m.johanna

Sep 9

On topic of dance, I beckon the memory of collections that twirl on the tips of their toes. Gilles Mendel’s vision was a dreamlike spin of ballet bodices and pleated waistlines in milk-and-honey silken neutrals. With glossy furs, glowing skin, and sparkling accoutrements, his gowns adorn the New York City Ballet’s summer production of Call Me Ben. Paired with pointe shoes on stage, footwear adapted to runway with a heel and bandage-esque, tie-front detail. Click for a song Mendel tells Elle is his all-time no.1

Sep 7

From Style.com a month or so back,

Happy feet slip into Louboutin flats.

Iridescent and beaut at just over $3k,

If stepped on or scuffed it would be a bad day.

Sep 3

architect & designer George Nelson said, “what you make is important.”

In soho, I wonder if Monsieur Nelson would build buildings with hardware that’s found in OK?

Aug 6

Once upon a time maybe two months ago, yours truly was minding her own business at a little spot in the lower east side. It was late, but it was fun, so the hour didn’t matter nearly so much as what was occurring between one baby-faced boy and the lady sitting beside him in fishnet stockings and black satin underpants. Pardon me, what? Are you? Uh oh.

Because if my mother taught me anything, to gather unsolicited evidence from the scene of a love crime is extremely uncouth. So yours truly put the thought out of her mind. And then, not that night but not much later, maybe one month ago, the baby-faced tweeter confirmed what the rest of the world was about to find out:

And thus our love of La Gag runs deeper than the river Essie, for how can we not respect a proclamation of love via l’art d’acrylic? True story, the end.

Aug 5

Thom Browne, make me a gown.

TB has long been doing quirky things for menswear. Though with an often dizzying impact his brand is impenetrably strong. And to sport TB’s genius is a task best approached with restraint. On a piece-by-piece basis, consider the looks below:

In a 2010 collection for Moncler, TB shows jackets and hats with perfectly classic, criss-crossed athletica stripes. Yet rather than pairing with bottoms equal in cycle-appeal, we’ve got visions of skinny jeans in dark and white denim tour-de-prancing thru our heads. And to an eponymous astronaut-inspired 2011 spring:

We ask, would you smooch yellowed lips? Perhaps only if promised the shark-emblazoned blazer in return? Throw in the shorts, too - and with a five inch deletion we pledge never to don in union with the jacket, and never ever with the socks.

Jul 1

j’adore!

When cookies from Paris arrive in designer postal shipping vessels, I not only gush over what is inside.

Jun 29

the best color in the whole world is the one that looks good on you

The perks of product development, extremely beautiful shipments.

Jun 28

A lot of the time dude fashion leaves us feeling a tiny bit torn in two directions. On the one hand, we love an on-trend man comfortable experimenting with style. But on the flip-side, we don’t like it when anyone seems to be pushing too hard the proverbial fashion envelope. This - especially in menswear - is a difficult line to balance without crossing, which is why we can find a lot we like about Consuelo Castiglioni’s Marni for spring ‘11. Namely, CC outfits the sort of boy for whom we’d trade swedish fish in order to sit beside in calculus. He seems cool but not pretentiously hip, would definitely have and happily lend remedy accessories for a bad-hair day, and could probably teach us a thing or two about surfing after class.

Generally speaking, we wish we could spend mornings aimlessly, drinking our coffee in slippers and silk pajamas. Mondays only exacerbate this lady-of-leisure lust and a Colombian in Florence is reading our minds, furthering our daydream to co-star what we interpret to be Johnny Depp’s attire of natural habitat. The texture, draping, stripes and animal prints of Haider Ackermann’s belted, scarved, and hooded loungewear (that, with the right elements also is streetwear) are really exciting us for fall. And for Saturday. And for the big screen biopic of Salvador Dali, rumored to be starring Mr. Depp. Which would be the most genius colliding of two worlds we could ever imagine.

Jun 25

Oh Pucci, how do we love you? Let us count the ways: almost-platinum blonde perfection, purses to be clutched or hung, plum painterly prints, peach palazzo power-suits, and the potential promise of return for turquoise embellishments.

Amidst our excitement over the last few weeks’ worth of resort 2011 shows, palazzo pants and bathing suits aren’t the only candies coming out of Paris and Milan. It shouldn’t go unnoticed that menswear collections have been hitting, and we aren’t interested only on behalf of chiseled male-modelness. So to begin our commentary on the topic, what Salvatore Ferragamo has done with classic-cut ivory, eggshell, shark, and crème brûlée, balanced with loungewear stripes and topped with collars of interest, is leaving us wanting to scrap the NYC dating scene in favor of finding boyfriends on Vespas with closets of cable-knit raiding readiness.

Jun 24

girl crush we never got over

Lately we feel like a lot of the girls other girls are turning to for inspiration aren’t leaving us satisfied. So we got to considering the things we look for and love in an it-girl. Revisiting our no.1 middle school icon/crush (and subsequently spending more time on a google image hunt than RL really needs to be made aware of while away on vacation, because it IS technically work we’re doing), we not only remembered why we loved her in the first place, but fell back into a swoon over Alicia Silverstone.

Hair is always pretty, though not too polished. Makeup is minimal, but if/when a smoky eye is implemented it is moderately and appropriately applied. She isn’t too thin and her curves aren’t alienating. But most of all, she never looks like she’s trying too hard to be fashiony, edgy, sexy, or different. Which is really how we wish more girls these days would be - in a word, natural. And because of it, she appears effortless, happy, approachable, romantic, and interesting. Which is exactly the look we’re going for this summer.

There is no way Alber Elbaz doesn’t seriously throw the best parties. It isn’t easy to design a collection with something for all (and you’d have to be into asphalt neutrals with pops of lemon peel and pomegranate to really agree with what we’re about to say), but assuming you’re keen on the color palette, is there any occasion for which he didn’t consider? Going to work? Going on a safari? Going to the pool? Going for ice cream with your BFFs? And then dancing? Check, check, covered, check. Which makes us think he must be meticulously attentive to the needs of his guests.

Jun 23

Yours truly is obsessing over from Nina Ricci’s resort show for 2011. Bringing forward a stunning collection of unstructured frocks in colors that induce the urge to glop on some twiggy-style mascara and find a city rooftop with a skyline view, it is exceedingly more inspiring than what one would already expect from an Italian in Paris.

Jun 16

Things we love about Rachel Roy’s resort looks:

1. Red lips,

2. Rings on every finger,

3. Top hats topping hair we wish we had the moxy for,

4. And palazzo pants in tangerine, capri, and a neutral sheer scallop-print.