Jezebel
critical mass
Posts Tagged “
eric wilson
”
critical mass
Fashion Show
"[H]is child/woman vintage looks had grown up beautifully....The collection was solid but never stolid...after trying to prove with last season's artsy complexities and boudoir transparency that he could match experimental international designers, he did something in this show that was actually much tougher. He gave a fresh and original polish to streamlined American style. It was a redemption for Jacobs and for a dull New York fashion season." So sayeth frequent Marc Jacobs-hater/International Herald Tribune fashion critic Suzy Menkes of the designer's Fall/Winter 2008 collection, which started exactly on time Friday night, thankyouverymuch. Annotated gallery begins below.
"[H]is child/woman vintage looks had grown up beautifully....The collection was solid but never stolid...after trying to prove with last season's artsy complexities and boudoir transparency that he could match experimental international designers, he did something in this show that was actually much tougher. He gave a fresh and original polish to streamlined American style. It was a redemption for Jacobs and for a dull New York fashion season." So sayeth frequent Marc Jacobs-hater/International Herald Tribune fashion critic Suzy Menkes of the designer's Fall/Winter 2008 collection, which started exactly on time Friday night, thankyouverymuch. Annotated gallery begins below. 
melancholy and the infinite badness
Against Happiness: Why Can't Grownups Be Emo?
Remember how "depression" used to be called "melancholy"? Well, Eric G. Wilson just wrote a book called Against Happiness that aims to return "melancholia" to the public lexicon, and basically bring back sadness and its "integral place in the great rhythm of the cosmos." It is sort of like anti-self-help. Oooh, new genre title: "self-pity"? "self-flagellate"? Neither really do it justice. Anyway, the key is saying "fuck you" to happiness. Joy is okay, but like with carbs on the South Beach it's got to be the right kind of joy, such as: "that unbearable exuberance that suddenly emerges from long suffering" or "that hard-earned tranquillity that comes from long meditation on the world's sorrows." Meanwhile, you must throw out your self-help books and seratonics and commence basking, dwelling and reveling in the cruel radiance of whatever. Here's how he explains the difference between what he advocates and clinical depression:Depression (as I see it, at least) causes apathy in the face of this unease, lethargy approaching total paralysis, an inability to feel much of anything one way or another. In contrast, melancholia generates a deep feeling in regard to this same anxiety, a turbulence of heart that results in an active questioning of the status quo, a perpetual longing to create new ways of being and seeing.Don't think you can really get one without the other? I'll show you something: More »
fashion victims
Fashion Blogger Announces That "It" Bags Are (Finally) Dead
On November 1 of last year New York Times fashion writer Eric Wilson put forth the bold headline: "Is This It for the It Bag?". Today, Los Angeles Times fashion blogger Monica Corcoran responds with the following: "The It Bag Is Dead. Designers Mourn." Well there you have it! Wrote Wilson back in November: "There is too much inventory. Prices are absurdly high... Status handbags, you see, are a lot like housing. After the rise of the $1,000 purse, fashion's equivalent of the $1 million studio, there inevitably comes talk of a backlash." (In the new issue of Harper's Bazaar, Bottega Veneta designer Tomas Maier rails against the very idea of such bags, calling them "bullshit".) But in her piece today, Corcoran suggests that the death of the It Bag has less to do with economics and more to do with celebrity, i.e., that the way we consume paparazzi images of women more famous more for forgetting to wear underwear could be impacting the status of the objects they carry that we are supposed to aspire to. More »
fashion victims
2007: The Year Fashion Caught Up With The Times; Lost All Meaning
New York Times fashion scribe Eric Wilson has some deep thoughts to share on the sartorial ramifications of the year 2007. (Let us not forget that this is the very same individual who also championed the antler, complete with allusion to "Gaston" in the Disney cartoon Beauty and the Beast.) In a column today, Wilson comes to the sorry realization that 2007 shall be remembered as the year in which design meant absolutely nothing at all.[S]cholars may conclude instead that this was the year in which designers finally succumbed to the baser desires of an overheated celebrity culture, in which the only thing that matters is fame and the only means to succeed is by screaming, "Look at me!" At least, that's what they might think after reviewing some of the year's worst fashion moments, in which actions seem so obviously calculated to provoke.More »
Dear New York Times "Styles" section reporter Eric Wilson: We've said it before, but we love you. You should blog all the time! Forget that fussy "newspaper reporter" bullshit! Because you are funny! And like us, you enjoy a bit of gossip. And we can't thank you enough for sharing the following exchange between designers John Galliano and Marc Jacobs you observed while having lunch at the Mercer Hotel last week :"Hi, John!" Mr. Jacobs exclaimed. "How are you doing?"
"Good, nice to see you," Mr. Galliano said. "Oh, you've gone a little darker, I see."
"Navy!" Mr. Jacobs said. "Na-vy."
"Oh, that would be a little chicer," Mr. Galliano said. "Indigo!"
"Well, if you ever feel like having tea or coffee, I'm sort of bedridden for a few days, so I can't move far," Mr. Jacobs said. "I had an operation."
"Oh really?"
"Sex change."
Thank you for making our lifetime, Eric Wilson. [NYT]
The New York Times's Eric Wilson has penned his greatest words ever. Ever. On previewing the Roberto Cavalli for H&M collection, Wilson writes: "I think the company missed an opportunity by not pushing the deliveries up in time for trick or treat... Mr. Cavalli has boiled down his signature looks for the masses into what you could call the Cavalli DNA. Unfortunately, that would be leopard prints for women and pimp wear for men. Seriously, do you want to own slinky black-on-black leopard print (though still sheer) boxer briefs, even if they're designed by Roberto Cavalli? Looking at a $249 long-haired fake fox bomber with a wide, excessively studded leather belt, there's really not much difference from what you might find under the "street walker" section of the costumes on sale at Ricky's." Bravo, Wilson, bravo! With this you have redeemed yourself for your Gaston reference back in April. [NYT]
fashion victims
If The Shoe Fits, You're Wearing It Wrong
For spring next year, designers and fashion editors have a vision: Girly. You'll be seeing color, flowers, bias-cut dresses, short skirts, frilly skirts, etc. Femme is in, and the girlier the better. At least from the ankle up. As The New York Times's Eric Wilson points out, for their spring '08 fashions, designers paraded feminine confections with foowear that looked "aggressively fetishistic or worse."At Balenciaga, the models' legs were caged in futuristic footwear made of metal plates laced up to the knees with braids. At Yves Saint Laurent, the soles of Mr. Pilati's needle-thin stilettos were replaced by a thin metal rod that connected the heel to the toe, leaving the most sensitive — some would say erotic — underbelly of the foot vulnerably exposed. The models looked as if they were walking a tightrope, and the audience was made to feel alternately fascinated and terrified.Sounds comfy! More »
ad libs
Louis Vuitton's Newest Model: Glasnost Glamourpuss
Eric Wilson of The New York Times 'Thursday Styles' section, has a piece today on how Louis Vuitton has hired former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev as a spokesmodel. Yes, you read right: First Scarlett Johansson, now our favorite birthmarked Russian! Kind of cool, right? Not to Eric Wilson! [Or me. -Ed.]...what is a reader to make of a Vuitton ad, coming in the big September books, that stars Mikhail S. Gorbachev, the last president of the Soviet Union? A decade ago, Mr. Gorbachev's appearance in a Pizza Hut commercial was generally greeted as a low point in his career.More »
stag party
