7 things that sweeten the return to Brussels

I don't know about you but I am most definitely suffering from end of summertime sadness, so this is a little list of fun things to look forward to in Brussels that will hopefully sweeten the grande return. Save the dates!

2 September - Meet the Author session with  Douglas Coupland at BOZAR 

A little something for all the Generation X babies!

"But I get this feeling- It is a feeling that our emotions while wonderful, are transpiring in a vacuum, and I think it boils down to the fact that we're middle class. You see, when you're middle class, you have to live with the fact that history will ignore you. You have to live with the fact that history will never champion your causes and that history will never feel sorry for you. It is the price that is paid for day-to-day comfort and silence. And because of this price, all happinesses are sterile; all sadnesses go unpitied."

10 September -Knight of Cups Premier at BOZAR

Cause Terrence Mallick is one of my favorites and the trailer looks amazing

10 September - Sufjan Stevens at BOZAR 

13 September - your last chance to enjoy THE BELGIANS An unexpected fashion story 

Because Belgians seem to be taking over the fashion world

28 September - Morrissey is playing at Ancienne Belgique 

Love him or hate him this man has provided the soundtrack to endless nights and days! And if you don't like The Smiths you probably don't have a soul!

29 September - Bryan Ferry is playing at Ancienne Belgique 

The ultimate dandy is back! I got to enjoy him just before the end of 2014 and he left me wanting more! One of the concerts I am looking forward to the most next season!





And last but not least I may just manage to watch Gaspar Noe's LOVE in 3D. Cause we all love controversy and maybe when it comes to sex scenes 3D actually makes sense!

Will suffer for fashion or how I fell in love with TOILETPAPER

A SURREAL TAKE ON THE NEW SEASON  or the coolest fashion shoot I have seen in a long long time and a soundtrack to go with it!

For New York's Spring Fashion issue, the masterminds behind TOILET PAPER MAGAZINE, conceptualist sculptor Maurizio Cattelan and photographer Pierpaolo Ferrari teamed up to shoot standout men's and women's runway collections in a most delightfully absurdist manner.

  

 

ALL THE PRETTY HORSES 

KAPUTT, an installation by Maurizio Cattelan

Elena-Ghiaurov photo by PierPaolo-Ferrari

TOILET PAPER 
Cause I am totally in love with it! 

Scream for ice-cream 

Photo taken by yours truly in Greecelnd at New Hotel

And guess what the Toilet Paper team is also behind the rad new KENZO campaign

A few of my favorite things

Cause it's winter, we're snowed in and spring seems nowhere in sight so thinking of a few of your favorite things makes waiting until its time to bloom bearable. Here's a list of some of mine.

-watching a movie whilst seated precisely in the middle of the cinema

-Joe Strummer, cause the future is unwritten

-small jail-style tattoos, especially anchors

-Devendra Banhart

-and long-haired bearded boys in general

-Van the Man (with a slight weakness for Brown Eyed Girl)

-the fact that Italian Vogue was code for weed in Tarantino's "Death Proof"

-"The Year of the Flood" by Margaret Atwood

-Actually anything by Margaret Atwood, Philip Roth (especially American Pastoral) or Ian McEwan (Saturday!)

-Alexander Ebert

-"Lola" by the Kinks

-James Turrell's skyspace installations

-all of Wes Anderson's movies

-cetaceans

-Helmut Newton

-pearls

-NYC

-Brad Pitt as Tyler Durden

-Flowerbomb by Viktor and Rolf

-"Where the wild things are" by Maurice Sendak

-French boys when they speak english

-Diane Arbus 

-gold, the color

-The Marolles

-Having mimosas for breakfast

-Bob Dylan in his youth

-Agent Provocateur underwear

-beets

-Fight Club, the book, the movie, everything!

-Miuccia Prada

-water

-diamonds, preferably on the soles of my shoes

-POP Art (Keith Haring and Roy Lichtenstein)

-Tom Robbins

-"The Kiss" from Rodin

-lace

-"The Master and Margarita" by Bulgakov

-Isabele Marant

-Black Vanilla scented candles

-Hendricks Gin

-blowing bubbles in the wind

-Living under the Acropolis

-The Aegean

-Harleys

-that unexpected smile from a beautiful stranger

-mittens

-white orchids and liliums

-Ryan Gosling when he is not playing in romcoms

-Nouvelle Vague and anything by Godard

-Londontown

-peanut butter jelly sandwiches

-Kusmi Algotea (a blend of Chinese green tea, spearmint leaves and seaweed)

-Dalmatians and Pugs

-"Drive"

-mom's poached eggs, cause they are a taste of heaven

-chocolate ice cream with lemon sorbet

-analog cameras

-glitter

-Wanderlust

-Dressing up and dressing down

-white cotton nightgowns

-mustaches

-perfecto black leather jackets

-Ksubi jeans

-DVF dresses

-red velvet cupcakes (preferably by The Hummingbird Bakery)

-Poppy seed bagels with cream cheese

-Gigs in small venues (Botanique and AB)

-Travelling (it's been over ten years that I have spent dreaming of Tanzania!)

-Diners

-heart shaped glasses

-"Just Kids" by Patti Smith

-decorating shoes and clothes with studs and skulls

-anything with Jasmine by KORRES

-The Smiths

-Pale Blue Eyes by the Velvet Underground cause I thought of you as my mountaintop, I thought of you as my peak, I thought of you as everything I had but could not keep

-manicures (and OPI nail polish)

-Kusama Yayoi

-being In Rainbows with Radiohead

-seedbombs

-and last but not least howling at the moon

PARADISE

I absolutely fell in love with this video and song! All you lucky ones that went to Pitchfork may have seen "Wild Nothing" and needless to say I'm gutted I didn't get to see them last weekend at Magasin 4 in Brussels! So a video about Wanderlust with Michelle Williams reciting extracts from Iris Murdoch's 1975 novel "A World Child". Enjoy.

Everything was love.

Everything will be love.

Everything has been love.

Everything would be love.

Everything would have been love

Ha and that was it

The truth at last

Everything would have been love

The huge eye with had become an immense sphere was gently breathing 

Only it was not an eye nor a sphere 

But a great wonderful animal covered in little waving legs like hairs

Waving oh so gently as if they were underwater 

"All shall be well and all shall be well" said the ocean 

So the place of reconciliation existed after all

Not like a little not all in a cupboard 

But flowing everywhere and being everything

I had only to will it and it would be

For spirit is omnipotent only I never knew it

Like being able to walk on the air

I could forgive 

I could be forgiven 

I could forgive

Perhaps that was the whole of it after all

Perhaps being forgiven was just forgiving only no one had ever told me 

There was nothing else needful

Just to forgive

Forgiving equals being forgiven 

The secret of the universe

Do not whatever you do forget it 

The past was folded up and in a twinkle of an eye

Everything had been changed

And made beautiful and good 

Photo I took on my way home to Greeceland last week.

And since the video is partly filmed in the Niagara Falls, here is a photo I took 2 winters ago with a fisheye lomography camera

On another note it's that time of the year again, the time when a fabulously expensive designer collaborates with H&M to bring fashion to the masses so ladies and fashionable gentlemen  around the globe time to mark your calendars and set your alarms on the 15th of November as Maison Martin Margiela (one of Belgium's finest!) will be available at an H&M near you! I love the promotion video and the choreographed cat walk for the unveiling of the collection in NYC on the 24th of October. Enjoy a sneak peak. 

I have my eye set on the following items 

Candy Wrapper Clutch 

I also love the plexiglass heals

Blue Velvet and The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

THE GOOD

Cause we are all secretly in love with Lana Del Ray, maybe it is the husky voice (that unfortunately doesn't really come out the same way during her live performances), the lusciously fake lips, the shinny big hair, the fabulously white-trash/vamp look or just the fact that she's absolutely awesome! As the new face of H&M she covered Blue Velvet, the video is aesthetically perfect and I have a feeling that even Mr Lynch had a little smile on his face when watching, enjoy!

THE BAD

Once upon a time, in a land not so far away there lived a big bad wolf who was head over heals in love with a girl called little red ridding hood...

CAUSE EVEN BAD WOLVES CAN BE GOOD

THE UGLY

Editor-at- large for Vogue Japan and self-proclaimed fashionista Anna Dello Russo is designing a special collection of jewellery, sunglasses, luggage and a ridiculous feather hat for H&M that will land in stores on October 4. Though I love extravagance, turquoise and gold (the main theme of her collection) the video is hideously kitsch and actually kind of scary, not to mention the appalling song. Enjoy! PS: YOU NEED A FASHION SHOWER!

 

Bits and Pieces

As the days are getting longer and spring makes some occasional, whimsical guest appearances one is increasingly inclined to go out and enjoy the magic of the night with friends and loved ones. Whether it's walking around the streets of Paris barefoot or having loving boys climb scaffoldings to enter through a bedroom window this latent spring has been  unpredictable and exciting. Enjoy a some random videos and words and photos I took of things that caught my eye.

This month's soundtrack on constant repeat as Moonrise Kingdom is the beautifulest movie this year and Francoise Hardy reminds me of my mother....it is indeed the time of love, the time of friends and the time of adventure...

I won’t kiss you. It might get to be a habit and I can’t get rid of habits.

— F. Scott Fitzgerald, Flappers and Philosophers  

And a little something to look forward to on November 15 2012 a special Maison Martin Margiela collection will be available at an H&M near you!

 

it’s amazing how many errors your fingers will

 find that your eyes never noticed.

 Paul Auster

runaway

singing boyz

a sign

Luck

The Marolles

rain

love your weapon of choice on the streets of Paris

Brussels when it's gay and proud

I always wanted to make my own clouds

Penis Envy

Cloud

Head in a box

Playtime

Attraction

The streets of Molenbeek

shoes

Mad Max

The first time

Rainbow Warriors

Juice van

 

What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though.

— J.D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye