Following what is now turning into a tradition of bugging people we like and admire and asking them to answer our silly questions, I’ve befriended the fab Christopher Lee Sauvè of ”Save Anna” fame and asked him to answer our Flamboyant Questionnaire, here’s what he had to say:

Christopher Lee Sauvé 02 09 : 18.36
Sure thing! Love these questions haha here you go!

DESCRIBE YOURSELF IN 5 WORDS

1) Obsessive
2) Visual
3) Loving
4) Critical
5) Energetic

YOU WIN 80 FANTA-MEGA MILLIONS OF EURO AT THE LOTTERY. WHAT IS THE FIRST THING YOU DO?

Start a cool concept school/store for kids who can’t afford college to do art/design/fashion… Purchase a giant yacht and take all my friends and family on a trip around the world!

WHICH SONG DO YOU SING IN THE SHOWER?

Smells Like Teen Spirit – Nirvana

WHAT DO YOU READ ON THE LOO?

New York Magazine

THE BEST AND THE WORST THING IN FASHION?

The best is creativity, the worst is Ed Hardy!

ART OR BUSINESS?

Warhol said business is art, but I think he was lying. Business is business and artists create art. I like to do both, I guess I am a designer.

FISH OR MEAT?

Spam.

YOUR GOOD INTENTIONS?

To provide cool clothes for people who love pop culture at affordable prices.

AND THE BAD ONES?

I have no bad intentions, I am Canadian!

THE BOOK, THE MOVIE AND THE SONG THAT CHANGED YOUR LIFE

Nina Simone biography, “I Put A Spell On You”, Madonna “Truth or Dare” documentary, “Nothing Compares To You” Sinead O’Connor.

YOUR ALL-TIME ICONS?

Keith Haring, Klaus Nomi, Warhol, Lagerfeld, Grace Jones, and Anna Wintour!

IF I SAY ‘FLAMBOYANT’, WHAT COMES INTO YOUR MIND?

When Jack Tripper on Three’s Company played a gay man.

You can buy his fabulous tshirts/bags/etc (you can even customize a pair of All-Stars or some American Apparel underwear with his killer graphics) on his Online Shop or see his great graphics and stuff on Tumblr… Enjoy!

R.S.

Mendoza is a cool little Mod shop in Brick Lane, where I found and bought a pair of lovely Chelsea Boots, in black suede, the grey ones pictured here are actually even better but I know what kind of life my shoes lead and grey suede just wouldn’t be able to survive it for long… Besides cool footwear, the shop carries great jackets and pants, and all sort of delicious things for the perfect Mod gentleman, the little striped college jackets are perfect and not very expensive, if only London wasn’t such a shopper’s paradise and we weren’t so damn poor!

R.S.

p.s.: hey I totally forgot about this post and left it as a draft for like… forever… but isn’t it great for a Back To School September thing?

Si avvicina il 9 Settembre, la serata di Vogue Fashion Night Out.  Quella sera tutti i negozi saranno aperti fino a tarda sera e ogni brand che vede la ghiotta opportunità di invogliare i clienti a comprare, ha preparato una limited edition di qualcosa: un abito, una borsa, una t-shirt. Da tempo non vedevo più nelle collezioni di John Richmond l’antico fervore per il punk e il rock più duro, quello stile underground che faceva parlare di sè durante i primi anni ‘80, prima di trasformarsi in un prodotto commerciale, adatto alle masse più che a una raffinata elite di estimatori del genere… e poi ieri, a sorpresa, una mail del suo press office con la foto della punk-tee. Mi si è accesa una lampadina di positività, che John sia tornato? Voi cosa ne pensate? Il messaggio è chiaro, essere punk è un modo di vivere, non una moda… c’è da credergli?

G.C.

Christopher Sauvè, the Iconosclast Genius that brought us the ‘Save Anna’ t-shirt (which has personally brought me quite a few hours of joy..) is now back with, among other things, the Che Anna project… here’s its manifesto:

Per quanto io tenti in tutti i modi di scappare dalla Moda, lei mi segue tenacemente, e riesce a trovarmi sempre e comunque… anche nel Sud Tirolo, dove ho passato una paradisiaca settimana tra castelli medievali, chiese super kitsch in stile ‘barocco bavarese’ e bagni di fieno… oltre alle centinaia di negozi specializzati nell’abbigliamento tradizionale del luogo, che personalmente amo alla follia (per un attimo mi sono convinto che avrei potuto affrontare TUTTO il prossimo inverno in giacca di lana cotta e lederhosen…), cosa ci è comparso durante un’escursione se non la Fabbrica del Loden?

Il nome ‘loden’ deriva dal tedesco arcaico e vuol dire all’incirca ‘balla di lana’, poi, per traslato, è diventato anche il termine per identificare non solo il tessuto, ma anche il tipico cappotto verde scuro con i bottoni di pelle intrecciata o di corno che molto probabilmente ognuno di noi è stato obbligato ad indossare durante l’infanzia…

Grazie ad un processo di infeltrimento della lana grezza, ed in seguito alla sua cardatura (che ne rende la parte esterna lucida e ’scivolosa’) il loden è il primo tessuto impermeabile della storia, tanto da meritarsi l’appellativo di ‘Gore-Tex del Medio Evo’… in origine il tessuto era ‘povero’, utilizzato dai contadini per ripararsi dal freddo e dalle intemperie, ma divenne di moda quando la fabbrica Mössmer nel 1882 confezionò un mantello bianco per l’imperatore Francesco Giuseppe. Così il loden, con l’aggiunta di un po’ di lana merinos, passò dallo status di materiale ‘vile’ a quello ben più ‘altolocato’ di tessuto per abiti da caccia e montagna per la nobiltà austroungarica.

Forse tutto ciò interesserà a pochi, ma pazienza: sento sempre più forte l’esigenza e il dovere di combattere con ogni mezzo l’imbarbarimento di cui siamo vittime (compiacenti…) e, mai come in vacanza, il nostro popolo da innumerevoli dimostrazioni di inciviltà…

be seeing you

F.L.M.B.

pics: Andrea Boschetti

post tosatura

loden giganti nel museo

'filo' modi di dire

Nel 2009 la stilista/musicista/ex ‘it-girl’ Pam Hogg è stata inserita nella ‘Scottish Hall of Fame’. All’evento si è presentata con una chaperon d’eccezione, Siouxsie Sioux, ed entrambe indossavano le deliranti tutine su cui la designer si sta concentrando ultimamente… che dire?

Le AMIAMO!

be seeing you

F.L.M.B.

pics: Princess Superstar by Riccardo Slavik

We’ve asked the superfabulous and talented Princess Superstar what she’s up to and to answer our Flamboyant Questionnaire… if you like her sexy sound you can download the delightful Chick Habit from her blog… Oh and this is just came up, The fabuolous Princess is offering very exclusive things and the chance to collaborate on her new album through the Pledge Music website, a cool and revolutionary way for artists to fund their albums, make sure to check it out…

here’s what The Princess told us:

hi!! I  am working on my 6th album which will be out in february 2011 and I am also writing a childrens album!

hope all is well xo

La Kunsthaus Tacheles lancia un S.O.S. artistico per salvare la casa d’arte dalla demolizione e successiva trasformazione in centro commerciale. La casa dell’arte Tacheles nasce nel 1907 proprio come centro commerciale, dopo la sua parziale distruzione durante la seconda guerra mondiale, nel 1990 viene occupata da un gruppo di artisti che l’ha resa un punto di riferimento per l’arte contemporanea a Berlino. Un luogo d’incontro per artisti provenienti da tutto il mondo che qui hanno la possibilità di ottenere uno spazio per creare ed esporre le proprie opere in un’atmosfera di libertà creativa e di scambio. Il fotografo berlinese Petrov Ahner ha indetto una vera e propria maratona artistica a sostegno della causa Tacheles nel blog www.isupporttacheles.blogspot.com… inviate contributi!

V.B.B.

da sinistra: Andreas Kronthaler (marito), Dora Swire (mamma), Dame Vivienne Westwood, Cora Corre (nipote)

(from www.daylimail.co.uk – 09/06/2006)

Fashion designer Dame Vivienne Westwood went to Buckingham Palace today without her knickers once again and wearing a pair of silver horns.

The style icon caused a stir in 1992 when she collected her OBE from the Queen minus her underwear and twirled round in the courtyard to reveal all.

This time, after she was made a Dame by the Prince of Wales, she shyly disclosed she was knicker-less again, adding: “Don’t ask. It’s the same answer. I don’t wear them with dresses. When I’m wearing trousers I might – my husband’s silk boxers.”

She insisted she would not be spinning around in the Palace to demonstrate this.

“It’s a different dress – that’s why I span around (then). I forgot.”

Today, she said her outfit – a black cap perched on the back of her vibrant orange hair and a black dress with campaign badges and the tiny horns on her head – showed her as an urban guerilla and a Che Guevara figure.

The tiny horns attached to her head were not the sign of the devil, she insisted.

“It’s a fantastic dress with a sort of net stole. My clothes reflect my political feeling.

“I’m supposed to be a bit like a Che Guevara – an urban guerilla, with my cap, this kind of jungle net and a badge for my Active Resistance to Propaganda campaign.

“The horns – we need a new renaissance. We don’t have culture. It’s a pagan symbol. They’re attached by a wire round the back of my head. It’s only the Christian religion that says they’re anything to do with the Devil. They can be a fertility symbol and be about good things.”

Dame Vivienne wore thin lines of bright blue eyeliner over her eyelids and in place of her eyebrows.

Her shoes were black mules decorated with lines of studded metal holes.

She said Charles did not inquire about her undergarments.

“No, of course not,” she remarked. But she did disclose that the Queen apparently found the 1992 incident quite funny.

“I met a man who worked with the Queen and he said she was rather amused by it.”

She added that the Prince said he hoped her award would help her career.

Dame Vivienne said she was delighted with accolade. “It’s so beautiful,” she said holding the scarlet ribboned honour. “It’s such a lovely colour.”

She was joined by her husband Andreas Kronthaler, her elderly mother Dora Swire, and her eight-year-old granddaughter Cora Corre, who is also Malcolm McLaren’s grandchild.

Cora wore a green netted top and blue cap. Dame Vivienne said: “Her outfit is based on mine. She’s a little guerilla.”

be seeing you

F.L.M.B

Alexander Wang debuts his Fall 2010 Inspiration video, worldwide, through a select number of sites on Wednesday, August 11th at noon, Eastern Standard Time. This is the first time Wang explored film as the medium to express the inspiration and emotion behind the collection. Shot in a deserted building that once stood as a hotel in NYC, the creative team built an abstract atmosphere of fantasy distorting the elements of wind, home, movement and stillness.

Director: Craig McDean
Art Director: Fabien Baron
Stylist: Karl Templer
Model: Abbey Lee / Next
Casting: Anita Bitton / The Establishment
Hair: Orlando Pita
Make-up: Mark Carasquillo
Song: Infinity by The XX (remixed by Flufftronix)

R.S.