Fabulous Miss Bardot

Love her look, adore the citrus orange! The best things don't
date - true classics. Those heavenly people at Fabulous
Magazine sure know how to create a great shot. Anyone off
skiing this spring take note: stylish and sexy, 'the softest
cashmere poncho adds a layer of luxury'. Easy peasy. You
can get one here: ocabini.com.

La Dolce Vita

La Dolce Vita, 1960

Shot in black and white, Fellini's La Dolce Vita tells of a search for both happiness and love that will never come. The Trevi fountain scene has become an iconic moment, pitting an electrifying Ekberg, with those waters caressing her impossibly voluptuous body, alongside a hopelessly infatuated, tuxedo clad Mastroianni. It's a fusion of eroticism, temptation and ultimately frustration, all encapsulated into a minute and 38 seconds of celluloid brilliance1.

 

While cinema, photography, TV, magazine and newspaper print may have switched to colour, Manga is one art form that hasn't and is still typically drawn in black and white. The Japanese word manga, literally translated, means 'whimsical drawings' and comes originally from the works of ukiyo-e or 'artists of the floating world' such as Hokusai, of the sailors-about-to-drown-in-a-big-wave-over-Mount-Fuji fame.

Chanel dress SS09

The first manga magazine as we know it was heavily influenced by Japan Punch, founded by Charles Wirgman, a British cartoonist.  It had a very simple style of drawing and wasn't very popular - it ended after three issues. Finally, in 1905, several incarnations later, Tokyo Pakku was created and became a huge hit.

Lara Stone in Chanel’s black and white sequined silk tulle dress is another triumph for monochrome. Isabel Marant calls Stone “a kind of alien—she’s a mix of a warrior and Brigitte Bardot.” She lives in London now and apparently avoids fashion parties, but when asked by Sarah Haight of WMagazine what she might want to do after her modelling days are over, she said “When I think about my job now... the people are nice and fun and easy and relaxed. You get to smoke at work. You make lots of money.” Stone pauses. “Where are you ever going to find another job where you don’t have a boss or responsibilities, really, except to get on an airplane and just show up? It’s a bit worrying.”

Monochrome Magic: 
Moschino Cheap and Chic cotton-blend bouclé cardigan, Tsumori Chisato basket jersey jacket, Ocabini tie-neck cashmere poncho, Alexander McQueen wool cape, Tsumori Chisato Slub cashmere fringe jacket, Alice by Temperley Trophy knitted cropped cardigan.

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1. Review by Duncan Kennedy, BBC News, March 2009

In the Begining

7 November 2010

Tracks of particles produced in a smashup 

of lead-ions in the Large Hadron Collider.

Background light filling the Universe holds a history that stretches back before Big Bang; the evidence is in the glow of Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation. New analysis of relic radiation from Big Bang suggests the universe got its start eons earlier and has cycled through a myriad of episodes of birth and death, with Big Bang merely the most recent in a series of starting guns.

Someone once explained the cosmos as sort of like soap bubbles floating in the air. Each time two bubble universes collide, rather than pop-you're-gone, it's crash-bang-splinter and a new universe begins from the bits blown off by the bump. 

Jonathan Saunders scarf, Resort 2010

November's mini big bang created in the Large Hadron Collider was incredibly hot and dense. Sub-atomic fireballs with temperatures of over ten trillion degrees, a million times hotter than the centre of the Sun, melted into a hot dense soup. In Ancient Rome the humble scarf was used not to stay snug, but as a sweat cloth to keep cool, worn in hot weather around the neck or tied to a belt.

Jonathan Saunders' graphic aesthetic for his Resort 2010 collection started as watercolors on graph paper and exploded into a neon-shot grid of layered lead-ion, collision-like printed streaks.

Shine the Light Fantastic

A star cluster bursts into life in the Milky Way.

Ocabini chiffon cashmere scarves in Silver Shimmer, Emerald and Mandarin.

 

 

Photo credit: NASA, ESA and the Hubble Heritage (STScI/AURA)-ESA/Hubble Collaboration.