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I Love Getting Mail

Posted on February 11, 2009
Filed Under Events | 3 Comments

I’m going up to New York for Fashion Week for the first time! Look at this cool invitation I received for Ports 1961. The fabric can be bunched and twisted and worn as a scarf. Very Issey Miyake, those pleats…

I’m not sure what to wear. I feel like the choices are these:
all black
something totally glamorous, well-thought-out and fashionable
something like this (hat tip to Jane at Sea of Shoes, my current blog crush. I can’t believe she’s 17!)

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I’m not blaming anyone for this

Posted on February 11, 2009
Filed Under Everything Else | 3 Comments

I was late meeting a friend for drinks the other night because of Blame it on Rio, the new W spread featuring Madonna and Jesus Luz (nothing on the W site, but if you google you can find them). Who is certainly hot enough to cause distraction. Someone needs to be thanked for producing this sexy photo spread, but more than that, for bringing back MADONNA. The Madonna who wears crosses and black lingerie, has platinum blonde hair, smokes and drinks and has shameless sex in anonymous hotel rooms.

Also, the gloves she’s wearing in the shoot are precisely what I have been looking for. Has anyone found a resource for these?!

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Alexis Bittar @ the Corcoran

Posted on February 9, 2009
Filed Under Events, Only in Washington | 2 Comments

A little selfish self-promotion here, but all of you should know that Alexis Bittar is coming to the Corcoran on Wednesday! Janet Bennett Kelly at the Post was awesome for including the talk in DC Scout and Cory Ohlendorf did a great interview with Alexis in Express on Friday. And I love this feature (lots of great images of the designer’s NYC workshop and apartment) here in New York Social Diary. He’s known for his hand-crafted lucite jewelry and bold styles. Go to his site and it won’t take you long to want pretty much everything. The Spring 2009 collection is just gorgeous, inspired by the natural world and full of feminine pieces in soft colors.

You can get tickets here, and you should.

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Yesterday, Georgetown

Posted on February 9, 2009
Filed Under On The Street, Women | 2 Comments

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That New Love Glow

Posted on February 4, 2009
Filed Under Everything Else | Leave a Comment

The other day Jade emailed me with a link and the subject line, “Rachel, this looked like you.” What looked like me were these very awesome shoes, “on sale” at Shopbop. Strangely enough, I had just been staring at this pair above at Georgetown shoe mecca Hu’s Shoes, also from Robert Clergerie. R.G…we were meant to be.

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The Shiseido Woman

Posted on February 2, 2009
Filed Under Around Town, Women | 7 Comments

The Japanese makeup company Shiseido always had an air of glamour and mystery to me, ever since I was a little girl. I encountered it first when I was probably eight or so, with my friend J (there we are, posing like the self-aware little girls that we were). We were constantly playing dress-up and rifling through the cabinets of her mother’s bathroom. Her mother, a photographer, never wore much makeup or dressed in anything besides black jeans and linen shirts, but she somehow had a decent collection of expensive-looking cosmetics that all looked like they came from somewhere exotic; where women applied face creams from hand-blown glass jars. So there was all of that, and she had a Shiseido lipstick. The sleek tube was black lacquer, and it slid open and closed shut as smoothly and as discreetly as Japanese paper doors. Coupled with the red lipstick inside, this was shockingly and defiantly sexy to me. This was womanhood in all its grown-up and worldly glory. I was transfixed.

Years later, I was entering high school and listening to a fair amount of Tori Amos (and, weirdly, Metallica). I sometimes dub late middle school and early high school my “angsty years,” not because I had any major problems or hated my parents or was unhappy (quite the opposite on all counts), but because I was highly emotional and attuned to what was in my own head and the way events affected me. I kept diaries like crazy. Being a teenager made me feel wildly excited and alive – everything was a turn-on. Tori Amos had a song called Muhammad My Friend, and the song opened like this:

Muhammad my friend
It’s time to tell the world
We both know it was a girl back in Bethlehem
And on that fateful day
When she was crucified
She wore Shiseido Red and we drank tea
By her side

Amos had a very close friendship with the late makeup artist Kevin Aucoin, who did some work with Shiseido. Amos is just an amazing wordsmith and story-teller, and was the only-I-understand-myself-soundtrack to my inner thoughts then. I don’t listen to her all that regularly, possibly because I use the music to transport myself back to those ballsy teenage days and you can’t over-use that sort of trick. But so there it was again: Shiseido. Shiseido Red, sex-bomb, defiant alter-Jesus. Glamorous, all-knowing, and important.

So Shiseido has always sort of followed me, and it entered my life rather suddenly again last week when a friend invited me to an intimate party unveiling Shiseido's Spring 2009 collection. The NARS collection was there, too, and several new fragrances, a few of which are not yet available for purchase (including Essence by Narciso Rodriguez, which smells incredible but is light as air. I want to smell like that all spring and summer). The NARS 2009 line was inspired by some of the Spring shows, including Chris Benz and Marchesa.

When I got into my car and peeked into my gift bag, I squealed (yup, totally did). Aside from the excitement I felt at being given a lot of pricey and beautifully packaged cosmetics for free (basically the entire NARS Spring line...I can toss my crumbly drugstore stuff now), I now owned my very own Shiseido lipstick. The color is Perfect Rouge, and strangely enough, it very closely resembles my own naturally flushed lips. I haven't opened it yet.

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