Nouvelles Obsessions

Karla Spetic: beautiful knots.



Emma Cook: just plain beautiful.



I found both of them at Maximillia, an Australian online boutique run by a girl with phenomenal taste.

Looking For...

I have been searching far and wide for a pair of denim bermuda-style shorts in a light wash to no avail. One American Eagle pair looked promising, but when they showed up, they were darker than the picture and the whiskering (ew) was much more prominent. If anyone sees a pair on any website, please let me know! I want a tight fit, none of this lose-fitting boyfriend crap. Grrr.

New York Fashion Week!

Fall 2009 Ready-To-Wear. Favourites follow. I want them allllll.

Temperley London

Marchesa

Naeem Khan

Beauty.

Matthew Williamson

A perennial favourite, I pretty much love love love EVERYTHING he does. How beautiful are these pieces? Absolutely exquisite.

Calvin Klein

Calvin Klein was one of my favourite collections of the week. Francisco Costa won me over with his raw silhouettes, the likes of which I'm not typically prone to, and the understated luxury of his fabrics.

The Little Guns

And finally. Here are some of my favourite looks from some of the lesser-known, up-and-coming designers that showed at New York Fashion Week. Phew!

Cushnie Et Ochs

Julian Louie

Bibhu Mohapatra

High School Prom

No really. That's actually what this post is about. I was prowling around Net-A-Porter today and saw that Justin Thornton and Thea Bregazzi of Preen now have a second, more affordable line called Preen Line, and it reminded me of my high school prom. Or, as we called it in Canada, grad formal. Time for a bed-time story.

When I was a senior in high school, my parents were just starting the process of transitioning to New York. My father would work in New York on the weekdays, and return to Toronto on the weekends, but his commute provided my sister and me with the perfect excuse to go dress-shopping in NYC. After a few days of searching, I found what I thought was THE dress at a little store called Acne in Soho (no, not the ever-popular Swedish brand, whose Soho outpost opened a couple years after I graduated). The dress was from Preen's Spring 2006 collection (before they were so popular) and is pictured below (the plaid dress), except it was a variation that substituted the plaid cotton and gray jersey with the dusty pink silk and dusty pink jersey seen on the second dress shown below. The salesperson draped the dress a little more elegantly than it was styled on the runway, tying the midsection in a bodice-like fashion more reminiscent of the waist of the second dress. The result was immaculate.


My parents, unfortunately, didn't understand my vision. I thought that it was a great representation of my refined fashion sensibilities and that I could totally pull it off, but they thought that it wasn't formal enough and that it was too expensive. So I ended up wearing this very pretty, but much less interesting, Mandalay dress. The kicker? The Mandalay dress was more expensive than the Preen one! This story really has no point, other than the fact that I still get angry in a forlorn sort of way whenever I hear anything about Preen, and wish I had been able to wear the dress I initially wanted to wear.


I think that the only way I'm going to be able to get over the whole incident is if I get to wear a Preen dress to a formal event in the future, and maybe this time my parents' seal of approval won't be required. But just in case: Mom, any of the looks below (all of which are from Preen's Fall 2009 ready-to-wear showing) would do...

Pretty please with a cherry on top?

Valentines Day Fashion

I finally bought them. I've been pining after these Twelfth Street by Cynthia Vincent shoes for forever, and another Valentine's Day single is all I really needed as an excuse to purchase these expensive puppies. Not only are they particularly indicative of my mood, but they're also an item I'm going wear all the time. Useful in so many ways. Picture from Planet Blue.  

Yummy Summer Dresses

You're probably not aware of this, but I kind of have an obsession with Fighting Eel. Designers Rona Bennett and Lan Chung work out of Hawaii, and the landscape inspires their basic, but always fun, dresses made from super-soft jersey fabrics. I already have three Fighting Eel dresses and... kind of... want to... buy some... of their Spring 2009 dresses, a few of which are shown above. 

The Choker

I'm bringing it back. I don't know if I've really thought this one through, but I've been gravitating towards chokers for a while now, and that's always a good sign. It's going to happen. Start by buying this sweet bronze choker from Marion Mercer. 

P.S. I'm done for today. Really. I think.

Bijoux Mignons

Yes this was in Daily Candy NYC today, but I like it too! And so will you! Delicate jewelry from Phoenix Roze, designed by Guy Rozenstrich, based in New York. 

RIVER PHOENIX

Holy shit. Holy shit. Holy shit. Anyone who knows me from my middle school dayz will know how OBSESSED I was with BOTH Stand By Me AND River Phoenix. Chris Chambers I love you with all my heart. I just saw this Alpha 60 shirt in a Style Bubble post and, despite recently realizing (in all seriousness) that I have far too many clothes, purchased it immediately. According to some... other... blogger cited by Susie Bubble, this tee "has become the uniform of every indie wannabe on the East Coast" of Australia, but, really, who cares? I am so so excited.

Argh!

I had been wanting some low, plain black pumps for quite some time (which are harder to find than you would imagine) and was in love with the 3" inch red Marc by Marc Jacobs ones I saw on Shopbop.com. After waiting... and waiting... for a black version to appear, I figured that I was pining after a shoe in vain, and settled for a less plain, but none-the-less beautiful, pair of low vintage Chanel black heels. But of course, the red heels are now available in black on Shopbop.com. And while I'm not one to complain about vintage Chanel pumps (that were also less expensive than the Marc by Marc shoes), it's just frustrating! This always seems to happen, and these Marc by Marc pumps are just plain to perfection. Get your hands on a pair while you can - they will always be in style and should last you for a very long time - and don't forget to check out the open-toe equivalents also available for purchase on Shopbop.com. GRRR!!!

Aujourd'hui

Fashion I've been craving ever since... today:

Ligne 6 Martin Margiela "Paintbrush Motif Tunic" from La Garconne.

BAD-ASS Alexandra Cassaniti sunglasses from Creatures of Comfort (though I just checked and they're cheaper on the Alexanda Cassaniti website) with frames that change colour depending on the intensity of light.

AND, in other news, Lyte, a line of super cute hair accessories designed by Molly Rhymer, now has a website of its own. Yay! I'll definitely be buying one or two soon.