Happy day-after-Christmas. I am a bad procrastinator and my family doesn’t really celebrate it.

The #33 issue of Ten Magazine is exceptional. I took some notes and looking back at them makes me happy.

The editorial NSFW editorial featuring Ayako Yoshida is worth the buy alone. She is the wife of photographer Michel Comte and the story happens to be shot by the talented love of her life. She is really stunning. It reminds me of the O’Keefe nudes done by Stieglitz. You can tell that he is really in love with her through the prints. It’s just magical.

Other random things from my sketchbook/notes:

Ed Rushca “She didn’t have to do that” | The Rolling Stones’ Heaven | People laying down in the suburbs

My friend Anhie and I stopped by the Citrus Tower and the President’s Wax Museum in Clermont, FL last week. I have been super busy and have not uploaded any pictures in a while. I have also been treasure hunting non-stop for the past three days.

I really am swimming in clothes and random things but I love them all.

And Florida.

I discovered the blog Inafractionofasecond tonight and I fell in love with these snapshot proportioned images by photographer David Shama.

architectural |gaunt | washout | angst |willowy | grunge

A message to all of you aggressive eBay bidders:

I want these boots. I want the FRYE Harness boots. I would even settle for the Engineer boots. Seriously, who doesn’t want these boots or owns these? Well, I don’t have them and I want them and you people keep out bidding me.

I have wanted these for a long time, but then I spotted them on my friend Stephen (his are by Durango) and it made me want them even more.

The Olsen pics below are random I know but guess who owns them. I wonder if they each have their own pair or if they share?

A day late but better than never. Sonia Rykiel’s (pronounced ruh-keel) line debuted at H&M yesterday. I know that everyone is eagerly anticipating the Rodarte Collection at Tar-Ghayy but please do not forget “the Queen of Knits”. Sonia started off creating knits and anytime I see her signature stripes, I swoon.

I took some screen captures from the podcast from H&M. Download them because Nathalie Rykiel is so charming in the video.

Also, thank God that there is an H&M store in Orlando now.

I was on Apartment Therapy until 4 o-clock in the morning last night. I used to visit the site every morning but lately, I wait a week or two and do it all in one sitting.

I really like the mix of patterns and color in the picture above. It reminds me of a Nicole Farhi look from a couple seasons ago. I have been digging ’90s florals that I have named Beverly Hills 90210 print.

I love this minty hospital scrubs color. It takes me back to the green apple over sized Balenciaga Le Dix that Mary Kate and Nicole Richie schlepped around.

And now, Balmain is the like the new Balenciaga. And rightly so.

It’s 2010.

Above, the wall reminds me of our hallway which is under renovation. There is peeled off wallpaper in places and light switches are naked. I like it though. I like distressed. I read in the comments that some designers call it country crappy.

Below, I really like looking at white spaces in designs magazines and blogs. But, the function of it ( I have a dog who like to get muddy sometimes) is nonexistent for me. Nevertheless, I very much like the pair of pictures in the far background. I saved this picture specifically because of those two pics.

This month is zooming by right in front of my face.

I had to use a fax machine yesterday and every single time I use one, I think of a dinosaur tapping in the phone number with it’s talons. I group fax machines with Atari’s, Beta players, typewriters, and abacuses. That’s where they belong, in the past.

Let’s all jump on this email bandwagon eh?

This is me in a DALAT | Lung Series dress. I wanted to post this because it’s my new profile picture on Facebook and I wore one of my new DALAT creations the other night for the Dechoes Christmas party.

I really don’t like getting my picture taken.

Artist James Rosenquist has a new book out titled, Painting Below Zero. I just read the Times Book Review by Debra Solomon. One Rosenquist quote really stood out to me and triggered lots of colorful imagery. It’s about the women he met in the ’80s:

“The one thing that really bothered me about them was their high pitched voices, voices that went right through me like ice picks. For some reason I found this very unsettling and went in search of a woman (now his second wife) with a low, mellow voice.”

This is really intriguing to me because I have met girls who I know adjust their voices to sound more shrill and girly so that they are less threatening to men. Think of the Alice-alter in The United States of Tara. It’s really phony and unnecessary to me. Wouldn’t that get confusing after a while? Like what happens when she gets too tipsy at a party?

The quote also injected into my brain a semi-automatic-slideshow of images in regards to the Rosenquist quote.

I thought of Mia Farrow’s dead-on portrayal of Daisy Buchanan in The Great Gatsby. She was made for that role. And her voice described by Fitzgerald as “full of money” was a perfect go-lightly-wind-chimey but at the same time piercing sound. Then I literally thought of ice picks and Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct. The picture is from the sequel (awful) but I am thinking more so of the first one. Lastly, there’s Go-Go Yubari in Kill Bill. I love the scene where she finally meets Black Mamba and addresses her in a sweet schoolgirl voice, then it drops to a sinister tone.

Amazing.

Rosenquist would swoon.

It’s a later date. Here are my selections of random people who beg to be exploited on LookBook.

No really, I picked these pictures because I like them.

You should check out Carla Sozzani’s (I thought from the picture that it was the editor of Vogue Italia but I guess it is her sister Franca) slideshow on T Magazine. I picked out my favorites. her apartment looks like a boutique.

I want  EVERYTHING!

Annnddd, the color Turquoise has been chosen as Pantone’s Color of the Year 2010. I just love the map, the man, and the sliver of color to the right that the photographer strategically included. So so purposeful!

I was on LookBook and you can really get sucked into that site. I picked out some of my picks. These are the Asians. I figured that it would be appropriate for my post from yesterday. You know, because people usually think that all Asians are Chinese.

I offer you a variety. The geisha dominatrix in Dior. The doll in the corner of the opium den. The nymphet taking a break from her uncle’s restaurant, where she does not get paid BTW. And the one in gold lame. I have yet to find the Chinese girl with green eyes (natural) like in Big Trouble in Little China. I think that I just gave away my age. I’m like 400 by the way.

It is true that we age well.

I’ll show my other round-eye pictures at a later date.

My Hotmail (flower_ta@hotmail.com) account has been hacked. Whoever who did this managed to permanently attach the message above to each email that I send.

I know what you are thinking. You use HOTMAIL?

I have had the account for ages. Besides my AOL account, it was my first email address and I still use it, along with five other active email accounts- mainly Flower@DalatDesigns.com and Flower.Dalat@Gmail.com.

Please everyone, reset your passwords regularly and do not make them easy to guess.

The bright side is that I had to comb through every email in my inbox, and I unearthed some hilarious old emails and pictures like the gem below courtesy of FailBlog.org.

You know how you can tell if a friend truly knows you?

If he/she can pick out art that you truly love. Katie picked out the piece above for me while she was down at Art Basel | Miami Beach. Now it will have a home on my screen saver. Yeeaaa!

I heard that Basel started off hot when a crew of U.S. Marshals and police officers seized works by Fernand Leger, Joan Miro, Edgar Degas and Yves Klein due to an insurance dispute between two dealers. That’s just what I heard.

I also heard there was a Pop-Up Margiela Store at Basel too. Oh I would have gone just to see thhaatt.

Now here are some pretty people from Baaah – zuhl.

There were rumors a while back but after reading the Times article from yesterday, it is all now too true.

Martin Margiela leaves Martin Margiela.

It was all too strange to me when Jay-Z mentioned Margiela in his song and mispronounced his name. But I guess he gets his come-up-ins when Miley mentioned Jay-Z in her song and then later admitted that she has never heard a Jay-Z song. So, I guess we are even. But this is off topic.

Seriously, I love MARTIN MARGIELA. The Maison is one the main reasons why I was so ecstatic to go to Antwerp. The system of his lines make absolute sense to me. And his reclusive tendencies, I absolutely identify with. I guess it would be a cliche if the Prada Group bought the company (as they did Helmut Lang and Jil Sander back in the day).

Diesel now owns MM. I guess that I should look on the bright side. There will be a fragrance coming out.

A friend of mine who lives out in LA wrote me an email yesterday:

“have you heard of this dude? http://www.makr.com/
apparently he is some leather-maker in orlando…..??!”

I have heard of MAKR before. I heard about it in the best way. Not by hype or hypnotism by a slick brand or image. I found out about it when I actually saw the physical product in everyday use. A customer came in and was using one of the leather envelope-proportion wallets and when I inquired about it, she said that it was her fiances’ leather goods line. That’s more powerful than any advertising that you can do for a product. I think that my friend Katie has a wallet from them as well.

I am a huge fan of leather goods. I am a picky picky leather good consumer. MAKR Goods look very well crafted. They create only a small run of each items which allows them to focus on the design and quality. This is becoming so far and few these days. It makes me so happy to see a young company focus on craftsmanship.

The wallets look spendy but the price points are very reasonable. The above will set you back $65 US- that is, if you can get your hand on one at all.

These accessories are selling out faster than a Zhu Zhu Pet.

You should check out their blog.

My favorite pic from i-D Magazine (Winter 2009 )

Whitewashed. It’s gorgeous and dreamlike.

And I just love the Snow White quote. I saw Mrs. White over at Epcot a couple weeks ago. She was with her Disney escort. She’s changed.

Photographer: Daniel Jackson
Stylist: Alastair McKimm

It’s Dree… again. This time she is making an appearance in Vogue Nippon (January 2010). Oh those layers and color combos! Nomadic-bohemian-throw-everything-that-I-love-on looks are not meant for the second guessing dresser. Most of the time, the most successful of these ensembles have been spun out by a pro-stylist.

In this case, her name is Francesca Burns.

Check out more of her work on the Fashion Spot. It’s vibrant and quite impressive.

Anja Rubik all pretty and holiday ready in Numero Magazine #108 (November 2009).

She looks so much like Lara Stone in the first pic. I’m sure she loves that comment.

The Wild Things featured in Australian Harper’s Bazaar (December 2009)

I haven’t seen the movie yet but this editorial reminds me to do so. I created a new huge playlist for myself and added the new Flaming Lips album Embryonic. If you have ever attended a Lips show or maybe seen a picture of such event, the first pic in this post may remind you.

Also, I promised my friend who has been sporting bow ties to look at pictures of the lead singer, Wayne Coyne. The front man is always impeccably dressed in neutral Paul Smith or Hugo Boss suits drizzled with fake blood and a bow tie dangling from his neck (me – speechless thinking of it).

And PS, the new issue of BRINK Mag has a feature on the Flaming Lips. You should check it out, like NOW.

Remember this issue? It’s the September issue from 2007 featuring Jude Law-hanger-on-er. It’s understood that this is the thickest fattest issue ever but I had no idea that people are buying it for around $80 on eBay. People are shelling out the PayPal bucks for the hype around this issue not because of Miller but because “THE SEPTEMBER ISSUE” about Anna Wintour was centered around the making of this particular magazine.

Anytime that I think about Factory Girl, I just look at the ground and shake my head. And let’s not even bring up that G.I. Joe movie.