bambina writes

Triple Treat

It's always nice to open a magazine and see three of your stories published in one issue.  The latest WWD Fast, a biannual publication of WWD which focuses on jeans, sportswear and youth culture, carries three pieces by me - one on Eairth, the organic line by Filipino designer Melissa Dizon, one on Metropolitain Cosmetics, just about the best beauty and fragrance shop in Johannesburg, and one on my favorite African city, Cape Town.

Read them after the break.

The Imeldific in Karl Lagerfeld

The terno goes haute couture.  Was Lola Karl inspired by Imelda Marcos?

Take a look at this from the Chanel Fall-Winter 2008 Couture show in Paris yesterday:

 

Continue reading "The Imeldific in Karl Lagerfeld" »

Yves Saint Laurent, indisputably one of the greatest fashion designers in history, died on Sunday at his home in Paris.  He was 71.

He was born with a nervous breakdown, according to his closest friend and business partner, Pierre Bergé. He was also born with talent and creativity that were immense and staggering.

His influence on fashion is chronicled in an article in WWD today, complete with tributes from Oscar dela Renta, Marc Jacobs, Jean-Paul Gaultier and Vera Wang.  Nothing as yet from Tom Ford though, who took over as designer for YSL Rive Gauche when Saint Laurent and Bergé sold their company to the Gucci Group in 1999.  Saint Laurent continued to design the couture collections until 2002, when he took his final, tearful bow and retired from the world of fashion.

It was Girls Night Out everywhere around the world last night. And there was a run on Cosmopolitans as well. After watching Sex and the City on opening night like all good card-carrying thirty- and forty-something women and gay men, we headed for the nearest bar and ordered what else but Cosmopolitans. Our rotund waiter was clueless as to why the dark pink drinks were unusually popular last night. And so began, drink in hand, a post-mortem on Sex and the City, the most hyped, most publicized, most fashionably self-conscious and most self-consciously fashionable movie of the year.

As far as homecomings go, Rafe Totengco's is pretty hard to beat.

Accessories designer Rafe Totengco, known for blending uptown sophistication with downtown edge, has taken his aesthetic to the Philippines.

"I was blown away with the reception I got from customers, who came in droves to congratulate me, shower me with affection and support," New York-based Totengco said about the launch party.

WWD today released a new Top Ten List, this time ranking the countries by the percentage of residents surveyed who say they buy designer brands.

And guess what? The Philippines is ranked 8th, with 26 per cent.

A few weeks back, my friend Mons Tantoco-Romulo asked me to answer the question of the week for her column in the Philippine Star. I'm flattered that Mons thinks of me every now and then despite my being away from Manila, but I'm afraid the replies I've given her over the years are rarely as profoundly introspective as everyone else's. Perhaps her respondents like to see her column as a chance to go all Deepak, but believe me, if your life the past four years has been anything like mine, with its never-ending circus of assessments and pre-trial conferences, you'd be Deepak-ed out.

So Mon's question, ironically put to me a week before Valentine's Day, was: "How do you move on after a heartbreak?"

If you think about it, it's been a good month for the Philippines - a civil servant gained a conscience and shed light on the extent of corruption in the government, the bishops admitted their shameful complicity in the ouster of a democratically elected president and the installation into power of a dwarf-sized devil, and protests against a rapacious regime have begun to pick up momentum.

But that's not all.

Filipino fashion blogger Bryanboy, the Third World's most outrageous fag, received the fashionista's highest honor: Marc Jacobs has named an ostrich bag from his Fall/Winter 08 collection "BB", after him.

And finally, an in-depth look at luxury retail in the Philippines came out in Tuesday's Women's Wear Daily, authored by... me! The stories appeared in a special section called Asia In Depth.

The first story, Manila: On the Retail Radar, focuses on the key players in the luxury retail industry, including Ayala Land. In a country saturated with malls, their own Greenbelt, particularly Greenbelt 4 & 5, truly is a world-class retail showcase. Talk about a case of "if you build it, they will come"!

Another goodbye, but this time a less lugubrious one.

After 45 years in fashion, Valentino took his final bow at his swan song couture show in Paris yesterday.

According to WWD,

Valentino said goodbye to fashion with relative discretion at a stellar show at the Musée Rodin. "We are very serene, very happy," he had said on Monday. And, indeed, when he took that last walk down the runway after a 45-year run at fashion's highest reaches, he maintained his composure as his audience jumped to its collective feet in wild appreciation.

He did elegant, he did glamorous, he did romantic, he did chic. And he ended with sublime, sending a parade of models swathed in identical silk column dresses, all in his signature red.

Talk about going out in a blaze of glory!

When I worked as fashion editor at a now-defunct Hong Kong glossy, I attended the Paris fashion shows for a couple of seasons, wide-eyed, bewildered, but enthralled and completely unmindful of being ushered into the 10th row or so with the rest of the Asian fashion press, way behind the US and European editors and a row or two behind the Japanese, but ahead of the Egyptians and Kuwaitis. I wasn't just a small fish in a vast ocean, I was a sardine thrilled to be tightly packed into a glittering tin. To my regret, I never attended a Valentino show. I believe in those days he was still showing couture in Rome, and prêt-a-porter in Milan.

Already then, in 1990, Valentino was a legend in fashion, and was celebrating 30 years in the industry. The Valentino press office had sent me a book, Valentino: Thirty Years of Magic, commemorating the event.

The Gerry Dryansky quote at the frontispiece of the book sums up the magic of Valentino beautifully:

"And a work of beauty stands firm as a work of beauty, no matter which way the wind is blowing."

As gorgeous as Valentino's clothes are, they always struck me as being for grown-ups, the sort I'd wear when I was more adult, more established, more tai-tai. My mother wore a navy and cream linen Valentino suit to my brother's wedding in 1986 - and she was 45 then, an age I'm fast approaching. Yet somehow, even after two children and a pretty awesome, multifaceted career, I feel I still don't merit a Valentino suit. The Chanel suits are a different story; I had to be dressed in them when I worked there eight years ago.

But I have to admit, I do feel grown-up enough to slink into a room wearing nothing but a silky red Valentino gown...

(Photo lifted from Jezebel)

I have a piece in today's WWD about the new Paul Smith store in Hijack City. I need to ask Adriaan Louw, the photographer who took the fabulous photos, if I can reproduce some of them here.

My favorite quote in the story came from Anthony Keyworth, one of the store's owners.

Finding stylish, well-made and attractively priced men's wear has always been a challenge for sartorially conscious South Africans. The South African male himself is typically stereotyped as a sports-mad, shorts-clad species. "We felt sorry for South African men," Keyworth revealed. "The choices they had were limited."

Yeah, those short-short khaki shorts and those garish green and orange shirts have got to go! They do serve their purpose, though, on occasion. To her enduring sartorial shame, a friend of mine realized the value of wearing the shirt plus a vest made of springbok hide in Paris of all places, to humor her husband when they watched a rugby (or whatever sport it was) world cup match last September. In all fairness, he (thankfully) doesn't rock the lion-ate-my-shorts-on-safari-that's-why-they're-so-short vibe.

The fashion don't was well worth it - at the very least, she got a surprisingly warm reception from the Parisians because she clearly wasn't English. And, she returned hauling back some serious loot from the likes of Prada and Vuitton.

Je Ne Regrette Rien

Yves Saint Laurent, indisputably one of the greatest fashion designers in history, died on Sunday at his home in Paris.  He was 71.

He was born with a nervous breakdown, according to his closest friend and business partner, Pierre Bergé. He was also born with talent and creativity that were immense and staggering.

His influence on fashion is chronicled in an article in WWD today, complete with tributes from Oscar dela Renta, Marc Jacobs, Jean-Paul Gaultier and Vera Wang.  Nothing as yet from Tom Ford though, who took over as designer for YSL Rive Gauche when Saint Laurent and Bergé sold their company to the Gucci Group in 1999.  Saint Laurent continued to design the couture collections until 2002, when he took his final, tearful bow and retired from the world of fashion.

Sexed Out

It was Girls Night Out everywhere around the world last night. And there was a run on Cosmopolitans as well. After watching Sex and the City on opening night like all good card-carrying thirty- and forty-something women and gay men, we headed for the nearest bar and ordered what else but Cosmopolitans. Our rotund waiter was clueless as to why the dark pink drinks were unusually popular last night. And so began, drink in hand, a post-mortem on Sex and the City, the most hyped, most publicized, most fashionably self-conscious and most self-consciously fashionable movie of the year.

Rafe Rocks Manila

As far as homecomings go, Rafe Totengco's is pretty hard to beat.

Accessories designer Rafe Totengco, known for blending uptown sophistication with downtown edge, has taken his aesthetic to the Philippines.

"I was blown away with the reception I got from customers, who came in droves to congratulate me, shower me with affection and support," New York-based Totengco said about the launch party.

In the Taff Ten Again*

WWD today released a new Top Ten List, this time ranking the countries by the percentage of residents surveyed who say they buy designer brands.

And guess what? The Philippines is ranked 8th, with 26 per cent.

White Mischief

A few weeks back, my friend Mons Tantoco-Romulo asked me to answer the question of the week for her column in the Philippine Star. I'm flattered that Mons thinks of me every now and then despite my being away from Manila, but I'm afraid the replies I've given her over the years are rarely as profoundly introspective as everyone else's. Perhaps her respondents like to see her column as a chance to go all Deepak, but believe me, if your life the past four years has been anything like mine, with its never-ending circus of assessments and pre-trial conferences, you'd be Deepak-ed out.

So Mon's question, ironically put to me a week before Valentine's Day, was: "How do you move on after a heartbreak?"

It's About Time

If you think about it, it's been a good month for the Philippines - a civil servant gained a conscience and shed light on the extent of corruption in the government, the bishops admitted their shameful complicity in the ouster of a democratically elected president and the installation into power of a dwarf-sized devil, and protests against a rapacious regime have begun to pick up momentum.

But that's not all.

Filipino fashion blogger Bryanboy, the Third World's most outrageous fag, received the fashionista's highest honor: Marc Jacobs has named an ostrich bag from his Fall/Winter 08 collection "BB", after him.

And finally, an in-depth look at luxury retail in the Philippines came out in Tuesday's Women's Wear Daily, authored by... me! The stories appeared in a special section called Asia In Depth.

The first story, Manila: On the Retail Radar, focuses on the key players in the luxury retail industry, including Ayala Land. In a country saturated with malls, their own Greenbelt, particularly Greenbelt 4 & 5, truly is a world-class retail showcase. Talk about a case of "if you build it, they will come"!

Ciao, Valentino

Another goodbye, but this time a less lugubrious one.

After 45 years in fashion, Valentino took his final bow at his swan song couture show in Paris yesterday.

According to WWD,

Valentino said goodbye to fashion with relative discretion at a stellar show at the Musée Rodin. "We are very serene, very happy," he had said on Monday. And, indeed, when he took that last walk down the runway after a 45-year run at fashion's highest reaches, he maintained his composure as his audience jumped to its collective feet in wild appreciation.

He did elegant, he did glamorous, he did romantic, he did chic. And he ended with sublime, sending a parade of models swathed in identical silk column dresses, all in his signature red.

Talk about going out in a blaze of glory!

When I worked as fashion editor at a now-defunct Hong Kong glossy, I attended the Paris fashion shows for a couple of seasons, wide-eyed, bewildered, but enthralled and completely unmindful of being ushered into the 10th row or so with the rest of the Asian fashion press, way behind the US and European editors and a row or two behind the Japanese, but ahead of the Egyptians and Kuwaitis. I wasn't just a small fish in a vast ocean, I was a sardine thrilled to be tightly packed into a glittering tin. To my regret, I never attended a Valentino show. I believe in those days he was still showing couture in Rome, and prêt-a-porter in Milan.

Already then, in 1990, Valentino was a legend in fashion, and was celebrating 30 years in the industry. The Valentino press office had sent me a book, Valentino: Thirty Years of Magic, commemorating the event.

The Gerry Dryansky quote at the frontispiece of the book sums up the magic of Valentino beautifully:

"And a work of beauty stands firm as a work of beauty, no matter which way the wind is blowing."

As gorgeous as Valentino's clothes are, they always struck me as being for grown-ups, the sort I'd wear when I was more adult, more established, more tai-tai. My mother wore a navy and cream linen Valentino suit to my brother's wedding in 1986 - and she was 45 then, an age I'm fast approaching. Yet somehow, even after two children and a pretty awesome, multifaceted career, I feel I still don't merit a Valentino suit. The Chanel suits are a different story; I had to be dressed in them when I worked there eight years ago.

But I have to admit, I do feel grown-up enough to slink into a room wearing nothing but a silky red Valentino gown...

(Photo lifted from Jezebel)

Paul Smith

I have a piece in today's WWD about the new Paul Smith store in Hijack City. I need to ask Adriaan Louw, the photographer who took the fabulous photos, if I can reproduce some of them here.

My favorite quote in the story came from Anthony Keyworth, one of the store's owners.

Finding stylish, well-made and attractively priced men's wear has always been a challenge for sartorially conscious South Africans. The South African male himself is typically stereotyped as a sports-mad, shorts-clad species. "We felt sorry for South African men," Keyworth revealed. "The choices they had were limited."

Yeah, those short-short khaki shorts and those garish green and orange shirts have got to go! They do serve their purpose, though, on occasion. To her enduring sartorial shame, a friend of mine realized the value of wearing the shirt plus a vest made of springbok hide in Paris of all places, to humor her husband when they watched a rugby (or whatever sport it was) world cup match last September. In all fairness, he (thankfully) doesn't rock the lion-ate-my-shorts-on-safari-that's-why-they're-so-short vibe.

The fashion don't was well worth it - at the very least, she got a surprisingly warm reception from the Parisians because she clearly wasn't English. And, she returned hauling back some serious loot from the likes of Prada and Vuitton.