To Lee

"Celebrating the breathtaking imagination and groundbreaking designs of Lee Alexander McQueen, the latest fashion film by Nick Knight pays tribute to McQueen's sensational creations, stellar career, and most importantly to the man himself. Directed by Knight and set to an exclusive soundtrack by Björk, the film is featured online at SHOWstudio.com."

Links à la Mode, Happy Holidays Edition

I didn't get the chance to post this on Christmas Eve, but here's the Happy Holidays edition of the Top 20 IFB members' posts from last week, including mine on SHOWstudio's Design_download. Enjoy!

The Happy Holidays Edition

Edited by Retrochick

Well, I suppose I shall start this week's Links à la Mode with this:

HAPPY CHRISTMAS!

It’s Christmas Eve and I’m sure visions of sugar plums are dancing in everyone’s heads as they trim the tree and sip mulled wine in preparation for tomorrow's frivolities. All too soon it’ll all be over and brain power sapped from too many TV Christmas Specials, you’ll be wanting some mental sustenance, and that’s where we come in.

Essentially that’s a long winded way of me saying that what follows are some lovely links to keep you busy over the Christmas period.

M.I.S.S and JeweleryWhore have D.I.Y ideas to keep your mind and body occupied, ID Style and Little Miss Make Up show you how to ramp up the glamour in your make up bag, whilst Daily Diva Dish and The Working Wardrobe will help you plan what to wear for New Years Eve and that dreaded day you return to work.

If you run out of entertainment here then you should always check out the full Links à la Mode thread for more yummy fashion goodness.

I hope you all have a fantastic holiday and that Santa brings you everything you asked for!

Links à la Mode : December 24th

• Alice in Stilettos – Don’t Be Victimized By Fashion
• DailyDivaDish – New Year’s Eve Fashion: Make an entrance without breaking the bank. Includes 2 looks + DIY ideas.
• Fashion X K8 – Bringing attention to an essay of literary criticism that provides the proper vocabulary with which we can converse about a new fashion paradigm.
• Fasshonaburu – An interview with Liu Wen, the first Asian model to strut her stuff on the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show catwalk.
• Idiosyncratic Style – Wham GLAM Thank You Ma’am – Indulge in a little glamour for the holidays.
• Jewelry Whore – HUGE Roundup of DIY Christmas Present Ideas! It’s not too late to make some fabulous jewelry for Christmas presents!
• kaKofonie Of si(gh)lenS – You’re only a couple clicks and a few stitches away from owning your own one-of-a-kind designer piece with free patterns from SHOWstudio.
• La Société de Mode – A scream of an interview with stylist Brett Bailey.
• Little Miss Makeup – Bold lips: This season’s hottest makeup trend.
• M.I.S.S. – Another simple yet attractive necklace by Pandora from Acessory Source in this week’s She’s Crafty.
• Previously Owned – To celebrate the [almost there] opening of the ONLINE store, Previously Owned BLOG is giving away a Royal Blue hobo!
• Retro Chick – Vintage Hair Styling with Flamingo Amy
• Style on a String – Harem Pants: Yay or Nay? And some quick tips on how to buy and wear them.
• Sugar and spice and all things nice – 10 things I like…. no, LOVE… about FANTASY SHOPPING!!
• sweetarchivia – Review of the much anticipated launch of the Rodarte for Target line by the Mulleavy sisters.
• THE COVETED – Versace Pre-Fall returns to color
• The Demoiselles – Wing Tips: Your First Time…at the Tailor
• The Fashion Planner – The Fashion Planner is excited to announce the publication of The Fashion Planner’s Guide!
• The Style PA – I review the comfy, Cable Cosy by Isabella Oliver.
• The Working Wardrobe – Learning the art of layering that is both fashion-forward and office-appropriate.

Design_download

Well, today's find certainly helps keep my mind off of the depression caused by last night. Whilst perusing SHOWstudio.com, in particular their Fashion Revolution exhibition, I discovered the most spectacular section of their Participation exhibit called Design_download: "Design_download is an ongoing project that offers the chance to access downloadable paper patterns by leading fashion designers. The premise is a riposte to the elitist nature of high fashion, offering everyone the opportunity to own a ‘designer’ garment, and giving designers the chance, quite literally, to ‘dress the world’." In other words, you get to download a pattern for free to make your own John Galliano/Alexander McQueen/Yohji Yamamoto/Maison Martin Margiela/Junya Watanabe/Gareth Pugh/Antony Price piece. Seriously. If you/I had discovered this in time (and had created something lovely), we could've entered a competition to have our finished pieces displayed online and in the exhibition at Somerset House in London. Alas, the pieces have been submitted and chosen, and this Fashion Revolution ends tomorrow (edit: the exhibition has been extended until the 23rd). So you'll now have to create for the sheer joy of making and owning your own high end piece.

I'm not sure where to start first. I'm particularly ecstatic about the John Galliano pattern (top). Eons ago I saw this gorgeous forest green corset-type top on Etsy (above), and had contacted the seller to get one custom made for myself when I had enough money. However, we lost contact, it disappeared from my Etsy Favorites, and I couldn't seem to find that seller when I had enough dollars to put an order in. And now by bizarre coincidence, I've seen the original corset again, as it was that person's result of trying out this Galliano pattern (that 'person' being Lucy Copping from Wales)! And now I have the chance to make one for myself. Eek!

I'm also, as you know, recently obsessed with the designers featured in Skin+Bones. So I'd love to try out the Yohji Yamamoto pattern. When it was originally posted on SHOWstudio, apparently you were only given the pattern for the above intricate jacket, but you didn't know exactly what you were constructing until you actually constructed it. Fascinating! There are photos up now of finished jackets, and I love the look, so I must try the pattern out, even if it's not so mysterious anymore.

I'd also like to try the Maison Martin Margiela pattern, which is actually "an unfinished design true to their principles of deconstruction, prompting the maker to make crucial decisions about the finished nature of the garment." I love the photos of the finished dresses, so this could be great fun.

Perhaps I should've asked Santa for some fabric this Christmas!

(Photos via SHOWstudio.com)

At last...

So, you say you have an extra £ 7,500 laying around? Well, that one-off dress that Gareth Pugh was creating inside the Internets is now up for sale in the SHOWstudio SHOP. I would recommend making sure you can afford to buy a slip or something to wear underneath it though...Oh, and that last pose - one of my favorite stretches.

Gareth Pugh's Sliced Wonder

If you're online right now, the last day of Gareth Pugh's LiveStudio session is running into overtime, but it looks like they're just finishing up. Here's a couple of screen shots of Gareth laying the finished dress flat out on the ground, and then just the dress itself. Every piece of the dress has been meticulously hand slashed by Gareth, so this dress is mega stretchy and drapey. I'm pretty sure it'll be way to much for my budget once it goes on sale in the SHOWstudio SHOP though. Sigh.

Edit: The session just ended. Here's one last screenshot with Gareth's hand showing where the front hem ends - the back is longer, like a train. Just lovely!

Gareth Pugh, Live in a Box

I feel like I suddenly have a lot of work to do for my blog, and no time to do it. I have a proposal to write up and send to my favorite designers, two interviews to write up questions for, and an article to write to possibly contribute to another blog/online magazine. Eek! But I have found some lovely things that I must share with you, so here I am, revisiting my old friend, Procrastination. He's always been good to me, so why not.

First up is what I think is an amazing project/idea, involving the likes of Gareth Pugh (did you lose sleep over that jacket like I did?). Informed by Fashion156, I discovered a site I shall be perusing quite regularly called SHOWstudio. For those of you out of the loop like myself, according to their About page, "SHOWstudio’s innovative and ground-breaking projects have defined the manner in which fashion is presented via the Internet. SHOWstudio.com has pioneered fashion film and is now recognised as a leading force behind this new medium." I never knew! Their current LiveStudio project involves the Gareth Pugh creating a unique dress in a studio over 3 days while being broadcast live over the Internet. Mr. Pugh will also answer your questions submitted online while he's trapped within this scarily creative box. AND, the garment will be available for sale in the SHOWstudio SHOP once the event/dress is finished.

I've missed the first day of this, but I'm going to try to catch it on Monday, since I have the day off. I'm quite intrigued by this whole idea. It just seems like the most delicious rat-in-a-maze experiment, except you have a brilliant designer instead of a rat, and a one-of-a-kind garment at the end instead of a piece of cheese. Although I do hope Mr. Pugh receives some kind of sustenance whilst being trapped on all our voyeuristic computer screens. Oh, there are quite a few designers I'd love to see do something like this so I can see their brilliance in action. Is that so wrong?