Adieu to a loving decade!

Its been a fabulously fashionable year.Thank you readers for all your encouragement and support.Keep tuning in for more action in the coming year.

Where beauty beguiles...

To replace the impossibly perfect "photo shopped" women with an equally impossible task of hand stitching each LV bag, fashion ads will always remain tainted with fantasy!

John Galliano, is that you?

Does anyone else have a better reaction to this 29 year old John Galliano? From here to where you are today, the transformation has indeed been GARGANTUAN!

Image Source:www.gettyimages.com

Yohji Yamamoto takes a U-turn, embraces skinny silhouette!

Think Yohji Yamamoto and images of gloomy girls buried under heaps of black cloth with not a hint of the powerful sexuality that might lie hidden underneath, float across the mind's eye.This time around when the silhouettes mirrored the recession and transformed from voluminous black skirts to tight mini skirts and skinny pants, everyone familiar with Yamamoto's work raised an eyebrow in pleasant surprise. A few days later when Yamamoto filed for bankruptcy protection with debts accrued to $67 million, the pieces all fitted together. Concept has been swapped for commercialism, where bottom line seemed to be the strong focus and that it could be strengthened without slaughtering creativity, is after all the genius of Yamamoto.

Yamamoto understood that no one has the pleasant mood or the gentle patience to indulge in "conceptual" fantasy.Rather he focused on the mood at hand, making angst filled women, thinned down by financial worries and dressed in fitted black skirts and shirts with mutton of leg sleeves and collars stylishly popped out, take on the task of being their families' breadwinner, their inner turmoil and state of unrest manifested through bedraggled hair and blazing eyes made prominent through brightly colored feathers stuck on the eyebrows of eyes painted to match the color of the feathers!

The no nonsense tough attitude was prolonged through taut black boned corset jackets and double breasted tuxedo jackets with their collars and lapels pushed down to bare shoulders and worn with miniskirts, all coyness vapourising into an overpowering femininity!

As the show progressed the girls got bolder and rougher donning black leather, puffed-sleeve moto-cross jackets and fitted shirts worn with either asymmetrical miniskirts with kilt pleats on one side or over studded garter peeking out of miniskirts!

With jobs so scarce and the mood intensely workaholic with everyone consumed by a ravaging need to hold on to their only source of income, the focus was on work wear, the lean frame of the damsels held in respect through skinny pants and shorts worn with the usual fare of Yamamoto's floor grazing shirt dresses or the more conventional T-shirt over jackets, even the t-shirts oozing out their despair through little black appliquéd flowers decorating them!

Toughness and practicality give way to another hero of the hour, namely frugality! The worked-to-the-bone woman has barely enough time to crash into bed after making a messy something in the kitchen with not even sufficient time to clean up the leftovers! What was once a spic and span apartment had metamorphosed into a hell where rodents, moths and the like roam around as if they owned the place! The tough life bearing down on her apartment eventually starts showing up in her wardrobe that comprises of skinny pants that hide bony legs and long black lounge robes, all riddled with holes resulting from persistent gnawing at by rodents, barely held together and ready to disintegrate at any time. But in our girl's fight for survival these are the least of her concerns and so we catch a glimpse of her running around doing her weekend errands in "decayed couture"!

Finally, even during bad times there is the occasional merriment in the form of some one's birthday or baptism which begs to be dressed in "cheerful clothes". Our heroine brings down a musty old box from her attic where she has put away the girlie dresses of her cheerful youth to wait for better times! As she unpacks those delicate Liberty print floral dresses and jackets with utmost care, she notices to her utter dismay that the icy hands of ill fortune that had pulled her down into this rotten hole, had extended its hands right into this box as well, shredding the dresses into a "holey" mess! With a sunken heart and a threadbare dress our girl marches on to face the world as it is today...

Apart from the skinny silhouette which was a first in Yamamoto's collection, a 2 inch heeled shoe too was debuted by the designer whose shoes in the past neatly fell into the category of flat soled trainers! The finger tip exposing gloves too added a groovy edge to the collection!

Though the shoddy financial situation of his company might have been a contributing factor in Yamamoto choosing commercially sell able clothes over conceptual ones, still one has to commend Yamamoto for coming up with an extremely functional and smart work wear wardrobe with a bit of punk rock chic thrown in, in the form of bullet riddled jackets, pants and dresses.

Image Source:www.style.com www.catwalking.com

It's Panty Party at Jean Paul Gaultier!

How do you design for a generation that believes in "Nothing risqued, nothing gained!" , a time when runway looks are deemed conservative and the young things in limelight believe in voyeurism as the supreme form of entertainment? A case in point is the incident during Spring Summer 2010 fashion week which saw Rihanna alter a Gareth Pugh dress from the same season to provoke, shock and thereby enhance her recall factor.

So on one side you have the younglings daring to bare and on the other side the designers struggling to stay afloat in a sinking economy. Add to that the rich tightening their purses, probably investing their money elsewhere what with the stock prices plummeting and stars like Rihanna combing Paris to build a wardrobe for her next performance. And Jean Paul Gaultier realises which side his bread is buttered on, and comes up with a ready to wear collection not for the elegant ladies of pony riding classes but for the likes of Lady Gaga, Kate Perry, Rihanna and their clan who like flaunting their well toned bodies in little nothings!

He starts by naming the collection "G-spot" and before you raise a hammer, the G is for "guêpière", (the French word for "waspie" or wasp-waist) girdle and garter and all the other little things in your wardrobe, for his collection was a lingerie fest taken to the extreme with girls sauntering down the runway in delicately constructed cone-bras, corsets, basques, trompe l'oeil tights resembling stockings and French knickers, leaving the likes of MIA spoilt for choice and tempting the likes of Paris Hilton to consider wearing knickers again, all the while emphatically establishing Jean as the ultimate king of underwear!

Now to put some clothes on the models who had their names written across their chest or down their neck in Gothic style, Jean Paul Gaultier started with denim dungarees casually tossed on tough worker women dressed indifferently not caring much whether their lingerie is peeking out or not.


This was followed by an even tougher bunch of girls who looked as if they had just emerged from a knife-wielding-gang-war what with their Brenton striped tops slashed along the stripes and rewrapped around their bodies as tops and tight mini-dresses!


A closeup of the girls after their tough encounter shows them to be real dare devils with their hats cocked to one side and their tattered clothes revealing their pointy satin cone bras armouring and protecting their life and femininity!


The focus gradually shifts to another part where "once-fashionistas" deeply dissatisfied with the happenings on the street, decide to take law into their own hands and prepare for a guerrilla war of sorts, mixing their miniskirts, monokinis and bondage boots with traditional military wear of khaki pants and long trench coats!


Even the power wielding corporate barons of Wall Street and La Défense decide to give their support to this "we need no clothes" recession inspired minimalism by carelessly tossing their jackets over their "couture" lingerie serving as bullet proof vests and proving that what lies underneath can very well serve as outerwear!


Meet the leader of the brigand, ready for combat with her gun belt slung around her waist and stomach padded to protect against the on slaughter of bullets!


As the "lingerie revolution" gains currency, corporate women to athletes to young girls adopt the display of girdles and cone bras as the de rigueur way of dressing with the girdles serving as miniskirts and cone bras morphing into shoulder and bum pads!


The party girls dressed themselves in techno orange and lemon yellow dresses with enough emphasis on lingerie!


The red carpet looks were executed either as long flowing gowns puncuated with cone bras or girdles or as embellished gowns generously slit in the front to prominently display bras or as "Lady Gaga dresses" tightly hugging the body either as a long laced "corset gown" or as a shiny body suit with patches of black protecting the wearer's modesty!


It's noteworthy that the armful of leather gauntlets formed of brightly colored leather strips that hung loosely on the model's slim arms were in fact inspired by the plastic bangles worn by Rajasthani tribal woman!


The accessories were in tandem with the wild mood in the street with thick chains adorning the necks and ears, big bright plastic bangles bulking up the hands and bondage boots and heels protecting the legs!

Apart from the "extraBRAganza" on display, the collection offered mostly performance clothes befitting a rock star excepting a few tuxedos, trench coats and dresses! Overall a very entertaining collection, though tighter edition would have rendered the collection less repetitive!

Image Source:www.catwalking.com www.coutorture.com www.tribuneindia.com

Kate Moss comes a full circle!

Recently Kate Moss had come under fire for reportedly saying that "skinny is better than healthy!". This comment is Kate's equivalent of saying that "the sun rises in the east"! Why? She's been a strong believer in a skinny existence for eons that a 1998 cartoon of her by Tom Richmond pleading her to eat something holds good even today!

1998 - Kate, please eat something!

2009 - Kate, please eat something!

Some people never change...

Image Source:www.tomrichmond.com

Happy Birthday, John Galliano!

Dear John,

You will always be my inspiration! Have a great day!

-XOXO

P.S: John's birthday is tomorrow.

1 more day to go...

Dear John,

Did you know of those oxygen-blast facials that make you glow the way you do?

Did you know that you are the only one to inspire me enough to put a pencil to paper?

Did you know of the sleepless night I spent sketching you?

Did you know that you are almost there...

-XOXO

Image Source:www.catwalking.com

2 more days to go...

Dear John,

Did you know of the times you used to frequent Victoria & Albert Museum?

Did you know of the frenzied crowd that wanted to model for your maiden collection 'Les Incroyables' ?

Did you know that you liked your water spiked with lemon?

Did you know that there are 2 more days to go...

-XOXO

Image Source:www.catwalking.com

3 more days to go...

Dear John,

Did you know that you played the dhol in Rajasthan?

Did you know that you exchanged your Levi's jacket with a Sherpa boy?

Did you know that you say "Wicked" like no one else?

Did you know that there are 3 more days to go...

-XOXO

Image Source:www.catwalking.com

4 more days to go...

Dear John,

Did you know as a little boy you danced flamingo on the kitchen table?

Did you know of the wafting aromas that filled the souks you passed through in Gibraltar?

Did you know of those cheerless cold mornings that saw you jogging by the Seine river?

Did you know that there are 4 more days to go...

-XOXO

Image Source:www.catwalking.com

5 more days to go...

Dear John,

Did you know that the mean ones tried to dismiss you off as a mere plumber's son?

Did you know that you are mentioned in "Last of the Breed (Lovely 2)", Peter Sarstedt's sequel to "Where do you go to (my lovely)?" ?

Did you know that you are resilient enough to stage your fashion show just three days after your father's death?

Did you know there are 5 more days to go...

-XOXO


Image Source:www.catwalking.com

6 more days to go...

Dear John,

Did you know that your teacher at school pulsing your creativity encouraged you to become a designer?

Did you know about the endless hours you spent sketching at the library?

Did you know that you are a self made man?

Did you know that there are 6 more days to go...

-XOXO


Image Source:www.catwalking.com

7 more days to go...

Dear John,

Did you know that in a week's time you would have completed 49 glorious years of fantasy spinning on this planet?

Did you know that you have come a long way from the days of Bunsen burner and baked beans, rusted keys and bales of black cloth?

Did you know that there are seven more days to go....

-XOXO


Image Source:www.catwalking.com

The Copy Cat that lurked the China Fashion Week!

On one side there is talk of how China is fast catching up with the West on the fashion design front too and would in a matter of few years challenge and maybe displace Parisian designers as the world's most avant garde designers while on the other side there is a strong belief that China can emerge as a design powerhouse only when it "thinks on its own feet" and stops copying the work of other designers. As I sat musing over this, browsing through photos from the Spring Summer 2010 collection of the China fashion week I saw this picture(the right one) which reaffirmed my doubts that the Chinese aren't there yet! Why? Otherwise they wouldn't so blatantly copy Gareth Pugh's design (the left one) from Spring Summer 2009 and pass it off as their own a year later in 2010!

Image Source:www.catwalking.com www.dailytelegraph.com.au

Beauty & the Beast!

We are told that the world is full of opposites, male vs female, fat vs thin, ugly vs beautiful and then there are some whom we would in a heartbeat trade places with and others we would give our life not to!

Image Source:www.zimbio.com

Thank God, this isn't me!

While most of the time celebrities' red carpet looks make people wish they were them, there are occasions when we see someone and think "Gosh, I would never be caught dead in something like that!" Here are some of those moments that left me exclaiming "Thank God, this isn't me!".

While the Spring 2010 runways screamed "underwear as outerwear" Eva Mendes, being the stressed celebrity that she is just got the "underwear" part of it and misconstrued the message as "no underwear"! Also after feasting on innumerable beautiful drapes on the Spring runway it is a pity to see her sport a skirt which looks more like she had to pull it up to wade through a muddy pool!


Will someone please remind Nina Hagen, that Halloween is over and behind us?

These are the times when I become a staunch supporter of "size 0" .

Image source:www.zimbio.com