Introducing...California Tailor, a women's shirting company that launched this week out of Los Angeles. Gill McLean, a British ex-pat living in California with a decade+ of clothing design experience decided she had enough with working for a big brand that often had to cut corners and set out on her own to combine the elegance of a traditionally tailored British shirt with the laid-back nonchalance of California style. The result is proper hybrid of the two that works so nicely. California Tailor's first collection, Shirt No. 1 ($168), is a series of eight button-down shirts (including one made from Liberty of London fabric), all machine washable, that are gently tailored but also a bit boyish. And like most small-batch clothing labels, California Tailor is all about quality and detail. From stitching to buttons to weaves and pockets, everything McLean has designed has been considered and reconsidered. Check out California Tailor and Shirt No. 1 online now, and here's a little teaser for things to come...obviously that t-shirt...I need it! Keep up with Tomboy Style elsewhere: INSTAGRAM | TWITTER | FACEBOOK
This is why I love the internet. Today I got to chat with Loux the Vintage Guru based in Namibia, Africa, whose Tumblr site I recently discovered and fell instantly under its spell. The budding fashion designer and all-round exquisitely-dressed dude is making waves with a collective of twenty-something like-minded style innovators to promote the fashion industry in Africa and inspire the art of elegant dressing. The result is a visual delight of unparalleled style that Loux documents on his Tumblr. But rather than simply showing you his photographs, I wanted to talk with him, get a feel for who this talented and ambitious young African designer is.
So he in Namibia, and I in Paris, this was our conversation…
If you were to take me vintage shopping in Namibia, where would we go, what would we see?
I would take you to a place called Omuthiya-Gwipundi in the northern part of Namibia, it’s an open market where they sell vintage and second-hand clothing. You can find all sorts of wonderful clothing for both men, women as well as children for very, very cheap– and it all comes from Africa; the stuff our parents’ generation was wearing.
Vintage shopping can be really expensive over here in Paris…
Really? Come here! A lot of the vendors don’t really realise the value of what they’re selling because many people aren’t interested in wearing vintage, they just see it as “used clothing”. The main fashion district of Namibia is actually in the capital city of Windhoek where you can also find some really beautiful vintage clothing, but I prefer to go to the open markets of Omuthiya-Gwipundi, as well as Johannesburg and Pretoria in South Africa. It makes me different from most people here; I manage to dress myself cheaply and end up looking like a million bucks.
What are the challenges you face being a designer in Namibia trying to launch a fashion brand?
Honestly, money. To launch a brand you need to market yourself; designers need to pay for events to showcase their clothes in the right light. Speaking of lighting– that’s expensive too! So all that is pretty much the main challenge I face.
Tell me the story of how you first became interested in fashion…
From a young age, I was inspired by my late grandfather, the old man always dressed in suits and shiny shoes and would tell me, “my son, fashion is what you adopt when you don’t yet know who you are, make sure you are always well-dressed”. So I grew up loving fashion from childhood.
Where and how did you learn to design clothes?
I learned from local tailors in Namibia as well as some friends I made from Japan. But I do believe the ability to design well is a God-given talent. I didn’t go to school to study it but I do have plans to further improve my skills and go to fashion school one day soon. For now, I have a very small workshop, I’m an emerging tailor and get training from professional tailors. I often use their workshops where they assist me in bringing my pieces together.
In Namibia, if you like vintage shopping, do they call you a “hipster”?!
I define myself as a Hipster! For me, that just means I get to express myself and influence other people’s fashion sense– most of my clients at the moment are young adults. It also makes me an avant-garde of change; introducing new ideas, design and style in Namibia and across Africa.
Give us your take on your personal style…
I call my style sophisticated-punk, it’s a bit of a mixture, but I think true style is an expression of your day to day mood. I fell in love with vintage pieces, especially from the 1960s, and normally alter them to fit me and modernise them in my own way. Most of the suits I wear are actually my late Dad’s suits. I wear a hat with every outfit as well as vintage club ties– I think they’re both stylish and respectful.
And do you dress like this everyday?
YES! It’s my style– if i don’t dress like this then I will be home (naked).
Walking down the street, what kind of reaction do you get from your average fellow Namibian to the way you dress?
They love it, they like my style, especially when I get together with my friends from South Africa who share the same enthusiasm for fashion.
What is the general feeling towards the importance of fashion in Namibia?
Well, I think not only in Namibia, but in Africa as a continent, it should be taken more seriously so that we can inspire the next generation and so that we can have and dress in our own brands and collections that reflect African style.
How do you think the rest of the world sees Africa currently in relation to the fashion industry?
I think the world only thinks Africa is blessed with models. But that’s not the case. The fashion industry in Africa is growing and I advise the international industry to attend fashion shows like the AFF (Africa Fashion Festival) and you’ll see first-hand that the African fashion industry is on point.
You’re collaborating with a group called Khumbula, described as “young visionaries who advocate for a well cut Africa, the sartorial Africa”. What’s it all about?
The collaboration with Khumbula, a group of stylists and designers from Johannesburg, South Africa, is to show the fashion world that we can unite as one in the African continent. When we collaborate we call ourself LIA (Love is African) and we’re currently playing a big part by simply inspiring fashionistas around the African continent. We’re also all passionate vintage fashion lovers that pay tribute to the legendary vintage clothing era. Khumbula is a Zulu word meaning “Remember”.
Has the Congolese subculture of the sapeurs influenced you at all?
We are not part of the sapeurs but we would love to be. This movement of our colonial-era dandy predecessors embodies elegance, style and manners that became a means of resistance. It’s a movement that has influenced us in such a way that it made us discover our style and personality by reaching in to the depths of our past for the rich cultural heritage left to us by our ancestors.
Who are your style icons/ muses?
Mr Sam Lambert and Mr. Shaka Maidoh, the African and British-born design duo behind Art Comes First, a fashion collective that share the same fascination for taking old things and and grafting pieces together to find new expressions. You’ll also see them killing it on all the street style blogs during fashion week in Europe.
What’s next for Loux the Vintage Guru?
Next month I’ll be showcasing my designs at RVK (Retro VIntage Kollection) Fashion Week in Pretoria South Africa, and then in April I’ll have my fashion show in Namibia, before I fly to showcase at the AFF (Africa Fashion Festival) in Ghana in May. These are all big events for me. In the long run, I hope to show my brand one day in Paris or Milan and of course, I’d love it to be the dopest brand in the country with a shop in every corner of Namibia.
If you were expecting some uplifting, motivational bullshit, too fucking bad. Go cry to your goddamn mom. What’s that? You’re all orphans? Go fuck yourselves, this isn’t a pity party, this is a fucking Bowl game.
This is my tenth goddamn year coaching the championship game, and I came here to win. Each year I’m stuck with a fresh team of you rookie assholes, chasing your tails and sticking your taints in the end zone water dish like it’s fucking playtime at the doggie day care. Well, not this year.
I’m fucking sick of listening to this ref call penalties for excessive cuteness year after year. If you came here today to be called “cute” and get on TV, you can walk out of this fucking locker room right now, move to L.A., dress in drag and model for goddamn page-a-day puppy calendars.
We came here today to play the game, and we came here to win. I don’t give a damn if you’re only ten weeks old—when their linebacker hits you in the face like a bag of dicks, you need to get up, nip him in the belly, and run the ball down the fucking field.
There’s no excuse to roll over and give up a single goddamn touchdown today. Are you scared of the Bernese Mountain Dog just because your whole body could fit in his fucking mouth? Suck it up, candy ass. You still have your balls, act like it. If I have to get the Bissel out here to vacuum your tears off the field, I swear I will neuter you myself during the next time out.
I know those fucking petting zoo cheerleaders have shit for brains and can’t spell a goddamn thing, but what they’re trying to tell you is to be fucking A-G-G-R-E-S-S-I-V-E.
Let’s make one thing clear: the only pussies on the field should be the stars of the Kitten Halftime Show. You want a fucking forever home? Bring home that championship ring.
Now let’s go out there and beat those sons of bitches.
but seriously, I support installing chandeliers on the undersides of all infrastructure
Some people find elevated freeways, and in particular the underpass created by the freeway, to be a real eyesore, but what can anybody do to spruce up such a sterile concrete environment?
But will a set of cool and colorful bike part chandeliers be enough to get people together under the freeway? Or will they simply shed light on a roadside problem which is usually kept in the dark?
Thanks to online platforms like Google Art Project and institutions releasing more and more images on the web for free, the general public has access to museum collections in ways they never have before. But what if you could do more than just remix images of objects in a collection — what if you could 3D print the objects themselves?
Laric’s 3D scan of John Gibson’s “Nymph Untying her Sandal” (19th century), stone and marble (via lincoln3dscans.co.uk)
For a project called “Lincoln 3D Scans,” artist Oliver Laric worked with the Collection Museum and Usher Gallery in Lincoln, UK, to make some of their pieces available in just that way. Laric sorted through their archives and chose dozens of objects to scan, from busts of Beethoven, Dante, and Einstein to pieces of furniture to a human pelvis bone. He then created 3D models of the objects, which he collected and published online. Each of the 52 pieces on Laric’s site — which is currently being highlighted as a “First Look” online exhibition by the New Museum — is presented in the form of a rotating GIF, stripped of color and looking like a kind of digital styrofoam version of itself. Underneath the GIFs are some basic identifying details and a button to download the scan as an STL file. Using that file, you can print the object yourself.
“The project aims at making the collection available to an audience outside of its geographic proximity and to treat the objects as starting points for new works,” Laric explains on the site’s Info page. “All models can be downloaded and used without copyright restrictions.” In other words, go forth, remix, and copy, with the museum’s blessing.
Laric actually has a note on the Info page asking people to email him when they’ve used the models or re-created them in some fashion, and the site’s Gallery displays the results. They’re a mixed bag, from an uninspiring video that zooms in, out, and around one of the objects cast in silver to a delightfully trippy animated GIF of Einstein’s head. Most people don’t seem to have printed out the objects (I suppose 3D printers are not that ubiquitous just yet) but rather have taken to animating and toying with them in virtual 3D space.
Cyril’s take on Ella Rose Curtois, “Marble boy”
One of the most successful of these is a surrealist take by an artist named Cyril, who’s plopped an oversized version of Ella Rose Curtois’s 19th-century sculpture of a marble player in the middle of an early-20th-century city street. Someone else named Boris Quezada has either printed out the same marble player and photographed it in his home or else Photoshopped it there. The sculpture is starkly white and looks wonderfully incongruous in its bland surroundings, raising a host of questions about the nature and value of copies and originals in our image-saturated culture. Museums will always be special places to visit, but there’s something strange and exciting about the possibility of bringing the museum home to you.
This is amazing. It also makes me angry about what other papyri might be in private collectors' hands and for that reason not known to scholars and the world at large.
St. Vincent’s new video is pale, weird, and futuristic—just like the singer herself. The new clip for “Digital Witness” was directed by Chino Moya and features the singer and her space-age minions stomping around the deserted streets of what looks to be some sort of IKEA town/Prada Marfa-style art installation. It’s all pretty weird—but so is St. Vincent, so it works.
St. Vincent is out Feb. 25. A full list of her upcoming tour dates is below.
St. Vincent tour 2014 Feb. 13—Postbahnhof—Berlin, Germany
Feb. 15—Paradiso—Amsterdam, Netherlands
Feb. 17—Ancienne Belgique—Brussels, Belgium
Feb. 18—La Cigale—Paris, France
Feb. 20—O2 Shepherds Bush Empire—London, England
Feb. 21—Manchester Cathedral—Manchester, England
Feb. 22—Olympia Theatre—Dublin, Ireland
Feb. 26—Terminal 5—New York, New York
Feb. 27—House Of Blues—Boston, Massachusetts
Feb. 28—Union Transfer—Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ...
It rained for about five minutes yesterday and Southern California might get a few more drops this weekend, but California is still in a very-bad-and-getting-worse drought. In fact, the state has been in a drought for a long time now and might be headed for a megadrought. That's not as scary as it sounds! Jk, yes it is. "One of the most persistent and intense ridges of high pressure ever recorded in North America has been anchored over the West Coast since December 2012," according to meteorologist Jeff Masters at WunderBlog, which is what made 2013 California's driest year on record. Once in a while the ridge breaks and allows a low pressure system in, causing a storm, but it "inevitably builds back after each storm, clamping down on any moisture reaching the state." Masters says that models show the ridge is on its way back up again (although it probably won't be as strong) and there won't be any more significant precipitation in the state for at least a week. (The high pressure ridge is just part of a weather pattern over the Northern Hemisphere that's also causing the Polar Vortex.)
The Sierras, an important source of water in California, got about two feet of snow this week, but snowpack up there is still at its lowest level in more than 50 years; a survey yesterday found it's now at 12 percent of its average level.
This drought is part of a larger, 14-year drought in the Western US, which peaked between 2000 and 2004, the droughtiest years since "the last mega drought over 800 years ago." (We've already learned that the twentieth century was unusually wet in California.) A 2012 study thinks those conditions "will be the new normal in the Western U.S. by 2030, and will be considered extremely wet by the year 2100." A lack of water that severe would make growth here pretty much impossible.
President Barack Obama today spoke about the recent court decision that gutted the nation's network neutrality law, saying that he expects the FCC to take action to preserve the open Internet, which proved crucial in his presidential campaign.
"It's something that I've cared deeply about ever since I ran for office, in part because my own campaign was empowered by a free and open Internet and the ability for citizens all across the country to engage and create and find new ways and new tools to mobilize themselves," Obama said. "A lot of that couldn't have been done if there were a lot of commercial barriers and roadblocks and so I've been a strong supporter of net neutrality."
The Federal Communications Commission passed the current net neutrality rules, via the Open Internet Order, in 2010 during Obama's first term. The rules prevented Internet service providers from blocking Web applications or charging for access to the network. Verizon challenged the rules and got them overturned, but the FCC could rewrite the order to put it on a more solid legal footing.
"Ninety percent of Americans work for someone else," Cantor said, according to a source in the room. "Most of them not only will never own their own business, for most of them that isn't their dream. Their dream is to have a good job, with an income that will allow them to support their family."
heads #literally exploded
You've really got to see this. Each party has its blind spots created by culture, ideology and demography. But this is incredibly rich and riveting for what may seem to some of us - or rather I would assume, just about everyone - as something extremely, extremely obvious. The Republican House leadership has discovered that not everyone runs a small business and not everyone is hyper-focused on cutting regulations. And they have a new message for Republican members of Congress: Most people have (or try to have) jobs and work for others!
Cornering the Bitcoin market may be easier than cornering orange juice futures.
Paramount Pictures / Aurich Lawson
As it turns out, if you mine or trade Bitcoin “solely [for your own] purposes,” the United States Department of the Treasury doesn’t need you to register as a money transmitter as defined under the Bank Secrecy Act. Similarly, companies that invest in Bitcoin don’t need to register either.
A new four-page document published Thursday by the Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) has further clarified financial rules pertaining to Bitcoin.
In March 2013, FinCEN’s rules stipulated that "a person that creates units of convertible virtual currency and sells those units to another person for real currency or its equivalent is engaged in transmission to another location and is a money transmitter" and is therefore subject to federal regulations.
The former Port Authority staffer that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie denied being friends with in high school now says there's proof Christie knew about the Fort Lee lane closures as they happened. Which again proves the political axiom: If you have nothing nice to say about a guy who might be able to prove that you were involved in a potentially-lawbreaking act of political retribution, don't say anything at all.
David Wildstein was a senior official at the agency that runs the George Washington Bridge and was the recipient of the now-famous email from a Christie staffer saying it was "Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee." Those traffic problems involved closing access lanes to the bridge between Fort Lee, New Jersey, and Manhattan, which backed up traffic into the New Jersey town, apparently in some sort of act of political punishment. Christie hadn't been directly linked to the email or the closures, until today.
As pointed out by the Huffington Post's Kim Bhasin, this is what Christie said earlier this month: "I had no knowledge or involvement in this issue — in its planning or its execution — and I am stunned by the abject stupidity that was shown here."
The New York Timesreports on Wildstein's new allegations:
In a letter released by his lawyer … [Wildstein] described the order to close the lanes as “the Christie administration’s order” and said “evidence exists as well tying Mr. Christie to having knowledge of the lane closures, during the period when the lanes were closed, contrary to what the Governor stated publicly in a two-hour press conference” three weeks ago.
You can read Wildstein's lawyer's letter below. "Mr. Wildstein contests the accuracy of various statements that the Governor made about him," the letter reads, "and he can prove the inaccuracy of some."
In that two-hour press conference, Christie denied not only knowing about the closures, but even denied knowing Wildstein very well, despite their having gone to high school together. He didn't actually use the word "nerd," but made the argument, in short, that while he was on the baseball team and acting as class president, he doesn't know what that dork Wildstein was doing. (Specifically: "We didn't travel in the same circles in high school. You know, I was the class president and athlete. I don't know what David was doing during that period of time.") The New Republic quickly disputed that, citing the coach of the baseball team.
Christie also said he hadn't regularly interacted with Wildstein, though The Wall Street Journal found photos of the two of them together during the actual period that the lanes were closed. When called before an Assembly committee to testify on the subject, Wildstein plead the Fifth.
Pundits were quick to offer their unique takes on the news ("if true"):
Update, 4:00 p.m.: Christie's 2013 campaign manager, Bill Stepien, will plead the Fifth instead of answering questions about his role in the closures. Christie removed Stepien from his position with the Republican Governor's Association earlier this month.
Update, 4:45 p.m.:Reflecting the distinction in the letter between what Wildstein can prove (the personal comments) and those things for which his lawyer states "evidence exists," the Huffington Post's Michael Calderone notes that The Times has updated its article to downplay his ability to prove Christie's knowledge. We've updated our headline to reflect the distinction as well.
Wildstein claims there is documentary proof that the governor has been lying.
If this proves to be true, then the governor must resign or be impeached. Because it will show that everything he said at his famous two-hour press conference was a lie.
Update, 5:50 p.m.: Christie's office responds, via Time's Zeke Miller.
In summary: Christie "had absolutely no prior knowledge of the lane closures before they happened and whatever Mr. Wildstein's motivations were for closing them to begin with."
"For me, it's sad that a brand like Burberry, heralded for its innovation in every other way has only recently realised that their clothes might look good on black skin," creative director, designer and stylist Harris Elliott muses over email. "It's unbelievable, America has Barack Obama in his second term, and the fashion world is making noise because a brand uses a black model on its runway."
via overbey ("Guy Fieri K-cups. Thinking apocalyptic, Kunstler-ian thoughts about this.")
At long last, now you can wake up with Guy Fieri and experience Flavortown in the comforts of your own home. Because Guy Fieri is now making his own coffee.
It’s called Guy Fieri’s Flavortown Roasts, obviously, and contains eight different flavors, available in Keurig-compatible single serve coffee cups.
Oh, and the flavors, they do not disappoint.
There is Bananas Foster Coffee (“sweet banana, caramelized sugar and cinnamon flavors”), in addition to Chocolate Mint Coffee, Hazelnut Cinnamon Roll Coffee, Hot Fudge Brownie Coffee, and Redwood Roast (“big, bold and strong like the mighty redwoods”). It’s like Girl Scout cookies turned into testosterone-fueled beverages. But the best tagline belongs to Caramel Apple Bread Pudding Coffee: “All the flavor from my righteous Caramel Apple Bread Pudding stuffed into your mug.”
Retailers are supposedly set to begin carrying the coffee in early 2014 in North America. According to variouswholesale sites, it looks a 24-pack of the single-serve cups will cost about 12 to 16 bucks.
Pinsel und Feder in Tinte auf Pergament, aquarelliert, Deckweiß- und Goldhöhung, 175 X 122 mm, Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Kupferstichkabinett
Can you believe it's a thing? Oxidation. Time honored too. They even have their own names for ways to make it happen. They have special bottle shapes, cheeses to go with it and so on. Oh, it's real. You should see for yourself.
Thursday, January 30th from 5 to 7pm
Dear Bath Magazine,
Last spring, as we tried to figure out how best to honor the resilience of our city in the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, we asked runners to lend us the shoes they wore in the race. In turn, their shoes, and the cover we produced, helped us to raise over $125,000 for the One Fund, the charity established here to benefit those affected by the bombing.
You liked the shoes cover so much that you borrowed (others have used less charitable phrases) the concept for your February issue on the half marathon in Bath.
We can’t speak for the dozens of runners who donated their shoes to us for that image. We can’t speak for the runners who are preparing to run this April. But we hope that if you were so bold as to borrow our idea, you will also borrow the spirit of that cover—and make a significant donation to the One Fund in the name of those who were unable to finish the race.
Sincerely,
Boston magazine
YouTube user "Ajakwerth" shares this video of himself and his wombat friend, Douglas. Douglas is an orphan who was taken to a rescue and rehabilitation school near Tallangatta in Victoria, Australia.
