Want to have a drink and hang out with me and Barima of Mode Parade? We will be talking culture and style, live, on our new modecast channel on Sunday, January 29 at 9pm GMT/4pm EST. Please feel free to ask questions for us to address on the broadcast. Just email your bit to finalfashion@gmail.com. Of course we also invite you to watch and join the discussion live by chat, twitter or facebook.
This is just something we’re doing for low-fidelity fun, and depending on how well we do it may become a recurring feature. As this is the first time we’ve ever attempted this, we expect to be a little bit lost and somewhat tipsy. Your attendance, patience, and contributions will be most welcome.
For my final paper doll of the Fall 2010 season, I selected Chanel Haute Couture. The shapes recall the over-padded, grown-up, rich-people clothes of the 1980s, but the styling was modern rock-chic at its very best. Karl Lagerfeld’s genius is quite apparent when going through the collection, and the clothes sketched so easily, perhaps because they were cut and sewn based on sketches in the first place. The doll is based on model Anna Selevezna.
You can buy this paper doll as a high-resolution, printable PDF to cut out and play with! Only $5 CDN. Just click the button below.
I was invited to customize a pair of Brown’s shoes for the Frugal Fashion Week Gala at the Bata Shoe Museum on Friday. The shoes I received were bright red patent, just like the Dr. Martens I customized with Ashley Rowe. I wanted to try dripping instead of splattering and Ashley kindly indulged me in her studio.
She did a super-hot pair of boots which you just get a blurry peek of here. Want to see Ashley’s and so many other customized Brown’s shoes? Best blog friend Anita is also doing a pair, among others. Buy a ticket to the gala on Friday here.
This is a heads up for all the fresh, up and coming fashion entrepreneurs in Toronto – TFI and YES are once again combining forces to offer up a FREE program of seminars and a business plan competition where you could win $1000 cash and a priceless mentorship opportunity.
Here’s the info:
JUNE 15 & 17, 2010 PASSION FOR FASHION ORIENTATION SESSIONS
Are you…
Interested in fashion design?
Looking to be your own boss?
Between the ages of 16 and 29?
THEN YOU BELONG IN A PASSION FOR FASHION!
Youth Employment Services (YES) has teamed up with Toronto Fashion Incubator (TFI) to create this amazing opportunity for youth to learn about entrepreneurship and fashion design. Sign up for one of these FREE information sessions to learn more. Targeted to youth aged 16 – 29 living in the Province of Ontario, who are not professional fashion designers, A Passion For Fashion participants will receive workshops on starting a business, fashion design and marketing, one-on-one mentorship and a chance to enter the Fashionista’s Den Competition where one lucky youth will win $1,000 cash, a one-year TFI Outreach membership and 50 hours of business advisory and fashion mentorship.
Now in its second year, this exciting program gives young fashion designers and entrepreneurs the opportunity to explore the world of entrepreneurship in the fashion industry, for free!
Interested? Visit www.yes.on.ca for eligibility, program information and additional orientation dates and locations in the GTA. To register for the June 15th and 17th sessions, contact Toronto Fashion Incubator at tfi@fashionincubator.com or call 416-971-7117 ext. 21.
So, in between many other things (Where is this week going? Ack!), I have been diligently diving into recycling boxes and picking up trash on the street, plus picking up donations from generous readers. And… washing each item, cutting them into hundreds of paillettes, punching holes in each paillette, and stitching each paillette one by one on to my entry for the Trash Fusion design contest. Curious? You can see some previous updates here and here.
The main event, a fashion show, is happening in Barrie, a town on a lake north of Toronto. My brother lives there, so I think it is a neat opportunity to show my family (and my 2 year old niece) some fashion. I’ve decided to model my own dress to keep the logistics simple. I am getting a hair cut from Greg May Hair just for the occasion, my first haircut since I resolved to grow my hair long. I plan on enjoying the modeling experience, it might be the last time I ever do it.
If you are in Barrie on June 12, you can come and see me walk the runway – a rare event. Check out the Ecofest Barrie site for more info.
Now that Julian Roberts’ Subtraction Cutting Tour is coming to Toronto (June 14 & 15, get tickets here), I’ve given myself the challenge of persuading people that its a class well worth taking. Beyond this city, the tour is also making stops in New York, Edmonton, Vancouver, and Portland – so if you’re near any of those places this summer, this post is for you.
I met Julian online at the end of 2005, back when I was fairly active on The Fashion Spot. We were looking at some of his work, and me being the skeptical little troll that I used to be (sometimes still am), I posted something to the effect of “what’s so special about it?” – well, if you’ve got a lot of time on your hands you can read through the whole thread here. To my great surprise, and eventual delight, Julian found the thread and engaged the forum-dwellers in a discussion about his work, took the time to answer our questions, and successfully showed me what was so special about what he does.
Julian Roberts is a designer who is experimental both in how he develops his designs and also how he shows them. This video, called “killing labels” records highlights of his portfolio.
As someone who is obsessed with the transitional, ephemeral qualities of fashion (hence, Final Fashion and this site’s old subheader, the last collection) Julian’s act of killing labels inspires me. He captures the most exciting parts of the process – the creation, and the showing, and turns the act of being a fashion designer from a very pragmatic act of creating objects for sale into the very radical act of allowing fashion to be ideas, events and images and nothing else, eliminating all of the material aspects that weigh down the process, leaving only the physical act of designing. As someone who loves the act of design but has no desire to see my name on labels, Julian’s career showed me that it is possible to design outside of the boundaries of the existing industry, to celebrate and share fashion as action rather than as a commodity.
Subtraction Cutting is one of the techniques that Julian uses to create, and the one that he is teaching on this tour. It is difficult to describe, so I would like to compare it to life drawing, or those creative writing exercises where the student is encouraged to write within parameters, but without planning. Its an exercise that boils down the act of designing, cutting, and sewing a garment into something that is fast and free, uninhibited and playful.
This is a technique that even those who have never sewn before can easily dive into, and those of us who are trained in traditional ways of doing things can recapture the original sense of wonder and discovery that first attracted us to designing.
Plus, Julian is just a very generous, candid dreamer of a professor, the kind of professor who you will always remember, and that comes across in the conversation I had with him.
This class will be a tremendous, transformative treat for anyone who loves to make things. I invite you to come and share this experience with me. Please buy a ticket – Julian and I would love to see you there!
If you’re in Toronto, and love fashion and art that is exuberant and provocative, you must go to FAT. All the best fresh talent does. From the press release:
