Brand Noise

Recession Black is the New Black

"Of course, black is like a mask," says [Christian] Lacroix, who calls this shift in sensibility a new minimalism. "The new pureness of lines centered on cut rather than decoration, the laser geometry of shapes and silhouettes are all maybe signs of a graphic protection linked unconsciously to recession, just like at the end of the '80s." Like Lacroix, Ghesquière was channeling a more austere sensibility in his Balenciaga collection, which, he said, was inspired by film noir, specifically the actress Simone Signoret's hard-edged look in the 1955 movie Les Diaboliques.

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Should Fashion Divest from Seasons?

The Wall Street Journal recently posted an interview addressing how designers and retailers are responding to warmer global temperatures.

The video revealed that there are other factors at play. And we agree.

Fashion has historically thrived on an obsolescence factor built into changing seasons. The advent of air conditioning, cars and textile technology have made the seasons passe.

There used to be a nicely nestled Cruise/Resort Collection, but most American women are globally motivated to travel throughout the year. Sunbelt travel is accessible to everyone now.

There's also a polarity of prices at play that transcends seasons. You can invest in one fabulous piece, but buy less expensive items on a weekly basis. No one is shy about mixing and matching anymore.

So the fashion issue is less a question of global warming than it is global advancement and an empowered consumer.

(Image: GalaDarling.)

Kid Robot Sponsoring Dunny Trading Parties

Some of the most incredible talents in the world have done Dunny over french. The new 3-Inch mini series appears world-wide on February 21 featuring collaborators, Superdeux, Genevieve Gauckler, 123Klan, SupaKitch, Easy Hey, Tilt, Mist, Der, Tizieu, Ajee, Doze X Secretlab, Nasty, Jack Usine, Koralie, Onde X Trbdsgn, Koa, Oktus the Woodboy and Skwak.

Now, they're holding trading parties to swap them, but the parties are not limited just to Dunnys. You can bring beaucoups of items with you to trade with other toy fans during the events.

Kid Robot, Secret to “Yo Gabba Gabba!” Success?

“Yo Gabba Gabba!” began appearing on Nickelodeon in August, and with remarkable speed it has acquired fans who are preschoolers and fans who are old enough to be their parents...Charles Rivkin, the president and chief executive of Wildbrain, which produces the show, says, “I challenge you to find another preschool show that four months after going on the air is actually selling adult apparel at Barneys.”

While plenty of shows for children have also appealed to adults — “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” “H. R. Pufnstuf,” even “Sesame Street” — “Yo Gabba Gabba!” updates this idea for a generation that, it has been argued, is ambivalent about letting go of its own youth.

The real deal came when the original creators hooked up with Wildbrain. Back in 2006, Wildbrain acquired a majority interest in Kidrobot, which makes and sells high-end “designer toys” and apparel that appeal to fashionable young adults (who may or may not be parents). Thus “Gabba”-related products arrived in exclusive retail settings much faster than usual, demonstrating consumer demand to other merchandise partners.

You couldn’t ask for more perfect serendipity in partners, which goes to prove that authenticity starts at the drawing board. Had “Yo Gabba Gabba!” been conceived under other premises, it wouldn’t have been strong enough to bring into the Kid Robot world. On the other hand, if “Yo Gabba Gabba!” merchandise went straight to big box retailers you would’ve had a watered down product. The Kid Robot connection offers the brand longevity, with more staying power than it would have had on its own.

(Image: T-shirt recrafted into dress by JinJur.)
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GM Denies Hummer HX Inspired by Halo

A lot of Halo fans think Hummer's new HX concept SUV looks quite a bit like the Warthog all-terrain vehicle from Bungie's hit games. The designers must have been thinking of the Warthog when they built it, right?

Wrong. Carl Zipfel, GM's director of exterior design for the HX concept, says the Warthog was not an inspiration for the new compact SUV.

Zipfel emphasized the futuristic look and off-road capabilities of the HX at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit today. But he says the design comes from modern-day ATVs, not Halo's heavily armed military vehicles.

Zipfel says he saw the buzz about the HX in video game blogs, and he seemed flattered by the the comparison. He even said he and several of the vehicle's young designers play Halo.

But as for the Warthog resemblance — that's just a coincidence.

GM's dismissing this too quickly. I see shades of the Coke/Mentos denial. GM, time to introduce yourself to the gang at Bungie and maybe connect with the Rooster Toothers.

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Punk Houses are Logo-Centric

They may be all about rebellion, but punk houses haven't changed much over the past 30 years, reports Penelope Green in The New York Times (1/3/08). A punk house can be situated in a trailer, van, warehouse, treehouse, bus -- or just about anywhere the rent is cheap. It was born of "an attempt to opt out of just about everything that smacked of the mainstream." Most punk houses are populated by male rockers in their 20s although there are some all-female and coed punk houses, too. The decor is, well, punk. "It's self-expression in the living space, not just on the bodies," says Abby Banks, who photographed 42 punk houses and published them in a book, "Punk House: Interiors in Anarchy."   

The punk-house interior, according to Abby, is "logo-centric.  As with T-shirts or tattoos, they contain lots of writing ... on walls, door jambs, stoves and  toilets."

Read the whole story (sourced by Reveries).

Spam Art

Like everybody else with an e-mail account, Linzie Hunter gets a lot of spam. It might be a little more unusual that she sometimes finds the subject headings so amusingly absurd — “No More Lonely Nights for Linzie,” for instance — that she forwards them to friends.

More recently, when Hunter, who is an illustrator, was experimenting with hand lettering, she did something extremely unusual. She found a way to convert commercial entreaty and flimflammery into something pleasing. That is, she made spam into art.

Working quickly, with a tablet and stylus attachment that allows her to draw in the computer program Photoshop, she gave each a unique treatment, like a hand-painted sign.

After a day and a half, she uploaded about 20 of these to her account on Flickr, creating a set of “Spam One-liners.” Two weeks later, one of her Flickr contacts, the illustrator John Martz, posted a link to the set from the popular illustration and cartooning blog known as Drawn! at drawn.ca. It quickly ricocheted — via art blogs, design blogs, tech blogs, personal blogs...In the space of a little more than a week, the number of views of the Spam One-liners set went from about 500 to more than 50,000. And more than a few people were asking Hunter to make prints or postcards that they could buy.

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Boutiques Fade in LA: New Strategies Required

From late 2005 to early this year, fashion boutiques popped up in L.A. like poodle skirts to a sock hop…Feminine outposts such as Iconology, Presse and Lily Savitch helped turn La Brea Avenue into a high-fashion enclave, while Sienna, Milk and ECookie upped the style quotient on the Westside. This new crop of boutiques was the antithesis of mass-market, offering a tightly edited selection of merchandise that represented the owners' particularly L.A. spin on the trends of the day.

Yet some of their closings and slowdowns have cast a shadow on L.A.'s reputation as an up-and-coming fashion capital…When consumers start tightening their purse strings, high-end retail suffers first.

Years ago, it wouldn't have mattered how deeply department stores discounted their merchandise. They didn't carry the edgier designers...But in an effort to chase the boutique business, department stores including Nordstrom and Macy's have, in recent years, developed new divisions for young, cutting-edge brands.

Tracey Ross said she no longer can afford to buy overly avant-garde pieces -- a shame, considering her keen eye for new design talent. "I love cultivating new designers," she said, "but I can't have pieces in my store that don't sell anymore.

Read the whole story.

JB Classics Collaborates with FMF & Ford Motors

Three years in the making, we show you today the outcome of the JB Classics + DJ Funkmaster Flex + Ford Motors collaborative efforts. The shoe project consists of two sneakers, one designed with each partner in this three-way project.

The JB Classics + DJ Funkmaster Flex Getlo comes with a true-blue nubuck toe box and heel panels, white full grain toe vamp and perforation details. The inner leather skin lining features the "FMF" logo print in accent colors to match the outsole.  Limited to 240 pairs worldwide, shops that will carry the sneaker include Deep Store (Paris), Overkill (Berlin), Garage (Switzerland), Qubic (New Zealand) and Moe's Sneaker Spot (NYC), just to name a few.

The JB Classics + Ford Motors Getlo comes with an equal amount of details. Most of the sneaker is covered in the Ford trademark blue, the tongue features an embossed Ford logo. The inner lining matches the outer sole and the red accents give for a nice contrast. Packaged with two sets of laces, Certificate of Ownership, hand numbered tongue  and cinch bag, this model was exclusively developed for Ford Motors.

Chrysler Carcoons

An very interesting article in today's NY Times puts some motion in the water about how we think about cars and the place they have in our lives.  Bob Nardelli is making his vision known, spring boarding off of what he knows best which is home improvement and consumer nesting habits via his leadership at Home Depot.

“I think a vehicle today has to be your most favorite room under your roof,” Mr. Nardelli said. “I really believe that. I mean, it has to bring you gratification, it has to be tranquil. It’s incidental that it gets you from Point A to B, right?”

Bob is partly right.    The place cars play in the family has clearly evolved from the post WW2 consumer boom.  From one car garages to the "second car" (video)    phenomenon, fueled by manufacturing innovation and global access to raw materials,  got more women and teens on the road and changed how we think about cars.  Cars were about escape, freedom.  They got us out exploring. Roads and businesses evolved as this product reshaped how people worked, played and shopped for goods and services. They spawned road trip vacations and drive-in restaurants- youth culture and new political realities with more of the country opened up to view by the general public. They became a way of communicating who you were because the role they played was fundamentally social and moving out of your home base to do something - to define who you are.   

Now, home base is where more connecting and communication of status  takes place.  Technology has fueled this.  From home theaters, to home draft beer, coffee and wine bars.  Home is now a crucial hub. The need to venture out has changed and become more specific and less open-ended.  More people  share a greater percentage of their work life at home.  More takes place in this space than ever before. There is more venturing inward and bringing people in based on connections helped by a new level of connectivity among people .  The journey is now far more introspective.  And in this move inward women play a far greater role in deciding what that experience is in this hub.  So when we think of cars now we don't think of them as less escape pods and more comfort pods that need to keep that same level of cocooned experience.  More similar to what we see happening in airline interior design.  The other reality is that much of the experience of driving has been taken away  via cruise control and improved roads and highways - so basically the weight of the experience is now a reinforcement of the comfort zone that is established in the home. 

The position of the car as second living room is a bit of a quick jump though. It is more complex than that.  Balancing aspects of car culture with aspects of home cocooning will be crucial.

A Chrysler spokesman, Mike Aberlich, said Mr. Nardelli’s comments might have stemmed from the briefings he received from the company’s marketing experts and car designers.

Their research has shown that customers are placing a greater emphasis on vehicle interiors. In fact, Chrysler has frequently referred to its minivans as “living rooms on wheels,” he said.