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solenn fresnay Nov 2013
En 1987
J’ai joué à touche-pipi dans la caravane de mes parents
Il s’appelait Nicolas et sentait bon la fleur d’oranger
C’était assez agréable
Nous passions des vacances dans le Cantal
Il n’a cessé de pleuvoir
Le camping était en pente avec en diagonale un interminable vide
Mes parents jouaient aux cartes avec les parents de Nicolas
Je ne sais pas qui ce jour-là a baisé qui
Ceci étant
Nicolas m’avait demandé si je pouvais manger un bout de sa viande avariée
Je devais avoir huit ans et des poussières d’étoiles dans les yeux
Le soir à l’apéritif mon père a vomi dans la bouche de la mère de Nicolas
La soirée se termina ainsi
Et tout le monde à bout de ses envies alla se coucher dans sa caravane respective


Pause


Ce furent de belles vacances
judy smith May 2016
For the fifth year in a row, Kering and Parsons School of Fashion rolled out the ‘Empowering Imagination’ design initiative. The competition engaged twelve 2016 graduates of the Parsons BFA Fashion Design program, who "were selected for their excellence in vision, acute awareness in design identity, and mastery of technical competencies." The winners, Ya Jun Lin and Tiffany Huang, will be awarded a 2-week trip to Kering facilities in Italy in June 2016 and will have their thesis collections featured in Saks Fifth Avenue New York’s windows.

The Kering and Parsons competition, which is currently in its fifth year, is one of a growing number of design competitions, including but not limited to the LVMH Prize, the ANDAM Awards, the Council of Fashion Designers of America/Vogue Fashion Fund, and its British counterpart, the Woolmark Prize, the Ecco Domani fashion award, and the Hyères Festival. among others.

In the generations prior, designers were certainly nominated for awards, but it seems that there was not nearly as intense of a focus on design competitions as a means for designers to get their footing, for design houses to scout talent, or for these competitions to select the best of the best in a especially large pool of young talent. Fern Mallis, the former executive director of the Council of Fashion Designers of America and an industry consultant, told the New York Times: “Take the Calvin [Kleins] and the Donna [Karans] and the Ralph [Laurens] of the world. Some of these people had money from a friend or a partner who worked with them, but they weren’t out spending their time doing competitions and winning awards to get their business going.” She sheds light on an essential element: The relatively drastic difference between the state of fashion then and fashion now. Fashion then was slower, less global, and (a lot) less dominated by the internet, and so, it made for quite different circumstances for the building of a fashion brand.

Nowadays, young designers are more or less going full speed ahead right off the bat. They show comprehensive collections, many of which consist of garments and an array of accessories. They are expected to be active on social media. They are expected to establish a strong industry presence (think: Go to events and parties). They are expected to cope with the fashion business that has become large-scale and international. They are expected to collaborate to expand their reach, and while it does, at times, feel excessive, this is the reality because the industry is moving at such a quick pace, one that some argue is unsustainably rapid. The result is designers and design houses consistently building their brands and very rarely starting small. Case in point: Young brands showing pre-collections within a few years of setting up shop (for a total of four collections per year, not counting any collaboration or capsule collections), and established brands showing roughly four womenswear collections, four menswear collections, two couture collections, and quite often, a few diffusion collections each year.

The current climate of 'more is more' (more collections, more collaborations, more social media, more international know-how, etc.) in fashion is what sets currently emerging brands apart from older brands, many of which started small. This reality also sheds light on the increasing frequency with which designers rely on competitions as a means of gaining funds, as well as a means of establishing their names and not uncommonly, gaining outside funding.

The Ralphs, Tommys, Calvins and Perrys started off a bit differently. Ralph Lauren, for instance, started a niche business. The empire builder, now 74, got his start working at a department store then worked for a private label tie manufacturer (which made ties for Brooks Brothers and Paul Stuart). He eventually convinced them to let him make ties under the Polo label and work out of a drawer in their showroom. After gaining credibility thanks to the impeccable quality of his ties, he expanded into other things. Tommy Hilfiger similarly started with one key garment: Jeans. After making a name for himself by buying jeans, altering them into bellbottoms and reselling them at Brown’s in Manhattan, he opened a store catering to those that wanted a “rock star” aesthetic when he was 18-years old with $150. While the store went bankrupt by the time he was 25, it allowed him to get his foot in the door. He was offered design positions at Calvin Klein (who also got his start by focusing on a single garment: Coats. With $2,000 of his own money and $10,000 lent to him by a friend, he set up shop; in 1973, he got his big break when a major department store buyer accidentally walked into his showroom and placed an order for $50,000). Hilfiger was also offered a design position with Perry Ellis but turned them down to start his eponymous with help from the Murjani Group. Speaking of Perry Ellis, the NYU grad went to work at an upscale retail store in Virginia, where he was promoted to a buying/merchandising position in NYC, where he was eventually offered a chance to start his own label, a small operation. After several years of success, he spun it off as its own entity. Marc Jacobs, who falls into a bit of a younger generation, started out focusing on sweaters.

These few individuals, some of the biggest names in American fashion, obviously share a common technique. They intentionally started very small. They built slowly from there, and they had the luxury of being able to do so. Others, such as Hubert de Givenchy, Alexander McQueen and his successor Sarah Burton, Nicolas Ghesquière, Julien Macdonald, John Galliano and his successor Bill Gaytten, and others, spent time as apprentices, working up to design directors or creative directors, and maybe maintaining a small eponymous label on the side. As I mentioned, attempting to compare these great brand builders or notable creative directors to the young designers of today is a bit like comparing apples and oranges, as the nature of the market now is vastly different from what it looked like 20 years ago, let alone 30 or 40 years ago.

With this in mind, fashion competitions have begun to play an important role in helping designers to cope with the increasing need to establish a brand early on. It seems to me that winning (or nearly winning) a prestigious fashion competition results in several key rewards.

Primarily, it puts a designer's name and brand on the map. This is likely the least noteworthy of the rewards, as chances are, if you are selected to participate in a design competition, your name and brand are already out there to some extent as one of the most promising young designers of the moment.

Second are the actual prizes, which commonly include mentoring from industry insiders and monetary grants. We know that participation in competitions, such as the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, the Woolmark Prize, the Swarovski, Ecco Domani, the LVMH Prize, etc., gives emerging designers face time with and mentoring from some of the most successful names in the industry. Chris Peters, half of the label Creatures of the Wind (pictured above), whose brand has been nominated for half of the aforementioned awards says of such participation: “It feels like we’ve talked to possibly everyone in fashion that we can possibly talk to." The grants, which range anywhere from $25,o00 to $400,000 and beyond, are obviously important, as many emerging designers take this money and stage a runway show or launch pre-collections, which often affect the business' bottom line in a major and positive way.

The third benefit is, in my opinion, the most significant. It seems that competitions also provide brands with some reputability in terms of finding funding. At the moment, the sea of young brands which is terribly vast. Like law school graduates, there are a lot of design school graduates. With this in mind, these competitions are, for the most part, serving as a selection mechanism. Sure, the inevitable industry politics and alternate agendas exist (without which the finalists lists may look a bit different), but great talent is being scouted, nonetheless. Not only is it important to showcase the most promising young talent and provide them with mentoring and grant money, as a way of maintaining an industry, but these competitions also do a monumental service to young brands in terms of securing additional funding. One of the most challenging aspects of the business for young/emerging brands is producing and growing absent outside investors' funds, and often, the only way for brands' to have access to such funds is by showing a proven sales track record, something that is difficult to establish when you've already put all of your money into your business and it is just not enough. This is a frustrating cycle for young designers.

However, this is where design competitions are a saving grace. If we look to recent Council of Fashion Designers of America/Vogue Fashion Fund winners and runners-up, for instance, it is not uncommon to see funding (distinct from the grants associated with winning) come on the heels of successful participation. Chrome Hearts, the cult L.A.-based accessories label, acquired a minority stake in The Elder Statesman, the brand established by Greg Chait, the 2012 winner, this past March. A minority stake in 2011 winner Joseph Altuzarra's eponymous label was purchased by luxury conglomerate Kering in September 2013. Creatures of the Wind, the NYC-based brand founded by Shane Gabier and Chris Peters, which took home a runner-up prize in the 2011 competition, welcomed an investment from The Dock Group, a Los Angeles-based fashion investment firm, last year, as well.

Across the pond, the British Fashion Council/Vogue Fashion Fund has awarded prizes to a handful of designers who have gone on to land noteworthy investments. In January 2013, Christopher Kane (pictured below), the 2011 winner, sold a majority stake in his brand to Kering. Footwear designer Nicholas Kirkwood was named the winner 2013 in May and by September, a majority stake in his company had been acquired by LVMH.

Thus, while the exposure that fashion design competition participants gain, and the mentoring and monetary grants that the winners enjoy, are certainly not to be discounted, the takeaway is much larger than that. These competitions are becoming the new way for investors and luxury conglomerates to source new talent, and for young brands to land the outside investments that they so desperately need to produce their collections, expand their studio space, build upon their existing collections, and even open brick and mortar stores.

While no one has scooped up inaugural LVMH winner Thomas Tait’s brand yet or fellow winner, Marques'Almeida, it is likely just be a matter of time.Read more at:www.marieaustralia.com/short-formal-dresses | http://www.marieaustralia.com/formal-dresses-sydney
Jonny Angel May 2015
We made a saint out of Nicolas
when we lost him.
We lost him
somewhere down Baja-way.
He was spinning his yarns there,
making magic in the desert,
a peyote fox,
then vanished
into thin air.
The last time we saw him
he was dancing circular
into the pitch,
waving his arms madly,
wildly speaking
in an ancient tongue.
Some of us believe
the mother ship came back.
I don't.
I think he turned feral
and continues
to cavort
on
the sabbath eves.
Theodore Bird Feb 2015
Tepid summer nights and
     holes in the soles of your feet.
Holes in your wrists, no?
Soft fluttering of dusted eyelashes and
     the pale pink of morning sun as you turn your cheek.
Blushing like a schoolgirl, no?
***** fingertips on dirtied skin and
     toothy smiles, moth-eaten pillowcases, stale whispers.
*'Pour susurrer des mots doux', non?
Vivian  Mar 2014
Andy Nicolas
Vivian Mar 2014
you were never an artist;
I'm sorry but it is true.
once, you sketched me
(sharpie on loose leaf, 2013)
and while I was touched by the gesture
[labor of love that it was]
it really looked more like your older brother.
now, your art is shared for mere
moments
(stylus on snapchat, 2014)
but you are still no artist.
you are an auteur, a lover, a curator,
finessing your homages to your youth
[pokemon, zelda, batman]
you may not be an artist
but I love you all the same.
CH Gorrie Jul 2012
Around me architectural mastery:
sycamores, embankments, enduring ionic pillars.
I round a walkway bordered by trees,
enamel thawing, gliding off their low leaves.
Beneath the late-May’s pounding sun,
through the glittered trees’ reaches,
a gazebo crackles into sight.
Children in their prime, sunbathers, a wistful portraitist
encircle it carelessly:
a leisured chimney; the billows of life.
The foliage escapes into the river,
purplish, palpitating, cyclic creases
receive the dewy notes.
Kayaks licking acacia-gum-edged
ripples sputter and slip
through reverberations
of leveled white-water terraces.
Blackcurrants in clotted cream
slide on the plush lips of a young passerby.
The 8 above a doorway
dances motionless, silent in my periphery;
“Nicolas Cage just sold the spot”
pops from unknown lungs
inside the Circus crowd.

Unacknowledged, half-proud
hands built the Roman baths
alone, closed-in by such grace,
forgotten, then as now.
I wander these ancestral lanes
more or less alone, the same.
Jedd Ong  Mar 2015
Dad
Jedd Ong Mar 2015
Dad
Muelle de Binondo Street,
Barangay San Nicolas,
Old Manila.

My dad's fate
Will always be muddled
With nostalgia:

The mid-afternoon
Traffic of fruit vendors,

The toothless strains
Of my grandfather's voice,
Bouncing off
The warehouse walls
Like folding cardboard,

The ceramic gallops of horse-
Drawn kalesas taking him
From school to
My grandfather's offices,
Every day and back,

Up and down
The cardboard box river
To Tondo. There, he hurriedly
Buys ten
Asado buns
From a stall across the
Street from their
School - a voracious
Schoolboy
Forever late for class, forever

Putting on basketball jerseys
Too wide for him,
Basketball shorts too
Short; body
Always too gangly,
Too long-limbed, wide eyed
And fleet footed
For his dreams to catch.

He once could dunk.

He is still a baby boomer -
Scared of firecrackers,
Weird penchant
For popped collar shirts,
Pointed shoes, and
Sequins - he, was an avid

Lover of stars - his old
Dust-strewn bed posts
Giving way, I imagine,
To iron bars caging
The luminous starry night,
Floating high above
The sewage
And the freight trucks
That weigh him so.

They sang to him.

In the tune of
My mother's voice -
The only album
He ever possessed.

Song set from
His favorite band.

"Apo Hiking Society."

His favorite word,
Was "leap."

A disciple
Of MJ, Dr. J,
And Magic,
Samboy, and Jawo,

Icarus on hardwood
And leaping
From the free throw line.

"Son," he once told me,
"You gotta leap
"If you wanna live."

He was always afraid of heights.

It wasn't until 41 that
We made him ride a roller-coaster,
That he had even seen a roller-coaster.

"You gotta leap
"If you wanna live."

I think my favorite
Memory of my dad
Is still him wringing my fingers
At Space Mountain with
Eyes so tightly shut
That we forgot
Our fears,
And screamed instead:

So.

This,
Is how the stars look like
When unbolted
By folding cardboard,
And iron bars.
Yeah it's one shot one ****

Plottin' against my enemies will soon to be killed
Bullets feedin' ya last meal
Dope rhymes sedatin' like pharmacy pills
Since hataz got no chill heads I'll drill  now you leakin' out like oil spills
Or a radiator angelic caters none could create a
Flows nasty as mine poppin' a multiplicity of shells I'm one of a kind
Thoughts intertwined  
****** into a demons intervention contenders in suspension from the soul lynching
Caught in the realms of heaven and hell & you can smell
The ashes burning fermentin'
time runnin' slower than molasses
My murders be classic enemies dramatic causin' static
Shoot more than Bird combined with Magic
Workin' my Johnson on the tracks tonsils sittin' as a hip hop consul underground magul  
**** longer than Repunzels hair follicles
Cookin' up sigils into a *** of gold no rainbow snortin' sir nose
D'void of Funk rattlin' the earth from the bass in my trunk blazin' skunks
Abraxas I'm embracin' one of my goetias when facin' ain't no replacin'
Fools givin' chase
and to tastes of demonic faces
My flows replenish like **** laces
Blunts turn into ashes dump it out on the masses
Epidemic mase deaden your pace hazardous like toxic waste
Adversaries don't wanna face
Off like Nicolas to Travolta livin' in an ultra violent culture
Cleatin' into ya flesh I be the stalkin' Vulture mulchin' ya
'til ya
  A dissembled particle blank photo in the article from curvin' emcees with my surgical
lyrical sickle stare into ya eyes as the blood trickles
Down ya body you easily brickled rhymes artificial
My soul sour as a pickle no tickles
Could move me or influence thee my legacy
Lay cinematography like A. Hitchcock in the 50s huh
Ya soon to be a death reel for thrills
Rememeber
All I need is one shot one **** forreal!!!!
Jeremy Duff Oct 2012
One Cuil = One level of abstraction away from the reality of a situation.

Example: You ask me for a cat.

One Cuil: If you asked me for a cat and I gave you a rhino.

Two Cuil: If you asked me for a cat, but it turns out I don't really exist. In the place where you perceived me to be standing is a picture of a large cat. On it's collar are the words: "I am a large rhino."

Three Cuil: You are a cat. You begin to scream, only to realise that you are meowing. You scratch just under your ears and begin to purr.

Four Cuil: Why are we wearing dinosaur outfits? A light breezes rolls over our bodies but you only have one arm. Suddenly, the wind begins to howl and an alternative universe is created where we are dinosaurs wearing human outfits. I have cats for arms, and as you notice this you meow again.

Five Cuil: You ask for a cat; and I give you a cat. Your pull it to your chest and begin to pet it. Your nose begins to run and you wipe it on the cats tail. On the other side of the world a bank is robbed by a woman who has 7 sisters. In her wallet is a picture of you, in your human form. Your ears are pierced in this picture and they were in your human form as well, but something is different about them. The cat purrs and grabs a hold of your earring, ripping it from your ear. Milk drips out of you wound and the lady robbing the bank is arrested. Her oldest sister is climaxing while having *** with my brother. I give you a cat and it is poisonous. I am dead.

Six Cuil: You ask me for a cat. Mark Whalberg tells me he will not **** and he hands me a cat. The cat is smoking a cigarette, I develop liver cancer. I die. The wind blows on you again and the cat does not have a left rear leg. It puts its cigarette out on my eye. MGMT plays softly and you meow to the moon which is a pizza. The pizza has olives on it which displeases you. Your displeasure causes the woman to rob the bank so she can buy you Hawaiian pizza.  The gravitational pull of the olives causes a flood to reach your house. You cry and your tears become lakes. The Earth is flooded. Uranus ignites suddenly, engulfing Neptune in flames. A civilization of Nicolas Cage's living there are destroyed. Obi Wan says that there has been a disturbance in the force. A cat hands you me.
It's too late to be thinking.

— The End —