Sat 6th Feb: Hibiscus Ridiculous behind the scenes

My website is gradually undergoing a season's worth of updates, starting with "Bespoke Accessories" section............more to follow so stay tuned to the Fabulous Fred calculator.  One of the shoots featured is the Hibiscus Ridiculous shoot we did for Dazed Digital whilst shooting the S/S look book.  Here are our fantastic models Petter & Ashleigh in Sarh Magnay stocking suits.  You can also see hair stylist Aimee getting involved helping Elisha shoot pieces inbetween set ups...........its all about multi-tasking............and generally being silly taking it in turns to dance to garage anthems........standard procedure.  

Check out Kim's website to see who else she has been styling this season........David Koma, Hannah Marshall, Piers Atkinson, NOKI, Atalanta Weller, House of Organza, Skunk Anansie, Coco Sumner............

Fri 5th Feb: Three ASFOUR A/W 2010

After looking back at the trio's Summer offering I'm now going to give you a taster of what lies await for Winter.  This season alchemy is the answer, focusing on the study of transformation in rebirth...........physically and metaphorically.  The colour palette is going to be a mesmerising metallic melting pot of the seven essential metals .........with rich navy and black thrown into the mix for good measure.   Embossed embellishments and reptilian surface pattern features will add textures alluding to the circular Ouroboros serpents from classic texts.   The entire collection will comprise of jersey styles through to their eagerly anticipated couture showpieces...............I can't wait to see it emerge on the 16th..............

................I'll be checking it out online from London but for those in NYC contact Onorato Wixom for a ticket request............

Three ASFOUR have sent me this alchemical reference image and portrait by Peter Ross.

  

Fri 5th Feb: Three ASFOUR S/S 2010

Whilst three ASFOUR are just wrapping up their new collection in preparation for the A/W show in NYC on 16th, I wanted to remind us all of the beautiful S/S show that they collaborated on with Yoko Ono.  The team worked close with the artist having access to her rarely seen dot drawings for inspiration to create the concentric prints that feature on the silk fabrics.  In keeping with the connection, the catwalk show was a choreographed piece in homage to Ono's own "Cut Piece" performance from 1965 when she invited the audience to cut her clothing.  You can see in the top image here the dress that was slowly sliced away with scissors during the unveiling of the collection to reveal a bathing suit at the end.  The rest of the garments had signature three ASFOUR swirling seams, circumnavigating the female anatomical planes and curves. Mesh panel leggings walked out alongside circular cut out detail catsuits and flowing floaty ruffle dresses.  You can see a video of the show here or just inspect each of these gorgeous look-book images shot by their very good friend Marcelo Krasilcic which they have sent me to share with you.

Thurs 4th Feb: Orgy of Hearts by Corrie Williamson

Later today will be the preview of a special exhibition at London's new Concept Store Darkroom.  To help raise money for the Haiti fund, artists have been commissioned to create an item designed to fit a Valentine theme to become part of "An Exhibitional Orgy of Love Hearts".  I contacted one of the contributors to find out more about her involvement and also finally feature her genius as I haven't done so before...........only indirectly via collections for Cooperative Designs and Goodone!  Introducing Corrie Williamson, Jewellery Designer...........and so much more..........I'm a big fan of her timeless pieces......

 

"The brief was to use black, white and one other colour and to put a heart shape somewhere in your piece....
Since I am midway through making the new Cooperative collection of jewellery at the moment when this came into my inbox i jumped at the chance to make something BIG. (well for a jewellery maker!)...most of my inspiration comes from Materials and at the moment I'm obsessed with plywoods from the cheap mass produced ones to making my own.
I had the idea to make a heart shape from holes so you can see the sandwich layers of wood in each of the holes...I wanted to combine this decorative overlay with an image behind that was going to be quite abstracted. I asked Amy Gwatkin to come up with some images to use and it was basically a choice between a topless boy and a wet t shirt! Difficult decision we went with the boy.... and it was just a case of mounting the image behind the wood after treating it to an abstract screen print, (small homage to my screenprinting days at Brighton seeing as how i never get near a squeegy anymore)."

These are all images of Corrie's work space and samples that she has kindly taken to go with this entry.  Her fascination for tools can be seen in her studio shnickle shnackle and also in her own work designing beautiful brushes which you can check out over on her blog.  Or to buy a signature ring at a bargain new sale price, head over to Browns!

Weds 3rd Feb: Bjørn Jørund Blikstad

You may recognise this AMAZING wall storage design from the front cover of the last Wallpaper Magazine ..........and perhaps my recommendation on AnOther Loves.......

I literally fell in LOVE with this cosmic stacking system as it is so similar to the hexagonal patchwork in my own work.  I did some research into the brain that masterminded this spacial optical illusion and discoverd that some of Bjorn's inspiration had come from studying Erno Rubik........I LOVE a Rubik's cube!  I asked Bjorn to explain a little bit more about his background and reasoning behind this inventive and appealing home interior solution.....

 

"My background is pretty much BA and Ma from Oslo National Academy of the Arts, 2007 and 2009 (I've spendt on year in the univeristy studying molecularbiology but dropped out) 

I have been intruiged by designingin storage concepts for two reasons

 

1) The will in creating a design come from a form of relation to the concept. Regarding chairs, what most furniture designers want to design, the closeness to the human body of the object, both in form and function, is what i belive are the main driving component. Usually when it comes to storage the objects in question aren't close in this sense, and the will in designing them kind of diminishes. I have therefore tried to update the human relation with the contents of storage from practical issues regarding easy acces and availiability to nodes in ones memory.

Where chair design may find inspiration from bodily nearness, storage could then find inspiration from mental nearness. This is where my inspiration comes from.

 

2)A normal book shelf have a 2 dimentional interface regarding browsing the contents of it i.e. the backs of the books. We live in a 3d world from where our memories are created, also when you read a story the memories are not of the page with the text, but the image of what it portrays. I have searched for a kind of mind mappning storage.

 

I usually think of the Imeuble, as some now call it (other names are Wallcubes or INFO3 CUBE2 (INFOcubed CUBEsquared) as 2,5D and raises the issues more than answering it."

Bjorn also kindly sent over some images of his work-in-progress for an inside look at the mathematics behind the engineering.  I can't wait to see this go into production so that discerning decorators can purchase thier own set.  

 

To see more press:  Trend Land

 Or his website: www.imeuble.no 

Tues 2nd Feb: John Lee Bird

My rick-rack has been immortalised by the brush strokes of John Lee Bird as part of an ongoing project painting London creatives.  I'm so thrilled to see all the details of my accessories executed perfectly..........I don't envy him trying to work out all the crazy lines of my Hibiscus Ridiculous hairpin.  John snapped me backstage at Patrick Wolf's performance at The Pallidium last year and caught Micachu and Alec Empire at the same time for the series.  If you head over to his site you can scroll through the previous two parts of this prolific endeavour.   I'm so chuffed with this bang on interpretation of my mug...........because he has unknowingly captured my little nape of the neck hair fluff which is always ruffled like this because I twiddle it with nervous energy...........not attractive at the end of the day when its totally wild............as seen here.......LOL!

Here is a snap from Somerset House by Rosy Nicholas to do a kind of spot-the-difference with the attention to detail in the rick-rack, hair pin, and hair fluff............and yes I do wear other clothes..........occasionally!

Tues 2nd Feb: Tim Walker behind the scenes footage

Thanks to Andy Macgregor for getting hold of this fantastic stop-frame animation for me to share with you...........its an excellent composition of how Hillman Studio constructed the set on Walker's campaign for Henry Cotton's............featuring Andy Macgregor .............and a life size Spitfire..........

Mon 1st Feb: 10 Hockney Celias

On a Hockney tip, here are 10 portraits of Celia Birtwell that I have scanned from an amazing little book I found on Saturday..........

"Portraits aren't just made up of drawing, they are made up of other insights as well.  Celia is one of the few girls I know really well.  I've drawn her so many times and knowing her makes it always slightly different.  I don't bother about getting the likeness in their face because I know it so well.  She has may faces and I think if you looked through all the drawings Ive done of her , you'd see that they don't look alike....Celia has a beautiful face, a very rare face with lots of things in it which appeal to me.  It shows aspects of her, like her intuitive knowledge and her kindness, which I think is the greatest virtue.  To me she's such a special person."