It appears we’re trending from the 70’s back to the 50’s and 60’s. Prada showed their Spring 2012 Collection yesterday at Milan Fashion Week, and one of the big influences was 1950’s and 60’s Southern California, an iconic era of customized muscle cars and surfer babes, made forever famous in songs from The Beach Boys, films like Grease, and books by Tom Wolfe.
Some of our favorites from the collection included dresses with hot rod flame details burning up the hem, and the throwback one piece swimsuits that still manage to flatter the figure. Ms. Prada also presented some very literal hot rod prints that could easily double as young boys pajamas, if the silhouette wasn’t so perfectly feminine. She even took the car motif into several pairs of strappy heels with flames shooting out of the proverbial tailpipe.
By the way, we are really loving how accessible the fashion business has become. Once a closed up industry reserved only for the VIPS invited to attend each show, practically every brand is making investments in digital media, streaming the runway walks live from the tents, and exciting a whole new generation of fashionistas. It’s also a fuller picture, as the public gains exposure to the creativity that goes beyond the clothes and into the styling, music and overall show presentation. For example, you can watch the entire Prada Spring 2012 Show right on YouTube:
Succulents are probably familiar to the Southern California dweller, but you may not have heard of them if you live in a rainy area. These typically desert dwelling plants store water in their leaves and roots, which gives them a trademark fuller, fleshier look known as “succulence”. They come in every size, from tiny little plants that can fit on a cocktail ring to giant agave plants and towering cacti. While all cacti are part of the succulent family, there is a huge variety of non-spiny succulents that are not considered cacti (seriously, there are so many).
While the different varieties come from the drier climates as far as Africa, South America, Asia and in the United States, they have become identifiable with the Southern California region because of their popularity as garden and home accents and their water saving properties. Some of our favorite varieties include string of buttons, zebra plants, black roses, flapjacks, and different types of echeveria. We love how easy they are to care for. They are drought resistant and hard to over-water. Most varieties do well both indoors and outdoors. You can also mix and match them in the same container, and fit them almost anywhere you need to – in a flower pot, on a wall, in a garden, or inside a terrarium. We even take them on the road to spruce up the the trade show booth, because they can handle being left in a car or getting bumped around a bit.
Succulents also create a lot of visual interest, because they take on so many shapes, textures and colors: concentric circles, spirals, columns and random forms of green and purple and red. Most recently, our resident stylist spotted an ideal location for the Spring lookbook shoot in a local LA backyard. Once we saw the pictures below, we were sold!
