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As we all know from friends or from personal experience, Kickstarter campaigns may not always be the final solution to make a project come true. Yet there are times when people react positively and enthusiastically to a clever idea or product and are ready to support it.
This is exactly what happened to Studio Samira Boon. The designer may be better known for her textile projects and functional products, but for her Kickstarter campaign she created a very clever toy that will attract not just kids but grown-ups as well.
Dubbed San Kaku Mado (most products designed by Boon have a Japanese name), this playful yet minimalist window mosaic puzzle consists in a series of transparent triangles in bright shades that offer endless possibilities and the chance to create infinite figures, objects and stories on smooth surfaces (though you can bet some grown ups will buy the sets for themselves and use them to decorate their own windows or turn them into fashion accessories...).
Having received positive feedback from the Kickstarter campaign, Boon will be able to start the production and distribution of the toy. As Boon launched her studio while she lived in Tokyo - a place where she still has a large group of customers - the manufacturing will take place in Japan, guaranteeing high quality to the product.
The main inspiration for this product came to Samira Boon from playing with her kids and deciding to develop a toy not just for her family but for her friends as well.
As it happens with all the best things, though the design of the product is very basic, it took a long time and a trial and error process to develop it.
The San Kaku Mado comes in one size and it will be sold in a flat package (easy to ship anywhere in the world and useful to be used as a storage box) containing 36 triangles in one colour (the product will be available in five different shades) that can be carried everywhere and used anywhere, as long as there is a window or glass surface where to stick the triangles.
"One of my favourite materials is the transparent vinyl that I started working with when I lived in Tokyo," Boon states on her Kickstarter page. "It varies in beautiful colours and lights up when the sun falls on it. But that is not the only beauty of this material; the most important thing is that due to its adhesive properties this material sticks to any flat surface such as mirrors and window. This makes the material highly suitable and easy for children to play with."
The main point of this toy is stimulating the creativity and the imagination of children while saving space and reminding most of us that kids don't need much to play with. "One of the most valuable things we can teach to our children is that they only need small things to make big things," Boon stated in a press release. "A simple little basic shape can become quite a story, and children can take us on a journey into their fantasy world."
To promote the product, Boon has also started making stop motion movies to capture the stories told by children playing with the San Kaku Mado.
But this is not the only happy twist Samira Boon is giving to this joyful story. The designer has indeed another surprise to make her customers happy: from now on with every € 500 (or more) given to her project via Kickstarter, Studio Samira Boon will donate a big box of San Kaku Mado sets worth €75 to children institutions, including hospitals and orphanages (all the public who backed her project can nominate organisations).
Looks like putting effort in everything you make - a lesson that Boon was reminded about while working as a designer in Japan - really pays. You can discover more about the San Kaku Mado Kickstarter campaign and support the project here.
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Fashionistas may remember the Church Orsanmichele in Florence in conjunction with a rather questionable event that featured Gareth Pugh, yet there is a lot more to discover about this building.
The first building erected on this site was a small oratory secreted in the orchard of a vegetable garden (orto) of a Benedictine monastery and open loggia with a grain warehouse upstairs.
A larger church stood on the site from the 9th century - San Michele ad Hortum or San Michele in Orte (contracted in Orsanmichele). The church was replaced by a grain market in the 13th century but the place retained its religious associations.
Today it's the feast of Saint Anne, and Florence celebrates its co-patron Saint with an art and archtectural event at the Orsanmichele Church and Museum. On 26th July 1343 Florence expelled from the city the tyrant Gualtieri di Brienne and the locals linked this episode to the figure of Saint Anne, declaring this date a solemn feast.
The Orsanmichele Church features one of the most ancient images of Saint Anne that you will ever find in the city, a fresco of the Saint painted in 1398 by Mariotto Di Nardo portraying the Saint with a miniature model of the city in her hands. The fresco is located over the votive altar of St. Anne, built in 1379, with a marble group of St. Anne, the Virgin and Child by Francesco da Sangallo (c. 1526).
After today's mass in the morning and the offering of the candles to the saint at 9.30 p.m., the church will remain open throughout the summer, and tomorrow there will be a special opening of the museum.
Entry will be free and tourists and locals will be able to admire the original sculptures created in the 15th and 16th centuries by Florentine artists. These pieces - Lorenzo Ghiberti's Saint Matthew, Saint Stephan and Saint John the Baptist, Nanni di Banco's Saint Eligius, Saint Philip, Four Crowned Saints group, Donatello's Saint Mark, Baccio da Montelupo's Saint John the Evangelist, Andrea del Verrocchio's Christ and Doubting Thomas, Giambologna's Saint Luke, Donatello's Saint Peter, Saint Jacob attributed to Niccolò di Pietro Lamberti, and the Madonna della Rosa attributed to Piero di Giovanni Tedesco - were originally located in the niches decorating the external sides of the church.
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In the film Elizabeth The Golden Age, Cate Blanchett's splendid gowns designed by Alexandra Byrne were based on costumes created by Balenciaga for a 1941 stage play.
Balenciaga's work for theatre plays, dance performances and films is actually not so well known, but a recently opened exhibition at the Cristóbal Balenciaga Museum in Getaria, Spain, is currently tackling this connection.
"Balenciaga y Las Artes Escénicas" (Balenciaga and The Performing Arts; until 18th October 2015) features reproductions of pictures plus newspaper clippings, documents, posters and programs of theatre plays and dance shows, that not many people probably remember or even know about.
The exhibition curator Pedro Usabiaga - a famous photographer who started his career working for important designers such as Jean-Paul Gaultier and Nino Cerruti, and who later on became a collaborator of many fashion magazines - had to embark in a personal investigation that took him two years and that brought him to different institutions and museums to find the materials on display.
Balenciaga collaborated with prominent authors and artists over four decades: his first job in the performing arts consisted in dressing dancer María Elena Arizmendi in 1935 when she starred in Ravel's "Bolero" at the Kursaal of Donostia-San Sebastián.
Balenciaga then worked on many other productions, especially after he moved to Paris and got in touch with the local intellectuals.
In France he created wardrobes for Histoire de rire, Pas de mari, pas d'ennuis and Échec à Don Juan by Claude-André Puget, with costumes inspired by the Spanish Golden Age.
He also designed costumes for Orphée by Jean Cocteau, and for different works by Albert Camus, Françoise Sagan and Marcel Achard.
In the '40s, Balenciaga dressed actress Helene Perdrière in Hymenee, a play by Édouard Bourdet, and Yolande Laffon in Etienne by Jacques Deval.
In 1945 he made the white costumes for the performers of the Orfeón Donostiarra (one of the singers worked in his atelier, so this collaboration was born out of a personal friendship).
After a break during World War II, Balenciaga returned to the world of the performing arts in 1949 when he dressed Maria Casarès in Camus' Les Justes staged at the Théâtre Hébertot and directed by Paul Œttly.
Balenciaga then worked on Spanish works written by Alfonso Paso and Jacinto Benavente and in theatrical adaptations of famous authors such as Agatha Christie, while he also developed designs for flamenco icons à la Rocío Jurado and Lola Flores.
One of the most unusual pieces in the exhibition is a picture of a costume Balenciaga created in 1952 for Antonio Ruiz Soler also known as "Antonio El Bailarín", one of the very few menswear pieces ever created by the designer.
In 1962 Balenciaga dressed Marie Dames in Les fochés, a play by Jan Marsan, collaborating the following year to a new version of Cocteau's Orphée, directed by Jean Lauvrais and Jean Pommier. The performance also featured actress Christiane Barry in an iconic black sequinned cape by Balenciaga (Usabiaga managed to include in the exhibition a rare picture of this design).
The exhibition closes with images of the designs Balenciaga created for actress Isabel Garcés in pieces by Benavente, Paso and Françoise Dorin, and pictures of Amparo Soler Leal in Le cheval évanoui by Françoise Sagan.
Stage costumes are considered by museum curators as particularly fascinating as they must be well constructed to survive rehearsals and performances, robust handling and quick changes, while Haute Couture gowns, despite being beautifully crafted, are often worn only once or twice.
Though it mainly features images rather than proper costumes, this exhibition is therefore interesting when we come to consider the portrayed costumes from this point of view and when we realise that in this case the couturier was lending his skills and very personal touch not to a high fashion gown, but to the vision of many different directors, choreographers and performers.
"Balenciaga and The Performing Arts" is accompanied by a series of courses at the Balenciaga Museum that will look at some of the themes tackled by the event. In October, for example, a special course will look at set design and costumes.
Usabiaga hopes that, after the exhibition closes in Spain, he will be able to take the event to France where new links and - who knows - even further materials about this fascinating connection may be found among collectors or in theatre archives.
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"There is nothing intrinsically dangerous in sewing clothes," Kate Ball-Young, former sourcing manager at Joe Fresh, surprisingly states when director Andrew Morgan interviews her about sweatshops in his documentary The True Cost (2015). Working in a factory making clothes for people based in the States or in Europe, she points out, is indeed not as dangerous as coal mining. Her words sound rather shocking for many of us, immediately conjuring up news clips of huge human disasters such as the collapse of the Rana Plaza building in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in 2013, the deadliest garment factory accident in history.
Morgan's The True Cost - premiered in Cannes, and launched in May in London to a crowd of celebrities including Livia Firth, founder and creative director of Eco-Age and executive producer of the film and husband Colin Firth, designer Tom Ford, milliner Stephen Jones, and founder and Executive Chairman of Net-A-Porter Natalie Massenet - analyses the many dangers caused by fast fashion.
Selected to be screened at the Edinburgh International Fashion Festival (it's on tomorrow), the documentary argues that cheap garments are not about bargaining to get a trendy look, but bargaining with the life of our planet and of our fellow human beings.
The ever-expanding fast fashion industry with its constant production of new clothes and accessories, is indeed exploiting underpaid workers and causing ecological emergencies. The toxic pesticides used in cotton and chemicals dyes in leather production release indeed their deadly products into the environment, affecting the health of people working around them, and causing cancer and birth defects.
The True Cost takes the format of a sort of long journey from one country to the other - from the United States to Bangladesh and China, from India to the UK, from Haiti to Cambodia.
The most interesting parts show the human cost workers are paying: apart from receiving very low wages and working in unsafe conditions, they are often separated from their families and must leave their children with relatives living in villages in order to move to big cities and work in factories, as we are told through the story of Shima Akhter, a garment worker.
Other shocking aspects, highlighted also by environmental activist Vandana Shiva, include the damages caused by Monsanto's monopoly on cotton seeds: farmers become indebted to corporations selling genetically modified cotton seeds (and often commit suicide not finding other ways out of their debts), they have to buy more pesticides because genetically modified cotton seeds do not work and, doing so, they end up spreading more harmful and toxic substances in many villages.
Morgan also takes the viewers to a peaceful demonstration in Cambodia for a decent living wage that turned into a bloody war when the police opened fire on the protesters, and stops at the funeral of one of the victims.
Though The True Cost has some interesting parts, there is a major problem with this documentary: Morgan is an enthusiastic reporter, but lacks solid investigative and research skills. At times he comes up with unchecked facts (the film claims fashion is the second most polluting industry in the world after oil, but, while that may be true, we don't know where or how he found this piece of information), and missed opportunities, as the director doesn't sit down to consider the real markups that could mean tangible improvements in sweatshops.
Besides, Morgan seems to have just found out about the big containers filled with unwanted clothes from charity shops being sent to countries such as Haiti.
This practice, Morgan points out, has killed the local textile industry, but the director doesn't seem to be aware that it has also been used by Western countries to prove how powerful they are, as the containers are marked as "exports" and used as proof of internal growth.
Besides, though representatives of major mass market retailers refused his requests to be interviewed, Morgan may have tried to talk to more fashion designers who are into supporting environmental causes (Vivienne Westwood would have been interesting) or with people working in other sections of the fast fashion industry chain, including designers (and even bloggers) who work for or collaborate with fast fashion retailers.
There is also another major problem with all the documentaries and books focusing on analysing the faults of the current fashion industry (but, if you like the genre, and you're looking for something more political with an arty twist about it, try Im Heung-Soon's "Factory Complex"): they mainly look at High Street retailers and limit their research to underdeveloped countries, but their findings would be equally shocking if they widened the scope to designer brands (Morgan seems to hint at this issue in the shoots of catwalk shows, but he doesn't really mention it) and Europe, where production is tendered and sub-tendered to illegal factories scattered in Italy and in various Eastern European countries.
Though documenting the tragedy of several factory workers and presenting alternatives through an interview with Safia Minney, founder and CEO of fair trade fashion brand People Tree, fashion designer Stella McCartney and Livia Firth (well, in this case Morgan could have found another interviewee rather than his patron...), The True Cost doesn't have a final solution.
The latter lies indeed in consumers' behaviour: the director implies indeed that by buying or refusing to buy something we can express a sort of vote for or against specific brands and prompt them to change.
Will this happen? It is very unlikely that one documentary will change the fashion industry, but The True Cost could have the same impact that other accessible films had on our collective eating habits and dependance from junk food and fast food chains.
It would indeed be interesting to show The True Cost in schools (even though the documentary is rated PG-13) to educate young consumers and alert them about our collective obscene consumption, reminding them to buy less and resist being brainwashed by adverts that make them believe their needs will be satisfied or they will sort out their life problems by buying this garment or that accessory.
As YouTube videos of young girls back from a clothing haul session claiming they love something bought from mass retailers (one of them actually admits she doesn't even know if she will ever wear one top she got...) are mixed with footage of consumers rushing to shopping malls on Black Friday, images of villages, women sitting in sweatshops and landfills with mountains of non biodegradable textile waste releasing armful gases, the viewers easily understand that slowing down and reducing our consuming habits can represent significant changes.
Yet there is something else that Morgan only touches upon towards the end and that could be the key to unlock the changes in our personal spending and buying habits - the current Capitalist system.
As Richard D. Wolff, Professor of Economics Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts, states towards the end of the documentary, if we really want everybody to share on a global level benefits in a reasonable way, it is even more imperative to criticise and change the system that has worsened the gaps between have and have nots, increasing social injustices and social tensions.
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Throughout her previous collections, knitwear designer and crochet artist Laura Theiss explored parallel and futuristic universes. In her Capsule Collection designed for Loreto Di Rienzo's Dyloan Studio and developed with the Bond Factory, a company specialised in new technologies such as thermowelding, melting for construction, ultrasound melting, taping, press bonding and laser cutting, Theiss has taken things further, trying to forecast the future of traditional crocheting and knitting techniques.
Inspired by early films about space travel à la Fritz Lang's Woman in the Moon, strong women like astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti, and fictional anti-heroines such as Ava, the enigmatic cyborg in Alex Garland's Ex Machina, Theiss designed intricate motifs, crocheted fractals, and kaleidoscopic patterns.
See-through motifs, cut-outs and metallic second skin-like mesh fractals were directly inspired by Ava's partially transparent body.
Yet Theiss also kept firmly in mind the cyborg's behaviour: just like Ava manipulates the main characters in the film, Theiss digitally hacked some of her crocheted elements to create innovative shapes.
The result is suprising with dresses, skirts, jumpers and coats featuring highly experimental techniques: crocheted patterns are seamlessly bonded with organza; a 3D crochet motif is printed on a jumper and coated with foil; cashmere knits are combined with fine leather characterised by an embossed crochet pattern that looks like an alien virus.
As Theiss pushes the boundaries of crocheting and knitting, taking them to another dimension to tangibly prove that traditions can lead to endless possibilities, she reminds us that this Capsule Collection is not just about technique.
All the designs are indeed created with the aim of empowering women and inspiring them not just to look at the future, but at the possibility of visioning, hacking and crafting it.
How did this collaboration come together?
Loreto Di Rienzo: Every season we work with different designers for our "Moda Futuribile" project focused on developing innovative projects with professionals from various branches and sections of the fashion industry. The theme of this season was "Tech and Craft" and Laura perfectly fitted this theme. The project also involved two other designers, Alan Maughan and Maria Schmiedt, and was showcased at the beginning of July during Pitti Filati 77, the Florence-based yarn fair.
What prompted you to transfer your skills to other techniques/materials?
Laura Theiss: In my collections I always try and push the boundaries of traditional crafts and create something innovative and unusual, like a new pattern, or come up with designs made with experimental yarns and techniques. When Dyloan Studio contacted me about this collaboration project, I immediately understood that, combining together their know-how and my skills in traditional crafts, we could have created a great collection.
Can you take us through the different stages of this collaboration?
Laura Theiss: First I visited Dyloan Studio in Milan and saw amazing sketches at their showroom. We went through my first design sketches and talked through the possible techniques and yarns we could have opted for. Then I went back home and constantly kept in touch with them, improving designs, taking new decisions and altering things during the process. When the production stage arrived, I moved back to Italy where work started at the Bond Factory. I was really impressed by several innovative processes I saw there, in particular by the seamless technologies. It's absolutely great to see how nowadays you can bond a fabric or even a zipper with no seams. The construction of such garments looks particularly amazing from the inside. Another technique that impressed me a lot was the way they produced bonded fabrics with three dimensional and embossed prints.
Which techniques did you employ for Laura Theiss' Capsule Collection?
Loreto Di Rienzo: Thermowelding, press bonding, 3D printing, embossing and embroidering. The key to the project, though, was combining these processes together with traditional hand-knitted techniques - this allowed us to reach completely unexpected results.
How many designs did you create with Dyloan and the Bond Factory?
Laura Theiss: I created a capsule collection of five looks that included sweaters, dresses, skirts, and a coat. We worked a way to combine seamless knitwear and crochet with fabric and embossing three-dimensional details on knitwear as well. We developed some truly unique pieces: a grey/green wool sweater with 3D printed and metallic foil print, and seamless bonded sleeves matched with a blue hand knitted mohair/silk skirt with 3D printing and seamless bonded waistline; a grey wool dress with three-dimensional geometric embroidery; a crochet top coated with metallic foil and bonded with knitwear, with bonded organza sleeves matched with a grey wool printed skirt; a crochet top bonded to a knitted dress and a knitted cashmere coat bonded with embossed leather. The patterns for the embroidered, embossed and printed details were borrowed from my own archives and traditional motifs, but all the pieces were made with Dyloan and manufactured at the Bond Factory.
Did you find this collaboration challenging?
Loreto Di Rienzo: Nothing is ever easy when you're experimenting with something completely new, but Laura has a great approach to things and her modus operandi and curiosity for these new technologies allowed us to obtain excellent results.
What kind of feedback did you get from the Pitti visitors?
Laura Theiss: It is always very interesting to talk to visitors during any kind of fairs and events, as their reaction often helps you finding new solutions and ideas for future projects. Pitti Filati visitors are professional members of the yarn and knitwear industries and everyone was very inspiring. They liked the pieces and they were interested in discovering more about the new possibilities that these techniques offered us. Both the Bond Factory and I found new international contacts and clients, so it was a very successful project that will hopefully continue with a bigger collection for the Autumn/Winter 2016-17 season.
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In yesterday's post, an obituary dedicated to Elio Fiorucci, we mentioned the fact that it is quite difficult to find some original Fiorucci clothes as fans would buy them and usually wear them a lot.
Among the rarest bits there are probably jumpers and knitwear (quite often victims of clothes-eating moths), yet there are a few pieces around.
The images in this post show for example a Fiorucci jumper with a matching shawl. They come from my family archive and belonged to my late auntie Flavia.
Though these pieces can probably be dated (according to my family's collective memories and photographic evidence) between 1984 and 1985 and were made in 100% wool, they are still in great condition (probably also thanks to some maniac family skills when it comes to preserving clothes...).
The pieces were probably from the collection Fiorucci made after seeing shirts with floral patterns during a trip to Mexico.
Both the sweater and the shawl were indeed characterised by a multi-coloured wool embroidery of flowers on a black background.
The floral pattern extended from the front and reached the right shoulder on the sweater, while the flowers were mainly concentrated on the central portion of the shawl.
The latter was actually a versatile piece since it could have been worn as a shawl and a scarf or could have been turned into a skirt.
The main inspiration must have been Frida Kahlo and the combination of black and floral patterns instantly makes you think about the colours of the Frida Kahlo portrait taken by photographer (and Frida's lover) Nickolas Muray in the late '30s.
This ensemble is definitely not a classic Fiorucci piece in neon colours or crazy patterns (though the colourful embroidery and the prominent location of the label on the jumper preserve that Fiorucci craziness...), but it is the tangible proof that the brand catered to a wide range of people with a vast range of tastes. This was indeed the sort of versatile design that a sensible grown up woman may have invested her money in.
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In the archives of the Met Museum in New York there is a collection of scarves by Fiorucci that would bring tears of joy to the eyes of many people who grew up between the '70s and the '80s.
The scarves feature vintage robots engaged in a rather unusual hobby, gardening; deserted gasoline stations; collages of people sunbathing and illustrations of women ready to jump in a swimming pool.
There are also prints of alien pin ups flying in the cosmo or images borrowed from Pop Art; vintage adverts from the '40s of fruit crate labels such as Homer and Carro Amano Aranci with their beautiful graphics and lithographed colors, or interior design scenes à la Memphis Milano.
The scarves would cause such an emotional reaction because the Fiorucci label is linked in the mind of many people growing up in countries as different and as far away one from the other as Italy, Japan and the Unites States with the best (and most colourful) years of their lives.
So when the abrupt news arrived yesterday around lunch time that Elio Fiorucci, 80, had been found dead (from natural causes) in his house in Viale Vittorio Veneto, Milan, a melancholic nostalgia for fun, freedom and joyfully clever prints must have invaded the mind of many people whose lives were touched by this brand.
Elio Fiorucci was born in Milan on 10th June 1935 and, as a young man he would help his father in his shop, specialised in slippers. In 1962 he started managing his own shoe store, but everything changed after a visit to London in 1965.
Fascinated by Mary Quant's miniskirts, Biba shops and the Swinging London scene, Fiorucci went back to Milan with a dream and some new ideas. In 1967 he opened a shop in Galleria Passerella, around San Babila.
The shop, designed by Amalia Dal Ponte and opened by Italian rocker Adriano Celentano, was a crazy place where Fiorucci would sell objects and items from all over the world that he would find interesting, intriguing and desirable.
While at the beginning Fiorucci's role was that of a talent scout with a passion for visiting art exhibitions and events that would inspire him and enhance his creativity, from 1970 on he started producing clothes and accessories, distributing them in Europe, Japan and the United States.
All garments and accessories were characterised by a cute logo: designed together with Italo Lupi, it featured two little sweet cherubs, one with blond locks, the other with dark hair, both with puffy rosy cheeks, the little angels were at times portrayed on shirts, dresses and swimwear wearing cool sunglasses.
One of Fiorucci's luckiest intuitions - inspired by the cultural revolution that Mary Quant had launched in the UK - was adding Lycra to denim and creating stretch trousers that would flatter women's bodies.
Another intuition regarded the branding of the products: Fiorucci's clothes were not advertised on fashion magazines since Elio and the photographer Oliviero Toscani, had a sort of anti-fashion and anti-bourgeois ethics and preferred coming up with controversial posters that portrayed playful images of semi-naked models that were deemed by many people as too transgressive, but were never vulgar and that consumers loved to collect.
After the Milan shop, Fiorucci opened in London and New York where the brand became a total sensation: designed by Ettore Sottsass, Andrea Branzi and Franco Marabelli, the store on East 59th Street became not just a clothes shop, but a meeting place for ordinary people and celebrities.
Visitors would be offered an espresso as they entered the store, since, after all, this was an Italian place; Andy Warhol, who loved its plasticky and colourful design, launched there his Interview magazine; Truman Capote signed books in the window; people gravitating around Studio 54 would hang around there (together with a very young Marc Jacobs); illustrator Antonio Lopez styled the windows; Joey Arias and theatrical German countertenor Klaus Nomi with a bunch of crazy people and colourful shop assistants would be dancing in the same windows; spotted by Madonna's stylist Maripol, who was at the time also in charge of finding young designers to showcase at Fiorucci's, Isabel and Ruben Toledo were offered a prime spot in a concession stand at the store where they enlisted the help of a very special sale assistant, model and filmmaker Suzie Zabrowska.
The New York shop became therefore an iconic landmark: its front was even recreated for a street scene on the set of Superman II (1980), while a young Madonna celebrated instead with a party at Studio 54 the 15th anniversary of the store.
Wherever they were located - Milan, New York or Los Angeles - Fiorucci stores were crowded with young people who loved shopping there because they considered it a place where they could express through the avant-garde clothes and accessories on sale there their passion for rebellion and transgression, and for a firm hope to distinguish and separate themselves from their parents.
At Fiorucci you could easily find hard plastic bags in fluorescent shades, scarves in the most incredible colours, sandals with thick rubber soles and glittering elastics that you would slip on and keep on your feet for hours on end on torrid summer days without ever getting one blister; not to mention the fun hairpins with colourful plastic planets, and the endless products with the little cool angels. It was somehow impossible to resist to the products on sale because they offered a visual, aesthetic and artistic revolution.
Fiorucci loved indeed to mix with artists: he managed to convince Keith Haring to cover his shop in Milan in graffiti, and he borrowed his colours from the works of Andy Warhol, the artist who had prompted him to look at the neon lights shining 24 hours on New York.
Global success marked the '80s, years in which Elio Fiorucci was inspired by cinema, and was fascinated by the advent of the first computers and by the art of music videos.
In 1984, Panini even dedicated to the brand a successful album in which 200 of the best, kitschest and craziest posters were turned into collectible stickers (in just a few months Panini sold 100 million stickers...). Around 100 stickers were designed by i-D founder and editor-in-chief and Fiorucci store's Creative Director Terry Jones (Elio Fiorucci also supported i-D magazine during its most critical years, between 1983 and 1984).
In 1990 Elio Fiorucci sold the company to a Japanese society, Edwin International, while the space in Galleria Passarella was sold in 2003 to global retailer H&M. The designer launched in the 2000s a new project called "Love Therapy", followed by collaborations with Italian High Street retailer Oviesse (OVS), and by several projects aimed at raising awareness for animal welfare issues.
Yet throughout the decades Fiorucci kept on inspiring people: in 1999 British artist Mark Leckey did a video entitled "Fiorucci Made Me Hardcore", featuring a selection of footage from the 1970s, '80s and '90s, that keeps on resurfacing every now and then like an old fashion trend, inspiring not only artists but also fashion designers; Dolce & Gabbana's S/S 2010 menswear collection featured instead shirts with prints of Fiorucci posters.
Museums aren't immune from collecting Fiorucci's stuff: the Met Museum preserves shirts, scarves, rubber boots, and a few dresses and ensembles in rayon and nylon; two Fiorucci shopping bags - one designed by Eric Schemilt Designs Ltd (1978), the other by Laurie Rosenwald (1980) - are part of the Victoria and Albert Museum collection in London.
Rather than being about aggressive expansion and money, Elio Fiorucci's philosophy was mainly based on pushing consumers to rediscover a balance with nature, and try and be happy. He also firmly believed that creativity is not about one person's own knowledge, but about a collaborative effort and a constant learning process inspired and driven by other people.
There is so much talk about "democratising fashion", and by now we all know that huge retailers are not "democratising", but making the divide bigger and deeper. Nowadays High Street retailers offer indeed cheaper versions of designer clothes, reminding us that those who can not afford the real thing can get a mere bad quality copy.
Elio Fiorucci's concept was instead very different: his experiment was a more genuine attempt at democratising fashion as Fiorucci's items were desirable, affordable and durable as well. He may deserve an exhibition (though it would be difficult to find some original Fiorucci clothes as most of us wore them till they were torn into bits and pieces), but there is something that he deserves even more - a place in any design museums, and a thank you note for having produced the garments and accessories we donned in the best (and most colourful) years of our lives.
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Last week The Board of Directors of la Biennale di Venezia, chaired by Paolo Baratta, appointed Alejandro Aravena as Director of the 15th International Architecture Exhibition 2016. Since 2013, the event has been anticipated (it would traditionally open in August), so that it will now stretch (like the Art Biennale) for roughy six months. Next year's architecture event will therefore be held from 28th May to 27th November, allowing more visitors and schools from all over the world to participate in the Biennale.
It will be tremendously difficult to replicate the interest and success of the 2013 Biennale curated by Rem Koolhaas, and, while Baratta perfectly knows this, he also feels rather positive. As he stated in a press release: "After the important experimental Biennale developed by Rem Koolhaas, dedicated entirely to the curator's research, it is our belief that we must follow up with a Biennale that convenes the architects, and is dedicated to the exploration of the new frontier that demonstrates the vitality of architecture, a frontier that spans across various parts of the world and shows architecture engaged in providing specific responses to specific demands. This Biennale intends to react once again to the gap between architecture and civil society, which in recent decades has transformed architecture into spectacle on the one hand, yet made it dispensable on the other."
According to Baratta, Aravena is among the architects of the new generation, who represents this new reality and vitality of architecture. Born in Chile in 1967, he graduated in Architecture from the Universidad Católica de Chile in 1992, establishing his pratice in 1994. Aravena's work include several buildings for the Universidad Catolica, St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas (2008), a Children Workshop and Chairless for Vitra in Germany (2008), writers' cabins for the Michalsky Foundation in Switzerland (2015) and a building for Novartis in their new campus in China (2015). Shortlisted in 2013 for the New Center for Contemporary Arts of Moscow, Aravena won the competition for the Teheran Stock Exchange in Iran.
Aravena also taught at Harvard University, where, together with engineer Andres Iacobelli he founded the social housing initiative Elemental, an Urban Do Tank, partner of Universidad Catolica and Chilean Oil Company Copec. Since it was founded, Elemental expanded their field of action to a wide range of infrastructure, public space and public buildings that use the city as a shortcut towards equality: the Metropolitan Promenade and Children's Park in Santiago, the reconstruction of the city of Constitución after the 2010 earthquake, the redesign of the Copper mining town of Calama or the intervention of the Choapa Region for Pelambres Mining Company.
Aravena's work has been featured in many different events and exhibitions all over the world from the São Paulo Biennale (2007) and the Milano Triennale (2008), to the MoMA in New York (2010), the MA Gallery in Tokyo (2011) and the Centre Pompidou.
The recipient of several awards including the Design of the Year (London Design Museum, 2015) and the 1st Prize of Zumtobel Global Award (Austria, 2014), Aravena is also the author of many volumes about architecture and his work has been published in over 50 countries.
The architect actually knows Venice pretty well: while still a student in 1991, he participated in the Venice Prize at the 5th International Architecture Exhibition of la Biennale di Venezia; two years later, he moved to Venice where he studied History and Theory at IUAV and engraving at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia. He took part in the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2008 (receiving the Silver Lion in this occasion) and in 2012 when he presented in the Giardini's Central Pavilion two projects by Elemental.
The latter were both driven by the challenging times contemporary Chile is facing: rapid social and economic change brought social inequalities that resulted in popular discontent, creating tensions that architecture and urban design can use as agents for improvement.
The projects revealed the architects' innovative responses to crises of different nature and their objective of finding an equitable common ground for those disenfranchised by changes. In both cases urban design was used to attract development and defuse social time bombs, and looked at landscape, infrastructure and environmental strategies; both were designed very quickly to briefs written in response to major crises - environmental and social - that developed in Constitución and Calama.
As you may remember, Constitución was struck by an earthquake followed by a tsunami in 2010; in 2011, people took to the streets in Calama to protest against the fact that, though the area is famous for its copper production, the government would take most of the revenue out of the area and spend it nationwide neglecting the area of the main mining operations.
These projects presented at the 2012 Biennale were focused on the fact that cities are magnets for people, knowledge and development, and Elemental used design to synthesize the cities' potential to be powerful vehiles to create wealth, and as a dismantling device for social time-bombs, considering cities as shortcuts towards equality.
Since Elemental's work is steeped in charged political and urban contexts of contemporary Chile, it's easy to guess that Alejandro Aravena's Biennale will be less theoretical than Koolhaas', but will hopefully prompt participants to come up with practical and functional solutions to the new and old problems society is going through.
"There are several battles that need to be won and several frontiers that need to be expanded in order to improve the quality of the built environment and consequently people's quality of life", Aravena stated in a press release. "This is what we would like people to come and see at the 15th International Architecture Exhibition: success stories worth to be told and exemplary cases worth to be shared where architecture did, is and will make a difference in those battles and frontiers."
While we may think the challenge will be on Aravena to equal the success of the previous event, the architect actually highlights how the 15th International Architecture Exhibition will be about focusing and learning from architectures that are capable of escaping the status quo. "We would like to present cases that, despite the difficulties, instead of resignation or bitterness, propose and do something," he added. "We would like to show that, in the permanent debate about the quality of the built environment, there is not only need but also room for action".
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The neon light works by American sculptor Bruce Nauman are probably among the most photographed installations at the 56th International Art Exhibition in Venice.
While Nauman also works with performance art and conceptualism, documenting his projects via black and white images or videos, a major part of his practice reflects his fascination with language.
The artist works indeed with puns, double meanings, popular expressions and idioms, forming words with fluorescent neon tubing, a material inspired by the neon beer signs on shop fronts in his San Francisco neighbourhood.
Among his best examples there are "Raw War" (1971), "Eat Death" (1972), "Life, Death, Love, Hate, Pleasure, Pain" (1983), "Human Nature/Life Death/Knows Doesn't Know" (1983), and "American Violence" (1981-1982), all on display inside the Arsenale.
Words illuminate in different alternating colours and the series prompts visitors to think about the materiality of neon tubing - which was conventionally used for industrial or commercial applications - as well as the materiality of language itself.
Neon - an ephemeral, time-bound medium used by Nauman throughout his career - is indeed still associated with advertising and signs rather than with art, ideas, or conceptual thoughts.
At times tacky and kitsch, neon lights often point towards restaurants, beers, cigarettes or even red-light districts, yet in Nauman's practice they are employed to spread hidden messages about politics, sex, violence, death, vices and virtues, reminding viewers that all these themes are intangible yet they exist.
Propped along the walls, the words are at times hard to distinguish as they cancel each other, blink and disappear while the viewer tries to read them.
Then they unexpectedly return and repeat themselves in phased sequences, proving that nothing is fixed and everything is fluid and upsetting the careful viewer with the message they carry.
The position of Nauman's punning neon word games (note: there are no pornographic figurative neon signs by Nauman at the Biennale blinking on and off Kama Sutra positions, or pieces strictly focusing on the body and identity), located right at the beginning of the main exhibition inside the Arsenale and their colourful shades, represent good photo opportunities for the visitors, and while they may not be too profound, being bold, bright and eye catching lists of words, they seem to be the sort of artworks favoured by the Instagram generation.
Nauman created his first neon piece, Window or Wall Sign, in 1967, hoping to achieve "an art that would kind of disappear", light is after all an elusive and instant medium that still manages to covey in his work an aggressive and direct message.
Is it possible to create the same elusive and instant effects of neon lights in a textile? Apparently yes, or at least this seems to be possible in a new series of fabrics designed by Vlisco.
Called "Neon Brilliance" (from the "Tell" Collection), this series is available in four different shades and it is directly inspired by two contrasting elements - neon tubing and Arabic ornamental motifs. The resulting design, a sort of electronic pattern, is therefore a fusion of ancient and modern elements.
There is actually another textile in the same collection with another intriguing name, "Infinite Journey", that, though inspired by hypnotic graphics rather than neon lights, perfectly reproduces in its endless swirls and mesmerising shades the same effects of the lights in amusement arcades or the colourful little mushroom-like bulbs on carousels and carnival games.
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In yesterday's post we mentioned Elsa Schiaparelli, so, for today, let's take a step back to Paris Haute Couture Week when the fashion house's new collection was showcased.
Schiaparelli's A/W 2015 collection was the first one designed by Bertrand Guyon, named creative director in April after Marco Zanini left the house.
Zanini and, after him, the in-house design team that produced the most recent Schiaparelli couture collection (under the direction of Farida Khelfa, former model and director of Jean Paul Gaultier's couture salons, and Schiap brand ambassador) were actually praised by most critics even when they came up with designs entirely lifted from Schiap's own collections, or when they heavily borrowed from the '30s and the '40s, coming up with costumy rather than modern pieces.
Though not an obvious or an extremely well-known name, Guyon is an École de la Chambre Syndicale de la Carte graduate and high fashion is his background and strongest point as his long apprenticeship in this discipline proves.
He indeed worked as assistant at Valentino (Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli were among his supporters at the Schiaparelli catwalk show) where he spent 7 years. Before that he worked at Givenchy (with its founder, then with John Galliano and Alexander McQueen) and was Christian Lacroix's assistant for eleven years.
Guyon may not have known Schiap that well before getting appointed Creative Director of the newly revamped maison, but he studied pretty well her semantics in the last few months. Rather than merely copying from it, Guyon reworked bits and pieces of her glossary, trying to create a new and desirable vocabulary for modern couture clients.
The designer dubbed indeed the collection "Théâtre d'Elsa" to highlight maybe the mise en scène of all Elsa's tropes under a new direction (a theme that calls to mind Schiap's theatrical Commedia dell'Arte Collection, though one design - the first ensemble in this post - was named "Trois…Six…Neuf"' after Michel Duran's 1936 play).
There were several inspirations behind the collection, some of them quite surprising: Guyon moved from Paris during the two world wars; the life of Schiap in London represented by a 1931 picture of the designer herself in a London street "scandalously" yet playfully wearing culottes (View this photo); and, believe it or not, Leigh Bowery.
It must be said that the latter was more a passing mood (maybe referenced in the thick tapestry-like brocades employed in this collection) than a tangible inspiration on the runway, as Guyon's hope was that of balancing simplicity and exuberance to remind us that Schiap didn't only design arty pieces, but was perfectly capable of producing wearable and functional garments.
A mid-calf hemline and wearable trouser suits prevailed, but extravagance was clear in the designs in sparkly brocades and in the embossed oversized coat characterised by a lacquered red shade.
Guyon's interest in Schiap's cosmopolitan life was clear in that mix of heavy tweeds and Surrealist embroidered motifs that went from Dali-esque brooches shaped like a telephone dial, an eye or a keyhole (the latter a reference to Schiap embroidering Saint Peter's keys on an evening suit in 1939) and handbags in the shape of a hand or a letter.
Some of the most intriguing pieces were actually the ones in which Guyon paid homage to Schiap's collaborators Christian Bérard and Marcel Vertes with prints or intarsia fur motifs inspired by their illustrations (animal lovers will hate the goat hair and fox jutting out of mink, but, fashion-wise, they were probably among the best pieces) while there were echoes of Wallis Simpson in a few sapphire blue gowns.
Guyon - who is definitely better versed in evening wear - must have developed a passion for decoration while working as Lacroix's assistant and he let it run wild in his stucco-like embroideries made with bullion, in the gilded sunburst decorations and star motifs (reinventions of Schiap's "Cosmique" A/W 1938-39 collection and shocking pink "Phoebus" cape, while the "Apollo of Versailles" cape was recreated in a new padded version), in the rhinestone straps that he used on the back of some of his evening gowns and in his three-dimensional appliqued flowers on organdy dresses.
The shocking pink flowing chiffon backless gown that closed the show was instead a palate cleanser, a sort of reaction to overembellishments with a sensual twist about it.
While hairstyles were borrowed from the '40s, the materials (velvet, brocade embroidered with caviar beads, mink and so on) were definitely taken from the Haute Couture school, but the shapes and some of the garments were quite modern (see the narrow tuxedo trousers and see-through biker jackets). Among the accessories, the tiaras spelling "Schiap" decorating the back of the models' heads were also an innovative touch.
As a whole the collection didn't reference so much the archive, but attempted to create a new language via clashes of colours such as shocking pink and mustard yellow, sheer pussy cat bow blouses and different textures unexpectedly combined together (see the mohair tartan with pink goat fur reworked in a spine-like braid, a sort of reinvention of the skeleton dress). The problem is that this new language is maybe not so new, but already pretty trendy as we have seen it on the Gucci runway.
One question remains: where is the house that Elsa built going? The chairman of Tod's Group Diego Della Valle bought the brand in 2006; Lacroix did a one-off collection (not intended for sale) for it in 2013; Zanini managed to get some of his designs on a few actresses on the red carpet, and now 21 Place Vendôme (where Schiap's house was once based) has a new tenant, yet the role and identity of the maison remain a mystery.
If these clothes are destined to be seen every now and then on celebrities on the red carpet or in photoshoots in glossy magazines, what is the maison going to sell? According to the plan, Guyon will design a high-end ready-to-wear collection as well. They call it "prêt-à-couture", but you wonder what's the point of it if ordinary people won't be able to afford it (and what's the point of creating high end ready-to-wear if some Haute Couture designers state they prefer "demi-couture", a sort of more wearable branch of high fashion?). Besides, there aren't any plans for products such as make up and fragrances that may act as cash cows for the house, so the future of this maison remains rather puzzling.
For the time being we do know that there were quite a few celebrities sitting in the front row including Meg Ryan, Game of Thrones star Carice van Houten and fashionista Daphne Guinness. Is this a good sign, something that shows the positive interest of some modern icons in this fashion house or is this a sign of the sort people money can buy? We will hopefully discover it in the next episode of the Schiap saga that is turning more and more into a classic "Modern Comedy" to use the name of a famous Schiap collection.
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Thursday, 27 Jan 2011 10:31 AM
Employers will hire more workers this year, and the economy will grow faster than envisioned three months ago, according to an Associated Press survey that found growing optimism among leading economists.
But unemployment will stay chronically high — nearly 9 percent by year's end, the latest quarterly AP Economy Survey shows. A majority of economists say it will be 2016 or later before unemployment drops to a historically normal rate of around 5 percent.
Economists have become more confident 19 months after the worst recession since the Great Depression ended. Lower Social Security taxes and higher stock prices will embolden Americans to spend more and help power the economy, they say.
"People will finally recognize that an economic recovery is under way," said Lynn Reaser, a board member of the National Association for Business Economics. "This won't be a recovery seen only by economists."
The gains this year will be enough to withstand the threats still clouding the economy, the AP survey found. A majority of the economists doubt, for example, that falling home prices and higher mortgage rates will pose a major risk to the economy in 2011.
The AP survey collected the views of 42 private, corporate and academic economists on a range of indicators.
Among their forecasts:
• The economy will grow 3.2 percent this year, compared with the 2.7 percent they forecast in October. That would top last year's estimated growth of less than 3 percent.
• Employers will create a net total of 2.2 million jobs. Three months ago, the economists predicted 1.6 million jobs would be added in 2011. Last year, employers added roughly 1.1 million.
• Consumers will spend 3.2 percent more this year than last year. That's stronger than the 2.5 percent growth the economists had forecast in October. And it's nearly double the spending growth that's estimated for 2010.
• Inflation will be 1.8 percent this year, barely more than the 1.7 percent the economists forecast in the previous survey and up only slightly from 1.5 percent last year. The 1.8 percent forecast falls within the range of inflation the Federal Reserve thinks a healthy economy needs.
Among the reasons for the economists' growing optimism: an extension of income-tax cuts, a cut in Social Security taxes for workers, easier access to loans, higher stock prices and a government that seems more sympathetic to the priorities of businesses.
The brighter outlook is also evident among people responsible for hiring.
Jerry Huddleston, human resources manager of the Ozark Natural Foods grocery store in Fayetteville, Ark., said he plans to hire for busy weekend shifts because sales are improving.
The store is generally slow to add jobs. But Huddleston said business is picking up. Customers seem more willing to pay more for organic milk, vitamin supplements and pre-made vegetarian meals.
"I think people are starting to be more confident that the job they have is the job they will have tomorrow," he said.
As the economy gradually strengthens, the economists expect interest rates will tick up, as they already have begun to do. They think the yield on the 10-year Treasury note, now at 3.4 percent, will reach 3.6 percent by midyear and 3.9 percent by year's end. Those higher rates would force up mortgage rates, which tend to track the 10-year Treasury yield.
Yet when asked about a range of threats — from falling home prices and rising energy prices to state budget woes and Europe's debt crisis — the economists called each a minor risk rather than a major risk to the economy.
In the spring and summer, many analysts had feared the economy might slide back into a "double-dip" recession.
"Consumers and businesses are in a better mood," said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight. "They are spending a little more freely. Not a lot more freely, but a little more freely."
That helps explain why Behravesh has lifted his forecast for economic growth in 2011 to 3.2 percent, from 2.2 percent in October.
Still, the Fed said Wednesday that the economy isn't growing fast enough to lower unemployment and still needs help from the Fed's $600 billion Treasury bond-purchase program. The bond purchases are intended to lower rates on loans and boost stock prices, spurring more spending and invigorating the economy.
President Barack Obama still faces risks from voters skeptical of his economic stewardship, according to a new Associated Press-GfK poll. More than half disapprove of how he's handled the economy. Just 35 percent say it's improved on his watch; 40 percent had said so a year ago.
Yet public sentiment may brighten if the economists prove correct in their forecasts. Rajeev Dhawan, director of Georgia State University's Economic Forecasting Center, has raised his estimate for growth this year to 2.7 percent, from 1.8 percent three months ago.
This year "will be better than 2010 in terms of hiring, spending and economic growth," Dhawan said. "Yet unemployment will decline only slowly. At least we're not going backward."
© Copyright 2015 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
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US News and World Report has just released its annual list of "America's Best Hospitals," and UNC Hospitals were recognized all across the board. The...
Wednesday July 29, 2015
Murder charges filed against UNC student in wrong-way I-85 crash
Three second-degree murder charges were filed Thursday against a University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill student accused of killing three people in a weekend...
Monday July 27, 2015
From Chapel Hill to the World Games
On July 25, Tim Taft, MD, will be on the field at the Los Angeles Coliseum for the Opening Ceremonies of the Special Olympics World...
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Hall Of Fame Calls To Jim Lampley, 0-1 As Fighter, The Best Ever As Blow by Blow Caller
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Construction and a name change are reshaping the complex Chapel Hill residents used to know as University Mall. According to a press release from the...
Thursday July 23, 2015
UNC gets $20M from Homeland Security for Coastal Resilience Center
With a $20 million grant from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, UNC-Chapel Hill launched a new Coastal Resilience Center of Excellence (CRC) to address...
Wednesday July 22, 2015
CLIO Sports Awards Honors Late Stuart Scott
The ceremony also memorialized late ESPN anchor Stuart Scott, who died in January at age 49 after a long battle with cancer, with a special...
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Happy 10th birthday to the SABR/Baseball-Reference Encyclopedia. Thanks to all those who have contributed and welcome to any who wish to contribute.
Valerio de los Santos
From BR Bullpen
(Redirected from Valerio De Los Santos)
Valerio Lorenzo de los Santos
- Bats Left, Throws Left
- Height 6' 2", Weight 180 lb.
- Debut July 31, 1998
- Final Game August 2, 2008
- Born October 6, 1972 in Las Matas de Farfan, San Juan, D.R.
[edit] Biographical Information
Valerio de los Santos came to Taiwan in 2009. He debuted on April 29, allowing 9 hits and 6 runs in 5 innings for the Uni-President Lions in a 6-2 loss to the Sinon Bulls and Itsuki Shoda.


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Ty Segall Announces Manipulator 2014 World Tour, Coming to The Stage Miami
Photo by Denée Petracek
The limo is loaded. The road-trip tunes have been recorded. And it's time to hit the highway.
With three whole months till the August 26 release of his latest garage-y psych-rock opus, Manipulator, the ever-frenetic Ty Segall is getting restless. Dude does not like downtime. So naturally, he's crashing the worldwide club circuit.
The tour stretches from summer through winter, taking Ty and his band from Bonnaroo to L.A., Austin, New Orleans, even The Stage Miami, before skipping across the Atlantic Ocean for a final European leg.
Just check the cut for Ty Segall's full 2014 dates.
See also: Five Signs You Might Be a Shitty Guitarist
Ty Segall's Manipulator 2014 World Tour Dates
June 12 Bonnaroo, Manchester, TN
August 23 FYF Fest, Los Angeles, CA @ FYF Fest
August 28 Echo, Los Angeles, CA
August 29 Echo, Los Angeles, CA
August 30 Echo, Los Angeles, CA
August 31 Echo, Los Angeles, CA
September 3 Club Congress, Tucson, AZ
September 4 Lowbrow Palace, El Paso, TX
September 5 Mohawk Outside, Austin, TX
September 6 One Eyed Jack's, New Orleans, LA
September 7 Hi Tone, Memphis, TN
September 8 Mercy Lounge, Nashville, TN
September 9 The Earl, Atlanta, GA
September 10 Club Downunder (FSU), Tallahassee, FL
September 11 The Stage, Miami, FL
September 12 Epic Problem (Skatepark of Tampa), Tampa, FL
September 13 Georgia Theatre, Athens, GA
September 14 Motorco Music Hall, Durham, NC
September 15 9:30 Club, Washington, DC
September 17 Webster Hall, New York, NY
September 19 Great Scott, Allston, MA
September 20 Pop Montreal at Club Soda, Montreal, QC
September 21 Danforth Music Hall, Toronto, ON
September 22 Trinosopes, Detroit, MI
September 23 Thalia Hall, Chicago, IL
September 24 Turf Club, St. Paul, MN
September 25 The Waiting Room, Omaha, NE
September 26 Bluebird Theater, Denver, CO
September 27 Urban Lounge, Salt Lake City, UT
September 28 Beauty Bar, Las Vegas, NV
October 9 La Siréne, La Rochelle, FR
October 21 La Cigale, Paris, FR
October 22 Bikini, Toulouse, FR
October 23 Apolo, Barcelona, ES
October 24 BUT, Madrid, ES
October 28 La Cooperative De Mai, Clermont Ferrand, FR
October 29 L'usine, Geneve, CH
October 30 Locomotive Club, Bologna, IT
October 31 Artisti Atlantide, Roma, IT
November 1 Interzone Art Center, Venice, IT
November 3 Paradiso, Amsterdam, NL
November 4 Knust, Hamburg, DE
November 5 Beat Pol, Dresden, DE
November 6 Astra, Berlin, DE
November 7 Pumpehuest, Copenhagen, DK
November 8 Kagelbana, Stockholm, SE
November 10 Gorilla, Manchester, UK
November 11 Brudennel Social Club, Leeds, UK
November 12 Electric Ballroom, London, UK
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Ty Segall. With Wand. Presented by Sweat Records and M.O. Thursday, September 11. The Stage, 170 NE 38th St., Miami. Call 305-576-9577 or visit thestagemiami.com.
Follow Crossfade on Facebook and Twitter @Crossfade_SFL.
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170 NE 38th St.
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Tarrus Riley With Dean Fraser And The Blak Soil BandFri., Aug. 7, 11:00pm
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Off hours: Acting Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange chiefGaurang Desai is the acting chief executive of Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX). A market structure specialist with more than 19 years experience, the 42-year-old, from India has also served as the chief operating officer of DGCX since its ... Abu Dhabi National, 4 days ago
Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange Becomes Recognized Body by DFSA - Forex Magnates, 1 month ago
Dubai Financial Services Authority grants Recognised body status to DGCX - LeapRate, 1 month ago
65 images for dgcx
Indian Rupee contract still on top at DGCX with increased volumes of 15% in H1 2015
Exchange traded FX is still very much a mainstay of DGCX's business as trading volume of the Indian Rupee futures contract rose 38% from last year in June DGCX, Dubai's prominent emerging commodities exchange has reported that it achieved the ...LeapRate, 5 days ago DGCX to waive off trade fees for Mini INR contracts LeapRate, 1 week ago Rupee Futures at Dubai Exchange To Rise New Indian Express, 2 weeks ago DGCX sees major new milestones in H1 Trade Arabia, 2 weeks ago
More from: Zawya.com, Zawya.com...and 12 other sources
DGCX approves Stampede Financials as Trading Member
SENSEX 27687.30 363.30 1.33% NIFTY 8373.65 111.30Finalaya.com, 2 months ago Stampede Capital gains as arm receives DGCX approval as Trading Member Arihant Capital, 2 months ago
Menacorp now offers trading on DGCX through MetaTrader 5
DUBAI: One of the leading brokers in the Arab world, Menacorp has officially launched MetaTrader 5 on the Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX). Now, Menacorp customers can trade the financial instruments available at the exchange enjoying ...The Gulf Today, 2 days ago Menaсorp starts offering trading on DGCX via MetaTrader 5 LeapRate, 5 days ago Mena-orp Now Offers Trading on DGCX via MetaTrader 5 Yahoo! Finance, 4 days ago Menaсorp Now Offers Trading on DGCX via MetaTrader 5 PR Newswire, 4 days ago
Mena-orp já oferece trading na DGCX via MetaTrader 5
DUBAI , Emirados Árabes Unidos, 23 de julho de 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Uma das principais corretoras do mundo árabe, a Menacorp lançou, oficialmente, o MetaTrader 5 na Bolsa de Ouro e de Commodities de Dubai (DGCX -- Dubai Gold and Commodities ...PR Newswire, 4 days ago Menaсorp ya ofrece cotización en DGCX a través de MetaTrader 5 PR Newswire, 4 days ago Mena-orp ahora ofrece operaciones en la DGCX mediante MetaTrader 5 Gnom.es, 4 days ago
Menaсorp propose désormais des services de trading sur la DGCX via MetaTrader 5
DUBAI , UAE, July 23, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- L'un des principaux courtiers du monde arabe, Menaсorp, a lancé officiellement MetaTrader 5 sur la Bourse de Duba pour l'or et les matières premières (Dubai Gold & Commodities Exchange, DGCX).PR Newswire, 4 days ago
Menaсorp bietet nun durch MetaTrader 5 auch Trading im DGCX
DUBAI , VAE, July 23, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Menaсorp , einer der führenden Broker der arabischen Welt, hat offiziell MetaTrader 5 für den Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX) eingeführt. Jetzt können die Kunden von Menaсorp mit all den ...PR Newswire, 4 days ago
DGCX plans new contracts in H2
Dubai Gold and Commodities Exchange (DGCX) today said first-half volumes jumped 11 per cent to reach over six million contracts as compared to the same period last year's more than 6.4 million contracts, valued at over $185 billion (Dh679 billion). ...Emirates247, 2 weeks ago DGCX plans new currency, hydrocarbon, precious metals, equity, agricultural contracts in H2 Emirates247, 2 weeks ago
DGCX posts 11% jump in H1 contracts
Issac John/Associate Business Editor / 8 July 2015 ubai Gold and Commodities Exchange ended the first half with trading volumes of more than 6.4 million contracts, valued at over $185 billion. ...Khaleej Times, 2 weeks ago UAE- DGCX posts 11% jump in H1 contracts MENAFN, 2 weeks ago
DGCX's deal with Bank of China to up interaction
(Staff Report) / 28 May 2015 The agreement creates a frame-work for both institutions to work together to enhance interaction and collaboration between the derivatives and financial markets of the ...Khaleej Times, 2 months ago UAE- DGCXs deal with Bank of China to up interaction MENAFN, 2 weeks ago
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This property allows you to book online with a credit card. After submitting a reservation request, the owner or manager has 24 hours to accept, at which time your card will be charged and you will receive an email confirmation
Recent Sapphire reviews
"Beautiful condo over looking to stunning pool and a wonderful view of the ocean!! Condo is well stocked with everything you need and has a great cozy feel! We had a total of 8 people and there was plenty of room!! My boys and I had a wonderful time and can not wait to stay there again!! 5+ stars! Thank you for sharing your beautiful place with us!!"Guest: Anna K. Date of Stay: July 2015 Review Submitted: July 28, 2015View listing
"This is a beautiful, comfortable, welcoming condo in a perfect location! Here in bad weather, and still had an amazing time... With an exquisite view and fully equipped kitchen making it easy to cook in the condo... Got tilapia at the H.E.B. And fresh shrimp at the shrimp outlet off of route 48... ( grill on balcony) Ate at The Pearl (Beachside Bar and Grill, right next door...all you can eat buffet) and Padre Brewing Co.. VERY FRESH)...saw birds at the convention center, turtles at the sea turtle rescue center, and more birds at Sabal Palm. LOTS to do! We also played golf at the South Padre Golf a Club which even had decent rental clubs. A challenging , and fun course. Have stayed here before and had a wonderful horseback beach ride! Be sure to go out on the bay with Scarlet on dolphin whisperer!"Guest: Judy Date of Stay: November 2014 Review Submitted: November 18, 2014View listing
"What a wonderful, relaxing place! I brought two kids, a 3 year old and an 18 month old and we also had 4 adults. Plenty of space for all of us and our kids' toys. Tori provided a pack n play, and a high chair that we used with my younger one. There were also beach toys, chairs, boogie boards and even a cooler to bring to the beach. The outside balcony was our favorite place to hang out and the views were gorgeous! We were out there as the sun was coming up, during our kids' nap time (it was all shaded) and after dinner. Loved it! The Sapphire has awesome pools and we enjoyed the kids pool at the Pearl too. Everything was comfortable so it felt like home. The staff at the Sapphire were very welcoming and helpful. The 7th floor was the perfect height for a condo. Not too high where you feel nervous about the balcony, but high enough to have the perfect view. The kitchen was extremely well stocked with the necessary cooking supplies...we had almost all meals at the condo which saved us a lot of money. We hope to come back soon since we had such a great time. Tori made the reservation process very easy and was happy to answer my questions. I highly recommend Sapphire 707 to anyone wanting to have a great South Padre vacation!"Guest: Reagan L. Date of Stay: June 2015 Review Submitted: June 28, 2015View listing
"We had a wonderful stay!! Saphire condos are super nice! Our room was awesome. I would definitely go back and I want this exact room. It was very spacious for the 7 of us! Perfect view! I can't say enough how much we enjoyed it!"Guest: Carolyn M. Date of Stay: July 2015 Review Submitted: July 10, 2015View listing
Featured Destinations: Smith Mountain Lake Rentals, Kiawah Island Rentals, Broken Bow Cabins, Port Aransas Condos


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Motel 6 San Bernardino South
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Travel Blogs from San Bernardino
California Dreaming
... of rush hour. After 2 1/2 hours we finally made it home to crash!!
SATURDAY 5/10-Today was a day to find the oil Terry uses in the Jeep or somewhere that will change it for us. We found a WalMart that will use the oil Terry likes so we waited while that was done then it was off to see two car shows. One wasn't there as advertised but the other near our campground at Cal Poly-Pomona campus was. They have a ranch/farm there so you could pick the strawberries or buy them ...
Blog 17 San Bernardino
Driven most of the day through the California Desert on 66. Over 200 miles through lava fields, dry river beds, sandy scrubland and cactus. Temperature in the 80s and very dry (yesterday it was 86). Now staying in a wigwam at San Bernardino (it's made of concrete). We have seen some odd things this holiday but the Bottle Ranch is probably the most unusual - thousands of bottles on ...
Our first few days in the US
... stay awake until 9pm, having been up for the equivalent of 22 hours by this point!
The next day we woke naturally at around 5am, but managed to sleep until 10, vaguely attempting to combat the jetlag but still feeling woozy. I experienced my first oatmeal for brekkie (nothing like porridge despite my best microwaving efforts) and Dan is happy as cereal is basically the same here. We went to visit Dan's cousins at their house in Norco (horse ...
Bye Bye California
... vote. I also want to mention Alex Ric******* who I promised I would mention in my travelblog. Alex, if you're reading this, i tried to find you on FB but couldn't. Thanks again for your help and enthusiasm and for allowing me to experience a part of US history in the making - Go Obama!! Right, back to Universal Studios...Oh my Goodness - again another WOW experience. I became evidently excited when I got up to the rotating globe (which was at the park ...
Have you slept in a wigwam lately?
... size. And the colour of the rocks, the colour of sky, combined with the brightness of the sun is something the behold. Noah and I cannot believe that a place like this exists and that we are here. We are regularly speechless and just soak up the surroundings .
We stop at a campsite and discuss whether or not we would camp here. It would be so dark and so quite at night but the stars would be phenomenal, as would be the sunrise. ...


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Rangers' Boyle a healthy scratch tonight, says it's 'nobody's fault but mine'
Feb 7, 2013, 12:30 PM EDT
NHL's latest trend — sending messages to veterans via the healthy scratch — extended to New York on Thursday, as the Rangers announced forward Brian Boyle would be one tonight against the Islanders.
"My whole body of work, it hasn't been there this year — I know I've got to be better," Boyle said upon learning he'd been dropped from the lineup. ""I work as hard as I can every day, but I need to play more desperate."
The 28-year-old joins a list of recent list of healthy scratches that includes Dustin Penner, Alex Goligoski, Alexei Kovalev, Ryan Whitney, Joe Corvo, Shane O'Brien and Jamie Langenbrunner.
Boyle burst onto Broadway during the 2010-11 campaign, scoring a career-high 21 goals and 35 points while averaging nearly 16 minutes per game. His production dipped in 2011-12 — 11 goals and 26 points — but he still received a healthy amount of ice time.
What's more, Boyle never missed games.
He played all 82 in each of the last two years and, according to NHL.com's Dave Lozo, will see his consecutive game streak of 174 come to an end tonight with
The 6-foot-7, 244-pound center owned up to not playing well this year — he has just one point and is minus-3 through nine games — and said he's part of the reason for New York's sluggish start.
"I'm just not playing well enough, making mistakes," Boyle said. "Everybody makes mistakes but I'm not contributing enough or playing to where I can play to.
"It's not for a lack of effort but there's no moral victories when you're 4-5 and I need to have a lot more of an impact."
In related news, defenseman Dan Girardi will miss his second straight contest on Thursday. The Rangers have him listed as "day-to-day, banged up," which is pretty scientific.
Captain Ryan Callahan will also make his return after dealing with a shoulder injury.
- hockeywithdrawal - Feb 7, 2013 at 1:27 PM
Put him on waivers…..PLEASE.
- brainoflindros - Feb 7, 2013 at 1:36 PM
Yes please do!
- travishenryskid - Feb 7, 2013 at 1:54 PM
Yes, blame Boyle for your offensive woes. That makes perfect sense. Maybe sitting a guy who isn't supposed to score will motivate the players who are supposed to score to actually score. Scapegoating at it's finest.
- stakex - Feb 7, 2013 at 2:39 PM
Its not just that he isn't scoring… he hasn't looked good at all. His play has been choppy, and hes been careless with the puck at times. Also, while hes not suppose to be the Rangers main scoring threat he is expected to contribute a bit on offense. Hes had 61 points over the last two years… and only one point in nine games this year (on pace for 10 points in an 82 game season). Hes also averageing less then a shot per game, which is a huge drop from the 383 shots hes had over the last two seasons.
Theres no doubt Boyle isn't playing good, and there is nothing at all wrong with sitting him for a game. Its not going to hurt the Rangers, and might even do Boyle some good.
- johnstone17 - Feb 8, 2013 at 8:12 AM
He was a big contributor on the penalty kill last year, blocked shots reguarly & was a solid forechecker. He has been none of that yet this year. He can contribute, no need to send him packing.
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Amelia Saltsman is the author of the Santa Monica Farmers' Market Cookbook. This week she shares three tartine recipes for summer. She tops toasted country bread with ingredients like smashed avocado, green tomatoes, and nectarines.
Steeping the perfect cup of Darjeeling tea is simple but exacting. Jeff Koehler, author of Darjeeling: The Colorful History and Precarious Fate of the World's Greatest Tea, joins us this week on Good Food.
A handful of companies are coming to the rescue in the carry-on drinks department. Wine writer and comedian Marissa Ross is a big fan of Fly Wine , a collection of TSA-friendly single serving bottles that you won't find on your average Delta flight.
The online drinks magazine Punch recently partnered with W&P Design to create the Carry-On Cocktail Kit, a smartly packaged case of cocktail ingredients like tonic syrup for G&Ts and seasoned bitters for Old Fashioneds.
This week market manager Laura Avery talks with pastry chef Shannon Swindle of Craft who is shopping for seasonal fruit like cherries, apricots and olallieberries. He bakes them into pies, purees them into sorbets or serves them fresh. Plus, Ken Brown of Andy's Orchard discusses his five varieties of cherries and describes the nectarines, apricots and peaches we can look forward to in the weeks to come.
This week we hear from Brigit Binns author of Sunset's Eating Up the West Coast: The best road trips, restaurants, and recipes from California to Washington. This recipe for Chocolate-Filled Doughnut Muffins was inspired by Franny's Cup and Saucer a mother-daughter run bakery in Point Arena, CA.
Jonathan Gold is the Pulitzer Prize-winning food writer for the LA Times. This week he reviews Tumanyan Khinkali Factory, a Georgian soup dumpling specialist in Glendale. He describes the khinkali as a "near peak soup dumpling experience."
It's cherry season here in Southern California, so we knew we had to ask Maureen Abood about her black cherry salsa. This week on the show she says, "Lamb loves to be paired with something sweet, and this recipe is just gorgeous."
David Wondrich is a cocktail historian and the author of two great books on cocktail lore. This week we dive into punch, the subject of his 2010 book Punch: The Delights and Dangers of the Flowing Bowl.
This week market manager Laura Avery and Chef Bruce Kalman of Union in Pasadena discuss the minimum waste stream of root-to-leaf cooking. Plus, Aja Tamai of Tamai Family Farms discusses her sweet mini peppers and three varieties of honeydew melons – honeygold, honey dewlicious and summerdew.
This week we hear from Anna Brones and Johanna Kindvall, authors of Fika: The Art of the Swedish Coffee Break. This recipe was inspired by Johanna's mother's cardamom cake.


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Clarabelle Cow's ball-dazzling photo of Barbie's Cycle Toon Hula
The Barbie's Cycle Toon Hula entrance is like a cruise inside Toontown. The attraction cycles are made to look like Benny the Can, and when you drive you can hula them by twisting the other guests.
You shouldn't try Pirate Mode
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50 Cent has apologized for his insensitive remarks about autism. "I realize my autism comments were insensitive, however it was not my intention to offend anyone and for this I apologize," 50 took to his Twitter Sunday (July 8) to announce. The ...Read More
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