Your leather biker jacket just isn’t cutting it anymore and last year’s coat is too boring/worn out to contemplate, well it’s officially time to invest. The cold weather has come around fast making today as good a time as any. There are so many styles to choose from when it comes to winter warmers, that the process can become a little overbearing. Twin makes it easy for you with the top four trends in coats this season.
As part of their jewellery season, Museum of London have worked with AnOther’s Fashion Editor, Agata Brehlen to curate an exhibition celebrating the diversity of contemporary jewellery making within the capital. Made in London: Jewellery Now will open on November 21, running alongside the major Cheapside Hoarde exhibition.
The exhibition brings together seven London-based contemporary jewellers. Delving into the creative processes and working methods of the designers, the exhibition paints a picture of London as a source of inspiration and innovation. Beyond presenting their work, the exhibition explores the unique professional identity of each designer, giving a snapshot of their world and imagination.
It features the jewellers, Jordan Askill, Imogen Belfield, Rachel Boston, Duffy, Husam el Odeh, Noemi Klein and Frances Wadsworth-Jones, whose work is produced in the capital.
Noemi Klein’s jewellery has been specially created for the museum and displayed in four different scenes designed by DLSD Studio. Below you see images of her, working in her studio in East London.
Made in London: Jewellery Now 21 November 2013 – 27 April 2014 Museum of London, Free
Vivienne Westwood is working with her friend Ian Kelly, award-winning biographer of Brummell and Giacomo Casanova, to write the first authorised memoir of her life, due to be published by Picador in October 2014.
It will be personal memoir which will be formed partly of her own voice and partly by contributions from her vast network of friends, family and associates.
“Vivienne is much more than what you first see,” says Kelly. “She is passionately committed to human rights and to eco-politics, but as well as that I am keen to tell the truth about a huge-hearted, warm and witty individual, whose face and clothes are known the world over, but who is also recognisably the Derbyshire primary school teacher who met and fell in love with Malcolm McLaren and changed the world.”
The publication will cover Westwood’s life from before she was a well-known designer, to opening her infamous clothing emporium on the King’s Road, to starting up her own label as a self-taught designer and meeting her current husband Andreas Kronthaler. Her extensive political activism and charitable work will also be covered.
A book that we at Twin looking forward to get our hands on.
People Tree, the pioneers for sustainable and fair trade fashion have collaborated with Black Score to create a capsule collection set to make us look and think twice about mankind and our interactions with certain animals. Simeon Farrar, the artist-designer behind the playful T-shirts and slogans at Black Score has given the penguins, sharks and foxes of the world a voice and a platform to stick their middle fingers up.
“I’d heard of People Tree for a long time and I really like everything they stand for,” stated Simeon. “So to be approached by them to do this was fantastic for me. What’s nice about the collaboration is that Black Score fans will be educated in where the clothes have come from, about organic cotton and everything People Tree stand for.” To hear more about the collaboration, watch Simeon’s full interview here.
The collaboration will hit stores at the end of November.
Twin met up with the young and emerging designer star Molly Goddard, at her home to take a few photos.
Molly is studying for a Master in Fashion Knitwear, but already this summer she teamed up with Asos.com to launch a capsule line of four dresses, one of them is seen in the photograph below. The bright, boxy tulle shaped dress has sold extremely well and has been seen on Susie Bubbles, amongst others.
Molly’s style is intriguing; bold, yet fariy-tale-like. And soon we will see more of her designs, as from next month Molly is starting up an online store selling her clothes. You can find more information about that on her website mollygoddard.com
Twin took the opportunity to ask Molly a few quick questions about inspiration and creativity.
What is colour?
Everything
How do you use it?
All over
What is texture?
Frills and crochet
What is structure?
Shit loads of fabric
What is beauty?
Pink, red and grey
What inspires you?
Old people
What is London?
My manor
Photography by Trinity Ellis
At the moment the Barbican is showing the stage production of Scenes from a Marriage, by Ingmar Bergman, in the theatre from November 14 – 17.
To complement the stage, they also present a short cycle of films by Bergman foregrounding the importance and influence of women in his work.
Ingmar Bergman was a Swedish director, writer and producer for film, stage and television. He is recognized as one of the most accomplished and influential film directors of all time and has directed over sixty films and documentaries.
His work is emotional and very honest, often portraying scenes of death, illness, faith, betrayal, bleakness and insanity.
Barbican are showing two films, the first one is Persona, about an actress who loses her voice during a performance and subsequently refuses to speak. The second one is Cries and Whispers, telling the angst-drenched story of a woman who is dying of cancer in the family mansion, and her two sisters who return home to comfort her.
Both films are starring the Norwegian actress and movie director Liv Ullmann.
Don’t miss out on these two beautiful films, order your tickets now at barbican.org.uk/film
Image from Scenes from a marriage
LE BOOK, the international reference book for fashion, photography, moving image and advertising, presents the latest edition of CONNECTIONS, this time in London on November 14 and 15.
In 2005 LE BOOK launched CONNECTIONS, a custom-made tradeshow for the creative community. At CONNECTIONS, an international network of creative talent and decision-makers gather under the LE BOOK label to form a new, living, breathing pulse of what’s going on in the world of trendsetting image-making.
The event is specially conceived for high-end professionals in the creative industry: creative directors, art directors, art buyers, image directors, marketing and communication executives, fashion editors and photo editors.
Don’t miss out on this unique opportunity to view portfolios and reels, source new talent / services and meet with your creative peers. Because CONNECTIONS is like getting six months of work done in one day.
By invitation only – register now lebook.com/connections
Jo Malone London, a favourite with the fashionable and known for celebrating luxurious British style with unexpected fragrances, has brought out the Peony & Blush Suede collection, by master perfumer Christine Nagel.
Flirtatious with the top note of red apple it also combines the opulence of jasmine, rose and gillyflower with a base note of suede and a hearty note of soft peony.
Luxurious and seductive we cannot get enough of this range which consists of a Cologne, Body & Hand Wash, softening Body Crème and a Home Candle perfect for a super chic gift.
Shop online at jomalone.com
@JoMaloneLondon
Text by Felicity Carter
This month sees the fourth annual UnderWire Festival take place in Hackney.
UnderWire’s founders launched the festival in 2010 with the belief that women working in the UK film industry needed more encouragement and a bigger platform for their work. Their belief is that women still make up a small proportion of film creatives, and their aim with Underwire is to recognise the best short work made by women across a range of crafts – from director to cinematographer; screenwriter to editor. Their team believes that a more gender balanced industry will benefit everyone by creating a diversity of perspectives, stories and experiences for audiences. Bringing together film and feminism, the four day event takes place from the 19-23 November. You can buy your tickets and find out more here: underwirefestival.com
Text by Beccy Hill
One can now find Prada’s new jewellery collection in stores, and aren’t we excited! It is a colour explosion with a wide range of cuffs, bangles, bracelets and earrings, made with unexpected materials such as saffiano leather, crystals and exotic crocodile skin.
The collection is inspired by the innovation and seductive glamour of 1940s haute jewellery. Each piece is finely crafted using artisanal haute jewellery techniques and exquisite detailing.
The collection brings together Prada’s signature Saffiano textured leather in rich shades of orange, emerald green and turquoise with bold formations of geometric crystals, inspired by the art deco era and the natural world.
On Friday November 8, Louis Vuitton will open its doors to the Townhouse, a new urban retail destination set within Selfridges. Louis Vuitton invites clients to journey through a new retail concept and signature interior, into a dialogue between modernity and tradition, surprise and discovery.
Built over three inter-connecting floors, the Townhouse is the largest of its kind in Europe, offering two floors for womenswear and, for the first time in Selfridges, Kim Jones’ menswear line.
In the middle of it all one will find the real showstopper; a state-of-the-art glass lift that links all three spaces. The short travel in the elevator then reveals a head turning surprise, as it begins to gently revolve, in tandem with the movement of the spiral.
The architectural concept is designed by French-born, Japanese based designer, Gwenaël Nicolas.
Every journey in Louis Vuitton’s Townhouse, regardless of how short, is definitely inspirational.
The Townhouse opens on November 8 in Selfridges, Oxford Street, London, W1.
If you happen to be in Copenhagen this week, don’t miss out on Copenhagen’s international documentary festival (CPH:DOX).
CPH:DOX is the largest documentary film festival in Scandinavia and is devoted to supporting independent and innovative film and presents the best and brightest in contemporary non-fiction, art cinema and experimental film. Each year the festival fills the Copenhagen cinemas with a selection of more than 200 films from around the world.
The festival is on from November 7 – 17.
Read more about it and order your tickets here: www.cphdox.dk
Last week the Brooklyn Museum opened up the doors to The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk, the first international exhibition dedicated to the groundbreaking French couturier. Playful, poetic, and transformative, Gaultier’s superbly crafted and detailed garments are inspired by the beauty and diversity of global cultures.
The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk is organized by the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, in collaboration with Maison Jean Paul Gaultier, Paris. The exhibition is curated by Thierry-Maxime Loriot of the MMFA. The Brooklyn presentation is coordinated by Lisa Small, Curator of Exhibitions, Brooklyn Museum.
The exhibition is on display until February 24 2014.
When we think of future technologies we often think of shiny silver slim stuff that streamlines our experience and simplifies our day to day. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, designer, artist and writer, is in fact invested in future processes that disrupt that ideology. A prominent voice on synthetic biology, a techno-science based on the intersection between nature and design, Daisy has worked on various provocative projects, notably E. chromi – a speculation on colour-coded disease detection that would allow you to diagnose yourself by looking at the colour of your faeces! With a degree in Architecture from Cambridge, time at Harvard, as well as an MA in Design Interactions from the Royal College of Art, Daisy has no formal training in science yet continues to push the field outside its comfort zone. Grow Your Own… Life After Nature, co-curated with designer Anthony Dunne, synthetic biologist Paul Freemont and biohacker Cathal Garvey at Science Gallery in Dublin is her most recent pursuit and will surely gather a host of controversial responses (Hint: it features human cheese)
Unlike all the tech and gadgets we deal with, anything biological is really a bit gross. What are your thoughts on their dissimilar appeal?
Drones are perhaps ‘sexy’ to the people in the tech community but others find them frightening. But I agree – biology is wet, it’s gloopy and it’s threatening when it’s growing. There is the idea that it’s okay in context but when it’s out of place, we don’t like it. At the Grow Your Own… we have Sissel Tolaas’ and Christina Agapakis’ Selfmade ‘human cheese’ that they made for the Synthetic Aesthetics project, displayed for the first time in Dubin. For some, this project is just disgusting and visceral, it’s gross…you don’t eat stuff from your body! But is this really from your body or is it your bacteria, and not you?
When do you think the context will arrive where biology in that sense is acceptable – will it ever happen?
Synthetic biologists talk online casino about being able to control biology … but will we actually be able to control biology in the same we control other design materials? That’s something that interests me as a designer, understanding what a machine or a designed ‘thing’ is when it changes or evolves, and whether we will ever tolerate that idea of change. You may have seen Suzanne Lee’s Biocouture jackets made from bacterially produced cellulose. For a lot of people there is something weird about the material aesthetic – we’ve become so used to mass-produced uniformity and somehow we feel safe with it, which in itself is strange.
You’ve just started your PhD, what are you going to explore?
The project is called ‘The Dream of Better,’ I’m exploring why we think the future is going to be better. What role has design played in constructing hope around technology? For example when you get a new iPhone you believe somehow that it’s going to make everything better, there is an inherent faith in technology and design for most people. When did everyone stop thinking that the Garden of Eden was where it was at?
That’s interesting because you often speak about the concept of perfection and I’m fascinated by what dictates perfection or ‘better’?
The world is so complex that someone in the end has to make that decision. You realise that you can put all these protocols in place but the decisions are often ultimately made in quite an esoteric way. A lot of my practice is about managing and opening up spaces within synthetic biology, as an emerging technology, and asking whether there is a role for art and design here? If synthetic biology is realisable, what should or shouldn’t we be making with it?
How do we know when we’ve reached the future? How do we know when we are there?
Maybe I don’t believe in the ‘future’. I’m not that optimistic about it and I don’t think that’s necessarily understood when I talk about my work. I remember having a conversation with my mum years ago and she said ‘I don’t think you should have children…I don’t think today’s world is a good world to bring children into, my generation has ruined it,’ which is an extraordinary thing to feel. But that’s what I’m curious about, the belief that some people have that ‘oh, its just going to sort itself out and it’s inevitable that it will’ … but will it?
Text by Monique Todd
Portrait of Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg by Harry Borden.
dublin.sciencegallery.com/growyourown
E. chromi, 2009. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg & James King with the 2009 University of Cambridge iGEM team.
The Synthetic Kingdom: A Natural History of the Synthetic Future, 2009. Photo by Carole Suety
Seasons of the Void, 2013. Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, Sascha Pohflepp & Andrew Stellitano
If you happen to be in New York tomorrow, don’t miss out Tinderbox Music Festival, which is an annual event showcasing a powerful and diverse lineup of emerging female artists producing innovative original music.
Rooted in the vibrant New York City music scene, Tinderbox fosters community by providing opportunities to perform, collaborate, and connect. Tinderbox donates its net proceeds to programs involved in empowering the next generation of female artists including GIRLS WRITE NOW, an organization providing guidance and opportunities for NYC’s underserved high school girls to develop their independent voices and explore careers in professional writing, and the WILLIE MAE ROCK CAMP FOR GIRLS, a non- profit music and mentoring program empowering girls and women through music education and activities, and the TINDERBOX SONGWRITING WORKSHOP, a program pairing established NYC female musicians with adolescent female songwriters to create and perform original songs.
The festival is held at the Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn, New York. Doors open at 5pm.
Check out the lineup here: tinderboxmusicfestival.com
Gimpel Fils Gallery is currently showing unseen photographs by the British fashion and documentary photographer Corinne Days’s early work.
May the Circle Remain Unbroken shows the people that the work brought together and the friendships that formed over 20 years ago and continue to endure three years after her passing. It also illuminates Day’s pioneering approach to photography where the boundaries are blurred to the extent that it is impossible to dissect the constructed from real. Corinne and long term partner Mark Szaszy’s Brewer Street flat often doubled as a set where friends, models and muses all overlapped. In addition to the photographs, a series of music videos by Mark will be screened bringing to life the protagonists in Day’s work.
The exhibition is on display at Gimpel Fils until November 23.
‘A photographic love letter’ is how renowned fashion photographer Tim Walker describes his new book. Celebrating ‘little old ladies who live down the lane’, The Granny Alphabet sees Walker collaborate with illustrator Lawrence Mynott and writer Kit Hesketh-Harvey.
Their words and sketches sit alongside Walker’s portraits of elderly ladies and their belongings, arranged in alphabetical order to bring a charming British ideal to life. In this month’s Vogue Walker says, Over the years ‘I’ve been keeping my eyes open for an elderly lady with a sparkle in her eye.’ And with all proceeds from the book going to the charity Friends of the Elderly, it seems he won’t have to look that far.
The Granny Alphabet is published by Thames & Hudson on November 11. Tim Walker is donating all proceeds to Friends of the Elderly, www.fote.org.uk
Text by Beccy Hill
The flats versus heels debate is a daily conundrum for some women. In recent seasons the fashion world has been paying more attention to the more comfortable shoe, giving it new life and our feet a much needed break. For autumn winter 2013 one style has come out on top (when a pair of Nike Free Runners just won’t do). The monk strap has overtaken the brogue for the boy/girl trend. Pair a dress with this season’s flat for a laid-back, cool aesthetic. Twin picks these four luxury pairs for your feet’s contentment.
Few people have the guts to delve into the lives of young people today, with all the various stereotypes and assumptions that swirl like barbed wire around UK youth. Nina Manandhar, a publisher, artist and photographer, has fearlessly produced in depth work surveying the dynamic nature of one of the most shunned age groups. The daughter of a printer and a former art graduate, Nina made a mark with her successful archive project ISYS with Cieron Magat, an initiative that provides a lens into the style and the living experience of various communities through film, books, exhibitions and events. Now with photo-book Money On My Oyster under her belt and imminent style project What We Wore in production; Nina continues to reveal the beautiful subtleties that make everyday life.
You describe yourself as a pop-ethnographer – what does that term mean to you?
I’m not quite sure what it means … I made it up. I like to immerse myself in other people’s worlds and almost become invisible in the process of documenting them. I guess a lot of ethnography is people going to far off countries to investigate disappearing tribes but I’m more interested in the contemporary city life, so it’s more ‘Pop’ than ‘world’. I like documentary because I’m really curious about other people and how they live their lives, and it’s an honour to be allowed to get a glimpse into their worlds.
Fashion is often seen as frivolous, however your work with ISYS often comments on social contexts through style. What is your view on fashion and its cultural importance?
ISYS was set up by myself and Cieron Magat because we are both interested in people and the idea of style as a way of getting to know people, of them declaring who they are. It’s not that I’m not interested in fashion and trends, I am, but for me it’s more about style, and the meaning of style – how it is used as a tool for identification and belonging to today’s world.
Youth culture also seems to be of particular significance in your projects – what draws you to the younger communities?
I think my teenage years were a really formative time for me, as it is for a lot of people I guess. I experimented with my appearance, had a real tight group of friends and felt a real sense of belonging through the music cultures I was exposed to. It was a time when I felt a real sense of community; belonging seemed simpler then.
There has been much talk about the younger generation as lacking a counter culture and a sense of clear identity – what are your thoughts on this?
The term ‘counter culture’ is so complex. There was a clearer sense of identity for the younger generations in the past because there was far less fragmentation of identities, both for older people and young alike. I guess youth cultures today have embraced consumer society more, but since it began, youth culture has been tied up with consumerism.
What I do think about a lot in terms of the younger generation now is a sense that their lives are lived out in a state of constant ‘publicness’ through the Internet and I wonder how that affects them and how they experience the world.
You’re now working on What We Wore, what inspired you to publish the collection in a printed format as well as online?
What We Wore was initially a project on ISYS; it was a weekly format that ended up being really popular. I really like print (my dad is actually a printer) and so saw how the concept could work really well as a book. With the help of my friend Eve Dawoud, I put together a proposal and took it to Prestel, who really liked it. It’s coming out Autumn 2014. We are looking for submissions – get involved at what-we-wore.com
More on Nina Manandhar and her projects visit:
Text by Monique Todd
PROM NIGHT from ISYS on Vimeo.
Last year Farfetch started its SUPERSTORE initiative to find the best new independent boutique, and now in its second year their search took them all the way to Wadi Bunder, Mumbai. In an attempt to support the growth and creativity of these international fashion destinations, Farfetch gives the winning store a chance to promote themselves to a global fashion audience. Le Mill was once a rice mill, but now the space carries contemporary and internatonal designers such as The Row, Peter Pilotto and Isabel Marant, as well as resident Indian designers such as Sabyasachi and Pero.
Farfetch carefully curates pieces from different concept stores and boutiques from Europe and the US, Le Mill is the first Indian store to join their network. To celebrate, Le Mill worked closely with emerging designers from India to produce a range of exclusive collections which are now available online at Farfetch. Farfetch created a Bollywood inspired fashion film for the occasion.
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