I heart Halloween! In commemoration of the holiday and bringing a lil extra bling goodness to your life; I’ve partnered up with Foxy Originals (merci Foxy! ) to give away to a lucky Thirty Four Flavours Reader a Fantasy Necklace in Gold (as seen above).
Even though we are in the Fall months when you look at this piece you can’t help but dream of a tropical paradise. Make fantasy a reality with this bib-style necklace featuring a peaceful Eden of swirling birds, flowers and leaves.
How do you win you ask? Easy! Just sign up to my blog – (see up there, in the right hand corner of the screen) and you will be automatically entered to win this gorgeous piece which I guarantee will be a staple in your fashionista wardrobe for years to come. P.S. To those already signed up to my blog; consider yourself already entered.
The winner will be announced on October 31, 2011. Trick or Treat!
I remember watching this on Fashion Television in my 20′s and thinking…this designer is a true artist. Even now…years later watching Shalom swirling around and getting her lovely dress sprayed by humanistic robots still gives me chills.
Last summer when The AMc Exhibit was showing at the Met a comprehensive account was given about each of his works. Here are the details of dress number 13:
Alexander McQueen (British, 1969–2010) Dress No. 13, spring/summer 1999
White cotton muslin spray-painted black and yellow with underskirt of white synthetic tulle
Andrew Bolton: In one of the most memorable moments at McQueen’s runway shows, two robots spray-painted a dress worn by the model Shalom Harlow. Here we talk to Shalom about the experience.
Shalom Harlow: I walked right up to it and stood on top of this circular platform. And as soon as I gained my footing, the circular platform started a slow, steady rotation. And it was almost like the mechanical robots were stretching and moving their parts after an extended period of slumber. And as they sort of gained consciousness, they recognized that there was another presence amongst them, and that was myself.
And at some point, the curiosity switched, and it became slightly more aggressive and frenetic and engaged on their part. And an agenda became solidified somehow. And my relationship with them shifted at that moment because I started to lose control over my own experience, and they were taking over. So they began to spray and paint and create this futuristic design on this very simple dress.
And when they were finished, they sort of receded and I walked, almost staggered, up to the audience and splayed myself in front of them with complete abandon and surrender.
It almost became this like aggressive sexual experience in some way. And I think that this moment really encapsulates, in a way, how Alexander related to—at least at this particular moment—related to creation. Is that all of creation? Is that the act of a human being being created, the sexual act? Is it the act of, you know, the Big Bang, if you will, that violence and that chaos and that surrender that takes place?
Alexander and I didn’t have any conversation directly related to this particular piece and to creating this moment within his show. I like to think that he wanted to interfere as little as possible and allow me to have the most genuine, spontaneous experience as possible.
In McQueen’s Words
“[The finale of this collection] was inspired by an installation by artist Rebecca Horn of two shotguns firing blood-red paint at each other.”
“Style,” South China Morning Post, September 2007
“It was really carefully choreographed. It took a week to program the robots.”
It pays to have a twitter account. I’ve caught many a deal and trend on it in the last year or so. I was reminded today that The Bay is selling Topshop’s gear on their website 24/7 which is available to all of Canada. The tweet read:
Heather-grey wool, a quilted lining and a faux-fur-lined hood give Cartonnier’s A-line coat categorically cozy appeal.
Front pockets
Front zip
Wool, polyester, viscose; viscose, acetate lining
Dry clean
30″L
Imported
I need a new parka. I’m just undecided on the type of parka I want. Do I want a dressy parka like the above and below that I can wear to kick it around town or to work? Or do I want a North Face to replace my 3 year old Oakley ski jacket?
I want the style factor, an affordable price point, good wear potential and hey, I want it to look super fly for at least 5-6 years. See I want investment for the ‘dollas’. I tend to stretch my purchases out as long as possible. This Oakley jacket I have could go for at least another year. You know the perfect go to, to pick up groceries, go to my folks, pick up food etc.. I’m not sure if these jackets are good for those purposes.
I don’t want to make double purchases. You know the type of purchases that really could be scaled down to one purchase and can be used for many uses. I like these two babies from Anthro. They could work but then maybe not? Only wear and tear could tell and then it’s too late.
I know I’m turning into an Anthro addict – (by the way, I bought the below said Culottes for $59 CAD on sale today!). It was the last in my size and I managed to get an additional 25% off in store. It pays to call ahead and get the lovely Anthro staff to keep it aside for you and man for the discount I was down. Yes, I know it did cost $60 still but it was still better than paying for it online in American dollars and having to spend even more money to ship for free. Meh - I just wanted to Culottes.
Ok and I’m back. I fancy the below Vaterland Parka more so than the above. What do you think? It’s a lil more pretty even though it’s a parka. I like the ruffle bottom, the more fitted look of the overall piece, the fur trim in the food and the belt. The colour is alright. I just would need to try it on I guess and see how it feels to walk around with. The good news about this piece is that it has a removable inside piece/hood if you get to warm. Which is a blessing when you are in shopping mall and sweltering under the lights in a parka.
The cool thing about the Adare Anorak is that it isn’t full length and easier to trek around town in, I love the colour, it looks really warm and inviting, its stylish, its unique and a tad cheaper.
What do you think?
I’m going to have to hit Winners up once a week in the lead up to the winter. I’m thinking for the money, I’d like to get at least one of these babies on sale or wait and see what the sales price is to compare towards a North Face parka and then judge which is the better value.
Vaterland Parka $268
With a ruffled hem and faux-fur trimmings, this super cozy, Sherpa-lined parka is equipped to embark on journeys near and far. By Daughters of Liberation.
Seriously? I am trying to save money here. But these pieces are just simply sublime. Yes, they are conversational and I could see myself rocking them endlessly for years to come. Indeed very retro but also modern. There’s no way I’m buying them full price but I will keep my trusty eye on their sales rack in a few months.
Dromedary Dress $228
A quick ending note, sure the fall is upon us and you may think these pieces look a lil too spring/summer…but think out of the box for a moment. Imagine marrying up these pieces with a nice cardigan, a wooley scarf or a nice fitted blazer. As soon as you know it, you can then be rocking them solo in the spring sunshine.
With the band playing Toronto this weekend, we consider the many reasons why we still care about Portishead and its landmark record Dummy, in spite of their many long absences.
By Anupa Mistry | October 7, 2011
(Photo: Portishead)
In 1994, British band Portishead released Dummy, a record that helped define the trip-hop moment and is still considered a classic by many. Since then, singer Beth Gibbons, producer Geoff Barrow, and producer-guitarist Adrian Utley have resurfaced for only two more studio records, 1997’s Portishead and Third in 2008. Each work is difficult in its own way, but somehow Dummy struck a chord that’s resulted in a lasting, albeit frustrating legacy for the notoriously reserved group.
Toronto writer Robert J. Wheaton explores the curious happenstance of Dummyin a new book issued as part of the music geek “33 1/3” series. (The Standard’s own Carl Wilson wrote one in 2007: a tangled ode to Celine Dion’s Let’s Talk About Love). Wheaton, who listened to the album “at least 600 or 700 times” during the book writing process alone, has (amazingly!) never seen Portishead live. Touring North America for the first time in 13 years, the group plays back-to-back dates at Toronto’s Sound Academy this Sunday and Monday so I asked Wheaton for five reasons Portishead still matters. You still have time to get tickets.
They want to give you a distinct experience.
Talking to key people who were around during the recording of Dummy, Wheaton gleaned that although the record plays pristine at times, Portishead are perfectionists about imperfection. “You can’t reproduce their process live,” he explains. “All of that experimentation and cutting and messing with each version… They were quite happy to produce a live performance that was quite distinctive in the way that their studio work is.” This means their stage set-up is minimal, compared to the full-bodied moments on recording. “’Wandering Star’ is an aggressive song with up-front drum and bass figures, but they now perform that live in a really stripped down way,” explains Wheaton. “They’ve gone from this pushy, unsettling version to a haunting sort of unsettling version.”
They prove ‘trip-hop’ was nothing more than a selling point.
A lot of bands hate the terms dreamed up by quick-trigger branding hacks at records labels, and Portishead isn’t an exception. “They hated it then and they probably hate it now,” says Wheaton. “Most of the credible musicians (Massive Attack, Tricky) felt the same way because it was sold, in the music press, as a distinctly British ‘improvement’ upon American hip-hop.” The weird racial and class subtext pointed to trip-hop as a ‘safe’ alternative to rap, which is why Barrow himself disparaged Dummy’s massive, early embrace as “yuppie music.” Post-Public Enemy’s zeitgeisty It Takes A Nation Of Millions… Barrow, who came from a hip-hop background, was insulted. “The good musicians ran from ‘trip-hop’ as fast as they could,” explains Wheaton. “And the industry got two-and-half to three years out of it before everyone got bored.” But look who’s still around.
They combined music in a way everyone is replicating now—without the help of YouTube or FilesTube.com.
Portishead spent years refining their unique combinatory approach to music. “Barrow’s biggest inspiration was hip-hop, and same with Utley although he came from a jazz background,” Wheaton points out. “And Beth doesn’t come from a soul, R&B or jazz background; she did a lot of new wave stuff with a singer-songwriter bent.” This very real mix made Portishead so distinctive. Wheaton feels trip-hop’s packaging forced musicians away from the “fertile ground” of a great moment in experimentation between electronic music and production techniques, with genres like lover’s rock and dub and reggae and hip-hop. Danger Mouse, of Gnarls Barkley fame, has clearly nerded out on Portishead’s production techniques—a casual listener can hear it in his dense atmospherics. It has thinned out traces in James Blake and Toronto’s The Weeknd. More than anything, says Wheaton, it’s licensed people to bring influences together they normally wouldn’t.
They want to challenge you. Who does that anymore?
Along with being weirded out by yuppies throwing fondue parties with Dummy playing in the background, Portishead were troubled by the rapid absorption of their early music into the culture. “It was a CD with vinyl cracks, pops, and scratches all over it and these big chunky basslines,” Wheaton points out, also describing parts of Dummy as “shockingly avant garde.” Third was even more experimental and brutalist in its aesthetic, and it makes sense: Portishead’s ethos has never been to release anything unless they have something to say. “They’re not interested in generic, imitative or unoriginal,” says Wheaton. And yet, somehow they’ve managed to provide difficult, scuzzy, emotionally fucked up music to people who don’t believe they like challenging music.
They are what we need, especially right now.
Think about the ’80s and early ’90s, politically. “England in the ’80s was a really aggressive, uncomfortable and unsettled place,” says Wheaton. “It was recessions and race riots and lots of anger, very much like right now.” This would have been inescapable for a band out of Bristol, which housed racial tensions (the 1980s St. Paul riots between police and black youth) and a thriving underground scene increasingly targeted by a rave-hostile government. Portishead was never overtly political like, say, Massive Attack. “But there are ideas on Dummy about how to be in society, and self-doubt and questions of intimacy,” explains Wheaton. “At the time, the rhetoric of Thatcherism was about the privacy of self and so this was quite radical in an intimate and unsettling way.” Ultimately, their aesthetic brashness can feel like an uncomfortable statement.
__ Anupa Mistry is a regular music critic for Toronto Standard.
) to give away to a lucky Thirty Four Flavours Reader a Fantasy Necklace in Gold (as seen above).
