your gonna LOVE this

[Guest]

http://www.herfamedgoodlooks.com/hfgl/Bette%20Frank/editorials/pages/bbid200608lecondemodevoguefrmariotestino048hr7.htm

 

[Joe]

Mamma mia, TOS.

 

What is the world coming to...this might actually be your shortest post in recent memory, if not ever!

 

 

 

J.

[Guest]

The sight of those gorgeous models in new furs was enough to silence the finest of orators.

[Ravens8]

You're right ToS - Love it

Thanks

[Guest]

The blonde on the left looks like she's going to pass out

 

Love the duets fur skirts though. Grab grab feel feel

 

Are those black mushrooms growing out of their heads

 

 

 

OFF

[Guest]

okay okay OFF.

Now I know you like the mucky faced Alaskan backwoods girl in a kind of a natural native ensemble; and also the very classic look too; specially on red heads.

BUT this is called H-I-G-H F-A-S-H-I-O-N .

And it may just put fur back on the high street eventually. The things on their heads are called H-A-T-S. Ladies wear things like that to the races here.

[Guest]

Obviously they're HIGH with all those mushrooms they're consuming.

 

So HIGH they're growing out of their heads

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

OFF

[Lucifur]

I gotta take OFF's side on this issue... what is it with high fashion, anyway? Is coked out, dangerously underweight, gaunt and sickly attractive?

 

Jesus, that blonde on the left looks like a freakin' vampire.

[Ravens8]

nothing wrong with vampires. some of my best friends are vampires. At lest if they looked like her they would become so (best friends that is)

[Guest]

okay guys see my other post.

 

See models need to look like that so the clothes move on them nicely. They are models; they are beautiful. If you dont like them then thats fine but your , OFF's or My opinion is not as valid as the designers, photographers , models make up artist, set designers and artists that creat the whole couture world. It is their opinion that counts; they are the arbiters of beauty and taste and style.

 

I bow to their superior opinion and then try to work out what they are trying to convey through the imagery.

 

Oh and lets not forget the audience who ARE buying couture and furs in record amounts. The chinese and the japanese. Petite, demure, low body mass index. If you notice the models aint so tall any more either.

 

And yes, the vampire look is in. Created by couture and now on street level; its a fanatsy thing. Fantasy can be beautiful; gothic can be beautiful. Suicide girls can be beautiful. Miss T and tryxie have a bit of the vampire look about thm ask them. (errr...I am still not convinced that tryxie isn't a vampire actually. She only ever comes out at night and is from only a few miles from Where Dracula came ashore.....

 

 

Now lets not have a huge personal row about al this. What we need to ascertain is whther beauty is a matter of taste or whether it can be measured and qualified.

 

And in any case; I look forward to places like the Cheltenham festival, and Royal Ascot, where you do see some of hat stuff translated into reality. Its a breath of fresh air.

I can remebr when couture inspired th street fashions...and vice versa. Sadly no more. But hey maybe it will return. Are you saying you wouldnt want to see these girls dressed like that IRL? All that keeps me going is one day I will!

I can remember my aunt in a pink plaid Dior suit, a pill box hat with veil, elbow length kid gloves and a phantom beaver on her shoulders, with amazing make up like a Russin ballerina. She was a waitress btw; and just bought one outfit a year which she saved for. She should have stood out like a sore thumb in the mining town of Pontpool but she din't; women wanted that glamorous escape then. My mother would buy material from Italy and make a dress that was the same as Sophia lorens. She would wear a headscarf an sunglasses and talk about Cannes. She actually went. people did then; they didn't accept their lot.

I have loads of old vogues and tatlers and some pages are marked. The lady who had them singled out things that maybe she could make, or maybe splash ot on buying. There are notes on the mags. Its not that couture has become divorced from the rel world; its that the real world doesnt respect beauty and glamour any more and so it appears bizarre to us.

[White Fox]

TOS... What the %#^% are you doing?! Give that young lady on the right something to wear! She is Freezing to death!

 

W

[Guest]

[furcrazy]

Very nice. I would love to have a fur helmet like the one on the floor.

[Del_Boy]

Love it

[Guest]

OFF's or My opinion is not as valid as the designers, photographers , models make up artist, set designers and artists that creat the whole couture world. It is their opinion that counts; they are the arbiters of beauty and taste and style...

 

Oh and lets not forget the audience who ARE buying couture and furs in record amounts. The chinese and the japanese. Petite, demure, low body mass index. If you notice the models aint so tall any more either.

 

This isn't strictly true. The stylists job is to direct the photo shoot and create a setting and mood, the make-up artist make the models look good, the photographer pulls it all together and creates wonderful images. All in the name of advertising to sell ready to wear fashion. Haute Couture and Couture fashion have no place here, they are not aimed at mass market sales, yet they are the mainstay of any fashion house, the ready to wear is just icing for them.

 

Firstly you have to understand the Haute Couture is not the same as Couture, and Pret a Porter is something entirely different again.

 

Haute Couture does not have a fashion show and will not be seen in the shops. These are individually designed pieces for a client. It's a one off, no repeats. You can guarantee you will not see someone in the same dress at a dinner party, ever!!

 

Couture does have a fashion show, and will not be seen in the shops, they might not even form part of the Couture collection available at the design house. These consist of collections of garment designs that are altered to fit the client. Many clients may be wearing the same clothes, but you won't find them in the off the peg stores.

 

Both the above are made individually for the clients and made in house by the designer house, be it YSL, Valentino, Chanel, etc.

 

Pret a Porter, on the other hand, is made overseas, usually China, from the pieces I have. This is where the folk who think they are rich shop. There are catwalk shows, though the garments on display don't necessarily form part of the ready to wear line. They are sized just like any other clothing store, try it on, if it fits buy it. If you are lucky the store may have access to a seamstress to have minor alterations made.

 

Then there are the shops for the rest of us which sell garments of various quality generally watered down versions of what seemed popular on the cat walk shows from the ready to wear collections, because they set the fashion trends for the shops and ultimately us. However that is a very simplistic view for the sake of brevity.

 

The catwalk shows, this is a good one, most of you think it's about outlandish clothes. Wrong.

 

The best way to describe it is its the concept car of clothing. Do you like the shape, colour, cut, styling? its one designer pitching his skills and ideas against another. It's one huge advertising campaign. So where does "fashion" come from? There is a whole industry based round fashion forecasting which every design house buys into. It sets possible trends, colours, ideas, shapes, etc. which designers then work with as a skeleton to progress into something else. And will eventually end up on your back, whether you like it or not, no matter how style concious you are or anti fashion. You will wear it.

 

I was going to talk about the modelling aspect of fashion, but I'm going to leave it. Otherwise people will accuse me of being as bad as ToS with his posts of biblical proportions. Maybe I'll deal with it later when I've had more tea.

[Guest]

All that confirms what I am saying. Yes I didn't go into that much detail; but my point is that couture creates the vision; and then it gets watered down a little so we can buy into that led by that vision.

 

The problem is that MASS fashion has rejected couture vision for a couple of decades now. A few designs deemed wearable, that are possible to produce cheaply, may make it through usually with NO credit or money being given to the design houses. In addition to this a great deal of "cabbage" ids produced by chinese companies eager to cash in by producing far more garments than ordered by the pet a porter design houses. Hence chanel gucci dior I think make a huge mistake given anything to China to manufacture; they simply do not respect intellectual property...neither do the high street chains.

 

BUT few elements of the vision survive. It is usually rejected as unwearable, distant, too way out. This is NOT the same as how it was 40 years ago. IF you wanted a Dior suit you saved for a Dior suit. It may have cost you 500 guineas in 1960; perhaps half the prcie of a basic house.

YET miners wives, teachers, office workers, airline hostesses woul save for two years to buy such a piece. I was there; I saw it. The working class did NOT go around in cheap crap until later in the sicxties when the synthetic and mass marketing ideas got under way. There have been brief revivals of couture; even haute couture for the wealthy. BUT now even the wealthy go around in Top Shop crap.

 

And sadly sometimes the fashion world actually panders to this; despearte to find some market for their huge money losing ventures to create beauty. SO they produce sportswear influenced designs at inflated prices like the crappy top that Poshs spice was wearing in the papers today. Its crap. The Daily Mail pointed out that you can buy similar in Primark for £12 and Victoria Beckhams cost £3000.

 

Couture fashion makes a misatake when they do this. It should be about quality, structure, line, tailoring, elegance, and vision and spirit. When it panders to casual influences it is self destructive.

 

Now I can't afford couture...or even pret a porter...very often. But thanks to ebay , and celebs being given things they don't appreciate or can't wear twice, there are a few excellent finds on ebay, or in dress agencies in London. My girfried has a Couture Mugler dress that originally cost £4k in velvet; a totally individual piece; all structured and boned and stunningly dramatic; gothic. It was 6 years old; but will never date. When she wears it peoples mouths drop open. It cost £175 and when I asked why so cheap the lady in the shop sighed and said

"where would people wear somthing like that these days? ; its like something from a movie. In any case the lady who was given it has gone up a size and she can't fit in it. Money is no object to her and she'd have no clue of the original cost or beauty of it. Take advantage....thats all she wants for it plus our 30% commission."

 

I expect tryxie you have some similar finds; as do other girls you were at college with if its anything like the fashion college near here.

But even they struggle with the confidence to wear some of this stuff as often it gets remarks like "who does she think she is?"

[Guest]

Anyway my point is Tryxie that an awful lot of input goes in from fashion professional to create a vision with mood atmospher spirit in order to inspire the rest of us. This is then made vailable to us down the line, either in terms of pret a porter, or even buying into the dream with cosmetics and perfume accessible to all. Yet it is sneered at by those for who beauty and vision and spirit is NOT important. That is fine; but it is an opinion based on lack of attempted appreciation, or valid criteria of assesment.

 

BUT now the mass marketing of hoodies and polar fleeces and really poor quality cheap clothing ignores high fashion, and we feel " vindicated" by able to sneer at high fashion and saying its out of touch and our polar fleces and jogging bottoms are far more realistic comfortable adffordable. And this conformity is reinforced by mass markting and the ida that every one has the right to their own opinion abouut fashion. They do; but it sin't valid. Polar fleeces and jogging bottoms are FUNCTIONAL yes; beuatiful absolutely not. Wear that stuff and you look crap ; that is NOT a matter of opinion.

[Guest]

In addition to this a great deal of "cabbage" ids produced by chinese companies eager to cash in by producing far more garments than ordered by the pet a porter design houses. Hence chanel gucci dior I think make a huge mistake given anything to China to manufacture; they simply do not respect intellectual property...neither do the high street chains.

 

I'm not so sure this is true. The workmanship from the Chinese manufacturer is impeccable. They won't overproduce to bolster their own profits or they will loose their contract, similarly there will be no rip offs by them. Because of the high quality of the garment and the quality assurance standards, substandard work will be rejected fast. These garment do find their way onto the market via eBay, with designer approval, after all the manufacture wont get paid for it and its a way to recover some outlay. This is how I got my Marc Jacobs jacket, with the exception of 3 broken stitches on an inner seam it was perfect, and after 30 seconds with a sewing machine it is perfect. Nieman Marcus would sell it to you for $430 I got mine for $30.

 

Once a design has been watered down and re worked by another high street design house any intellectual property right has pretty much gone, otherwise there would would be no catwalk style filtering down at all.

 

The working class did NOT go around in cheap crap until later in the sicxties when the synthetic and mass marketing ideas got under way.

 

True, but material quality was much better then, manufacturing tolerances were lower, customer expectation was higher and costs were lower. The high street chain wasn't really visible and those that were tended to cater for the wealthier market. Largely clothes were still made by tailors. These weren't fashion items, these were clothes for folk to wear not make statements. That was the prerogative of the rich.

 

SO they produce sportswear influenced designs at inflated prices like the crappy top that Poshs spice was wearing in the papers today. Its crap. The Daily Mail pointed out that you can buy similar in Primark for £12 and Victoria Beckhams cost £3000. Couture fashion makes a misatake when they do this. It should be about quality, structure, line, tailoring, elegance, and vision and spirit. When it panders to casual influences it is self destructive.

 

I wouldn't expect any better from the Daily Mail, its an example of the ignorant preaching to the stupid. Sorry ToS, nothing personal. Its the same technique used on the anti fur editorials.

 

Primark? What can I say about them. Even poor white trash can afford to get 2 complete outfits from them, of the same quality from Chanel, still afford their fags, beer and fish and chips, and still have change from a fiver. It's the cheapest of the cheap, wear your item for a week, don't wash it, just chuck it, cos it won't stand the wash. You cannot draw a comparison.

 

Now just because you think the top is crappy kinda goes against the idea that couture is fashion, not all fashion is going to be liked by everyone. But I bet you the quality of the garment is outstanding. Even the Pret a Porter ranges are made from high quality fabrics, usually they will never find their way onto the high street or other design houses. So the floor sweepings from grade 4 cotton that Primark use and its commercial chemical dye is nowhere the same as grade 1 prima cotton with a bespoke dye and colour. And so it goes.

[Guest]

One look at either of my grandparents or thre aunts in particula wardrobes would show you you are mistaken Tryxie about th past. Clothes WERE worn as a statement.

A crombie for a amn, costing over £100 guineas, was a statement. The fact that it was the overcoat of the gentleman, and every working class man aspird to have one, shows that at that time beautiful clothes were valued, and they still had the money for fish and chips.

HATS were worn by working class women and men to any special event; ven church on sunday. I still have two christian dior fur hats that were from two different Aunts; both working class women.

My mother in the sixties walked around like an itaian movie star and she wasn't the only one. Her dresses were either made ...but from high class Italian silk prints...a nd she had hermes scarves that cost 6 weeks wages.

 

Then catalogue clothing, and high street stores like Cand A started. BUT even they had some quality and attempt to emulate high fashion then. Even Debenhams had fabulous clothes that look off the catwalk of the time and they were erassuringly expensive. SOMEHOW people managed to save for them; or make what they couldn't afford from the same material.

 

In 1947 tailoresses in pontypool were inundated with requests for the New look. That in itself was criticised for being fantasy inspired and oppulent; with far too much material being used in the days when rationing was still being done by the government.

But the new look was seized by the masses. thr was general consnsus that WHATEVER dior produced would be wonderful and aspired to.

 

The functional mass market clothing has killd all that.

 

And some design houses attempt to dumb down. They produc a £3k jacket and then rinterprt it pret a porter for £500. Its not beautiful. Am I contradicting myself? No. I am merely pointing out that sometimes coutur goes for "pratcical" or "conformist" clothing to get some money in.

 

I think they would be better off sticking to inspire us with vision and beauty. The jacket of VB may be well made; but it has no design featurs that faltter; there is no structure; it is a simple utilitarian inspired design. Sporty. I wouldn't let my girfriend muck the chickens out in it.....firstly because it isnt beautiful but also secondly it isnt actually practical either.

 

Anyway lets go back a few years.

Mclarn and Westwood the Bromley contingent and bricolage. Shocking; inspird, individual, new , rblious. The incongruous assmbly and garish colours, combined with elements of fetishism and "reclaimed" items like the crombi and the old school tie ; and Art being worn such as the seditionairrs shirts, ensured a reaction from Hgh fashion; who were inspired by it. Waht was laughed at at first, and sneered at when it became high fashion by the drones, was within 5 years in Woolworths. Bondae trousers in woolworths yes. You wouldn't get that now would you because they are too darned expensive to make with all the kilts zips multi material detail cut straps etc.

They want to buy plain t shirts or with some bland staement liike " surf bunny" on it that costs 25p and they can sell for £5. That is what global capitalism has done. If you can times something by ten from cost price, or even twenty, then you have a dividend for shareholders. You cant do that by making something that appeals to the people who understand fashion; you can only do it by dumbing down and appealing to the drones.

 

The last great fashion movement that had a relationship with high fashion was probably the new romantic movement. Oppulent, fantasy inspired. Vivienne Westwood still bases her designs on the spirit and people do still wear it; but not the proles any more sadly. They fear being laughed at. Gwen Steffani looked amazing in that video in all the westwood stuff. But whereas it should have inspired kids into wearing it in the street it hasn't.

 

BUT in 1980 many went around looking like they were in a Duran Duran or Adam and the Ants video . They wore coutur influnced designs. A new lot of designers sprung up housed in Hyper Hyper in Kensington making fabulous quality garments with a stamp of spirit beauty and individuality . Some of these little stalls went on to be top couture houses. Ghost for one. Then the wonderful £500 fantasy dresses of "deadlier than the male"(Sarah Whitworth) were worn by working class girls to city centrewine bars. They wore furs with them, and long gloves. Incrededibly theatrical make up. It was an amazing time. Much as I hated Thatcher, I think in hindsight she actually encouraged people to believe in themselves. The crash of the late 80s destroyed the whole spirit; and a bleaker nihilist spirit of "grunge" or the mass marketing of sportswear to "casuals" that felt they didn't have to dress up and you looked a "twat" if you did, was born. And high fashion since has been murdered. So, until now, has street fashion. now it begins to change.

I saw a girl in a vintage leopard jacket today with 3/4 length sleves and long gloves. Her make u was drmatic. two minutes later I saw another young girl maybe 22 with footless tights, an a flowing dress with a vlvet bolero, and agin nice make up. Even the boys are strarting to think about it, and get inspiration from the world of high fashion...albeit maybe via bands like my chemical romance, the kaiser chiefs (who wear the Crombie label...very expnsive but great quality) and Dita von Teese. Burlesque thrives suddenly. Things are changing. People have had enough of being drab dreary conformist. I predict a new mood . Have a look at the massive fashion forums on myspace. Also note that there is minimal opposition to furs on them.

 

Those kids I saw today would giv their back teeth for those designs that Off and others have slatd. And that is new. Two years ago people wouldnt have had the courage to wear them.

[Worker 11811]

Although the styles are a bit out there for my usual tastes, I have to admit the fur skirts are nice.

 

However, I don't like fake colored contacts in the women's eyes.

 

That's one thing I never liked, fake colored contacts! One of the first things I notice about a woman is her eyes. I just love to look into a beautiful woman's eyes. When they are wearing fake contacts, I feel like I'm looking through a dirty plate glass window. It spoils the effect.

 

My wife once mentioned getting contacts. I told her it was okay as long as she got plain ones. That was years ago. When I told her how much I hated colored contact lenses, the issue went dead. She never brought it up again.

 

By the way... Did I ever tell you how much I hate fake colored contacts?

[Guest]

Who's wearing the fake coloured contacts?

[Worker 11811]

The blonde on the far left of the frame and the brunette standing next to her. The black woman and the two Asians aren't but the red haired one might be but I can't tell for sure.

[Guest]

the blonde is Jessica Stam, she's a natural red head with blue eyes, not sure who her friend is.

[Guest]

Why do you like the fur skirts worker?

 

Is it a matter of taste are are they qualifiably beautiful?

 

I will let you naswer before I give my criteria and assesment.

 

I would also like to know tryxies's opinion on the whole concept using critria she has learned in her studies. While I would bow to her superior knowledge , it would be nice if we could all come up with SOME kind of objective critria to assess fashion; or indeed is it all a matter of opinion and everyones opinion is valid?

 

Think about that. I have an opinion on neurosurgery. I dare say I could identify areas of the brain that perform certain functions; etc. BUT you wouldn't trust my opinion about how to proceed with a brain operation would you?

 

Why is ART something everyone thinks the can have an opinion about WITHOUT justification of why?

[Worker 11811]

Your average skirt drapes softly around the wearer. A fur skirt looks stiffer and doesn't have pleats or wrinkles yet it is soft and forms to the wearer's shape. A single panel of fur wrapping 360º around the waist yet it still moves when she moves.

 

Watching a woman's legs move as the fur rubs against them is a very exciting thought. The idea of a woman's entire waist being surrounded in fur is a turn-on too.