YStyle Picks of the Week
Going for the gold
MANILA, Philippines - If their outfits are any indication, Team Philippines is bound to do pretty well at the 2012 London Olympics with Rajo Laurel designing the uniforms for the 30-person contingent. Using the traditional barong Tagalog as his inspiration, the uniforms will feature modern palay embroidery and dark cobalt and blue threads for good fortune. “The main accessory is the salakot, which I have gilded in gold leaf and will hopefully catch the light as they enter the Olympic arena,” Rajo says. Very Hunger Games-like, eh?
Kaiser made it
It was a collaboration just waiting to happen. While most designers typically use colored pencils or watercolors to color in their sketches, for the last two decades Karl Lagerfeld used Shu Uemura eyeshadow palettes as his medium of choice. “I design with Shu Uemura because other manufacturers do not offer such beautiful colors,” according to Lagerfeld. The admiration between the Kaiser and the Japanese cosmetics giant appears to be mutual with the latter tapping the former to design a one-off holiday makeup line. The campaign, shot by Karl himself, natch, will be out anytime soon and the collection will be available in stores by November.
Designer knock-offs
In the local fashion industry, it’s no secret that a few of our local designers get copious amounts of inspiration from the runways in New York and Paris. While there’s nothing wrong with that, when references get too literal, the whole business starts to look a little fishy. Shortly after Philippine Fashion Week concluded last May, a little-known Tumblr blog called Ayyy, Teh!! set up shop and exposed some of Philippine fashion’s dirty little secrets. While the similarities between the pieces of local designers and their foreign counterparts are a little eerie, we can't discount the possibility of sheer coincidence. We'll leave it up to you to decide whether they're runway rip-offs or not.
Bumped off kicks
American designer Jeremy Scott, whose biggest claim to fame is as Karl Lagefeld’s chosen successor at Chanel, received quite a bit of attention just this week for a particular pair of sneaks from his fall collaboration with Adidas. Dubbed by critics as the “shackle sneakers,” the shoe company issued an apology then pulled out the particular pair after being accused of symbolizing slavery and trivializing the oppression of African Americans. Perhaps Scott intended them to be some sort of anti-theft precaution? While the shoes do look cool, we’re not exactly raring to chain them to our ankles.
Call me Abercrombie
To be honest, we were already kind of over the whole Call Me Maybe thing two weeks ago, but when a video came out of half-naked Abercrombie and Fitch male models with rock-hard abs lip-synching to the ubiquitous ditty, we totally ate it up. Besides, the video takes the edge off the retailer’s latest controversy in which model Benjamine Bowers is suing the company for a cool $1 million, claiming that he was forced to expose and, um, handle himself inappropriately during his casting for the brand. We wonder if he was still expecting a call after that. Maybe?
Miss Selfridge in Manila
British high street fashion brand Miss Selfridge opened in Greenbelt 5 this week, joining the ranks of other UK retail brands that have already set up here, such as Dorothy Perkins, Warehouse, and of course, Topshop. Geared towards younger fashion plates, expect a trendy variety of pastels, denim, Aztec-prints, and lace.
Asian invasion
Quintessential American fashion retail brand J. Crew has sets its sight on global expansion with their most recent announcement: starting October 2012 their merchandise will be available in Hong Kong and China at Lane Crawford, thanks to their newly-formed partnership with the luxury relatailer. With stores like Muji, Uniqlo, and Cotton On having already found their way to Manila, a Hong Kong shopping trip after the holidays is starting to sound appealing again.
