Material Archive

My week in pictures & other random stuff I like:

Awesome People Hanging Out Together

Eartha Kitt and James Dean





Andy Warhol & Alfred Hitchcock





Errol Flynn and wife Nora Eddington with Rita Hayworth and Orson Welles

Michael Jackson & Steven Tyler

Ella Fitzgerald & Marilyn Monroe

Karl Lagerfeld & Grace Coddington, 1974

Mick Jagger, William S. Burroughs & Andy Warhol, 1980.





Lauren Bacall, Humphrey Bogart & Marilyn Monroe, 1953





David Bowie, Iggy Pop & Lou Reed


See more here.

Suzie Smith's Celeb Dolls

 

 

Several years ago, at the Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition, I bought a Courtney Love doll that sits on the ledge of my bed. She has a tag that reads: "Don't date the captain of the football team, be the captain of the football team." --- Courtney Love

Needless to say, that quote makes me smile everytime –

Last week, I was super excited when I came across Tina Turner in similar form at The Drake General Store – another "Action Figure" from Suzie Smith. Below is a exerpt from her site on the series:

"Action Figures is a series of screen-printed dolls of famous people who I find iconic and inspirational. In the series I created dolls of Yoko Ono, Tina Turner, Courtney Love, Frida Kahlo, Johnny Cash, Jean-Michael Basquiat, Nina Simone, the Guerilla Girls, John Waters, David Bowie, Missy Elliott, John Lennon, and Stompin’ Tom Connors. The installation was from an exhibition entitled Supernovas held at the Winnipeg art gallery in 2007. The exhibition was curated by Shawna Dempsey and Lorri Millan."



 

Nice job Talbots

 

 

 

Wow Talbots – way to go to make me pay attention to you.

Steve Jobs and Bill Gates

See more here.

Natalie Massenet & Conan O'Brien

 

No, Natalie Massenet and Conan O'Brien don't really have anything to do with one another. I just came across these shots of them and thought they were great. Her, with her hugely visionary fashion empire, and he, with his marvelous bouffant – which I always thought defied gravity on it's own – until now. :)

 

She shot by Henry Bourne, he shot by Gillian Laub.

Name them all in a minute: Go!

Andrew Yang's Dolls of Anna Wintour & Grace Cottington

I have a Courtney Love doll that I just love – it's a bit rougher than these "couture" versions but the idea as a whole amuses me.
These dolls by Andrew Yang are so fun – but if he had wanted to be a bit more accurate with Grace, he would have left off the eyebrows! ;-) See the whole collection here.
 

Love Courtney

       

Say what you will about Courtney and her "kook" but I still think Hole's Live Through This was a great album. This video kills me...""It's not TAUPE! It's fucking Caramel!"

I heart Jeff Bridges

If you like Jeff Bridges, you'll love him after you see his website. Everytime I look at it, I wish I was friends with him.

Beware of Artists...

Milla in Marni

One of my fav looks from the Met Gala

Jean Philippe Delhomme

One of my favourite books that I bought last year was Jean-Philippe Delhomme's The Cultivated Life. Today, after reading an article in Interview magazine, I was delighted to discover that he has a marvelous new blog under the nom de plume “The Unknown Hipster”. I think I love this man.

Anna Dello Russo

Perfection.

Yabba Dabba

 


 


 

Tory Burch Fall 2010



Magic!

Mint and pink with a hit of silver or gold = happiness.

This is Fig Newton – how insanely cute is this cat?


Anna's coat is perfection. Prada me thinks...


Miss Peyton does a self-portrait.

Givenchy

Gimmie

My BF

Taylor Swift

First movie I remember seeing in the theatre.

She did that for his birthday. Sweet isn't it?

Still love Tom Baker

I have such fond memories of watching Doctor Who with my brother as a child. I think I developed a fear of spiders specifically because of that show! <:-)

My friend Matt Watts posted a great little interview with the ever charming Tom Baker. Listen to it here.

Oscars: Best Dress

Ok, I tried to pick a favourite dress from this year but they all put me to sleep. Even though I have a soft spot for Maggie's Dries dress, it still wasn't quite right. Michelle Williams' 2006 Vera Wang paired with Chopard diamonds is still my all time fav – no one this year even came close.

Beautiful Julianne Moore on NYTimes Style Cover

 

I love everything about Julianne Moore. Read the NYTimes Style Mag article about her here.

Karen Elson: Beauty & Talent

I realize I am a bit biased given the association, but regardless, I think Karen's voice is quite lovely and the song shows promise!

Looking Good Tina Fey

And just for fun:

 

 

Beautiful things

Yes - that's Ellen Page!

Evan Rachel Wood

Some lovely atypical images of Grace Kelly

Tina in France

Have you ever seen Tina Turner's house in the south of France? She's built quite a nice little life there and every time I see this photo of her from Architectural Digest, I mentally Photoshop myself into her place.

Brush with beauty Christina Hendricks at Holts

Guess what beautiful Mad Men actress I ran in to this evening while popping by Holts to grab a few things? She and her new husband were like love sick teenagers smooching and floating around the store. At first, I almost walked right in to them next to the David Yurman section and then, moments later, they came and stood beside me when I was looking at some Tom Binns pieces. As is typical when you meet actors in person, Miss Hendricks was much smaller and thinner than I expected given her bodacious hourglass frame on the show. Indeed, she was still curvy but not as you might expect – the camera really does add a lot. Not so long ago, I also saw one of the Oslen twins trying on glasses and she was barely visible – thinnest, tiniest little thing you ever saw. A sprite!

As for her personal style, Christina's clothes and shoes were not terribly discernible or noteworthy – just all black. As was her Hugo Boss handbag. What struck me most about her was her beautiful velvety voice – it's really quite distinctive and appealing.

So, now that I've covered how she looked, no doubt you want to know what she was shopping for, oui? Well, to my surprise, she was quite keen on the Alexander McQueen bracelet pictured below. If I'm not mistaken, she was trying on the same version in a red lacquer finish. Although I do quite like McQueen's clutches of late with skull clasps, this particular item is not my cup of tea – not a fan of skulls as a lone focus – which also seems pretty passé in general now too, but, to each her own. She asked the sales woman to "have it sent up to her room."

The Selby features Ines de la Fressange

 
Isn't it fascinating to see how other people live? Love Ines' pink drawing room. The Selby is a voyeur's delight.

I ♥ Vanessa Paradis

Moma to Warhol: "No thanks for the gift" – circa 1956

Click on image to see larger.

The Perfect Client Brief

Signed: Love Mick x     via SwissMiss via Tom Muller

Daniel Craig as an ice-pop

Wow – I missed this one! Apparently back in June as a celebration of National Ice Cream Week, Del Monte made a limited edition of ice-pops in 007's likeness after he was voted by English women as "the man they would most like to..um..lick". Ahem. Available in cranberry, blueberry and pomegranate.

My vote for best Emmy look: Blake Lively

It's hard to tell from this particular photo taken outdoors, but when she was on stage with the house lights, she looked striking. Her skin looked like it was glowing.

Yes, this makes me sad

In high school, I hung out with a group of boys that were a bit obsessed with Point Break. I hate to admit that I can likely still recite the movie to this day having seen it every time we ended up at my friend Emmanuel's house after some party.

Dirty Dancing. Ghost and Road House are three of Swayze's other films that are, for whatever reason, on permanent rotation on late night TV. So for years, after coming home at some ridiculous hour from this or that event, I would invariably end up eating whatever was left in the fridge while marveling at Patrick Swayze's perfect dancer's physique. I always thought he seemed so earnest in all of his roles and thereby liked him – he was a good guy. Then, after I saw him on SNL years later in a skit with the late Chris Farley as a Chip & Dale dancer – it sealed the deal. I thought, here's a man that can laugh at himself. He'll be missed by many.

JLo doesn't like computers?

As I was looking up images about Grace Jones today, I came across a snippet where Jennifer Lopez was quoted as saying she doesn't like computers and never goes near them. No, I'm not a fan and this blog is not about bashing people, but, this was shocking to me so I felt compelled to post about it . How is it possible in 2009 for an entertainer (or supposed mogul even?), who clearly likes to reference things like Flashdance, to eschew the amazing and never ending resource that is the personal computer and internet? Lopez, who is only 40, owns a perfume empire and clothing line, a restaurant and production company and doesn't use a computer? Huh? How does that even work? Or rather, how does she work? Does she have to sit with someone every time an email needs to be sent about her white decor requirements? Does she order from Net-A-Porter at 4am over the phone? What if the babies need a new LV snuggly? Where is your independence JLo? Aren't you dying to read PDiddy's power motivating tweets? I find this sort of insight into her character absolutely baffling considering her strong diva persona and how much talk there has been about how well branded and savvy a business person she is. I guess there is obviously someone (or a team) beside her crafting the master plan – and it can't be Skeletor since he wasn't on the scene from the beginning...? Whatever it is, she probably should reconsider bragging about being an out-of-touch fuddy-duddy from the block.

I ♥ Grace Jones

I was looking at some photos of Rihanna (shot by Steven Klein for Vogue Italia), Lady Gaga in V, and Kanye's girlfriend Amber Rose yesterday and naturally they reminded me of Grace Jones. I have a few of her songs in permanent rotation but realized as I looked at these young celebs, and how much they were clearly influenced (knowingly or not) by her, that I actually knew little about her myself. I was in grade school (1985) when I first saw the video for Slave to the Rhythm and I remember how struck I was by her unique voice and her arresting image. I can't think of any other female performer from that New Wave period who had such a powerful look – which I learned today was created by her stylist Jean-Paul Goude, whom she later had a son with. More recently, he confessed after they separated that he had fallen in love with the image he had created for her versus the real person – what a thing to admit and how very Pygmalion!

She recently appeared on the cover of V last Spring and when I saw it initially, I actually thought it was model Alek Wek doing an homage to her until I read the article. Just goes to show how remarkably well preserved the woman is – she still looks incredible. And yes, it was Jean-Paul that took the photograph! How full circle for them both.

Snaps from SATC Sequel

Huffington Post just posted these images from scenes shot on the streets of NYC today for the upcoming Sex & The City sequel. Love the accessories and the CLs, but the white dress is too Lauren Conrad for me. There were some other horrific 80's outfits they uploaded as well, but I won't post those as this site is officially a no 80's fashion zone. I honestly want to yell at MJ for not letting it die already. How many years of 80s fug do we have to endure already? Seriously – worst period in fashion e-v-e-r.

Loveable Leader: Nobu

I just watched a really great documentary about Nobu Matsuhisa and was really inspired and moved by his story and outlook. A tireless family man, who failed many times before succeeding really reminded me that it's a never stop trying attitude that prevails in the end. I was also surprised by his lovely manner and disciplined work ethic – which were never at odds. One can be a happy, motivating leader to their staff without sacrificing quality or their standards.

I ♥ Vanessa Paradis

Goop stunning in Marc Jacobs Fall 2009

 

Can't say I heard a word she said – was too busy drooling over her look. Perfection.

Good Bye to MJ