Superheroes @ The NY Times

This week, the Costume Institute of the Metropolitan Museum of Art will present “Superheroes: Fashion and Fantasy” (May 7 through Sept. 1), which spotlights more than 500 ensembles—from sportswear to haute couture to film costumes—that reflect a heroic ideal.

On yesterday's The New York Times Sunday Styles Magazine photographer Raymond Meier and Brazilian supermodel Caroline Trentini displayed an array of super-powered looks inspired by the exhibition. They created fun ficticious superheroes that are ready to fight for fashion victims everywhere - if not one themselves.

KUNOICHI All her life, Kunoichi heard that only men can be ninjas. But when her naïve parents inadvertently ran afoul of the Japanese mob, the time had come to put her years of secret training to use.

MORAY When a family’s boat capsizes in rough seas, an infant survives — thanks to eerily glowing coral on the ocean floor. The baby grows up to be Moray, the protector of all sea creatures, including sushi.

INSECTA A scientist at a pest-control lab is accidentally exposed to lethal aerosols, enabling her to now communicate with the vermin (men?) she once devoted her life to destroying.

ABSOLUTE ZERO She came to 2008 on a vital mission — to prevent a catastrophic war. Absolute Zero knows her ability to stop time will be critical ... if her amnesia can be cured.

LE RENARD As a little girl, Le Renard would always sabotage her father’s weekend hunts. Her reward from Mother Earth was a mystic totem that grants her the cunning and heightened senses of a fox.

CIRCUIT BREAKER Lights! Camera! Disaster! A horrific accident on the set of a low-budget flick turned a B-actress into Circuit Breaker, who uses her electrical powers to fight pushy publicists, casting-couch directors and ill-conceived superhero adaptations.

SURREPTITIOUS Instead of being irked by classmates describing her as a wallflower, Surreptitious embraced it. She used her smarts to fashion material that allows her to literally blend into shadows. It’ll take her investigative journalism career far.

Via TNYT

Leather Jackets @ The NY Times

Photography by Dean Isidro

Via The New York Times

Dita Von Teese @ The New York Times

Domains Section.

Show Stopper: Dita Von Teese — burlesque performer and lingerie designer for the Wonderbra company — lives in a 1920s, three-bedroom Craftsman home in the heart of Hollywood.

Biggest misconception about burlesque: That it’s about dancing around in hot pants with feather boas. Burlesque was about the striptease. The stars of burlesque took their clothes off, end of story, period.

Hardest thing about stripping: To make it look effortless and natural.

Her first corset: It was out of my life for a little while. It was stolen, by a friend of mine’s daughter. One day she returned it and said she was sorry. I was happy. I have hundreds of corsets, but that is the most important one.

Worst moment onstage: My hair caught on fire. I do an act where I sit on a vanity table that has candelabras on it. Well, there was a lot of hair spray going on. I realized what was happening and put my hair out. The show went on.

Next big purchase: I’m getting ready to make a new show, and that is always a big expense. It will involve $80,000 worth of costumes and props. This one is going to be especially rhinestone heavy.

Personal hero: Mae West. There hasn’t been another actress in the world who wrote every line she ever said in a film.

Morning routine: My waking time always changes, because sometimes I am really jet lagged. When I’m home, I am up around 9 o’clock. First, I check my BlackBerry, which is next to me in bed. Then I let my dogs outside and get everybody breakfast.

Best thing about divorce from Marilyn Manson: There’s a long list. I am happy to have the drugs out of my life.

Fear about new love: That I’ll fall for a man who wants a modern, minimalist interior.

Prized possession: I took my engagement diamond and had it transformed at Christian Dior in Paris into a beautiful ring. It’s nice; it’s big. I feel like I suffered greatly for that diamond, and it needed to be reborn into something better.

Performance piece: Yes, I do perform in a giant martini glass, but I don’t keep it at home. All my props are kept in storage, a really big storage space, because I have a lot of things even bigger than that glass. I have never been where they are stored, to be honest. It’s somewhere in Los Angeles.

Animal friends: I have various taxidermied animals. I have a peacock, swans and birds in large glass domes. They’re beautiful.

Rainy-day activities: Sitting in front of the fire with my pets, two dachshunds and three Devon Rex cats, which is a breed that has unusually large ears and wide-set eyes.

Indispensable gadget: A 1940s phone station. It’s a stand that holds the phone, and you sit in it. You can’t move around. I used to have a cordless phone and I hated it.

Waistline: I’m not technically a tight lacer. It’s a fetish, in which you wear extremely tight corsets all the time. I don’t sleep in my corsets, and I’m not obsessed with obtaining the world’s smallest waist. My waist is around 18 inches.

Velvet painting: A painting of me by an artist named Olivia, who specializes in pinups.

Burlesque memento: I have an artifact of the famed burlesque star Sally Rand, from 1939. It’s a box that says “Winter Underwear for Men” on it. Inside is a crocheted warmer for a man’s equipment. It’s hysterical.

Guilty pleasure: Eating foie gras in Paris. That has gotten me into a lot of trouble with PETA. But it is a guilty pleasure; I feel guilty and horrible about it.

Extra bedrooms: I turned one of them into a dark, jewel box of a bedroom. Another is a wardrobe with my dresses, shoes and vintage clothes. The third is devoted to my hat collection and vanity. It’s a real powder room.

Collections: I collect in a crazy way. I have at least 15 collections. I collect vintage hair combs; vintage clothes; vintage lingerie; hats; jewelry; cigarette holders.

Favorite collection: My hats. When I look at them I can’t believe these are things that women wore on the street every day. They are dramatic and distinctive.

Treasured eras: For taxidermy, Victorian; for furniture, Art Deco; for lingerie, 1940s stockings and Victorian corsets; hats I like mid-1940s, when they wore the little tilted hats, like men’s hats.

What she drives: I have two classic cars, a 1939 Chrysler New Yorker and a 1965 Jaguar S-Type. I drove a Chrysler 300. But I just got a new car, a BMW Z4.

Fanciest corset: It’s by Mr. Pearl, without a doubt the world’s most-sought-after corset maker. He lives in Paris, and all the couturiers go to him. He has an unmatched talent for creating the perfect wasp waist. Each corset requires between 6 and 20 fittings.

Evening routine: I have no routine. I am happy if I am in bed by 1 a.m. It’s a great victory for me if I can sleep eight hours or more.

By her bed: A beautiful Art Deco box with a condom in it. I’m a single girl.

Favorite chore: Grocery shopping. I wasn’t always able to afford food, so I love putting things in my cart and realizing I can afford them.

Always in fridge: Eggs and truffle sauce. I order the sauce online. It is called Truffle Gatherers sauce. It is so good with eggs. It is very precious to me.

What she misses about America when abroad: More value to the dollar.

Fitness routine: About 20 minutes jumping on the trampoline and an hour of Pilates. I often take Sundays off.

What she wanted to be when she grew up: A ballerina.

Obsession: Ballet shoes. I have a collection dyed in every color of the rainbow.

Belief system: There are superstitions in burlesque. You aren’t supposed to put your shoes on the table. I try to pay attention to that, but I really like looking at my shoes, so I put them on the table all the time.

Perfect kitchen: One of my big extravagances when I moved out of my former husband’s house was a matching pink stove and refrigerator in ’50s style. Unlike real vintage items, they work.

Obsolete item she can’t bear to part with: Everything I have is obsolete. That’s the point.

Via NY Times

More Paris Fashion week

Alexander McQueen

Givenchi

Dai Fujiwara for Issey Miyake

Zucca

Via The New York Times

Rei Kawakubo @ NYT Magazine

Great article on Comme des Garcons' Rei Kawakubo on the NYTimes magazine by Cathy Horyn. It gives great insight on the whole creative process and operation of the world's most conceptual and avant-garde fashion house, founded by Kawakubo almost 40 years ago. Under the Comme de Garcons' umbrella she gave room for the talents of Junya Watanabe and Tao Kurihara, that unlike cheaper CDG collections are separate labels with their own identity and creative independence. Kawakubo claims that the first time she sees their collections is when they are shown on the Paris runways, though they all work on the same office building in Tokyo.

To read the whole article click here

High Tech @ The New York Times

All photos by Matthew Brookes.

Via The New York Times

Under Things @ The New York Times

Louis Vuitton swimsuit and Missoni shoes

Rodarte tulle dress with Swarovski crystals

Akris leather and embroidered tulle coat, Araks cotton bra & briefs and Christian Louboutin shoes.


Vena Cava silk chiffon tank, Doo. Ri cashmere shorts with Swarovski crystals and Christian Louboutin shoes


Louis Vuitton embroidered jacket, organza shorts, swimsuit, and shoes.

Chloe silk mousseline blouse.

Araks cotton bra & and briefs and Emilio Cavallini stockings.

Dolce & Gabbana brocade corset with tulle overlay, Agent Provocateur lace briefs with satin garters, Emilio Cavallini stockings and Christian Louboutin shoes.

Via The New York Times

The Beauty of Natalie Portman

I can't get over how beautiful Natalie Portman is. She is just GORGEOUS! And VERY talented to top it off!! What else, a Harvard diploma? Oops, she's got one of those too.

I really admire her work ethics, her choice of roles and her disdain for the Hollywood hype-machine, feeding tabloids with scandals and what-nots just for some free press. I loved her on "Paris, Je T'Aime" where she plays the aspiring young actress that falls in love with the young French man. He is blind by the way and at no moment that even matters, to her or anyone in the audience. I was not crazy for the Star Wars stuff, but I am not their target audience I guess, though Princess Amidala was "fierce" and had the best wardrobe in the movie.

Via The New York Times

High Art Beach Towels

Jump-start your holiday shopping, or replenish your stash of towels before guests arrive, with bath or beach towels decorated with images by the artists Cindy Sherman, Elizabeth Peyton, Jeff Koons, and Kehinde Wiley. The limited-edition towels will be sold at the Raleigh Hotel pool in Miami Beach during the annual Art Basel Miami Beach show, from Dec. 5 to 9. They will also be sold through Target.com and Worksonwhatever.com, starting Nov. 19.

The 60-by-70-inch, 100 percent cotton terry towels are $50 each, and the proceeds will be used to support public art projects around the country.

Via The New York Times

Yue Minjun @ Queens Museum of Art

“Yue Minjun and the Symbolic Smile,” at the Queens Museum of Art, is the first American museum exhibition of Yue’s work and further evidence of his remarkable rise in the super-heated field of Chinese contemporary art. The work at the Queens Museum ranges from a grouping of 20 life-size terracotta soldiers grinning cast bronze versions of the famous statues unearthed years ago at the tomb of China’s first emperor, to a painting of a laughing version of himself holding another aloft in front of the Statue of Liberty. A few years ago, Yue was eking out a precarious existence in one of Beijing’s artist colonies, trying to figure out a way to weave China’s tumultuous experience into his works. Now, largely on the strength of his signature grin, he has achieved stardom internationally. The mesmerizing enigma of that reddish face painted over and over again, with the wide laugh and the eyes tightly shut from the hilarious strain, is subject to a multitude of interpretations. The smile has been variously interpreted as a sort of joke at the absurdity of it all, or the illusion of happiness in lives inevitably heading toward extinction. “There were also paintings during the Cultural Revolution period, those Soviet-style posters showing happy people laughing,” Yue explained. “But what’s interesting is that normally what you see in those posters is the opposite of reality.” He said his smile was in a way a parody of those posters. But, since it’s a self-portrait, it’s also necessarily a parody of himself, he added. At the Queens Museum, there is also a series called “Hats,” in which Yue has painted himself in all sorts of headgear, from an American football helmet to a peaked cap of a soldier in China’s People’s Liberation Army, with that unvarying laugh on his face. Mr. Yue was born in 1962 in China’s far northern Heilongjiang Province and moved to Beijing with his parents as a child. He studied oil painting at the Hebei Normal University and graduated in 1989, when China was rocked by student-led demonstrations and their suppression on Tiananmen Square in June of that year.

From Oct/14/07-Jan/08/08 at the Queens Museum of Art

Via The New York Times