Wednesday, June 10, 2009

No shoes, no shirt, no problem!



These shoes are by Alexander McQueen, and I'm drooling over them!


The second photo is from an Italian magazine from the 1970's. Trompe l'oeil at it's finest. The story attached to the photo explains that designer Ruben Torres started this idea in a moment of panic at the inauguration of the pret-a-porter salon in Paris. None of his clothes had arrived at the stand, so he quickly thought up to design the collection on the model's skin. He declared, "no more problems with fabric and sizes!" He decided to offer this genius to his clients. It would have cost you 1000 francs for a design from Ruben himself, or a reduced price for a design from an assistant.



On a related note, when faced with the strike of her seamstress two weeks before a fashion show, Elsa schiaparelli and her head designer, salesgirl, and one tailor pulled together to put out a show despite the seemingly impossible task. They worked together day and night and refused to move the date of the show. On the day of the fashion show, they sent down the runway jackets with one sleeve, or none, sketches pinned to muslins, evening gowns cut in muslin with the color fabric swatches pinned onto the gown and handwritten instructions of the finalized garments written down the sides of the samples. And you know what, it sold very well.


A little creativity can go a long way.

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