Frontrow Day five – Amsterdam Fashion Week

At the last day of the Amsterdam Fashion Week the frontrows were filled with a mix of designers, celebs, editors and society-people. We spotted a.o. designers Monique van Heist, Jan Taminiau and Mart Visser,  writer/artist Jan Cremer and former Olympic swimmer Inge de Bruin. Fashion seems more and more alive and kicking!

Frontrow day one – Amsterdam Fashion Week 2010

The evening of the openingssoiree was visited by a lot of familiar fashion faces. Right before the shows of Jan Taminiau and Mattijs began, we photographed the people sitting front row…

Streetfashion Paris fw2010

What are you wearing during the Menswear Fashionweek? Your Burberry-boots, your latest D&G-vest or that vintage YSL? Maybe we’ll spot you in Paris, Milan, New York or Amsterdam. During the fashion-weeks we refresh our streetwear-category regularly. We don’t judge, we’re not the fashion-police, we just enjoy fashion and your own personal style. Next stop: Paris.

Pictures by Muriel Schouten

Menswearshows fw2010 Paris: Kanyeeeee!

Look who we spotted at the menswearshows, it’s Kanye West with his girlfriend Amber Rose wearing a …..dress?? The musician, fan fs style and fashion,  was visiting the shows of Louis Vuitton and Yves St. Laurent.

Streetfashion Paris fw2010

What are you wearing during the Menswear Fashionweek? Your Burberry-boots, your latest D&G-vest or that vintage YSL? Maybe we’ll spot you in Paris, Milan, New York or Amsterdam. During the fashion-weeks we refresh our streetwear-category regularly. We don’t judge, we’re not the fashion-police, we just enjoy fashion and your own personal style. Next stop: Paris.

Pictures by Muriel Schouten

Elle Style Awards turn multi-colored folklore

Friday evening, the 15th of  January, the sixth edition of the Elle Style Awards took place in Amsterdam. The Dutch fashion scene gathered at the Hermitage to see which stylist, celebrity and guest of the evening had the best style.

The dresscode, as well as the whole theme for the evening, was folklore. This lead to a mixed, colorful and multi-colored scene. There were feathers, crazy prints and sequins. Of course we spotted lots of red, fur and eyecatching accessories. We could just sit and stare at all those people for a whole evening. How amazing!

Yet there was more to see at the Hermitage. Three young stylists gave their own fashion show. They each created seven folklore-inspired looks. For these looks they had to use some items from the latest H&M collection and mix and match these items with real designer pieces.

All three stylists had a very strong own style and gave a fantastic show. Lisa Anne Stuyfzand won the award of Elle Stylist Award. During her show the audience already went crazy and applauded several times. Lisa Anne used feather and lace and her models showed a lot of leg. The fun part of her show was the fact that her models carried copper cauldrons as handbags.

Besides the Stylist Award there was the Elle Personal Style Award, which was presented to a Dutch celebrity. Singer Giovanca received this award for her great streetchic/etnic style. The third award of the evening, the Elle Most Sensuous Woman Award, went to the best dressed woman of the evening: model Sylvia van der Klooster in a stunning Fong Leng-creation. Her outfit really stood out and perfectly matched the folklore dresscode.

After the awards were presented it was time for the real party to get started. Together with all guests Elle celebrated another great year of style and fashion.

Groupielove # 7

Turning out refined day looks and eveningwear since 1981, the house of Herrera specializes in classic shapes (lean trousers, pencil skirts, A-line ball dresses, and nipped-waist jackets) stitched up in soigné silk faille and jacquard, luxurious taffeta and mink. In recent seasons, Oscar regulars like Renée Zellweger have splashed this most Park Avenue of labels with a starry dash of Hollywood Boulevard.

Carolina Herrera made a name for herself by dressing well before she began designing well. (And she is still recognized for her chic uniform of crisp white shirts and tailored black trousers.) She was born in 1939 to a family of Venezuelan aristocrats and, with her second husband, Reinaldo Herrera, partied with a coterie of 1970’s jet-setters that included Mick Jagger and Andy Warhol. Herrera landed on the International Best-Dressed List time and again during those years, and was named to its Hall of Fame in 1980. The same yearHerrera designed her first line of ready-to-wear as a “test.” She aced it.

Herrera was named the CFDA Womenswear Designer of the Year in 2004, and in 2008 the organization gave her the Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award.

Christopher Bailey: Designer of the Year at BFA

Christopher Bailey, the creative whirlwind who has helped turn the heritage brand, Burberry, into a global luxury label, was wednesdaynight named ‘Designer of the Year’ 2009, at the British Fashion Awards. It is the second win for Bailey who previously was awarded the title in 2005.

Last night’s fashion “oscar” capped a remarkable year for Bailey, the 38-year-old Yorkshireman, who received the MBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours earlier this year, and whose spring/summer 2010 Burberry Prorsum collection was the highlight of London Fashion Week, in September.

In addition, Burberry took home the Designer Brand award. In his acceptance speech, Bailey, who is chief creative officer, announced that Burberry Prorsum would continue to show at London Fashion Week in February.

You want to know why we like Christopher?

Bailey knows how to mix classic and modern and his particular skill is to cleverly update the brand stalwarts, like the trench, with enough fashion flair to make them seem fresh and wantable, season after season. The figures speak for themselves: while other brands languish in the recession, Burberry saw its revenue rise by 21% in the last financial year.  That translates into a lot of product sold — and Bailey is in control of it all. Everything you see ath Burberry’s headquarters has been passed by Bailey, not just the building, but the website and the furniture, right down to the bottles of water. He micromanages some areas, such as a new store concept, and macromanages the rest.

So is Bailey a scary control freak, unable to let go of even the smallest detail? “I’m so lucky,” he told Colin McDowell at The Sunday Times. “My role is challenging. It is so multifaceted, but that enables me to absorb many things that really interest me: the music for the shows, the website, the ad campaigns, the fragrances — and the clothes, of course.”

Bailey was brought up in Yorkshire; his father was a carpenter and his mother worked as a window-dresser for Marks & Spencer. Direct, natural and always articulate, he is a true Yorkshireman and no pushover. He trained in a tough school, working with Donna Karan, then as chief womenswear designer for Tom Ford at Gucci, before being chosen by Rose Marie Bravo, the chief executive at the time, to design for Burberry.

Despite all appearances — he is always in jeans and a T-shirt, but rarely without a jacket — Bailey is a fashion businessman as well as a designer. “The power that my job gives me is huge,” he says. “It would be so easy to be overwhelmed by the pressure. The deadlines, the budgets, the fact that my life at Burberry is so scheduled, and my days are full from 8.30am until late, usually well after 8pm. And the meetings. I’m always conscious that Burberry is much bigger than I am. It’s 153 years old. My life here hasn’t even reached 10 years yet, but I have been here long enough to say that Burberry flows in my veins. I love its values. I respond to its strong foundations and, of course, its history is a constant inspiration.”

According to Bailey, there is a knack to being a fashion polymath. “I can compartmentalise different aspects of my life in my head, so that, on one side, I have work and all the different projects we are involved in at any one moment, and on the other, my personal life. Keeping them in separate boxes contains them so they can both be made manageable. At work, I need order: cool, clean spaces that really help me to think clearly. But at home, I want that order to be scrambled.”

He has learnt how to go into performance mode in public, but he likes his private life to be private. “You know, I often think I could easily become a hermit,” he says. “I certainly know I can live by myself, although I would always choose to live in a loving relationship.” He is in one now, having recovered from an earlier relationship that ended in tragedy when his lover died. Maybe that’s why he claims: “The most wonderful thing is being happy with someone. Someone who can give you mental stimulation as well as emotional support.”

And he is very loyal. “My best friend is Rebecca. She was my best friend at school and she is still the person I ring more often than anybody, apart from my family. I go to Yorkshire whenever I can, have Sunday dinner with my parents, talk to Mum in the kitchen while she’s making the gravy. That’s when I feel totally happy and content.” He has a house not far from his parents; it’s an old farm, and he loves driving up there from his flat in Chelsea in what he claims is “a really clapped-out old Mini”.

Once he’s there, he has his way of unwinding. “I put on my wellies — I love my wellies — get the wheelbarrow out of the shed and bring in the logs and the coals. My great luxury is that I have a fire in the bedroom. Then I go to see the cows. I usually have friends to stay. We often end up at the local in the evening, having a few drinks.” It’s the same with holidays. “Nothing glamorous,” he says. “I just don’t need it.”

“It’s not looks, it’s character that counts with me. And really, I suppose, I like people in the same way that I like houses: a bit rambly and slouchy. People I can put my feet up with.”

See, that’s why we like him.

Groupielove #3

Christopher Bailey, chief creative officer of Burberry, and one of Great Britains best-known designers, collected last monday his MBE from Buckingham Palace. Bailey, 38, was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire  in June this year, for his services to the fashion industry “This award also recognises the incredible team that I work with and it is a privilege to be a part of Burberry, a great British brand” Bailey said.

The recognitions are the latest in a long list of awards for the talented Yorkshireman. In 2004, Bailey received an honorary fellowship from the Royal College of Art, from where he graduated with an MA in 1994. He also holds honorary doctorates from the University of Westminster and the University of Huddersfield.

Dutch models: Patricia van der Vliet

Dutch models were well-represented at the catwalk this year. One of the ‘new faces’ we saw in many big shows was  Patricia van der Vliet. The blond girl popped up in shows from Prada, Balenciaga, Nina Ricci and Yves Saint Laurent. She even had the honor to open the Louis Vuitton show (the only time we saw her with black (afro) hair).

Patricia once participated in the Dutch tv-show Holland’s Next Top Model. Although she did not win, she ultimately made her way into the modelling business.

Her diverse appearances in shows of the largest brands in the world showed us how versatile Patricia is as a model. In some shows she was hardly recognizable.

Style.com already discussed Patricia as one of the ten new faces on the catwalk. Hopefully we will be seing a lot more of this girl. If you ask us, we already consider her as a Top Model.

Tess van Daelen

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