Sometimes I wonder if the downside of studying fashion is that you start to lose touch with reality. Case in point, last week my brain set off no alarms when our teacher told us about a 30,000 Euro custom fragrance from Cartier. I hope that at least 50% of you are shocked by the price tag.
This made me think back to a few years ago in Vancouver, when I remember seeing a one bedroom apartment in my building going for around $400,000. "OMG," I thought. "What a deal!" Yep. For 640 square feet. I had lost touch with reality, and I was only familiar with Downtown Vancouver prices. Then I'd see ads for apartments in Langley, that could be bought in full for the same down payment you'd use towards an apartment in Vancouver, and have to remind myself that you can't compare apples to oranges. $1,000,000 for a two bedroom apartment in downtown Vancouver with no water view? I'm certainly not in the market for it, but I think the price is legitimate. That scares me. But at least real estate is an investment.
I sometimes feel like an observer in the world of luxury, the same way I felt like I was an observer in the Vancouver real estate market. I was never the consumer, but that wasn't because I felt the price was unjustified. I was just not in the market to settle down in Vancouver.
In the fashion luxury industry, I feel like an observer simply because I can't fathom spending so much money on something that might be useless after a season. Sure, some pieces are investment pieces and I can understand those purchases much more, and will probably make a couple in my lifetime. But with the 30,000 Euro fragrance, I just can't imagine spending that much money on something that will disappear after a while. I would either never use it, or I would break down in tears if I accidentally missed my neck while spraying and wasted 100 Euro.
But, just as there is a market for Vancouver real estate, there is a market for fashion luxury.
I plan to be a successful fashion buyer, and want for nothing, but at what point is 30,000 Euro considered reasonable for a fragrance, even if it is customized for you and takes months of consultations and work to create? I just don't think I could ever get to a point where that's a consideration. Could you? If so, at what point?
24 January 2013
16 January 2013
The Joys of January!
Milan has a great way to deal with the depression of January. You know, that feeling you have when you realize you have almost a full year to go before Christmas, a heck of a long way to go before your next holiday (usually Easter), that you spent way too much during Christmas break, and that the weather just sucks. Just. Sucks. Oh, and you realize how little you studied over the break, and how much work you have to do now. Just me? Right.
So now that I've brought you down, let's bring you back up!
January starts with one of the most beautiful words in existence. SALES. That's right, forget lining up for Boxing Day sales while you're still trying to digest your Christmas dinner. Give it a couple of weeks, let your credit card cool off, and then hit up the sales that start the first weekend of January, and usually last until the end of February. This happens twice a year, so don't worry, if you can't get your act together to come and visit me in the next few weeks, you can always wait for the July sales!
Then, Pitti Uomo starts in Firenze. I did a bad thing, and skipped school one day to go. In my defence, I had already bought the train ticket and found out after that the class was being rescheduled! A little history... Pitti Immagine puts on international fashion trade shows and events. Pitti Uomo in January is a huge trade show where designers show their Fall/Winter 2013/2014 collections - designers who don't show at the various fashion weeks. I had no idea what to expect when I arrived, and my first (and second, and third, and fourth...) reaction was THIS IS HUGE. I got lost countless times. More so when I tried to find specific booths. I call them booths, but that's not the right word. They're pop-up shops. Hundreds, and hundreds of pop-up shops. They were all really well done, but two in particular stood out. The first was the Happiness brand. We're doing a school project for them so I was really excited to see what they had going on. They had built this hotel idea, with each room showcasing the different products. Sunglasses in one room, clothing in the "laundry room", shoes in another, prints in another. The other that blew my mind was Ballantyne. They had created a kind of magical forest, and in addition to deep, rich forest-y colours which I love already, they had this guy walking around the room with a bag full of noisemakers subtly making these sounds of the forest, from birds chirping, to a babbling creek. I literally wanted to throw the cashmere sweaters on the floor, curl up in them, and spend 3 hours in the forest.
A few days later, White Milano started. I have to admit that with Pitti so fresh in my mind, White was really a letdown. It's much smaller in size, and more of a booth set up than a pop-up store set up. The positive side of White was that the booths were less busy which gave me a chance to talk to the reps and get some information and actually meet some people. That didn't happen at Pitti - who wants to talk to a student when you have a line up of buyers waiting?
Last, but most certainly not least, Milano Men's Fashion Week started the same weekend as White. It was a mix of disappointment and awesomeness for me. The disappointment came from being cut from being a dresser for the Vivenne Westwood show, because they had 10 more people than they needed. So after leading all of us backstage and making us stand around andogle male models wait for almost an hour, we had to go home. But the awesome part came when one of the other dressers got invited to the after party, and invited me as her plus one! Sadly for me, Vivienne spent the evening behind the VIP ropes where I certainly wasn't allowed, otherwise I would've tried to sit next to her and talk to her all night long. She fascinates me!
So, all this said, it's January 16th right now and I'd say it's been a pretty great first half of the month. I've taken part in all of these industry events, AND I even scored myself an awesome deal on a few new things that I "had" to buy.
Has this post convinced any of you to come and visit me yet? ;)
So now that I've brought you down, let's bring you back up!
January starts with one of the most beautiful words in existence. SALES. That's right, forget lining up for Boxing Day sales while you're still trying to digest your Christmas dinner. Give it a couple of weeks, let your credit card cool off, and then hit up the sales that start the first weekend of January, and usually last until the end of February. This happens twice a year, so don't worry, if you can't get your act together to come and visit me in the next few weeks, you can always wait for the July sales!
Then, Pitti Uomo starts in Firenze. I did a bad thing, and skipped school one day to go. In my defence, I had already bought the train ticket and found out after that the class was being rescheduled! A little history... Pitti Immagine puts on international fashion trade shows and events. Pitti Uomo in January is a huge trade show where designers show their Fall/Winter 2013/2014 collections - designers who don't show at the various fashion weeks. I had no idea what to expect when I arrived, and my first (and second, and third, and fourth...) reaction was THIS IS HUGE. I got lost countless times. More so when I tried to find specific booths. I call them booths, but that's not the right word. They're pop-up shops. Hundreds, and hundreds of pop-up shops. They were all really well done, but two in particular stood out. The first was the Happiness brand. We're doing a school project for them so I was really excited to see what they had going on. They had built this hotel idea, with each room showcasing the different products. Sunglasses in one room, clothing in the "laundry room", shoes in another, prints in another. The other that blew my mind was Ballantyne. They had created a kind of magical forest, and in addition to deep, rich forest-y colours which I love already, they had this guy walking around the room with a bag full of noisemakers subtly making these sounds of the forest, from birds chirping, to a babbling creek. I literally wanted to throw the cashmere sweaters on the floor, curl up in them, and spend 3 hours in the forest.
A few days later, White Milano started. I have to admit that with Pitti so fresh in my mind, White was really a letdown. It's much smaller in size, and more of a booth set up than a pop-up store set up. The positive side of White was that the booths were less busy which gave me a chance to talk to the reps and get some information and actually meet some people. That didn't happen at Pitti - who wants to talk to a student when you have a line up of buyers waiting?
Last, but most certainly not least, Milano Men's Fashion Week started the same weekend as White. It was a mix of disappointment and awesomeness for me. The disappointment came from being cut from being a dresser for the Vivenne Westwood show, because they had 10 more people than they needed. So after leading all of us backstage and making us stand around and
So, all this said, it's January 16th right now and I'd say it's been a pretty great first half of the month. I've taken part in all of these industry events, AND I even scored myself an awesome deal on a few new things that I "had" to buy.
Has this post convinced any of you to come and visit me yet? ;)
12 January 2013
A Study in Sands
Those of you suffering the long, grey winter in Vancouver will probably want to skip this post.
I HAVE to tell you about the two best beaches on Tenerife.
The first was the one that I frequented the most, just a 10 minute bus ride from right outside my hotel. Playa de Las Teresitas is a man-made beach on Tenerife, and so the only one (so I've heard, I didn't see all of the beaches) without black sand. In 1973, the city brought 4 million bags on sand over from the Sahara to make this beach. They also constructed a breakwater to protect the beach, so it's popular even for the locals just to come down and swim laps (it's 1.5km long).
The next beach I discovered because I happened to meet two new friends on the way to the bus station! Otherwise, I probably wouldn't have gone, only because the bus to that beach stops right by Las Teresitas and I would have just gotten off there. Vacation = lazy.
Playa del Roque de Las Bodegas is a black sand beach, and absolutely gorgeous. There's something weird about seeing yourself covered in black sand. Especially when you're getting on the bus and trying to hide from the bus driver that you're covered in it and probably about to leave half the beach behind on the bus. Overall, a great day!
So now I can say that I've been swimming in the Atlantic. Oh, and for those of you who hate me after reading this, you might be comforted to know that despite washing my hair daily, I STILL find the odd piece of sand in my hair.
I HAVE to tell you about the two best beaches on Tenerife.
The first was the one that I frequented the most, just a 10 minute bus ride from right outside my hotel. Playa de Las Teresitas is a man-made beach on Tenerife, and so the only one (so I've heard, I didn't see all of the beaches) without black sand. In 1973, the city brought 4 million bags on sand over from the Sahara to make this beach. They also constructed a breakwater to protect the beach, so it's popular even for the locals just to come down and swim laps (it's 1.5km long).
The next beach I discovered because I happened to meet two new friends on the way to the bus station! Otherwise, I probably wouldn't have gone, only because the bus to that beach stops right by Las Teresitas and I would have just gotten off there. Vacation = lazy.
Playa del Roque de Las Bodegas is a black sand beach, and absolutely gorgeous. There's something weird about seeing yourself covered in black sand. Especially when you're getting on the bus and trying to hide from the bus driver that you're covered in it and probably about to leave half the beach behind on the bus. Overall, a great day!
So now I can say that I've been swimming in the Atlantic. Oh, and for those of you who hate me after reading this, you might be comforted to know that despite washing my hair daily, I STILL find the odd piece of sand in my hair.
11 January 2013
Tenerife, Canary Islands
Wow! I have been MIA. Apologies, but that's what happens when you're on vacation and have no homework to do, which translates in to not needing to do anything to put off doing homework, like blogging.
For Christmas and New Year's Eve I went to Santa Cruz, Tenerife. The weather was like Vancouver summers - warm in the day, and brisk in the evening.
Santa Cruz is a good base to travel around the island. One day I went to Las Americas on the southern end of the island and it was a totally different scene. It was tourist central. Santa Cruz is a port city, and the main tourists they see are those stopped in for the day on a cruise ship. That said, I was pretty surprised at the lack of English language in Santa Cruz. I ended up speaking some crazy mix of English, Italian, and the little bits of Spanish I could remember from high school.
One of the coolest things that I happened upon, because no one seems to write about it, are all of these painted rocks behind the auditorium. I wish I had more information to give you, but I can't seem to find any! Anyway, if you go to Santa Cruz, check these out.
The island has a lot of great museums, but I was fooled by everyone's reviews about the museum of Science and Space in La Laguna. We took a day trip there, and as soon as we walked in I realized I had just paid to enter a poor man's version of Science World!! I guess that's all part of the learning experience...
I was also somewhat fooled by the reviews everyone had of shopping in Santa Cruz. People raved about The Meridiano, and seeing as I'm a buying student, I thought that I should do some homework and go shopping! It was pretty dismal. But that's the review by someone who lives in Milano. ;)
Overall, it was a great week. They really know how to do Christmas (they have their own song!) and New Year's Eve there! We went to a huge outdoor symphony and fireworks on Christmas, and another outdoor concert and fireworks for New Year's Eve.
The week inspired my New Year's resolution, which is to travel to the seaside at least once every 6 weeks just to breathe the ocean air. Those of you who have spent the majority of your lives by the ocean will understand!
For Christmas and New Year's Eve I went to Santa Cruz, Tenerife. The weather was like Vancouver summers - warm in the day, and brisk in the evening.
Santa Cruz is a good base to travel around the island. One day I went to Las Americas on the southern end of the island and it was a totally different scene. It was tourist central. Santa Cruz is a port city, and the main tourists they see are those stopped in for the day on a cruise ship. That said, I was pretty surprised at the lack of English language in Santa Cruz. I ended up speaking some crazy mix of English, Italian, and the little bits of Spanish I could remember from high school.
One of the coolest things that I happened upon, because no one seems to write about it, are all of these painted rocks behind the auditorium. I wish I had more information to give you, but I can't seem to find any! Anyway, if you go to Santa Cruz, check these out.
The island has a lot of great museums, but I was fooled by everyone's reviews about the museum of Science and Space in La Laguna. We took a day trip there, and as soon as we walked in I realized I had just paid to enter a poor man's version of Science World!! I guess that's all part of the learning experience...
I was also somewhat fooled by the reviews everyone had of shopping in Santa Cruz. People raved about The Meridiano, and seeing as I'm a buying student, I thought that I should do some homework and go shopping! It was pretty dismal. But that's the review by someone who lives in Milano. ;)
Overall, it was a great week. They really know how to do Christmas (they have their own song!) and New Year's Eve there! We went to a huge outdoor symphony and fireworks on Christmas, and another outdoor concert and fireworks for New Year's Eve.
The week inspired my New Year's resolution, which is to travel to the seaside at least once every 6 weeks just to breathe the ocean air. Those of you who have spent the majority of your lives by the ocean will understand!
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