basement valentine

I'm a little too proud of this outfit to not post on it...
I guess it's my room in outfit form, with a blanket print and arts n' craftsy shoes and dress and top. Plus it had to be multi-colored to match my room. When I was littler I really wanted to get the Trading Spaces Jr. treatment, but in retrospect that would have been a terrible idea. As a toddler I told my sister that when I'd grow up I'd be either a "birthday party girl" (whatever that means,) a Barbie (I don't even want to get into the implications here,) or a pancake (THEY WERE MY FAVORITE FOOD OKAY.) I think it's a terribly positive thing I didn't sleep in a Barbie-themed room every night for years. Though pancakes might be kind of cool.

The dress is my Bat Mitzvah dress from Loehmann's, the top is Comme des Garcons, Hudson's Bay sweater, DIY'd hair clip, random socks, and the shoes were a gift from Comme des Garcons.

And oh, these LEGGINGS:
I am obsessed. They were sent to me by the brand, so let's review...

Brand: Romance Was Born
Pros: You mean other than the fact that these are afghan squares in leggings form? The print is vivid and precise, and they're super comfortable.
Cons:
I find that a lot of designer samples' width fit me perfectly and are way too long the other way, but it's a pain when the actual product is sized for models, too. These leggings are not a sample, so the proportions are slightly uncomfortable. I just fold over the waistband a ton.

And, in honor of my pictured Cibo Matto 45, let us all take three minutes and six seconds out of our days to have our minds blown:

spin the bottle, in the laundry room for seven, listening to stairway to heaven

The other day, a boy at our lunch table said he has five pounds of bedazzles lying all over his room.
A kind of suburban basement wall paneling, arts n' crafts, proudly cheap vibe.
David Bowie, Rodarte SS11 shoe collage by Jane, moon tarot, Meadham Kirchhoff SS11 shoes, and Chloe Sevigny. The title is a culmination of a bunch of First Kiss (sadly sold out, boo!) stories.

No Make-Up Week and cute stuff


This week is no make-up week on this here Internet! I'm coming a bit late to the party, but consider almost every outfit photo on this blog a contribution. To quote from the event's page,
"The philosophy is this. Make-up is great. It is a powerful tool, a way to express yourself, your mood and interior life. But, when you can’t go without something, it loses it’s spark.

A study online claims that 8 out of 10 women prefer their female colleagues to wear makeup and the same number of women said they would rather employ a woman who wore makeup than one who didn’t. Because of these expectations, I think it’s hard for any woman to have a good relationship to make-up."

I do the occasional lipstick or eyeliner because of the addition it can make to an outfit, but on days when I'm not into my skin, I'm tempted to cake on all that foundation stuff. I usually don't because I'm lazy and don't have much time in the morning, plus something about it feels too mask-like and makes me uncomfortable or kind of suffocated. What're your make-up musings? *Points to audience like member of Zoom cast*

This outfit was supposed to be a really obvious combination of light and dark and somewhat cartoony, what with the hair bow and dino boots and bunny bag.

Sweater from Salvation Army and Miu Miu fabric. The creative director at Prada was super cool and sent me a couple things in this fabric which matches my dog and his too, he said. My dog is always nicer to me when I wear this in my hair, but I don't know what it's actually supposed to be.

Alice + Olivia dress worn as skirt, Hide boots.
I was given this skirt when I styled Alice + Olivia's musical guests for their SS11 presentation (more on that later!) and I'm obsessed with how tear-crinkled the fabric looks. When I biked to school it got kind of dirty and murky at the bottom, but I'm really into it? Recently I've been less careful about my clothes' cleanliness because I like the idea of a closet full of lived-in and well-loved clothes. I will maybe regret taking such poor care when I have to sell all my stuff because I went broke after investing in a documentary about the history of the Snuggie, but that is why I am mentioning the documentary idea now. What do you think? Is it a wise business move? And would you be willing to fund it?

Dino boots! The designer gave them to me when I visited Ra in Antwerp (again, more on that later. Ra is awesome and led to me sitting in my school counselor's office a few days ago explaining why I wrote "live in a creative commune" under "Future Career Goals.")
Brand: Hide
Pros: They're comfy, remind me of the Greek god Hermes and of dinosaurs, and I of course love absurdity. They're also easy to clean, like dirt from bike riding.
Cons: So far no problems, but we'll see how they hold up as time goes on.

Are there any other components of a product you guys would like to hear about for when I try this freebie review format in the future?

This BAG, my lord. It's so cute and creepy and reminds me of something one of the Gashlycrumb Tinies might've owned. And I can't wait for how it'll look when it's all old and worn.

Brand: sent to me by Mandy Coon
Pros: Uh, it's adorable? I mean, button eyes! I carried my giant ass, calculator-containing pencil case around in it all day, if that tells you anything about the practicality. It's incredibly well-made with impeccable stitches. And there are some details that most people probably won't see but make it a bag that is a luxury bag, like silk lining and patches of fabric on the inside of the ears (as in this beautiful clipart.)
Cons: The length of the handle, because I feel like bunny bags should swing easily over the shoulder and not be carried daintily by the hand. The chain heightens the irony of a black leather bunny bag, but takes it a bit too far and makes the bag less versatile (the leather can't just be black leather, it has to be "punk" black leather) and more trendy (specifically, the one of Spring 2009 when everyone on Tumblr was posting photos of studs from Jak & Jil.) I wouldn't really care if the chain was detachable and there was space to add your own handle, but I struggled to tie my own gray string on there and had to adjust it all day.

carnival

Today I wore a sweater to school that had the f-word on it.

I thought I would get quite the beating from my peers, and I was totally wrong. And kind of disappointed! Which sounds horrible (it's a good thing that I can be openly feminist at school) but I guess I'm just bored. What was so great about dressing up in middle school was when people got really confused and sometimes even angry and had the most entertaining responses, but now a lot of them think they're supposed to like my outfits because some magazine does, and as a result, I am never challenged. The best was when people found out about this blog, and said things like, "Wow, I would not have guessed you care about fashion." Which I loved -- I don't want to look like someone who cares about fashion. Now everything is justified by the attention this blog receives, the same way I dislike the logo placement on my Miu Miu collar, as if it makes the oddness somehow okay. My goal for this school year was to wear outfits that confuse the people I'm surrounded by every day, challenge beauty ideals...I know it's cheesy to post inspiration quotes, but these are not the kind you will see pasted onto a photo of a sunset and tumbled:

"I like making images that from a distance seem kind of seductive, colorful, luscious and engaging, and then you realize what you're looking at is something totally opposite. It seems boring to me to pursue the typical idea of beauty, because that is the easiest and the most obvious way to see the world. It's more challenging to look at the other side." -- Cindy Sherman

"I know when I first started, I said things like, 'It's really great to be beautiful and powerful and sexy,' and I take a little bit of that back now. What I was saying was that you don't have to look a certain way or have a certain hairstyle to be a feminist; that just because a girl wears lipstick that doesn't mean she's not a feminist. But now I realize that I wasn't really challenging the standard of beauty. A friend said to me, 'Why is it so subversive to be beautiful in the traditional sense? I think it's much more subversive to create your own form of beauty and to set your own standards.' She's right." -- Kathleen Hanna

Speaking of Kathleen Hanna, this sweater is actually courtesy of her! It was made and given to her by Jim Drain and Elyse Allen and the label says Happy Banana. I had breakfast with her and my pal Wendy when I was in New York and it was definitely a highlight of my Fashion Week, even though it was not actually a part of Fashion Week and we hardly talked about fashion. We talked a bit about the politics of it though, and when I mentioned the kinds of things that are, like, really really important to the Internet at this time of year (seat placements, who got shot by which street style photographers, more stupidity) Kathleen said, "Who cares? People are dying," so quick, in one breath, and it was like...duh! I mean, seriously, what a wonderful thing to hear and mindset to get in during a time I have such a love/hate relationship with.

She also gave me these zines I'm really stoked on:

I gave a presentation to my English class about Riot Grrrl and my teacher said I could read an excerpt from one of these out loud one of these days after we're done with the spoken word unit. Today my group had to think of a metaphor for the moon. We submitted, "the moon is Caillou once he has acne and insomnia."

You may think from these photos that I want to kill you. I do not. It is just my regular face.
Sweater, gift. Jeans sent to me by Proenza Schouler. Pierre Hardy for Gap wedges. Happy Socks from tobi.com. Hairbow from the Olvera Street Market. The headband I'm wearing in the first photo was sent to me by Monsoon Accessorize, and I pinned on the crown, which came from a postcard of a Mexican bingo card.

cheap

I am going to get really lazy with posting for a while now to catch up on what I missed here at home while I was...not...here. That is how tired I am. Enjoy this New Yorker profile, meanwhile? And the witch/teen angst vibes I'm feeling for fall (more here and here):
Chloe Sevigny, tarot, Venetia Scott, Corinne Day, Wednesday, cats, The Craft (source unknown.)

real time

The best part of Fashion Week so far was definitely tonight, which had little to do with Fashion Week at all. ~Courtesy~ of Soho House, I had dinner with Elizabeth, Laia, Jane, Deanne, and Zana, where we talked about things like Neopets and Tamagotchis. Riveting! I guess they each planted the seeds of our fashion blogging passions. I'd be lying if I said the Neopets paintbrushes were never a seriously important part of my life.

So very classy, we are! Everyone was so on their style game, I managed to snap pictures of Jane's eyelashed Octopus jangle and Laia's witchy beige vibes, featuring Zana's rad harness.


My outfit today was put together with "Army Dreamers" by Kate Bush stuck in my head, more about the way it sounds than what it means. I guess now is a good time to post this mix:

  1. Army Dreamers -- Kate Bush
  2. Silver -- The Pixies
  3. Devil Got My Woman -- Skip James
  4. Whole Lotta Yoko -- Yoko Ono and Ivry Gitlis with the Dirty Mac
  5. Dead Man's Bones -- Dead Man's Bones
  6. Softer, Softest -- Hole
  7. Gold Dust Woman -- Fleetwood Mac
  8. Speak For Me -- Cat Power
  9. Colleen -- Joanna Newsom
  10. Season of the Witch -- Hole
  11. Walk About -- The Slits

Drug store barrettes to correspond with the pink doodly flowers on my shoes.

Duskin dress, vintage crinoline and jacket, Totoro spook brooch from Studio Ghibli in Tokyo. Deborah Lippman was at Barneys on Fashion's Night Out and gave me this mesmerizing nail polish called Across the Universe. The sparkly in the polish goes with the sparkly in the dress and in the tights, which I used to try to balance out the dustiness of the jacket and crinoline. Clearly this is all a very complicated process, filled with maths and stuff.

Tights were a gift from the Rodarte sisters and I bought the Miu Miu clogs at Bergdorf Goodman. Seriously getting into witch vibes, and for once I'm acting like the characters I try to project through my outfit. But that's all for another time.

Thanks for the lovely night, dudes! Real talk with awesome people is just what you need during the middle of Fashion Week.

funkytown

Antwerp was amazing! Fashion's Night Out was super fun! It is all a bit too much to write about while putting off homework at the Barnes & Noble cafe, right now. So meanwhile, it looks like only about 99% of my summer was spent watching Seinfeld, and the other 1% was spent doing a few things I'm kind of psyched about..

Such as outfit pictures for Afterzine! You were supposed to dress inspired by a book/book character. I was one of three people who did a Haruki Murakami novel. I think fashion bloggers have inherent telepathy with one another, or something. The other pictures are really great, and turned me on to a number of blogs I didn't know before. The rest of the zine has things like short stories or essays interpreting the term "negative space," fashion illustrations and photography...just take a look at this snazzy list of contributors:

Thurston Moore, you guys!


I also wrote something for Style.com. It is about fashion! And also style. You never know what to expect with me! Quite the card, I am! Etc.

They have a ton of fancy lists up right now in honor of their 10th anniversary. Two thumbs up, fine holiday fun.

I also styled a shoot for BlackBook? It was such a good time. We went to the Sticks & Stones Farm in Connecticut where they had tiny sheds and beds and it made the whole thing way more relaxing and fun. The whole team was really great to work with, and the model was really sweet...I won't talk about the clothes since they should speak for themselves, but hope you like it and all that. Also, they named it after the new Hole album! Aw.
Also, I was thisclose to stealing everything.

One of Them

“Tavi, take a look at this,” my dad said, waking me from my airplane slumber with excitement, pointing to an article in the New York Times about Apple products. Normally I take no interest in all that talk, but it was different this time around. For you see -- I have become one of them.

Too loyal to the good ole days when each Tweet was followed by “via web” as opposed to “via some kind of new-fangled Steve Jobs application,” I never planned to posses any of these modern gadgets. Until my sister got a laptop, which came with a free iPod Touch, which went to me. I was immediately converted, and felt pride in the way I could slide the “unlock” button with such ease; the way my “To Do” lists suddenly looked so much more efficient. The pseudo-notebook paper on a screen gave them validity, while real life notebook paper was for people who were amateurs at, well, life. Suddenly, I didn’t just have to buy deodorant. I had to buy deodorant.

These few days were bliss. But a dark cloud settled over my happiness as the Times article went on about the new Touch models. How they were so thin and sleek and could open envelopes. They had built-in microphones, and a million cameras, and, hell, you could probably make an Oscar award-winning movie with the new Touch. It had super powers, which made it possible for you to stalk anyone, ever.

And here I was, with the old one. I opened up my To Do list. I would have to find Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s house on my own.

This didn’t translate to my dad. “Aren’t you pleased with my shopping skills?” he asked, giddy. “We have the new model!”

I didn’t want to break it to him, but it was for his own good. “Dad, we don’t have the new model. It won’t be available for a while. We have the old one.”

His face fell before he began scrambling to find other possible explanations, pointing desperately at the upper left corner of our ancient Touch. “That? Isn’t that a camera? You’re sure?” he begged, as though asking once more would magically transform the device.

But he knew the answer. We both did. That was no camera; that was a useless, tiny black panel. Black, and filled with despair.

Suddenly, my iPod Touch was nothing to be proud of. It was not sleek, nor shiny, and could open no envelopes. Oh, God, I thought in a panic, what’ll I do about all those envelopes? It was a brick; as fat and useless as a Five-Dollar Foot Long. Even the boingy little noises it produced were as irritating as that Subway commercial. I pictured it under my bed, where it belonged and would soon be hidden, next to the first generation iPod Shuffle.

“Oh, that? You can have it if you want,” a friend of mine said back in fifth grade.

“Really?” I barely breathed.

“Yeah, it’s cool. Everyone in my family already owns an iPod. And I won it at some Bar Mitzvah.”

I fell in love with my new iPod Shuffle. Sure, it had no screen. And sure, it held approximately four songs. But that didn’t matter. It was an iPod. It was an iPod and it hung on a little iPod lanyard around my neck. I was one of them.

But as I would soon learn, a Shuffle could gain me no credibility. “It doesn’t even have a screen,” my friends would say, ticking away at their Nanos, trying to decide between Cheetah Girls and High School Musical. Indeed, I was definitely not one of them.

And the Touch situation was just the same. Distressed and unable to handle any more suffering, I began curling back into fetal position to sleep when I spotted a red hard candy on the floor in front of me. Hours earlier, I got it out of my backpack, dropped it, and just could not find it again. I had probably spent half of the eight-hour flight searching. And now, here it was, lodged in between the wall and the foot of the person in front of me.

Know what probably could’ve found it earlier?

The new iPod Touch.

My dad and I got off the plane soon thereafter. We got our luggage. We dragged our feet. We told the guy at customs we had a good time, but what did we know? We were no new iPod Touches.

“What’s that smell?” I asked my dad as we sat in silence on the EL train coming home. Then I remembered. I glanced at my To Do list. I no longer had to buy deodorant. I just...had to buy deodorant.

you probably don't even know my middle name.

Today my dad and I just walked around and got lost here in Antwerp. It's great for that kind of thing. But I'm too worn out from eating these Belgian waffles to recap everything quite yet:
It's such hard work! You have to sit there and move the fork from the plate to your mouth. I took a photo in order to capture the Hard Work, hoping I could show it to my P.E. teacher and get gym credits for doing Hard Work outside class. I got distracted upon viewing the picture, however, by my great photography skills. For a moment I thought I'd make a fantastic food blogger. Then I remembered that the camera was good, not me, and that my diet consists solely of Nesquik, Goldfish, Fruit Roll-Ups, and Fun Dip. (And, if you work at any of those companies and happen to be reading this, you may want to consider sending me a supply of the lifetime sort in exchange for your mention. Just a thought.)

I wore this. Kinda going for a Royal Tenenbaums vibe, half-Margot and half-their house. And I really am happy to be in Antwerp, even if I don't look it. The sulking expression is half-Margot and half-glaring at my dad and telling him how to press a camera button through gritted teeth. Did you know that form of speaking makes you look creepy in all countries?

Miu Miu collar from the Miu Miu store in NY. Tom Ford lipstick (the shade is "ginger fawn." I'm obsessed. Mine was a gift from a friend so I can't say I'd spend $85 on a tube of lipstick otherwise, but I'm happy to have it. Prefer it to the lipsticks from Chanel and Armani for sure.)
(I swear I don't talk like that in real life.)

Random house-found barrettes (I chose red to correspond with my hair and lipstick, making a full spectrum of different kinds of reds. The yellow is for the collar. Plus I like the idea of wearing a naked lady collar with a barrette with a teddy bear on it.) Hand-me-down dress.
Teacup baroque vintage heels from Beacon's Closet in NY.
I have never been a bag person, and have never really found myself particularly lusting after one, but thanks to the generous ladies at Sonia Rykiel, I'll never need to. I'll also never need a sleeping bag or any friends, because I just want to shrink and sleep in this and hug it all the time. We'll share our feelings at these shrinking and hugging sleepovers, and it'll go like this:
Me: Do you ever get the feeling that it's all a lie?
Bag: ...
Me: Oh, Bag, that is so like you! Pass the popcorn!

stuff you care about, which will drastically change your life

Well, high school has sufficiently managed to take over my life. I am still figuring out how to manage all this "homework" you people speak of. When you kids on Tumblr were stressing, you really weren't kidding!

Thankfully, I really really like high school so far. Which is why I am actually sad (sad!) to be missing these next couple weeks for a few moments of insanity. Today my dad and I are leaving for Antwerp, Belgium as we were generously invited to Stephen Jones' exhibit at the MoMu (and you can bet I will be wearing that bow hat, WEARING IT LIKE NO MAN OR WOMAN HAS EVER WORN A BOW HAT BEFORE, GODDAMN.) It should result in some wonderful photos and lots of exciting stories, too.
Speaking of the bow hat, the new issue of Pop has come out, which means my article about couture week in Paris is out, which means I can now transfer my fangirling over to the blog. So many photos and stories to come, but for now I am kind of obsessed with this photo my dad took when I was talking to John Galliano backstage:
Anyway, then we will then be headed to Fashion Week in New York, yay, etc. I'll be tweeting/blogging the event for and hanging out at Barneys, so follow them and all that, and also stop by and say hello!

I also recommend heading over to Opening Ceremony at 35 Howard Street where some of my clothes will be for sale. I love them and would wear and have worn them all, but we have a rule at my house about closet space and some things have to go. Other things at my booth will be brand new donations from when I was working on my Bat Mitzvah project, Clothing With a Cause. My entire portion of the profits from the clothes will go towards the same organization I used before, STAND. Go back and read my post on CWAC or the post I wrote about it for the Pop blog and then buy something and feel good about it.

All this craziness means that I will really suck at email for the next few weeks, so apologies in advance. Now might not be the best time to write me and expect an urgent response.

Now that you're done reading about all these important events that are vital to your own life, enjoy this wonderful old Comme ad:

(source)