Tresor - What?

Love Kate Winslet....Love Peter Lindbergh (director).... but WTF!!!

This is the most cliched and sappy commercial I've seen in years! ( I think the last sappy one I saw was a Johnson's baby oil commercial).

C'mon! Really! Runnning on a bridge in the middle of Paris! Doesn't she have an appointment at Chanel or Galliano? What's with the "my heart is so full and brimming with love" look on her face? Save that look for the glass cases at Cartier, KATIE! Jeez!

Kate running on a bridge with an UZI and gunning down the male intruder - much more interesting. I may sound cynical but this commercial is a waste of romance and time. It looks like a downgraded version of the Chanel/Nicole Kidman spots.

Next!

Balboa Park, San Diego

Last year, I took a break from cooking a turkey and this year I remembered why. I don't know what possessed me to volunteer to bring a turkey for a small Thanksgiving gathering with friends but there I was brining, roasting, basting and stuffing every available orifice on a turkey that took me 4 hours to track down (let's not go there!).

So as a treat, we took a little break to San Diego. The traffic was another story. Next year - I'm staying in bed.

Balboa Park was gorgeous. The Museum of Art (there are 17 museums in the park) was undergoing some renovations and these are the screens they used to camouflage the construction:



At the Old Globe Theatre where How the Grinch Stole Christmas was playing, they had the official lighting of the Seuss-inspired Christmas Tree. And hey - IT'S PINK!!!



Merry Smoochie!

www.balboapark.org

Hey, Hookers!

Finally, a t-shirt that's all about ME!!!!

What? John Lee Hooker? Oh......

These cool tees are from Your Friend or Foe. A t-shirt line inspired by jazz, blues and soul music and uses vintage album covers from the greats such as Hooker, Davis, Roach etc. re-interpreted into t-shirt graphics.

Rock and Roll is OUT! JAZZ is IN!

It would help to have a nice physique to go with these. I'm thinking SPANX.

Heath Ledger loves his Hooker Tee to death (it's already torn at the collar):
Photo: Fashion Wire Daily


Here are some more that I liked:




The tees are available online, Barneys and American Rag among others.

LET THE HOLIDAY SHOPPING BEGIN!!!!!


www.yourfriendorfoe.com

Murakami

Los Angeles, November 10,2007.

If you haven't yet seen this GORGEOUS exhibit @ the Geffen Contemporary in Little Tokyo- GO NOW!!!!

I first heard about the exhibit at Chuvaness' blog. I was hesitant about going to this show since I'm not really a fan of japanese cartoon-y anime art but I was familiar with Murakami's commercial work and I was completely AMAZED!



The exhibit covered a lot of Murakami's work and included paintings, sculpture, video installations and a display of merchandise where his art was applied.

AND THE LOUIS VUITTON!

They actually installed a mini-Louis Vuitton store within the exhibit which sold LV merchandise made exclusively for the exhibit including special edition NeverFulls (3 sizes), agenda and circular coin purse. I wanted to take home the LV trunk with the mini-croc purses in 30 colors (not for sale). I thought this would sell-out by now but they were still pretty well-stocked. The limited edition prints of his artwork are now all sold out (starting at $895 a pop).

What's amazing is, he actually has paintings which incorporated the LV logo in it.

The later work definitely had the marks of computer aided design (i.e. the vectorized Adobe Illustrator line quality), but his earlier work, which looked entirely computer generated, was even more exciting! They look deceptively simple. One of the techniques he used was to lay down layer upon thick layer of paint and then sanding away parts of it to create an image. The results were awesome! I mean, you just had to be there!

It was great to see the (naughty) fiberglass sculptures. Even better is the parents trying to avert their children's eyes away from them or trying to explain it. Yes, the show attracted a lot of little kids for obvious reasons.
Photo:artnet.com ("My Lonesome Cowboy")

The exhibit is on until Februay 11, 2008. GO!!! NOW!!

Photo: Vinyl Inflatables at the entrance.


www.moca.org

Nicholas Stoodley

When I was growing up in the Philippines, "ready-to-wear" was still a new concept (shows you how OLD I am!). Ready-to-Wear, in my world, consisted of white t-shirts, school uniforms and Puritan Brand tighty-whities (in mesh!).

New clothes meant getting material and making a trip to the "modista" (tailor) and looking through a stack of fashion magazines. The "modista" clipped a swatch of your fabric to the picture of the style that you chose and you came back 3 days later for a fitting. Even my denim was tailor-made.

So what do you do at 12 years old when mom hands you PHP100 (about $80 in '07 US dollars) and tells you to go shop for clothes? On your own? I let the driver drop me off at Goldcrest, which was a newly opened mall (well, it was new THEN!)

It featured lots of "boutiques" including a GAP (not related to the U.S. store, but still a jeans store). I didn't really find anything interesting at GAP (I did try on a pair of red Britannia pants), so I went out and stumbled upon the Nicholas Stoodley boutique. I think my brother had a Nicholas Stoodley shirt in his closet, but I thought that was an import.

The Nicholas Stoodley boutique was clean and sparse and so unlike the typical boutiques at the time. Other stores' idea of visual merchandising was to jam every nook and cranny with merchandise (and everything was wrapped in plastic). So the Stoodley boutique was a breath of fresh air and the merchandise was light and tropical and screamed luxury. They had a small men's collection and I picked out a pair of off-white linen pants which I jammed my prepubescent body into and closed the sale at PHP99! You can get tailor made pants at other places for half that price.

I stumbled upon these photos at nostalgiamanila.blogspot.com. You can read more about Nicholas Stoodley there including how he started out as Valentino's assistant and his memories of 70's Manila under martial rule.

Early premium denim.

Epaulet shirts. Very Prada!



Pleats and FLARED! Luv the shirt on this one.

Photos: NostalgiaManila.blogspot.com

Boule!

Oh my God!

I've always wanted to try this confiserie-patisserie-glacerie. But they have horrible parking.

Then they moved a coupla feet down close to the Vietnamese restaurant I was having lunch in (the vietnamese have parking) so I decided to stroll next door to checkitout and what an amazing treat!!!!!!

I am hooked on the caramel macaroon ($1.25). It also comes in chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, eggnog and pumpkin (cuz of halloween). I would have taken a picture but I ate it all. Sorry, no self control. They also have this croissant dough packed into a mold and it looks like ensaymada. I forget the name ($3.50). They also have caneles, financiers, glace and a cookie called tiger's eye which I all have to try next time, and trust me, there will be a next time!

www.boulela.com

______________________________________
*UPDATE! I figured out the pastry I ate - it's Kouign-Aman. Here's more about it, click here

West Holly-weenie! Part Deux

More costumes from the parade:
(Clilck on Photo for expanded view)

There's always a Madonna and a Cyndi Lauper. And this year, it was Madonna as seen in the MTV Awards in 18th century regalia complete with 2 backup danseuses. The pink damask on the pirate was absolutely gorgeous, and hey - It's PINK!


Chiquita banana. The Robin just happened to be standing next to the Andy Warhol Soup Can. He must have been hungry...


First Aid Station. Too bad there were no Filipina Nurses from Cedars Sinai with Teri Hatcher!


Typical Gorefest look.


Food! The food stalls were busy. This was the Brazilian Currascaria stall complete with a hunky Brazilian. Check out the meat!

West Holly-weenie!

The Halloween Parade in West Hollywood is called Carnaval! Of course, I am told nothing compares to the New York Parade, this one seems manageable with entertainment stages scattered along the closed off section of Santa Monica Boulevard between Lacienega and Doheny.

The costumes seem to be getting more "blah" each year, yet there are some notables and it's always a lotta fun.

Below is my favorite - disco ball gurl and Mr. Dick-In-A-Box (no free peeks - natch!)



There were a lotta The Girls Next Door with Hugh Hefner but this group literally stood out since these guys were all over 6 feet tall without the beehives.


And these guys are probably bunnies from the same block. Looks like the result of Hugh Hefner's very bad experiments in cloning.


Then there are always hotties who dare to feature their god-given talents:



And the protesters who love them:

PRINTS FOR HALSEA

The Boat Canyon Collection by Halsea was just recently released and it features a print I designed based on a vintage print.

Check it out at www.halsea.com!

Halloween

I've seen this on Martha Stewart Living a few years back but this is the first time I've seen it done in person. These windows belong to our neighbors.