Wundering

Our lovely friend Zora Boyd, the genius behind Wunderkammer Jewellery dropped by last night. She left a beautiful present, a silver Wunderkammer skull ring with tattooed face and flowers for eyes. It's so beautiful we had to shoot it.

Photography: Grant Fell. Lighting: Rachael Churchward

Black 13: Jonas Bresnan and Katie Felstead shoot Kristine Drinke

The shoots are rolling in for Black 13 and we are excited to have Aussie/UK photographer Jonas Bresnan working with UK fashion editor Katie Felstead for her third Black shoot in a row. The pair have worked with make-up artist Mel Archer @ CLM and hair stylist Mark Daniel Bailey @ Artlist to capture one of the most interesting new faces we have seen in a while, Elite London's Kristina Drinke (top). The Latvian beauty is relatively unknown but has a face that suggests she won't be for long. Bresnan, a German-born Australian based in London, is described by Models.com as one of the "photographers bringing sexy back" and he already has three covers to his name including the fabulous Muse cover of Claudia Schiffer (above) styled by the wonderful Sarah Cobb. We are also rather fond of Jonas's editorial of Black Issue 5 cover girl Rosie Huntington -Whiteley (below) who, incidentally, is replacing Megan Fox in the upcoming Transformers 4 movie.

Lashes Eleven

Mascara is a beauty staple of women everywhere and M.A.C cosmetics have long recognised this by developing mascaras for every woman and every situation. The right wand and formula can perform a multitude of miracles; lift, curl, lengthen, darken, separate, thicken, volumize - the requirements are seemingly endless. A mascara's quality lies in its precise combination of wand and formula so when the lovely folk at M.A.C gave us this mirror showcasing all of the current mascaras on offer from the uber beauty brand, it only seemed right to post the eleven here on Blacklog. Two new mascaras are now available at M.A.C locations: M.A.C Studio Fix Lash features a wand that is an amalgam of a brush and a comb allowing a root-to-tip share of an innovative mousse-style formula over every single lash - sparse, spare lashes included. M.A.C Opulash delivers sexy, smouldering, fat-lashed volume and lots and lots of curl with an extra large brush. So crack that whip, and lash it good.

A Land Called Fantasy

We're loving these images from the forthcoming Prada FW2010 Look Book. Described as a 'fantasy look book, the images, backstage and runway shots from the recent European shows, are cleverly transformed by art directors Alexander Reichert and Fausto Fantinuoli at long-time Prada Spa design and architectural partner OMA. OMA, and in particular, Rem Koolhaas, have played a significant role in the design and art direction of Prada's epicenter store in Rodeo Drive and a number of other Prada global stores since 2000 as well as providing the art direction for their famous catwalk shows in recent times. The design division AMO is also responsoble for Prada's magazine. All photography from backstage and catwalk by Philip Meech.

Seeing (Valentino) Red in Brizzy

In early August, Tourism Queensland are hosting Black Magazine in Brisbane for a weekend to attend the opening of the Valentino Retrospective Past/Present/Future exhibition at the city's classy GOMA gallery. The exhibition is a stunning display of many of the masterpieces created by the great Italian couturier Valentino Garavani and the House of Valentino. The exhibition runs from August 7 to November 14 and Brisbane is the only Australasian city to host the retrospective courtesy of the wonderful Les Arts Decoratifs, a private, non-profit museum of the decorative arts in Paris. Valentino is recognised for many things; from literally creating a colour to providing that most elegant of stateswoman, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, with six black and white dresses to mourn the passing of her husband in 1964, and much in between.

Perhaps it is the recognition from the French government as the first official couture house outside of Paris, within the strict definition of haute couture, that says it all though. Curated by Pamela Gobin, curator-in-chief for the Fashion and Textiles collection of Les Arts Decoratifs, the weekend also features future directions of the house (since Valentino's retirement in 2007) with five recent creations by new creative directors Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli - who had already been working together designing accessories for the previous ten years. For lovers of great fashion the hop across the ditch for a weekend of Brisbane spring time has never looked more appealing, especially with some of the airfares on offer this morning. Thanks Tourism Queensland...

Black 13 - Vuitton In The Rain

Caity above Motutara Island

So the rain came as promised on Friday and yes, it did make our day shooting Louis Vuitton Fall 2010 a little difficult, but the light was utterly fantastic all day and we had enough hands on deck to ensure the range was well looked after. All details in the previous post so here's a selection of behind-the-scenes shots but we're not going to give away too much just yet!

Ella grapples with the wind

Victoria having her hair dried for the fifth time!

Photographer David Shields is a picture of concentration

Crew shot (above) and (below) Ella's

silhouette

Above: Make-up artist Stacy Lee Ghin applies Caity's lip

John helps out with a light reading

Fashion editor Rachael Churchward fits KW footwear.

The Chucks act as a stepping stone in the rain

The bluffs keep rolling at Muriwai

Black 13 -NZ shoot 1 - Here comes the rain

After some of the most sublime Auckland winter weather in memory, the forecast for tomorrow is for rain. We're pleased about this as we had hoped for a wet and wintery day to capture the raw beauty of a winter's day at Muriwai for this particular issue of Black. We're also deeply excited to be shooting the dress above and several more from the Louis Vuitton Fall 2010 RTW range, in New Zealand. Black fashion director Rachael Churchward is mixing it up with a couple of internationally recognised New Zealand designers; Karen Walker and Kate Sylvester. Photographer David Shields, a stalwart of early Black issues, is a fan of the rain and its attendant low light challenges and Greg Murrell will be overseeing hair on all of the NZ shoots in issue 13. Stacey Lee Ghin is on make-up and the models are NZ new faces; Victoria, Caity and Ella, all at Clyne Models. Assistant fashion editor is Phoebe Trezevant-Miller. We'll post on-set images from the LV Meets Muriwai (working title) shoot tomorrow or Saturday.

Lara's The One

Whilst it is good to see Black 11 cover girl Constance Jablonski (above) at number 10 on the coveted Models.com ranking of the world's top 50 (or is that 70?) working girls - and to see Black cover girls Heidi Mount (12), Hannah Holman (21), Siri Tollerod (43) andAlana Zimmer (44) still featuring - it's great to see the ubiquitous chameleon Lara Stone (below) assuming the number one position that was held for so long by Rachel Zimmerman.

The poster girl for real women really is a great beauty in a classical sense. We'll be announcing another top 50 girl for the cover of Black 13 soon.

Blacklisted #2

Above: Zana of Garbage Dress

Meadowlark's Limited Edition Blogger Collection.

Below: Di$count

Above: Kingdom of Style

In the press release about Meadowlark's new line of colab jewellery, a range designed in partnership with bloggers, Chris Lorimer's Ciel PR quotes the quote master himself, Karl Lagerfeld; " Fashion is all about zeitgeist. It has to be something that comes to you, but you have to be like a watch; right on time, because 'zeit' means time. I'm only interested in now and tomorrow - yesterday was ok." Meadowlark, one of New Zealand's leading contemporary jewellery designers has interpreted, probably quite accurately, that "now" equals "bloggers" and decided to incorporate the creative thinking of four bloggers into the new designs. Simply entitled the Blogger Collection, it is a great wee range and the choice of bloggers is inspired: the UK's Kingdom of Style, Aussie blogs Di$count and Gnarlitude and San Fran/New York's Garbage Dress all work with Meadowlark to create a ring each. They are all top line blogs and the designs are equally desirable. Great idea, great result.

Below: Gnarlitude

S Double - the return of Shawn Stussy

Back in the 80's and 90's Stussy was the coolest, most covetable street wear brand around. The Mossimos, Airwalks, Mooks et al were really all just tagging along for the ride as Stussy surfed wave after wave of design concepts, music genres and styles - the pork pie hat and classic over all/dungaree spring immediately to mind. The label's founder, Shawn Stussy, was a hard out surfer and board shaper that simply decided to make fashion (Stolen Girlfriends and Huffer, you are on the right road) up until he sold his share of the company to Frank Sinatra Jnr in 1996. Family and a lot more surfing in Hawaii followed for many years, until now. S/Double, Shawn's new label is available online here and looking good too.

Converse - Three Artists, One Song Mach 2

In 2008 Converse facilitated the creation of one of the sweetest indie tunes released that year. My Drive Thru, featuring Santogold, Julian Casablancas and N.E.R.D and was produced by Pharrell Williams. It was a quality tune from an interesting threesome. In recent times Converse have fully taken to heart their positioning within the psyche of the world's creative communities and particularly its place as the great rock'n'roll sneaker. They recently instigated a number of quality arts and music initiatives that can be viewed online here. The latest Three Artists, One Song series, features conscious, classy rapper Kid Kudi who is sublime on the mic while Vampire Weekend's Rostam Batmanglij and Best Coast's Bethany Cosentino round it up in an indie chime. Nice...

The Caker - Jordan's baking up a storm.

As you may or may not know Jordan Rondel has been writing for Black for the past couple of issues. We asked her to write about local fashion labels and retailers because she has great personal style. After recently sampling some of her cup cakes though, it is clear she is also a talented baker of fine cakes that reflect her French and NZ lineage. Last year she started her own cake making business and blog, The Caker. If you live in the Auckland area Jordan will whip up one of her amazing creations for $40 delivered.

Beautiful Youth Aotearoa: Clyne

Victoria

As we move into shooting season for Black 13, we've been scouring the various local model agencies looking for interesting new models for our local shoots with fashion director Rachael Churchward - and photographers Russ Flatt, Craig Owen, Stephen Tilley, David Shields and Marissa Findlay. In a developmental sense the industry is looking very healthy with a plethora of beautiful new faces coming through at all of the main agencies and also at the boutique establishments. We thought we'd post a few of the new faces that are capturing our eye for a variety of reasons - there are many more who could easily appear in a future issue of Black and many that will succeed elsewhere. First agency, Clyne Models where there is a strong development board - and a high percentage of redheads.

Yasmin Bidois

Lauren

Jono.

Ella Verberne.

Caity.

Declan Riesteren.

Stetsasonic "Talkin All That Jazz"

This hip-hop gem was the second single off Stetsasonic's second album, In Full Gear (1988) and showcases the original hip-hop band's still unique mix of live instrumentation and rap. Pinned on a jazzy shuffle with Lonnie Liston Smith's Expansions bassline - played on stand-up bass - the tune is testament to an incredible era of hip-hop. There's some classic fashion of the time in this clip too - the 'black force' image a la Public Enemy in the bar through to the white boiler suit look, Prince Paul and the crew sure looked the part. De La Soul, Tribe Called Quest, Jungle Brothers, BDP....Talkin All That Jazz would have been influential to them all.

Blacklisted #1

Image: Andy Eaton

Over the last twelve issues of Black Magazine we have featured 'things we love' in our upfront section 'Blacklist.' Today we thought we'd begin to post a series on Blacklog under the title 'Blacklisted' - the people, products, tunes, bands etc that we are loving here at Black. Simple as that, we love this.

Band of Skulls.

This British three piece released their debut album, the charmingly-named Baby Darling Doll Face Honey in March 2009 to considerable critical acclaim. Packed with singles like I Know What I Am, Blood, Fires and the Twilight Saga soundtrack-featuring Friends (but don't hold that against them), yet the album has a couple of killer tracks that haven't joined the single train, notably Dull Gold Heart and the gorgeous, creeping Cold Fame. Considering Band of Skulls only formed in November 2008 they very much look like a band to watch over the next year or two.

Andy Eaton.

At the risk of sounding like a stuck record, we don't take submissions here at Black but every now and then a photographer approaches us about shooting for us and we find it hard to say no. London/New York based photographer Andy Eaton has a style that we believe is quintessentially Black so we have commissioned him to shoot a ten page editorial for Black 13 with stylist Sara Dunn. Andy has a substantial pedigree having worked as an assistant with Solve Sundsbo and Nick Knight before assisting Mert & Marcus for 1 year. More recently he has assisted full-time with Tom Munro in New York.

VSmagazinelive.com.

Fashion films are proliferating on the net, as are sites willing to post moving image fashion. One such site is the online home of VS Magazine. Described as a 'curated and emotional view on fashion and culture' the site, and particularly the television section, is a veritable treasure trove of video, TV, fashion and music clips both contemporary, and enticingly, historical. It's clear they have quality archival researchers on board; clips including Bridget Bardot singing on a motorcycle, David Bowie as a teen fronting a 'long hair protest, the original Nancy Sinatra video for Bang Bang (above), excerpts from film's such as Polanski's Cul de Sac and much more have been lovingly curated in a fab gallery of fashion and culture. Not 100% sure about some of Ellen von Unwerth's films but by and large well worth a look.

Lara Stone in the new Calvin Klein campaign.

Not since the above mentioned Bridget Bardot has a front tooth gap been so adorable and desirable. Lara Stone, a global favourite amongst fashion photographers and the model currently ranked Number 1 in the world by Models.com features in the new campaign for Calvin Klein Collection, ck Calvin Klein and Calvin Klein Jeans. The Calvin Klein Collection images were shot by Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott who are themselves on a trajectory toward Number 1, as the image above would suggest. Beautiful...

Blaire Archibald.

At just 21, Blaire Archibald is finishing his degree at AUT in fashion and design with a project that has captured our attention here at Black, to the degree that we are planning to offer some assistance with said project. The snappily dressed fashionista has a knowledge of the broader industry, including publishing, that belies his age. He is also a model listed on the very strong development board at Clyne Models in Auckland giving him experience on both sides of the camera. Watch this space...