a fashion collection with a twist, stuff as the end product is not clothes but car tax discs. Unusual – yes, sick but we all know how important accessorising is…
It would seem like a bad idea if such creatively interesting designers hadn’t contributed to the cause. They include Emma Bell, who has twice shown at London Fashion Week, David David and Pam Hogg. Along with artists Natasha Law and Stuart Semple, they have all created unique collectable pieces of fashion memorabilia.
You can pick up these discs of fashion-random-brilliance at Matches or at the pop-up shop KIN in Kingly Court, Carnaby Street. Abiding the law has never looked so good.
Today I was sent to Coventry, abortion quite literally. Together with 30 other Climate Camp activists dressed as Santa we descended on E.On, health the energy company responsible for the proposed new coal fired power station to be built at Kingsnorth.
This action followed a 48 hour action that happened over last Friday and Saturday – and E.On were not expecting our return. In fact, buy they were probably kicking themselves that the special fencing that they had put in place late last week was now lying dismantled on the floor next to their headquarters.
As a result our merry busload hopped off easily and headed straight for the main entrance of E.On’s offices.
Why? Despite spending a lot of time and energy letting the public know that they are one of the biggest investors in renewable energy in the UK (they’ll point out the big array of solar panels on one of their buildings and the lobby features a looped tape about wind farms) they are also pitching to build the first new coal fired power station to be built in the UK in 30 years, which will alone defeat all our CO2 emissions goals. So why spend so unwisely?
Whilst some merry santas climbed atop the revolving door and superglued their hands to the various entrances, another bunch of santas headed off into the building to see if they could speak to head honcho Paul Golby and let the employees know a bit more about the facts behind new coal.
Bearing banners that said Stop Coal and E.On F.Off they set off down the corridors singing some specially adapted carol songs.
Two intrepid santas managed to enter a boardroom meeting, surprising the attendees with some gifts of lumps of coal – for as you know santa gives bad children coal instead of gifts and E.On has been very bad this year. They were ejected from the property, but soon raced back in again…
We managed to disrupt operations for four hours, stopping employees and visitors as they came to work and giving interviews to the BBC and ITV, and live on the radio. Our action was spoken about on the World at One on Radio 4, which you can listen to here. We are talked about at approximately 8 minutes and 20 seconds into the programme.
The police were surprisingly even handed, although some employees were clearly fuming, especially the head of security (woops) One indoor santa even managed to locate a cup of tea and a newspaper to read.
At one point we were able to reenter the building, with the santas forming a conga line for the cameras. We delivered papers written by leading NGOs describing why there is no need for coal power, and generally had a merry old time. All employees and visitors were rerouted through back entrances, so I think it is fair to say that we were fairly disruptive…
Eventually we decided that once unstuck it was best that we leave, but the police had other ideas, and as we walked off down the road they tried to contain us, managing to trap four of our number and arrest them.
The rest of us ran off down the street to find our getaway vehicles, parked up in a local pub car park. Our drivers had thoughtfully bought us lunch in the pub, but shortly after we had gulped it down we were asked to leave because the police presence was putting off other customers. The police followed us as we left to pick up the other santas at Warwick university student union, and thereafter ensued the slowest police chase ever, with us managing to lose them after taking a wrong turn.
The purpose of this action was to embarrass E.On and raise awareness of what they up to in a light hearted and humourous way – I think that as a bunch of merry santas we did this exceptionally well. We hope that E.On will take heed and stop greenwashing their plans. It’s simple, don’t build Kingsnorth. Spend your money increasing investment in your (meagre) renewable energy supplies. If you would like to help us stop companies like E.On destroying our world check out what Climate Camp is up to next. More articles on this action can be read on Indymedia here and here.
We’re having a bit of a Grace Jones moment here at Amelia’s HQ. Obviously we’ve always known she was AMAZING but her majestic new single ‘Williams’ Blood’ goes to prove that she’s still totally got it. In fact, buy it’s been on repeat for about the past week and we’ve all been waving our arms in the air singing “I’ve got the Williams’ blood in me”. There’s an infectious gospel refrain running through this song that really brings out Jones’ strident message. Strongly autobiographical, link ‘Williams’ Blood’ tells the story of her parents’ life together in small-town domesticity and her musician grandfather – he of the Williams blood – philandering his way around the world, an insight into the Grace Jones spirit of rebellion.
There’s a cry for freedom and for breaking away from the strictures and constraints of her background, which you can’t help but feel has been successful for this overtly sexual, bonkers wardrobed, gay icon, hence the joyful bursts of the chorus. It also seems almost subversive for a female singer to talk about the influence of a male ancestor on their lives but Jones has never been one to play by the rules. In fact, as one of our writers proved, she’s perhaps the only woman with such immense stature you could prove your respect for by mooning. But that’s another story…
‘Williams’ Blood’ is released next Monday 8th December on Wall of Sound.
“The film was an experiment”, abortion says Jonas Cuaron, settling down across from me on a sofa at the Renoir this Saturday. I’ve come for the release of his debut film, Año Uña – year of nails – and the place is abuzz with excitement; I’m especially enamoured by the snippets of Mexican-tilted Spanish I hear that always make me nostalgic (Luisa with no ‘o’, can you guess?), “Ai que deliciosa!” someone behind me exclaims at the sight of a quesadilla in the first few minutes of the film; maravillosa indeed.
“I wanted to make a film”, he continues, “using a format that would be hard to watch”. Hard to watch? A legitimate concern when it dawns on you that you’re in for a feature-length film composed entirely of still-frame photographs. But the merit of any film boils down to one thing, a good story – and the impossible romance between American girl and Mexican boy in the throes of puberty, subsumes this hard-to-watch format and makes it altogether accessible. Plot aside for a moment though, the genesis of the film deserves as much attention, so I asked Jonas how the whole thing came about.
JC: For the film I took photographs of my everyday life for a year. I wanted to break the way in which film is normally done. Normally people write a screenplay first, and then out of the screenplay they do the image, but here I wanted to do it backwards. I took the photographs and then we made an installation where we put them all up in a room, and made a story from that.
Were there other possible narratives, did you find it hard to pick which story to tell?
Well I always knew that it had to be a story of this girl from the US and this boy from Mexico. They were the ones I photographed the most that year, and so I knew they were going to be the main characters and it grew organically from there. But sometimes I think, with all those photographs I could make a different movie, draw something completely different from the same images.
What was exciting about working in that format?
Well I wanted to play with the boundaries between reality and fiction. I wanted to have images that were real, but to show, how with text, or with a narrative over those images, you can have a completely different meaning. All the images in the movie are real, but none of that happened, I wanted to play with that boundary.
So there was no interchange between reality and fiction? There must’ve been!
Well I mean, in the events there was. Like my Grandpa really did get sick and he had cancer, but for instance, the main characters, Diego and Molly, they are my brother and my girlfriend, so I hope that wasn’t real (chuckles).
How did your brother feel about in falling in love with your girlfriend, was that awkward?
Well the narrative was so fictional, so far away from reality that both him and Eireann saw it as an acting job; they never thought of it as real. All the character’s names are real aside from Eireann, which I changed to Molly because I wanted to help Diego and Molly not feel awkward, and I knew that Diego was gonna be saying really dirty things about her character, so I thought it would be easier for him if she was called Molly and not Eireann.
Throughout the film, Molly seems to be perpetually trying to capture something real from Mexico in a photograph, and failing. Is that Ironic? Seeing as you’re playing with a moment captured and how it can mean lots of things.
With Molly, a lot of what I wanted to play with was the idea of the tourist, being a foreigner in another country, so even though she’s the one seeing, she’s the observer with the camera, in the case of a tourist like Molly, people are also observing her. So with her character I played a lot with the subconscious of being in a new place.
You grew up partially in Mexico and partially in the US, so is that something you link closely too?
For me, that part of the narrative – the interchange between two cultures – it really fascinates me; so when I realised that Diego and Molly would be my main characters, I was happy because the relationship between both cultures is an important one for me. I know what it is to be new in a different place, and I understand the boundaries between the two languages, and a lot of this is seen in the character of Molly. Many of those pictures were taken during Eireann’s first visit to Mexico, and it was at the time when Bush had just been elected. For her it was really hard to be in Mexico because everyone was judging her for what Bush was doing, so I wanted to play with the idea, that I also feel from being a Mexican in the US, that people see you as a nationality and not who you are.
What is the main theme of the film for you?
When I first started making a film with photographs, I realised that the main theme would be the passage of time and the impermanence of things. You can’t do anything about photography and not talk about the passage of time, and particularly in a film – film is always dependent on the idea of time and still-photography doesn’t have time in a way, and so for me, the whole film is an exploration of how nothing lasts forever.
Would you use the format again?
I think it’s a very interesting format to explore, but for me, I’ve done everything I would want to do with that format. It’s been a very important learning experience for me. At the end of the day, the important thing is having a good story.
Muchisimas Gracias Jonas. How do you like London?
It’s cold.
Last night, adiposity to coincide with World AIDS Day, clinicvinspired.com, a youth volunteer organisation website, hosted a charity fashion show to raise money for the children’s HIV Charity, Body & Soul.
This fashion show was the last stage in a creative process, which started off with four volunteer design teams, based in four parts of the country, who gave their time to find new and exciting designers. The creative workshops were set up by Junky Styling in London, Traid, who nurtured the Bristol designers, the Ethical Fashion Forum in Nottingham and Kesh(pictured above), who worked with the Manchester based designers.
Said designers had to then compete against each other to create the best outfit from recycled clothes, e.g.: the clothes given to charity shops – and it was at this fashion show where the winner would be decided by designer Ben de Lisi.
TV presenter Miquita Oliver hosted the event and the celebrity quota was filled by Rolling Stone daughter, Leah Wood (pictured above), who modeled on the catwalk and Radio 1 DJ Edith Bowman, who provided some post-show tunes.
Even bigger names (not in attendance) but supporting the charity include actress Kate Winslet and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who donated a suit and a shirt respectively, to be remade into something fabulous. Designer Zandra Rhodes is also a big supporter of this recycling fashion cause saying, “It is appalling how much we waste in society these days, but it seems we are entering a new era of resourcefulness. This is really exciting – and the best part of it is young people are leading the new trend.”
Taking place in Central Saint Martins aptly named Innovation Centre; the venue was small and intimate, which perfectly captured the tone of the event. Unlike most fashion shows, this one had a very human element when a representative from the Body & Soul charity got on stage to talk about her experience living with HIV. She spoke about having to live a double life, having to hide her illness from the world due to the level of prejudice that still exists towards the disease. Money raised from this event will go towards generating awareness about HIV.
As we sat by the catwalk, video screens showed the designers in their workshops making the clothes that would soon appear in front of us. What these guys did with discarded shirts and dresses was pretty impressive, it wasn’t about following trends but making creative, innovative and pretty pieces, and there was a lot of that evident on the catwalk.
Ben de Lisi was there to judge the entries, with only a matter of minutes to decide who the winner would be, he was asked how he would do it and said, “I shoot straight from the hip, I know exactly what I want.”
Who he wanted was designer Anne-Marie Fleming, from the Junky Styling stable. She seemed to me to be a safe choice as although her design was good, it was not the best seen on the catwalk by a long way.
This event worked so well to promote two causes, the importance of recycling (not always being a slave to trends) and reducing the level of our prejudice about supposedly taboo subjects.
All the clothes can be viewed at vinspired.com/fashion and will be auctioned on eBay from today, so you can get your hands on a uniquely designed piece and give some cash to a very good cause.
If you’re planning on going to any of these events, viagra buy or have something you want to write an article about for the Earth Blog, more about email us: earth@ameliasmagazine.com!
Eco-Design Christmas Fair 2008 website +152+Brick+Lane,+London+E1+6RU&sll=51.521668,-0.071497&sspn=0.007423,0.019011&g=152+Brick+Lane,+London+E1+6RU&ie=UTF8&ll=51.522349,-0.072269&spn=0.007423,0.019011&z=16&iwloc=A”target=”_blank”>The Boiler House, The Old Truman Brewery, 152 Brick Lane, London E1 6RU
Saturday 13th December 2008 12pm-7pm
Sunday 14th December 2008 11am-7pm
entry £2 or £1
A great event at which you will be able to see and buy some wonderful eco-design products (including organic clothing, furniture, jewellery, books and alternative technology) directly from the makers.
Exhibitors include Amira Fairtrade Fashion Clothing, Green Oil UK Ltd (Green bicycle chain lubricant & maintenance products) , Lizzie Lee Lighting and Po-zu Ecological footwear, amongst others! For a full list and for more information about the event please visit www.ecodesignfair.co.uk
Contact Louise Kamara: info@ecodesignfair.co.uk or 07956 916 079
Make Christmas as ethical as you can this year with another Fairtrade fair at Westminister Hall. Fair Trade Fair is an annual event that has been going on for 20 years; the first of which was organised in 1987 by Benny Dembitzer and opened by Bob Geldof.
Fairtrade events are incredibly important as they play a major role in empowering developing country producers, promoting sustainability and reducing world poverty.
The fairtrade movement encourages the payment of a fair price and the improvement of environmental standards; products range from handicrafts, coffee, tea and sugar to wine, flowers and cotton. http://www.fairtradefair.org/ftf/index.htm http://www.myspace.com/FairTradeFair
Here’s a scary thought: there’s only 21 days left for Christmas shopping… so leave the high street and take advantage as London’s coolest shopping districts throw late night events…
Bermondsey Street – nearest tube: London Bridge Thursday 4th December
From 6.30pm to 9.30pm, drugs pop down to this fashion-forward little street, viagra sale where not only will you get 10% off in all the shops but the Fashion and Textile Museum is also open late, stomach with guest appearances by some of the designers featured in the museum. Shopping and culture: the perfect way to spend an evening.
Cabbages and Frocks Christmas Fair – nearest tube: Kentish Town Sunday 7th December
Want designer goodies at bargain prices? This is the place to go. The weekly market pulls out all the stops this Sunday for its annual Christmas Fair, with all the sellers offering special yule-time discounts and the chance for you to get a genuine designer garment into your wardrobe – or give someone the best gift ever – get down there now….well, on Sunday.
Columbia Road – nearest tube: Old Street Every Wednesday in December
Situated in the heart of the east-end, you can browse in over 50 boutiques and shops, which are all open until 9pm and listen to live music to get you in that Christmas spirit while you browse for gifts.
As the title suggests, this shopping experience takes place within three roads – Old Street, Great Eastern Street and Shoreditch High Street – the shops taking part are offering special discounts on their wares, free gift wrap and the chance to pick up a brilliant present for the fashion-conscious people in your life. More details below:
Written by Jennifer McNulty on Wednesday December 3rd, 2008 1:41 pm
Edinburgh College of Art always have much to offer at Graduate Fashion Week. Weird and wonderful, expert craftsmanship, innovative use of materials and new silhouettes, Edinburgh always seems to make it appear dazzling effortless.
They were all wonderful, frankly, but here are some of my favourites:
Jacob caused a striking stir as the show’s opener, featuring futuristic shapes and wide brimmed visor hats. Industrial colours lifted dresses, which were more like armour.
Raj Mistry Graduate collection by Raj Mistry
Raj’s expert menswear collection really stood out. He married sportswear with engineered shapes with luxurious materials for outerwear; zips and drawstrings in contrasting colours were nice details.
Farah Saffari
Graduate collection by Farah Saffari
A whimsical approach to fashion was the mainstay in Farah’s collection, inspired by nature and, probably, the beach. Cropped tops, translucent layers and piped waists resulted in mermaid-like creatures rather than models.
Colin Oliphant
Something about Colin’s relaxed tailoring for men that also worked on ladies really stood out; it was simplicity at its best. Subtle lapel-free jackets with crew necks were worn over collarless shirts in muted colours, and a collection like this is always welcome amidst a sea of designers who try to push the boundaries a little too far.
Ainslie Hogg
Juxtaposed to Colin’s subtle collection (above) came Ainslie Hogg’s weird and wonderful experimentation with material and shape. It was the kind of collection, akin to Michael Van Der Ham, that shouldn’t work but completely does. Materials of various textures and densities were combined in hap-hazard fashion to create striking ensembles.
Katarzyna Krzywania
I simply loved Katarzyna’s hooded overcoats with contrasting geometric shapes.
Dan’s menswear was a perfect blend of old and new – a sort of updated period novel hero with contemporary, aesthetic fabrics in the place where tweeds and heritage fabrics might be. High-waisted trousers and structured jackets featured in this richly-coloured collection.
Katie Bremner
What’s not to love about Katie’s ethereal world? Her fringed frocks in garish colours, embellished with hearts, added both fun and thought provocation to the show. Not a collection for the supermarket, but for the fashion-forward at the very least.
Marie Leiknes
Pages from Marie Leiknes‘ graduate collection sketchbooks
Marie creates new silhouettes from marvellous knitwear in vivid colours. Millinery had an Eastern influence, whilst the garments themselves featured triangular wool formations and contrasting colours.
Riona Horrox
Riona might have looked to 1990s hip hop for inspiration for her premium menswear. Oversized coats with digital prints were decorated with wool trims or worn with hoods. Orange and copper highlights glared from a general colour palette of black and grey. Riona went on to win the Menswear Award at the Gala Show yesterday evening (more to come on that soon) – and quite rightly so.
Louise Bennetts
Louise’s collection consisted of parachute-like dresses and capes in varying shades of orange – warm tones that brought life to paler structures. Layered translucent materials created interest, and bold black lines that divided up the garments added yet another dimension to this highly polished collection.
Emma Hardstaff
Emma closed the show with her collection of dreamy quilted numbers with vague digital prints, some of which were disguised with translucent fabric. The prawn-like head pieces, whilst attracting attention, were a little unnecessary – but it was a collection worthy of closing the show nonetheless, and gained much deserved recognition at the Gala Show. Bravo!
Three cheers for Edinburgh, as always! Hip Hip…
Written by Matt Bramford on Thursday June 14th, 2012 6:10 pm
Eugene Lin’s interest in Mythology has not dwindled and neither has his talent: for his S/S 2014 collection he set out to create his own fable with Valkyrie; named after the Norse myth that female spirits of battle become swans with the aid of feathered cloaks. Returning once again to the Fashion Scout catwalk, for this latest battle he offered a much cleaner and less embellished collection, sending his own kind of modern warrior women down the runway. Pure white pieces came first, before a burst of unexpected orange turned things up a notch. Strong tailoring included high waists, feathers and pleats and provoked much delight, my own included. Lin provided his signature sharp lines and much loved screen prints; this time including some minimal digital printing techniques that worked well with the structured pieces. Themes and references can be tacky if overdone but Eugene Lin managed to modernise the myth and create a collection that showed the execution of an idea done well, plus the power of top class tailoring.
‘Chanel No.5′ designed by Jean Helleau. Illustration by Sandra Contreras
When Freud pondered the question of ‘what women want, pharmacy ’ someone should have told him that there are few things more desirable than a beautiful bottle of scent. Since the early 20th century, viagra 100mg the perfume flaçon (small bottle) has taken on many weird and wonderful guises – some of which have gone on to become cultural artefacts and artist’s muses. By no means a comprehensive list, here is a small selection of some of the most jaw-dropping flaçons you’ll ever encounter – some of which even manage to upstage the scents they contain.
Chanel Nº 5
“I always launch my collection on the 5th day of the 5th month, so the number 5 seems to bring me luck – therefore, I will name it Nº 5,” proclaimed Mademoiselle Chanel after putting her initial doubts to one side and deciding to branch out into fragrance. The name itself summed up the scent’s abstract nature, and was a two-fingered salute to the other flowery perfume names at the time. Launched in 1921, No. 5 made greater use of synthetic ingredients, resulting in a blend of rose and ylang ylang that is rich, intoxicating but decidedly ‘unfloral.’ The first bottle was designed by the lady herself, modelled on the Charvet toiletry bottle that once belonged to her then-lover Captain Arthur ‘Boy’ Capel. The resulting flaçon we know and love was created in 1924 by Jean Helleau, and went on to become the subject of Andy Warhol’s famous ‘pop art’ prints, as well as being on permenant display in New York’s Musuem of Modern Art (MOMA) since 1959. The rich gold coloured liquid seen vividly through the glass of the minimalist square bottle, with its simple black letters and jewel-like stopper simply screams luxury. 86 years on, it is still capable of stopping women’s hearts – my fair own included.
Named after the Shalimar Gardens in Lahore, and meaning ‘temple of love’ in Sanskrit, you could half expect a genie to emerge from this fan-shaped bottle with sapphire-coloured stopper, but the sweet vanilla fragrance inside is just as mesmerising. Designed by Raymond Guerlain in 1925 and manufactured by Cristal Baccarat (who along with Lalique, first turned the perfume flaçon into an objet d’art) the design of Shalimar was inspired by the fountains one might find in Indian palaces, and was displayed at the Decorative Arts Exhibition in the same year. The bottle has recently been given a modern make-over by jewellery designer/socialite Jade Jagger, who hasn’t strayed that far from the original, and produced a slightly sleeker version that Raymond himself would have been happy with.
Flower by Kenzo
‘Flower by Kenzo’ designed by Serge Mansau. Illustration by Kayleigh Bluck
I love the beautiful simplicity of Flower by Kenzo – how the tall thin glass leans gracefully to one side like a delicate stem in a summer breeze, echoing the sweet floral fragrance within – with a trompe l’oeil image of a flower appearing as if it were inside the bottle itself. Launched in 2000, the flaçon was designed by Serge Mansau, a French glass sculptor and stage decorator, who had already honed his craft designing flaçons for the likes of Dior and Hermés. He was given the concept of a flower by Kenzo’s artistic director Patrick Geudj, who wanted to highlight it as a powerful symbol for peace, and was particularly inspired by photographer Marc Ribaud’s image March in Washington (21st of October 1967) in which a girl holds a flower in front of a gun that is being pointed at her. Who knew a perfume could be political?
Shocking by Schiaparelli
Schiaparelli’s ‘Shocking’ designed by Leonor Fini. Illustration by Joana Faria
Inspired by a bust of Mae West, who was one of Schiaparelli’s major clients, 1937’s “Shocking” was designed by Argentine painter Leonor Fini, and best exemplifies Schiaparelli’s role in the surrealist movement (her designs included her famous lobster dress, and a hat in the shape of high heeled shoe.) The name was inspired by Cartier’s famous ‘shocking pink’ diamond the Tête de Belier (Ram’s Head) and Shocking’s encasing box was dyed in the same pink shade to match. In an era where few fashion houses were releasing perfume, ‘Shocking’ was Schiaparelli’s attempt to compete with her nemesis Chanel (although sadly unlike her rival, the label did not adapt to the changes brought about by WWII and closed in 1954.) The scent itself – a rather dry powdery bouquet of honey rose and jasmine – may not be to everyone’s taste, but the bottle still remains a little piece of perfume history.
Alien by Thierry Mugler
‘Alien’ designed by Thierry Mugler. Illustration by Karolina Burdon
Designed by Mugler himself, Alien is a bright amethyst and gold flaçon, made to appear like a ‘sacred stone’ and bringing to mind 1980’s sci-fi films such as Blade Runner and Tron – and is a good example of the designer’s flamboyant, theatrical style (check out Beyoncé’s motorcycle corset for a better idea). Alien was Mugler’s second fragrance, which he described as a nod to ‘ultra-feminity’ and contains notes of sambac jasmine and cashmeran wood, creating a soft woody- amber bouquet. The flaçon according to the designer “symbolises thoughtfulness and peace of mind” despite appearing as if it’s going to hatch a new life form on a mission to destroy all humanity as we know it, HG Wells-style.
Written by Viola Levy on Wednesday November 3rd, 2010 5:20 pm
