Archive for the 'Awesome Things' Category

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New week, new things.

Published on April 23, 2012 in Awesome Things, New week new things and Shoes. 6 Comments
This week:
  • I know it’s a little overdone but I’m still loving that whole Americana sportwear collegiate inspired stuff and this sweater-tee (it’s made of cotton sweatshirting but it’s got short sleeves). It’s part of the Nike Sportswear collection and drops into store very soon. It’s actually a men’s tee, but I think it’d look great on a girl too. Well, it does look great on a girl because I put it on Maddy (above) and it looks fresh as on her, especially with the rolled sleeve. Keep an eye out!

What's good, Wellywood?

Published on April 19, 2012 in Awesome Things and Me. 13 Comments

The Twenty-seven Names workroom.

Yesterday morning I touched down in our capital city and the first thing that struck me was the cold. No, actually, the very first thing that happened was I was notified of this (BEST NEWS EVER!) but the second thing was the cold. Jesus Christ it is freezing here in Wellington. (In comparison to Auckland, anyway.) Despite my adverse reaction to the ridiculous temperature and wind outside, I was determined to make a go of the day in Wellington, as opposed to spending the whole day in my hotel room.

I started with dropping my bags at my premier studio (balllllerrrrr) at the Museum Hotel. The room wasn’t ready but that was okay – I had plans. I walked more than 100 metres for the first time in months – 15 minutes to Floriditas -an all day eatery on Cuba Street. I was meeting Anjali and Rachel from Twenty-seven Names for breakfast. I had buttery scrambled eggs. They were good. For anyone who is visiting Wellington, I highly recommend them and the ginger loaf with caramel icing. The rest of the day was filled with a lemon honey ginger at Fidel’s, a mission to find a place that would get rid of my gel nails (Roisna at Classiquo came to the rescue – thanks Roisna!), a meeting with Louise Hatton – Wellington’s finest fashion photographer, a trip to the new(ish) Twenty-seven Names workspace, a trip to the Ruby store, two meet ups with friends, a quick wardrobe change, an attendance at the Wellington Fashion Week opening function where the Mayor of Wellington flashed her spanx/bike pants under her dress during her speech (on purpose) – no joke and I met a lollipop-toting Issy from Season 3 of New Zealand’s Next Top Model, a fashion-week-esque dinner of fried chicken and macaroni cheese at Sweet Mother’s Kitchen and drinks at Hawthorn. I got back to the hotel at 2:00am, dead. It’s surprising how productive one can be when they wake up at 7:30am.

Now it’s 11:55am the next day and I haven’t ventured outside. The first Wellington Fashion Week show is on tonight but I’ve got a good 6 hours until then – Wellingtonians! What’s good?! Hit me up!

The Juliette Hogan Maxwell trouser.

Published on April 17, 2012 in Awesome Things, Me and new things. 3 Comments

All Images/James K Lowe.

Everyone who knows me knows I’m partial to pants (as opposed to skirts and dresses) and although I have about 10 pairs my wardrobe right now, I’m always on the look out for the next great pair. My latest and greatest is this pair I picked up from Juliette Hogan a few weeks ago. They’re called the ‘Maxwell’ trouser. They’re a light, grey wool with a slight stretch and a great looking texture. The good thing about these pants is they’re cropped. For your average tall person (ie. not my short ass) they’d be a bit more ankle exposing, but for this dwarf they’re just that little bit longer – the perfect length to cuff. I feel like they’re the perfect fancy version of schoolboy pants. All I need is a short-sleeve white shirt, some tortoiseshell round glasses and a rucksack and I’ll have the look down. You can grab your very own pair, here.

Continue reading ‘The Juliette Hogan Maxwell trouser.’

New week, new things.

Published on April 16, 2012 in Awesome Things and New week new things. 3 Comments

My 2.5 week old Colour Gloss nails, by Leah Light. Image/James K Lowe.

This week:

  • Okay, I have to admit I’m not really a nail girl – the foils and the sparkles and all that stuff that’s so in right now is not really my thing. It just seems like way too much admin, you know? Despite the fact I’m not a nail polish fanatic, I was given the opportunity a couple of weeks ago to have my nails done by Leah Light at a Glassons event. I’ve never tried gel polish before and because it was free and I had time I thought I’d give it a go. Have any of you tried it? This stuff is ridiculous! I don’t know what they do to keep it on there but I have had mine for almost three weeks (on Wednesday it’ll be three weeks) and this is how it looks (see above) – no chips, no nothing. The stuff is staying hard and fast. Highly recommend for those who are into nail art.

MBFWA: Blogger Central.

Published on April 13, 2012 in Awesome Things and Mercedes Benz Fashion Week Australia. 2 Comments

Bryan Boy backstage at Burberry last year.

I’m still sick in bed which sucks, but there is an upside to this. Firstly, I haven’t been wearing contact lenses which means I’m saving money, and secondly I have had a lot of time to browse the internet and I have just, just come across this list of people due to attend Australian Fashion Week in a couple of weeks:

  1. Bryan Boy! The last time I saw the guy was over a year ago in New York and we ate asian food. I don’t usually crave asian food but after a good 6 weeks tripping around with Isaac eating bread and well, non-asian food, I was el desperado for some bloody rice by the time we met up with Bryan. As well as loving the fact that he loves to eat asian food as much as I do, he’s literally the funnest person to be around. Can’t wait to see him again.
  2. Susie Bubble of Style Bubble is back again.
  3. Tommy Ton of Jak + Jil is also back again.
  4. Yvan Rodic of The Facehunter is also, also back again.
  5. Pretty sure I saw on Fashion Toast‘s Rumi Neely’s twitter that she was also going to be in Sydney for the week.
  6. All the usual Sydney style bloggers, including the nicest girl around, Nicole Warne of Gary Pepper Vintage – who is turning model for the week and walking the Talulah show.

Other rumored bloggers to attend? Leandra Medine of The Man Repeller and Imran Ahmed of The Business of Fashion.

Other people to stalk? Taylor Tomasi-Hill (style and accessories director for US Marie Claire), Candice Lake and Whitney Port. Yes, that Whitney. Of ‘The Hills’ fame. Also it must be noted that a few Kiwi girls are over to cast for the shows – one of my favourite girls of all time and someone seen on this blog a lot: Olivia Lefebre (62 Models) and Brigette Thomas – also of 62 models and winner of New Zealand’s Next Top Model season 3.

Going to be a bit of an exciting week huh?!

Hey I don't know you and this is crazy but I made this video – watch it, maybe?

Published on April 9, 2012 in Awesome Things, Me, Models and OMG. 18 Comments

If you’re good at the internet, you’ll know where I’m going already by reading the title of this post. If not, get with the programme! Long story short, a good few weeks back I saw the original parody of Carly Rae Jepsen’s music video for her single, ‘Call Me Maybe’ (starring tween heart-throbs Justin Bieber, Selena Gomez and Ashley Tisdale) and I was immediately obsessed. Then and there I vowed to make a parody video of the parody video.

I promised myself I would remake the video as part of promotion for Isaac and my ‘Thugged Out Since Cub Scouts‘ tees back in February, but life got in the way and it didn’t get done in time. Nevertheless, a solid month later I did manage to truck on with the project and finally last Thursday night (and Friday night, and Saturday night) I (and a whole host of friends and models*) got together to create what I like to think is nothing short of a masterpiece.

I do realise there are a lot of people who won’t appreciate this at all, but screw them, it was ridiculously fun to make (aside from the 20 hours of editing using iMovie when I don’t know how to operate it). I mean, how often do you ever get to just let loose and act like a 15 year old girl and have it all documented? Exactly! Hardly ever. It was the best time I’ve had in a long time. So with all that in mind, I hope you enjoy.

Happy Easter Monday folks. We up in here.

Continue reading ‘Hey I don't know you and this is crazy but I made this video – watch it, maybe?’

3 reasons to shop the Opening Ceremony sale section.

Published on April 5, 2012 in Awesome Things and Rant. 4 Comments

Opening Ceremony Embroidered Yarn Wool Dress. All Images/openingceremony.us

I’ve been thinking a lot about online shopping. While I am a big advocate of browsing the racks from the comforts of your own home, I have come to realise that I don’t actually do that much of it. I go through phases of it. Right now, I’m in what I like to call the ‘broke’ phase:

‘money in’ does not quite seem to equate to ‘money out’.

In fact, let’s be honest here, I’m in the ‘debt’ phase, which is one worse than the ‘broke’ phase:

‘money in’ is equal to half the amount of ‘money already owing’, which doesn’t even touch on ‘money out’.

But sometimes I’m in neither of these phases. Sometimes I’ve got ‘money in’ equal to ‘money out’. It’s times like those where I browse the online stores, and when I do I head straight to my top five – one of which being Opening Ceremony. Now, because I’m feeling the lack of income, I’ve decided to bring you some things from the sale section of the store. Usually when I hear sale, I think terrible things, but you know what? Opening Ceremony’s sale section is actually quite good at the moment. So good, that I have three things in my (wish list) shopping cart right now:

Continue reading ’3 reasons to shop the Opening Ceremony sale section.’

New week, new things.

Published on April 2, 2012 in Awesome Things and New week new things. 8 Comments

My new Huffer men's anorak, as worn by the lovely Widika @ Red 11.

This week:

  • The anorak. More specifically, the army green/khaki anorak. There are a few options around town but one of my favourites has to be this men’s one by Huffer. (They do a women’s version too for those that way inclined.) It’s simple, has just the right amount of details (the leather trims!) and is supremely practical for Autumn weather. I tossed up between the men’s and women’s and decided to go for the men’s because I’m actually a boy trapped inside a girl’s body. I copped an XS one on Friday – the sleeves are a bit long but I just rolled them and went with it. I think I like it even better with the sleeves rolled anyway. I didn’t plan to but it ended up that I wore it literally all weekend. I even took it out on Saturday night and put my things in the pockets instead of taking a bag. Genius.

Things I've seen: Stolen Girlfriends Club SS12-13.

Published on March 31, 2012 in Awesome Things and Models. 6 Comments

Some of the models after the show.

I showed up at the new Stolen Girlfriends Club headquarters on Wednesday afternoon, camera and friends in tow. We were invited to the Ponsonby/Grey Lynn premises for a media viewing of the brand’s Spring/Summer 2012-2013 Collection, ‘Mr & Mrs Bones’. Tucked around the corner on Crummer Road, the location turned out to the basement of a building, a big open space with concrete walls and floors and fluorescent lights. As a nice change to your average fashion show, there were canapés (food! At a fashion thing! Amazing!) offered, as well as your usual drinks. Another noticable difference was the small audience invited – strictly one row of chairs around three sides of the room, and just enough invitees to each have a seat.

Intimate.

Here’s what I saw:

Continue reading ‘Things I've seen: Stolen Girlfriends Club SS12-13.’

Little Brother makes menswear girls can wear too.

Published on March 30, 2012 in Awesome Things, Models and Photography. 10 Comments

Little Brother - menswear that girls can wear too. Little Brother Stripe sweater and Duke chino (on both), Converse Chuck Taylor's (on Alyssa), Little Brother Mod parka and Converse Jack Purcell's (on Callum).

Older readers may remember that I did a similar post to this one – Little Brother menswear on both a girl and a guy. Newer readers – let me briefly explain:

For a long time now, I’ve loved wearing men’s clothes. I was loving it at age 11 when I was borrowing my brother’s old sweaters, at age 16 when I was raiding my then boyfriend’s wardrobe and I’m still loving it a good decade later. The only difference between now and then is that now I can afford to buy my own menswear. One of my favorite places to go for menswear that I can wear, is Little Brother. Their smallest pant size is small enough to fit my size 8 women’s waist, the XS button-down fits square on my shoulder and the knitwear is the perfect amount of oversized.

Little Brother is one of the few menswear brands makes clothes that look just as good on a girl as they do on a guy. It’s with that in mind that I originally came up with the idea for this shoot – visual evidence that Little Brother makes menswear that girls can wear too.

So, with the turn of the season and Winter ranges coming into store, I thought it might just be time to do this shoot again. Time to rustle up some models and show everyone how great the new collection looks. This time I took it outdoors, and with the help of my assistants (my brother, Maddy Budd and Lilah Merz) and my two ridiculously good looking models (Alyssa Hiyama and Callum Smith) we created, in my obviously biased opinion, some bloody great images. There are so many that I love that I can’t post them all here, so see my favourites below and for more of my other favourites, visit my photo blog. To see them in the flesh, look out for the latest issue of 1972 Magazine, available at Barkers stores nationwide.

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The Untouched World model casting. (I may have found my calling.)

Published on March 29, 2012 in Awesome Things, Me, Models and Rant. 6 Comments

Some of the faces that cast for Untouched World.

I rarely ever claim to know much, if anything, about fashion. I like what I like and I know if something fits and generally I have an idea of whether it’s commercially viable (read: going to sell) or not, but ask me anything beyond that and I’m stuck. Ask me about Prada’s Spring/Summer 2004 show and all I can tell you is that there were probably clothes in it. Ask me about silhouettes and what they’re influenced by, and about anything technical or about the history of fashion and I’ll just give you a blank stare. Ask me about New Zealand models, however, and I’m pretty sure I’ll be able to school you.

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Gorman opened up shop, I tried on some clothes, now you can too.

Published on March 27, 2012 in Awesome Things and Me. 167 Comments

Gorman's 'Aran' Jumper. All Images/Hone Hernandez.

Saturday marked a pretty special occasion for New Zealand (well, Auckland) retail. Melbourne-born and much wider known womenswear label, Gorman, opened up shop in the old Trelise Cooper Kids space on Nuffield Street in Newmarket. Not one to shy away from the opportunity to a.) see new clothes, b.) try them on and c.) have my photo taken, I rushed down on Monday with a new photographer in tow (one that I’d never met until 5 minutes before these photos were taken – check his work here) and had a little try on of my favourite pieces from A/W 2012. These are the results:

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New week, new things.

Published on March 26, 2012 in Awesome Things and New week new things. 6 Comments

New this week: The Caker is now selling cakes out of Eight Thirty on K'Rd.

A lot of Mondays back, I started this section: New week, new thing, which was supposed to showcase something new for week – whether it was new to you or new to me or had just been released and new to the world. It lasted about 3 weeks. Basically, I fell off. But, because I am now on a blogging ‘roll’ per se, and in the spirit of stickability and integrity being consistent and reliable and all those good things you look for in a blogger (and person!) I have decided to bring it back. No falling off this time.

Because this is a revival of some sort, I’ve decided to change the format slightly. Each week I’ll be bringing you three new things – and not all fashion, either. Wish me luck! Here goes:

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Why I would get Wood Wood's winter 2012 womenswear.

Published on March 22, 2012 in Awesome Things. 2 Comments

All Images/via wearethemarket.com

I know this stuff won’t be available for the Southern Hemisphere Winter, but it’s good enough to share with you anyway. Plus, there’s always next, next Winter, right?

I don’t usually make a habit of posting lookbooks or campaign images unless I think they’re actually amazing, so before you say anything, shush and listen. This is good. Wood Wood is a Copenhagen based streetwear/casualwear label that until recently, I never knew created womenswear. The menswear is the fodder of people who dress like my brother – if you’re into Norse Projects and Engineered Garments and you know, really cool streetwear, you’ll like (if you don’t already) Wood Wood. (In New Zealand, it’s stocked at Qubic and Good as Gold.)

This Winter 2012-2012 collection is just the kind of thing I want to be wearing this upcoming Winter. People who know me know that I’m pretty casual in the way I dress – as hard as I’ve tried, I can’t seem to ever look like the shiny, put-together types (alá Nicole Warne) so I give up. This Wood Wood womenswear seems to be made for me – Americana, collegiate inspired sweaters and cardigans, button up shirts and beanies, and even a bit of fair isle thrown into the mix. See my favourites below.

Continue reading ‘Why I would get Wood Wood's winter 2012 womenswear.’

The Area 51 A/W 2012 Lookbook.

Published on March 20, 2012 in Awesome Things, Models and Photography. 22 Comments

All Images/Katherine Lowe for Area 51. (Click for larger.)

It’s been a really busy couple of weeks. I don’t know what happened. Perhaps it’s the change of season or the end of the financial year – all I know is that January was really, really dead and then once it got to the middle of February it’s like everybody woke up and realised that they’d achieved nothing in the last month and went into full on panic mode to rectify it. I’ve had more emails and requests to do things than I’ve ever had in the history of having this blog (3 years). I’m not complaining though, it’s nice to have people hassling me for a change (as opposed to the other way ’round).

One job I recently got to do, was team up with New Zealand’s favourite streetwear store, Area 51. They asked me to put together a little lookbook using some of my favourite things from the new Autumn/Winter ranges that they stock. Of course I leapt at the chance, and after a bit of model-wrangling and a few organisational hitches, one Saturday afternoon the team and I gathered together in a big empty office space in the middle of town, snacks and lights and a tonne of clothes in tow, to produce what you can see here:

Continue reading ‘The Area 51 A/W 2012 Lookbook.’