Nom-nom-nom, the brain said after swallowing all this:
1. Hah, even the new trends often come from old garments: How Thrift Stores Drive Fashion.
2. Oh, when people love designing this much (and are this clear about what exactly they are doing): ‘My cuts are minimal and simple, but not cold. The hand of the maker is celebrated, not erased, and our fabrics are understated but full of texture and life. This collection is no different, and in that vein I’m especially fond of the finishing technique on the hems and necklines of these garments. Organic, bias cut rolled edges trim all of the openings – a finish that honors the nature of the material and gels perfectly with the story behind the garment. This trim doesn’t interfere with or contradict the nature of the fabric – it feels more like an extension of the way the material wants to behave naturally. Continuous, organic form; deference to the nature of the medium; evoking emotion with simplified shape – that’s the story of each of these garments. The silhouettes we love in materials that enhance their form, not hinder it.’
3. Kate Fletcher has been part of establishing the Union for Concerned Researchers in Fashion and has given a mini-interview to Lucy Siegle about it: Cause For Concern – The Researchers Calling For Fashion Change. Heart-eyes! because all her writing is like this: ‘the other issues are around a lowering of expectations around the consumer’s ideas around garments. If the message is that clothing can be endlessly recycled, that’s a sign that it is disposable. All in all, there’s a constant undermining of the idea that clothes are precious and that you should take care of them and that they have an intrinsic value. […] The truth is, it’s predicated on consumption. Both consuming a new piece and then recycling it again and then consuming a new piece and that idea is fundamentally at odds with the finite limit nature of the resource base.’
4. On style, and taste, and courage to do (and dress) your own thing: The Spotlight Effect & Style Anxiety and On Taste.
5. I’ve been writing with fountain pens only for more than ten years now, this explains some of the reasons pretty well: The Joy of Fountain Pens. My favorite, however, is the bulky and decidedly non-elegant yet so comfy Faber-Castell Scribolino. My current one has lasted me so long that some of the coating has come off exactly in places where I put the most pressure.
6. Well, if you are somebody like me, a ritualistic and zealous recycler, you won’t like this: We’re Buying Into a Giant Lie About Plastic. Most important point being that separating your garbage does not mean that it gets to be recycled as there are so many intermediate steps…
7. On cities, city planning, and how certain urban dynamics drive or asphyxiate the emergence of new exciting fashion: The Closure of Fashion Cities.
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What I was writing about a year ago: After 6 months of the big spreadsheet.
What I was writing about two years ago: Garment makers and fixers, I salute you. This is a true love story to the women of my family who have been sourcing, making, and fixing for much longer than it has been in vogue. Also, an explanation why to me all this minimalism, voluntary frugality, and upcycling comes so easy… this has been the basic setup for generations of Latvian women.
What I was wearing a year ago: #whatiwore 2018w28 + Sunday links. Repeating this week: the silk maxi, my mom’s silk dress, and the birks.
What I was wearing two years ago: my mom’s silk dress and lace top, the birks.
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Do you have any favorite writing tools? The perfect pen, the greatest highlighter, the one and only planner that you cannot imagine replacing? Tell me about them, I’m all ears…
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Also, the tipjar is available if you ever feel like buying me a coffee!
