// Fade to #C5C5C5 » inspiration

Wapping Project & Moonshine Cinema

Qing — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 23:07:21 +0000

Last Saturday we went to The Wapping Project, a gallery/restaurant/bar=cool hang out place at Wapping Hydraulic Power Station on Wapping Wall. The place is hosting a BBQ with outdoor black & white movie cinema for their 10th Anniversary.

As you seen, the place is beautifully re-done. It was originally the local hydraulic power station and bought by this couple who was high in british theatre industry. They have kept the most features and made the place somehow not just a cool place but feeling warm, welcome and homy although you will be sitting surrounded by big machines.

With the soft early evening sunlight, the place looks so cinematic…

Candles were lit everywhere to soften the aged machines… …

…they have thought about every single little details… the rolling bar stools…

…the still water jugs seem to have their own lives… …

…and jars of cookies probably know most of stories about here?

love the coordination of rusty iron…sea green…soft grey and black table…

when you walk downstairs, even toilette area is a must-photograph zone… battered concrete wall with glass doors…

BBQ area is located outside, you have 4 different salads.

1. feta cheese – tomato – black olives – basil – salad

2. runner beans – beatroot – salad

3. big couscous – peas – celery – salad

4. cucumber – crunchy seaweed – radish – salad

Their extremely-crunchy-home-made bread is deliiiiicious!

For BBQ meat dish, you could have either Lamb / Prawns / Sardines / Sausages plus 2 types of salads from above.

If you are a vegetarian, you will have 4 salads. Total BBQ per portion per head was £12 which is very reasonable.

So here is the lamb…

…with Sardines…

…and giant tiger prawns… …yum yum!!

And the cinema showed a black & white classic called ‘Of Human Bondage’…I have to agree that all old movies are kind of confusing. Some of the plots and scenes are not so connected in our modern logic mind, but hey…the atmosphere was amazing. They have deck chairs and lots of cushions. My best advice? Take a blanket and lots of snacks!!

BBQ is £12 starts from 7pm and ‘Moonshine Cinema’ is £7 starts at 9pm.

All movie schedules until 28th August is as below:

Friday 6th Agugust – Timecode (15) 2000, Mike Figgis (97mins)

Saturday 7th August – Dark Victory (PG) 1939, Edmund Goulding (104mins)

Friday 13th August – Samson & Delilah (15), 2009, Warwick Thornton (97mins)

Saturday 14th August – Now, Voyager (PG), 1942, Irving Rapper (117mins)

Friday 20th August – The Unloved (5), 2009, Samantha Morton (103mins)

Saturday 21st August – All About Eve (U), 1950, Joseph L.Mankiewicz (138mins)

Friday 27th August – Sweet Sixteen (18), 2002, Ken Loach (106mins)

Saturday 28th August – What Ever Happened To Baby Jane? (12), 1962, Robert Aldrich (134mins)

The sound of Autumn/Winter 2010-11

awais — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 15:07:37 +0000

A few months back I wrote a post about some of my favourite tracks from the spring/summer shows. Now that the major fashion weeks are over, I thought I’d follow up with a post about the autumn/winter shows as well.

Magdalena Frackowiak for Sophia Kokosalaki A/W 2010-11

Apparat – Arcadia (Telefon Tel Aviv Remix) (Emporio Armani) [Spotify] [YouTube]
Sisters of Mercy – Temple of Love (Dior Homme) [Spotify] [YouTube]
The Presets – Are you the one? (Alexander Wang) [YouTube]
These New Puritans – We Want War (Sophia Kokosalaki) [Spotify] [YouTube]
Yazoo – Nobody’s Diary (Burberry) [Spotify] [YouTube]
Prince – Kiss (Balmain) [Spotify]
Fever Ray – Triangle Walks (Tiga’s 1-2-3-4 Remix) (Diesel Black Gold) [Spotify] [YouTube]
Peaches – Talk to me (Giles Deacon) [Spotify] [YouTube]
Malcolm McLaren – Operaa House (Miu Miu) [Spotify] [YouTube]
In Flagranti – Ex Ex Ex (Headman Dub) (Versace) [Spotify] [YouTube]

Photo source: Style.com / Marcio Madeira / Firstview

A balletic performance

awais — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 18:03:49 +0000

I’m a huge fan of Katie Shillingford’s work. I’ve always liked what she does, but her recent work has just blown me away. I think she is definitely amongst the five best fashion stylists in the UK at the moment! This editorial from the February issue of Dazed & Confuzed was shot by Ben Toms and the model is Ranya Mordanova.

View Full Album

Photo source: Dazed & Confused, via CouteQueCoute

Marchesa Casati – A dash of eccentricity

awais — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 04:45:22 +0000

Earlier we’ve blogged about how art inspires fashion, but how about when the artistic inspiration is a person – a muse? One such person, the Marchesa Luisa Casati, has inspired many writers, painters and also fashion designers .

The Marchesa was born into a wealthy Austrian-Italian family in Milan in 1881. A patron of coutouriers such as Paul Poiret, Mariano Fortuny and Erté and jewellers like Lalique, Casati astonished European society for the first three decades of the 20th century with her eccentric personality and outrageous style. In his autobiography Erté described her as the “the most extravagantly odd woman I have ever met”. She would wear living snakes as jewellery, throw parties where her servants were covered in leafed gold from top to toe and parade her pet cheetahs around in Venice on leashes covered with gold and diamonds whilst wearing nothing but a fur coat. Her hair was a dyed a deep henna red, her skin powdered pale white and her eyes heavily kohled.

The Marchesa painted by Augustus John to the left. Carina Roitfeld as Casati, photographed by Karl Lagerfeld.

More after the jump

She wasn’t only an inspiration to her contemporaries, more than 50 years after her death she still continues to inspires artists and fashion designers alike. In 2003 the New Yorker wrote an article about the Marchesa. The photograph of Vogue Paris editor Carine Roitfeld dressed as Casati was taken by none other than Karl Lagerfeld. The article also featured sketches by Lagerfeld inspired by Luisa Casati.

Chanel resort collection 2010

The Marchesa also seems to have been one of the main inspirations for Lagerfeld’s resort collection for Chanel 2010. The show was held in Venice, a place which was home to Casati for a large part of her life. The models’ hair and makeup was clearly inspired by her signature look.

Another designer who cites the Marchesa as a major influence is John Galliano. His extravagant haute couture show for Dior in 1998 was inspired by her and cost 2 million dollars to stage. The show was held at Opéra Garnier in Paris and the setting was inspired by the Marchesa’s lavish soirées.

Galliano for Dior Couture 1998

Galliano was also inspired by Casati when he launched his debut fragrance in 2008. The design of the flasque is inspired by this portrait of Casati, painted by Giovanni Baldini.

For his autumn/winter 2004/05 collection, which was named ”a dash of eccentricity”, Armani named Visconti’s movie The Damned, La Belle Époque and the Marchesa as his main influences.

Armani autumn/winter 2004/05

She was also the main inspiration behind Tom Ford’s spring/summer 2004 collection for Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche.

Yves Saint Laurent, spring/summer 2004

The Marchesa is also the theme of a recent editorial shoot in Acne Paper’s fall/winter issue. The shoot features Tilda Swinton and was shot by Paolo Roversi.

Tilda Swinton as the Marchesa in the autumn/winter 2009 number of Acne Paper

Casati was once quoted saying “I want to be a living work of art”. Throughout her life, she tried to commision her own immortality by patronizing some of the biggest artists of her time. When looking back at how she still manages to inspire people to this day, I would say that her quest was successful.

Photo sources: Vogue/Style.com, Acne Paper, Chanel, The New Yorker

Favourite Part of a Female

Qing — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 14:08:15 +0000

No…not a question from Dr.Hannibal, but when you look at a female, which part would you notice first.

Many people would say eyes as they are said ‘the window to heart’, how much can you see a person from looking into the eyes. Christian Dior’s least favourtie part on a femal is actual the knees. And that is the reason he always had all his skirt length to be ‘just over the knee’. He obviously quite prefer the female waist and therefore invent the ‘new look’ with cinched in waistline. However, Coco Chanel thinks that was a backwards move since she freed women’s body from corset by dressing them in cotton jersey which is at the time a common material for mens underwear.

I personally favour John Galliano’s choice, the back view of a female. It could speak so much attitude with a simple back view. Johnny Depp admits when he first time saw that beautiful female back in a Paris hotel lobby, he knew he had found the one—Vanessa Paradis.

And that’s why so many designers are focusing details on the back. Australian designer Willow had this quite cleverly done on a ready-to-wear day & night dress.

It’s romantic, yes it’s powerful too.

The sound of Spring/Summer 2010

awais — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 18:00:10 +0000

There’s no doubt that choosing the right music for a fashion show is important. I once read an interview with a designer who said that it can be compared to selecting the right soundtrack to a movie. It not only sets the mood, it also helps the spectators understand the designer’s vision and inspiration. I’ve compiled a list with some of the tracks used by designers for the spring/summer 2010 shows. Listening to some of these songs makes me wonder – what do these songs tell us about the collections? The inspiration? The person who buys them? Or even the label or designer?

New Order – Perfect Kiss (Dunhill, Paris Menswear Fashion Week)
Phoenix – Lisztomania (Yigal Azrouël, New York Fashion Week)
Deadmau5 – Ghosts n stuff (Versace, Milan Fashion Week)
Lil’ Mama – Lip Gloss (Prada, Milan Fashion Week)
The Beloved – Sweet Harmony (Jil Sander, Milan Menswear Fashion Week)
Metronomy – Hearthbreaker (Diskjokke remix) (Balenciaga, Paris Fashion Week)
Little Boots – Mathematics (DKNY, New York Fashion Week)
Gossip – Dimestore Diamond (Max Azria and Nicole Miller, New York Fashion Week)
The Kooks – Sofa Song (Burberry Prorsum, London Fashion Week)
Peaches – Downtown (Simian Mobile Disco Remix) (Etro, Milan Fashion Week)

I’m not sure, but judging from the sounds of it, spring/summer 2010 doesn’t only look good, it sounds good too!

Photo source: Style.com / Marcio Madeira

The Fate and Consequence between a Glitter Jacket and Michael Jackson’s Death

Qing — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 22:36:04 +0000

Way before the memorial day when MJ’s death suddenly happened as a shuttered global news, people who’s working for high-street fashion were busy predicting about what would be the hugest trend in AW2009 among all high-street. After working in UK fashion industry for many years, you are sort of having some 6th sense on what’s coming on next.

There was this photo-shooting of Paris Hilton in a Fushia Pink jacket with shining patent skinny trousers on early issue of 2009 Nylon magazine and my instinct told me that this look was sort of new. An initial storyboard with a going-out mood was created for first Autumn Story 2009 and this story then later became ’80’s Manhattan’ which is at the beginning confused all fashion buyers and consumers with question such as ‘why would you wear glitter in early autumn before Christmas’.

I guess the fashion world is a bit of a ‘Butterfly Effect’ in some way, which means everything and absolutely anything could effect the current trends as well as the future ones going out on the fashion world. Look now, MJ’s death has brought him back in world centre attention and this final stir naturally rocks the glitter story sky high.

Fast forward last year when Lady Gaga released her first album, at least that was the time when I started to show my interest to her. Before, I always thought that she’s just a manufactured music figure with no difference to Britney Spears. Then I read about somewhere that she’s actually a very creative person and that she collaborates with some friends of hers to create her on-stage looks and outfits. This instantly drew my attention to her, because not only that music needs to be strong enough to convince me, but also equally important is the visual performance to finish the whole ‘Package’. Her visual ‘Package’ led me to listen her songs and realize ‘they aren’t that bad at all’. Lady Gaga is such a good example of modern 21st century of pop/perform artist.

Back in early 90s being a teenage in China with no internet and limited sources of anything from outside world, Michael Jackson, Kurt Cobain was one of a few big names spreading around China. Without enough visual images, Cassettes and CDs were the only art forms to represent an artist. There were very limited images within CDs and from which you had to use quite a lots of own imagination to create the personalities of the artists. Of course Michael Jackson stood out. Sure he offers much more as he ticks all the boxes, from imagery to the sound of music to the technology he brought into music video world. Today, same for Lady Gaga, with so much technology and so much competition, how do you stand out? Gaga is doing an amazing job. She brought lots of glitters and leotards back to our life and yet we were still experimenting the looks, she’s already move on to another level. She claims that, ‘When I’m writing music, I’m thinking about the clothes I want to wear on stage. It’s all about everything altogether – performance art, pop performance art, fashion. For me it’s everything coming together and being a real story that will bring back the super-fan. I want the imagery to be so strong that fans will want to eat and taste the lick every part of us.’

Pop music must take the next-coming-trend on board to catch people’s attention to make the most possible impact. When you were crazy buying the come-back-80s-look early 2009, think about La Roux…when you rocking a dark jazzy look, think about Amy Winehouse. And now just a few days left before 2009, girls… when you slip on that black sequin blazer out partying and twirling around, think about MJ for one last time, I’m sorry to see you go, but at least you passed away at a damn right timing…

tokyo through one guy’s lense

Qing — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:44:31 +0000

there is always something about Japan or let’s focus and zoom into Tokyo. You are living in a city like kaleidoscope.This blog that I have recently been eyeing on is by this chinese guy living in Tokyo. Obviously a fashion media lover, got tons of magazines. He/She had taken a photo to show the stags of mags from floor to ceiling and claim that’s only 1/5 of his/her collection.

I have no idea whether he/she’s an art student or working there, but his/her photography skill is very detailed and vibrant coloured, slightly reminds me of Nick Knight. (look into those night club photos he’s taken, the people are cosmopolitan and mixed with East-London-grunge and New-York-glamorous)

The blog is a mix of street fashion shots, night club people catch shots and artistic object shots. I found street fashion shots are quite inspiring with details into the clothing and accessories while night club shots are great to feel people’s mood which also helps designers to re-think about human’s feeling while designing.

Well…enjoy it…and I’m sure you will, just like me.

Songs to design by

awais — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 05:21:38 +0000

Marsheaux – Hanging On

Yelle – A cause des garçons (TEPR remix)

Chad Gendason – Take your love away

Covenant – We want revolution

New Young Pony Club – Ice cream

Temposhark – Crime

Takako Minekawa – Phonobaloon Song

Autechre – Gantz Graf

Shiny Toy Guns – Le disko

Kurd Maverick – Blue Monday (Vandalism Remix)

Auto-Auto x Parralox – Don’t talk about love, Mr Schneider (the oxy mashup)

Emmon – Lips on Fire (Parralox Remix)

Some people visit an art gallery when they need inspiration, some read a book and some go travelling. Ever since I first starting doodling design ideas in my sketchbooks, I’ve been making playlists with “songs to design by” – songs that inspire me, help me keep focused and get my creative juices flowing. Some times it’s the lyrics, other times the beat, a certain composition or a catchy chorus or hook. So, for this #musicmonday I thought I’d post some of these songs.

Marsheaux – Hanging On (YouTube)
Covenant – We want revolution (YouTube)
Temposhark – Crime (YouTube)
The Human League – All I ever wanted (YouTube)
Takako Minekawa – Phonobaloon Song (YouTube)
Autechre – Gantz Graf (YouTube)
Hype – Living on video (Spotify)
Celluloide – Synchronise (Spotify)
Kurd Maverick – Blue Monday (Vandalism Remix) (YouTube)
Auto-Auto x Parralox – Don’t talk about love, Mr Schneider (the oxy mashup) (YouTube)

For those not familiar with the #musicmonday concept, this is how it works. Every monday twittering music fans post their song of the day. The tweet has a link to the song and the hash tag #musicmonday.

Photo source: badjonni

Art-inspired fashion

awais — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 01:04:06 +0000

Earlier this summer I was watching the video of La Roux’s Bulletproof and in the video she is wearing a Mondrian-inspired jacket by Jean-Charles de Castalbajac.

The fact that designers often take inspiration from art is hardly anything new, but what I find really fascinating is how different designers’ interpretation of the same piece of art can be. The brief for one of the first projects I did when I was in fashion school was to design an outfit inspired by an art piece. I remember chosing Mondrian’s iconic grid-based paintings and drawing a white skirt and jacket with black lines – it looked like a butchered version of Yves Saint Laurent’s iconic Mondrian dress from 1964.

Designers taking inspiration from art is hardly anything new. One thing I find really fascinating though is how different the outcome of different people’s interpretation of the same piece of art can be. One of the most famous examples of “fashion-inspired-by-art” is probably Yves Saint Laurent’s day dress from 1965 inspired by Dutch artist Piet Mondrian’s work. Earlier this summer I was watching the video of La Roux’s Bulletproof and in the video she is wearing another nice Mondrian-inspired piece – a jacket from Jean-Charles de Castalbajac’s Spring/Summer 2009 collection.

One of my favourite Mondrian-inspired collections though, has to be Norwegian design duo Batlak & Selvig’s spring/summer 2009-collection. Click >> here for a video of the fashion show which was held at Galleri Riis in Oslo in August 2008.

For those interested in reading more about Mondrian-inspired fashion, please check out this blog post by John Coulthart. In the post he also links to another great blog post on this topic by Couture Allure.

Photo source: Galleri Riis