Tap your inner '80s cokehead.

On second thoughts, don't.
But do watch Scarface, if only to see Michelle Pfeiffer with a cool bob, rocking out some very special dance moves.

What with the second coming of Halston, I really thought there was going to be a resurgence of 1970s glamour (Scarface is on the cusp of the two decades) but then, as it turned out the new Halston wasn't really any good. Oh well, we'll always have Kate Hudson:

Moo moo

Spike Lee directed and starred in Do the Right Thing (1989) and here he is as Mookie, a man for whose style I have endless admiration. I thinks it's the combination of the Nike Cross Trainers and sweet nerdy glasses. Now where do I get me some of those under-short tights?

Oh, Pierre. You Shouldn't Have Come.

Sadly these babies are going straight to the 'if I were a rich girl' pile. I haven't been able to find a front on shot, but those metal bits go a little something like this:

You know exactly what it means to me.

This is a costume from one of my favourite films ever, The Red Shoes (1948).
I remember at the time I thought this dress from Toni Maticevski's S/S 2004 collection was almost as beautiful, but I can't really see it now.

Men, your emancipation draws nigh

The winds of change are blowing. Cast away your chafing trousers and all hail the man in skirt!

Some more reasons to adore Marc Jacobs.

The red m&m and Sponge Bob Square Pants. Of course.
These shoes are really kind of grotesque, and yet I still have a perverse desire to try them on. Not that it makes a difference, for some reason I don't think DJs will be stocking them.

I heart Ebay

Every time I decide to become a grown up and get a proper handbag (i.e. Witchery or Country Road) I find something amazing and slightly impractical like this (from the ebay store Brown Sugar Vintage, whose prices would be bargains if not for the craptastic exchange rate).

In other happy ebay news (well, not happy for my bank balance, obviously), I just won this Sonia Delaunay Lithograph:

I love the socks so much, I couldn't not buy it. Delaunay was also a fashion and costume designer.

April Rose Knows.

I'm not entirely sure who April Rose is (google helpfully tells me she is a model) but I am digging the dress. It's young and fun while still referencing a futurist aesthetic that has been promising to hit the mainstream for some seasons. There is some hope yet for Australian red carpet fashion.

always patriotic

I have a problem with Australian celebrities wearing foreign designer clothing to Australian events, and Natalie Bassingthwaighteingfordinham is a repeat offender:

I don't how she managed to make Prada look so unimaginative but, hey presto, there it is. I must say she is looking very pretty at the ARIAs but things would have been better if she had worn this Shakuhachi dress:

grouchy

I have so many problems with Gabrielle Cilmi's outfit, I don't know where to begin.
Oh wait, yeah I do:
1) Bubble Skirts. It's over. So over.
2) Clear bra straps are the stupidest sartorial invention since the cork hat (I'm un-Australian, I know, but surely corks hitting you in the face is as annoying as flies). They are not invisible, they are ugly fugly and if a dress cannot be worn with a normal bra or a strapless and if chicken fillets/ tit tape don't hold it up, then it doesn't fit you and you shouldn't wear it.
3) The whole dress looks like sad rehash of the C-3PO-style metal works of the Balenciaga S/S 07 collection.
4) The jewellery + the dress. It’s just not kosher.
5) SMH tells me the dress was created by British designer Julien MacDonald. Here are some Australian-designed dresses which would have looked WAY cuter.
Tina Kalivas S/S 08

Zimmerman S/S 08 (This one reminds me of a Stella McCartney dress, Gwyneth Paltrow wore to the Oscars some years ago, a gown I loved until a dear friend described Paltrow as 'looking as if she was wearing her vagina on the outside'. That rather unsavoury appraisal kind of ruined it for me.)

I realise I have breached my no-mean-comments policy, so let me end on this note: despite all the bad parts of this outfit, the girl looks pretty and happy. Hip hip hooray.

the toes knows

Virgin Threads (now Stars and Infinite Darkness) used to sell these lovely ballet flats but I can't find them anywhere now. I seem to recall you could request the words you wanted hand painted on your shoes, and that one pair was emblazoned with a Smiths lyric - though which exactly I can't remember. Perhaps it was "Oh, how do I feel about my shoes? They make me awkward and plain". Probably not though. You'd need pretty big feet. Bigger than others.

Still, there is plenty to lust after at Stars and Infinite Darkness. Check out this necklace:

screen goddess

I don't normally love red on blondes, but this is an awesome-red and an awesome-blond, so I'm willing to make an exception. An awesome-exception, if you will.
(Don't worry, Tom, I do get some opportunities to do actual work in between accosting customers.)

legs 11

Take note, ladies, you do need legs that go on for days to look this good in a mens' t-shirt. Not that there aren't plenty of perks to being short, right?. Like, for example, we can crawl into small spaces. And stuff.

struck by...

These are some 1950s sling-backs I got off ebay ages ago but have never actually worn. I think the reason for this is that they are in basically perfect condition and I hate the idea of something surviving this long, only to have me scuff them up. Plus, I don't know what goes with green satin and gold rhinestone lightening bolts.

Pear Head

A photo of my might-have-been daddy (my mum's ex-husband) taken in New York's east village. Apparently he was affectionately referred to as 'prune face'. The pear brooch is an old rhinestone thing I picked up on ebay.
Update: Here is some more pear-shaped madness:

Here's Johnny

Look, ma, no hands!

Geometric Knitwear - The Greatest Legacy of the 1980s?

Yeah, probs.

This is one of Jenny Kee's creations and to be honest her designs kind of weird me out a bit. However, Kee does claim to have done the no-pants dance with John Lennon and if that doesn't count for something, I don't know what's what.

And finally this is a sweet little number I picked up at Salvos. I was mightily disturbed by the (nice but obviously deranged) shop assistant, who suggested I could 'unpick all the beading' and have a perfectly nice black jumper. Bah! Humbug!

Marta, Marta, Marta!

Ok, so probably the main reason I'm interested in this piece from John Galliano's first collection for Dior (1997) is that I think the model is Marta (2) from Arrested Development. But apart from that... seed beads are pretty cool, I guess. Like this Stella McCartney Necklace:

The Marta scan is from Fashion Show, Paris Style, a book worth looking at for the pictures alone.

Orry, alright.

It seems a shame that Orry Kelly, surely one of Kiama's brightest sons, so rarely gets a mention in the Australian media, especially given he received four Oscar nominations (and won three) during his career as a costume designer. Here are some examples of his wonderful work.
Les Girls (1957)

Some Like It Hot (1959)
Irma La Douce (1963)

Walk like an Egyptian.

The time is so ripe for someone to rip off these platforms from Joseph L. Mankiewicz's Cleopatra (1963). This picture comes from Linda O'Keeffe's rather fabulous (though somewhat unimaginatively titled) book, Shoes.

Caper!

If anyone is interested, I'm seriously considering doing an Ocean's 11-style heist on the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This is the stuff I insist on taking as my share:

Chanel cocktail dress, 1926-1927

Mailot bathing suit, 1965

British court dress, 1750

Balenciaga cocktail dress, 1955-1965

I'm planning on starting yoga lessons at my local community center soon, so I can totally be the little dude who hides in mini-bars and stuff.

A few of my favourite things.

It's a roman blind covered in doilies. That's right, doilies are back and better than ever. Just don't put them on clothes. Wearing a doily is only slightly less bad than wearing a skirt of neckties stitched together and about on par with clogs made out of ham.

May I present the Bobbin Tower (patent pending). Due to the cutthroat nature of the inventing community, I can't give away any clues regarding how it is constructed (the Sfork™ was MY invention, Sing-chiow!) but suffice it to say it is the answer to all your bobbin storing problems.

lines

I used to own a vintage black wool jacket that had the most beautiful dusty pink satin lining - it had that second-hand, worn look that is super rare to find. Then I wore it to World Bar and some egg-sucking gutter trash stole it. Seriously though, who steals clothes? (Other than Winona Ryder, obviously, and you know when she did it, it was kinda awesome.)
Moral of the story, contrast satin linings are cool. Super cool.

Hair Raising Trends

Sonia Rykiel

Maison Martin Margiela

Maison Martin Margiela

I am so appalled by my own title for this post that I can't think of anything else to write.
Except - don't you think it is weird that both Rykiel and Margiela put their models in stocking-pants? Creepy.