Fashion Week: Part Monique Lhuillier

I may not know how to pronounce her last name, but I do know that Monique Lhuillier rocked the shit out of Fashion Week and I would kill to wear any of these dresses.

I want to start out big: this gold beaded dress is exquisite. Nice classic shift shape, covered in glowing golden beads. I love how the beading swirls around a bit around the hip, making it that much more awesome.









This gold dress is slightly more subdued in color, but the skirt of cascading ruffles adds plenty of drama. This would be great on someone with really strong coloring; I think it would totally wash me out. It would also look great on Maritska Hargitay, since everything looks good on her.










Taupe is tough color, but the details of this dress totally eliminate the possible blah-ness. The crossed halter top will appear again in this post; despite my worries that wearing it would feel like being choked, it's extremely flattering (if you have great shoulders).









This printed dress is less red carpet, more "I am by far the most fashionable person in the office right now and you should make me your queen." I don't know if the belt is part of the dress, but it is the perfect accessory. Belts are great with prints, since it breaks up the pattern and keeps it from getting too busy.









Turquoise and gold? Perfect for both cocktails in Saint Tropez and bringing a burst of color to the drab streets of any city. I love how the gold neckline is looped into the top, so it's hidden for a few inches and then reappears, just as glorious as before. Also, very sexy glimpse of skin in the center of the top; nice compliment to the more modest pencil skirt.











More gold! More halter! More impeccable, wearable design! This white dress looks like a blinged-out cloud, totally weightless and comfy. It looks a bit like a bathing suit cover-up, and I'd be worried about how high cut it is in the front, but I would wear it everyday no matter.









To bring it back to earth a bit, you could wear this dress all fall (even though it's spring 2009). This grey shift dress sort of looks like it has bedazzled bra straps, but in a very chic way. The tiny belt is a serious counterpart to the shiny cap sleeves, and combined you have a great hourglass silhouette.










Here's a more formal version-- you can really tell that Lhuillier started in bridal wear, because it's so classically beautiful and elegant. The one-shoulder look was seen repeatedly during NY Fashion Week, and this is a gorgeous example. This screams Angelina Jolie, glamorous UN Ambassador and Mother Extraordinaire, to me.








Another lovely draped dress, with a gold belt, in a vivid teal. Another dress I want almost as much as I want Ryan Lochte. In unrelated news, the dvd on Michael Phelps that NBC was hawking came last week, and I'm watching the 4x200 freestyle relay (the one in which Phelps, Lochte, Berens and Vanderkaay totally destroyed both the world record and every other team) as I type this.








One final dress: a strapless column in the palest green. Love the gathered top, loose skirt, and the big statement necklace on the model.

Fashion Week: Part 2

Let the parade of dresses I will forever be too poor to wear continue!

It seems that we'll be wearing a lot of cobalt come spring, which is lucky because I look very good in all shades of blue. Doo.Ri showed this stunning, perfectly draped dress, which seems so effortlessly glamorous. It's a very sexy dress, because it almost looks like if you tugged one bit of fabric, the whole thing would just fall away. But the possible scandal is implied; there's just a swatch of skin showing on her chest, and you can't even see her knees. A very nice balance.


Carlos Miele also showed a great cobalt gown, strapless with layers of shiny and matte fabric, plus a cloud of taffeta (or something) at the bottom. I also loved this red dress he showed, although those shoes are absolutely the wrong choice.






















Lela Rose showed a lot of lovely dresses, but this particular one is a great use of the goddess trend, which, really, should never go out of style. Why look like a woman when you can look like a goddess, right?
















For a change of pace, here's a non-blue dress. I tend to be underwhelmed by black dresses, but this Tracy Reese dress is so ladylike and charming that I can't help but fall in love with it. It's a bit old fashioned with the poofy skirt and lace overlay, but the shorter length and fun gathered neckline keep it young.








This Zac Posen dress sort of looks like you fashioned a dress out of a yellow picnic blanket. But in a flirty, fun, awesome way.

Fashion Week: Part 1

Last week was Fashion Week here in New York, so I spent way too much time on NYMag.com looking at the designer slideshows. In order to pretend that I was being productive by doing this, I decided to bring you a few of my favorite looks (mostly dresses, obviously) from Spring 2009.

First, Anna Sui's collection was full of weird, artsy-craftsy hippie dresses, plus these two incredibly adorable outfits on models with great hair. This orange and pink printed halter dress is so fun and floaty, and the pink shift dress with Indian-inspired details is perfectly, effortlessly cute. And I would kill for that second model's wavy hair, and I love both of their shoes.















Next, there's Christian Siriano. I am super impressed that he's showing a full collection at Fashion Week just a year after winning Project Runway, and that it's both innovative and gorgeous. Personally, a lot of his designs are too foofy for me-- they're a little "I'm wearing a giant cotton ball," you know? But these two gowns are exquisite. The shades of grey shot through with yellow is so fun while still sophisticated, and the diagonal stripes are so flattering on a girl's curves. I can imagine anyone from a random starlet to Kate Winslet wearing the long version on the red carpet, and the cocktail-length dress would be a great attention-getter at some downtown event. Those shoes on the second girl, though? No. The hat on the first? Fierce. (I'm sorry, I had to.)









Oscar de la Renta is known for outfitting Ladies, both First and Who Lunch, but he also showed a few dresses that wouldn't look out of place on a Young Lady. I adore this strapless blue and white frock, and how the gathered fabric makes the print seem a little bit rowdy. I wish the hem was a bit less asymmetrical, though. This second dress looks like a tall glass of milk, very creamy and flowing. The orange piping and band at the waist keep it a bit structured, while still allowing a lot of looseness. Doesn't this dress look as comfortable as your favorite bathrobe, but about a billion times more glamorous?








Speaking of flowy, this silk column dress by Naeem Khan
is like a tall glass of something, set on fire at the bottom and sprinkled with tinsel at the top. But I love it! I think ombre gets a bad rap because it can look like you spilled something on part of your dress, but I've always believed it's a dynamic way to combine multiple colors and shades. And the sparkly bodice on this dress makes it that much more fabulous. I think we can all agree to ignore the ginormous side ponytail, though.



That's all for now; a new appreciation of cobalt and a love letter to all things Monique Lhuillier is coming up soon.

Akiko dresses

The other night I got really bored and decided to do some inventory on my closet. Turns out, not including the dress I bought last Friday, that I own 20 dresses. 11 of these are either rayon or model (which, wikipedia tells me, is just a different form of rayon). 10 are babydoll dresses and another four have some other sort of waist detail, like wrap dresses or a twist at the waist. Out of the 20, 3 were bought in 2006 or earlier (although to be honest, I have a good amount of older and fancier dresses that I left at home and are a few years older). 17 dresses in 14 months actually doesn’t sound too bad, right?

The dress I bought last Friday is part rayon, babydoll, and a wrap dress, plus it has the other dress requirement of showing cleavage (I’m not a slut, I swear it’s just that high-necked dresses aren’t at all flattering on me. I think v-necks draw the eye up to the shown skin on the chest, while an eye on a high-necked dress has no place to go but the stomach, and I’d much rather you look at my boobs than my stomach). It’s very cute and is partly patterned, which is a dress trend I’ve been trying to do more of (17 of my dresses are solid colored, and the only one with a real pattern is the batik Ghana dress, which I’ve never worn but will someday).

But I'm not going to blog about the dress I did buy, but all the ones I didn't. At the Brooklyn boutique Pema, on Bedford Ave between 4th and 5th, there was a huge sale with 50% off almost every piece of clothing in the store. I picked out some dresses, went into the dressing room, and quickly realized that 3 out of the 4 pieces were by the same designer. Introducing... Akiko!

I'm having trouble finding information on her and a big designer website is not coming up, so the dresses will have to speak for themselves. She designs simple but cute dresses that hit all my requirements (jersey, babydoll, solid-colored, low-cut).

This brown one was picked by InStyle as one of the best dresses under $200 in 2006. It probably isn't available anymore, but it's $170.

I actually tried on this blue one and was sorely tempted to get it. It's not babydoll, but the draped neck and embroidered collar makes the top really interesting and fun. It'd be perfect for going out to someplace fun yet upscale; it'd be tough to dress it down for class, though. It's on sale for $98 at Nika la Butik.

I also tried on a dress slightly similar to this black one (excuse the awful mannequin photos). It was a really light, buttery yellow/god, with a bright cold trim under the bust and at the neckline. It has the same tiered skirt, which is a trend that I think only works in fabrics with a little bit of weight yet a lot of movement (I want to marry rayon and modal can be our best man). This black one is marked down from $199 to $49.75 at Bella Jules boutique.


The other dress I tried on, that I had a really tough time leaving behind, was the same great berry color as the right dress, in the style of the left purple dress. These photos are awful-- you can barely see the dip-dye effect on the silk bottom section of the dress, and there are these little details where the silk part of the straps meets the modal bodice. But trust me, it's a cute dress. And bra friendly! But here's what's stopped me: first, I feel like everytime a celebrity wears a dip-dye or ombre dress, the Fug Girls proclaim it scroll-down fug and make a "She spilled something on her skirt" joke. But I kind of like the graduated color scheme, especially when going from light on top to dark on bottom. Plus, these dip dye isn't horribly dramatic; it's not going from baby pink to fuschia, I swear. Anway, the second thing that stopped me was the price; even at half off it was $90, which I feel is a little too much for a dress I'll only wear on special-but-not-that-special occasions. I don't know, I might just be a really cheap girl. It was a cute dress... anyway, the purple dress is $89.50 and the berry spaghetti strap dress is awesomely priced at $42.25, both at Bella Jules boutique. There's also an "azur" version of the berry dress, although it's full priced ($167) at Polkadots and Moonbeams.

Here a few more Akiko dresses at Bella Jules that I liked. But keep your eye out for the label next time you're browsing a rack of cute dresses at a boutique. They're all under $200, which all things considered is pretty reasonable (earlier today Danielle and I were bitching about the label Moschino Cheap and Chic, which has like $900 dresses. What the fuck is that? Does cheap mean something else in Moschino world?). I feel like if I'm spending more than a 100 bucks on something it has to go beyond cute-- it has to be beautiful. These dresses are mostly cute, and they don't have the incredible construction or details that makes me want to drop more money. So, I guess I voted "no" against this by not laying down my credit card, but we'll see if there are more Akiko dresses in my future.
Teal One Shoulder Dress, $179

Grey Contrast Leather dress, $49.75

Cream Sequin Tunic, $34.75