being outrageous

My musical accompaniment for this post. Talking about Monroe and walking on snow white, New York's a go go and everything tastes nice. He's outrageous.



More from the Bowie show at the V&a.. yes, I'm being a bit obsessed, but there are still so many images I want to share with you.  And I keep thinking.. I've been speaking with so many people, friends who weren't even BORN when he was doing this stuff. And yet they connect with him. And, well, fair enough: after all, I think Shakespeare (or Marlowe, depending on your point of view) was a genius, and yet he was before my time.

I mean, even in his MUG shot, David Bowie still managed to turn it into a photo shoot.






So - at the risk of sounding very, very old, I"m going to put it out there. Who, today, is pushing the boundaries? I know Lady Gaga - maybe she's peaked, but even with the sheer numbers of fans, she always struck me as the next generation's Madonna.

Madonna, wearing meat.

But when I look at Bieber fans.. I'm not judging, but call me cynical: it feels like the whole X Factor, Pop Idol star-marker machinery has created drones, creations being managed by older men, it's about money and numbers (which equals money) and not about creativity. Being an artist.

All the images here were from that one press day at the show. I'm having fun with collaging the things I shot. I'm sure you're all bored to tears with Bowie by now, have moved on, and for all I know, no one's even reading this. That's okay: I'm having fun.

Now off to write my screenplay! Stay warm, kittens, and have a lovely day. xoxo

brit-stitch: the milkman

It's rare I get excited about a handbag.

But I've been going thru a phase for months now, where I'm just not happy with my bags.

So when, the Saturday before last, I happened to be on facebook, and saw my friend Laura ('a daisy chain dream') posting about her new Brit-Stitch 'half pint' bag arriving in the post, I became.. okay, I became obsessed. Hers was pale pink, called 'chinz rose' - a pale English rose colour just perfect for her nearly white skin and henna red hair - she knows her own style, does Laura - but it's such early days for Brit-Stitch that their website isn't even up yet! Well, it is, but they're not yet selling bags on it.


I did learn some things about the brand - the back story with the milkman's bag, and the fact that the bags, all leather, are handstitched IN THE UK, and it's a family run business that goes back a few generations.. everything about this captivated my imagination.

And while choosing one style, one colour, was agony - I was up at night, torn between the leather shopper in warm sand & oil green,  or the leather laptop bag in caramel - I kept coming back to the Milkman. In 'grayed jade'.

Because as you might have noticed: it's a colour that makes me happy. Calmly happy. I've been looking all over for a brilliant book I've got, on colour - written also by an English girl, who travelled the world and told an incredible story about an emperor, and this soft, grayed jade coloured pottery, this Celadon glaze.. it was such a beautiful story, about how this emperor had everything, all the bling, but this one simple, humble bowl, with that colour glaze, embodied all that is good, and humble, and was worth more to him than all the dazzling other stuff.

All the bling in the kingdom. All the crazy expensive It bags.

I've also been playing around with this colour, and images from the Bowie V&a exhibition.. they're probably not letting the public take photos, so this is a real treat, to bring out my toys from the show. Like this image from a video, married with a sketch that Bowie did.




And in case you're not a grayed jade girl, there are lots of other great colours. AND they'll make anything, in any colour, if you can't find something you like. They even have - for those so inclined - a great tomato red. Which has already sold out: they can't seem to make these babies fast enough!

You can buy Brit-Stitch bags online thru The Hut. Or keep an eye on them thru their Brit-Stitch facebook page. Their prices are crazy cheap, for hand stitched real leather, and they're only just a baby, as a brand, so it might not stay this way forever. But there's something about the people behind the brand that is just so genuine, so heartfelt, that I predict they're going to be hugely successful. Like they said on the (unfinished) site: these bags are made with love.

from ibiza to the norfolk broads

When I was shooting Bowie's eyes from a screen yesterday, at the V&a show 'David Bowie is', I kept thinking, where have I seen this before? And then I remembered.. a flight to Miami, I was watching the brilliant film, 'I am Love', with Tilda Swinton, and I had shot her eyes. On the plane, with my little phone camera. I kept starting and stopping the film, to get this image - almost as tricky as catching the right shot from the front row - not the end, but the side view - at catwalk shows. (Okay, yes, granted, it was a long flight). But still.

At the time, I didn't know that Bowie would be collaborating with Tilda for his video, the Stars are Out Tonight, because he hadn't made it yet. (I've got another shot in this post, a few actually, of Tilda from I am Love. It's a great film - set in Milan - I loved it.)

I didn't even think so much that he reminded me of Tilda Swinton at the time. He's always reminded me of my Soviet Georgian boyfriend, Victor, who was 23 when I was 33, who looked - uncannily, naturally, bizarrely - like David Bowie in the Man Who Fell to Earth. Which I also captured, in a room at the exhibition yesterday, where you can sit on benches and see clips from various films he was in.




But I can't describe the exhibit without the music. So here, for your listening pleasure, the song that went with the video with the eyes, Life on Mars. All these years, I've been happily singing along, thinking the line was 'run my people to the North Abroads'. Hence the title: the real line. But I bet you, in the shower, I'll stick with my version.

My friend JJ said she heard Tilda was at the event yesterday, dressed as Bowie. If so, I didn't see her. But it was rather crowded.

What would be brilliant would be - and I'm half expecting to hear this - that it turns out, Bowie WAS there. But he was disguised as just, you know, a normal Human Being.

like dolphins can swim

Sometimes, things in life exceed your expectation.

I'm just back from a day at the V&a for the press preview of 'David Bowie is', the show opening on the 23rd. I came of age during Bowie's reign, I've been to live shows, his music, films, have made up the soundtrack to the film that is my life - so I'm not ready to put in words how surprised I was at how emotional this was for me.

Victoria Broackes, co-curator of this extraordinary exhibit, was one of the people who spoke briefly (you didn't need to say much: the show, his work, did the talking). As the Telegraph put it, they're hopeful that David Bowie will attend the exhibition.

But he was already there.

I love how he's a musician that isn't precious about his work: he lets his videos stay on YouTube, for free. I was mesmerised, reading his original words for Heroes, and I've found a more recent live version for this post. Those lines.. 'I wish I could swim, like dolphins can swim'.. and that Buddhist concept of 'this is that'. 

I am God. 

And don't even get me started on the headphones; they're MAGIC. They react to whatever you're near, sound, music, his voice, others, going on and off as you move.. I wish I could see all the art, words, images, that will come of the 600 top press people that attended the event today. Because, in the end, that's all David Bowie is: an artist, who inspires us to create something new.

starman

Yesterday I had the privilege to be invited to a press preview of the British Design 1948-2012 show, opening this Saturday at the V&A. If you click below, you can have the full experience, as this section of the show played music from that time:



All set? Great.



This is just one of several HUNDRED items in the show - at this rate, I will be devoting my blog to it all year (provided I post once a day). This was one of David Bowie's stage costumes, designed by the Japanese fashion designer Kansai Yamamoto (whose recent show I also had the privilege of seeing - at the V&A!). Bowie had commissioned Kansai to create the wardrobe for his Ziggy Stardust character. Kansai had - admiringly - described Bowie at the time as 'neither man nor woman.'

He was, in fact, such an icon, that when I saw his first show - in college, with a group of friends - I remember some cute guys from school driving us in a van across the border to Canada, very thrilling! - and so psyched we were - in the mid/late 70s, this was - to be seeing Bowie live, that even I had my most glittery glam outfit on (always the Virgo, it was a simple, fitted, long sleeved plain glitter tee: as minimalist as you could get back then).

But that's the thing about being an icon: you've always got to be moving forward. David Jones, aka Bowie, played that night to an audience of kids all glam rocked to the hilt - in a soft, grey, vintage suit. Ziggy Stardust was gone. It was the dawn of the Thin White Duke.

Some other versions of the song, for your viewing pleasure. And a rare find of the original video of Space Oddity.
















BRITISH DESIGN 1948-2012: INNOVATION IN THE MODERN AGE at the V&A opens this Saturday, March 31. Thank you, Charlotte, for inviting me: it's a wonderful show, and I can't wait to come back.

ashes to ashes

I never know what posts will get responses, or why. And I don't know how some bloggers get like 300 comments (granted, they've been doing it a lot longer than me). Once recently I posted something that got zero comments. ZERO! Mr. Dot felt so sorry for me, it was so cute to see him so.. sensitive to my feelings. When I got a comment, he was really happy for me.

One thing that's been getting a lot of response (relatively speaking), by emails, too, is the two part zip dress coming up for Topshop by Richard Nicholl ('nudes', recent post). Meg asked when she can get it. Well, Meg, you don't have too long to wait now: according to my own Topshop Deep Throat, launch date is 13 February (Saturday), just in time for Valentine's Day. I'm not sure if that means just certain shops, or globally and online, but I'm about to meet him/her in a dark car park somewhere in DC in the late 1970s to find out.

This Richard Nicholl for Topshop 'pink nude bustier' is £70, (convert to your currency) and launches 13th February.

This title, btw, is a reference to an old poem we used to write on each others' yearbooks in the States:

ashes to ashes
dust to dust
what's a bra
without a bust

Turn up your stereo speakers, boys & girls, and sing along with Dave:

blue, blue, electric blue

'... that's the colour of my room, where I will live..' I love that Bowie song, and have been singing it in my head, ever since I took this shot of my friend Claire's blue wedge espadrille sandals, which she got 'somewhere in Fulham, in a little shop.' It's a colour that's been popping up all over town (and in the Hamptons, so presumably elsewhere, too). It's like what I used to call 'Greek blue' but then it hit me: it's 80s, glam rock, 'electric blue!' And it's such a great little accent colour: on Ray Bans, in patterns.. it makes a nice transition accent colour into fall. Below a sneak preview of a post I'm quite happy about: another brilliant group of style icons.




On the off chance that anyone actually clicks on my youtube links (I must ask my blog friends: how do you imbed them as boxes??) here is Moby requesting the song, on 'live by request', it's quite cute, and here's Bowie performing Sound & Vision. Play at your own risk: I can't get it out of my head!