MAN Hour

Daryoush Haj-Najafi...

MAN, the Topman-backed group show and one of few genuine must-sees at London Fashion Week, is launching a range of tees and bags designed by those appearing in MAN's forthcoming show in September: Hans Madsen, leather specialist James Long and hotly tipped sportswear tailor Christopher Shannon. MAN has even gained a French contingent with fashion and art collective Andrea Crews, chosen by Colette proprietress Sarah.

The launch party, Brit Disco, took place during Paris men's week at Rive Gauche club, a massive improvement over the usual Le Baron, where I once witnessed Gareth Pugh get booted for making out in the toilet. London DJs Disco Bloodbath provided the tunes, disco being the musical micro-trend of the summer, especially of the Italo and Cosmic varieties. The air was hot with impossibly twink-like fashion editors and talk of new appointments, such as Dazed & Confused's Nicola Formichetti's new title of fashion director of Vogue Hommes Japan. He sat with Arena Homme Plus' Jo-Ann Furniss and V's Jay Massacret, while on the dance floor, throwing mad shapes, was Charlie Porter, new deputy editor of Fantastic Man and now i-D. His boss at Fan Man, Gert Jonkers, said of Romain Kremer's men's show earlier that evening: "Helmet Lang, new rave." While it wasn't meant enthusiastically, it should have been, as it cleverly summed up the Clockwork Orange-referencing, codpiece-featuring collection. Meanwhile, in queue for a smoke, rumors of an upcoming Teen V bounced around.

Also in the house was Seven New York's Joseph Quartana and former Lindberg designer and model-cum-DJ David Lindwall, who managed to bag a Seven order for his conspiracy-theory tees earlier that day, joining Dover Street Market. At the end of the night, Cassette Playa's Carri Mundane—yet another Seven favorite—introduced me to Kanye West's ever-present front-row pals and Paris Fashion Week sensations Don C and Taz Arnold whose style was described by the New York Times' Cathy Horyn as "fascinating" and "cubist." His solo project, TI$A, new release is Vote Obama, which samples Ice Cube. Don C declared by Justice tee, "Fresh to Death," making my night. They then left to go to a strip club with Carri, who told them they should definitely check out Bernhard Willhelm's show come Sunday. They did, with Kanye in tow, so if he's sporting medieval tights in his next video, you'll know why.


Fantastic Man's Jop van Bennekom & Gert Jonkers, Carri Mundane of Cassette Playa
photos by Debbie Bragg

The fourth and final installment from item idem on his SWAP collaboration with Andrea Crews collective...

Looking back, I can say with certainty that we accomplished our mission with SWAP, to express ideas and images through a combination of media: a pop-up shop, a window display, products, performances and blogs. SWAP even appeared in the Fashion Scoops section of Women's Wear Daily, featuring the final state as a window installation at colette. Yet, ironically, these successes might have unraveled the entire SWAP enterprise, because that same window was taken down a day early, following a polite request from Louis Vuitton, who apparently didn't like our reappropriation of their bags.

Far from an attack on Louis Vuitton's image or logotype, the SWAP project was merely an attempt to share ideas through art and fashion. For the six of its seven scheduled days, the window was extremely popular, drawing reactions of all kinds. I remember Andie MacDowell passing by and taking pictures with her mobile phone, while a few minutes later, an elderly woman denounced the window as very ugly. Personally, I am never that interested in good versus bad; I am more focused on the background noise and the intensity of reactions, whatever they may be. I believe this is what the artistic endeavor is all about, to provoke vivid emotions and engender new ways of thinking. Still, despite the early dismantling, Hint remains a fantastic window to express how pleasantly surprised I am to attract Louis Vuitton's attention with our humble project, yet also disappointed that passersby couldn't enjoy SWAP on the last day.

I'd like to thank all the actors and partners of the SWAP project for their generous participation, especially Sarah from colette, whose positive attitude and affection for experimentation is a model for us all. SWAP will be back!




Photos by Baudouin

Dark, shaky, blurry and boozy video of Colette's New York Fashion Week party—in conjunction with street label Married to the Mob and Jalouse magazine—at Beatrice Inn, with Uffie on hosting duties and a special DJ set by artist Fafi (who's the one in the feather headdress, in case you have bionic eyes)...

For Dogtown and Z-Boys, Thrasher freaks and deck collectors, Skate Study House debuts today at Colette. A project by 80's freestyle pro Pierre André Senizergues and Gil Le Bon de Lapointe, the exhibition recreates iconic pieces of furniture by the likes of Mies van der Rohe and Le Corbusier using skateboard ephemera. It's high design for post-grungers. Radical.

In the Colette gallery from January 7 - 26, Boogie will exhibit photos from his first book, "It's All Good" (Powerhouse). A Serbian who—thanks to the magic of the green-card lottery—fled to Brooklyn at the height of his country's civil war, he knows a thing or two about social unrest. Thus, despite Boogie's up-tempo name, a warning: the images are kind of a downer, yet in that enduringly optimistic way artists have...

Part two of Cyril Duval' Art Basel adventures...

Now enough about art, let's talk about the world of glamour and futility—parties! First up, the fete for the fourth edition of Javier Peres' Daddy magazine, hosted by himself, Terence Koh and Aron (the downtown don) in a men's strip club called Goldrush. Seeing the queer mafia in this crappy neon temple, symbolizing Western hetero cowboy power, was actually pretty cool—cute faces all around, no useless celebs showing off, plus everyone got free lap dances, thanks to Daddy Javier. Later, speaking of naughtiness, Monsieur Andre and his Le Baron team again provided the best place for finding trouble. Indeed one could meet almost anyone there, burning the last energy of the day in secret communion before waking up four hours later to buy and sell more art. Then there were parties for Purple, WOW, colette (this pic is of Sarah and myself), etc. So many parties, so little time.

And now, I'm still shocked by how people can throw a party and simply expect people to gather in an ill-designed space. I mean, an open bar isn't everything. Thus, the award for creative laziness goes to Visionaire's party to celebrate its latest art book, despite the hot vinyl records inserted inside, such as my pal Mai Ueda, with her great “I Wanna Buy Some Clothes“ track, and a hilarious backstage compilation by Michel Gaubert. Not only did they settle on MINI as their sponsor (do we care about a toy car gift?), but the doorman was possibly the bitchiest ever—fortunately, I didn't have to tangle with him. Upon entering, we were welcomed by half-naked, long-haired Chippendale look-alikes (I never thought I would one day say that—please someone bring back Hedi's skinny boys), who shamelessly pushed copies of the new Visionaire in our faces, as if we were shopping for live chickens in a New Delhi market. Plus, the music was all about Justice (nothing against them, but you know), the cocktails were kind of weird and we had to contend with an army of paparazzi trying to find the beautiful people. Perhaps they were waiting for late-arriving Linda Evangelista, as I was not.

Hint's art editor, Aric Chen, in Art Basel...

"You're eye candy; I can take CARE of you." That was Pharrell Williams's way of saying hi to my friend Josee Lepage, with whom designer Tobias Wong and I created a pop-up tattoo parlor at Design Miami. Earlier in the day, Williams had come by with KAWS and said he was into creating a tattoo for us sometime. But at dinner last night, at the home of real estate honcho Craig Robins (left) and Design Miami director Ambra Medda, Williams was apparently into other things. And so was Josee. "I can take care of you, too!" she shot back.

Josee wasn't the only eye candy there. Terry Richardson came in with some of his own, and as he walked past his self-portrait hanging in Robins's foyer, it was like seeing double vision—both Terrys were wearing the same red lumberjack shirt. Meanwhile, piles of sushi overflowed from buffets around the swimming pool, as uber-curator Hans-Ulrich Obrist held court and Paper's Kim Hastreiter gushed about the talented photographer Marcelo Krasilcic's project for the magazine earlier that day. Picture a stack of furniture with bananas on top. "He's Brazilian," Hastreiter explained.

Our bellies filled, we headed to the hot-ticket Visionaire party at the Delano, where the door scene was just a mild drama compared to the full-blown train wreck we expected. Inside, Cecilia Dean and outgoing Art Basel chief Sam Keller were chatting up our favorite architect, Jacques Herzog—"It's wild in here," Herzog told us—as models struck trashy poses in trashier dresses and Paul Marlow of un-trashy Loden Dager hinted that the menswear line was in for a big award (stay tuned).

Sarah from Colette won us over, telling us she had been wearing the temporary tattoo we were offering (the rest are permanent), before we headed to the Purple party at Le Baron. Amid the dancing throngs, we ran into a fresh-faced (and drinkless) Ryan McGinley, whose legs were dead, he said, from seeing all gazillion-and-a-half fairs, while Eli Sudbrack of Assume Vivid Astro Focus told us he'd been in town since Monday and still hadn't had enough. Purple's Olivier Zahm used our shoulder as a prop, leaping up to take photos of all the girls dancing on the furniture. And after having more drinks spilled on us than a rug in a frat house, it was 4 am and time to go home.

—Aric Chen