Cyprus the landscapes

This all seems such a long time ago now, Emin is counting the days until he returns (less than a month) I will have to wait until Christmas. Going at this time of year I noticed a lot of the villager foraging, clearly Fregan's before they even had a name for it. This was taken in the village, down the side of Emin's aunts house, which is in a lovely spot but now abandoned and slowly falling into disrepair. What makes it even sadder is I know there is some lovely furniture inside..

Honey from this region is the best tasting in the world, these very cobbled together hives are full to the brim, no wonder as the blossom trees are everywhere, everything planted in this place has to earn it's keep, so most of the trees are fruiting trees so had I stayed a couple of weeks longer the place would have been a sea of blossom.

I have shown you photographs like this before but I never tire of seeing how the villagers use everything including the oil cans, which are the only splash of colour around this time of year.

About half a kilometer or less from the house you reach this plateau, this is a very typical view looking over to the sea, which I did walk to one day, great going down, bloody agony coming back.

You can, if you peer very closely just make out the back of his house, on the left.

To the right of his house rolling hills of yellow were everywhere, I never knew in the early days that this country could be so green,

Another week has flown by, tonight the private view of Ida Kar @ NPG and an audience with Mater & Pater..yeah

Chain Mail

I continuously covet chain mail necklaces, not really sure why, they are not pretty, in fact they look quite industrial. The price of these is prohibitive and I am toying with making one myself, I have sourced some fine silver strand and to me they look like french knitting you know those little dolls with the hoops on top? I will add it to my to do list!!
This necklace is by Fiona Paxton I found it via the link to Darkroom's website. This shop looks wonderful.

The following two necklaces come via the V&A who have a shop here

Tiziana Redavid

Sarah Cavender

Yohji Disappointment

I have a bit of a confession to make, over the years I have always assumed that I love Yohji Yamamoto's work, it was because I see each season separate from the rest along side other giants from japan such as Issey Miyake and Rei Kawakubo amongst others. So in essence I have never really focused specifically on his oeuvre in isolation. For the post I went back 10 years, I wanted to go back to 1995 which was when he produced his exquisite kimono inspired gowns, later his focus was more on tailoring and now I see it as a whole narrative it is a very Gothic almost Victorian silhouette. Not overly flattering, you would have to be very tall to carry off much of these outfits, but up close and personal the tailoring is amazing and for this alone he is worthy of his reputation but now I can see the broader picture I can't say I am the fan I thought I was.

Truly, I searched long and hard to fill this post with images, they were all so gloomy and shroud like, with a Dickensian feel running through most of the last 10 years.

That said the details are stunning

apart from the buttons, seriously the buttons were all cheap plastic, how can you pay so much attention to the detail of cut and not think a little more creatively about the buttons?

So the exhibition.

Because it was coming on the back of the superb 30 year retrospective that has just finished at the Barbican I assumed it would further elaborate in detail his thought process. What I wanted was to see more of the clothes and the philosophy behind them.

I am a big fan of text married with the displays, I wear glasses, so constantly peering over them flitting between tiny printed matter and then looking up hurts my eyes, and I know I am not alone in that. I also expected to see the relationship between his clothes and the photography from his catalogues, since he has worked with some amazing photographers over the years and has really upped the ante where catalogues are concerned.

Instead I walk in behind some gormless idiot waving his press pass, he is feted with a press pack whilst I a paying visitor get a broad sheet with tiny writing and numbers which I have to match to the exhibits.

On entry your feet are made to stick to the floor, I thought someone had spilt Coca Cola, so tried to side step it, you have to walk past an attendant who neither smiles or greets you, or even bothers to explain why your feet are suddenly glued to the floor. Inside the room, just the one, you are greeted by a horrible industrial bank of scaffolding, to the right a dark corridor with tiny monitors looping his shows, to the left a retina burning bright light bounces off the shiny white plastic floor (now we know the tacky back was to keep the floor clean...it was failing miserably) the clothes are scattered across room with no explanation, the walls are bare.

Having been impressed by both their Versace retrospective and Vivienne Westwood's nothing quite prepares you for this disaster of curating. Presenting the clothes is itself an art form as both Liberty's and Selfridges windows illustrate to perfection. This was like the slap dash efforts more commonly seen at Harvey Nichols, low on budget, low on ideas and lacking any sensitivity to the paying public. It was an insult to my intelligence,

The quote above comes from the COS catalogue it is well worth a read and makes me very keen to try and get to Antwerp to see this MoMu for myself, someone at the V&A should read it.

I have since discovered the photographs are on show at The Wapping Project Bankside They should be with the clothes at the V&A

The view from here

Friday was Watteau @ RA which is truly an excellent show, small but perfectly formed it focuses on his drawings which are exquisite in detail, much has been gathered from galleries from around the world and it was brilliantly displayed. I came away heartened and enlightened just like a good exhibition should..
Dinner at Les Deaux Salons was good this time, we cracked the meat conundrum by having a starter then a salad. They are not the best organised place though, running out of bread for a while and the look of horror when my sister asked for some white bread... Quelle Horreur after an interminable wait one teeny tiny piece arrived. And another thing, they still do not give you anything green with the cheese board. We mentioned it to the waitress who promised to highlight it later. Even the salad had a paucity of leaves, how I ached to run across the road to buy a little gem lettuce instead of the pathetic designer leaves draped some what sadly across my duck.
So onwards to the much anticipated Yohji Yamamoto exhibition, which is dreadful, truly a waste of seven of my finest pounds, I will discuss why tomorrow but lets look at the good, oh there I am. Spring is here and so my leather jacket is back on..

After the V&A I wandered around the corner to Few & Far and spied this jumper Sarah Lund style.
There is an interview with her in this weeks Observer and the good news is there are more to come...Series with Chief Superintendent Lund that is , not interviews! Yeah

I would love to shop this wardrobe, such beautiful clothes all at Few & Far

Spring at the Conran Shop, I love the colour of this sofa, if I ever won the lottery I would buy so much from here.

Blossom is all around London at the moment, it is the beginning of my favourite time of year, the light, the blossom, the green of the leaves...

As I am lumbered with the most ugliest, most annoyingly destructive dog IN THE WORLD , I sometimes wistfully covet something more elegant and better behaved. Are these not adorable?

Finally sartorial style from Hans Place, this photograph does not do her justice, she looked so creamy

Finally why do I blog?

This post is brilliant because

a) even more readers will discover the excellent Belgian Waffle and

b) it really does make sense of why indeed it is such a popular sport. Yes, sport, because I don't know about you slouches but I have to walk bloody miles to bring you this Pandora's box of delights.

I started blogging because like a lot of things I see on the Internet I think, Hell! I can do that, how easy is that? Just pop a few piccy's up, raise a few points, and ramble on self indulgently about my ridiculously shambolic life, easy peasey.

My inspiration at the time was the amazing Dear Ada who hubbed and spoked amazing art like no other blogger could. I could never have kept up with that level of commitment, she sometimes posted 3 different artists a day! Two other blog genii were Susie Bubble and the Queens @ Kingdom of Style, the latter's refusal to bow to commercialism I hold very dear to my heart, because for me there is the rub, so many blogs cow tow to he flashing box in their margin, hard to criticise a company when you are raking it in from them. I can see why so many fall, but sometimes I think if I see one more American Apparel icon flashing at me in my peripheral vision I will scream. So I raise a toast to the Queens for staying true to their roots.

My blog has evolved from something quite superficially decorative into a bit of an unwieldy octopus. It has saved my relationship with Emin because being able to write down how I feel makes me put him into perspective, it is a wholly cathartic experience, a problem shared truly is.... The blog is not wholly anonymous although I wish it were so, I write about what I can cope with being read by most, including Emin, but in my mind it is still me, a keyboard and a couple of bloguettes commenting, it is the intimacy I like, that, and the fact it has forced me to look long and hard at what I have and what I have achieved plus it's made me pathetically grateful in many ways, including facing up to my grammar demons, though THANK GOD for spell check! Please, please don't laugh but even I am seriously thinking I could write a book in retirement, I said write, not publish you understand.

Plus, best of all I even get to meet some of you!

Tziporah Salamon

If I can look half as glamorous as this when I retire I will be happy

I would love to lounge around in richly embroidered textiles, she reminds me of Nancy Cunard.

You can see more here

Jet Korine

This is one of those site that I trip up over whilst having a leisurely read of my blog roll. Kingdom of Style is a fabulous hub & spoke system for upcoming designers, this one in particular would tick all my needs for wearing inside my draughty Edwardian house.

You can see more here

Monochrome Miffy and other stories

I feel for the first time that I may have cracked this sartorial conundrum. it's been all good this week and it's looking good for a few weeks to come too, despite the casualties of war.
I normally dress down on Friday but I have dinner at Les Deux Salons tonight plus a private view of Watteau so I felt a little elegance was in order..non?
Tomorrow Yohji Yamamoto @ V&A

I was in such a rush to leave the country I failed to report back on the joy of Twelfth Night, any concerns I had taking The Leyla Monster were quickly dispelled after the opening scene. The only draw back was the miserable fucker gentleman sat next to us who moaned when Leyla lent forward, he failed on every level to understand the bar in front was ridiculously large and seriously impeded the view of a 9 year old who was frequently swept along with the plot. Whilst nothing will EVER come close to replicating the amazing Michael Grandage production this one was good, marred for me by two actors. Not as I expected Malvolio who was very good, but Viola. Rebecca Hall is such a limp, fey actor, she really does not breathe much life into anything, she plays the same character in the same way in everything and what was worse the production was set in the restoration period simply it seemed to accommodate her long hair. So bad at conveying her disguise as her brother, hers was the only character I had to explain to Leyla. The other poor performance was the maid whose shrill voice grated and very nearly spoilt every scene she was in. The star for me was Marton Csokas, I didn't recognise him but he played a bad boy in Kingdom of Heaven. He was brilliant and stole every scene he was in. I have come to the conclusion that a troll could play Orsino and I would lust after him!
Leyla loved it she laughed so much when the letter gets 'dropped' and her face as the brother and sister arrive on stage together was a picture, she actually sat on the edge of her seat and squealed with delight, something that miserable idiot next to me had clearly not done for a while.
In my haste to get to the airport on time I managed to forget my toiletries bag, the belt to hold up all my jeans and books to read. I bought Kate Atkinson's Started Early Took My Dog which I loved, not least because much of it is set in the Leeds's of my childhood.

It was Maggie O'Farrell's The Hand That Held Mine which blew me away though, it is so exquisitely written every sentence was just so beautifully poetic, I loved it and did not ever want it to end.