Make Up For Ever is expanding the Aqua collection for summer style

The weather may be one way to tell that it’s finally summer, but the debut of bright new makeup colours is certainly our favourite sign! Make Up For Ever has announced a new range of summer colours for their popular waterproof Aqua line—just in time for sweaty temperatures or days spent by the pool. The new colours include five Aqua Rouge lip shades, two Aqua Lip pencils, three pastel Aqua Cream pigments and two new Aqua Eyes pencils. And because the season is all about bright, sunny shades, the Make Up For Ever Aqua summer collection is full of vibrant colours. (If you’re ready to bring out your inner seapunk, this collection is for you!)

Topshop festival has launched a music festival style collection with Kate Bosworth

Working with the Topshop design team, Bosworth created items that extend the actress’s style and work hand in hand with the Topshop brand. The special 21-piece collection consists of signature pieces ranging from neon printed shorts, fur lined vests, gladiator sandals and even feathered wings. And before you click through to our gallery of all the Topshop Festival items—you may have already seen them: Bosworth wore many of the items at this year’s Coachella festival.

Just in time for this summer’s music festival season, Topshop is launching an interactive campaign called Topshop Festival. Inspired by the energy of the ever-growing popularity of British music festivals and its fashion, the campaign includes music, movies and, of course, must-have products. Even better, Topshop turned to Kate Bosworth—a Coachella devotee who’s always embraced the festival fashion trend—to help create some items for the collection. It’s not a collaboration, per say, but more of a Bosworth-approved edit of the Topshop Festival collection.

A celebrity is a person who has a prominent profile and commands, Lily of the valley print is having a celebrity moment

A celebrity is a person who has a prominent profile and commands some degree of public fascination and influence in day-to-day media. The term is often synonymous with wealth (commonly denoted as a person with fame and fortune), implied with great popular appeal, prominence in a particular field, and is easily recognized by the general public.

A favourite flower of Christian Dior – the designer wore a sprig of it in his buttonhole and sewed it into the lining of dresses before they were worn on the catwalk – lily of the valley is currently enjoying another moment in the spotlight. Or, rather, on the red carpet.

A print using the pretty, bell-shaped white flower is in Dolce & Gabbana's spring collection, and, made into trousers, tops, dresses and even kimonos, it's been adopted by celebrities in a big way. Penny Lancaster wore a shift with the print on it last week, while Kylie Minogue donned a pyjama-style blouse and printed pants for a premiere of The Great Gatsby at the weekend. Helen Mirren has worn her version – a pleated knee-length number – to three different events since last December.

Why is it so popular, and why now? The print appeared in only one look for the brand's spring/summer show but it was used in around 15 designs in the commercial collection, which is traditionally more wearable.

Do you know why choosing the right perfume is so important

I was remembering the scent of Aquamanda. You must rememberAquamanda? We used to marinade ourselves in it during the early 70s. Everything I owned was saturated with the scent of orange blossom. How odd that I should remember a smell without actually smelling it. Then again, is there anything more evocative of time and place than a perfume? I bet Daisy Buchanan wasn't so much moved to tears by the sight of Gatsby's "beautiful shirts" as by the memories stirred by the scent of them – and him.

You know when there is a "something" that hovers just out of reach and you can't quite put your finger on it? While I was watching The Joy of the Single (a documentary about 45rpm records, not marital status), there was a snippet, a mere 10 seconds, of a young and svelte Roy Wood, shimmering in blue sequins, warbling Blackberry Way, and something stirred. I had a vivid recollection of my beloved sequinned Biba tank top, but that wasn't it. It was something more … sensory. A smell. It took me a whole 24 hours to finally nail it: the scent of the Biba tank top when I put it on.

Since the 70s I've worked my way from Revlon's Charlie to YSL Rive Gauche by way of Chanel Allure and a brief infatuation with Armani Acqua di Gioia – and thence to Chanel No 5 – which my daughters still call "Mummy Smell". I can't honestly recall it, but I know my own mum favoured Worth's Je Reviens. My nan sprayed everything (and everybody) with lavender water or 4711 eau de cologne. I've learned that although I adore the scent of roses I cannot abide tuberose and that, for some reason, Nina Ricci's L'Air du Temps brings me out in spots. I'm not fickle with my perfumes – it turns out that I am one of those people who remains loyal to a handful of favourites and in my case those are currently Chanel No 5,

Jules and Club Monaco Collaborate, Club Monaco Debuts Tumblr Lookbook Featuring Bloggers Like Sincerely Jules

One of the fashion tastemakers featured in the campaign is Julie Sarinana, of Sincerely, Jules. The Los Angeles-based blogger is well-versed in the world of Tumblr, and modeled alongside other bloggers like Betty Autier of Le Blog de Betty and George Lewis Jr. of Twin Shadow.

Club Monaco has embarked on a new fashion frontier: The retailer will digitally debut its Fall 2013 lookbook on Tumblr with the help of seven prominent bloggers. The brand's online initiative, which launches today, will make it one of the first to reveal a major lookbook on the social media platform—which is fitting considering many of the bloggers are social media masters.

We chatted with Sarinana about Club Monaco's digital exploration, her campaign for the brand, and ways to maintain a fabulous blog.

Being that you are a prominent figure in the online fashion community, did Club Monaco's project to reach out to buyers via Tumblr seem like the right idea?

I think it’s great that Club Monaco is trying to push the social media boundaries, and I think they are doing it in a really creative and attainable way. Their audience can literally take the images right from the lookbook site and Pin, post on Tumblr, and Facebook them. It allows the whole lookbook to go viral, which I think is really cool.

The best and worst dressed - in Oscars 2013 pictures

This was Jennifer Lawrence's night. She won the Oscar, and she won the red carpet too, in Christian Dior. The formula for a successful Oscar dress is similar to that for a successful Oscar film: you want plenty of drama but not too many complications. This dress does that perfectly. The silhouette is knockout, and there are no fussy styling details to detracting from that. The swept-back hair, neat silver clutch and delicate jewellery are all in harmony. There will be celebrations at Christian Dior HQ in Paris: the awesome internal structure (note how it looks good from every angle), the perfect skin-flattering pale (moonshine?) and the dappled texture to the fabric (so it never looks shiny or crinkly, even under a million flashbulbs) are a great advertisement for the Dior atelier.

I think we can assume it wasn't Anne Hathaway's goal to be upstaged by her own nipples, but that's what happened in this Prada gown. The dress was a last-minute choice: LA "sources" say she switched from her usual Valentino at the last minute. Those aren't actually her nipples, by the way, they are darted seams in the fabric. (Look at how the skirt of the gown holds its shape as it falls to the floor, and you can tell that the satin is much too heavy for nipples to bore through like that.) But such dressmaking niceties won't help save this dress for being remembered for the nipples. I don't love this look anyway: too angular and sharp. She looks like an enormous, shiny pair of scissors.

From spring 2013 fashion trend slouchy Bermudas to sharp suits, shorts have made the leap from vacation wear to staple

On the ready-to-wear runways, shorts are also a familiar sight. Miuccia Prada opened her Spring 2000 show with a body-hugging pair, and has been experimenting with variations on the theme ever since. Marni designer Consuelo Castiglioni has been peppering her collections with them for years, in every length, fabric and pattern imaginable. This spring, tailored shorts have taken the spotlight. Chloé, Prabal Gurung and Fendi showed them in lush leathers; Carolina Herrera and Cacharel favoured light, shiny fabrics; Dolce & Gabbana, Hermès and Chalayan experimented with trippy prints; and Emporio Armani femme’d them up with sweet ruffles. Clearly, fashion’s cyclicality is what makes this trend so right, right now.

Several months before her 38th birthday, Gwyneth Paltrow took a pair for a spin on the red carpet. Forty-four-year-old Jennifer Aniston practically lives in them. And at 53, Sharon Stone was snapped wearing hers with a slouchy sweater and knee-high boots. As fashion statements go, shorts aren’t new: Sexy, sporty hot pants will forever be associated with the 1970s, while countless girls who came of age in the ’80s emulated Baby’s Dirty Dancing denim cut-offs. In the ’90s, shorts teamed with tights were a seasonless staple—a look that has since become an off-duty model classic.

“Everything old is new again,” says Barbara Atkin, vice-president of fashion direction at Holt Renfrew. “Designers keep bringing back shorts, over and over again, in different ways. It’s the right time. We’ve had so many short miniskirts—it was time to evolve from that.” 

The style-centric exhibits taking over the world’s greatest galleries, museums and art spaces

In 2013, the exhibition boom continues. Steele and her curatorial team tackle an explosive subject with Queer Style, opening at FIT next September. The first major show to explore the gay influence on fashion, it’s been a long time coming, but its arrival this year seems thrillingly on-trend, 2013 having got rolling with an inaugural address in which U.S. President Obama gave a shout-out to Stonewall and a showing of Chanel haute couture that concluded with lesbian brides.

And transgressive seems to be trending. Costumes worn by rock music’s great gender bender are featured in David Bowie is, an exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London (March 23 to July 28).

Going beyond the usual suspects (Beau Brummell and Oscar Wilde), the show also recognizes latter-day fops, such as Iké Udé, the Nigerian-born artist, and Sebastian Horsley, a clothes-conscious London artist and reprobate—he died from multiple drug ingestion in 2010—who once had a retrospective show called Hookers, Dealers, Tailors.

At the museum of fashion in the Louvre this summer, the topic will be specific:Behind the Seams: An Indiscreet Look at the Mechanics of Fashion (July 4 to November 24) is a show about the variously engineered underwear, his and hers, that over the centuries has shaped the fashionable silhouette. In Toronto, footwear will be fetishized. The Design Exchange, busy establishing a more popular profile, will present a retrospective of the glamorous cobbler Christian Louboutin (June 21 to September 15). And the Bata Shoe Museum is offering Out of the Box: The Rise of Sneaker Culture (April 25, 2013 to April 22, 2014), designed by Karim Rashid.

When it comes to total sartorial splendour, a highlight of the 2013 calendar is the reopening of the Musée Galliera in Paris next fall with a major retrospective of Azzedine Alaïa. Even though this fashion museum has been closed for renovation since 2009, its director, Olivier Saillard, has been hosting shows in extramural venues and becoming, as Lynn Yaeger said of him in The New York Times, “the modern master of contemporary costume museum performance-presentation.”

Last year at the Palais de Tokyo, an institution dedicated to contemporary art, Saillard staged a piece called The Impossible Wardrobe. It starred Tilda Swinton, who, wearing white gloves, modelled museum pieces too venerable to be worn—including a coat that had belonged to Napoleon—by merely handling them. Her performance amounted to a morbid but droll meditation on old-school custodianship.

Last spring at Les Docks, a hip new cultural centre located on the revitalized banks of the Seine in the east end of Paris, Saillard curated an exhibition that featured all of the all-white Spring 2012 collection from Comme des Garçons. To present a designer line in its entirety—and in season—might have seemed to be blurring the line between appreciation and promotion. In fact, Saillard found Rei Kawakubo’s work so poetic, so far from commercial conventions that he thought of it as a snowball flying in the face of a fashion world caught up in success and branding.

The Metropolitan Museum discourages solo exhibitions by living fashion designers. Operating as special consultant to the Costume Institute, Diana Vreeland put up such a show in 1983—a retrospective of Yves Saint Laurent, who was still alive, that came in for a harsh smackdown. In her 1986 book Selling Culture: Bloomingdale’s, Diana Vreeland and the New Aristocracy of Taste in Reagan’s America, cultural historian Debora Silverman dismissed the exhibition as “a giant advertising campaign.”

Today, however, the reputation of Vreeland, who died in 1989, has been earning fresh praise. Held in connection with Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel, both a book and a documentary film by her granddaughter-in-law, Lisa Immordino Vreeland, Diana Vreeland After Diana Vreeland was an exhibition and a symposium that took place in Venice last year and paid particular attention to her curatorial career.

Like the pages she had edited inHarper’s Bazaar and Vogue, Vreeland’s shows at the Costume Institute from 1972 to 1989 were known for their pizzazz. Historical accuracy was sometimes sacrificed in favour of drama and allure. Nevertheless, Judith Clark, who helped curate the exhibition and organize the discussions in Italy last summer, has published essays that defend the joie de vivre of Vreeland’s approach.

Now curator in charge of the Costume Institute, Harold Koda began as an intern. He was involved in his first fashion exhibition as Vreeland’s assistant on The Glory of Russian Costume, which opened in December 1976. The Met’s next big show is Punk: Chaos to Couture, from May 9 to August 11.

Between Catherine the Great and Johnny Rotten, things have changed. Koda points out that the time has passed “when institutions were willing to lend their most important, most fragile treasures.” Catherine’s wedding dress has not left Russia since.

There have also been shifts in thinking of a less practical, more philosophical nature. As Vreeland always knew, fashion requires an immersive environment. That doesn’t mean perfuming the galleries, as she liked to do, but crowd-pleasing installation matters. “What has finally occurred to everyone—and this is really relatively recent, I’d say in the last 10 years—is [the importance of] how you present it,” says Koda, decoding the evolution of the fashion exhibition. “The scholarship that you’re conveying can be the same, but how you’re presenting it is going to make it something that people will get off their duffs [for] and come to the museum to be exposed to.”

As an ideal example of this new breed of exhibition, Koda cites The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk, which originated at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts in 2011 and is still on tour. After Montreal, Dallas, San Francisco, Madrid, Rotterdam and Stockholm, it will arrive at the Brooklyn Museum in late October.

Because MMFA director Nathalie Bondil is always interested in what she describes as “the mind behind the craft,” the Gaultier show celebrates artful designs at the same time as it illuminates the couturier’s thoughtful vision of diversity and inclusion. All the while it delights the eye, tickles the ribs and leaves jaws dropping with mannequins that talk and have human faces that move.

How to do a frizz-free blowout on the most humid of days and more answers to your beauty questions

How do I make my at-home blowout frizz-free in the summer?

Something key to remember is that the environment in which you blowdry your hair has a large impact on how your hair will react to heat styling. It’s advisable to blowdry your hair in a dry environment, i.e. not the bathroom you just steamed up with your shower! Next, make sure your hair is actually completely dry when you have completed the blowout. Any damp areas are likely to react to the air temperatures around you, which seldom results in smooth strands. Always finish hair with an anti-humidity spray, such as Oribe Imperméable Anti-humidity Spray ($44, at Donato Salon & Spa), which utilizes copolymer technology to shield hair from the impact of humidity, and also contains a UV filter to protect hair.

I’m not comfortable going without foundation, but on a hot day my oily skin makes it a challenge to keep my foundation in place. Any recommendations?

This is a common problem for so many people, especially when seasons change. I think anyone can relate to feeling a bit naked with no makeup applied on a day-to-day basis, but there’s no need to throw in the towel just yet. With the right products, your makeup won’t be melting off your face much longer! Enlist a mattifying primer likeBecca Ever-Matte Poreless Priming Perfector ($44, sephora.ca), to your routine. It’s silicon-free (no heavy feeling on the skin), and contains EverMat, a trademarked formula that works to control sebum production while tightening pores—all good things! Once that’s settled into your skin (give it a minute or two), apply HourglassImmaculate Liquid Powder Foundation ($64, sephora.ca) to the areas you feel you need coverage the most. This particular foundation is a liquid-to-powder formula that dries down to a velvety finish without looking dull or flat, and contains anti-aging ingredients, which are certainly welcomed if you are wearing foundation on a daily basis.

I feel like my eyeshadow looks fine when I apply it, but then it doesn’t really have as much impact after a few hours. How do I fix this?

First of all, you should definitely be using an eyeshadow primer whenever you want your shadow to go the distance for you. Once your primer is applied, reach for something that will add dimension to your overall look—the more dimension, the more impact! Chanel Stylo Eyeshadows ($36 each, at Chanel counters) are an intriguing new range of shimmer cream shadows in stick format. These bright pigments will add a bit of shine to your eye makeup routine and the application is sublime. The texture and consistency will cool your lids when gliding onto skin but the colour will not budge once set—so you’ll pleased with how they perform during the sticky-heat of summer months.

I understand properly cleansing skin is important, but wipes don’t really cut it on my lazy days. How can I still cleanse my face without a slew of steps to complete?

I think a lot of people can relate to this sentiment! Everyone wants camera-ready skin, but to actually take care of skin properly requires a significant amount of effort, time and consideration of products and practices used! I’ve never been a fan of quick cleansing with facial wipes, because they never seem to really take everything off my skin, so I turn to the next best thing: a multi-functioning cleanser, which serves as a makeup remover, cleanser and toner in one. A favourite is Estée Lauder Perfectly Clean Triple-Action Cleanser ($32, esteelauder.ca), because the airy foam is remarkably effective in removing makeup—long-lasting formulas included. This cleanser does so without stripping skin, as it contains a complex of blue algae (which is vitamin- and mineral-rich), Zinc PCA (which controls oil production) and milk thistle (which adds moisture to the skin).

I gravitate towards green fragrances, but would love something new for summer. Any suggestions?

Always! I think it’s important to expand your olfactory horizons little by little with each fragrance that you engage in. Try something that’s more citrus than green in terms of freshness, so it won’t be a complete compromise for what you already have an inclination towards using. I recommend L’Occitane Thé Verte & Bigarade ($75,loccitane.ca), which is a new scent that you will reach for constantly, starring orange essential oil from Tunisia and green tea extract from Japan, resulting in a bright, fresh fragrance that is delightful on anyone. (Bonus: this fragrance is actually unisex!)

Photos of cute models, bad-ass statement T-shirts and more outside fashion week

Yesterday, florals were all the rage but today’s all about leopard print. The print was seen on oversized bags, logo-sweatshirts, added layers and the trend was rounded out with a literal tiger face on Andrea Beechey’s clutch.

The finish line of World MasterCard Fashion Week Fall 2013 may officially be tonight but our street style photos stop here (sad face). To finish it off, our photographer Stefania Yarhi worked her magic (as per usual) to bring us some stellar shots of graphics, bold patterns and even a 90210 star!

Playing around with a different pattern was Elayne Teixeira-Millar, who layered black and white stripes under a graphic T-shirt with a Kendrick Lamar reference and another attendee wore striped disco pants while taking a seriously large step. Graphics were also prominent on that redheaded model Elise Gatschene, who was spotted in a truly amazing Budweiser sweater (that we really wish we owned it) and another gal with perfect eyeliner’s hat told us she “aint no wifey.” All these girls were definitely sending a message loud and clear with their looks on day four.

Leather continued to be a fan favourite with show goers and we saw Canadian actress and star of the just-cancelled 90210 reboot, Jessica Lowndes, in a leather-sleeved dress and a perfect red lip. Outside, we saw a mint green twist on the ever-classic leather moto jacket and a bright yellow clutch. Who says leather should only come in black?

In today’s society people in rich countries are linked to people in poor countries through the commoditisation and consumption of what can be called fashion. In one area of the globe people are working long hours to produce things that people in another part of the globe are anxious to consume. The chain of production and consumption of Nike shoes is an example of this. The Nike shoes are produced in Taiwan and consumed in North America. In the production end there is the nation building a hard working ideology that leads people to produce and entices people to consume with a vast amount of goods for the offering. Commodities are no longer just utilitarian but are fashionable, be they running shoes or sweat suits.

The fashion industry has long been one of the largest employers in the United States, and it remains so in the 21st century. However, employment declined considerably as production increasingly moved overseas, especially to China. Because data on the fashion industry typically are reported for national economies and expressed in terms of the industry’s many separate sectors, aggregate figures for world production of textiles and clothing are difficult to obtain. However, by any measure, the industry accounts for a significant share of world economic output.

New night creams, rosacea cures, serums and CC creams to try this season

Our skin repairs itself as we sleep, so it matters what you put on it for those eight hours (OK, five, if you count the week we power-watched the entire season of House of Cards). Dermatologist Dr. Nowell Solish suggests using a different moisturizer for day and night. “[Using] the same cream may not be as effective as two different creams if they work by a different mechanism,” he explains. That’s good news for fans of Oprah Winfrey’s favourite moisturizer, which now has an evening companion in (1) Philosophy Hope in a Jar Night ($55, thebay.com). It features glycolic acid, which helps smooth skin. If you want to boost collagen, retinol is your best bet, says dermatologist Dr. Jaggi Rao. Considered the benchmark for all wrinkle-fighters, it’s combined with efficacy-boosting niacin in (2) StriVectin-AR’s Advanced Retinol Night Treatment ($120, murale.ca), and with skin-plumping hyaluronic acid and complexion-brightening vitamin C in (3) Neutrogena Rapid Tone Repair Night ($25, at drugstores). Sensitive types (retinol has a rep for irritating skin) can try (4) Éminence Organic Lavender Age Corrective Night Concentrate ($66,eminenceorganics.com), which soothes skin with shea butter and primrose oil while a stem-cell complex firms and seals fine lines.

The fashion industry is a product of the modern age. Prior to the mid-19th century, most clothing was custom made. It was handmade for individuals, either as home production or on order from dressmakers and tailors. By the beginning of the 20th century—with the rise of new technologies such as the sewing machine, the rise of global capitalism and the development of the factory system of production, and the proliferation of retail outlets such as department stores—clothing had increasingly come to be mass-produced in standard sizes and sold at fixed prices. Although the fashion industry developed first in Europe and America, today it is an international and highly globalized industry, with clothing often designed in one country, manufactured in another, and sold world-wide. For example, an American fashion company might source fabric in China and have the clothes manufactured in Vietnam, finished in Italy, and shipped to a warehouse in the United States for distribution to retail outlets internationally. The fashion industry has long been one of the largest employers in the United States, and it remains so in the 21st century. However, employment declined considerably as production increasingly moved overseas, especially to China. Because data on the fashion industry typically are reported for national economies and expressed in terms of the industry’s many separate sectors, aggregate figures for world production of textiles and clothing are difficult to obtain. However, by any measure, the industry accounts for a significant share of world economic output.

The fashion industry consists of four levels: the production of raw materials, principally fibers and textiles but also leather and fur; the production of fashion goods by designers, manufacturers, contractors, and others; retail sales; and various forms of advertising and promotion. These levels consist of many separate but interdependent sectors, all of which are devoted to the goal of satisfying consumer demand for apparel under conditions that enable participants in the industry to operate at a profit.

The definition of fashion and anti-fashion is as thus. Anti-fashion is fixed and changes little overtime. Anti-fashion is different depending on which cultural or social group one is associated with or where one lives but within that group or locality the style changes little and stays constant. Fashion is the exact opposite of anti-fashion. Fashion changes very quickly and is not affiliated with one group or an area of the world but is spread out throughout the world wherever people can communicate easily with each other. For example, the 1953 Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation gown is an example of anti-fashion because it is traditional and does not change over any period; whereas, a gown from fashion designer Dior’s collection of 1953 is fashion because it will change every season as Dior comes up with a new gown to replace the old one. In the Dior gown the length, cut, fabric, and embroidery of the gown changes for season to season and does not stay the same. Anti-fashion is concerned with maintaining the status quo while fashion is concerned with social mobility. Time is expressed in terms of continuity in anti-fashion and as change in fashion. Fashion has changing modes of adornment while anti-fashion has fixed modes of adornment. Indigenous and peasant modes of adornment are an example of anti-fashion. Change in fashion is part of the larger system and is structured to be a deliberate change in style.

Kate Hudson designs an exclusive collection Ann Taylor

If celebrities were described by their fashion sense then Kate Hudson would be LA cool. And those are the exact words we would use to describe Hudson’s new capsule collection for Ann Taylor. That’s right; if you’ve been looking to embody Hudson’s free-spirited beachy style, look no more. The exclusive summer 2013 collection will feature a selection of chic white pieces and rose-gold accessories all inspired by Hudson’s love for fashion.

The easy-breezy collection will be available at Ann Taylor stores nationwide on Wednesday, May 22nd and will feature a selection of dresses, skirts, tops and accessories. Sophisticated retailer Ann Taylor has expressed their love for Hudson before, making her the face of their Spring 2012 campaign. “I’m so excited about the capsule collection and working with Ann Taylor”, Hudson said in a press release. “It was such an honor when they asked me to come back for the campaign and to work on a collection inspired by my personal style.” 

Hudson, who is known for her stunning red carpet ensembles, describes the new collection as very chic and incredibly wearable. With pieces priced from $78-$128, footwear at $158 and accessories priced up to $58, there’s sure to be something for everyone. To celebrate the collaboration, which marks the actress’ first foray into fashion, Ann Taylor will host a White themed Party at Ann Taylor stores nationwide on Wednesday, May 22nd from 6pm to 8pm.

The change from anti-fashion to fashion because of the influence of western capitalist civilization can be best seen in eastern Indonesia. The ikat textiles of the Ngada area of eastern Indonesia are changing because of modernization and development happening in that area. Traditionally in the Ngada area there was no idea similar to that of the Western idea of fashion. But anti-fashion in the form of traditional textiles and ways to adorn oneself were widely popular. Textiles in Indonesia have played many roles for the local people. Textiles defined a person’s rank and status and indicated being part of the ruling class. People expressed their ethnic identity and social hierarchy through textiles in Indonesia. The ikat textiles were also bartered for food by some people of Indonesia thus being considered economic goods. Textiles took on many different forms in the social custom and religion of the Indonesian people. Textiles were also a way to communicate religious messages as some motifs had spiritual religious meanings according to the local culture.

Yorkdale announces even more new stores to open in 2013 including Mulberry, Zara Home, David Yurman and All Saints

As if Yorkdale Shopping Centre couldn’t get any better, the luxury mega mall has just announced yet another list of first-to-Canada brands opening throughout 2013. After completing a $220 million dollar renovation in November, which saw the Canadian launch of retailers like Kate Spade New York, Loft and Ted Baker, Yorkdale is announcing that luxury retailers David Yurman, Mulberry, All Saints,Zara Home, John Varvatos, and White House | Black Market will join them this year. Ferragamo and Massimo Dutti, who both entered Canada in 2012, will also be opening at Yorkdale Shopping Centre.

In addition to all that international excitement, Brandy Melville, Stuart Weitzman, Lego and Ontario’s own, Honey also plan Yorkdale openings in 2013, as well as current expansions and renovations in the works for current Yorkdale anchors,Holt Renfrew, Harry Rosen and the Bay.

Although tailors and dressmakers were no doubt responsible for many innovations before, and the textile industry certainly led many trends, the history of fashion design is normally taken to date from 1858, when the English-born Charles Frederick Worth opened the first true haute couture house in Paris. The Haute house was the name established by government for the fashion houses that met the standards of industry. They have to adhere to standards such as: keeping at least 20 employees engaged in making the clothes, showing two collections per year at fashion shows, and presenting a certain number of patterns to costumers.Since then the professional designer has become a progressively more dominant figure, despite the origins of many fashions in street fashion. For women the flapper styles of the 1920s marked the most major alteration in styles for several centuries, with a drastic shortening of skirt lengths and much looser-fitting clothes; with occasional revivals of long skirts, variations of the shorter length have remained dominant ever since. Flappers also wore cloches, which were snug fitting and covered the forehead. Her shoes had a heel and some sort of buckle. The most important part was the jewelry, such as: earrings and necklaces that had diamonds or gems. The flapper gave a particular image as being seductive due to her short length dress, which was form fitting, and the large amounts of rich jewelery around her neck.

The pace of change picked up in the 1780s with the increased publication of French engravings that showed the latest Paris styles; though there had been distribution of dressed dolls from France as patterns since the 16th century, and Abraham Bosse had produced engravings of fashion from the 1620s. By 1800, all Western Europeans were dressing alike (or thought they were): local variation became first a sign of provincial culture, and then a badge of the conservative peasant.

The retailer’s latest collection gives model off-duty style a permanent place in our closets

Yesterday they were making our hearts race with a campaign fronted by Queen Beyoncé and today we found out the Swedish brand will be releasing a collection inspired and modeled by four of fashion’s other favourites—models Joan Smalls, Daphne Groeneveld, Lindsey Wixson, andLiu Wen.

Titled “The New Icon,” the collection is set to hit store floors mid-April and consists of festival ready looks like a tasseled leather jackets, bolo ties, and western inspired ankle boots that are indicative of model off duty style. For those of you who don’t know what that means, it’s basically an effortless look you would spot a model in while she runs from show to show (that would likely be captured by one of many street style photographers).

The collection is simple, effortless and the models say they would actually pick up the pieces while shopping. “It’s super cool and for your everyday girl who wants to look great and feel comfortable at the same time,” said Smalls.

The characterization of a person as “beautiful”, whether on an individual basis or by community consensus, is often based on some combination of inner beauty, which includes psychological factors such as personality, intelligence, grace, politeness, charisma, integrity, congruence and elegance, and outer beauty (i.e.physical attractiveness) which includes physical attributes which are valued on aesthetic basis.

Standards of beauty have changed over time, based on changing cultural values. Historically, paintings show a wide range of different standards for beauty. However, humans who are relatively young, with smooth skin, well-proportioned bodies, and regular features, have traditionally been considered the most beautiful throughout history.

Beauty presents a standard of comparison, and it can cause resentment and dissatisfaction when not achieved. People who do not fit the "beauty ideal" may be ostracized within their communities. The television sitcom Ugly Betty portrays the life of a girl faced with hardships due to society's unwelcoming attitudes toward those they deem unattractive. However, a person may also be targeted for harassment because of their beauty. InMalèna, a strikingly beautiful Italian woman is forced into poverty by the women of the community who refuse to give her work for fear that she may "woo" their husbands. The documentary Beauty in the Eyes of the Beheld explores both the societal blessings and curses of female beauty through interviews of women considered beautiful.

The fashion industry consists of four levels: the production of raw materials, principally fibers and textiles but also leather and fur; the production of fashion goods by designers, manufacturers, contractors, and others; retail sales; and various forms of advertising and promotion. These levels consist of many separate but interdependent sectors, all of which are devoted to the goal of satisfying consumer demand for apparel under conditions that enable participants in the industry to operate at a profit.

Interviews, Instaglams and more! The latest intel on Valentino’s groundbreaking virtual museum

Back in December 2011, fashion legend Valentino Garavani launched the first ever 3D fashion museum focusing on his five-decade couture and ready-to-wear career. Allowing anyone with internet connection to be immersed in the history of the design house with thousands of images of sketches, illustrations, advertising campaigns, editorials, fashion show videos and red carpet pictures, the site has now added an editorial slant.

Each month, the website will feature “Valentino’s Words,” personal, hand-written notes from the designer himself, as well as “Mr. Blasberg’s Questionnaire” in which society and fashion writer Derek Blasberg will invite Valentino muses, industry insiders and fashion icons to answer a series of personal questions about their insights on fashion and life in the fashion lane.

To kick it all off, Academy Award nominee Hugh Jackman is featured as Blasberg’s first interviewee. On a more visual level, Carlos Souza, longtime Valentino ambassador and fashion industry insider, takes viewers behind the scenes of the Valentino brand via his “Instaglams” (@ValentinoInstaglams), where he’ll be capturing the glamour of Valentino’s monthly happenings.

The media plays a very significant role when it comes to fashion. For instance, an important part of fashion is fashion journalism. Editorial critique, guidelines and commentary can be found in magazines, newspapers, on television, fashion websites, social networks and in fashion blogs. In the recent years, fashion blogging and YouTube videos have become a major outlet for spreading trends and fashion tips. Through these media outlets, readers and viewers all over the world can learn about fashion, making it very accessible.

Fashion is the exact opposite of anti-fashion. Fashion changes very quickly and is not affiliated with one group or an area of the world but is spread out throughout the world wherever people can communicate easily with each other. For example, the 1953 Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation gown is an example of anti-fashion because it is traditional and does not change over any period; whereas, a gown from fashion designer Dior’s collection of 1953 is fashion because it will change every season as Dior comes up with a new gown to replace the old one. In the Dior gown the length, cut, fabric, and embroidery of the gown changes for season to season and does not stay the same. Anti-fashion is concerned with maintaining the status quo while fashion is concerned with social mobility. Time is expressed in terms of continuity in anti-fashion and as change in fashion. Fashion has changing modes of adornment while anti-fashion has fixed modes of adornment. Indigenous and peasant modes of adornment are an example of anti-fashion. Change in fashion is part of the larger system and is structured to be a deliberate change in style.

Arts & Fashion Week with the 5 talents we predict will be making waves

From constantly refreshing the home pages of my favorite fashion sites to trekking down to the tents of David Pecaut Square for Toronto’s own collections, it seems that this so-called “month” is years long! Before we close our books on the Fall 2013 collections season, there is one more week to get excited about in Toronto–that is of course–[FAT] Arts & Fashion Week which took place last week in a beautiful warehouse in the up-and-coming arts neighborhood off Sterling Road in the west end.

under Vanja Vasic first put together an alternative fashion week while a student in Ryerson University’s Fashion Design program. I remember attending one of the first presentations, as my big sis happened to be showing alongside Vasic and her fellow students. The evening was a haphazard collection of musical performances, runway shows and modern dance–needless to say, FAT has come a long way since then.

Attending shows at Arts & Fashion Week reminds me why I love fashion. Vasic and her colleagues have created an incredible platform for unknown designers to present their collections in front of the fashion community, media outlets and supporters. I’ll admit to getting a bit misty-eyed as a group of high-school and first-year university students presented their designs as part of PACT Fashion, an organization founded byMake Den owner Irene Stickney which gives under-privileged youths practical skills and creative outlets. It’s organizations like PACT that make FAT what it is today–a community of creative minds working together to make fashion and design accessible to those who otherwise are forced to sit on the sidelines.

In today’s society people in rich countries are linked to people in poor countries through the commoditisation and consumption of what can be called fashion. In one area of the globe people are working long hours to produce things that people in another part of the globe are anxious to consume. The chain of production and consumption of Nike shoes is an example of this. The Nike shoes are produced in Taiwan and consumed in North America. In the production end there is the nation building a hard working ideology that leads people to produce and entices people to consume with a vast amount of goods for the offering. Commodities are no longer just utilitarian but are fashionable, be they running shoes or sweat suits.

Textiles in Indonesia have played many roles for the local people. Textiles defined a person’s rank and status and indicated being part of the ruling class. People expressed their ethnic identity and social hierarchy through textiles in Indonesia. The ikat textiles were also bartered for food by some people of Indonesia thus being considered economic goods. Textiles took on many different forms in the social custom and religion of the Indonesian people. Textiles were also a way to communicate religious messages as some motifs had spiritual religious meanings according to the local culture.

Grey Cup-inspired FASHION shoot, prep for the football festivities the most fashionable way we know how

There have been 99 years of touchdowns, tackles, and blitzes in the Canadian Football league, and this Sunday will make it 100. The 100-year anniversary of the Grey Cupwill be heading to Toronto to host the final game of the CFL’s season and hometown team, the Toronto Argonauts, will be facing the Calgary Stampeders. While the two cities mayors may be placing bets on the winning team, we’re thinking about what to wear when watching.

Watching football may often include jerseys, face paint, and pom poms, but for our game day themed shoot for Fall issue of Men’s FASHION we were more intrigued by varsity jackets, heavy flannels, and chunky knits. Pieces that are a nod to athleticism that don’t literally say, ‘I’m watching a sporting event’. We saw designers like DSquared updating the varsity jacket and giving it a more fitted silhouette and athletic inspired bomber jackets from Jil Sander that updates a classic wardrobe staple.

If you’re a football fanatic who can’t wait until Sunday or a casual on looker from the sidelines (aka the food table at the viewing party), there’s a way to tackle the athletic trends without looking like a linebacker. A fashion touchdown, if you will.There have been 99 years of touchdowns, tackles, and blitzes in the Canadian Football league, and this Sunday will make it 100. The 100-year anniversary of the Grey Cupwill be heading to Toronto to host the final game of the CFL’s season and hometown team, the Toronto Argonauts, will be facing the Calgary Stampeders. While the two cities mayors may be placing bets on the winning team, we’re thinking about what to wear when watching.

Watching football may often include jerseys, face paint, and pom poms, but for our game day themed shoot for Fall issue of Men’s FASHION we were more intrigued by varsity jackets, heavy flannels, and chunky knits. Pieces that are a nod to athleticism that don’t literally say, ‘I’m watching a sporting event’. We saw designers like DSquared updating the varsity jacket and giving it a more fitted silhouette and athletic inspired bomber jackets from Jil Sander that updates a classic wardrobe staple.

If you’re a football fanatic who can’t wait until Sunday or a casual on looker from the sidelines (aka the food table at the viewing party), there’s a way to tackle the athletic trends without looking like a linebacker. A fashion touchdown, if you will.

The media plays a very significant role when it comes to fashion. For instance, an important part of fashion is fashion journalism. Editorial critique, guidelines and commentary can be found in magazines, newspapers, on television, fashion websites, social networks and in fashion blogs. In the recent years, fashion blogging and YouTube videos have become a major outlet for spreading trends and fashion tips. Through these media outlets, readers and viewers all over the world can learn about fashion, making it very accessible.

Naked & Famous celebrates 5 years with a covetable capsule collection for men

We’re not ones to turn down a celebration, especially when it’s in honour of a cool Canadian brand. That’s why we’re currently all over Naked & Famous’s capsule collection designed for its five-year anniversary in the denim biz.

Sure, the pieces are men’s but we’re always up for the challenge of appropriating menswear for ourselves and if you’re a guy looking for a summer closet update, this is exactly what you need.

Since 2009, the Canadian brand has specialized in high-quality Japanese raw denim and now, designer Brandon Svarc has teamed up with Toronto denim mecca Over the Rainbow—located in Yorkville—to create an exclusive 10-piece capsule collection.

Titled “5&5,” the collection features five pairs of jorts (that’s code for jean shorts) and five sleeveless button-ups in graphic prints and basic greys. Just 200 pieces of the capsule collection were produced making it extremely covetable and perfect for any denim-obsessed men. These pieces will have your closet ready for summer, even if the weather isn’t there just yet. Get them while you still can.

The use of traditional textiles for fashion is becoming a big business in eastern Indonesia, but these traditional textiles are losing their ethnic identity markers and are being used as an item of fashion.  Just like the Nike shoes that are a capitalist form of fashion for the modern consumer, the ikat textiles of Eastern Indonesia’s Ngada area, which use to be a form of static anti-fashion, are becoming a part of fashion as they are being incorporated into forms of highly valued western goods.

Wives of government officials are promoting the use of traditional textiles in the form of western garments, such as skirts, vests, blouses etc. This trend is also being followed by the general populace and whoever can afford to hire a tailor is doing so to stitch traditional ikat textiles into western clothes. Thus traditional textiles are now fashion goods and no longer confined to the black, white and brown colour palette, coming in array of colours. Handbags, wallets and other accessories are also being made from traditional textiles, and traditional textiles are also being used in interior decorations. These items are considered fashionable by civil servants and their families. There is also a booming tourist trade in the Kupang city of eastern Indonesia where international as well as domestic tourists want to get their hands on traditionally printed western goods.

Today this has changed as most textiles are not being produced at home. Because of colonialism in the past by the Dutch, western goods are considered modern and valued more than traditional goods. Because of this western clothing is valued more than the traditional sarong. Sarongs are now used only for rituals and ceremonial occasions; whereas, western clothes are worn to church or visiting a government office.

Thom Browne, the most important man in menswear now

Menswear designer Thom Browne has used the runway to float some strange ideas. His provocative and characteristically wacky proposals have included a Big Bird suit of feathers in banker’s grey; punky makeup paired with papal-like capes; matronly skirts topped by jackets with the Hulk’s shoulders; see-through pants; square pants; and pants with three legs.

You might wonder, “Who but a clown is going to wear this stuff?” But all the theatrical pieces serve to put into relief the Thom Browne suit. Consisting of a short, snug jacket and trousers cropped to shin-revealing heights, it has been the basis of everything Browne has done since he launched his business a dozen years ago. In the beginning, it seemed extreme, was mocked and incited comparisons to Pee-wee Herman, but it has turned out to be a defining shape of men’s clothing today.

If you want to see something really freaky, take a look at an average suit from just six years ago. I’ve got one. Both jacket and pants are slightly too long, and the whole thing is made from the kind of lightweight, ultrafine wool that drapes like silk. Put it on, and it feels like a kimono.

Browne cuts his suits of harder stuff. He likes sturdier materials that keep their shape. That’s why Michelle Obama looked so good in the Thom Browne coat she wore to her husband’s second inauguration. It was made from a heavyweight silk that lent structure to the garment and that, says Browne, “was amazing to tailor.” Worn by FLOTUS, that coat spread Browne’s name far and wide, but his influence was already an established fact in the menswear industry. As Todd Snyder, another New York designer, said in the March Esquire, “Thom Browne single-handedly revolutionized the way people think of how a man’s clothes should fit.”

Just a few weeks after the inauguration, and with that issue of Esquire just hitting newsstands, I expect to find Browne in a state of excitement. Instead, on the phone from his Manhattan studio, he’s self-contained and unassuming. To the word “revolutionized,” he responds, “I never really pay attention to things like that. I like to just focus on what I do.”

There’s something about Browne’s attitude that echoes the “nothing-to-look-at-here” attitude of Beau Brummell, the 19th-century dandy who dressed for discretion rather than display. In fact, in the preface Browne wrote for the catalogue published in connection with Artist/Rebel/Dandy: Men of Fashion, an exhibition currently at the Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, he describes Brummell’s look as “pared down, fitted and uniform-like,” and goes on to declare, “This is precisely what I relate to as a menswear designer… Menswear does not need to scream fashion.” Browne has said that every collection starts with the grey suit. He is not bored by uniformity. In fact, as he once told Women’s Wear Daily, “Not having so much choice is what I find refreshing.”

That was in 2009, as Browne was preparing for his first show in Europe. A guest of Pitti Immagine Uomo, a menswear trade show that takes place in Florence, he staged a theatrical presentation intended to let the European audience know what he was all about. Forty models were identically dressed, working at identical desks in front of identical typewriters.

Last year in Paris, Browne unveiled his collection for this spring and summer in a garden. This time, the models became statues stepping into silver-dipped wingtip brogues that were secured to marble slabs, as if to suggest the importance of a solid foundation. While there was an array of madly coloured madras plaids, the clothes reflected Browne’s fundamentals of fit and proportion.

Creatively, Browne doesn’t travel far from his principles. Thoughts become cloth. He doesn’t bother with sketches and never uses any type of visual reference. “It’s really just straight from my head.”

Business-wise, however, Browne has been more of a vagabond. Born in Allentown, Pennsylvania, in 1965, he studied economics at university, tried acting in Los Angeles and wound up in the fashion business in New York. After working for Club Monaco, he established his business in 2001.

It was a custom-made operation until 2003, when he began producing menswear collections, which he began showing in Paris in 2010. Since 2007, he has been designing a collection (for men and women) called Black Fleece by Brooks Brothers. In 2009, he started doing a menswear line (Moncler Gamme Bleu) that is presented in Milan. In 2011, he introduced a full women’s collection, which hit the catwalk in New York; he also signed his first licensing deal, with Dita Eyewear, a Los Angeles company. And, as of press time, he was scheduled to open a flagship store—his second, after the one in New York—in Tokyo.

In the course of this career, Browne has exerted influence, both general and specific. He took up scissors against all that was baggy and slack, and demonstrated to a new generation of men —who knew only Casual Friday—that tailored clothing can be cool. At the same time, he gave lessons in dressing down, and helped make the cardigan sweater seem as well turned-out as a blazer.

Of course, Browne has not been the only designer to have slenderized the male wardrobe in the 21st century. Hedi Slimane, a Frenchman, has pioneered clothes so skinny that it took a new breed of skinny models to wear them.

However, in Browne’s case, his sensibility happened to converge with a whole new appreciation for the heritage of American menswear, as evidenced by the impact ofMad Men and the revived interest in Ivy League style.

While Browne has made signatures out of American campus looks such as shirts with button-down collars or bare ankles, he upholds old-world values of fit and quality.

And quality can be costly. In an episode of Family Guy, Stewie paid three grand for a Thom Browne sweater. Rob Lo, co-owner of Roden Gray, a Vancouver store where Browne’s menswear collection has been available for the past three seasons, says that you can get a sweater for $1,000; suits start at $2,400 and sell well.

In the early days, such suits were seen to be so oddly fitting that they were comical. In this regard, Browne is comparable to another great American maverick, Gertrude Stein, a writer whose prose, plainer even than Hemingway’s, was thought to be a joke before it became known as modern literature. A little misunderstanding for an artist is perhaps not a bad thing. As Stein once observed, “My writing is as clear as mud, but mud settles and clear streams run on and disappear.”

Keira Knightley wears Elie Saab couture on the Anna Karenina red carpet

The much-anticipated TIFF premiere of Anna Karenina took place on Friday night and Keira Knightley and Jude Law walked the red carpet in outfits that were almost as opulent as the costumes from the film itself. For Keira Knightley, this meant an impeccable haute couture Elie Saab dress from the designer’s Fall 2012 collection—certainly one of the top fashion moments from TIFF so far. The black sheer lace gown (perhaps a nod to the veils she wears as Anna Karenina?) was almost dripping with embellished crystal detail and was finished with a trim, skinny belt. 

Jude Law’s double-breasted suit didn’t look especially like something Alexei Karenin would wear, but when he opened the jacket to reveal a pinstripe vest with white piping it almost seemed like his outfit was missing a pocket watch or monocle. Also in a three-piece suite on the TIFF red carpet was Aaron Taylor-Johnson (accompanied by his wife, director Sam Taylor-Wood) and while we’re tempted to call the colour of his suit “denim” we’ll settle on “dusty blue.” Aaron Taylor-Johnson kept the Anna Kareninaopulence going with the addition of a sparkling beetle-shaped brooch on his lapel. Director Joe Wright did not partake in the three-piece suit trend, but his wifeAnoushka Shankar (who, like her dad Ravi Shankar, is also an accomplished sitar player) looked stunning on the TIFF red carpet in a textured black skirt and detailed blouse.

Although style and fashion vary widely, cross-cultural research has found a variety of commonalities in people's perception of beauty. The earliest Western theory of beauty can be found in the works of early Greek philosophers from the pre-Socratic period, such as Pythagoras. The Pythagorean school saw a strong connection between mathematics and beauty. In particular, they noted that objects proportioned according to the golden ratio seemed more attractive. Ancient Greek architecture is based on this view of symmetry and proportion.

A feature of beautiful women that has been explored by researchers is a waist–hip ratio of approximately 0.70. Physiologists have shown that women with hourglass figures are more fertile than other women due to higher levels of certain female hormones, a fact that may subconsciously condition males choosing mates.

How much money a person earns may also be influenced by physical beauty. One study found that people low in physical attractiveness earn 5 to 10 percent less than ordinary looking people, who in turn earn 3 to 8 percent less than those who are considered good looking.  Discrimination against others based on their appearance is known as lookism.