"Long Live McQueen" (2/23/10)

Not even the threat of record-breaking blizzard conditions could stop the forces of fashion. In the days leading up to the first show at New York Fashion Week in Bryant Park, editors, casting directors, and designers were scrambling to make sure that models and racks of clothes made it to Manhattan before the snow did. Despite inclement weather, the clothes arrived, the models hit the catwalk running, and the show was set to go—that is, until the passing of one designer cast a different kind of cloud over the whole affair.

Superstar British designer Alexander McQueen—a force of nature in his own right—committed suicide on February 10, the eve of his mother’s funeral and the day before the start of New York Fashion Week. McQueen’s death gives us cause to reflect on both his incredible creative legacy and the ugly effects of depression and stress that the fashion industry tries to airbrush away.

A high school dropout, McQueen trained as a tailor on London’s famous Savile Row before entering Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, where he began to hone his style as a master of the macabre. His fall 2007 ready-to-wear collection was inspired by the Salem Witch Trials. When the clothes were presented in Paris, McQueen staged a show with a red and black pentagram traced in sand accompanying a film featuring swarms of locusts and faces decaying to skulls. Another collection was based on Hitchcock’s “The Birds,” and yet another was shown in the dungeon that held Marie Antoinette before her execution. McQueen’s bold fascination with morbid themes and dark psychology earned him the nickname enfant terrible, along with the admiration of fashion editors worldwide.

Though most of his eccentric concoctions were entirely unwearable, it didn’t stop his designs from becoming iconic. McQueen’s precarious ten-inch stilettos, bedazzled and shaped like lobster claws, were donned by outrageous chanteuse Lady Gaga in her music video for “Bad Romance.” The massive booties, which debuted last October in McQueen’s spring 2010 show, look like hooves, and no one but Gaga could stomp around in them without twisting an ankle. Another pair of shoes from the show was reminiscent of the eerie, organic designs of Spanish architect Antoni Gaudí. Like Gaudí’s apartment balconies that resemble gaping jaws, McQueen’s shoes look like they’re about to gnaw on the models’ toes. McQueen’s ability to fuse the fearsome, fantastical, and fabulous was always fashion-forward.

In addition to these over-the-top couture items, some of McQueen’s designs did have mass-market appeal. His skull print chiffon scarves—a morbid take on florals—managed to be dainty and dark, girly and ghoulish. Coveted by celebrities like Lindsay Lohan, Nicole Ritchie, Mary Kate Olsen, and Kate Moss, the rocker-chic scarves retail for $200–$395. Low-cost alternatives abound, however: I plucked my $5 version out of an overflowing bin in New York’s Chinatown.

Like many of today’s highly visible figures in fashion, McQueen was an avid Twitter user. He used the site to air some personal demons, and his updates in the days leading up to his suicide revealed that his mother’s death was deeply troubling for him. Sadly, McQueen’s downward spiral is the second to shock the fashion world in recent months. Daul Kim, a 20-year-old South Korean model and fashion-world darling, killed herself in November. Like McQueen, Kim also used high-traffic Internet sites as spots to vent her frustration and despair. In the weeks prior to her death, Kim had posted ominous updates on her blog, where she wrote that she felt “mad depressed” and “like a ghost.” In recent years, other models have died as a result of their psychological struggles, including two from the complications of anorexia: 22-year-old Uruguayan model Luisel Ramos in 2006, and 21-year-old Brazilian beauty Ana Carolina Reston earlier this month.

It’s no surprise that fashion is not all frivolous fun, but these recent deaths suggest that the fashion industry has a problem that must be addressed. With any luck, these terrible losses will spark some serious discussion about how to help models and designers suffering from depression or similar afflictions. When McQueen died, the world lost a brilliant, exciting, irreverent designer whose shows were theatrical spectacles and whose masterfully crafted ensembles were like pieces of performance art. He will be missed for his impeccable technical gifts, daring creativity, and unparalleled ability to turn the disturbing or stigmatized into high-drama, show-stopping, jaw-dropping work. In the words of one writer quoted by ABC News, “Long live McQueen!”

(photo of McQueen AW 2009 from Zimbio)

"Hunting for Vintage with AvantGaudy" (2/2/10)

Thrifting isn’t an activity for those afraid to get their hands dirty. Though there’s a definite thrill in searching for buried treasures hidden in boxes overflowing with vintage clothes, accessories, and photographs, thrift stores are often dusty, musty, crowded, and disorganized. If you hardly have time in the morning to throw together an ensemble of stained cords and a wrinkled button-down, you might not have what it takes to sift through piles of sometimes-smelly stuff. When you do stumble across a can’t-live-without-it item, you have to make sure that it’s not irreparably stained or ripped. Then, once you get it home, you have to carefully wash out layers of caked dust and a few decades worth of funk. Although I love the eco-friendliness of thrifting—better to buy old clothes than to support the energy-guzzling mass production of new ones—and like to imagine the clothes’ history, I don’t enjoy the hands-on aspect of thrifting.

“Looking at a thrift store is overwhelming and time-intensive,” says Deborah Umunnabuike, a fourth-year in the College and co-founder of the Internet vintage fashion emporium Avant Gaudy. Her useful Web site, which she started with her sister Jessica in the summer of 2005, stocks high-quality, fashion-forward vintage items, solving all of my thrifting conundrums. On buying trips throughout Chicago and the rest of the Midwest, AG staffers wade through rack after rack of vintage goods and handpick chic pieces in runway-ready condition. The clothes are awesomely outlandish pieces, which Umunnabuike describes as “avant-garde sensibility for the new guard,” and are targeted to hip teens and twenty-somethings with a strong sense of personal style.

As Avant Gaudy’s success suggests, vintage clothes are anything but outmoded. Avant Gaudy staff scours blogs, pores over fashion magazines, and scouts merchandise at various clothing stores in order to forecast emerging trends. “We look at publications like Women’s Wear Daily to look at what colors and styles will be popular for the coming season,” says Umunnabuike. “References in fashion designers’ collections help us figure out what will be important next season, which in turn tells us what we need to be looking for,” she added. Last summer, the company hosted an internship program where merchandise buyers searched for vintage items that reflected the ’80s glam aesthetic reintroduced by contemporary designers like Marc Jacobs and Christophe Decarnin. To capitalize on the ’80s homage taking the contemporary runways by storm, Avant Gaudy stocked short dresses, sequined pieces, and sky-high shoulder pads, all of which they were able to sell successfully this fall.

However, there’s a fine line between looking chic and looking crazy, so in addition to their online store, Avant Gaudy also features a blog that shows customers how to prevent their ensembles from appearing costume-y. “Most people aspire to look great, but aren’t fashionistas. The blog is a mouthpiece for advertising, but also shows people how they can wear current trends in an accessible way, like by taming down crazy dresses with tailored blazers or sweaters,” says Umunnabuike.

Umunnabuike, a political science major, believes that there’s an overlap between her academic work and entrepreneurial endeavors. The ability to prioritize, think critically, and effectively manage her time, which have become crucial as she works on her B.A. paper about black youth and music, are also important in the business world. “At the U of C, you’re taught to analyze a situation, figure out what’s important, and ask questions. That’s the kind of thinking you need to run a business,” says Umunnabuike. The resources and networking opportunities at CAPS and the Booth School of Business, where she had temporary office space last summer and had the opportunity to seek mentors, helped Umunnabuike get her footing in the fashion world. Whether working on a midterm or selecting items from Avant Gaudy’s 500-piece inventory to feature on the company’s web site, the skills she has honed at U of C have served Umunnabuike well.

As graduation rapidly approaches, Umunnabuike has stepped down from her position as CEO. Though she’s still involved with operations in a consulting capacity, the company is now helmed by Marife Nellas, a recent college grad from Creighton in Nebraska. Umunnabuike has her sights set on future entrepreneurial opportunities, but wants to take some time after graduation to hone new skills. “I caught the entrepreneurial bug and want to be running my own business long-term, but want to spend some time in [the] corporate world to gain credibility and experience,” she says. Whether she’s running her own business or revitalizing pre-existing brands, this stylish girl is poised to take the fashion world by storm.

(photo from Avantgaudy.com)

"Blogs" (1/26/10)

With advertisers still running for the hills and publishers continuing to fold, it seems that textbook-sized fashion magazines are a thing of the past. Although you can no longer lug around a backbreaking Vogue, new media makes it easier than ever to get your daily dose of fashion. Here are some of my favorite places to log on and get connected to the fashion world.

Go Fug Yourself

This blog is penned by Heather and Jessica, a dynamic duo with a keen eye and sharp wit. Responsible for introducing a new variation of the “F word” to the cultural lexicon, the girls lampoon starlets and celebutantes who go about town looking “fantastically ugly,” or some more explicit variant thereof. The writers, who also contribute to New York Magazine, take devilish delight in pointing out can’t-look-away disasters where celebrity stylists clearly fell asleep at the wheel. The blog is part celebration, part censure of sartorial calamities. My favorite features include the imagined dialogues between celebrities, especially the incoherent mutterings of designer Karl Lagerfeld (“Kaiser Karl”), who reminds readers that “Humor is the crutch of the plain, pet. BE GORGEOUS.” Fugly regular Aubrey O’Day, who skyrocketed to C-list celebrity after appearing on a season of P. Diddy’s Making the Band, also never fails to disappoint with retina-scarring selections that look like a stew of neon colors and couch-cushion patterns, seasoned with a splash of saloon.

The Sartorialist

Scott Schuman is a globetrotting photographer on the style prowl. Schuman, a regular contributor to GQ, snaps great shots of stylish people all over the world, from suntanned surfers on Australian shores, to heavy-lidded hipsters in Manhattan’s Lower East Side and petite Parisian women in diaphanous dresses and sky-high heels. All of the photographs are beautifully composed, saturated with color and sunlight, featuring men and women for whom style is a sixth sense. The best images are ones of elegant, aging Italian men in Milan, who pair perfectly tailored trousers with slightly scuffed shoes and look effortlessly bello. Schuman alternates between profiling fashion insiders, like models, editors, and designers, and sharing snapshots of creatively-coiffed students, accountants, and entrepreneurs. Though most of Schuman’s subjects, especially the female ones, adhere to a very conventional definition of beauty, the images do attest to the fact that one doesn’t have to splurge on the season’s hottest handbag in order to be staggeringly stylish.

Style Rookie

This blog, penned by precocious 13-year-old Tavi Gevinson, makes me feel a little embarrassed about the years I spent watching Keenan and Kel and Clarissa Explains It All. At an age when I was sprawled out on the couch watching Nickeloden, Gevinson has befriended the Rodarte designers and scored a deal to endorse their collection for Target, sat front row at some seriously prestigous fashion shows, and even wrote a piece for Harper’s Bazaar. While her commentary sometimes borders on breathless idolatry, she’s got an encyclopedic knowledge of fashion and an infectious enthusiasm for an industry in which so many people seem jaded and apathetic. Elle editor Anne Slowey dismissed Gevinson as a novelty and wondered whether the “tween savant” actually writes her own freelance work, but I think she should get some rousing high-fives for her initiative and work ethic. She’ll grow into more sophisticated prose, but her blog is smart, interesting, and full of great observations and news about designers, campaigns, and shows. As a bonus, I can try to relive my teen years vicariously through Gevinson, who is far more self-assured, passionate, and eloquent than I was at her age.

When it comes to blogs, I’m a bit of a dilettante. For a while I penned People Without Pants, a chronicle of my daily misadventures on the New York City public transportation system, where flashers and urinators strike without warning. Then, I wrote Shabulous, an ode to everything “Shabby and Fabulous,” where I waxed poetic about salvaging furniture from the garbage heap and cleaning it up with a little sweat and sandpaper. I stopped writing when I realized I had neither the ideas nor the stamina to keep it up. Thankfully, these writers have a seemingly neverending supply of insight, ideas, commentary, and criticism that illuminate the fashion world. So if you’re fed up with Facebook or need to get off of Gmail, browse some fashion blogs and download some style savvy.

(Photo by Tavi Gevinson, thestylerookie.blogspot.com)