Monday 28 February 2011

We like new designer Enya Mooney

One of our more random jobs over the last couple of years has been running a BBC competition/project called “Your Label”. Basically it was to give young designers the chance to show a capsule collection during LFW. The whole thing was shown on BBC2 at some ungodly hour.
One of the designers we encountered through Your Label was Enya Mooney whose youthfully sophisticated collection was one of our favourites so we were pleased to receive an invitation to Enya’s first “proper” show, an off schedule catwalk at Fashion Mavericks in the Strand.
Working under the name “Enya Patricia” (not sure why) Enya showed a compact and assured collection, it’s not usually our sort of thing but we rather liked it. Have a look at the whole thing here:www.enyapatricia.com and see what you think.

Keep up the good work.




Lou Goes To The Opera


Lou Dalton is one of our current menswear faves so we were pleased to find ourselves on the front row at her Royal Opera House show last Wednesday sitting opposite 80’s superstar Holly Johnson of Frankie Goes To Hollywood fame.
Lou says of her collection “a feeling of discomfort often drives an individual to look inwardly or to look for acceptance from others who have fallen from the conformity of the world around them”….. and cites the Seattle scene and the Russian criminal underworld as influences.

We say…. lovely knitwear as ever and the best wide trousers we’ve seen in a long while. The show had a really nice “salon” atmosphere and reminded us of our first ever show in our Floral Street shop in 1996 which was all gold chairs and Kraftwerk.
Here’s a few shots from Lou’s show to keep you going until she gets round to posting the full set on her own site.

Letters from Edinburgh



Edinburgh band Letters rather appropriately sent us a letter here at the studio. The envelope also contained a copy of their first single The Grand National/Pipe Dreams.
They describe themselves as “dark cello pop noise” and we can’t think of a more appropriate description. They seem to have a penchant for playing gigs in book-strewn flats and standing moodily in black and white on spiral stairs looking literary. We thoroughly approve of this type of behaviour

You can download the single for your very own by visiting their website.

They’re playing a few shows in Scotland in March with a full tour to follow (hopefully) so keep an eye out in the listings or sign up to their blog…

Friday 25 February 2011

Juliana Sissons: Knights & Knits at the V&A

We were recently working on a project with knit designer (and original Blitz-Kid!) Juliana Sissons who has been filling her time lately with an “artist in residence” slot at the V&A. She was given a studio space in the museum and full access to all the collections to use as inspiration for a “couture” collection, lucky girl.
Last Saturday she showed her “armour” inspired women’s collection in the Museum’s Medieval and Renaissance galleries to a mixture of invited audience and slightly bemused foreign tourists. The models suddenly appeared amongst the crowds and took their places on pre-placed podiums, looking a bit like those “living sculptures” you see on London’s South Bank and trying not to be put off by the constant attention of a thousand camera phones.
The outfits were lovely, somehow soft and strict at the same time. Marvellously complex knit structures and great use of colour too.

Can’t wait to see what she gets up to next.

Sunday 20 February 2011

Jean-Pierre Braganza catwalk at LFW

Much against our better judgement we have been to a few London Fashion Week shows this season. All that queuing and unseemly scrum whilst being screwed-out by overdressed fashion students really isn't our scene. However we are fans of Canadian designer Jean -Pierre Braganza so we took the plunge and rolled up in Northumberland avenue to see what he'd been up to.
For AW11 his continuing themes are sci- fi, anatomy and rock and roll. His techniques are: complex cutting, layering and panelling. Highly structured with interesting use of quilting, leather and jersey.
J-P has translated some of his ideas into fairly avant-garde menswear we particularly liked the red suit.
We thoroughly approve of his wilful refusal to follow 'trends'. This is the way to genuinely innovate.
He says he's thinking about "clothes for a future world", we would happily wear them now.

We find we rather enjoy all this fashion stuff. More to follow.

http://www.jeanpierrebraganza.com/

Saturday 19 February 2011

When in Paris Burro likes....

Paris seems ridiculously expensive at the moment particularly if you go to the posh places. However even in the Marais you can still get a not too pricey cup of coffee avec croissant with the required Parisian atmosphere at Au Petit Fer a Cheval, 30 Rue Vielle Du Temple. Hits the spot if you want a piece of old Paris.

What we don't get is the apparent popularity of Starbucks, there seem to be branches everywhere, do French people really like the yukky coffee ??

Friday 4 February 2011

Where are they now? Graeme Sinden.....

                                                                                                                                             

In the dim and distant early part of this Century the lovely Graeme Sinden was a shop assistant in our flagship store (which was then at 29 Floral Street) during the day whilst honing his DJ skills at night. Indeed he DJed at Burro's now-legendary "Summer Fetes" at 333 in Old Street and provided music for most of our in-store events (when we let him!).

His musical career has taken a decided upturn since he left us and he's now half of "Count & Sinden" who have a great album "Mega Mega Mega"out on Domino and collaborated with the Mystery Jets on last Autumn's ubiquitous single "After Dark".

Here's a picture of Graeme in his Burro days hanging around outside the changing rooms in the shop which for some reason appeared in the Japanese magazine Jille in May 2004. If we could read Japanese we'd tell you what they had to say about him!

There's a free mixtape from Graeme on his myspace with remixes from a load of artists including one of our favourites These New Puritans.

Click this link to download the mix: http://www.teenagespaceship.com/sindenpresents/

                                  HARDCORE GIRLS EP OUT OCT 13TH