Cruise Control

Today we viewed the Louis Vuitton Cruise 2010 and Men's Pre-collection Spring/Summer 2010 ranges at the Louis Vuitton VIP room in downtown Auckland. Marc Jacobs has outdone himself, and that's saying something, with the French Coquette-inspired Cruise range - a spirited, sparkling collection that will have LV lovers the world over re-organising their wardrobe (or trunk) to make space for a collection that is literally shimmering with gems. Nautical themes tie in to cinched dresses that effortlessly harbour one of the most challenging partnerships in fashion; stripes and polka dots together. The sparkle that shines is omnipresent; shimmering monogram-stamped sequins, Swarovski crystals and elements of Vuitton's famous luggage are incorporated into heels, boots and clothing emanating a 'cool couture' attitude. But wait there's more! The new men's collection had Black Senior Fashion Editor Atip W and myself dancing a jig with a small but classically American range replete with bicycle courier-inspired lightweight goodies, and a fabulous 60's college jacket that is beyond "must have." All-in-all, two stunning summer collections that point strongly to great things coming from Marc Jacobs and the iconic brand. The Cruise range can be seen here at ILVOELV.

Sneaky Squizz - Black 11 - 3

We have all of Robert Erdmann's London shoots in now and, as you would expect, they all showcase top drawer photography, fashion, hair, make-up and models. The men's shoot (above) features the styling of the inimitable William Gilchrist, stylist for The Rolling Stones Shine A Light tour/movie and an authority on men's fashion. Hair is by Tyler Johnston, make-up by Shama - both at CLM London and the model is Petr @ Select London.

Black's New Stylehunter

Publishing magazines can take an inordinate amount of time. The Churchword and I recently decided that despite our best efforts we haven't been keeping our blogs up to date as often as we would like to and we needed to enlist some help, particularly with The Black Eye. Who better to ask then than stylish girl round town, Jordan Rondel. Many of you will know her as a contributor to the excellent Isaac Likes and we have admired her personal style for some time now so it made perfect sense. Jordan will be on the look-out, along with Rachael and myself, for the sartorially sublime at Air New Zealand Fashion Week and on the streets and in the work places around town. She will also make contributions here on Blacklog.

Black 11 - The Schwartz Report #4 - Hannah Holman

Today in New York, Michael Schwartz, Valery Gherman and Elizabeth Sulcer will be shooting our fourth cover girl for Black 11. Hannah Holman is a relative newcomer compared to Heidi Mount, Constance Jablonski or Siri Tollerod but she is definitely on the rise. The Elite New York girl has recently shot the new global campaign for Miu Miu with Mert and Marcus and also just shot Vogue Nippon with uber stylist Joe McKenna. She has a fabulous face and a hell of a 'look' - watch this space...

Talking Pictures

Above: Marrissa Findlay's lovely flamingos

Mobile phone technology is developing so quickly that anything may soon be possible with the power-packed communication devices; changing channels, blocking police radars, opening the garage door - our world is the personal communication device's oyster. Yet it is the camera component of the phone which is here and now. Recognising this Samsung have teamed up with some of Aotearoa's most creative people to celebrate the launch of the new Samsung Ultra Touch staging an exhibition and auction of images taken on the phone's 8 megapixel camera with dual power LED flash. The selection of collaborators is quite inspired too: brilliant film-maker Taika Waititi, artist Otis Frizzell, Front Row Diary editor Anna Fitzpatrick, TVNZ make-up queen Michiko Hughes, actress Madeleine Sami, George FM breakfast host Nick D, fashion photographer Marissa Findlay and media personalities Tee Twyford and Josie Steenhart. The exhibition takes place at the new Zambesi store in Newmarket on September 16 and will raise funds for one of the best charities around, Youthline. Judging by these first pics in - which can be seen online here on a regularly-updated basis, it will be a fascinating mix of creative capture.

Above: Anna Fitzpatrick knows a good pair of shorts when she sees them.
Below: Michiko Hughes snaps the fashion TV.
Bottom: Otis Frizzell takes one of an E.

Black Showcased On F-Tape

Black collage courtesy F-Tape

We have been honoured by inclusion on London fashion mega resource F-Tape's independent magazine special which has been created to coincide with the upcoming London Fashion Week. The site decided to pull together their choice of the best 20 or so indie fashion titles in the world and have included Black Magazine on that list. Considering the list includes such venerable titles as S., Tokion, Wonderland, Volt, Hercules, Zink, Dansk and many more, we are pretty excited - and for the contributors whose work was chosen by the F-Tape crew from the images supplied.

Thanks F-Tape!

Seductive Lens

We weren't able to make it along to the Plaything Gallery recently to witness the Derek Henderson film for Stolen Girlfriend's Club Weapons of Mass Seduction first hand. Luckily Luke Harwood flicked us the link to the film online at Curious Films as it is a lovely thing. Featuring a bunch of SGC's friends and associates never quite starting - or finishing - their sentences, the film is set to a lilting music track by Milan Borich and it's an hypnotic way to see the current range. There are a few musos including Borich, Rebekah Davies and The Check's Jacob Moore (above). Here's the link...

Vision On

Children Of Vision launched their online store this week and judging by the post (above) on the front page of influential UK fashion blog Kingdom Of Style, it had an immediate affect...

Flying Finn

Some people hate pigeons. "Flying rats!" they say indignantly while shooshing them away from park benches, statues and river banks. Not so artist Finn Fair who rather charmingly describes them as "a proud, heroic icon of the downtrodden and disenfranchised" and has incorporated the winged creatures into his recent body of work Shine On Dirt. The artist sees a parallel between pigeons and the under class and says the work draws on this parallel and celebrates his "friends, the artists, musicians, labourers, workers, beneficiaries, the ill, the eccentrics and misfits." Shine On Dirt is "an obvious sign of adoration for the beautiful personalities I have surrounded myself with." As long time fans of the outsider, we can only agree.

Shine On Dirt opens at the COCA gallery in Christchurch on September 22.

Alastair Makes Good

Image: Models.com

We have some fond memories of Air NZ Fashion Week and perhaps no more so than 2003 when a young I.D magazine stylist called Alastair McKimm came to New Zealand and hooked up with Nom D. Alastair ingratiated himself with the locals although he very much became 'The I.D guy" rather than Alastair McKimm. At that stage he was a freelancer who had been fashion editor on a number of I.D shoots rather than being on the staff payroll. He returned to style Nom D's show the following year and has strong ties to the New Zealand fashion scene. The Churchword had been trawling Streeters.com recently and was very impressed to see the quality of work the stylist has been delivering of late, so it came as no surprise to see his cheeky face on the front page of Models.com overnight. Having just been made fashion director of uber cool New York mag The Last Magazine, let's hope he is on the list of media targets for next year's Air NZ Fashion Week.

Below: Alastair styles Aggy

Nice Artse!

It is no slight on New Zealand advertising creatives but sometimes sitting right behind a bus's back end can be gruelling for those of us who don't want bank interest rates or photo copier refill deals shoved in our faces. Great news then that Tiger Beer and the creative crew known as Cut Collective are offering an aesthetic alternative that will be considerably more pleasing on the eye.

The Cut Collective, comprised of five Auckland artists; the brilliantly-monikered "TrustMe", Component, Flox, Enforce 1 and Kool have spray-stencilled no less than 10 buses with their thought-provoking pieces, aimed at "people encountering art outside of the traditional context of the gallery or museum."

The buses are scheduled to hit Auckland streets from Sept 7 to November 22 but in the meantime you can check out more of the Cut Collective's work at Bungalow 8 in the Viaduct.

Shoemaker Shines - Black Hearts Kathryn Wilson

What a load of new cobblers! Or so it seems at present with New Zealand shoe designers starting to proliferate on both sides of the Tasman. In recent times we have seen the emergence of Chaos & Harmony, Aussie-based Beau Coops and the highly desirable Yours - and we are starting to see some real quality form, fashion and function for our feet, to boot (sorry). Thus, when local shoe designer Kathryn Wilson sent us some images of her new range we were eager to see how far she had progressed in the recently competitive pantheon of local shoe design and we can say without a word of a lie that she is on fire. For her Winter 09 collection Kathryn created a cute little black-and-white loafer named after our fashion director, the Churchward Loafer. The Summer 2010 range features a number of loafers again, plus killer high and low boots, moccassins, boat shoes, heels, pumps and some fabulous brogues (above). Add a wad of coloured patent leather and the range signals a coming of age for New Zealand's resident shoe queen.

A Brief History of Pink

Speaking of nice album covers, album of the week at Black HQ is A Brief History Of Love by The Big Pink (above). One of the first 'rock'albums of recent times reflecting the x-factor Brit-gat-vocal of The Verve or Jesus And Mary Chain - at their best - wrapped in quality contemporary production. The album's highlights include song du jour Dominoes, the building Velvet, the Mary Chain-esque title track and the verging-on-epic Too Young To Love. Pink is good. Very good.

Pleasant Rebel

The Walls of the Well is the lovely laid-back new album by Phoenix Foundation drummer Richie Singleton aka Rebel Peasant that's more chilled than Dan Carter, which is saying something. Like just about everything that comes out of Welli's Pretty Foundation enclave, it is an accomplished package including a shoe-in, we think, for NZ album artwork of the year so far. The quality fashion photography by Amelia Handscombe (above) and final treatment (below) is good enough to hang on your wall.

Sneaky Squizz - Black 11 - 2

We received a lot of love for Paul Empson and June Nakamoto's Parisien contributions last issue - in particular the shoot with Kim Noorda for which Nakamoto pulled and combined some classic pieces - notably the Westwood strapped boots and the Dior couture. The pair have collaborated once again for Issue 11 and the result is rather special. Empson cast Marloes Horst for the shoot as she had recently shot the Pirelli calendar with Terry Richardson and was very "comfortable with herself" whilst Nakamoto once again trawled the cities showrooms and press agencies looking for beautiful fashion.

We love the international flavour that our Paris team are bringing too - US-born Empson lives in Sydney but is spending more and more time in the city whilst Nakamoto, a regular contributor to the likes of I.D magazine, is of Japanese heritage but has been based in Europe for some time. The above image will feature in a 16 page spread shot once again in the splendiferous surrounds of Europe's romantic city.

Here Comes The Night

Swedish-born Andre Savaria was the most active graffiti-artist in Paris in the 1980’s before his trademark ‘Mr. A’ signature became an icon of Parisian life, travelling from the city walls to high fashion magazines and into fashion collaborations. He has a clothing line called Black Block, loves the nightlife, and appeared on the cover of the revered Purple Fashion Fall/Winter 2008 issue so when leading vodka brand Belvedere announced a collaboration with Savaria, it looks very much like a Paris match, made in heaven.

Belvedere IX will be available exclusively from select bars and restaurants around New Zealand, including Agents and Merchants, Bar3 at SkyCity, Clooney, and Hotel DeBrett in Auckland, Fat Eddies, Indochine and Sticky Fingers in Christchurch and Carousel in Dunedin, from August, 2009.

The Impossible (Polaroid) Dream

Photo: Cathleen Naundorf

When production of analogue instant film stopped at Polaroid's plants in Mexico and The Netherlands last June, photographers all around the world let out a collective "No!" The film has been widely loved as a creative medium and as a pre-shoot option when the main event, usually large format film was too expensive to waste on lighting set-ups and make-up finals. When local photographer (and instant film format lover) Stephen Tilly exhibited his excellent Polaroid Is Dead show here in Auckland as recently as May 2009, he obviously didn't know about The Impossible Project.

Impossible Project is a collective culled largely from former Polaroid factory workers who refuse to let the Polaroid company's transformation from an instant film company to a global consumer electronics and digital imaging company affect their desire to see the format continue. They have signed a 10 year lease on the old Netherlands Polaroid factory, engaged a team of the world's leading analogue film experts and plan to release their first instant film, a film that works in vintage Polaroid cameras, in 2010. They stress that this is "NOT Polaroid" and the film will have it's own characteristics "consisting of new optimised components, produced with a streamlined modern setup. An innovative and fresh analogue material, sold under a new brand name that perfectly will match the global re-positioning of Integral Films."

We can hear a collective "yes!" emanating from our photographer friends around the world.

The Impossible Project will be supplying Black Magazine with some of the new product for a shoot here in New Zealand that will appear in Issue 12.

Zam Zam Zam!

We are loving the new Zambesi Summer 09/10 campaign shot by Marissa Findlay. The images feature Vinnie Woolston, who needs little introduction to Blacklog readers, and the recently departed Alina who worked extremely hard in Aotearoa while she was here. Good to see the Zambesi brand and Marissa's photography more in sync than ever.

The range is in store at Zambesi now.

Tangential Divergence

Photography by director of Tangent Emmanuel Giraud and excellent styling by Heather Cairns

The figurative dictionary meaning of tangent; a completely different line of thought or action, is an apt description of the new online fashion magazine which launched in Sydney two nights ago. There seems to be a proliferation of online fashion mags over the ditch and this can only be a good thing. Academy For Men and now, Tangent. We know only too well what it costs to produce a big, quality-printed edition of a magazine so why not go down the path of getting as much content and concept online for far less outlay as possible? Like AFM, and locally 1am, Tangent is a good-size Issuu-powered page-turning format with some really good local fashion shoots inside that suggest style is alive and well in Australia. All-in-all, a nice new line of thought or action.

Top 5 Indie Tunes at Black HQ this week

You Push, I'll Go by Baby Dayliner.

Ethan Marunas aka Baby Dayliner is a graduate of La Guardia High School of Music & Art - better known as FAME school - but don't hold that against him. You Push, I'll Go is a sublime mix of eighties vocal a la The The or Orange Juice and a smooth little house groove. Loving this direction, maybe more indie types will absorb the great nineties house grooves instead of the super dull techno-trance rhythms underpinning so much of the so called 'new electronica'

Rats by The Black Heart Procession

This bands forefathers include Three Mile Pilot but they may also be shapeshifters judging by their publicity pics. Rats is a slow swamp country groove spliced with synths and overlaid with a laconic vocal - a tune that wouldn't be out of place on you guessed it, True Blood.

Deli by Delorean

The car of the same name is now famous and whilst this Spanish dance pop group aren't quite famous yet their synth-infused sound is not too dissimilar to Empire Of The Sun or MGMT so they could well be, quite soon. Best when it chugs along...

Zoomba by Starlight Mints

Alan Vest, the Nunez's and Javier Gonzalez, aka Starlight Mints, describe their sound "bubblegum synch" but on this tune they sound more like Bowie-Queen synch, and that's much better than it sounds.


Bull Black Nova by Wilco

Wilco's new album (The Album) will keep fans of this Chicago folk-country-indie sextet more than happy - yet the nicely-named Bull Black Nova is something of a departure - for the better. Unlike the rest of the album this tune has a groove based upon stabbed keys and even more interestingly, a searing twin guitar break that crescendos toward the end of the song. More please...

Dust Sisters

Serene Thain

When sixteen of Auckland's finest female artists decided to get together and form a visual artist cooperative called the Dust Collective it was always going to be a big call to find a space big enough to exhibit all of their work at once. Thus Auckland in September will host two simultaneous exhibitions; Dust 1.2 at AUT's St Paul Street Gallery and Dust:Dispersion at Artstation in Ponsonby.

Collective member Elaine Conway suggests there is a broad range of creative expression on offer: "We have Juliette Laird who crochets fishing line into balls of expanded dust; Juliet Monaghan who invites her audience into a wedding veil to experience the hopes and dreams of brides-to-be, Serene Thain who combs $2 stores to find an array of colourful plastic objects to create intricate Luna Park-like constructions and Jude Graveson who has stretched and dried animal gut to invite a look form the inside."

The women are all graduates of A.U.T, Elim and M.I.T and work in an assortment of media and when naming the collective, liked the analogy that dust moves, settles and inhabits spaces - a perfect segway from the post below. Both exhibitions open on Thursday September 17.

Juliette Laird

Elaine Conway

Sandy Dee-lite

Kseniya Simonova's sand massaging techniques in this performance for Ukraine's Got Talent are so flitteringly clever, it beggars belief she has only had 700,000 and something hits on You Tube. The sand-shifting artistic kaleidescope she orchestrates may be a mere performance on a Ukranian TV show but her Talent far exceeds it.

Black 11 - On Set - Street Life

Ajoh, our favourite last top model, with make-up by Amber D

Levi surveys the burgers and wonders about "Mermaid Dollars"

Believe it or not Commerce Street in Auckland's Britomart district is an interesting place, even at 7 o’clock on a Thursday night. Multi-national food outlets dot either side of the wide-ish thoroughfare, there is a metallic carpark centre-piece and The White Lady, open for almost every day since 1948, lights it all up with her fairy lights and quality burgers. A good place for the third part of our shoot thought photographer Russ Flatt, and by and large it was. Then the er, freaks came out. In the case of Freaky Glasses Guy (below) and his impressive ensemble, it was a welcome intrusion. The Churchword commented that the combo of outfit, glasses and particularly the positioning of the eyewear on his head was a styling moment that she could not have thought up herself. Street magic.

Freaky Glasses Guy gets in the picture with Lewis

Rachael fits Ajoh into the Alexander Wangs

Angus pulls a pukana and (below) Russ Flatt's lens action...