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Though scads of new designers enter the ready-to-wear arena every year, it's rare to come across a promising young milliner, which places Gigi Burris in a creative class of her own. After launching her namesake line in 2009, the New York-based hat maker quickly developed a following (and an impressive list of editorial credits) for her statement-making chapeaux that combine old-world techniques with contemporary finishes. Burris' latest Spring lineup was inspired by "decayed art deco and the former glory of Miami Beach," she told Style.com at a preview this week. Those ideas were most evident in pieces like a sculpted buckram sun hat trimmed with ostrich feathers as well as hand-painted turkey plume fascinators and chantilly lace turbans. On the more modern end of the spectrum, she showed edgy, asymmetric leather visors that resembled bird beaks and petite straw bibi featuring clean metallic hardware and the stripped-down spine of a feather. "I try to keep it from seeming too English or mature. My customers aren't fussy old ladies or Alexander Wang girls, but the look is still downtown," she said.
Gigi Burris is carried by select retailers including Collete, Kirna Zabete, and the Webster, and sold online at Moda Operandi. For more information, visit gigiburris.com.
Our crack team of intern-statisticians has been at work all morning, and they can now report: The most popular Halloween costume of 2013 by a mile(y): Miley. For better or worse, partygoers on both coasts made Cyrus' VMA stoned-teddy onesie and foam finger their outfit of choice last night. In doing so, they follow a proud tradition set forward earlier this week by Joan Rivers, Paris Hilton, and Mrs. Hugh Hefner. Congratulations, everyone!
Clockwise, from above left: "Mileys" at West Hollywood's Halloween Parade; at Matt Kliegman and Carlos Quirarte's party at The Westway, NYC; as embodied by Perez Hilton at Heidi Klum's annual Halloween party; and at Where the Wild Things Are at the Rose Bar, NYC. By anecdotal tally, it seems male Mileys outnumbered female Mileys by three to one.
Being a bona fide supermodel, Helena Christensen knows a thing or two about looking good in lingerie. Perhaps that's why, in 2012, classic European negligee brand Triumph tapped the icon to design a collection just for the company. Today, Christensen and Triumph debut their fourth outing together and, thanks to the latter's concurrent launch of U.S. e-commerce, the collaboration will now, for the first time, be available Stateside.
"Every time I start thinking about a collection, I just roam around inside my head to see what inspirations or ideas I've kept in there," explained Christensen of her creative process. For Spring '14, however, she had a more tangible muse—an antique photography book, Perfect Womanhood, that she found at a local New York flea market. "It was one of those finds where you go, Really? No one else saw this?" said Christensen, flipping through the 1938 monograph to point out a series of untouched, naturalistic nudes of "women with just the most beautiful bodies. To me, these women are just so elegant, timeless, sensual, and beautiful," she added. "You don't think, This is a naked woman. You just think, This is a beautiful woman." Continue Reading "Helena Christensen Designs With Women In Mind" >>
Lyz Olko has a lot on her plate at any given moment. In addition to running her cult downtown label Obesity + Speed, Olko doubles as the social director of both The Jane Hotel and The Westway, and clocks just four hours of sleep each night. That's a lot of blood, sweat, and cheers, but it's paid off for the designer, who described the latest Spring lineup as her "most elevated yet." Over the past eight years, O+S has become known for its punky, goth-tinged aesthetic and best-selling destroyed T-shirts, which Olko individually shreds in her Lower East Side apartment. ("My fingers are bleeding because I had to destroy 100 of them last night," she said at a preview earlier this week.) Olko switched things up a bit this season, and traded out her typically dark stuff for clothes that had more street appeal, citing early-nineties hip-hop as an influence. "It's a lot more positive and bright, with no boundaries," she told Style.com. "This collection is about working hard, kicking butt, and striving to do better."
Her positive outlook was evident in a range of novelty tees emblazoned with phrases like "Love Without Limits," "Do You Ever Dream of Candy Coated Rain Drops," and "The Hustle Never Dies." In addition to rolling out those trendy, made-for-hashtag pieces , Olko also focused more on tailoring this go-round. She introduced outerwear for the first time with a slouchy twill car coat, and whipped up iridescent organza button-ups as well as crepe basketball shorts and mesh basketball jerseys with twisted backs. To further up O+S's street cred, Olko teamed up with Ruth Gruca a.k.a. Miss Been Trill (she dates Heron Preston), who both styled and posed for the new lookbook, shot in a Russian boxing gym and debuting here on Style.com. "I wanted the sports influence to feel vague and dreamy—like The Cremaster Cycle meets Boyz n the Hood meets Do the Right Thing," Olko said.
Obesity + Speed is currently sold in New York at Barneys, American Two Shot, and Oak. For more information, visit obesityandspeed.com.
Halloween is tonight, and if you don't have a costume at this point and would like one, you're basically at the mercy of your closet. Best of luck. But for those who prefer an armchair version of America's favorite undredressed holiday, Opening Ceremony has rounded up some of its famous (and soon-to-be-famous) friends' best costumes through the years. Highlights include Chloe Sevigny as Joan of Arc—inspired by the Smiths' "Bigmouth Strikes Again," and complete with Walkman!—and Humberto Leon as "sexy Harry Potter." Browse with fun-sized candy in hand, as I did.
Scanning back through recent seasons, the runways have sometime looked like an episode of VH1's I Love the '90s. Think of the grunge revivals at Dries Van Noten and Saint Laurent, or the catwalk comebacks of Carolyn Murphy and Kirsten Owen. We've also seen designers return to logomania, crop tops, and overalls. But the nineties throwback that feels most modern to us is the slipdress—the clean, minimal lines of which recall the glory days of Carolyn Bessette Kennedy and a young Kate Moss. For Spring, everyone from Stella McCartney and Isabel Marant to Jason Wu and Wes Gordon put their respective spin on the streamlined look. Keeping with that theme, Donna Karan celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary of DKNY by revisiting the slinky, low-backed "naked dress" made infamous by the character Carrie Bradshaw on Sex and the City.
Blue Is the Warmest Color heated up Cannes, just arrived in U.S. theaters, and now has the Miu Miu seal of approval. Miuccia Prada tapped the film's Palme d'Or-winning stars, Lea Seydoux (who has been the face of Prada in the past) and Adele Exarchopoulos, for Miu Miu's Resort campaign, shot by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin. A word to the wise for the prurient: The film is NC-17; the campaign, PG.
Chinese designer Huishan Zhang, who landed on our radar this past summer, is the latest recipient of the Dorchester Collection Fashion Prize, which, includes a $25,000 award and mentorship. The 30-year-old Central Saint Martins alum was among four other finalists—Emilia Wickstead, Barbara Casasola, and Fyodor Golan—who presented their Spring 2014 collections to a panel of judges at the Dorchester Hotel on Tuesday night. "I was enjoying my night already, no matter what," Zhang told WWD. "I thought I’d have another glass of Champagne then go home but now we might have to open a bottle!" Previous winners include Thomas Tait, Anndra Neen, and Augustin Teboul.
On the one-year anniversary of Superstorm Sandy, it's only appropriate that the Council of Fashion Designers of America should turn its attention to the environment. At a New York luncheon yesterday, the CFDA and Lexus announced the winners of the Eco-Fashion Challenge—an annual event that rewards designers for their environmentally responsible fashion. "It's only the tip of the iceberg," said Amber Valletta, who, wearing a Daniel Silverstain dress cut from zero waste, predicted that there will be a major shift in eco-friendly design in another five years. "It's necessary, responsible, and economical. Luxury is about being thoughtful and sustainable from the beginning."
Guests including Coco Rocha, Steven Sebring, Maria Cornejo, and Steven Kolb filed into ABC Kitchen for the affair. Over shared plates of locally sourced crab toast and braised mushroom, they applauded top winner Natalie "Alabama" Chanin for her organic, handcrafted wares. "Hand embroidery is very engrained in rural communities in America," Chanin said. She pointed to the hand-sewn skirt from her namesake label that she was wearing, explaining how she sources the organic cotton from Texas, then has it processed and dyed in North Carolina before it's sewn by Alabama artisans.
The selection committee, which included Valletta, fashion consultant Julie Gilhart, and CFDA's Lisa Smilor, among others, also gave awards to Mark Davis for his jewelry, and SVILU's Britt Cosgrove and Marina Polo for their environmentally sound, understated womenswear.
There's no questioning Asia's importance in the fashion market, and Western brands have more than taken note. This month in Hong Kong alone, Tory Burch, Kenzo, Moncler, and Calvin Klein all hosted events within days of each other. And at Singapore's FIDe fashion week (FIDe is an organization that aims to promote regional and international designers in Singapore), European brands like Pierre Balmain and American ones like Burkman Bros and Ari Dein similarly made the trek eastward to show their collections. "It was the first time both brands participated in a full-length fashion show," Steven Kolb, the CEO of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, said of the latter two. "Fashion is no longer defined by borders, and the more we can nurture global relations, the greater the success for our designers."
But the region is also increasingly interested in holding its own in global fashion, and the eleven-day event in Singapore, which typically features several days of presentations by French haute couturiers and Asian couturiers, included the latest step in that direction: the founding of the Asian Couture Federation (ACF). Now, the Asian couturiers (dubbed by the ACF as "Asian Couturier Extraordinaires") will have a support system of their own. Its inception was an act that won FIDé executive chairman and ACF founder Frank Cintamani (below, left) France's esteemed Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres honor. Even Shinzo Abe, the Prime Minister of Japan, offered Cintamani a pat on the back, calling the Federation's establishment "a significant event for all of Asia," at a time "when we consider that fashion until recently was generally seen as the domain of Europe and the United States."
