Fashion for thought – Alexander van Slobbe exibition

Alexander van Slobbe is quite an entrepeneur. As front runner of the Dutch modernist fashion movement in the 1990s he achieved most of his successes outside his homecountry. In fact his main line Orson+Bodil only has three points of sale in the Netherlands. He has collaborated with Puma and Marc Jacobs amongst many others. His work is all about construction and styleful minimalsm. The Dutch modernism movement definetly does not come close to my personal aesthetic, but i have deep respect for people who work this hard and achieve so much influence in the world coming from this dot on the map we call home.

pieces from his fall/winter 2009  Orson+Bodil collection

His work has been collected for an overview by the Centraal Museum in Utrecht and will be presented in a special exposition called:

Stof tot nadenken(which literally means thinking material, but is being officially translated as Fashion for Thought )

from Feb 13th to May 16th 2010 at the Centraal Museum Utrecht

Here comes the best thing! Almost as interesting as the exposition, if not more(to me anyway).. is the fact there will be an accompanying project called “Patroon Ontrafeld”(“pattern untangled“) which will include patterns of Slobbe himself  available in a sewing workspace in the museum as well as creative workshops with famous artists and designers and a “sewing for dummies” workshop. As a finale to all this goodness there will be a  fashion show and design contest.

pieces from his spring/summer 2009 collection

mini biography: 1984 graduated cum laude at the fashion academy in Arnhem
started the label orson+bodil in 1989
1993 started menswear label SO and was the first Dutchman to have his own show in Paris in 1993.
In 1995 had over 200 selling points all over the world and soon after over 20 of his own stores.
2003 recieved the prince Bernhard culture award

link to the exibit page at the Utrecht Centraal Museum website

Style it like U mean it

Staying on topic with wardrobe/closet inspiration. I discovered a site that needed it’s own post here for sure. It feautres little style and wardrobe tour video’s of various fabulously creative girls and boys.

It’s absolutely brilliant and worth checking out cause it gives you more of an inside into personal style of real people. More so than just random streetstyle pics. It’s like one of those people would take you home and show you around their closet.  I love seeing how excited these people are about fashion and their style. It’s very recognizible and made me all giddy watching. If you wanna watch all videos your sunday afternoon will be lazy but well spent, mine certainly was 😉

Ashley Shaw from Stylelikeu.com

Hunter Thompson from Stylelikeu.com

there’s much much more so go check it out!

Walk-in to my dreams..

a girl can dream..

I’m in the mids of renovating and decorating my new home. The one room i’m embarassed about having not gotten to YET is my closet(or the 10 square meter former study room). I have a plan but haven’t gotten around to execute it since the house had other priorities such as the main living areas.  So now i have a room with a big pile of clothing bags and moving boxes and it frustrates me every morning having to dive in there to search for single items not being to find anything .. trust me it’s no fun. So to motivate myself i filled my clostet inspiration folder on my computer with jpg’s galore . Sometimes highly unrealistic but  jawdropping, envy-envoking pictures.. but now it’s time to share some of that with you guys and maybe it will be the kick in the … i need to get started on mine 😉 Practical storage solutions i guess are organizing everything till you can’t organize anymore; plastic containters, double rails, using the whole space you got(so as high as you can build the system is best). I chose pictures of some of the more atainable closets. I don’t want to make myself feel worse.

this is also part of my master plan- one glamourously wallpapered wall.

it really adds an atmosphere of ultra stylishness

i think this is a changing room, but the wallpaper is gorge

light and spacious feel

ceiling is the limit

not afraid of colour

love the chandelier

this is still within realistic proportions right??

love the rug but i’d need a housekeeper to keep the room dust-free

Olivia Palermo’s closet- the big mirror is not only practical but makes the room look more spacious

this is if you rather have clothing room that a living room

If you have a simple clean clothing collection or want to display your prettiest clothes a single rail(or branch) storage is for you:

Preview: Primark Spring 2010

Some quick Primark gossip: First, the pictures of the spring collection are here. This season it’s very “English rose romantic”: lace shirts, florals prints and straw bags. I like it, but I will skip the denim on denim trend in the second picture (Yes, I know it’s very Chloe ss2010, but I bloody hate it. Die trend! Die!). 

And for all Dutch Primark lovers: a second store will be opened in the centre of Nijmegen in 2013!

Roxy print playsuit (£13) worn with plastic straw chain strap bag (£6).

Denim shirt (£10) worn with matching skinny jeans (£8) and belt (£2).  

Limited Edition lace boyfriend jacket (£25) worn with matching lace shorts (£15) and cotton modal vest (£2).

Lulu rose prom dress (£15) worn with straw boater.

Rose print blouse (£8) worn with lace vest, rose print shorts  (£5) and ditzy print fabric trilby (£4).

Chambray parka -Hello 90’s!- ( £19) worn with sequin motif striped dress (£9) and jazz pumps (£8).

Rose print jacket (£13) worn with lace vest (£4), floral print shorts (£7) and rattan straw handled bag.

Fashion at the Time of Fascism

Nothing better than spending a cold evening with a big pile of fashion books. My newest purchase is this book about Italian fashion during Mussolini’s Fascist regime (1922-1943). The authors of this book, Mario Lupano and Alessandra Vaccari, collected images from women’s glossies, magazines, photo archives, journals, catalogues, design and architecture to show the rythms, rituals and lifestyles of a typical Italian day. There are four themes: “Measurements,” “Model,” “Brand” and “Parade.” The thing I like about the book is it’s weird combination of glamour (pretty women smoking in  elegant suits) and “science” (how to restructure your face, as as shown on the picture next to the mud mask). 

Buy it here or here.