Superdry leather jacket

Superdry,
maker of those awful Osaka 6 shirts, also have some items that won’t make you look
like someone who thinks Razorlight are cutting edge. The best of a
pretty dire range is this leather
jacket, which costs a reasonable £190.

I should like it; it has military
epaulettes and enough pockets to fit everything you’ve ever wanted in, but
something’s just not right. It could be the Beckham factor – the thought of
following in his fashion footsteps makes me throw up a bit – but apart from
that, it just looks a bit too worn. With a leather jacket, it’s nice to have
the feeling that you’ve worn it in; that the jacket has unique patches that are
all of your making. Instead the lived-in look has just been done in a factory. To
be honest, it’s probably the fact that David Beckham wears it that’s putting me
off it.

Reiss online store

Reiss
occupy a bizarre place in the fashion market. Their prices are near designer
level, yet they’re a little known brand. COS has also recently muscled in
on their patch with a much more affordable range of clothes that appeal to the
same set of shoppers. Yet Reiss are fighting back the best way they know how,
by opening another store.

This time
it’s an online store.
As companies are realising, you can’t function in today’s environment without
an accessible all-access point from with customers can browse and buy. There
are drawbacks to the site at the moment though. Right now they only deliver to
the UK & Ireland and the prices are still slightly too high. But if money’s
no object, it’s worth giving Reiss a look.

Fame, Fortune and Fashion awaits at ASOS.com

On-line retailers, ASOS.com are going from strength to strength and are fast becoming the dominant force in on-line fashion retail. They’re not resting on their laurels though and have been doing their bit to support new fashion talent.

Earlier this year, ASOS ran a competition to celebrate 100 years of London College of Fashion. Emerging design talent from the esteemed fashion school had to design an outfit inspired by a 20th Century icon and the winners got the chance to work on collections with the ASOS team. Cue lots of outfits inspired by David Bowie, Withnail and I, and.. who else do students like?.. the Teletubbies.

The menswear winner was a young guy called James Hawkes who took inspiration from his childhood heroes, lifeguards (code for: “misspent his youth watching Baywatch”).  If I’m honest, I wouldn’t have chosen him from his collection, but remarkably, his ASOS collection has turned actually really nice and very wearable.

Read the rest of this entry »

Play dress up at H&M

H&M
like to do things in reverse. Usually, you’re supposed to have an online store
before you get a virtual fitting room. But – hope you don’t mind me swearing -
those gosh darn rebels at H&M don’t care for rules. In fact they made the
rulebook and tore it up again just to show how much they don’t care for rules.

Whilst they
don’t care for rules (as you may have guessed) they do care for virtual dress
up dolls, as are featured on their website’s dressing
room. You can make yourself fat or thin and give yourself the hips and lips
you’ve always wanted. You can put in your exact measurements, so you’d see how
you look in your new H&M outfit. The one thing you can’t do is buy the
clothes.

Pea-Coat Watch – Junk de Luxe

Another hot trend for this season is the pea coat. This is a trend that was simmering away last winter but has now come to a rolling boil, with several versions on the catwalk and in the high street.

The pea coat started life as standard issue for the navy. They are typically double-breasted, made from heavy worsted wool and usually have vertical slash pockets. They also normally have impossibly large lapels, although these have slimmed down slightly in the transfer from the high seas.

This fine example is from the ever dependable Junk de Luxe. It’s enough of a pea coat to look like a pea coat but not too much of one to mean that you won’t be able to wear it next season. It’s an investment! You can order it from from Urban Outfitters here.

Beyond the Valley

Beyond the Valley is a collective of designers of both clothing and accessory designers, most of whom are Central Saint Martins, RCA and Goldsmiths graduates. These plucky youngsters clubbed together and set up the Beyond the Valley store and gallery on Newburgh Street, just off London’s Carnaby Street. If you haven’t been, its worth a look in if you’re London based or next time you’re visiting the Big Smoke.

The idea of the shop is to create a space for new designers to test things out, and build a name for themselves. Everything’s produced in limited qualities and most of their stock is exclusive to the shop, so you don’t have to worry about going out and… actually, I can’t even say it, it’s too nightmarish – you know what I’m referring to.

They have a limited selection available through their web shop, including these “I heart moNeY” tees. There’s also “I heart aNYone”, “I heart my poNY” and cheekily “I heart fanNY”. Tee hee!

Nothing’s Fine, I’m Torn… Kris Van Assche at Dior Homme

I want to like him, but I’m just not sure about Kris Van Assche’s first collection for Dior Homme. What do you think?

Obviously I was sick to death of the stuff Hedi Slimane was sending his models slouching down the catwalk in – same old monotone, same old silhouette – and was definitely as ready for a change as Hedi clearly was. However, I’m not sure Kris has cracked it yet. It seems too different but at the same time not different enough. The aspects I liked, like the lean structured silhouettes, have gone and the aspects I didn’t (the monotones, the flannels) have stayed.

The poor bloke’s in an impossible position – Hedi Slimane totally dominated menswear for the past God knows how long. The Dior Homme silhouette was instantly recognisable, iconic even, and really wearable – a gift for intense lanky boys who’d been underserved by fashion in previous years. It was the antidote to the brash Eurotrash designers and was all smart under-stated sophistication.

So, trying to put that history to one side, and trying to judge it on it’s merits are we feeling it? Thoughts!

1815 – Pringle’s new line

This season Pringle are launching a new line, aimed at a younger crowd. The 1815 collection, named after the year the Scottish label was born, takes Pringle staples – knitwear, waxed jackets and the diamond pattern – and edges them out. Well, a little bit anyway. You’re not going to shock your grandmother in any of these, but there’s a definite nod to street culture as well as a slight whiff of a punk attitude.

This is all the brainchild of new Creative Director Clare Waight Keller who comes to Pringle from Gucci. There’s no doubt it’s a very cleverly conceived line, with lots of witty takes on the Pringle classics. The chunky knits, which use Scottish wool, are bang on trend and I especially like their modern take on the argyle pattern jumper shown here. The waxed cotton biker jacket is also great and the perfect item if you’re ever invited to a motorcycle convention in Newmarket.

You can browse the collection here.

Return of the Puffer Jacket

Its often said of fashion that if you stand still long enough you’ll come back into fashion. You’ll have to endure a long time being a social lepper in your Accupuncture trainers and Maharishi trousers, but you probably will be cutting edge again at some point.

Only the old adage isn’t quite right. Take puffer jackets for example. Alexander McQueen has one this season (see below), as does Dior Homme and this time round we’re not talking about those bulky duvets East 17 used to sport. These ones are much slimmed down, shorter and neater, more like a 70s style ski jacket. And I think ‘ski’ is really the vibe you’re trying to give off with these jackets. You could go for salopettes tucked into big boots but I think that would be taking it too far. You can reference the right proportions with some skinny jeans and some really phat high top trainers.

And just because I have to mention it, the leather they’ve used for the McQueen jacket is the softest, most beautiful leather I think I’ve ever had my hands on. It doesn’t even look like leather. Search it out if only to give it a grope.

Organic cotton

Today is Blog Action Day, or more probably today is the day after Blog Action Day. Anyway, inspired by this, and my natural piety, I decided to look into organic cotton. Katherine Hamnett, as you’d expect, has been using organic cotton since the nineties. On her website there’s some slightly hysterical "information" about non-organic cotton production (which apparently causes 200,000 cotton-grower suicides a year – surely there wouldn’t be any left after a couple of years. Three tops). But whilst she may have a loose grasp on the detail, she’s got a firm grip on the general gist, and she’s definitely putting her all behind the cause, persuading Tesco to run an organic line of T-shirts this year. She later pulled out of the partnership as she didn’t like Tesco’s ethics.  Go girl!

Searching for a more balanced view I found this article from the New Scientist. It’s pretty old but it’s trying to put up the case for the opposition and largely failing, which is encouraging. There’s also some quite plausible facts on the People Tree website.

Should you want to go green, but preserve your fashion credentials, American Apparel has a range of organic cotton goods (even for dogs) but of course the last word has to go to the ever moderate Katherine: Clean Up Or Die.

Print’s Charming, hoodie from Peg Leg NYC

I love this graphic print hoody from Peg Leg NYC. It’s a really inspired design where the garment design and the textile design complement each other perfectly – the pocket is positioned so it fits perfectly with the print on the body. This is the label’s second year and I feel like they’re part of an encouraging trend where we seeing street labels taking a few more chances with colour and print. I think you’ve got to credit Bathing Ape with spearheading this move.

Peg Leg is hard to find outside the US but you can get this and the rest of their collection from their on-line store. The pound’s doing well against the dollar at the moment (with shipping this costs about £75) so why not take advantage.