Fashion is a vicious circle.

I believe that all women should like their bodies and use them as tools of seduction - Ghada Amer

Knossos

Tibet

Emilio Pucci SS 2012 RTW

Valentino FW 2012/2013 HC

Bulgari

Elle Muliarchyk

Inez&Vinoodh, Vogue Paris June/July 2012 (model Gisele Bundchen)

Paola Kudacki, Down the rabbit hole (model Crystal Renn, 25 magazine)

Anja Rubik and 25 magazine

What a model saw when she went out from a models' apartament...

... and after a long walk ended up in Palais de Tokyo with Robert Kuta (click!)

Saint Natasha Poly

Mario Sorrenti, Vogue Paris June/July 2012, Clair de Jour (model Natasha Poly, styling Emmanuelle Alt)

The Mandorla in Icon Revealing Mystery - click!
Within a mandorla - click!

Fight for/with couture

Haute couture heat has finally chilled a little bit. Models were booked. Front rows were sat. Dresses were presented. Reviews were written. Careers were destroyed. Other careers were speeded up. New photo shoots were ordered by editors-in-chief. Dresses were chosen. Dresses were delivered to studios and hopefully none of drivers was seriously injured. At a shooting, I did witness a fight between PR people from two esteemed fashion houses whose argument about the schedule of photographing the dresses got totally wild. However, I did not notice any marks of blood, from which I draw a conclusion that they didn't resort to using their nails or teeth.

Since the haute craziness slightly slowed down, yet its memory is still vivid, we can finally look at the couture from a healthy distance.

Versace - tiny&sexy. As always. But this is the thing we love about Versace. The dresses are meant to send a clear message."I'm more powerful than Putin, but you can undress me". And they never fail to fullfill this task.

For Dior you surprisingly need boobs. Or two pins on the back and two elbows very close to your waist in order to prevent it from falling down. Fabrics are absolutely fabulous.

I don't remember in which dress exactly I was photographed recently, but I do remember one great thing about the fabrics. They bend the light in a fantastic way that makes the rays fall on your skin and brighten your face as if it was glowing with happiness and relax. Perfect red carpet solution. You can move, you can take even big steps, you look great and you feel marvellous. Irrespective of the fact that this colection might be considered a little bit conservative, it was just great as it was tailored for the women who will wear it.

And it's not only my personal opinion. Ieva, who is in the picture and with whom I shared a room in July, said right after the show that she just felt fantastic. Sometimes you look fantastic, but fantastic you definitely feel not.

Stephane Rollande. "Don't move, don't speak, don't think, look fabulous". Holy Jesus. The fabric is great and you get a divine shape in this dress, but this rubber decoration on the sleeves is freaking heavy! And these stripes are a truly worth Araki. Haute bondage.

I just adore this Alexis Mabille's dress. Full stop.

Chanel. I cannot help expressing my personal opinion again. This is one of my two favorite collections, all the designs were extremely beautiful, feminine and respectful of women's different shapes and attitudes. Moreover, Chanel haute couture is one of the most comfortable things I have ever imagined wearing because of the silk linings of truly luxurious quality.

Jean Paul Gautier. It felt awkward to wear this dress as it implied that Andriej Pejic has more breasts than me. I must be as flat as a table...

Iris van Herpen is freaking genious! I don't know what it is and how she made it, but wearing this insane dresses feels so great! So great! It's more a sculpture than a garment. But is fantastic!

And here comes creme de la creme:

Valentino

Givenchy

For me, this is the essence of post-feminism in fashion, although each fahion house understands it slightly different. When it comes to Valentino, the dresses are like a breath of fresh air, they set free a women that wears them instead of catching her in a golden cage. Thei prove that beauty does not necesarily need a sacrifice. You can look astounding withouth suffering from a physical discomfort. In Valentino, you can lauugh, dance, walk, you can even jump and run, the dress is not a limit. On the other hand, Givenchy's post-feministis attitude is not about freedom, is about the link with primal strenght. The dress that is in the picture is made from leather that nearly melts with the skin of a women who wears it. It interacts with her and evokes animal instincts, sharpens intuition and lifts confidence. It has never happened to me in any dress to feel as a fighter. As if I could do anything, reach anything and was intestructable. As if nobody could stop me and the Great Mother's blood was flowing in my veins. In this gown, I was not fragile at all. I was full of power.

And talking about couture and feminism, Pier Paolo Piccioli, Maria Grazia Chiuri and Riccardo Tisci are not the only ones to fight for women's rights with a thread and a needle.


Ghada Amer has a lot to say about this with couture too.

The best resort collection.

I want this whole collection. Right now. And I don't care, I'm gonna wear it on the street and may people point their fingers on me and call me a freak. It is something. It is hot!

And this whole Lana and Florence inspired streetstyle is not even warm. It is sweet, flowy and mild.

No emotions. You get what I mean?

Tillmans fashionable

Yesterday I had a chance to work with an incredibly lovely team that I will remember for long. People were sweet and professional, pictures were simple yet highly esthetic, clothes were not only visually interesting, but also wearable (shoes!!!). Since I always google the people I am about to work with, I did so this time as well and came across the results of one of the most thrilling collaborations I got to know about recently.

Both born in Germany and internationally recognizable, Lutz Huelle, a designer, and Wolfgang Tillmans, a photographer, turned out to have once joined their creative powers. The first did I work with yesterday. The latter remains one of my favorite photographers since his solo show in Zacheta National Gallery of Art in Warsaw.

Huelle presented his first collection at a fashion show and Tillmans photographed it:

http://lutzarchives.wordpress.com/2012/05/01/lutz-1-the-debut-the-show-photos-wolfgang-tillmans/

http://lutzparis.wordpress.com/

http://tillmans.co.uk/

What do models think about when they don't think about fashion

To all my friends who think that I'm on vacations in Paris and I'm paid for it:

No, they don't pay you for going to castings.

Yes, you need to go to MANY castings to get a single job.

Yes, they pay you for standing on stage in high heels (jobs). But this happens only after a good run around the city in Nike runs (castings).

And yes, after whole day of dealing with clothes you must be insane to spend the rest of it on shopping. 

And this is why the other day, just for the sake of our mental health, we decided with beautiful Magdalena Fiolka to forget about shopping and visit a museum. All in all, sales in Galerie Lafayette can wait.

And it was fun, because, c'mon, how many hours a day can a man talk about garments? Isn't it nicer to wonder from time to time how Jackson Pollock was moving while painting his pieces?

Jackson Pollock, Untitled (Silver over black white red and yellow), 1948

I bet he danced better than Jagger. As a shaman or something. In a trance, but not fury. Completely concentrated like a ballerina. Physically, efortlessly. And what do you think?

Snakeskin: steal and be famous

Snakeskin is always en vogue. All in all, it's nicer to have a black mamba on your foor that in your foot (or its teeth to be precise). On the other hand, snakes appear to be more and more extinct and their catchers from the Third World more and more rebellious. They don't agree to catch these poisonous animals for a cup of rice anymore. Since the western luxurious goods market is still recovering from the heavy shake after the global crisis, the number of designers who can afford making head-to-toe snakeskin looks is gradually decreasing. Good news to PETA, bad news to fashion victims.


But, c'mon, this is a creative buisiness, no? And we live in copy-paste era. So evviva printmaking!


But making a good snakeskin print is not a piece of cake.

Not even for Christian Louboutin's team:

If I were a print designer, I'd resort to copying Johann Jacob Scheuchzer's pictures from "Physica Sacra" (click on the title to see the whole album). He's not a musician and I'm not The Pirate Bay. Moreover, he's already dead. So there's nothing to loose but good taste.

I bet his lawyers wouldn't sue me, fashion journalist would brief with relief and Anna dello Russo would become my fan. Steal and be famous!

Ugly ugly ugly

Apparently, ugliness is the trend of next season. Iris Apfel might be able to look ugly on her own, as she once said during her panel conversation with Tavi Gevison (http://www.refinery29.com/iris-apfel-tavi-met-museum), but some people - might not. And then fashion icons come and offer their proffesional yet costly help:

Marc Jacobs FW 12 by Juergen Teller

Vogue Italia July 2012 cover by Steven Meisel

There's nothing bad or indecent in ugliness. But I am myself extremely envious of all the people who don't know how to look ugly on their own and they have to spend enormous money on designer pieces to achieve the ugly effect. Geeez. These people must be extremely beautiful. They must shine with beauty, sparkle with beauty and hurt eyes of onlookers. Their beauty must be simply unbearable.

As most of people are capable of looking ugly without any tips from fashion experts, I am afraid.

Hungry hungry hungry

Model and vegan, I would not even touch this. But who says that models and vegans cannot enjoy Dutch baroque taste?