Polka dots

I'm loving this Christian Lacroix polka dot creation from the Spring 2009 collection - I can't wait for Spring!!

Gung Hei Fat Choi!

Or... Happy (Chinese) New Year for non-Mandarin speakers.

Photo by bcn25

Overall, the Year of the Ox is expected to be as slow-moving and steady-as-you-go as an ox dragging a pile of bricks on its back through a muddy rice paddy (you get what I mean). This is a conservative year, full of traditions and values (I know like, a thousand people getting married, so that makes sense). However this is not a year to be outrageous (goodbye Amex). The year of the Ox will bring stability and growth in the face of patience and diligence. It is also a year of harvest, where we reap what we have sown (uh oh... I hope there's no cosmic bad karma hanging around!).

So people... In all my mystic wisdom. Work hard, be patient (I've already broken this rule and been punished for it several times over) and don't under any circumstances be crazy outrageous. Is anyone else feeling stifled?

Crying Sushi

I don't care if all of New York thinks he is a wanker (quite possibly, he is - he is said to be eerily similar to the lovable areshole that has made him famous - Ari Gold). Jeremy Piven is smokin' hot.

Keep eating sushi baby - you're delicious even with elevated levels of mercury.

Boom!

More Awards

America Ferrera and Penelope Cruz both looked rather lovely (If not a little famished in P.Cruz's case) at the SAGs, as did Anne Hathaway (despite me just wanting to shove her into a rabbit suit because she looks like a rabbit with those big eyes and that toothy grin of hers).

There's that champagne colour again...

Angelina Jolie again strutted around looking ephemeral and earth-mother-ish. Kind of smug and annoying, actually, and not a tad dull again. My usual warm-heartedness for her is starting to fade. It's time this family stopped being everywhere for a while.

Teri Hatcher was her usual try-hard self, with a dress far too reminiscent of Eva Mendes a few weeks ago.

And ... shoot me now... I thought the following ladies were looking frumpy. I know Kate Winslet is all about her body shape (and God love her for wearing some colour this time) but... She was bottle-shaped and not in a message in a bottle kind of a way. More like bottle tree. Ick.

Emily Blunt - attempting to ruin sequins for me. Bitch.

Eva Longoria... Why?

Friday Post: Cuteness

Seeking to bust the Valentine's Day OTT icki-ness factor, I Love You More Than Blank is a cute site where you can tell someone just how much you love them in a heart of your making.

As map magazine describes it: As a kid, do you remember measuring how much you loved someone by the width of your open arms? Love was a physical space in between your hands, with your heart in the middle. Do you remember your first love, and counting off the reasons why your heart beat faster at the sound of their name or their voice? Remember plucking flower petals and wishing on dandelions, as they both took your thoughts of love and devotion for a journey on the wind? Using the real things in our everyday lives as a measuring stick for the height and breadth of our feelings, I love you more than blank is a funny, surprising, cute and heartfelt dedication to how much we really love each other.

I would say:

i love you more than ...

a pot of tea on a cold sunday morning

I am far too verbose.

New York Style

I leave in less than a week. I pray for the weather to warm up just a little (but not at the expense of snow), for the exchange rate to improve a lot, and for my ability to adapt to extensive periods of time in a cramped space to have improved monumentally since my last long-haul overseas trip, and that should anything go wrong mid-flight, that I have a pilot as skilled as the ex-fighter pilot who saved 158 people by landing in the Hudson (hey - it's closer to town than JFK Airport). I also pray to look as stylish as some of these women while I'm in New York:

What's an homage to NY fashion without some Carrie?

(although I admit, I may have overdosed)

I know it's all a bit all-black-ish, but black is so stylish and easy, and if you slip in a puddle - no one will know.

Photo credits: Primarily from Garance Dore, some shots from the Stella Macartney A/W 08/09 collections and a random Kate Moss (from her latest TopShop collection) and of course the HBO/SATC website.

Cool Invention: LightLane

Tongue In Chic

As you know, I'm wetting myself with excitement over the pending New York trip. I read about this crazy hotel - the Standard Hotel - which has recently opened in the Meatpacking District of New York (it's already in LA, Miami, Hollywood). Check out the website for the NY hotel - it's so cool, it shows pics of the hotel updated every 15 minutes!

Check out the websites for the other hotels in the chain and you'll notice there's nothing "standard" about The Standard. The rooms are fabulously appointed, and there's a general aura of retro-cool all over the place. It's the kind of place where I think you'd want to be dressed like Jane Jetson to fit in with the old-school space age decor.

The Cactus Lounge at the Hollywood Standard

This year, The Standard has released an uber kitsch calendar (Standard High 2009), featuring its staff dressed as the various characters you meet in the corridors of high school (who doesn't love a good look inside the high schools of America - I've always found it fascinating, ever since Degrassi Junior High [although that was Canada... same diff] all the way up to the darkly hilarious Mean Girls). The calendar was shot by Michael Elins, who has worked for Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair and Time. The calendar features The Stoner, The Jock, The Bully, Prom Queen, The Nerd etc.

Paint Box

Photo courtesy Gold Coast Bulletin website

Over the weekend it was the Big Day Out at the Gold Coast - a musical festival that has been running here in Oz ever since I can remember. The country town I grew up attempted to pay artistic homage (or, attempt to trick the locals into thinking it's the BDO) by hosting the Huge Day Out. It wasn't the hit BDO is...

The backdrop to the mainstage this year was an enlarged version of Aussie artist, George Gittoes, triptych Night Vision / Soldier / Revelation & Night Vision. Gittoes' website is a bit wanky and annoying but he is an award winning artist, so he gets away with it. George is one of those people who likes to suffer for his art: he routinely puts himself into danger zones and areas of conflict (i.e. he's currently dodging the Taleban in Aghanistan right now - fun) and derives his inspiration from the brutality and inhumanity of war. Gittoes' latest project is a documentary called The Miscreants which depicts the clampdown on artistic freedom in Pakistan and the brutality exercised by everyone involved. I am most impressed to hear that The Miscreants is now compulsory viewing for all US troops in Afghanistan. It will feature on SBS in Australia in March.

On a lighter note, my favourite local gallery Joshua Levi Galleries (at Woolloongabba around the corner from all the lovely restaurants and stores) is continuing with the music amongst art series, with The Travelling So and So's and Pear and the Awkward Orchestra playing into the evening. Art lovers appear with a bottle of wine, a cushion from about 7pm onwards and look at the art and enjoy the artsy ambience. Fun times. I'll be there.

I love this pic - it's called 'Vampires Drink Milk'

Prom Night

Look how beautiful, happy and in love these guys are. I wish for someone to look at me like that...

I bet Will Smith is just chomping at the bit for an Obama movie. I see big, big movies about this couple one day.

Perez Hilton...

as always seems to be the first one with a photo. She looks awesome!

Gown designed by Jason Wu

And The New First Lady Wore...

Isabel Toledo (Cuban-American designer who doesn't have the budget - or the need now that Michelle has made her a household name anyway - to advertise) in a sunny, optimistic yellow. On her feet? Jimmy Choo. But of course.

This follows on from her Narcisco Rodriguez (another Cuban-American designer - I think Ugly Betty would be pleased!) caramel and black outfit at Lincoln Memorial the other day.

Below is a word cloud (thanks http://www.smh.com/) from Barack Obama's inauguration speech, which shows the words he used most pictographically (I love this stuff).


"Amid scenes of jubilation, in which many Americans wept openly with joy, Mr Obama, aged 47, the son of a Kenyan man and a white woman from Kansas, became the first black president of the world's most powerful nation. ...Mr Obama then delivered one of the most widely-anticipated speeches of the modern era. In a deliberate attempt to lower expectations that have grown in the weeks before to the inauguration, it was a darkly sombre speech, warning Americans and the world that the US was "in the midst of crisis"."

The speech ended on a positive note.

America, in the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

I Can't Wait For...

The inauguration of Barack Obama. What a moment to be alive - we're watching history take place here, people! Amazing. One day we'll be crotchety old women and we'll say something uber patronising to a young person about this moment. Suck on that future young people. We get to see it happen.

I wish, I wish, I wish...

I could own a pair of these shoes.. seriously these are amazing.

Straight from Phillip Lim's 2009 Spring collection, are the specially designed Christian Louboutin ruffled heels complete with signature red soles.

They are even available in flats for those fun Spring fling days

If only...

Cool Job of the Week / Current Crush

Jon Favreau, a 27 year old Gemini (obsessed much?), is Barack Obama's speechwriter - surely one of the coolest and most (mentally) gruelling jobs on the planet right now! And talk about geek chic - he just sits in cafes all day (they keep mentioning Starbucks - really uncool, but I'm willing to ignore this), wears glasses (actually, evidently he doesn't but this links in way too well with the Oliver Peoples post below) and gets to cruise the web reading other people's speeches, keep up with current affairs etc etc etc. Wowowowow.

Jon is the youngest speechwriter in the White House on record (however a quick scan indicates speechwriters are actually quite young - the oldest in the Obama camp is 31, and Bush's past speechwriter was in his early 30s also). Jon was 23 when he met Barack for the first time - Obama was rehearsing his 2004 convention speech when Jon suggested he rewrite the last line (at the time, Jon worked for John Kerry. We all know how that one panned out). It didn't take long for Jon to be snapped up by Obama and the rest, so they say, is history.

Given Obama's own writing skills (he has been called the best writer-president since Abraham Lincoln and has written quite a few of his own landmark, stand up and squeal with optimism for the future speeches) and his brilliant public speaking abilities, Jon claims that it's a piece of cake writing for him, but you can imagine it would be a high pressure job. Although, in trademark style Obama sets aside time for joking: When Mr. Obama’s White Sox swept Mr. Favreau’s beloved Red Sox three games to none in their American League 2005 division series, the senator walked over to his speechwriter’s desk with a little broom and started sweeping it off.

Fo his inspiration, Favreau looks to JFK and Martin Luther King speeches and endless cups of coffee (he reportedly doesn't sleep more than 6 hours per night and generally goes to bed around 3am - this is distinctly vampire-like behaviour and a massive turn on for yours truly, despite needing a solid 8 hours per night myself).

In typical geek style, Jon uses big words when talking to girls. When he tries to tell girls that he's Obama's speechwriter, naturally very few (until now - his face is everywhere right now) believe him. To which he replies: "If I really wanted to hit on you, don’t you think I’d make up something more outlandish?" Outlandish. Great work.

Obama will be inaugurated at 3am Australian time tomorrow morning - the world is waiting with bated breath to hear his first words as President. It's amazing to think someone our age has written those words for him. Imagine.

A Little More

From The Sartorialist. Here are some of his latest fabulous pictures.

The woman in the jacket is so well put together, and then you scroll to her crazy leggings! I love them! And the beautiful boy looks almost faun-like, a little like Mr Tumnus from The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (half-man half-goat if you've forgotten your childhood). The big bag is such a juxtaposition compared to the rest of his small self!

This is by far one of my favourite images ever from The Sartorialist. Asides from being a bit of a styler for a woman her age, I think her outfit, her expression, those dark eyes, the grey hair without a hint of fussiness (or hair dye) makes her a fascinating study. Being an overly imaginative kind of a girl, I've already decided she survived the Holocaust, has dark secrets she will never tell anyone, and is a wonderful grandmother. As well as resilience and strength, I see warmth in her. What about you? What do you think of when you look at her?