SUMMER OF BRAZIL

Summer in fashion is always ahead of the actual weather conditions that we are surrounded with. While Brazils busiest women ADRIANA LIMA  & GISELE BÜNDCHEN are striking sexy poses in seductive bikinis and exotic fashion from billboards from H&M or various May covers of Vogue Spain and Turkey, are we still holding close to our umbrellas and trenches. Music’s most wanted person in fashion is without doubt Rihanna, and so even she finds a place in our summer of Brazil with a cover on their May issue!

While Gisele even sings for H&M to support UNICEF SEE HERE, there are more reasons why Brazil will be the place to be. Not only the world of football is coming together for the FIFA World Cup in Brazil this summer and but also two years later the Olympic Games take place in Rio, summer 2016!

But for now lets keep our eyes on fashion and enjoy some of the most beautiful summer shots in the gallery bellow, and with that in mind it’s going to be a hot summer for sure!

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Spain May 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue SpainMay 2014

Adrian Lima Vogue Turkey May 2014

Rihanna Vogue Brazil May 2014

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Gisele Bündchen for H&M

Wonderful Fashion, it’s time for Christmas

 

Glitter on the streets, sparkling windows at Cartier, Ralph Lauren & Selfridges inviting you to spend a quarter million on Christmas presents, over-robed christmas trees and glamour is the theme in every second advertisement, it must be Christmas time. Have a wonderful look at the season’s most spectacular christmas decorations in London:

Cartier at its best

Ralph Lauren Christmas Dream.1

Ralph Lauren Christmas Dream.2

Harrods Night Light

Harrods Express to Destination….

Selfridges Christmas Destination

YSL at Selfridges

Party at Christmas with Harvey Nichols

Shine, Glamour and Glitter

Yes, and Mr.Poletan is admitting that I am in love with all these luxury decorated windows, pushing my credit card to the limit. But for me it is not primary about the presents. Christmas is the feeling; family-time, ski-holidays and finishing the year in total harmony. However, we should still not forget to put effort into dressing up for the festival days. I don’t get it, why some people are stressing out about Christmas? Joy, love, eat and have a great time…don’t worry January will be depressing enough, paying your bills, returning unwished presents or getting in shape for fashion week in February. At least Haute Couture Shows in Paris and Hollywood Award Season will light and lift up the start of the year, but lest’s not look to far ahead and enjoy the minute.

“wonderful time, holidays are coming and festival fashion for everyone”

Vogue Germany published the perfect winter/holiday issue with Julia Stegner gracing the cover again, making it her 20th Vogue cover at the age of 26 only! In the current December issue she is titled the “Snow Queen” and Fräulein Stegner proves with attitude and elegance what it takes to be a powerful cover-star. The editorial features fashion from embroidered Gucci evening gowns to oversized Loewe coats and hot Fendi screen sunglasses. These pieces are Kitzbühel and St.Moritz approved.

December 2013 Vogue Germany

Schnee Königin Julia

Julia Stegner Editorial for Vogue Germany

Julia Stegner Editorial for Vogue Germany

Julia Stegner Editorial for Vogue Germany

All I can do with these impressions is to encourage you to celebrate, feel and love yourself through-out the month. Share this magic time with your dearest! And enhance the feeling of christmas, by spreading your christmas emotions out in our grey world, which is at least for a couple of weeks covered in lights and shinning. Santa oh Santa, thank you….

THE GLAMOUR EFFECT

Monaco has it, the British Fashion Awards not yet and what about the German fashion-culture? 

Every new week brings new exciting things with it. After some several events in London, last week it took me abroad á la Côte d’Azur. To be accurate, we have been in Antibes, Cannes, Nice and Monte Carlo. And I can say, Monaco gives you the ultimate glamour, jet-set and opulence feeling and for a good reason Côte d’Azur is famous for its blue, azure, shinny water, just like diamonds from Graff!

Antibes

Monaco

Crazy Chic

Shooting Time

Monaco

Feel the Sun

Tea Time with Siri

Monaco

The reason why I went there was the production of an editorial for the April issue of the Australian fashion magazine KURV. We were shooting in the former house of F.Scott Fitzgerald. My job was basically to cast the models, and we selected Siri Mesmer and Stefan Pollmann from Modelwerk. I believe that the task was completed pretty successful. But not everything was running as smooth as the models, KLM airlines did not seem to care much about our production and so our styling luggage arrived more than 24 hours delayed in Nice, and a fashion shooting without fashion seems to be quite difficult. So Instead, I used the free time for day trip to Monaco, including sight-seeing trips to the beautiful Palace, Casino and Stadium of Monaco.

During this trip to Monaco I realised once again that fashion culture in Germany is left behind and how thin the line between luxury fashion and no sense for luxury at all is. Its about the details but at the end of the day, I believe true fashion taste and all well thought through style concept has nothing to do with where you come from. It has to be your inner vision and your intuition to develop and create a personal style.
I know for me it will always be the interaction between high-fashion, sex and glamour lifestyle in relation to the zeitgeist. Something Germany just can’t offer at the moment.

For me ‘normal’ is mostly connected to boring, to be politically correct. Not that there is anything wrong with being politically correct, but I simply prefer it un peu ‘crazy chic’ when talking about fashion, style and being creative.

Monday evening was show-time for the British Fashion Awards at the London National Opera. The society of fashion, from designers over to models and style icons came together to celebrate the very best of british and international fashion. Muccia Prada, Marc Jacobs, Donatella Versace and Victoria Beckham attend the event. Kate Moss received the BFC special recognition and Christopher Bailey took two awards home from Burberry. To get back to ‘crazy chic’ and the ‘glamour effect’ that was what I missed that night. The venue gave the opportunity to install a glamorous, entertaining ceremony, but I did not fell anything of this at all. The night lacked of magic, feelings and sense of organisation. The awards were thrown out like newspapers in front of suburb houses  in the morning and the speeches by the winners were limited  to the worlds ‘thanks and bye’. A bit from Paris couture and a bit of Milan luxury with New York show effect would be well advised last night, but would it still be London then? All I know is, let’s lift it up for the next year please….

Ready for the Night

Champaign Reception with Dahlia

Red Carpet BFA

Beautiful Venue

The VIP Tables

THE ICONS ARE IN CONTROL

I hear from everywhere in the industry that there will never be again an area of supermodels as in the 90s and early 2000s with Naomi, Claudia, Kate, Eva, Christy or Amber, but actually it feels like they never left.  Especially in these days they are going for the big business again, so why are we looking for new ICONS?

Interview Germany October 2013 Covers by Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott:
Stephanie Seymour, Naomi Campbell, Christy Turlington, Kate Moss, Amber Valletta, Linda Evangelista and Daria Werbowy.

 The Interview Germany October issue encapsulates it with their seven covers: There is no way around the iconic supermodels at the moment. I chose the return of the ICONS as a title for these covers, not because they have been away in the last years, but more the way they are present in the industry at the minute again.

Let’s just think of Claudia Schiffer, she has her own TV-show in Germany airing, similar to Project Runway, and seems to rebrand herself now more as an industry expert rather than just Karl’s girl.

Next one is Kate Moss, bringing out another personal wardrobe collection with Topshop next spring, after a three-year break and just in, she will also become Contributing Fashion Editor at British Vogue, which is quite a big deal!

Calvin Klein Underwear Women’s Campaign F/W 2013 by Mario Sorrenti

Christy Turlington is looking fabulous as ever in her Calvin Klein Underwear campaign and I just have the feeling that Naomi Campbell is walking runways shows up and down like she is one of these 18-year-old new faces from Russia, not to mention she is hosting TV-shows around the globe and taking all major red-carpets.

However, you can not close the list of icons, before bringing up the cash-cow of the industry: Gisele Bündchen, gracing the Vogue Paris November Cover, being face of Chanel, Louis Vuitton and hyping her own beauty and fashion lines beside all that, shows you how branding is done perfectly and probably the reason why she is Brazil’s hottest and most successful export!

Vogue Paris November 2013 Cover by Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin

Eventually, it might be true that in fashion things are a bit short-lasting, but at the end of the day it shows as well, that true personalities maintain in-fashion, just like a Valentino vintage coat; its beauty and quality is going to last you forever…

When Dream Worlds meet Reality – the Power of Fashion

Recently, I have been thinking a lot about the local value of fashion in my life and which impact fashion has actually on me. This question came up as I was watching the fashion documentary called The Editors Eye.

A few days later, I have also been talking to my cousin in Germany about the American Vogue September issue and its adverts.  At one point she mentioned the Mulberry fall/winter campaign shot by Tim Walker with Cara Delevingne.

Mulberry Fall/Winter 2013 with Cara Delevingne shot by Tim Walker

My tutor had discussed the exactly same advertisement a few days earlier with us in university. Surprisingly, my cousin who is interested in fashion but not working in the fashion industry at all, came to the same interpretation as my Tutor. (He used to be assistant to celebrity photographer Rankin, so he knows what he is talking about) Both said they were kept by this campaign as it has something magical, unreal and reminded them of Alice in wonderland.

Click on image to see the full documentary on YouTube

Back to the American Vogue documentary The Editors Eye, where they have been talking about the actual Vogue shooting of Alice in wonderland in 2003 with Russian supermodel Natalia Vojvodina and some of the century’s best designers as the characters of the fairy tale.
It was a combination of dream worlds and reality, as they connected and picked up topics from our society like drugs and darkness in the editorial story and coated it with the beauty of Alice and the luxury high fashion.
I instantly noticed while talking to my cousin, that the Mulberry campaign shows parts of our reality like perfectionism and over-control and on the other hand it has this Alice in wonderland effect as well.

US Vogue – Alice in Wonderland by Annie Leibovitz & Grace Coddington 2003

So after these two incidents, I asked my self again what is the value, or even duty of fashion, beside covering our body and expressing personalities through it.

As a conclusion, I believe that fashion should portray the zeitgeist and reflect what is happening in our world to a certain extend but also take us away, make us feel dreaming and tell us fairy tales. 
Yes, sometimes it should just inspire us to dream and take away from the grey and sober reality. 

US Vogue – Alice in Wonderland by Annie Leibovitz & Grace Coddington 2003

US Vogue – Alice in Wonderland by Annie Leibovitz & Grace Coddington 2003