The Man Who Lived On His Bike

THE MAN WHO LIVED ON HIS BIKE from Guillaume Blanchet on Vimeo.

Amon Tobin "ISAM" Live

The new extended trailer for Amon Tobin's next visual experience that will be featured in six major cities around the world (Paris, Montreal, Berlin, Brussels, Amsterdam and London). These audiovisual environments rock.

F A H A D

Fahad Asvt.

Photog extraordinaire, blogger, and debonaire.

We had so much fun at this photo shoot in Montreal - it started out as a brainstorming session to figure out what concept would work best amongst his other portraits on his new blog, Mr. Black's Diary. We figured he was going for a vintage look with an edge so when Ms. Joane suggested a murder mystery, we were all on board. However, murder mystery quickly turned into model-distracted-and-getting-ready-to-go-out, so we all went with the flow (and this is what came of it).

P.S. I still don't quite know what I love so much about the blurry color one, but it just works for me.

Song of the day: Max Cooper - Symphonica

Atwater

A short excursion to the Atwater market in Montreal. Photos by Ted Oyama - budding photographic and architectural entrepreneur.

Reading horoscopes, most important part of the day.

I love this one!

Basically, the Atwater market is more expensive and further away, but has really beautiful and locally grown produce. We were lucky to have gone the day it started snowing!

Mix of the day: Love Thy Brother - The Young Canada Mixtape

Speaking of shadez...

Check out the Vintage Frames Company, they have some of the rarest and dopest eye wear ever. Oh, and they're based in Montreal (*wink!). I love that city.

Seriously though, the sunglasses are amazing and he has - or seems to have, anyway - every pair of awesome eye-wear imaginable, in every color.

Two snaps and a circle!

Reigning in our disposable lifestyles - DIY (pt. 2)

And another post of vanity!

Blazer - Village des Valeurs (Pie IX, Montreal, Quebec, CANADA) - about $4 - with black velvet lapels

Feather stencil - found at an awesome second hand clothing / costume rental store called Eva B on St. Laurent (in Montreal); thick ink (feels almost like black glue) on muslin fabric, made by local artist (unnamed) - about $7

Dark blue + black and white = great combo

photos by Kevin Colombu (http://www.kevincolombu.com/blog/)

Stripe-It-Up

Mom's style from back in the day (1972)

a new DIY project

gap stripes

more gap stripe campaign

Stripes are all the rage. Although that expression never really was my favorite. "Rage", for me, implies a certain anger and viciousness, and my feelings about stripes are far from being described by those two nouns. Stripes have come back into style might be a better way of putting it. The new GAP campaign has clearly incorporated stripes, and these can be found all over their store: vertically, horizontally, in all different widths. I think that stripes are a nice, clean and modest pattern. They remind me of Brittany (in France) and the whole sailor look, which I, for some reason, associate with organization and cleanliness. I found the blue and white striped dress at H&M for about $20 and have decided to amp up the striped look a bit by adding some more military details (although the epaulette may be a bit too large to be called a "detail"). I found the blue patch, satin cream-colored rope and beige fringe at Fabricville in Montreal (for about $14) and will eventually sew them together. I love the plaid look that's been going around as well, but the stripes are an even better way to look casual yet put together at the same time. My great friend Shannon (below) is also a huge fan of the stripes - and we can't say she looks too shabby in them either!

Shannon (wifey!)

Laurent and his striped number

no. way.

After a relatively gruesome midnight bus ride back home from Montreal - aren't they always? - I had about 3 hours to get to an internship interview in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. It took about 2 hours to eat and get to my dad's office to change and look somewhat clean/not like I'd been playing sleep-contortion-opoly for the last 9 hours. Now, there are two bits of exciting news, the first being that I got the internship. The second is that THE STREETBOTS ARE TAKING OVER THE WORLD! I saw one on Grand Street in Williamsburg and was shocked to say the least - I wonder if they travel in packs! I guess I'll have to keep an eye open for the crazy critters...

UPDATE: Apparently these actually ARE all over the world! A friend who is traveling around North America told me he saw some in Toronto and Chicago as well!

In search of the master of the suicidal streetbots

Durocher & Milton

Parc & Milton (north side)

Hutchinson & Milton

The squashed little square bodies, the outward pointing feet, the familiar triple-lined center. They're everywhere! On Milton Ave., anyway. Who is creating these buddies (and how!)?

UPDATE: Apparently, our buddies can be found all over Montreal - Place Ville-Marie, St. Laurent, Square Victoria... Looks like I'm going to have to go on an adventure and find the whole family!

Let's call it DIY, studs

Lauriane (photo by 4Mika - 4Mika.com)

Lauriane (photo by 4Mika - 4Mika.com)

fig 1.

fig. 2

fig. 3

Military style became particularly trendy after the death of the King of Pop. We saw the gold rope-like embroidery across the chest and epaulettes, which veered into familiar faux shoulder insignia, colorful ribbon strips at the wrists and bright buttons. Of course, we've all seen the boyfriend blazer trend as well. Recently, however, I've noticed an amalgamation of the two with the increase of an edgier side to these looks - studs. There seems to be a punk version of the military jacket and blazer- studded shoulders, studded wrists, studded pockets. Balmain (fig. 1) has created a few of these and I've seen some nice studded lapels at Zara (fig. 2). A couple weeks ago, my brother's girlfriend Lauriane was wearing a plain v-neck grey sweater with the perfect studded detail on the shoulders from Sandro (take a look at the studded Fall '09-'10 collection here: http://www.sandro-paris.com/). Fond of the look, I decided to search for some studs to DIY a sweater myself. I went first to Omer de Serres, an art supply story in Montreal, where one of the employees showed me her studded belt (making sure I was in fact referring to the right peice of metal) and directed me towards St. Denis, to a punk store store called X2O-Rio, where I could find studs. They were selling 10 for $2, so I bought two bags, went home, and carefully folded 5 metal prongs into each shoulder of the sweater. Et voila! Not as nice as last year's Givenchy studded number (fig. 3), but still cool.

Let's call them streetbots, Montreal

Parc & Milton (south side)

Aylmer & Milton

These little guys can be seen around the McGill Ghetto in Montreal - usually in Frogger mode, in the middle of an intersection, trying to avoid traffic despite their immobile positions. They're made of some sort of thick glue, embossed into the pavement. Interestingly enough, each one's head is pointing in the same direction (east). One friend's oh-so-avant-garde theory is that they are being squashed by cars, symbolically suggesting the death of technology. Another ponders the technicalities; or more specifically the directionality, wondering where they are all going, who they are going to meet, what are they going to talk about (assuming they are going to a streetbot meeting, of course). In either case, these little dudes are corner-of-the-eye catchers; sweet reminders of simplistic creativity.