Thakoon has partnered with Nars to create a range of super-vibrant nail colors. The range, called the Thakoon for NARS Nail Collection, is made up of six colors designed to complement and resonate with the designer’s Spring 12 collection.
The result, which is Nars’ first collab with a fashion designer, is a half-a-dozen eye-widening shades in hues that reflect the colors of an Indian spice market. Koliary is a bright mid-blue; Anardana is a pinky red; Ratin Jot is a medium saturated purple; Amchoor is a super bright and warm sunshine yellow and Kutki is a bright light blue.
Finally, Lal Mirchi is a bright red orange hybrid that adds an extra exclusive element to the range as it is only available in the Nars store on Bleecker Street.
The highly saturated, high-shine shades come in an opaque finish, designed to work perfectly for spring and the formula is long-wearing and chip-resistant and free of toluene, formaldehyde and DBP.
The look tunes in to Thakoon’s spring 12 color palette of orange, turquoise and green. The brands – and indeed, their heads, Thakoon Panichgul and Francois Nars – are already long term partners, having worked together at New York Fashion Week, so this team up has an air of inevitability about it.
The polishes are widening distribution as of tomorrow after a limited release. The polishes are $18 (£14) each.
www.narscosmetics.com
www.thakoon.com
With proportions nodding to the Fifties’, a series of visual updates help to formalize the camouflage pattern here. The slicked-back rockabilly hair feels well-tuned to match with the mid-thigh, slim-lined jacket but the Teddy Boy connotations end there as the otherwise pared down mac describes a much more current appeal with its renewed and formal take on camou. Such offbeat pops of camou are being worked in unexpected arenas for menswear right now and that’s what happens here as it finds a contrast in the softened shades of the round toed Oxford in baby blue, which are matched with soft pink socks. Hard and soft, vintage and current; the simple background features are thoughtfully styled with cuffed black jeans and a buttoned up gray shirt.
Stephen Jones is exhibiting an edit of his stunning hats at the Bowes Museum this summer. The London milliner, who has created headwear for an impressive roster of maisons and designers including Jean Paul Gaultier, Vivienne Westwood, Dior, and Giles Deacon as well as for an A-list line up of private clients from Carla Bruni to Madonna, has emptied his archives of a number of his most prominent designs for the show, called From Georgiana to Boy George.
The refined setting of The Bowes Museum will play host to designs like the towering swan mask-hat that featured as the opener for Giles Deacon’s Spring 12 Giles show, alongside other head turning styles, which often draw inspiration from the peacockish Georgian era – especially the Regency – hence the show’s name.
Jones, a Central St Martins graduate, has carved a reputation nonpareil in the world of millinery since opening his Covent Garden store in 1980, and counts illustrious customers from Princess Diana to Dita Von Teese and Kylie to Mick Jagger among his wearers.
Joanna Hashagan, keeper of Fashion and Textiles at the Bowes Museum, says: “We are delighted to have attracted such a top designer as Stephen Jones to exhibit in our amazing gallery, which recently hosted an exhibition of […] Vivienne Westwood shoes. To have Stephen’s hats here is really topping it off in prestigious manner.”
Cherry picked Jones creations already reside in permanent museum collections from London’s V&A to New York’s FIT. The exhibition in Durham runs from May 19 to September 2 2012.
www.thebowesmuseum.org.uk
The Design Museum and Swarovski have come together to task a raft of designers to create works reflecting how digital technologies change and how quickly.
The show, called Digital Crystal, is couched in philosophical terms with designers challenged to examine the “future of memory” with works that either use or reflect vanguard technologies and communication.
The show is Swarovski’s first ever museum level exhibition and it promises a selection of searing visuals as well as an intellectual dissection of how state of the art design will be remembered in years to come.
A decade ago, Swarovski expanded beyond the realms of fashion and jewelry into technological arenas and at the time commissioned headline designers including Ron Arad, Yves Behar, Paul Cocksedge, Troika and Fredrikson Stallard to create works reflecting how crystals were being used for technical ends. These designers are reworking those existing pieces – including Ron Arads text-displaying crystal chandelier – to update them for today’s brief. They will be shown alongside a dozen new works by designers from as far afield as Korea and Canada.
The show will run from September 5 to January 13, 2012. Swarovski will design an exclusive line of merchandise taking inspiration from the exhibition.
www.swarovski.com
www.designmuseum.org
Prada has teamed up with Vahram Muratyan on a new project called Prada Parallel Universes. The creative result is a series of animated gifs, which is being disseminated through the net on graphic designer Muratyan’s own site, a cadre of high profile co-conspirator blogs and also on Prada.com.
The third party bloggers will each be given their own gif to release. Style Bubble, Bryan Boy, Anna Dello Russo, Kate Loves Me, A Shaded View on Fashion and Know Wear will all have their own surreal visions to unveil.
Each of these visuals reference one of Prada’s key accessories for the season, including the Dixie sunglasses, the Pyramide bags and the men’s golf-inspired Rocket shoes as the viral collab sees the Paris artist use his renowned graphics to create a series of block color, lo-fi digitals that bring the retro car culture inspired accessories to digital life.
In the animations, the handle of the Pyramide bag becomes a steering wheel, the rocket shoes double up as skyscraper toppers and the saffiano envelope clutch is a diving pool. The chic Fifties’ style feel of the accessories is followed through in the mood of the graphics.
Prada calls the collab a dreamlike virtual story that matched new media with Prada’s semiotics and “a road paved with its 2012 Spring/Summer men’s and women’s accessories”. With a promise that the project will become wearable we expect to see these graphics make the leap to printed versions before long. Muratyan’s illustrations are familiar to design and fashion fans from his Paris vs New York blog.
www.prada.com
parisvsnyc.blogspot.com
A surplus style camou jacket is contrasted with a pretty pleated coral skirt here as authentic oversized menswear gets played out alongside a street-ready rendition of the super feminine soft and balletic folds. The masculine element is echoed in the beanie and boots, which both underline the modern military feel but the overall look remains feminine thanks to the bright lipstick and oversized shades. The basic underlayer of the white crew neck T-shirt is what unites the two disparate ends of gender play – that, and the cleverly minimal palette. For while coral and olive team well, the background tricolor of black, white and green also unite leaving the coral color to really pop.
Proportion play dominates this colorful look as the oversized knit is worn as a dress and styled with knee socks and DIY studded pumps. The volume of the knit’s silhouette and its mid gauge yarn count are at odds with the super-thin delicate gold jewelry and slim lined Aviator frame but the supersize earrings that resonate with the big knit help to make this wearer look elfin and cute in comparison. That slightly childlike nod in the styling is echoed in the schoolgirl backpack and knee highs. Her blue end dip dye hair is worn in a messy top knot that complements the washed out color. Though it fades out, the color retains enough punch to match with that super smurfette blue stripe.
Lulu Guinness has designed a capsule range that will form part of the Uniqlo Spring 2012 UT collection.
There are 14 cute graphic designs in the range of wide necked, gently draping T-shirts, which all come in the trademark Lulu palette of black, white and vivid lipstick red, with inky blue and gray backgrounds.
The designs hail from a line up of the Lulu Guinness brand’s most iconic images and graphics. That means a hairline and glasses that resemble the designer’s own, and repeat prints and riffs on cats and kisses, with big lipstick kisses and cat features featuring. A vintage cameo print, trompe l’oeil pearls and a stylishly hand drawn London skyline complete the line up along with a printed bow and a line drawing of London townhouses.
Plain bodies are contrasted with nautical style stripes on contrast sleeves for a few of the styles and while the mood taps into the Lulu Guinness premium lifestyle, the prices are in line with the rest of Uniqlo’s huge UT T-shirt collection, making the London designer’s look easily achievable.
The collection hits stores today and retails for $19.90 [£12.90]. The designer will attend an event at the Japanese store’s Oxford Street flagship on Thursday to launch the designs.
www.luluguinness.com
www.uniqlo.com
Asos Africa is looking to deploy customized kitenge prints on its Spring 2012 range. The three year old sub-line from the etail giant is rescaling and re-coloring the traditional wax prints to give them a modern edge as they appear on items including pencil and midi skirts, peplum details, crop tops, micro shorts and tunics.
The prints, which are traditionally used to convey mood and meaning through color and pattern are used in the Spring 12 range as all-over clashing prints or as geometric panels. Bold stripes and fluorescent highlights are juxtaposed as repeat patterns and a sharpened sense of color sees a spectrum of acid lime, turquoise and lilac contrasted with black and white sections. Pieces are over-layered with conversational prints of Kenyan wildlife including miniature rhinos and giraffes. Beaded and applique detail are in line with the ethnic mood.
The range, which is made in conjunction with Soko and several small African communities, launches online on April 30, 2012. For each Asos Africa garment sold £5 goes to help the building of Soko’s new workshop and is match funded by the Asos Foundation.
Last June Michelle Obama wore an Asos Africa top on her visit to the continent.
www.asos.com
With an echo of the old school gent, this is a modern take on tailoring. It’s all about maxing the accessories to dandify the off beat separates as a standard black blazer and off-matched tapered trousers get an athletic yet genteel overhaul. Geek glasses and a straw trilby tone down the cavalier facial hair, while the matching polka dot pocket square and socks testify to the attention paid to the smaller details. There is a sense of East London styling here with vintage finds drawing the eye. We love that vintage holdall’s tennis racket holder and the way its lighter than tan leather is echoed in the well-loved two tone brogues. The whole look gets a color pop in the foulard style handkerchief hem paisley pop necktie (think D&G Spring 12) which perfectly sums up the youthful rehash of generations old styling.
