Super Moon

Tonight the moon will be the closest it's been to earth for 19 years. It's cloudy so I won't be able to see it but as an homage to the moon, any extra-terrestrial friends out there and to a man who has done his fair share for menswear, here's a couple of pictures of The Man Who Fell To Earth, Mr David Bowie, taken by Geoff MacCormack.

The striped jacket is an original by Bowie's tailor Freddie Burretti and shows him on the Trans-Siberian Express in 1973 where I imagine he turned a few heads.

The second is a shot taken on the set of The Man Who Fell To Earth. Is there anybody like him out there?

Let's hear it for the boys

Contrary to what this blog may suggest I find menswear a more interesting and definitely subtle ground. It's time for me to focus on a few menswear thoughts and in order to kick this off I am posting one of my favourite shots ever. A Jean-Paul Gaultier outfit from a few years back.

Yes he's wearing a skirt but.. it's everything together that makes it masculine, his glance, his cigarette, his hair, his stance. While the straps and harness give it a hint of some other world. It's a great picture.

Apocalypse now

Chanel's stern women had dressed in a hurry to escape who knows what sort of ashen situation this season. Layered clothes, jackets sewn in to one another, quilted fabrics, these girls (and a couple of guys) were not hanging around to make small talk.

Many of the shows this season had a fin de siecle feel about them be it war or some other disaster the future has yet to reveal, and it's safe to say we're experiencing enough of both just now.

Great fashion designers have always been able to distill our consciousness in to clothes and from the images I've seen recently there may be trouble ahead.

Roaring 40s

I mentioned in an earlier post about the Marc Jacobs collection reminding me of Bladerunner and there's more of that "end of time" feel in the Fall Miu Miu collection.

There's a nostalgic air for 40s war-time style with strong shoulders, prim tailoring, fabric that looks like rayon (but is clearly silk) but with Miuccia Prada's pitch perfect modern execution.

The powdered faces and groomed hair don't compete with the clothes while a red lip or a great pair of sun-glasses provide the perfect accent. Prada's little sister grew in to a woman to be reckoned with.

The shape of things to come

I saw a lot of sculptural shapes in the outerwear during this round of fashion weeks. No-one ever treated clothing as sculpture better than Cristobal Balenciaga, a skill that has revered and enhanced with the era of Nicolas Ghesquiere.

To close the Fall 2011 show he sent out coats that are re-workings from an original Balenciaga design from 1965. In today's fabrics with Ghesquiere's hand tracing the work of "the master of us all", they sing.

Just don't add water

Levi's new Waterless Jeans campaign is pretty impressive. It's the most simple (and obvious) idea transformed in to a very canny campaign.

The message? Wash your jeans less (in cold water and line dry when you must). The result? Use less water, and energy. Magic!

I'm simplifying things here but it's a thought provoking campaign and I hope it really does provoke some people to think.

Not for the faint hearted...

...or the big breasted. Or in fact just the breasted.

Balmain's plunging to there skinny fit jumpsuit is pretty much as rock 'n' roll as it gets, from a show where many looks were clearly inspired by 70s David Bowie. The jackets covered with mirrors were also amazing. It's enough to make a girl want to go out and dance!

Hats off to hats.

I read a rallying argument today by Ari Cohen on the Huffington Post for a return to the wearing of hats. I fully agree but in today's, and certainly LA's, overall casual attitude to the sartorial side of life it's hard to not feel conspicuous. A little OTT in a sea of flip-flops.

But then, I suppose sometimes we want to be looked at in which instance a hat certainly helps, it also adds a spot of mystery, a je ne sais quoi, and of course protection from the sun if you want to be pragmatic about it.

A friend of mine in London called Noel Stewart, produces beautiful headwear. By combining his classical millinery training with humour and romanticism he presents hats that range from the every day to the once in a lifetime. It makes me want to don a chapeau and fall in step with Ari!

Show me the Marni!

After my adoption plea to Miuccia Prada would come the same type of begging to Consuelo Castiglioni. Anyone who has enough chutzpah to produce an outfit that matches the wall and floor is my kind of woman.

I often think the label produces clothes that only women really "get" as Marni balances a fine line between tastefully quirky and divinely eccentric. It's a slow sexiness, and that's a great thing in this age.

It was hard to pick a favourite outfit from the Fall 2011 show but if I was pressed here they (probably) would be.