Diane, A Shaded View on Fashion

PHILIP CHU INTERVIEWS with JUUN J

Photo bhy Philip CHU at Juun's SS 2011 Paris show.  

 

Dear Shaded Viewers,

It's almost a new season and I am sure this outstanding Korean designer -  Juun J must be crazy busy preparing  to amaze us again in June.  Fortunately, Juun and I were contacted for a project so I got a chance to ask him a few questions to share with the shaded viewers.  

P:  What's your design process?  

J:  My design process starts classically .  However, the classic for me is totally than the basic classic, which means classic mode with the items taken apart and put back together again to become entirely  new items.  

P: Besides fashion, do you collect anything?  

J:  I  collect table lamps.  Besides Fashion, my focus is on the beauty of table lamps.  I have collected about 40 different designs of table lamps.  My table lamps create the entire mood it is as if you are in under the spell of the Galaxy.  It enchants me that is why I love night fall.  

P:  If you weren't a designer what would you have been?

J:  I live in a big city and as a designer I have to move to other big cities and the truth is...I don't like being in cities. If i were not a designer, I would do gardening.  I sincerely love to take care of animals and plants.  However, it is never too late, and I think I could still do that in some day.  When I am finished being a designer I will challenge myself as a gardener.  Lately, I understand  that the beauty of nature is richer than Fashion.  

Later,

Philip Chu 

 

 

GEORGETTE KONING ON ARNHEM MODE BIENNALE - OPEN NOW! PART 1

Amber is the name of the fourth edition of the Arnhem Mode Biennale. It must be one of the biggest fashion-events, and it's held in Holland. In a huge enormous building are over 30 installations, visions of fashionlabels such as Prada, Anne-Sofie Back, Rodarte, Thom Browne, threeASFOUR, Rad Harouani, Juun.J, Klavers van Engelen, Damir Doma - look for the whole list and programme at www.arnhemmodebiennale.nl Below you see my favorite work, it's made by A.F. Vandevorst. The installation shows a girl sleeping in a hospital bed in her A.F.Vandevorst dress. The girl as well as the matress and pillow are made out of candlewax. Once lit, what starts as a perfect image will slowly melt and perisch during the biennale.

Maison Martin Margiela s/s 2009 Kite Tunic, made from a kite, the patterns are embroidered with multicolored fringes.

Nicholas Kirkwood collaboration with Keith Haring Foundation

Anne-Sofie Back Atelje

Klavers van Engelen - wind/music machine

Juun.J.Sand is dripping on the heads of the dolls.

Iris van Herpen 'waterdress'.

Overview and part installation threeASFOUR.

Patrick Ervell presented clothes as flowers in a herbarium.

More pictures tomorrow...

                                                                              

 

Blueprint & Audi Fashion Festival in Singapore. By Glenn Belverio

 
Above: A look from max.tan

Dear Shaded Viewers,

 Two weeks ago I was invited to the independent city-state of Singapore to cover Audi Fashion Festival and the Blueprint trade show for A Shaded View. Singapore has got to be the most ideal global location for a fashion week, mainly because it's the luxury fashion mall capital of the world. The fashion outposts of brands like Chanel and Fendi have massively huge shops here and the hotel I was staying at, The Fairmont, was virtually wrapped in a shopping mall. One minute I was trying to find the fitness center or the breakfast room and suddenly I was not just in the middle of an Hermes store, but half-naked in the dressing room without realizing how I got there.

The tone for this was set when I checked into my hotel room and discovered that there was a mini Prada boutique in my bathroom and a Gucci handbag counter next to my bed. At first I didn't mind but then when the salespeople kept waking me up in the middle of the night trying to get me to buy things, it got a little annoying.

I was extremely jet-lagged when I arrived so the only shows I remember seeing at the Audi Fashion Festival were Antonio Berardi (very nice), Triumph lingerie (an ill-advised spectacle that looked like a high-school production of a Victoria's Secret show, with accessories culled from dumpsters) and Ungaro (ghastly). I missed the most buzzed-about show, Raoul, but I've covered it below because the clothing was wonderful.

Above: Laughable lingerie...Triumph was a tragedy. 

Blueprint, which took place at the Marina Bay Sands, was very nicely put together and featured booths and catwalks by interesting designers from Singapore, Bangkok, Beijing, Delhi, the Dominican Republic, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Kuala Lumpur, London, Manila, New York, Seoul, Sweden and Tokyo. All of the collections were Cruise which makes sense because steamy Singapore is practically one meter above the equator, so it's a year-long cruise destination. (I think equatorial fashion weeks are becoming my beat: Last month I was at a fashion week in Fortaleza, Brazil, which is just below the equator.)

 Singaporeans Andrew Loh and Kenny Lim were depressed with the "corporate struggle" after working at various advertising agencies for 15 years and not having a true creative outlet. They turned their depression into DEPRESSION, a clothing line that I would describe as "Japanese-influenced design meets Joy Division." "Being avant-garde or quirky is no longer enough for today's shopper," the now not-depressed boys proclaim. A perfect Cruise collection for wearing during that cruise down the River Styx. 

RAOUL, founded in 2002, is the Singapore brand best-known on the international circuit, having shown in both New York and Paris. Besides men's and women's wear, the brand has expanded to accessories and timepieces. I really liked the elegant simplicity of this current collection.

 Another interesting Singapore designer was MAE PANG, who played florescent colors off of slick patent panels.

I really liked the sandals at max.tan

Singapore label REVASSEUR (French for "daydreamer") is designed by Gilda Su who honed her skills during four years of study in Japan. Her aim is to "bring fun back into fashion and to encourage its wearers to experiment." I enjoyed her quirky sensibility. 

 Joseph Quartana of 7 New York and I at the cocktail before the Ungaro show. Joseph was globetrotting all over Asia, with a stop in Seoul before Singapore and then he was off to a a DJ gig for Designers Against AIDS in Bali.

 Blueprint was held in the complex that is part of the gigantic and dramatic Marina Bay Sands Hotel & Casino. Designed to look like a trio of joss sticks, the hotel boasts a massive rooftop bar that's an open-air green park. I never made it up there but Joseph said it was spectacular.

Complementing the "joss sticks" is the Museum of Art and Science which is designed to resemble a lotus flower. 

 I couldn't tell if this was a Dali homage or just a sculpture that couldn't withstand Singapore's relentless heat. I nearly fainted standing out in the sun for 5 minutes to get these photos and I'm a sun person.

Me during lunch at the White Rabbit, a beautiful converted church. The fashion-week organizers from Mercury PR invited us there for a lovely Eurocentric lunch. 

 I had a view of the legendary British Colonial hotel Raffles from the window of my luxe room at The Fairmont.

Singapore is more than just shopping malls; in Chinatown and Little India, colorful Buddhist and Hindu temples vie for attention with the surrounding skyscrapers. 

A close call: When I saw this sign I realized that I had forgotten about the two durians I had tucked away in my Bernard Wilhelm man purse. It's illegal to carry them on the subway or buses or to have them in your hotel room. 

 Little India

 My second favorite Bollywood star, Amir Khan, hawking Coke outside a Hindu temple.

No trip to Singapore is complete without a dinner of chili crab. We had ours at Jumbo Seafood in Clarke Quay.

Further reading:

My whirlwind Buddhist & Hindu temple tour of Singapore

 

Love,

Glenn Belverio

Kelly Cutrone's new book, "Normal Gets You Nowhere"

Dear Shaded Viewers,

There's just no stopping Kelly Cutrone, founder of NYC and LA-based PR company People's Revolution and reality TV star. She's a Hindu goddess who walks among us, flying her freak flag and dispensing her streetwise wisdom to young and old the world over.

As a follow-up to her mega New York Time's bestseller, "If You Have to Cry, Go Outside," Kelly's new book, "Normal Gets You Nowhere," (HarperOne) is bursting with her trademark punk-rock spiritual fierce philosophy and indispensable advice for anyone starting out in the world, new grads, dreamers and those who might just need a dose of Kelly to push them forward.

Last month I was lucky enough to have Kelly read aloud her book's opening salvo to me; a blistering attack on the destructiveness and emptiness of capitalism and the thousands of choices it offers us. The passage serves as a wake-up call to the millions of Americans who have allowed themselves to be anesthetized by the relentless and hypnotic siren song of soul-less consumerism. 

"In the words of Pink Floyd, we've become 'comfortably numb.' While horrible things happen all over the world, we spend a lot of our time deciding, Hmmmm, should I get the Honey Nut Cheerios or the organic almond Kashi granola? Should I buy a boyfriend jean or a skinny jean? Should I watch HBO or TiVo? Let's face it, we are in a capitalistically overwhelmed state. And this is no accident. While you're in the grocery store or the Gap deciding what to eat and what to wear, there are lobbyists and politicians in Washingtong passing bills that you know nothing about. They might be limiting your rights at the airport, in an abortion clinic, or at a gay pride parade. But you wouldn't know because you're wondering whether your cereal has antioxidant powers or if that new pair of jeans will get you fucked."

Well put, my revolutionary sister.

Later,

Glenn Belverio

My Hipstamatic portrait of Kelly in her home right after the release of her first book in March 2010

Kelly and Diane taping a segment for MTV in Kelly's bed, March 2010

 

SR.MARCELO HORACIO MAQUIEIRA ANNOUNCES RIETVELD’S ACADEMIE GRADUATION 2011: FASHION.

 

 

 

Shows: Saturday June 18th at 19.00 and 21.00 hrs at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, Amsterdam.

Best,

Marcelo.

Marco de Rivera reports on Bernar Venet at Le Château de Versailles

Bernar Venet is the new contemporary artist invited by Le Château de Versailles near Paris for 2011. Bernar Venet is a 70 years old french minimal artist based in New York but not so famous in Paris. After the controversy with Jeff Koons and Takashi Murakami last year, Venet is not creating such a polemic with his “corten” steel rods. Indeed there are 7 sculptures only located in the giant garden and at the entrance of the Château. Here are, in exclusivity, the first pictures of this exhibition starting June 1st.

Photos : Marco de Rivera

Later,

Marco de Rivera

Gardenia!

Gardenia is an exceptional theater performance from the Belgian 

company Les Ballets C de la B. The next stops on the world tour

are Montreal, Quebec, Rome & London (Sadlers Wells).

I photographed the actors in Rotterdam last month.

For more information go to 

www.lesballetscdela.be

 

 

 photographs by Michael James O'Brien c. 2011

memorial day and a pattern from PIERROT

 

Gil Scott-Heron - The Bottle| We Almost Lost Detroit

Never too late to say good bye.

Always relevant. RIP

HEDI SLIMANE DIARY / CJ1 PORTRAIT OF A CALIFORNIA BOY / VENICE BEACH 01 11 http://www.hedislimane.com/diary/