Because, y’know, anything this sleek, shiny and impeccably tailored also screams ‘posh’ in a non-Spice-Girl-related way. Go VB.
Victoria Beckham autumn/winter 2013/14 /style.com
Related links
See uptown city chic at Rag & Bone autumn/winter 2013/14
The devil is in the details at Victoria Beckham autumn/winter 2012/13
Carven + Victoria Beckham - an understated sartorial match made in heaven?
Vogue’s ‘Storm Troupers: Celebrating Hurricane Sandy’s First Responders’: some say it’s a degrading comparison between high fashion with those saving the rest of humankind from natural disasters. “Is the models’ presence supposed to suggest that Oscar de la Renta’s spring collection is equally heroic?” Time magazine asks, while the Huffington Posts ridicules the spread for “a photo shoot intended to celebrate Sandy’s heroes [that] ends up paying tribute to the same pouty models — and high-fashion ideals — that does every other issue of Vogue.”
Uh, yeah. Because Vogue is a fashion magazine, and has never pretended to be anything else. Clothes (and advertisers) first, setting second. Indeed, the magazine should be commended for thinking outside the box and working with the heroes of Hurricane Sandy. No, pretty girls in expensive clothes is not as heroic, or anywhere even in the same league, as providing food, water and medical assistance in the wake of a natural disaster. But that’s not what this is about; it’s about New York: its vanity and its frippery, but also its people - good, hard-working folks, many of whom it would not be the city it is today.
Related links
See the quirky, beautiful designs of New York-based jewellery designer Vera Balyura
City girl dressing by 3.1 Phillip Lim
Fashion photographer Elle Muliarchyk shoots different facets of the New York woman
Old asian ladies tai chi-ing in New York: reminds me of my grandpa in Hong Kong (miss him! ♥) / UNIFORM by Alexa Karolinski, Zoe Latta and Mike Eckhaus via NOWNESS
Another beautiful day on the Brooklyn Bridge. Photo taken and edited using only iPhone apps! (Taken with Instagram)
I met Vera Balyura outside Hemingway & Pickett, a store in LA’s Silver Lake district that is run, funnily enough, by an Australian (owner Toby Burke Hemingway is from Melbourne). The store was hosting a trunk show for her label VeraMeat, and the slender, hauntingly beautiful designer was at the door personally to greet guests with her gorgeous companion Fred (a girl, by the way).
Fascinated by her quirky jewellery, I nabbed her for a few quick questions. She was lovely, and I cannot say enough how much I’ve fallen in love with her pieces. I mean c’mon guys - a dinosaur eating fried chicken? ‘Sif not cool.
So you’re a jewellery designer. How did you start?
I started off making things for myself. I was modelling at the time, and I’ve always made stuff with my grandfather, like miniatures and stuff so I just wanted to just make things for myself that I kind of wanted to wear. And then a stylist saw some of my stuff and she was like, ‘Oh’, you know, ‘I’d love to feature this’. And she worked with Nylon a lot and so she said ‘You really need to make a line,’ and so I did, and I sent it to her and they ended up featuring me so it was really great.
It’s just something I enjoy doing for myself and I kind of then got into the swing and it grew and grew and grew and now I have a store in Manhattan and other stores like this (Hemingway and Pickett) carry my stuff.
Are you originally from New York?
Yeah. Well I was born in Europe but I grew up in New York. I’ve lived there for over ten years, I went to school there and everything but yeah, I come to LA a lot and my sister lives here and I need excuses to come here.
Yeah? Why do you like LA?
I like the weather the most.
Funny, that’s what most people say about Australia.
The weather!
It’s so good. I’ve actually been to Sydney and I love it, I like the ibises and the bats in the park, it’s very inspiring. Fred looks like a little bat so…
Is Fred your only pet?
She is, I used to have a little bluebird with a red belly, it was really interesting and I used to just let it fly around and I had the window open and it would leave and everything and then about a year and a half after I had it, it was just sitting on the windowsill and it was kind of like looking at it me and I could tell it waslike, ‘Can I go?’ and I was like, ‘You can go if you want.’ So he went outside, and then he came back every few months to visit me.
Oh! Do you still see him?
Well that was when I was in Brooklyn and now I’ve moved to Manhattan so…
He’s probably gone back and seen new people in your apartment and been like, ‘Who is this?’
I know. He doesn’t see me anymore. But he was such a beautiful, beautiful little treasure.
So have you always loved animals?
Yeah I have, especially unique animals or animals that I feel like me pick me. I have a lot of weird animal stories.
Like?
Well animals, like even really mean dogs that don’t like anyone, they really like me. And for some reason they’re very calm around me.
Like me and my friend went to this insane asylum just to check it out and it was closed [but] we went to take photos, and one of the family members of the family that watched it - he used to be in the asylum, he stuttered and had a lot of issues - he was there by himself …
He came with this huge pit bull on a chain and the pit bull was just barking ‘ar, ar, ar,’ and then he let it go off the leash and it ran towards us, but it went right past me towards my friend and my friend was terrified with his hands up and I was like, ‘It’s okay, come here,’ and he just sat next to me, like super calm.
Wow.
It’s fun. I don’t know why it is, but it just is.
So animals are where you get most of your inspiration from?
Well, I just make things I want for myself, mostly.
And where does the ‘meat’ in VeraMeat come from?
Yeah, the meat comes from me laughing [while] walking near the BQE (Brooklyn-Queens Expressway in New York) after work and thinking, ‘What’s honest, that I love [and] yet think is funny?’ ‘Meat’ came to mind as it’s something hard to like these days as being vegan is the politically correct thing yet my body type doesn’t allow that nor does my blood type. Long story short, I just thought ‘VeraMeat’ and started laughing. Then I knew I would have to stick with it.
Also, my company is the ‘meatier’ side of jewelry - more interesting subject matter and better materials.
[And some] fun news - Werner Herzog the director just picked up a VeraMeat Edward Scissorhand necklace for good luck!
A pared-back approach to cooking that focuses on fun and good flavours. Also, I kind of love her jumper.
Name: Victoria Yee Howe
Current location: Brooklyn
Daily uniform: Mini skirts, boots, a big wool coat, dark sunglasses and a thoughtful perfume. I try to buy either very cheap, old clothing or really expensive new clothing and not much in between. My dream uniform involves a lot of Comme des Garçons, Jil Sander, Erdem, Peter Pilotto, disco jumpsuits, impractical high heels and vintage Alaïa.
I have a few: …big dreams and grand plans.
In the kitchen, I swear by: Old movies humming in the background, sharp knives, and a retractable Sharpie. A Kitchenaid mixer and Vitamix if I’m feeling flush. Solitude if I’m working on a deadline—can’t bust out the ninja moves unless I’m alone.
The taste I couldn’t live without: Too hard to choose one, but I’d be very sad if I never got to eat pickled vegetables, salted milk chocolate, dim sum and strong hot tea ever again (but please not all at once).
Carbs are: …something a lot of other people seem to like talking about?
This week I can’t stop buying: Black truffles, edible gold spray paint, and blackwatch plaid.
My mother taught me: Good manners
My cat, Banana, is: Obviously the shit.
I’m dying to go: All over the Middle East, North Africa, Lake Baikal, St. Petersburg, the Kamchatka Peninsula, backwoods China. Basically…almost everywhere? Especially the places you’re not supposed to go.
Excerpt from ‘Sous style: Victoria loves Jil Sander & Salted Chocolate’, text by Britt Aboutaleb and photography by Lianna Tarantin / Elle US
… everything from Theory. But especially these. My husband’s little text this morning on the current Aussie to US dollar exchange rate - “If you were going to get something from the States, today would be a good day” - makes me wish I had a couple of hundred dollars to spend on clothes. But alas, must. save*. But dreaming never cost a cent, did it?**
I was privileged enough to speak to photographer Elle Muliarchyk the other day; along the way, we spoke briefly about her photographic and videographic series ‘Designing our Fortunes’, featuring model Meghan Collison.
“For the whole summer she [Meghan Collison] transformed into 10 different characters. Each character was a different prototype of a girl who lived in New York, like an Upper East Side lady, a former Shaker girl, a lesbian architect, a blogger, girls like this.
In each personality, changed with a wig, makeup, clothing and everything, the girls went to fortune tellers. But the psychics didn’t know that each time it was actually the same girl; they thought it was a different girl and they gave her different fortunes based on what she wore and who she represented with fashion.
I’m interested in our interaction with the fashion and the clothes, because fashion is the business of fantasy. We are working in the business that creates the fantasy for everyone else. It’s really amazing that we have this power to create the world that everyone else lives in, in this fantasy.”
Full story to come later. In the meantime, more of Elle’s work
‘Designing our Fortunes’ / Elle Muliarchyk for Dossier journal via Touch Puppet
Image: Amy
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