guess there's just no way of knowing

In a stark white room, with eleven models standing as stiff as boards, Eleven Objects presented their first full collection. They've progressed past luxury collars into luxury things: accessories, garments, and most importantly an idea, the idea that the smallest accessory can be biggest statement of all.

The collection was inspired by Baroque refinement and New Order, and to me those are rather ambitious points of reference when you consider how New Order had this startlingly genius habit of constructing perfect songs. I mean, Blue Monday? True Faith? Bizarre Love Triangle? PERFECT SONGS. So when Eleven Objects referenced New Order, they took the mood of their music as well as their absolute precision. What struck me immediately was the utter meticulousness of the garments. Sharp collars looked as though they were sliced with x-acto knives, embellished so deliberately with crystals and rosettes, cast in latex and brocade and heavyweight silk. Mathematically harmonious proportions with peplums, cropped jackets, and collar sleeves that hit the arms at just the right place.

Eleven Objects is going places. I DECREE IT.

dream fortress

(risto trench, vintage blouse, eleven objects collar gift from the brand, rodarte x oc leather apron, dries van noten shoes)

What are roots? What is home? What is this notion of permanence, of "settling down", of comfort and stability and roof over one's head to call one's own? What do these things mean to you? I can't really say that it means anything to me. As a child our family moved many times, my time was balanced between my mother's arms and my grandparent's tender care, between states our family both fled and journeyed to. Now that I am grown I am more nomadic than ever. Living in places from two months to a year, never quite longer than a year and a half. 

As someone who lacks the feeling of home, it has become imperative that I create my own. It is my own cerebral plane that is the summation of my influences and experiences and the best possible version of my aesthetics. It's that place that your mind wanders to just before you fall asleep. It is hazy magickal dreamscapes, it is Ellie Arroway's Vega exoplanet, it is the lush environments that Liz Fraser creates simply with the sound of her voice. It is The Verve's Beautiful Mind, it is nonrepresentational reality, it is this Risto moon trench coat, it is The Fade. And lately I am less interested in adhering to a look, I'm more interested in exploring that place, my home, through my outfits. Capturing my dreams with pastel colors and hazy prints and things that bend light in interesting ways. Like this outfit, which took me out on a date night with my love last Friday.

Favorite vintage printed blouse with Eleven Objects jeweled latex (!) FW12 collar that was a far too generous present from the brand. I'm deeply humbled by this thoughtful gift. It is dreamy, translucent latex that fits right at home with my aesthetic these days. In love. 

That all probably sounded very pretentious, but I don't know, my style is changing and evolving and I get a weird sense of relief when I wear something that feels like home. Like my brain is saying "oh, this is how I am supposed to look, this is how I am supposed to express myself to the world." Do  you feel ever get that feeling?

bedroom bat eyes

(image via rookie)

As a lifelong card-carrying member of the, ahem, g0th persuasion, I've always been happily attracted to classic symbols of the subculture. Things like bats and skulls and skeletons and Djarum Blacks (which yes I know will kill you but THE SMELL OF CLOVES! AHHHH it brings me right back to The Outland and being 20 and loving Combichrist) are neat because they are so highly associated with The Goth. We all know that Halloween is the best time of year to stock up on home decorations. And consider this: wearing black clothes isn't much of a stylistic stretch for most people, but pairing black clothes with this giant Meadham Kirchhoff bat necklace instantly transforms you into a delightful gothy creature of the night. I really doubt most mainstreamies would feel comfortable wearing a symbol that so strongly identifies with a subculture they do not belong to, and may even find kind of dumb. This necklace, in all its Hot Topic/dingy goth bar/Deathrock glory, is my necessary accessory of the year. Who can I talk to about bringing this beauty into my life?!

cause when you're #foreveralone, it's hard to find someone who understands

(dress and jacket by/from risto, zana bayne harness, chris habana necklace, dries van noten shoes)

Music and one's clothes form a strong basis for one's identity, probably more so than other mediums of art, at least it is this way for me. Last night I went to see Grimes at the Empty Bottle after her new album Visions has been on heavy rotation on my record player. Grimes has this uncanny ability to so perfectly capture the vibes I've been feeling lately - celestial, otherworldy, transcendental. Her music creates another planet in my head, a sort-of despondent place that exists only in her songs, and like the Cocteau Twins it is a place that I like to go because my world is so focused on practicality. I wouldn't call this escapism - just the opposite, in fact; occupying cerebral spaces other than my own helps me feel more connected to the world around me because it helps me remember what is outside my boundaries. So I wore this outfit because I wanted to feel ethereal and also because, um, shuffles feet, I never leave my apartment and even something as simple as going to show is an occasion for me to dress up these days. Hermit life.

I will not even pretend to know anything about makeup, but uh, I wanted doe eyes last night and with the help of ye olde Google Image Search Gizmo, a few photos of Twiggy provided inspiration for this. When I was applying the mini lashes, my eyes teared up a little and mixed with the eyeliner and I looked like the Black Oil from The X-Files. Kind of wonderful if you're into that sort of thing (which I am), but the rest of the non-mytharc obsessed world would call it NAGL.

Took a bunch of photos, but this the only one you get for now! I'm going to a few more shows this month and will be doing a post later about them. In the meanwhile, the universe needs to be made aware of Grimes' cat sweater with blue and red eyeballs. There! I've done my duty to the cosmos. Go forth, my cherubic readers, and spread the Good News of the Grimes cat sweater.

from hawaii to chicago, with luv

This weekend was the Chicago Zine Fest, which is one of the few things I feverishly look forward to each year. I worked at the event taking photos of adorable zinesters for glitterguts.com. I even got to meet some readers of this little blog, which warmed my heart, because I forget that some people actually read this thing! The zine community is a special little hidden subcultural treasure, unbound by the constraints of advertisers and censors and the careful tiptoeing that besets larger, glossier print magazines. Table after table was filled with adorable mini-comics and drawings, punx fanzines, feminist and survivor perzines, literary journals and radical manifestos. At some point I need to finish the zine I started on...last year...but in the meanwhile, enjoy these photos of some of my favorite tables.

And of course, I couldn't resist taking photos of some of the most inspired outfits at the fest...

This girl was dazzling. Her outfit  was so intricately assembled and she was stoked to show off the necklace she made at one of the CZF workshops.

This lady was wearing simply the most perfect pair of pink tights ever.

I wore my Meadham Kirchhoff for Topshop sea creature sequined dress with old combat boots that you can't see, and haphazardly knotted my boyfriend's belt around my waist. Couldn't be bothered to style my hair, after all, I was working and also was nursing a bit of a hangover from the night before. The larger black zine I'm holding is called Reckless Chants and features a bit from my BFF Annie! It was an absolute complete coincidence that I met Jessie, who wrote that zine, because she happened to be wearing a SHOWERBEERS button and SHOWERBEERS is Annie's boyfriend. Zines, making the world infinitely smaller, one page at a time.

DEGEN NYC power pubes

At the last minute on the first unofficial day of NYFW, I found myself towards the Chelsea Pier, on a bitter cold day, at the DEGEN presentation with the happiest range of characters. Models and showgoers and PR reps were exuberantly happy and all smiles as cheeky knitwear was on display. Have you ever been to a fashion show where people seem happy to be there? It can happen! I have seen it with my own eyes! Fashion, in its usually disingenuous desire to be seen as a Legitimate Creative Venture, treats itself with the seriousness of a tortured artist's k-hole. It was refreshing to see humor and liveliness through the designer's clothes. The knitwear-based collection featured subdued tones with stripes for emphasis and cozy textures that could warm the coldest day. DEGEN's take on politics and gender roles (the collection was apparently inspired by the recent repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell) were given a delightful twist in the form of naughty cut-outs and  undergarments that proudly displayed the very thing they were trying to hide.

SWEATER PASTIES. I MEAN.

Obviously the most important piece of the collection where these redhead knit pube panties, which, ahem, capture the texture so perfectly. 

The dream of the 90s are alive in DEGEN platform sneakers, featuring rhyming cutouts and knit patterns in a way that feel original and modern, and not contrived like certain other way-trendy shoe designers...

I just had to take a photo of this girl (who apparently is a DEGEN intern) because her exemplary outfit and smile kind of encapsulated the presentation. No bullshit, no pretention, just hilarious clothes and fashion as a means to bring people together. I'm into that.

sickness

(rodarte x oc dress, prada glasses)

  The Soft Moon - Into The Depths 

Being jaded is a terrible thing. And yet, at my tender age of 26, with my awkward missteps into adulthood and pathological yearning for those younger years that I lost, I find myself becoming cynical, like a runaway train, zooming straight past my youthful exuberance.

So for a piece of music to infect my soul the way The Soft Moon's self-titled album has done, is a rarified occasion. I mean, when I first heard this album, I was floored. I clutched my head in a frantic effort to comprehend the perfection of the sounds I was hearing. The guttural gnashing of guitars and gyroscoping synthesizers, the breathy vocals that are sparse and simple, the overwhelming attitude of terror and sickly delight. It's music that I didn't even know that I had been yearning to listen to.

It inspires me greatly. Something about The Soft Moon's cascading yet deliberate horror resonates deeply with me, as a reflection of both I view the world how when I'm feeling most contemptuous and to some extent, how perhaps we all do, how all of us have a capacity to feel very ugly things. 

So the idea behind this outfit was to capture that sort of unmitigated anger and severity of the music while containing it within the confines of retro Bauhaus shapes and colors, like the album cover which you'll see below.

 Evil Prada eyebrow glasses.

Gray, white, and black marbled vinyl. Sexiest record in my vinyl collection. I urge you all to listen to it.