October mags.

- I do like GQ's 50th Anniversary issue. I wanted the Paul Newman cover--I received Johnny Depp. That's cool I guess. For last year's Men of the Year issue, I wanted Jay-Z; I received Will Ferrell. I suppose that's the downside of subscriptions. Of the top 50 men of style, several designers are included like Slimane, Saint-Laurent, and Givenchy. In the top 15 to watch for the next 50 years, not a single designer--no Tom Ford, Thom Browne, or Nicolas Ghesquiere. Not a one. Either US GQ is ignoring the fashion world, or they made a huge oversight.

- Although we all probably could've guessed it, Justin Timberlake and Jake Gyllenhaal do not dress themselves for events. Surprise! Gyllenhall uses stylist sisters Clare and Nina Hallworth; Timberlake, Annie Psaltiras. And I thought those two guys just "had it"...at least Jake! Justin's "FutureSex/LoveSounds" look was a little, well, styled. But he did make me covet a YSL three-piece suit, for sure.

- Also received Men's Vogue. I love that Ralph Lauren has a big layout. He deserves major props. He is American men's fashion.

- I received October's Details a while ago. I always love what they do over there. So they need to keep it up. I don't know if I agree with their top ten item list, though. Isn't it just a rehash of last year's from nearly every F/W issue? All criticism aside, their editorials are always incredible and they have the best fashion coverage, I think.

If only I spoke French...

And if only it was going to be available in the States. Another fashion documentary, this time about the man, Karl. Lagerfeld is another designer whom I am kind of obsessed with. He's crazy! And I love watching these creative people doing their thing. Maybe Colette will have this? Hmm.

Attention Hipsters...!

To those who are trying to make the most out of the Wayfarer's recent resurgence in popularity and the subsequent doom that all things cool eventually come to, the Wayfarer's time is up! As there is nothing unique and/or hip about southern sorority girls, you know something has become ubiquitous when they pick it up. So to my dismay (basically because I thought Wayfarers required skinny jeans, striped shirts and Kirsten Dunst at your side), I saw them everywhere this weekend during tailgating for yesterday's football game. And they are apparently filtering across other campuses as well. The pic below is not from my school. So even if it's only two campuses (which I doubt), the Hipsters of New York would be having an emo-cow.

There is something off about how these glasses have been worn for much of the past year and how these girls are putting them with sundresses and flip-flops that's giving me a bad case of cognitive dissonance. If this continues, it's Risky Business all over again (and we know how that turned out). Fashionista predicted the Wayfarers demise a few weeks back, and it now looks like it's oh so true.

Photo: No one I know--just an example of the Wayfarers new market. Chloe Sevigny would be so upset.

Thank god. I kind of hated them anway!

Oh shit.

Marc Jacobs isn't playing, either. Whether for men or women, if Marc left New York and began showing both the MJ line and Marc elsewhere, it would be a huge blow to American fashion. He is easily one of the headliners of NYFW. While I don't think showing a show two hours later than scheduled, with no apparent reason, is cool, the details included in the article (that Italian factories were closed for the whole of August, thus could not ship things to get here sooner) gives Marc a stronger case, beyond the default "prima donna" explanation we'd like to give him. I wasn't that impressed with this S/S08 collection, particularly after the beauty of the F/W07 collection. But he's kind of an American fashion institution--not Ralph Lauren, but also definitely not Proenza Schouler. If anything, his shows are one of the bright spots, awesome collection or not, of NYFW.

Please don't go, Marc!

By the way, the Loic Prigent documentary of Jacobs' LV S/S07 collection is kind of awesome. If you compare it to "Signe Chanel" and the process Lagerfeld uses to create his collections there, it seems that Marc is much more hands on, like he's down there draping himself. While neither seem to do much of the sewing, Jacobs looks to at least be in the studios, while Karl seems quite removed from where his atelier crafts his designs. Ooh, also, you see the creation of the heinous Cubist Vuitton bag--the one made from six or seven different LV bags. While that bag is kind of tacky, it was a bear to create and construct. I love to see stuff like this.

On that note, Thom Browne is a mystery to me, so I'd like to see how he creates a collection and what he's like as a person--we know very little about him other than that he very much enjoys the ankle. Loic needs to give him a call!

Colette doesn't play.

I ordered the Marc Jacobs/Louis Vuitton documentary Sunday night. It will arrive at my apartment tomorrow morning. I guess that's what happens when you pay a lot for shipping, but I just assumed it was because I was American and they are French. Yeah France!

Did anybody else see Marc by Marc? He's got some smart looking things going on for next Spring. I like the jackets.

Damn it, Kanye!

First, he makes this ridiculous tirade at the VMAs. And now, the dumb picture I have of him in the post about Tom Ford eyewear is driving people to my blog, but only to see that picture. I thought there were all kinds of people reading my awesome stuff. No such luck. But if you're reading this, and like what you see, tell your friends. Even if Kanye West is what brought you here.

Do you need a bow tie to go with your navy pants?

Has it come to be that when a man wears a dark pant and tucks in his shirt that he constitutes “dressed up”? Every time I wear navy chinos or a pair of dark denim, people comment, “You’re all dressed up!” No, I have on the same pants from yesterday, but rather than being a shade of faded beige, they are dark blue. While dark colors in general, your blacks and your blues, tend to be used most in “dressed up” clothes, can we not wear them with the same attitude and feeling one wears the, apparently, more relaxed browns? Or have we become so used to seeing khaki that the only reason one would wear blue or black pants would be because they are “dressed up”?

I went to this thing last night for school. It was my department’s welcoming/beginning of the school year party. I wore a purple plaid oxford, a pair of raw denim jeans, and my Wallabees (my go-to shoe for F/W). This kind of outfit was not out of the ordinary for what I might wear to school or to any other kind of outing. But I got many comments on my clothes. I admit, the shirt was kind of fly. I’d like to think I could thank Chris Bailey over there at Burberry, but I have a feeling he had very little to do with this exact shirt I had on. Maybe it was the whole outfit, dark pants included, that tipped everyone off that I was, indeed, “dressed up”. Perhaps it was that my clothes provided a sharp contrast to the t-shirts and shorts that many of the grad students, and even professors, were wearing. Yes, I did intend to look good, and to have people notice. For me, I’m just as comfortable in dark denim as I am in khaki pants—at the end of the day, they’re both pants. But this happens every time I wear dark pants. And it is to the pants that I attribute part of this thing that happens.

Oddly enough, very few to no one says anything when my outfit includes a pant in a shade of brown. It could be the same top I’ve worn with dark pants, but now with lighter ones, and no one says anything about being dressed up. Have we become so addicted to the khakis and honey browns that when we see a man wearing navy, or even black, pants we assume they’re dressed up? Is there something that got twisted along the way that now uses a tucked in shirt as an indicator of someone who is dressed up? In September’s Vogue, there is a series of articles about the fact that many of today’s women are either scared of “dressing up” or are so confused as to what it means that they end up not “dressing up”. I think the problem extends beyond women, and into the realm of man.

The same month’s Details includes an essay about men wearing “mom jeans”—the ones that are of a light blue and may or may not be tapered at the end. Many a man will put those bad boys on, throw on a button-down and say they’re ready to go to dinner. Maybe it is about the color, then, that differentiates dressed up and dressed down. The color of many of these men’s mom jeans are in fact one that is lighter. But maybe it’s about the less than little to no thought people want to use when deciding what to wear—the mom jeans are comfortable, and they’re right there, you don’t have to search for anything else because the jeans are right where you left them when you took them off yesterday. Let’s face it, sometimes it only requires a little bit of thought, like say grabbing the chocolate brown chinos instead of the beige ones that keeps you out of mom territory and in the male gender column.

Even if your pants are not in fact dark, the simple act of tucking the shirt tail in moves you out of the generic. All of this takes the same amount of time you would use when figuring out which flip-flops to wear with your cargos (ugh). Or just put on some navy pants.

Photos: RalphLauren.com, Burberry.com

Well...

Between this being my first full week of classes, and all the insanity of fashion week, I haven't been updating a whole lot. And the fact that much of NYFW is dedicated to women's wear and most of the S/S08 menswear was presented earlier this summer, there just isn't much to report on and/or discuss. I will, however, have a full run down of all S/S08 menswear within the next week.

All that being said, there are a couple folks I forgot would be showing this week, Michael Bastian included. I was glad to see his collection.

Also, a professor whose work I much respect has asked for my take on fashion. I wanted to write back and say that I don't think anyone over five years old should wear denim shorts and that any kind of short or pant featuring cargo pockets should be burned. I don't think that's at all what she wants. I plan to write an essay within the next month detailing my take on fashion. My first step will be to read Diana Crane's "Fashion and Its Social Agendas". We'll see where I'm at after that.

Photo: Diana Crane.

Thom Browne is crazy...

But I still love him. Here are some of the first looks we have from Thursday's runway, thanks to the New York Times. Despite the long fringe and the knotted shirt sleeves, Browne is making waves, of some sort. At least some of his insanity seems wearable. If only my bank account matched how much I admire this dude. I saw him when I was in NY. I nearly shit my pants. I didn't want to shout him out right during dinner, but I was in awe for sure. Maybe there's some hope that his Black Fleece collection for Brooks Brothers will some how make it down to me, and go on an insane markdown. Time will tell.

I'm glad we're only into day two of NYFW. There's some hope left for some hottness.

...

No word on anything NY Fashion Week. Apparently, today is the first "official" day. If so, I hope pictures from yesterday's "unofficial" happenings appear, because I need to see the Band of Outsiders' collection! Ah!

In other news, I just bought the Italian chino suit jacket from J.Crew's online sale. I'm not sure what, beyond denim, that I'll wear it with right now, or even when I'll wear it, as khaki colored suits are not necessarily fall gear. But I don't yet plan on wearing the full suit (the pants are no longer in stock), so I think it'll work as a sports coat. Either way, for $100 for everything including shipping, it was too much to pass up--I had to have it!

Speaking of fall and jackets, I have found myself stalking Philip Lim's boy-cut pea coat. Because I don't live in NY, I can't just roll up to the store and try it on. But I want to know what it might look like on me. And I'm just not sure if it's a good look at all. Yet, I still think it's kind of awesome. Ugh. I don't know.

NY Fashion Week begins tomorrow.

Who I'm excited to see:

- Band of Outsiders (Tuesday - presentation)
- Rag and Bone (Wednesday - runway)
- Thom Browne (Thursday - runway)
- Ralph Lauren (Saturday - runway)
- 3.1 Philip Lim (Sunday - runway)

Despite the huge numbers of designers showing over the next week, I'm into only a few. Milan and Paris showed S/S08 earlier this summer, so we're really catching the tail end of the men's designs for next season.

I was only sort of impressed by the Europeans. I was disappointed by Chris Bailey, whose Prorsum line for Burberry seemed rather strange, and I tend to love most things they do over there. I enjoyed Balenciaga, but that may be because I love Ghesquiere's work for his women's line. There were a few other bright spots, Gucci comes to mind, but nothing particularly outstanding.

Photos: Burberry Prorsum, Balenciaga, Gucci -- courtesy men.style.com

I'll be more interested in the F/W08 collections we'll see early next year, particularly that of Kris Van Assche for Dior. I quite like his own line, but was a little weirded out by his designs for Dior. Obviously, he's not Slimane so his work will be different, but I am so used to seeing the Slimane silhouette, etc. However, Van Assche's take was welcome because he did his own version of Dior rather than a Hedi-redux, which he rightfully should as their new taste maker.

We'll see what NY has in store for us.