A little over two years ago, we followed The Uniform Project where Sheena Matheiken chose to wear one single dress for an entire year. Certainly she was creative in doing so and made the idea of wearing a single garment every.single.day a little less painful for the rest of us. She offered the design for sale on her website and it quickly sold out. Since then, other contributors have proposed their own versions of the modular LBD, all of which have sold out as they were released.

There is definite interest in the pared down approach to fashion.

Other designers around the world are playing with this idea too. The Ultra 10 Challenge, who’s creators are based in Kuala Lumpur and China, has come up with a 10-piece-wardrobe-for-365-days concept. The collection includes some creative convertible and multifunctional pieces such as the 3-in-1 coat, which converts into both a shirt and a skirt and the 2-in-1 jacket which converts into a vest. Other included wardrobe staples are a white shirt/dress, stretch pants, cotton trousers, a skirt, a dress, a cropped top and a vest. The whole collection is made from organic cotton and recycled materials. Though it appears to no longer be available for sale online, I’m still finding that this concept provokes an inspiring way to think about reformulating my own wardrobe based on multitasking, interchangeable and classic pieces.

What about shoes? Israeli designer Daniela Bekerman has created a convertible shoe concept. Her shoe takes on different styles and heel heights depending on which heel attachment is chosen. The shoe is not available for sale (still in concept stage), but the idea is fantastic and would definitely be a godsend solution for frequent travelers.

I don’t think that most of us are there yet, in terms of being ready to adopt the discipline of wearing only 10 garments and one pair of shoes for a whole year. But definitely, visionaries such as the ones mentioned here are helping open our eyes to new ideas to curb over-consumption. There is definitely freedom to be had in such simplicity.

If I could set my vanity aside for a moment, that might help too.

Indeed, as overworked, overburdened, overstressed women, doesn’t a little ME-covery sound perfect just about… now?

What does Saatchi & Saatchi mean by Me-Covery behavior? Here’s the full scoop, but essentially it is meant to show a trend where many women today are looking to:

 
• Buy healthier foods. More organic & high quality foods
• Consume LESS fast food
• Work out more, on their own, through online programs, videos and gaming systems
• Buy more vitamins and they are seeing their doctors more regularly
• Buy more skincare and hair-care products
• Plan to have more fun. That means vacations and getaways but also bedroom toys!

It is said that growth and change can only really be achieved as the outcome of difficult experiences. This economic crisis, though painful, has indeed brought us a whole new level of awareness, a definite realization that apparently we don’t need all that “stuff” and that things like our health are much more important… And that the little treats of a new workout DVD or $20 volumizing mousse can reintroduce just the right amount of yumminess in our daily routine, just enough to keep us going as we await the – economic – recovery.

We are smart consumers, always weary of being sold to under the pretext of a new trend or market segmentation, but personally, I love the term Me-Covery enough to feel like promoting the idea. If this appellation is all about making positive changes to look and feel better by eating better, getting active, primping up and having fun then… that’s a trend worth spreading the word about. Especially if merchants and service providers are looking to provide well-priced solutions to accommodate us.

Me-Covery? Bring it on!

It’s the Year of the Rabbit! After the past intense 12 months of the Tiger Year we can all take a nice deep breath and relax;  the rabbit is all about grace, mercy and peace.   This is a year to focus on the family (always the priority of the rabbit… just look at Brangelina, both rabbits!) comfort and healing.  Its a year to remember that gentle persuasion can be more effective than force and discussion will bring about greater compromise than aggression.

The most important holiday on the Chinese calendar, Chinese New Year celebrates not only the changing of the seasons but also the spiritual side of a new beginning.

Homes are scrubbed from top to bottom to sweep out any ill fortune and welcome in good luck. Debt is repaid and sometimes forgiven… squabbles are settled and peace is offered…it is both mental and physical clean slate.

There is feasting and firecrackers and paper envelopes with money… that’s right check, check, and CHECK!

My family likes all those things.

As a mother to a child born in China, I look at this holiday as a chance to keep my daughter connected to the country of her birth and honor those traditions most important to it.

For the past few years we have celebrated with two other families who also have children born in China and there is something rather special about watching all our girls together… they have a bond that they don’t recognize… but we do and we take a certain comfort from knowing that they have each other in their lives.

We feast. Oh yes, we feast. We order take away from a most delicious restaurant and eat noodles for a long life and fight over the last dumpling and accept the fact that we will never eat all the rice they insist on including with our dinner.

We don’t do firecrackers because exploding things is illegal in our neck of the woods, but we do wear fetching Chinese dresses… well, okay, the little girls wear fetching Chinese dresses, we wear jeans.

But the jeans are fetching.

The traditional red envelopes (with crisp $1 bills inside) are handed out and the girls whisper about what treasures they plan to buy… apparently, when you are 7, $1 goes a long way.

Every year I hope my envelope will have a couple of extra “0′s” on the bill, but alas, it has yet to be…

If we’re on our game we’ve usually come up with either a craft or a game for the kids to do while the ladies play (badly) mahjong and the men throw back a few Tsingtaos and we always end up talking about our time in China… when we met our beautiful babies and how very much we want to go back and how very much we love the place of our daughters’ birth.

And now we’ve had fortune cookies and our girls are knackered and dragging and it’s time to wish our friends good luck in this coming year… and so we head back to our (clean) home with full bellies and fuller hearts, wishing our friends nothing but prosperity and knowing that we are already full of good luck.

Who would not like to know their future? Especially in the launch of a new year. And, in case you’ve always been curious – as I have! – about the origins of the many forms of fortune telling, I thought I’d share a little research as well as a few favorite (and free!) websites that make such predictions.

Whether you believe in it or not, knowing the future is not a new thing. All forms of divination come from ancient times and was a very common practice in early societies. For example, the Tarot is a deck of cards that originated over 500 years ago in northern Italy. Although the Tarot deck of 78 cards was first used as a card game, it quickly became a tool for divination. The Tarot deck consists of Major (0 – 22) and Minor (four suits of 14 cards each) arcana cards. The early Tarot deck had symbolism from the Medieval and Renaissance Europe, but over the centuries over a hundred different Tarot decks developed, using a variety of symbols. Today, the Tarot is by far the most popular tool for spiritual introspection in the West.

Another popular form of fortune-telling is the I Ching, also known as the Classic of Changes or Book of Changes. It is one of the Five Classics that are the fundamental books of Confucianism. It is over 3000 years old (the symbols used in divination are over 5000 years old), making it both one of the oldest surviving books in the world, and one of the oldest forms of divination. It is based on simple energetic principles, and the dynamics between opposites, Yin and Yang. It is the most popular spiritual resource in Asia, and is growing in popularity due to its ability to provide detailed insights to those who study it.

Runes are 24 alphabetic symbols or letters that were first used over 1500 years ago by the Ostrogoths, a division of the Goths that settled in what we know as the Urkraine during the Roman Empire. Runes were initially most popular among Wiccans and modern pagans, but has become much more mainstream in the past 30 years.

And yet another ancient practice is Numerology that converts letters into numbers (A=1, B=2, C=3, etc), and compares the results to determine a person’s personality, strengths and talents, obstacles, inner needs and ways to deal with people or situations.  A traditional reading combines your birth date and birth name with the current date in order to give you what is relevant to you today. Interpretation requires some knowledge, but the advantage of numerology is that the readings are entirely objective and you can check the math yourself.

Astrology is probably the most popular of all vehicles for intuitive perception. Most people would know about astrology by their ‘sign’ which refers to one of the 12 constellations of the zodiac. This is your sun sign, which is nothing more than the date of one’s birthday. This is the most simplistic form of astrology that produces very limited results. Having an astrology reading, on the other hand, is an incredible tool for self-discovery. By studying the moon, sun, stars and planets and where they were at the time of birth gives a very specific reading of your personality, life and future prospects.

As Christianity took hold, the use of  divination became reviled as a pagan practice. Many still feel that reading tarot cards is purely witchcraft. There are also many critics who believe that reading one’s horoscope is a waste of time. Divination is often dismissed by skeptics as being mere entertainment with no scientific data to back up their claims. But entertainment it is.

So, here are some fun (and free) sites to try for yourself:

Astrologyzone – Susan Miller is a popular Astrologer, speaker and author. Her website, AstrologyZone.com gives detailed monthly readings based on your sun-sign.

AccessNewAge – Tarology combines numerology of your birthday with one of the first nine cards of the Major arcana in a Tarot deck. Use your birthday to determine your Tarology Number by adding your month and day and year (all four digits) together. The number (between 1 and 9) will correlate with a tarot card. This monthly reading will give you your direction for the month. Also, the tarot card that corresponds with your Tarology Number is your personality card. After finding out what your card is find out further meaning by going here.

Facade – This is a site that offers readings in Tarot, iChing, Runes and more. Simply ask a question and choose what form of divination you would like to have answer your question.

I use all three of these sites and I am amazed on how accurate they are. Since none of the readings are prepared specifically for me (I would have to pay for that) I am, nonetheless, always impressed by the overall precision of the readings.

Try them and let me know what you think. For fun. Right?

Dear Shoppers,

Well dears, it’s that time of year again… the time of year when one purchase can make or break many a relationship… the time of year when you find yourself desperately succumbing to just any old thing because despite a month of thinking about it, 2 weeks of late night Internet browsing, and 4 days of running out to the local shops on your lunch hour, you’re still empty handed and have nothing to give your mother.

So you buy her a Snuggie and hope she gets the joke. Or maybe actually likes it! Because your mother, who Zumbas, day hikes and volunteers at the local chihuahua rescue is suddenly a helpless old woman who can’t stay warm and talk on the phone at the same time?

I think not my puppies.

Pour yourself a nice glass of eggnog, maybe with a splash of whiskey, and get comfy because I am here not to tell you what to buy but much more importantly, what not to buy this holiday season.

Drugstore gift packs. This includes drugstore cologne/perfume wrapped with a bottle opener or keychain but mostly anything with soap on a rope. Soap-on-a-Rope is the bane of every father’s Christmas stocking. Have you ever seen it in action? Of course not. Your father will smile and thank you and he will dutifully hang it in his shower where he may even try to use it and darlings, have you ever tried to wash yourself with a car shaped soap? It’s awkward. After this one half hearted attempt it will lose all distinguishing characteristics and it will hang, for months, a mocking blob, in the shower until your mother tosses it in a fit of aggressive mildew removal.

Teddy Bears for anyone over the age of 16. I don’t care if that bear is wearing a festive outfit and comes with a box of cut rate chocolate… if it doesn’t have a serious piece of jewelry bling around its wee furry neck, it doesn’t belong under the tree.

Speaking of the under 16 set… itʼs important to address toys. Toys, as you know, are my forte, my specialité, my, as the kids say, thang. Iʼve seen toys come and Iʼve seen them go and trust me when I say, drum sets, eleventy billion piece “some assembly required” kits and dolls with teeny tiny shoes and purses, are only appropriate if you A) hate the parents of the recipient and B) are fine living with the knowledge that someday, somehow, they will retaliate and you will be sad. So very sad.

If your gift for the small people in your life requires batteries, be certain that you include them. Tape them smartly to the front of the present, because the phrase, “Batteries Not Included” is known to strike terror in the heart of many a parent on Christmas morning… of course there will not be 3 D-Cell batteries or 12 AAAs floating around in the junk drawer and, over the hysterical sobbing of little Susie or Billy, the parents will curse you and be forced to trudge out to the only shop open on this national holiday, the local liquor mart, where they will pay twice as much for a shoddy and dusty package of batteries to a hostile and smug proprietor.

I’ve seen it happen. Again, one day, you will be so very sad.

Moving on…

Avoid anything “camp”. This includes the aforementioned Snuggie, as well as items such as the Chia Pet, the hanging tomato garden and most especially, the As Seen on TV Hat. There is just so very much wrong with this hat/video viewer that Santa threatened to put anyone who asks for it on the Naughty List. The very idea of grown ass men and women sitting around in a giant ball cap with what is basically a Tyco View-Master attachment is the stuff of which my nightmares are made…

Naughty lingerie. No one needs to be dressed up as a sexy elf (take it from me, they do not exist) or worse, a sexy Mrs. Claus. Men, if you want to see your wife or girlfriend in something a little racy, it is time to man up and make a stop if not at La Perla, than at least Victoria’s Secret.

Finally, I hope this next category need not be said, but unless your loved one has come to you and verbally stated, with at least 2 sober witnesses present, that all they really want this year is a gym membership/Wii Fit/Biggest Loser dvd collection, FOR THE LOVE OF DECEMBER never give anything that implies weight loss, firmer abs, or a perkier butt.

Once again, you will be sad. Very very sad. If you don’t believe me, ask Santa about Christmas 1997.

Gift giving can be a tricky minefield for the uneducated, so consider yourselves blessed as you set forth on your holiday purchasing with a clear understanding of what just constitutes a gift most horrible… remember, there is no such thing as a difficult person to buy for, only lazy shoppers.

Happy Holidays!

Love,
Mrs. Claus

You may have noticed that I like IKEA. When I need something for the home I think of IKEA. I love their simple, inexpensive ways to freshen up the home, to fill a specific home décor need or to make a simple meatball with gravy dinner. To me, IKEA is for the home just as a grocery store for food. The more I find out about IKEA, the more I like it and what it stands for. I thought you might also be interested in these little known facts about the brand:

• IKEA is an acronym for the initials of Ingvar Kamprad and the initials where he grew up, Elmtaryd and Agunnaryd, Sweden.
• The first store in Canada opened in 1976 in Vancouver.
• The first store in United States opened in 1985 in Philadelphia.
• There is a grand total of 301 IKEA stores in 41 countries/territories. The IKEA Group itself owns 267 stores in 25 countries. The other 34 stores are owned and run by franchisees outside the IKEA Group in 16 countries/ territories.
• IKEA was one of the first retail stores to charge for bags and then to completely get rid of plastic bags.
• IKEA was one of the first to introduce reusable bags.
• IKEA can cater your next event, small or large.
• 150 million meatballs are sold each year around the world. Mmmmm, just thinking about their meatballs is giving me acraving. Here is a link to make your own Swedish meatballs.
• IKEA has a store front section to completely outfit your own store or boutique with everything from counters to stylish shelving.
• In 2009 660,100,000 people visited an IKEA store worldwide.
• All IKEA products have a designer’s name on them.
• BILLY, the classic bookcase for book lovers, was born back in 1979. Since then they have sold about 41 million of them around the world.
• IKEA consists of 9,500 home furnishing articles – most of them packed flat and ready to go!
• IKEA allows you to be your own interior designer by using their planner guides.
• Globally, IKEA is the largest corporate donor to UNICEF.
• Sustainability is integral to the IKEA culture and business. IKEA’s environmental practices, including flat packing to diminish our CO2 footprint are key to the way IKEA does business. Here is a list of some of their latest sustainability improvements.
• IKEA US and American Forests have planted over 1.5 million trees through in-kind store customer donations.
• IKEA Canada sells Christmas trees for $20 at all their stores. A portion of sale proceeds will go to their long-standing environmental partner, Tree Canada for the “Pick a tree, plant a tree” program.  In addition, customers receive a coupon for $20 off a $75 purchase made between January 2 and February 28, 2011. Christmas Trees will be available for sale starting November 25 until they are sold out.
• IKEA is sponsoring the Life Improvement Project. They are accepting proposals until November 8th, 2010 on how you would spend a year and a $100,000 helping others.  If interested check out the website.

Fun facts. I would love to hear an interesting tidbit you may know about IKEA that we don’t know.

So, please pardon our appearance as tweaks and retrieval of files  is still going on. A few pages and functions are still looking rickety in the process.

Thanks for your patience!

Indeed, take a look at Lumi Co. This brand new start up company is up to BIG (huge) things. It is headed by the very young (22 year olds) but incredibly brilliant and determined product design students, the team of Jesse and Stéphan.

What’s Lumi? It’s a totally unique, groundbreaking printing technology. Why is it so special? Lumi’s process isn’t derived from any other existing printing technology. It enables printing with photo-realistic qualities, on any NATURAL material (even over texture). This has been previously impossible. Sure, there are ways to print on textiles, but the only known process are screen printing for natural textiles (which limits the quality & authenticity of the printed image) or sublimation which can only be done on synthetic materials, with a whole lot of harmful chemicals. Natural materials cannot be printed using the sublimation technique because it would burn and destroy them.

In contrast, Lumi can print the exact, unaltered image in an eco-friendly way on ANY natural material. This is truly ground-breaking. The image is permanent, wash-fast and eco-safe.

How do 22 year olds come up with something like this? Well, you need one very passionate young lady who doesn’t understand nor accept the meaning of “No, this can’t be done.” This was the standard response that Jesse got for a numbers of years as she was asking herself why, oh why, were there no methods of reproducing, i.e. printing, full-color/full-tonal gradation images on natural fabrics, cotton, linen, leather, etc… She took a year off of school to explore this very question. Her investigation took her to talk to print experts all over the world, who all told her the same thing: it can’t be done.

From her Kickstarter interview, Jesse says:  “I conceived of the idea back in high school when I was operating a fashion company and began to question why my creativity had to be limited by the materials and technologies that I could find in the yellow pages. Choosing textile imaging as a focus, I began an in-depth quest to learn every way that people in every culture have applied imagery to fabrics through the ages. What resulted was a deep knowledge of why we’ve come to use the technologies that are currently available, but also exactly where their limitations lie. Still unsatisfied and looking for solutions I began to study types of printing that weren’t textile related, that is when I uncovered the building blocks to the Lumi Process.”

That’s when the detail-oriented, problem-solving partner, Stéphan, came in to assist Jesse on developing the mechanics of the new technology. The funding that they are looking to receive through Kickstarter will finance the last of the R & D stage and enable them to start collaborating with photographers and fashion brands to test the creative capabilities of their product.

Just so you know, Kickstarter projects only get financed once they have reached 100% of their goal, within the assigned timeline. Otherwise, they get… nothing. Ouch. Which is why I want to encourage you to become a Kickstarter backer for Lumi. There are 20 days left for them to achieve their goal and they are still – at the time of this writing – at 48% of their $12,000 goal. You can become a backer with as little as $5 all the way to… well, however much you’d like. BTW, you get a gift with your pledge over $15 and the gifts become better and better with each pledge amount.

You WANT to be a part of this. The textile, fashion and home décor industries have NO idea what’s about to hit them. Yeah, you want to say “I was there”. Go to Lumi’s Kickstarter page and pledge here.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

UPDATE: Lumi Co. was successfully funded on February 22 and the project is moving ahead, full steam. I can’t wait to see how it develops. I am so incredibly impressed with these two amazing young minds. Bravo!

I’m in awe of the amazing talent of the creative directors that build these dreamy, fantastical montages and of their elves that execute their vision  for every passerby’s delight…

So, I was researching this season’s holiday windows from the NYC chi-chi retailers (because they have the biggest budgets and because they need to outdo themselves every year, you know they’ll create something astonishing) to present here, when I found that all the best photos came from one single photographer: Rudy Pospisil. So, let me just send you directly to his blog where there are enough magical images to guarantee that you will feel jolly before you even click to page 2.

Some of the displays captured by Rudy will simply take your breath away… So crammed with fantasy, surrealism, fairytale, color, sparkle  and detail.

Here is a collage of some of my favorites…

Thank you, Rudy for sharing the magic of these displays.

I LOVE this new site! Looklet is “styling studio” where you and I can mix & match fashion styles to create all sorts of looks. I get to fantasize about what I’d wear if I were 6 feet tall and a size 0, or still in my 20′s and foolish again, or if about what I’d wear if I needed to attend a movie premiere. Ahhh, the fantasy. Meanwhile, I’m still in my pj’s.

Looklet is like playing with paper dolls, but for “adults” and with real fashions. The Looklet wardrobe features the latest trends by new and top designers and vintage boutiques. They also have contests where participants can build a look based around the prize item.

I don’t know what their revenue model is since they mention that they don’t sell anything on their site (Must be advertising revenue…). Still I really admire all the photography, styling and back-end work that went into making this application. Admirable. And fun.