Christian Louboutin is asked five questions by New York boutique department store Bergdorf Goodman and charms with his easy manner and just-so French accent. Below are the questions along with snippets from his responses.
What’s your most cherished NYC secret?: The restaurant Quality Meats: “….I’m a meat lover……” Whose closet would you like to raid?: Loulou de la Falaise: “…She’s been having 30 years of fashion history and so many colors and so many accessories….” What must have can’t you live without? I-phone: ”….It’s difficult because I feel like it’s like an addiction, but it’s definitely, it’s the only addiction that I have so I think I’m fine with it.” What is the one style you never want to see make a comeback? Clogs: “…for one reason, I love shoes and there’s a thing I love about shoes and it’s the sound of shoes……hearing the sound of a clog is really not nice, not pretty, it’s an ugly sound….” What is your worst childhood fashion memory: A ski suit: “….I had this incredibly puffy, bright red, ski outfit….”
If you’re a fan, he will be making an appearance at Bergdorf’s on January 31st on the second floor. Click here for details.
We caught up with designer Leah McSweeney recently to find out the latest developments with her Married to the MOB label. A pioneer on the streetwear scene when she started up MOB seven years ago, the label has had it twists and turns, including the recent conclusion of a partnership with an investor and is getting back to its roots, albeit with a second-act heaping does of wisdom. McSweeney = MOB so it’s no surprise that many of the bumps, bruises and joys experienced by the brand over the past few years found a parallel in the young designer’s own life. Compelling, frank, more than slightly intense, not to mention a bit of a lightening rod, this is one female whose next moves we will always look out for and cheer.
HS: A lot has happened in the past year. Can you catch everyone up on Married to the Mob and what happened to your brand? You had investors and now you are no longer partnered with them.
Leah: Legally I can’t get into details. In the long run, the only thing that matters is I got my company back. I have nothing but gratitude toward my ex-partners, they believed in me but we’re two different animals. They’re amazing at what they do with men’s brands and I will say the three years I had funding, it was the best education on the business. I worked side by side with super smart, successful people, but more importantly I learned how to make a garment, and I learned about fabric, production and design. I started out making tee shirts and I didn’t have any experience. When I went into the partnership I was 25 and on top of the world, thinking, this is the easiest thing getting this brand to blow up. I thought it was the be all end all and it was just the beginning.
In the Q&A continued on the next page, find out aobut MOB’s second act, McSweeney’s road to sobriety, favorite collabos, what she has to say about streetwear, the future of “bitch” in MOB designs, and the start of a new label.
The release of the Muppets movie has unleashed the passion of longtime adult fans all over the country. Miss Piggy recently tapped for a collaboration with Mac cosmetics talks to Oyster magazine about beauty style and more :
Oyster: You have been in the spotlight for nearly 40 years and yet you don’t look a day over 25. What’s your beauty secret — Lotions? Serums? Botox? Miss Piggy: You bet! Lotions! Serums! Botox! Spackle! Duct Tape! You name it, I use it. Even though I am naturally beautiful, I believe in using every means at moi’s disposal to improve, enhance and otherwise fabulasize moiself. As my stylist always says: “What’s the point of looking in the mirror if you can’t surprise yourself?”
One of our fave ladies Melody Ehsani gets love from Life+Times in a feature written by no less than the amazing Dream Hampton:
Melody Ehsani is as beautiful as anything she’s ever created. She experiments with fashion and makeup in ways that anticipate trends (she shaved one side of her head about five years before Cassie) and her presence single-handedly transforms a room she enters. Still, she’s soulful and her jewelry, worn by music’s biggest trendsetters, always seems to carry a story or history, or even humor (see the enamel “I’m Fly” jet plane ring). She’s intentional in every way, she holds a direct gaze and is generous and disciplined about keeping her word. Melody’s drive and focus have given her brand cache. And she’s just beginning…
One of the institutions in sneaker culture, the illustrious Sneaker Freaker, got to pick the brain of Snob favorite Jeremy Scott. A worthy read as you can see:
Do you think that people take fashion too seriously? Yes I do. It should be fun, it should be something that you play with. Fashion should be… frivolous. I guess the thing that’s hard for me to understand is why other people see fashion in that way, because I just don’t. I don’t think I see life in that way either. Even when really bad things happen, I can still kind of chuckle about it. It doesn’t mean it’s not serious. But I could still probably make a joke about it, you know? And have a little laugh, even though I’m upset. I just think of fashion as a church, where they kneel down and pray in front of a blouse. It’s not meant for that! I want my clothes to have a life. I want people to live in them and wear them and create memories in them, meet their boyfriend and then have pictures on Facebook, then going back and thinking ‘Oh, I was wearing that jacket,’ and that has so much more emotion instead of something that’s so precious you don’t even want to wear it!
Radcollector columnist, JZ Radical, owner of Narural Koncept talks to uber talented artist Sky Farrell.Read the interview in its entitrety here. Girl Rule!
We showed Super Fertile designer Kali Arulpragasam’s latest jewellery collection titled “Murder” (one look featured above) last week and today Stylelist has followed up with an interview with the designer. If you don’t already know, she is the older sister of M.I.A. and in the interview she was asked what her sibling thinks of her work:
What does M.I.A. think of the collection?
I tend to not give my jewels to celebrities, so she usually gets an invoice from me when she wants something. After I released the first images of “Murder” during the first week of June she tweeted it, so I know she approves. I’m experimenting with a new concept which is not to use celebrities to sell my work. I never use celebrities. I must be the only designer to turn down Lady Gaga. I don’t even have a press agent. I’m approaching this as art, my jewelry is wearable art.
Darn! Perhaps not the best of friends those two, but they certain share the commonality of wearing their intensity on their sleeves, a trait which of course we admire greatly.
Michèle Lamy is one of those enigmatic figures who make our individualistic style dreams come true, her latest feature on Oyster Magazine starts as follows:
Teenage stripper, cabaret consort, restaurateur, designer, film-maker, defence attorney and philosophical protègèe to the late Gilles Deleuze are but a handful of Lamy’s past pursuits. The LA club queen has cult appeal, kindled by an intimidating intellect and an awe-inspiring sense of style. In Oyster #93 we asked Lamy what roles beauty and self-image have played in her colourful life.
“Don’t try to be what people want you to be, it’s the wrong way,” says Franca Sozzani discussing her latest book I Capricci della Moda, in which she shares her blog entries from last year, the exchanges she’s had with readers as well as an inside look into what makes Vogue Italia so successful. With sub-sites like “Vogue Curvy” and “Vogue Black,” Sozanni also shares that the printed magazine has seen a 20 percent increase in sales. We say take notes U.S. glossies!
