Kobi Levi

Kobi Levi is a talented breed of shoe designer. He takes shoe design to a whole new level on the art scale with his cheeky creations. Some look like they were bore out of the mind of a sexual deviant and others from the innocent imagination of a child. With Halloween coming up I thought that this was an appropriate topic to cover since these shoes look like they are playing dress up and not what they seem. Here are some of my favorite pieces by him.

                                                                Banana Slip on 2010

                                                                        Blow 2010

                                                                            Miao 2010

                                                                     Sling Shot  2010

                                                               XXX Pump 2010

                                                                Chewing Gum 2009

                                                                Double Boot 2000


"In my artistic footwear design the shoe is my canvas. The trigger to create a new piece comes when an idea, a concept and/or an image comes to mind. The combination of the image and footwear creates a new hybrid and the design/concept comes to life. The piece is a wearable sculpture. It is "alive" with/out the foot/body. Most of the inspirations are out of the "shoe-world" and give the footwear an extreme transformation. The result is usually humoristic with a unique point of view about footwear. Another aspect of the creation is the realization. All the pieces are hand-made in my studio. The challenging technical development is the key to bring the design to life in the best way."
-Kobi Levi

*please click here to see Levi's blog and to see more of his designs

I had a dream...

                         Last night I has a dream that I went to an audition to model for Vogue.
                                   
                                   Anna Wintour, the editor-in-cheif was running it.

For those of you that are not familiar with Anna Wintour, you may remember a movie that came out in 2006 starring Anne Hathaway and Meryl Streep. Based on 2003 best seller novel, The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisburger. It is rumored that the role of Miranda Priestly, played by Streep was based on Vogue editor-in-cheif, Anna Wintour who Weisburger was an assistant to at one time. Wintour is notorious for her icy demeanor, and demanding personality.

In my dream I am with my boyfriend and he tells me he's so proud of me for auditioning to model. I tell him I'm not here to model. I point at Wintour and say "I want to be her someday." Not knowing who she is I tell him that she is probably one of the most powerful women in the fashion industry.

The audition goes on and I know that she will have no interest in me as a model because of my size, but I don't care.

As she's calling out names for those who made it. I stand with a group of girls telling them she likes tall blonds with broad shoulders. We watch as the models she picks are all broad shouldered tall blonds. One pretty curvy girl asks why she didn't get picked and Anna says "You know why! Because of your size."

The girl looks crushed and I get into a full out verbal brawl with Wintour. I can tell that no one has spoken this way to her in years since she is usually the one with all the power. Since I have nothing to gain or loose from her I go from making fun of her page boy bob hair cut to telling her that her daughter will end up with an eating disorder and that she needs to use her power to help women love themselves more instead of hating themselves. I have stunned her into silence. As I'm about to walk away she give me her business card and tells me to meet her at her office in a week for an interview.

What I'll be for Halloween

This year I think I will be dressing as head designer and creative director for the house of Chanel, Karl Lagerfeild.

I'm a die hard fan of the Chanel look but also its a fairly easy outfit, I practically dress like him as it pretty frequently. I don't think I'll carry around the little paper fan he used to be known for having.

*I'll post a picture of my costume

Christina Hendricks Bazaar Cover

Queen of Curves Christina Hendricks, star of hit show Mad Men graces the cover of Harper's Bazaar. This will not be the first cover.

She blew people away with her Venus-like image in the February/March issue of New York magazine. One cannot help but notice her whether its the bright red hair, amazing curves or the way she carries herself. Walking down the red carpet among waif thin actresses, she wiggles past them faster than you can say Marlyn Monroe, who she is often compared too. Her body shape almost always comes up in conversation for her.

"When the attention started to be about my figure, I was surprised, because it wasn't something I was focused on. And then it became very positive, and people were saying very nice things."

 In Harper's Bazaar, she talks about her life before acting when she was a model. She started out as one at 17. At 5'8 and a size 4, she was aked by her agent to loose 10 pounds.

"I remember thinking, You're crazy! I said okay, but I didn't do it. It seems that models have gotten smaller. I was a 4, but now they're a 0 or 2."

Hendricks is living proof that curvy is in fact quite sexy. It is refreshing to have a figure in the media that gives diversity in body shape. Everyone seems to adore Hendricks and find her irresistible.



"Women hit on me, my husband thinks it's so odd that so many women hit on me. Gay men too. They say to me, 'Well, I'm not straight, but if I was…' I think it's so flattering."

 

*click her to read full Harper's Bazaar article

Jean Paul Gaultier Ready to Wear Spring 2011 Opens with Plus Size Model

Jean Paul Gaultier's Spring 2011 collection reminded me if David Bowie in his Ziggy Stardust days had a love child with Joan Jett. Its a little punk, little glam rock, with some ethereal hippie/Bohemian frocks, thrown in with structured leather. Below are my favorite looks (it was hard not to post every piece.)

As you may have noticed, the show opened and closed with plus sized model, lead singer of the band Gossip, Beth Ditto. Despite her size Ditto is making her mark in the fashion world. In an interview, when asked if she had always been comfortable with her size, she replied, 

I used to say that no, I didn't. Sometimes, you feel uncomfortable but then you look around and realize it's not you -- it's what other people project onto you. It's not really how you feel about yourself; it's the way the world makes you feel. It's not even a real emotion, but it definitely affects you. When I was a little kid it was really hard for me. One day you're a cute, chubby kid, but then you get boobs and your mom realizes it's not baby fat. You start to feel a lot of weird pressure. There were times in junior high when I'd say, "When I get older I'll be thin." I thought it would go away.

But then high school came and I got into riot grrrl. My best friend, Jay, was also this fat gay boy. I would watch 'Jerry Springer' and there would be fat girls in bathing suits, and I would be like, "Gross!" And [Jay] would be like, "Who cares?" It was the first time I was ever like, "Oh, yeah. I don't really think it's gross. I've just been told that it's gross. I have that body. Why would I think it was gross?" It was just very deep. Some days you wake up and you're like, "Oh, God, it would be a lot easier to be in a different body." But I think everybody feels that way, no matter what body they have.

Ditto bravely posed nude for Love Magazine, showing that a body that is not portrayed in teh media whatsoever except in a negative manner can be attractive or at least an alternative. There are arguments about portraying obesity in a positive manner because of the health effects and the "epidemic" this country struggles with. This is a valid concern but the flip side is that the fashion world does not seem to bat an eye at the effects of only portraying a slim (no pun intended) view of what attractive is.

Recently I watched a documentary/lecture given by Jean Kilbourne, Number Four of her series "Killing Us Softly". Jean Kilbourne has been examining advertisement and how women have been portrayed in it for decades. Points she brings up a lot is that in advertisement, women are portrayed in demeaning and unrealistic ways. Airbrushed to perfection with body shapes roughly 5% of the countries population actually has, yet is the only size portrayed in all sources of media. Also for years women are portrayed in demeaning ways whether is be in a manner that is...

                                                               sexually violent....

                                                   dehumanizing (portrayed as objects....

                                                               ...or as animals)

                                                                    ...more violence

                                                          extreme sexuality.....

                                               ...and portraying children as sexual objects

Is having an overweight women in a fashion show all that bad? Seriously? Like women aren't made to feel bad enough in society. Maybe normalizing something that is normal, like diversity and body size, isn't such an awful thing. I'm curious as to how people feel about this...ideas?

Betsey Johnson Dress

 

Doesn't' she look like a Princess? Maybe... except for the fact her necklace reads "Ride Me" on it. Otherwise I found this to be a playful ethereal piece and a favorite of the Spring 2011 fashion line. What do you think? Would you ever where this and to what sort of event?