It’s no surprise that this long-haired, leggy beauty counts Jane Birkin and Lou Doillon as her style icons – she looks as if she’s part of their French family. But actually American singer-songwriter Diane Birch is the daughter of a Seventh-day Adventist preacher. Often seen sporting a wide-brimmed black hat, heavy fringe and a mix of vintage clothing which drapes over her 6ft frame, we are currently doting on Birch’s bohemian look. And her voice is as beautiful on the ear as her looks are on the eye.
Diane Birch’s album ‘Bible Belt’ is out now on S-Curve Records. www.dianebirch.com
Right about now, no one does girlie, kooky and indie better than Zooey Deschanel. With those big doe eyes – and a just retro enough wardrobe – her pretty look and ethereal sound, courtesy of She & Him Volume Two, makes her our summer pin-up du jour. Zooey we heart you!
She & Him Volume Two is out now on P-Vine, Double Six and Merge Records, produced by M. Ward. www.sheandhim.com
After instigating MySpace rumours that they were a group of Swedish kids, nostalgia poppers Summer Camp finally revealed their true identity-singer-songwriter Jeremy Warmsley and Elizabeth Sankey, aka the editor of Platform magazine.
Mystery solved, this week the pair have just put out their blissful spectral pop track Ghost Train on Moshi Moshi records. The secrecy surrounding their collaboration, which is fuelled by a mutual love of John Cusack films and Molly Ringwald in The Breakfast Club, has injected some refreshing enigmatic charm into the hit-parade.
Check out the montage video featuring shots from a 1969 film titled ‘Last Summer’, featuring a young Barbara Hershey, pre Beaches fame.
Coachella kicks off in California this week, and we are starting to gear up for another summer of Hunter clad lost weekends in the British countryside. The granddaddy of festivals, Glastonbury, turns 40 this year and photographer Liam Bailey is celebrating with an exhibition of photographs taken over years of faithful attendance. Since the early Nineties he has been capturing the acts of abandon and free spiritedness that happen when so many people pile into a field for a weekend under the stars. Steering away from the main stages, his images concentrate on the mud, tents and mayhem that make the festival so unique.
Liam Bailey’s Lost & Found – Celebrating 40 years of Glastonbury is at The Print Space in Shoreditch from Thursday April 15 to May 4. liambaileyprojects.com
If Twin were a book with cover stars, we’d be rather envious of clothing brand Rika’s stellar line-up. The spring edition of Rika magazine, which is a showcases their bright and breezy designs, has not one but five leading ladies: Christina Kruse, Daisy Lowe, Ania Chorabik, Louise Mast, Anna Brewster, Liberty Ross AND Josephine de la Baume. What more could you want? We dig this edition’s edgy style pack.
Yes, Laura Marling is one of the most quietly exciting British artists to have come to the fore in recent years. We look forward to letting her music wash over us on balmy summer nights, but it’s the artwork for her limited edition new album, I Sing Because I Can, that really makes our hearts beat faster in our tiny chests. Invest now.
Making our way down one of London’s most beautiful shopping routes – Old Bond Street – this Hermès window stopped us in our tracks.
Photographed by Andrew Meredith and styled by Laura Kay – the pair have created a lovely lo-fi 3D effect with the covetable, colourful and classic Hermès scarves, incorporating them cleverly into the image itself. Twin says trés chic.
Over 20 years before Kathryn Bigelow won the Oscar for Best Director, Sally Potter – the woman behind Orlando and Rage – made cinema history in 1983 with her first feature film The Gold Diggers.
Using an all-female cast and crew – all of whom received equal pay – the film was made for £250,000 and was a landmark in female filmmaking.
Radical and experimental, complete with dance numbers and songs performed by Potter herself, the story centres around a bank worker (Colette Laffont) who becomes obsessed by how money is circulated and traded, and the uncanny way it always ends up in the hands of powerful men. Her path converges with that of beautiful blonde, Ruby (Julie Christie) a film star who is herself an object trading on her beauty. Together they become a united front against bureaucracy and commodification.
As far as feminist-fantasy musicals go The Gold Diggers is in a category of its own making – for those in Glasgow this Thursday night there’s a rare chance to catch a big screen showing at the Centre for Contemporary Arts.
“…if what you’re making isn’t a high camp movie but a documentary about child trafficking, and your famous trainwreck star keeps genuine experts from fronting such films, and your end product features a scene in which a very young and serially abused child labourer is required to comfort a Hollywood starlet, then it would seem fair to cast the production as such an obvious moral failure that it’s worth anatomising the wrongheaded decisions that led to such a flawed idea being aired – and wondering if they are not symptomatic of a wider cultural malaise.”
‘Curiosity, imagination and small things that talk about bigger things’-this is what Luminous Books is all about.
Artist Louisa Bailey started out with just a single shelf of about 20 paperbacks before opening her pop-up shop tucked just off Dalston’s Kinglsand Road, at the George Polke Gallery in September 2009.
Every Saturday Luminous Books presents a highly edited collection of rare and unusual second hand editions. An act of defiance against the endless choices posed by bookshop chains and a great antidote to the online Amazon experience, book lovers are encouraged to browse through the works of writers like Jorge Luis Borges, Bertrand Russel and Miranda July, or contemplate Plato’s cave, whales and the Antarctic.
You can also catch Luminous at various East London markets, and this Easter Sunday at Wills-Moody Jumble Sale. Keep an eye out for copies of J.D Salinger in early April when illustrator Nicola Starr will present her collection of rare Salinger editions.
Luminous Books is open every Saturday 12 – 6pm. George Polke gallery, 3.5 Frederick Terrace, E8 4EW www.luminousbooks.co.uk
Hot on the fashion heels of The Sartorialist’s first book, Swiss-born Yvan Rodic was in London this week to launch his own collection of images of style-makers snapped on the pavements of London, New York, Paris, Reykjavik and beyond. Bringing together over 300 photographs from his cult blog, Facehunter, the book is a paean to our continued love affair with street style as the new fashion frontline.
At first glance these precious minerals appear to be beautiful, close-up photographs. On closer inspection though they are in fact meticulous oil paintings. These incredible renderings are the works of Ontario born Carly Waito, who has a lifelong fascination with the natural world, “especially the little parts we feel compelled to pick up and keep.” In an increasingly urban world, Waito’s work with nature becomes even more covetable.
What better way to spend a Sunday night than at Let Loose. Twin’s surprise highlight was the understated presence of R-Patz who caused a certain hot hot heat amongst the female contingent of Bush Hall.
Design blog It’s Nice That is a daily fix for discovering new talent and inspiring ideas from across the creative industry. In their biannual printed magazine the team bring together the best online posts from the past six months for us to physically thumb our way through, as well as treating us to some specially written interviews and features from top creative figures.
Check out April’s issue for interviews featuring the likes of graphic design legend Milton Glaser, fashion designer Sir Paul Smith and artist Maisie Broadhead amongst others. Designer Ken Garland rifts on his love of rust, while artist Johan Lofgren’s expounds on his impressive collection of vintage board games.
It’s Nice That Issue #3 with Parra print is available to pre-order only from the It’s Nice That for £10. www.itsnicethat.com/shop
American rock band, OK Go, are in danger of becoming better-known for their videos than for their songs. The latest, This Too Shall Pass, took several months, around 60 people and more than 60 takes to realise. The result is an insanely good chain reaction filmed in a single shot. Put together in a two storey warehouse in Echo Park, L.A, the chain reaction machine was designed and built by the band, with the help of members of Syyn Labs.
Geek facts: The wooden tracks that guide the metal balls at the beginning of the video had to be waxed after each take to prevent dust from slowing them down, and the angle of the board had to be at a precise incline of 3.4 degrees.
The video has already had over 2 million hits on YouTube. See it for yourself.
We’re excited about the latest creative foray from Pringle. To celebrate its 195 birthday, Pringle of Scotland have teamed up with The Serpentine Gallery (a comparatively youthful 40 years-old), and invited their favourite creative minds to re-interpret iconic Pringle products – from the twinset, to the argyle pattern.
And after his Pringle film with Tilda Swinton, featured in issue one of Twin, the lovely Ryan McGinley is back on board. The photographer has designed the “John”(McGinley) – a jumper with a seagull on the right shoulder to represent freedom and named after his boyfriend, whilst Tilda creates “The Twinset of my Dreams”, with her designer friend Waris.
The only downside is that we’ll have to wait until September for these innovative goodies from artists Douglas Gordon, David Shrigley, and Luke Fowler hit stores.
Illustrator Poppy Chancellor reprises ‘Let Loose’ this Sunday. A late night fete with magnificent music and poetry, visitors will be treated to the sweet sounds of Eliza Doolittle, Plaster of Paris and more (a secret special guest is lined up). Last year Paloma Faith performed, and stretched atop a grand piano with a rose in her mouth!
The WORK IT! team will be selling vintage clothes, and there’s a chance to buy accessories and cakes – as well as the wares of up and coming artists who will host their own stalls. Sweet. All proceeds go to The Keith Mason memorial fund. Feel-good fun or what?
Let Loose, is at Bush Hall, 310 Uxbridge Road, W12 7lJ 7th March at 7.30pm, £8 www.bushhallmusic.co.uk
Inspiration: Nature Obsessions: Robert Pattinson Favourite designer: It’s my first season, so I’m quite new to this. But I love Roksanda Ilincic Ambitions: To be happy and successful Not many people know: My hometown only has a population of 12,000 If you had one wish: To work with Mario Testino
Scouted: I was spotted at IKEA in Malmo Best-loved designer: Comme des Garcons Favourite photographer: Irving Penn Not many people know: That my favourite spice is basil and I’m a good knitter If you had one wish: I’d be able to speak every language in the world fluently
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