All-Black Is The New Black

I am very into black clothes and all-black outfits at the moment. I like that it feels so simple and almost like an uniform because it is reduced to just one single non-colour – hence the cut, shape and texture of the fabric start playing an even bigger role. At least half of my wardrobe consists of mainly black clothes now. I am trying to get more into blogging-mode again as I have been neglecting this very blog for far too long and only kept updating my Instagram. I was even thinking about giving up on blogging for good. Here is a selection of black clothes to start with.

1. Maison Martin Margiela 14 Men's Coated Replica Duffle Coat // 2. Neil Barrett Bonded-Jersey Crew Neck Sweatshirt // 3. Nanamica Cycling Pack // 4. Yang Li Men's Triple Welted Sole Derby Shoes // 5. Comme des Garçons Very Black Line Document Holder // 6. Acne Canada Scarf // 7. Adidas Originals Campus 80's // 8. Weekday Ilex Tee // 9. COS Elasticated Waist Trousers

Julia Saner

I already mentioned her in an entry about a year ago after she won the Elite Model Look International 2009 and after impressing me with that editorial shoot in Swiss fashion magazine Annabelle. Nowadays it seems that she is having a really busy schedule and is being booked for runway shows and fashion shoots everywhere. She appeared on the runway for every important designer in Milan and Paris last season including Chanel, Fendi, Dior, Givenchy, Céline and many more. Rumor has it Anna Wintour was the one who discovered and mentioned her to Lagerfeld and also that she is also going to be in a fashion spread shot by Mario Testino for the Februrary issue of Vogue US. She also currently appears in a lot of Pre-Fall 2011 lookbooks like in Thakoon's which is pictured below. I am so glad for her and we will certainly see a lot more of her in the future. Go Julia!

Thakoon Pre-Fall 2011 Lookbook

Zurich Lookbook by Playlust & Ron Orp

Fellow blogger Play, who is from Zurich as well, published her second lookbook from Zurich together with Ron Orp. It's all about „Now-Looks at Wow-Events“ and it looks indeed like a visual diary of the most inreresting events that took place the last couple weeks in Zurich. There are lots of pictures of local people but also some celebrities and some micro-interviews. She also did a little interview with me, which you can find on page 32. Affa is on the cover of the lookbook and view the lookbook online here.

Fashionslave

Part of Zurich's newest shopping destination opened its doors this month: Im Viadukt. The viaducts exist since 1894 and are used as a pathway for trains. After renovating the viaducts the last couple years, they decided to offer the space underneath them to various kinds of stores or restaurants. The renovation work is reaching its end and the first batch of stores opened two weeks ago. I am kind of disappointed when I look at the list of stores that made it in the end, but there are still some very interesting ones – like Fashionslave.

Fashionslave is situated in viaduct number 29. It's a concept store offering exclusively menswear from labels such as Raf Simons, Henrik Vibskov and Odeur. Besides that, it's a place for artists and designers to collaborate and showcase their stuff. There's also a hair and make-up artist available if you need more than just a change in clothes.

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Address:
Menswear & Style Gallery
im Viadukt 29
Viaduktstrasse 29
8005 Zürich
Phone: +41 44 440 29 29
http://fashionslave.ch/

I created a new category called Zurich City Guide to collect all my entries so far about shops and other places in Zurich but more importantly also for the ones in the future.

Paris Fall 2010 RTW

Last week, another month of fashion madness ended this season with the ready-to-wear fashion shows in Paris. Paris fashion week is the one I was looking most forward to, since many of my favourite designers were showing their collection there, plus I was eagerly waiting until the first pictures of Alexander McQueen's final collection hit the web – and it was worth the wait. The team of McQueen showed 16 outfits in a private presentation, which are all referencing to paintings of the 15th-century. Although the clothes look really complicated, McQueen made them with a minimum of seams – such techniques always fascinated him. Another great collection was Lanvin. Can Alber Elbaz do any wrong? He has been constantly one of my favourites for the last couple of seasons. His collection for Lanvin appeared to be comfortable while maintaining a strong shape. The clothes looked like made out of one garment that draped around women's bodies. Although I didn't have much time during Paris fashion week to follow the shows as closely as the other ones, I still managed to have a look at most of them.

Alexander McQueen


Lanvin


Stella McCartney


Chloé


Other collections I liked as well

Pictures via style.com

POP Magazine Issue 22

I've never been interested in POP magazine until last summer, when the first issue of POP with Dasha Zhukova as editor-in-chief came out. In this issue, Dasha Zhukova talks in the editor's letter about how everything is made digitally available today and whether it will be the end of today's print publications or not. At one point, she says: „However, art and fashion magazines serve a more aestehtic purpose than an informative one. It is the beauty of the layouts, the quality of the design, the feel of the paper, all the tactile sensations that make these publications worth buying. These magazines are collector's items of sorts, visual time capsules of the period in which they are published.“ While I think this doesn't apply to all fashion magazines, it certainly does now to POP. I am not buying magazines anymore to keep me updated or to get the latest news, because that's what I have my Google Reader or Twitter for nowadays. I have already written a bit about all this in one of my previous blog entries. This issue of POP Magazine contains over 360 pages and is full of beautiful editorials, well written articles and interviews with a great layout and design.

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This issue is also a good example on how you can connect digital content with a printed publication. They included some graphic markers for something called augmented reality, where you will have to go to their website and show the marker to your webcam – something very interesting will happen. Unfortunately, I couldn't test this so far, because thepop.com/ar and POP's iPhone app are both having problems at the moment.

London & Milan Fall 2010 RTW

The most awaited show in London was Burberry once again – even Anna Wintour came to London exclusively for this single show. The collection had a similar vibe as the menswear one, so not too many surprises there. But I have to give them kudos for their livestream, because they took it to a whole new level. Not only did they stream their show live in 3D (same technology as in current cinemas) to a few selected places all over the globe, they also streamed it directly to our screens in HD and even made a whole pre-show around it – similar to broadcastings known from TV channels. After the show, you were able to pre-order some items for a limited time with an estimated delivery time of six to eight weeks, which means you would get it before it even hits the stores. As I already said in an earlier post, I think this all is going in a very interesting and exciting new direction and I can't wait until other brands make similar moves. Here are my favourites from London and Milan fashion week.

Margaret Howell (London)


Burberry Prorsum (London)


Fendi (Milan)


No. 21 (Milan)

I have only picked the ones of which I liked the entire collection – but it might be very well, that I have missed some nice ones, because I didn't have much time the last two weeks to pay close attention. I'm looking forward to hearing your favourites in the comment's section.

Margaret Howell pictures via elle.com, rest via style.com.

New York Fall 2010 RTW

Many designers in New York decided this season to stream their fashion shows live over the internet, which is great news for all the fashion addicts in the world. It is like having an own private front-row seat, because we can watch it from wherever we are (in my case it was mostly my bed). You get to experience so much more by watching the livestream instead of just looking at pictures on style.com. We would have missed the whole staging and music, like Rodarte's glowy finale with black light or Marc Jacob's dreamy soundtrack Over The Rainbow, which fit perfectly to the mood of the collection. It looks like more and more designers will provide us with livestreams in the future and I find this novelty very exciting. Here are my favourite collections of New York Fall 2010 and I would like to hear your favourites in the comments too.

Marc Jacobs


Thakoon


Rodarte


The Row


Other collections I liked as well

All pictures via style.com

RIP Lee Alexander McQueen

Alexander McQueen Fall 2008 Ready-To-Wear (pictures via style.com)
Lee Alexander McQueen, 1969-2010. The fashion world lost one of its geniuses yesterday.

Elle Collections Spring/Summer 2010

After having seen Susie's blog entry about the Elle Collections magazine, I decided to see whether my local newsagent had it in stock. I've never heard about it before surprisingly. Without much hope, they actually had a pile of copies there, so I grabbed one and must say, it was a very good purchase.

After flicking through the first few pages, you'll notice how different it is from an average magazine. Instead of just showing pictures of the runway collections like those on style.com, there are collage and selections based on a theme. For example a two page spread dedicated to fashion invites or one dedicated to facts about Chanel's fashion show. Also, the typography and design is very beautiful. The cover is a matte-grainy paper and there are different types of paper within the magazine.

There are different articles with questions they asked to various persons, such as editors of magazines or famous fashion bloggers – or a pleasurable article of an editor of The Times about how he experienced his first season at those fashion shows without having had any previous knowledge in fashion.

RTW Fall 2010 Menswear Favourites

After having seen all the menswear fall 2010 runway collections that were presented in Milan and Paris, I decided to make a little selection of my favourites this season. Did you follow the men's fashion shows and if so, who were your favourites?

Dior Homme


Lanvin


Givenchy


Burberry Prorsum

All pictures via GQ.com

H&M Garden Collection And Other

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Selection of the upcoming H&M Garden Collection and other pieces, that will soon be in stores. The H&M Garden Collection will hit stores on March 25th. See the women's spring collection here and men's spring collection here.