intense fashion: dita von teese for jean-paul gaultier

dita walked the runway for the jean-paul gaultier show during paris haute couture fashion week on wednesday, 7 july. performing a brief striptease, she revealed an extravagant swarovski accented corset designed by gaultier and made by mr. pearl. she tweeted after the show, "that was quite a haute couture moment, cinched to the max by mr. pearl for the jean-paul gaultier show!"

 

yipes! that is one itty-bitty waist!!!

from the dita von teese newsletter

intense fashion: louis vuitton f/w 2010

beautiful editorial-style ad campaign from photographer stephen meisel. 

love the style. love the female figures- hello cleavage!!! 

i would like to wear these dresses daily and be quite the proper lady.

the models are truly divine: karen elson, natalia vodianova and christy turlington.

yes, christy turlington. she STILL looks that freaking amazing...

AD LOVE: balenciaga

Balenciaga’s just released their first fragrance in twelve years, Balenciaga Paris.
The scent, which is powdery, light, and perfect for someone who doesn’t want to smell like they’re wearing perfume, launches at Bergdorf Goodman on the 15th.
We expect Charlotte Gainsbourg’s Steven Meisel-shot campaign to pop up everywhere this spring, but for now, you can watch Nicolas Ghesquière talk about his process. The bottle, which will remain the same when they roll out new scents, is inspired by the classic Balenciaga silhouette. Ghesquière imagines a woman setting it down amongst her things to create an Irving Penn-like still life and he chose Charlotte for her “oddity…and bizarre beauty.”

Images of the original Balenciaga boutique on Avenue George V pop up in the video, as well as the original perfume bottle (one of which I happened to find in Beirut over the holidays — now I know it’s from 1947) and the rest of Ghesquière’s inspiration.
If you ever though fragrance was an afterthought, this should change your mind.

http://wp.fashionista.com/2010/02/nicolas-ghesquiere-on-balenciagas-new-fragrance-paris/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+fashionistacom+%28Fashionista%29

music! marion cotillard & franz ferdinand "the eye of mars"

theme song for dior's lady rouge. je ne sais pas *pourquoi*, mais c'est une jolie chanson.

"whatever happened to beautiful? where is our story? where's our love story? so now we're selling our dreams, we're selling our dreams to you all..."

quotable: fran lebowitz

"paris is a great beauty. as such it possesses all the qualities that one finds in any other great beauty; chic, sexiness, grandeur, arrogance and the absolute inability and refusal to listen to reason."

l-r: jardin du luxembourg; courtyard on rue clovis, i think, maybe; city skyline.

i don't know what to title this post...

hi! i haven't been very exciting lately... sorry.

i've been continuing with my french class at the sorbonne, which is going well. i am actually learning some good stuff, so hopefully i am improving...

other than that, i've just been hanging out, 

which doesn't really make for an interesting blog post...

this is pic is of moo and andre seen from the apt.

i just liked how they glowed in the bright sunlight, with moo's blonde hair and andre's bright white shirt.

i saw this cool old-fashioned rail car yesterday! i was totally jealous that it was going the other way! i wanted to ride it!!! :) apparently they use these when they are performing maintenance on the regular cars. and it's just cool.

i am baby-sitting now! fun! this is my little cutie-patootie ella!

yesterday, we went to luxembourg garden and had tons of fun. 

ella rode the horsies and then we went to the playground.

andre played with us too! ella loved it when i sat behind her on one side of the see-saw and andre was on the other side. she kept saying "faster! faster!" we got some air on that thing! :)

then we tried every slide available. i got on one too, which of course is comical bc i am 5'10" and those toys aren't exactly made for someone that size... but i had fun anyways. 

ella has such a fun laugh.

after we'd exhausted every game at the playground, we got in the poussette (stroller- i learned a new word!) and walked back out through the garden.

it was a really beautiful day: the flowers were in bloom, the sun was shining, a nice mild temperature. perfect park day.

we stopped to watch the boats for a little bit. ella wanted to do that too, but it was time to go.

so we walked home and she was fast asleep before we were half way there.

i met moo and madona for a juice since we hadn't hung out in a while. then just watched a movie and passed out. i was WORN OUT! haha, guess i played to hard at the park too...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!

yay! i went to sacre coeur in montmartre, which was beautiful and full of tourists. i didn't mind though. i like that there were so many people. i decided it would be a good idea to climb to the top of the dome. they say it is three hundred steps, but it is actually a few more. i counted... haha. i thought i was gonna pass out by step 300! well, it wasn't really that bad, but my legs were not used to that much exercise i think... it was a beautiful view though, and totally worth the climb. you can see everything in paris! the eiffel tower is behind me.

this one is a view of part of the church and the surrounding area.

sacre coeur! the architecture is pretty much amazing. i think people should make more churches like this. there is a difference between the hallowed halls of this church and a strip-mall church. i realize it's not where you pray, but that you do pray, but it feels... 

more, in a place like this. know what i'm sayin'?

i got a little distracted walking around, so by the time i got home, i had about 10 minutes to get ready for my birthday dinner. ahh! you all know i am not good about getting ready quickly, but i was surprisingly speedy. however, i got lost and walked the completely opposite direction of the way i was supposed to go... durr... not actually surprising though.

we went to dinner at this beautiful moroccan restaurant called 404. it was so charming, but the tables were very low so i felt like a giant! the food was very delicious as well.

these are my fellow revelers: andre and me

brian.

nono.

my birthday pastries. i loved the sparklers, but i was a little bit afraid that i was going to catch on fire... but it was super-cute!!! 

moo! and scooterpoo! what a lovely thing for my birthday! i love scooter rides!

this is moo exercising. pedaling backwards on a stationary bike. brilliant. :)

we went to a bar to sit and chat and drink. we had more people join as well. i was pretty tired though... all that exercising today! oy! haha. linda looked particularly hot with her helmet perched atop her head... sexy.

so, all in all, it was a perfect day!

thank you to all my friends and family for the nice birthday wishes.

i love you all!!! miss you!!!

08-08-08!!!

today was such a lovely day. i met andre and we walked through the jardin des plantes. these above are my new favorite flowers: dahlias. 

some more pretty flowers.

andre walking through the rows of flowers. 

that is the natural history museum in the background.

les fleurs.

this is the biggest chunk of black quartz i have ever seen. 

or quartz of any other color for that matter...

within the garden there is a zoo! la menagerie du jardin des plantes. i love zoos!

this is my favorite orangutan! i think this one was theodora. she looked a bit bored and was staring out at all of us, but she decided to do some gymnastics to pass the time.

mama and bebe!!! how precious is that??? i used to get piggy-back rides when i was little too.

sweet.

beautiful creature. i like his coat too. i want one just like it... lol.

this is the poor iguana that looked like he was desperately trying to get out of the glass. sad.

andre checking out the bitty crocodiles. they didn't look very menacing...

this photo is not upside down.

these things looked like sloths to me, but they were called something else which i don't remember...

this is the mystic snake.

loooooooooooook in to my eyyyyyes.

he was pretty interesting.

cuuute!!! but also poisonous... dart frogs.

idk what kind of birds they were, but they gave me great color inspiration... 

i'm thinking chiffon... floor-length. lots of layers. what do you think?

the view from andre's mini balcony. i am quite jealous...

it is hard to tell, but you can see notre dame as well as sacre coeur away in the distance.

tres magnifique. and very relaxing just sitting there watching and listening.

i almost fell asleep right there.

so that is all for today. i am tired from our adventures and i must get my beauty sleep because

IT IS MY BIRTHDAY TOMORROW!!!

samedi (2), mardi (5), mercredi (6) et jeudi (7)

saturday night, a bunch of us hung out at a cafe in moo's neighborhood.

this pic is of arnaud. it is really only funny bc he is pulling plastic water guns out of his gucci satchel... he says it's a dangerous hood and one must be prepared.

view of the plaza and the bar across the street. it is so damn charming here... totally ridiculous.

i was kinda lazy tuesday... i went for a walk by the canal near our apt. it's so cute. nono calls it her little seine. it's really quaint. i sat on a bench in the sun and read a book. still lazy, but i was soaking up the atmosphere.

the book i was reading (about creativity in paris) had a really great quote. 

"the privilege you are experiencing as "an artist" in paris is something very different: it is the privilege of the lone individual fortunate enough and brave enough to follow her dream."

isn't that fantastic? that quote feels very personal to me. my mum told me pretty much the same thing, but she hasn't published a book... hehe. ilu mum.

wednesday night we hung out at le buci. i had a delicious croque madame and a glass of rose'. lovely. these are my beautiful friends, nono and moo. :)

my new friend andre and me. he hates posed pictures, but i think this one turned out quite nice.

nono and i rode our bikes to meet mylene, so i got my own personal sight-seeing tour on the way back home. this is nono on her bike in front of the louvre. it is seriously spectacular, especially at night. it is so BIG!!!

see, what did i tell you? spectacular. i've been here before, but it is still amazing every time i see it. beautiful.

our failed attempt at taking my photo in front of the louvre... oh well. looks kinda cool blurry.

it was sooo cool riding through paris at night. it's more exciting than walking bc it goes by fast so you really have to appreciate quickly and it is much better than driving bc you feel like you are a part of the city. i'd recommend it to everyone. but be careful of taxis and buses and other stupid people... that part is kinda scary!!!

today, thursday, i went to see the richard avedon exhibit at the jeu de paume. an excellent exhibit. such an amazing photographer. i personally loved the fashion shoots (naturally) but the portraits were quite spectacular as well. i love how he presents a subject not how they'd necessarily like to be shown, but how he digs deeper to find the meaning behind each face. it's really very interesting and also very beautiful at the same time.

this is from the outside of the museum. how would you like to make out with the eiffel tower and all of paris in the background... ahh, l'amour... it's like it's out of a movie. it should be terribly cliche, but at the same time, i totally wish it were me! 

haha, that's the sap in me, for sure.

it was soooo rainy today. of course, it would stop while i was indoors and then pour once i was outside again... so lucky.

i walked through the tuileries garden and up the rue du rivoli. i popped in to all the tourist shops when it started to rain. this is a corner of the louvre. it was rainy a lot of the day, but that didn't stop the sun and blue skies from coming out every once in a while...

this is the ferris wheel in the tuileries garden, still there like it was so many years ago... i think there are more rides than there were before though... oh, and i also found our favorite haagen dazs store. haha. i don't remember what our little man looked like though, so i didn't say hi.

this is my poster from the avedon exhibit. "dovima and the elephants" wearing dior.

i swear, he is a one in a million photographer. the photos are just soooo BEAUTIFUL.

like, seriously stunning.

so yeah, besides being very wet all day long, it was a lovely day. i made a really yummy dinner with our fresh veggies from the market. i'm pretty sure they taste better than grocery store veggies... now i am off to bed so i can get up tomorrow and find more adventures!