MY VERY OWN SAY ON FASHION FAQs

A women's magazine recently asked me to participate in an interview for its September issue and sent me a list of questions. These are the predictable questions, with my unexpected answers.

 Q. What is the must-have/must-try trend this season and why? 

 

A. Everything and nothing. I've long given up on this idea of "must-have" as nothing is really a must-have unless it's lunch. There are simply too many pressing requirements in life to think of any random fashion item as a "must-have." Seriously, what actually happens if you don't have a "must-have"? Nothing. Who cares?

Based on the trends that you chose, please answer the following: Top 3 runway representations of the trend and why you chose these 3 brands.

There aren't actually any "trends" anymore: Everything goes nowadays. In any given season, you can see everything presented as the latest. The trend seems to be that at any one label, they would show a wide spectrum of looks and items to encompass all tastes and styles: The result is that short, long, volume, slim, minimal, print, plain, embellished, matte, shiny, black, colour, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s is well-represented. Show me a "trend" and I will show you the exact opposite - and often from the same collection. Fashion is a market after all, and labels just want sales.

 

Is this a trend for everyone? Why and why not?

 This "trend" of providing something for everyone with a cynical eye on sales is ironically what is detracting from the power of fashion. Because everything goes, nothing is therefore a "must-have" and the pull to buy isn't that urgent. And since everything is '"in" then you might as well just shop your own closet.

What do you like and dislike most about this trend?

I like that this makes fashion very democratic - but I dislike that now everyone is a fashion expert/ style icon. Now everyone with who can afford to buy a studded shoe thinks he's a fashion director - or worse - editor. 

Is this a seasonal trend or do you predict this trend to have a long shelf life? Why and why not? 

Hopefully this doesn't go on for very long - but delusions can last for a whole lifetime. 

How do you suggest to wear this trend for the work week and weekend.

You can wear delusions for a very long time, and everyday of the week if you factor in trips to Seoul to get your face done now and then.

 

Give 2 style tips on how to wear this trend. 

Must-haves to wear this trend convincingly would be to have a Kenzo cap and a new nose/ filler cheeks.   

What are the must-haves to own?

The LOUDEST press samples you can grab at the sample sale and a very developed ego.  

 

What items do you think will sell the best? 

Absolutely the LOUDEST, most-easily recognised items, those things that can immediately be identified on Instagram - things which leave no room for real worth, workmanship or subtlety. 

How do you turn this high-fashion trend into everyday life? Is it possible? Why and Why not? 

Everyone and their sidekick is doing it, so as long as you have an Instagram account you can too. And get that studded shoe!

3 dos and 3 don't when trying out this trend.

dos:

1. Watch Korean dramas and MVs, and learn to do synchronised dancing. 

2. Layer everything loud over everything louder. 

3. Wear the most hideous, over designed shoes.

don'ts: 

1. Think too much - it will crease your brow. 

2. Read. 

3. Pretend that you're human.   

 

Who are some personalities who will wear this trend best? (eg. someone who is a conservative dresser or someone who loves colors etc) 

This trend is for all the poor lost souls who always wanted to be in fashion and now they find they can - after some nip and tuck and now that Instagram has made words redundant.

Does this trend come with rules you should follow or is it best to break any fashion rule with regards to this trend?

There are no more fashion rules - only ego and shamelessness.

SPRING 2015 MENSWEAR: THE NUDE MEN UNCOVERED

Bottega Veneta

Calvin Klein Collection

This is a lesson in styling: If you look beyond the pale pink/ beige monochrome of these very different collections, you can see that the looks break down to pretty much the same items; I think the germ of the idea of athletic wear is there, also the idea of underwear, the referencing of women's lingerie but styling makes it all so different, and that includes the choice of model. Bottega Veneta's has a ballet dancer's langour, while Calvin Klein's has more of a pornstar appeal.

Bottega Veneta

Calvin Klein Collection

SPRING 2015 MENSWEAR: Z ZEGNA

I read with absolute dismay that Z Zegna, a label that I loved for so long, for its clear creative vision and beautifully realised designs by Paul Surridge, will now be merged with Zegna Sport to become a rebooted label. The first collection to be codesigned by Mr Surridge and Murray Scallon (formerly the head designer at Zegna Sport), though it tells a cohesive story, looks like it's been designed by committee. It has all the essentials of a second line, "youthful, high-performance clothes that focus on quality materials and slick Italian tailoring." In fact, more clothes that we don't need, not because they don't fulfill the brief, but because the market is already saturated with such-like. What we do need more is beauty and personal vision, not cynical calculation of what will sell.  Do you like what you see?

SPRING 2015 MENSWEAR REVIEW

What a fresh, eye-opening start to another round of fashion shows and all those fashion tarts are off again on their business flights and cars in the carousel of stale parties and Instagram-ops and what-nots. Did you like Sarah Burton's Matisse collage-suitings at Alexander McQueen? I thought they were sharp and jazzy and Japanese (Comme/Junya, anyone?) at the same time, decorative without being bogged down. The entire thing was bracingly "racy", except for a quartet of looks that had the look of those black-and-red lacquer bento boxes: Too literal a reference to Japan.

It's clearly inspired by Henri Matisse's cut-outs (like this Blue Nude from 1952), which fashion types can see at the exhibition Henri Matisse: The Cut-Outs, at the Tate Modern (on till 7 September) instead of worrying about which samples to wear.

HOTTEST MALE MODEL OF THE MOMENT: JIN DACHUAN

My new obsession.

POSTCARD FROM PHUKET (2005)

I decided that I needed a holiday one Thursday morning while I was in the office. On top of my work, I had to explain to a stylist the difference between being stylish and being merely trendy. It didn't make my "pep talk" any easier to see her endearing little moustache bristling. The fiendish features editor later (unhelpfully) said that it was the Salvador Dali in her trying to get out. 
Phuket time is one hour behind Singapore time, but it seems like an entirely different experience of time altogether. Everything feels slower once you arrive at the airport, which is casual and 1980s ugly, and lighter, as if you just threw away five years of designer clothes from your wardrobe. 
The last time I was in Phuket, the island was nothing but wooden shacks and rubber plantations. Now there are distressing excavations and diggings (but where are the workers?) and tractors with no drivers. Huge and largely similar billboards advertise the hotels and condos that will be standing where there are now just piles of yellow upturned earth. Is this progress? And does it all have to be so ugly?
As we drive further into the depths of Phuket in the evening light, my Phuket emerges. A young girl is planting her three little siblings on a scooter before jumping on herself. All four race off into the dusty, winding hill roads, her talcum-ed brown neck is thrown back in a white laugh, her just-had-a-bath hair is flying in the wind.

Phuket for me is the trials of schoolboys in orange, white and blue uniforms walking home after school. They all sport that brusque-short haircut that makes them look like budding thugs, savage yet sweet, violent and vulnerable at the same time. They stare at our speeding, dark minibus insolently.
Phuket for me is always sunset time. A slow island slowing down as planters go home for a bathe by the well; as shops close and their owners sit outside to enjoy the breeze. 
Even the stray dogs look content. 
And then we arrive at the Royal Phuket Yacht Club.  

FOOTBALL FEVER: AND GOD CREATED CHRISTIANO RONALDO

Football phenom Cristiano Ronaldo strips down (yes, yet again) for Mario Testino (always!), on the June issue of Spanish Vogue, alongside Russian supermodel and girlfriend (of two years) Irina Shayk. Ronaldo, to my mind the most perfectly beautiful of all footballers, and the highest paid soccer star in the world, plays for Real Madrid and will captain the Portuguese national team in this year's World Cup in Rio.

I know many of you would have never seen Ronaldo's eyebrows in their natural glory and here they are. If you click on the T Magazine cover, you will be able to see why he has them groomed into immaculate arches at all times now. Many have objected to his Joan Crawford worthy plucked arches, but I rather like them and I think they add a certain attractive violence to his prettiness. 

HE SAID SHE SAID: STEVEN MEISEL

"It's so crazy to live in such a narrow, narrow place. Age, weight, sexuality, race - every kind of prejudice." - Steven Meisel

WHAT IS NORMCORE? DO YOU CARE?

NOTES TO THE NEW HIPSTER

Is there to be no end to the indignities to suffered by the chronically clued-in? As the new “Normcore” trend breaks into our collective consciousness, here are some notes on how to be, or not to be.

1. Firstly, don’t worry too much about precisely defining Normcore; Just take it that a silly fashion director somewhere decided to spell Hipster with an ‘N’, and go on making your lunch. It’s only fashion jargon and you have a living to make.

2. The guiding principle for fashion jargon seems always to be on a need to know basis and you, a mere non-fashion professional, need only know this: The fashion pendulum has swung yet again, and now, the epitome of cool is the anti-cool.

3. Normcore is about affordable, bland, functional anti-style. It’s conventional and nondescript drag, stuff you can pull out of your dryer drum anytime and wear with devastating buff nails. 

4. Examples given of this trend seem marked by white sneakers, dull zip-ups and not-skinny jeans, in other words, stuff you wore when you were in NUS. A Normcorer dresses like an undergrad seeking to blend in, rather than stand out. 

5. According to "experts", Normcore is a reaction against the aggressive coolness that relies on vivid difference (studded trophy platforms, K-pop type synchronized dancing, nail art) to a post-cool of authenticity and sameness. To me, this “sameness” thing is troubling. If all around you are synchronized dancing in studded and screaming prints, the Normcorer will not fit in – she will stand out in her discreet denims, plaid shirt-dress and trainers. Is Normcore grunge spelt with an N?

6. The horribly termed Normcore was coined by K-HOLE, a New York-based trend forecasting group. They define it as “a desire to be blank.” But this concept and its assumption that the average hipster isn’t blank would immediately present a challenge for those for which this is relevant. What if you were already blank, as so many hipsters naturally must be? What if you didn’t fundamentally have any identity or persona at all and studied fashion in Perth? What if shopping at Givenchy actually gave your life purpose? Then how do you adopt the Normcore?

7. Who are you if your clothes are brand-free and logo-less? Wouldn’t you be a complete nonentity without a single label signifier? Since Normcore has nothing to do with flashy fashion and more to do with character, it would present a particular challenge to those who would most want to embrace it. The Singapore fashion scene is after all filled with an inhuman army of the vacuous. 

8. So. Instead of scratching your head over every last trend, perhaps you should take a cold shower and then go out there and do something useful with your life.

A version of this piece appears in Style: June 2014.

VESAK DAY

Vesak Day, celebrated by Buddhists around the world commemorates the birth, enlightenment and nirvana of Siddharta Gautama Shakyamuni Buddha.

However, the date of Vesak Day varies around the world depending on the lunar calendars used in different cultures. In countries following the Western Gregorian calendar, it will happen in May. However, in China, Japan and Korea, Vesak Day is celebrated in April. In Thailand, it is celebrated much later.

On Vesak Day, devout Buddhists will usually visit their temples for prayers and offerings of candles and flowers. Other rituals include bathing of the Buddha statue, sharing in vegetarian meals as well as listening to teachings by monks.

Releasing caged birds and animals is a common practice. It symbolises liberation. But in recent years, eco awareness has resulted in more restraint as most tame animals let into the wild might not survive and those animals that do survive might upset the ecosystem in the wild.

In Singapore, Vesak Day was made a public holiday in 1955. To all the readers of this blog, have a serene and joyful Vesak Day 

AUDI FASHION FESTIVAL 2014: IS SINGAPORE A FASHION HUB?

The Audi Fashion Festival this month kicks-start Singapore’s busy roster of fashion festivals. But do these retail-centric events make Singapore a true fashion hub? 

There are times when it seems the shows are staged just to make it harder for you to run your errands. If you have a legitimate reason to be in the mall, say to pick up your dryclean, or pop down to the supermarket to forage for food, there’s bound to be women’s magazine editor blocking your path and insisting that you look at how she’s balancing her Blackberry and Starbucks while clutching her trophy handbag and stumbling on her bizarre platforms. 

She can’t walk properly because she's not wearing her prescription glasses and can’t Whatsapp through her gigantic shades while simultaneously pretending there are street-style bloggers snapping at her heels. 

This caricature of a fashion creature is just symptomatic of the derivative nature of our fashion festival scene. They saw it on a blog, and then it slowly dawned on them that they could borrow that sample and toss it together with something from River Island. Same concept writ large: Our fashion festivals are retail events that have all the sound and fury of a real fashion week (read: season-making ones in Paris and Milan) signifying nothing more than our ability to furiously self-promote, and maybe sell a dress or two.  

Surely to be a truly influential fashion capital you need to show newsworthy, influential and groundbreaking collections and not just glorified trunk shows no matter how many red carpets you roll out for C-list celebs and “couturiers”? Peopling the front row with socialites dressed to attend a gala and “editors” whose only ability is shopping, at ticketed consumer events with warmish sponsored cocktails, does not a fashion hub make. It does make for a busy shopping mall, and a great hindrance to real shoppers but that’s about it – otherwise any city with a fashion week (and its attendant pretentious fashionista) can call itself a fashion hub. Bear in mind that places as far-flung as Mongolia and Dakar have fashion weeks too. OK, they probably do call themselves fashion hubs, just as their denizens have Blackberrys and Starbucks.

According to organizers, our shows are in part (a big part) staged for consumers who otherwise might not get a chance to attend a show in London, New York, Milan or Paris. In other words, our fashion shows are obviously ticketed entertainment — just like rock concerts or the circus (if it looks and sounds like a circus, then it probably is one). It is time that our fashion festivals take fashion seriously and promote the local designers and labels that need to be recognized by the tiny pool of influential international editors. We have the talent. We just aren’t pushing them enough. Originality, intelligence and creativity make fashion, not an ability to emulate and “recreate”. Zeal is wasted on pushing that lowest-rung recognizable name as if a gift was being bestowed on the city. So-and-so will close the festival at midnight after a heavy prolonged black-tie supper. Such and such a celebrity will grace the catwalk. How much was he paid? Really? Who cares? Anyone who cares about fashion, any professional whose business it is to care about fashion, would have seen the original show a few months ago, probably in sweatpants on his sofa.

For the rest, there’s Cirque du Soleil Amaluna. 

A version of this essay appears in the May edition of Style magazine. 

ARE EGGS HEALTHY?

Still Life by William Bailey

"Mrs. Bates, let me propose your venturing on one of these eggs. An egg boiled very soft is not unwholesome. Serle understands boiling an egg better than any body. I would not recommend an egg boiled by any body else—but you need not be afraid—they are very small, you see—one of our small eggs will not hurt you. Miss Bates, let Emma help you to a little bit of tart—a very little bit. Ours are all apple tarts. You need not be afraid of unwholesome preserves here. I do not advise the custard." - Mr Woodhouse, in Emma by Jane Austen

ANNA WINTOUR COSTUME CENTER

Calm down. 
It isn't what you think, although it sounds like it: A shrine to the 'costumes' worn by Ms Wintour, although I'm sure something of the sort is in the offing (shudders - imagine an endless archive of those stiff tai tai print dresses and heavy crystal chokers). 

The famous Cecil Beaton photo of a group of Charles James ballgowns

No, instead, the Anna Wintour Costume Center is part of the The Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of New York. The inaugural exhibition, politically correctly American, is Charles James: Beyond Fashion (till August 10); First Lady Michelle Obama cut the ribbon officially opening the Anna Wintour Costume Center, which has just undergone a two-year renovation. 

WHY IS FASHION IMPORTANT?

I'm so happy to note that this is extracted from her last column. According to Vanessa Friedman, the outgoing fashion editor of the Financial Times, this is why fashion matters:

"If anyone ever challenges me about fashion and its legitimacy, I have a very simple answer – one that I wish I had had in that long-ago job interview, and one I would like to leave with you. Why does fashion matter? The world is not run by naked people.

Beyond that is an even more basic truth about why this subject is worth so much investment of time and attention: everyone has to get dressed in the morning. Everyone, on some level, thinks about clothes; about how they want others to see them, metaphorically as well as literally. It is one of the few universal subjects."

I have to say that I'm not a fan of the American Ms Friedman; I disagree with most of the columns she's written for the paper (which I really like and read regularly) over the 11 years she's been there. She's going to join the New York Times, to replace the revered Cathy Horyn, and I shudder to think how strangely boring and irrelevant the fashion coverage will become at that title.

WEEKEND READING LIST: ALL ROADS LEAD TO THAILAND

The last time I was in Bangkok was literally the eve of the anti-government demonstrations last November; the hotel manager called me that morning soon after breakfast and instructed me to pack my bags and leave just as I can because he had received advance information that demonstrators had begun to move towards the road leading to the hotel and would close it to traffic; he couldn't say if things would get violent but was advising guests to evacuate. Something in his tense voice over the phone made me pack my bags at once, and within an hour, I left in the hotel car. Turning back for one last look, I saw the crowd of demonstrators marching in, flags waving, with something of a festive air, but guards were beginning to bar entrances with barricades, and the streets were noisy with shrill whistles and clappers.

I felt like Sigourney Weaver in A Year of Living Dangerously.

Fast forward to (more or less) six months later and I'm simply longing to visit Bangkok again. As you know, for most Singaporeans, Bangkok is simply an obsession and a habit. I have not heard of any Singaporean who didn't like Bangkok; and according to my luxury brands PRs, the local press are always keenly enthusiastic about Thailand press junkets (as opposed to those to Hong Kong and etc ones, although arguably the press here salivate like a komodo dragon at any mention of a junket, with eyes bulging and ropes of sticky drool, cankerous tail waving). I wonder if it is thus for your country?

This last weeked I was reading 2011's Thoughtful Gardening by Robin Lane Fox, one of my favourite (living) writers and amongst the riveting chapters on cuttings and pests, Mr Fox remembers his visit to Bangkok as a young journalist. In particular he mentions the Phukae Botanic Garden, a gigantic park in Saraburi, some 60 miles outside Bangkok. Within the city, Mr Fox remembers Wang Suan Phakket (Lettuce Farm Palace), the lovingly tended garden of the late Princess Chumbhot. He took the bus number 3, which delivered him to the door of this "tranquil retreat". 

Reading about these gardens made me simply long to visit Bangkok.

I called my Thai sister Ms O. All my visits to Thailand are preceded by calls to my Thai sister.

She was busy making T-shirts.

What for?

Ms O was involved in what promises to be the mother of all demonstrations; she was making T-shirts for the anti-Thaksin army. Ms O said: "Honey please don't come between 5 May and 17 May. Millions of people are going to demonstrate to oust Yingluck. May not be that peaceful. Come after." 

Sure enough, the papers are full of dire reports on the impending demonstrations which will climax with new, and surely contested, elections in July. 

With this wearying warning in mind, it could be months before I see Mr Fox's Thai gardens.  

LOUIS KOO, THE BURNT CARAMEL TOFFEE TWIST

Firstly, Louis Koo's bizarre waxen caramel toffee colour has been much commented upon, leading many to speculate that he sleeps on a tanning bed; But that doesn't explain the waxen Madame Tussauds quality that he has, does it? 

Nong Poy and The Burnt Toffee Twist

But the caramel colour and waxen quality didn't put off Thai transsexual actress Nong Poy who had reportedly foamed over Louis Koo while shooting film The White Storm with the caramel-coloured actor. Poy had even apparently dumped her long-time boyfriend for the actor (Hong Kong media reported). Although, bizarrely, Poy had declined to shoot "intimate" scenes with Koo for the movie "for fear of frightening her parents". 

This ambiguous latter bit is really hard to understand, and if you think about it, has no logic whatsoever. It does leave one rather wondering what Poy's parents might have objected to. 

My guess is Koo's unnatural colouring. 

Poy and Koo were rumoured to have developed a romance, and caused Poy to have broken up with her boyfriend of five years. Poy admitted that she and her boyfriend had split, but denied that Louis was the "third party". She said: "He treats me like a younger sister, and I feel that he has never courted me before. I don't want to tarnish his reputation!"

THE WORLD OF CALVIN KLEIN

Kevein Carrigan, Francisco Costa, Italo Zucchelli

Major preparations are underway here in Singapore to celebrate the Calvin Klein multi brands today with a one-of-a-kind architectural installation. Singapore was selected as the location for this invitation-only event to celebrate the global expansion, and to mark the opening of four new Calvin Klein Collection stores in Southeast Asia this year in Singapore, Hong Kong, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur.

The special star-studded event will be hosted by the company’s creative directors – Francisco Costa, Italo Zucchelli and Kevin Carrigan together with Calvin Klein ceo Tom Murry. The evening will include important guests from the worlds of fashion and entertainment.

Tonight, for one night only, Calvin Klein will present a unique concept house by renowned architect Joshua Prince-Ramus, uniting the company’s different labels under one roof. The structure is constructed within the former Kallang Airport – which was decommissioned in 1955. It is the first time such an event will be held in this architectural landmark. Calvin Klein Home pieces will be featured throughout and over 30 models will wear looks from the Fall 2014 Calvin Klein Collection, Calvin Klein platinum label, Calvin Klein Underwear and the newly relaunched Calvin Klein Jeans.

TOM FORD'S GAY MARRIAGE

"We are now married, which is nice. I know that was just made legal in the UK which is great, but we were married in the States." - Tom Ford, who has been in a relationship with Richard Buckley for 27 years. They have a son, Alexander John Buckley Ford, in 2012.

Meanwhile, on the Huffington Post the 64-year-old Jeremy Irons started out saying that he didn’t “have a strong feeling either way” on the subject of gay marriages, but speculated: “Could a father not marry his son? It's not incest between men. Incest is there to protect us from inbreeding, but men don't breed." 

Of course the sisters are up in arms.

LET'S BE ECCENTRIC!

NEW CALVIN KLEIN COLLECTION FLAGSHIP STORE AT THE SHOPPES AT MARINA BAY SANDS SINGAPORE

The Calvin Klein Collection flagship store opens in Singapore today. Housed in The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands, this concept store reflects the Calvin Klein hallmark minimalism updated with dramatic bold lines, sleek surfaces and immaculate finishes. The new Calvin Klein Collection store follows the brand's global store design. The design features a sleek Italian marble and glass storefront that mirrors the monochromatic surfaces found inside. The quietly contemplative interiors are complemented with state of the art lighting and cleanly graphic furniture.

A salon within the store has the hush of a curated gallery space where pieces from the current collection are highlighted in an intimate setting. The award-winning store concept was first introduced in the Calvin Klein Collection store at Forum 66 in Shenyang, China.

The store carries the latest mens and womens collections including key runway looks designed by Italo Zucchelli and Francisco Costa, and a comprehensive range of shoes and accessories.

This Calvin Klein Collection store joins five other flagship stores globally, and marks the rolling out of three more flagship stores in the region this year, including one each in Hong Kong, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur. 

Calvin Klein Collection, #01-16, The Shoppes at Marina Bay Sands.