Citadium – The temple of StreetStyle in Paris

Arsene Wargas
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Reading Time: 2 minutes

Who already went to Paris and visit Citadium? If you did go to Paris and did not visit Citadium, is because you are not interested in StreetCulture. Because in deed, Citadium IS THE TEMPLE OF STREET in Paris.

The first store, or I should say Megastore, opened in 2000 under the creative vision of Printemps Department Sores. A parisian place that mixes the StreetStyle, Skate culture, Rock and sport attitude with a high pitched fashion taste. My friends would say: “this is dynamite honey”. The first store gathers more than 250 brands in a huge 20,000 square feet store! You need to see.

In time Citadium become one of the important references in fashion and life style with a huge street influence. Basically: “Be there or be square”.

10 years after the first opening, and in order to celebrate the 10th anniversary, Citadium revealed its new store concept and opened a cool place in the city center between Le Marais and the Halles.
A full teasing and buzz campaign was put in place in order to reveal the event. Check here the last video reavealing the new store address:

l’oeil mystère – révélation

So if you want to know everything about street style and you are in Paris, do not hesitate to go there. When Street style and fashion come together, Luxuryactivist likes it!
More information, check here: http://www.citadium.com/

LA

Balenciaga Beauty? The Black & White Experience

Arsene Wargas
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1
Reading Time: 2 minutes

After the very beautiful and successful launch of Balenciaga Paris, the new Fragrance of Balenciaga, now the brand has “Beauty Ambitions”. They are launching 3 products under a very timeless luxury theme: Black & White.

Balenciaga paris black & white2 body products and one Travel spray. The first product is a Body Scrubbing, but not anyone… a black one. The texture is very surprising. It is a scrubbing Gel with an astonishing black intense colour, like a black beauty caviar. It is supposed to enlight and clean the body skin and let your skin slightly fragranced. After the arshness of black, the softness of White: a beauty body cream based in Karité butter.

The 2 products are packaged in a very qualitative packaging with all luxury aspects. Some say it is a “simple” body line extension from the Fragrance launched during the 1st half of this year. We can smell this beautiful, timeless and powdery violet, also present in the fragrance.

I think this can be more than a line extension. I would bet it is a test made by the brand to check the possibility to develop a full line of cosmetics, like Dior or YSL. All classical brands with a modern fashionable twist… ready to create Must have products…
We can see that the Black Exfoliator is already a Must Have…
Final but not least, the Travel spray was craft on the theme Black & White. Shaped inBalenciaga paris black & whitean octagonal silhouette, its white body wears black stripes like designed on the mass. Very chic, elegant and “convenient to be showed in public”.

I think Balenciaga follows its path of elegance and fashion attitude, something Dior has succeded on the past 10 years. Nicolas Ghesquière keeps the road as Artistic Director of the Brand. We still need to wait September to be able to buy these beauties at all Balenciaga Parfums point of sales and specially the brand stores.
LA

S like………. Shakira

José Amorim
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Reading Time: < 1

Shakira is the next Celebrity with a fragrance. She signed a multimillion dollar contract with the Beauty Group Puig. If you remember, Puig has a great experience in Celebrities fragrances thanks to Antonio Banderas. The spanish actor brings millions to Puig Beauty Group thanks to a challenging distribution and marketing campaign.

Puig believe they can do the same with Shakira. As you know she is the biggest Latino singer in the moment with her 50 million album sold during her career. The new fragrance will be called “S” as Shakira. Experts thinks the sales potential can be big, some talked about 35 to 40 million dollars.

The launching date is september 2010 and we might find the product over more than 10,000 point of sales around the world. I hope she will do the Video herself!
LA

New Bentley Continental GT Convertible

Arsene Wargas
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3
Reading Time: 2 minutes

The Goodwood Festival of Speed, commonly abbreviated as FoS and referred within the United Kingdom as the Festival of Speed, is an annual hill climb featuring historic motor racing vehicles that is held in the grounds of Goodwood House, West Sussex, England. It was started in 1993 by the present Earl of March in order to bring motor racing back to the Goodwood estate – a location steeped in British motor racing history.

This year, Bentley decided to reveal and display its new Continental Supercar Convertible. The sophisticated luxury car accelerates from zero to 60 mph in 3.9 seconds and has a top speed of 202 mph (308Km/h). It is a beautiful masterpiece from Bentley. As a reminder, Bentley Motors Limited is a British manufacturer of automobiles founded on 18 January 1919 by Walter Owen Bentley (known as W.O. Bentley or just “W.O.”). Bentley had been previously known for his range of aero-engines in World War I, the most famous being the Bentley BR1 as used in later versions of the Sopwith Camel. Since 1998, the company has been owned by theVolkswagen Group of Germany. The firm is based in Crewe, England with their Central Production Facilities being based there.

Watch here a great film about this new high-end car:

LA

Orlando Bloom, the new Boss Orange face

José Amorim
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4
Reading Time: 2 minutes

It is official, Orlando Bloom, famous english actor, will be the new face for Boss Orange fragrance for men. We all know the brilliant career he has. Orlando Bloom was born in Canterbury, Kent, England. According to Wikipedia, “He had his break-through roles in 2001 as the elf-prince Legolas in The Lord of the Rings and starting in 2003 as blacksmith Will Turner in the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy of films, and subsequently established himself as a lead in Hollywood films, including Elizabethtown and Kingdom of Heaven. He appeared in the ensemble film New York, I Love You, and will have roles in Sympathy for Delicious and Main Street. Bloom made his professional stage debut in West End’s In Celebration at the Duke of York’s Theatre, St. Martin’s Lane, which ended its run on 15 September 2007. On 12 October 2009 Bloom was named a UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador. In late 2007, Bloom began dating Australian model Miranda Kerr. The couple’s engagement was announced on June 21, 2010.”

Boss is investing massively in the spokesperson business. In deed, from almost unknown models to superstars. A L’Oréal or LVMH strategy. The first fragrance
under the Boss Orange Label for women has Sienna Miller as spokesperson. Il was the first time Boss got a great hit with feminine fragrances. Now, the masculine fragrance will follow with Orlando Bloom pretty face. The actor is happy with this project as he believes the brand fits his image: Casual, chic yet sophisticated and relax… More information to come.

See here the video for the feminine fragrance. It gives us the tone for the new one upcoming.

Seduced?
LA

Nycked, how to reinvent swimwear

Arsene Wargas
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6
Reading Time: 2 minutes

When true new yorkers revisit one of the fashion standards, you get more than just fashion, you get an aspirational lifestyle… and that it is Nycked. This might be one of the most interesting exercises on a very mainstream glamourous fashion segment: the Swimwear. The recipe is a quite exquisite one. For a great Swimwear collection, you always need a brazilian around. Brazilians are experts on the glamour you might generate with a gentle piece of clothe. Then, you need a great artist and you place both in New York, a city where everything is possible… then you get Nycked. Here is what the brand says on their Facebook page:

“NYCKED swimwear is born from the vivid energy of both Lorenzo Martone of ARC NEW YORK/Chandelier Creative and Jules Kim of Bijules. Hailing from Brazil and the American South, the two recognize the aspirational lifestyle of being a New Yorker as one overflowing with style, intrigue, elegance and intimacy. NYCKED offers an alternative to standard beachwear and gives anyone the opportunity to live the New York look.”

Here the video where Jules Kim explains the project. She looks a very inspiring person, check it out here:

This year I though summer would be boring but thanks to this great collection, I find now summer more “spiced up”. It is sexy, sophisticated, highly aspirational, looks very well executed and there is a lot of talented people behind. I also find there is a punk rock influence, that of course pleases me a lot. it makes it dynamic, active and edgy. We can also appreciate that the people behind  have a “fashion background” and not a swimOutdoor past… it helps to see things on a different new perspective.

I have chosen some visuals that trully represents my idea of the brand, do not hesitate to go to their website and check others looks. Check their Facebook page here and do not hesitate to link to their website: http://www.nycked.com or the Twitter channel on http://www.twitter.com/nyckedswimwear

Let’s hope this project goes through and that other things might come from Nycked…

What do you think?

LA

Burberry presents its Make up Collection

José Amorim
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24
Reading Time: 2 minutes

This summer, Burberry fans will be glad. It will be the birth of Burberry Beauty. A full Make up collection, based on the refined taste of Christopher Bailey, the Brand Artistic Director.

As a friendly reminder, Burberry was founded in 1856 by Lord Thomas Burberry. In that year, our modern gentleman-Dandy created his first outdoor outfits for elegant sportsmen. Today the Brand evolved in a tremendous successful story and has become one of the leading luxury brand around the world. We can define Burberry thanks to its authentic british heritage and its globally recognised icon portfolio: the trench coat, trademark check and Prorsum horse logo. Of course, this great success brought a multi category competence: Womenswear, menswear, non-apparel, childrenswear, fragrances and now Make up (finally).

Christopher Bailey, created a classy and yet fashionable collection. He graduated from the Royal College of Art with

a Masters degree in 1994 and later received an honorary fellowship from the College in 2004. From 1994 to 1996 he was the Womenswear Designer at Donna Karan and Senior Designer of Womenswear at Gucci in Milan from 1996 to 2001. He joined Burberry in May 2001 as creative director and became chief creative director in November 2009.

With the new Make up collection, Mr Bailey got his great inspiration from Catwalks and created a high end sophisticated Make up products, revisiting the Nude theme in a more trendy feeling. It is a short range but a complete one. You can find basically:
– Foundation
– Self Tanning pouder
– Eye pencil
– Lipstick

All these products will be sell into the perfect IT vanity. Price range will be between 18€ to 41€. Much cheaper than a Trench Coat 🙂
For the Advertising campaign, the brand has chosen  Mario Testino, the famous fashion fotographer and exclusively british models (as very often). The brand chosed Lily Donaldson, Rosie Huntington-Whiteley and Nina Porter. Get “trenchty” this summer.
LA

Hermès and the dark side of the Force?

Arsene Wargas
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6
Reading Time: 2 minutes

Hermès always make us dream inside their advertising campaigns. Some of them are between a Art photo and a Film. This Fall, Hermès proposes its darkness Tale… Between a Conan Doyle, modernized Sherlock Holmes and a Clean Tim Burton… While some spend their nights dreaming of Twilight the movie… I dream of Dark Hermès…

The new campaign was done by the italian famous photograph Paolo Roversi. He is nowadays one of the most influent fashion photographers. He worked with the greatests (Helmut Newton, Peter Knapp, Guy Bourdin or Laurence Sackman. Mr Roversi had the inspirational universe of Baroque Victorian glamour that brought to the Hermès campaign this glam dark side.

He photographed all top models around the world and today he works for all Fashion magazines like Vogue, Elle, Marie Claire… Here some of my prefered photos of Paolo Roversi. Some of them are very well known and even used by lots of brands too.

But, back to Hermès. Here the famous italian photograph displays all his talent on the silhouette of feminine top model Constance Jablonski. She is a young french 20 years old model but she already seduced all the greatest creators. From
Moschino, to Cesare Paciotti, Dries Van Noten or even Diane Von Furstenberg. She was the face for Estée Lauder last year. During the 2010 Spring/Summer season fashion weeks, she blew the record of 70 different catwalks for one season! She is THE face right now. Here are some other photos of the Hermès Campaign that I love the most. This is a fantastic timeless tale. From QueenVictoria londonian souvenirs to today’s streets… We could write a thousand stories about it. And you?

LA

And finally Art went online… buy it here!

Arsene Wargas
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1
Reading Time: 2 minutes

What if your favorite Sally Mann or Andy Warhol would be available for you directly via your computer?  That is the goal and the aim of THE NEVICA PROJECT.

Imagine a virtual gallery or gallerist that can connect artists with potential buyers. As they say, instead of bringing the world to the world of Arts, they bring Arts to the world. Interesting concept that already pleased different artists like Sally Mann (I love her work) or Warren McKenzie.

Nevica comes from the italian and it means “It is snowing”. Here, it represents a project that will grow little by little and hopefully will become big.

The Nevica Project was created by Jayson Lawfer. He has a great experience in the world of Arts as he spent most of his career as an accomplished artists (Ceramic) and as a Curator for several exhibitions.

Basically, you connect to www.thenevicaproject.com and have a look into the different galleries. Once you find a Artwork that you like, you can send an email in order to get the price and the link to place an order. This can of course protect and respect the Artists work without showing prices in the internet (especially that we know that prices in art are very changing.

I find this project very interesting as it places Art in an interesting thinking. Piece of Art vs Consumption Goods, Rare and elitist vs Spread and Accessible… interesting debate that The Nevica Project brings on the table. At the same time, this project respect the Artists ethics and the buyers privacy as the 21st century gallerist… e-volution or re-volution? It is up to you.

The company also proposes consultancy services for private collectioners or/and professional gallerists as Mr Lawfer has a great experience in the sector.

LA

Rosa Cha… Lingerie Fall 2010!

Arsene Wargas
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2
Reading Time: < 1

The young yet talented brazilian brand, Rosa Cha, revealed its new collection for these fall 2010… about Lingerie. Rosa Cha is a very well know brand in the world about Swimsuits. Today, they took all the femininity they created in the swimsuits and try to add an extra glamour. And we can see it is pretty well done. The brand stylist and founder, Amir Slama, explains very well his collection. It is an interesting blend of 2 worlds: the world of Lingerie for the traditional materials and the world of Diving with the cutting edge shapes. See here the video of the full collection.

What do you think?

LA

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