band of outsiders

>> Designers may be pulling their belt tighter this Fashion Week, but hardly any are pulling out of the rat race altogether — the attention is too valuable. "You kill a thousand birds with one stone, because you get that many people there in an hour and you're getting one message across to them," says Scott Sternberg of Boy and Band of Outsiders. "They're writers and photographers and culturally indulgent people with loud mouths."

Instead, designers are saving by hosting presentations instead of runway shows (Monique Lhuillier, Temperley London, and Carmen Marc Valvo), inviting fewer guests (Marc Jacobs and DKNY, who's slicing her usual 1,000 down to 400), sending email invites instead of by mail (nearly everyone), or showing fewer looks to save on fabric and sample-making costs.

Two models, 15 looks, and a free space to show it in »

Not caring very much about what other people think has been the formula for being cool since cool became a "thing". Designers have been a prime example of this for as long as fashion has existed. Anyone who has ever become a sensation was never really like everyone else. You can't lead the crowd if you are "of" the crowd. And that's all there is to it.

We were thinking about this when we read that Scott Sternberg, who runs Band of Outsiders and Boyy, has scraped his Spring 09 presentation/show in favor of a video saying, “I don’t make runway clothes. These are clothes you wear on the street, so I’m just super-uncomfortable with it. It puts it in totally the wrong context — I want to do something closer to where the clothes are, and let people actually touch and feel them as opposed to seeing them on a 14-year-old anorexic model.” Aside from the fact that this might have something to do with the recession, he's totally and completely right and everyone knows it. The only reason we go to these shows, which are more or less completely irrelevant because there is no 'spectacle'--just blazers as usual, is because it gives everyone a break from the insane stuff during fashion week. It's really, ahem, low-key, and really, ahem, unpretentious and as much as we realize it's kind of unnecessary, we've always appreciated the break in insanity. So, Sternberg, in addition to this, has shot his look book with a celebrity friend on polaroid. This, we think, takes the cake. It is very cool of both of them to be behaving this way because it takes the power of The Industry and of The Tabloids and puts it right back in their own hands. Like, "Oh, you're going to try to have me schedule myself in the same time slot as DKNY? Oh, you're going to try to make me some common Starbucks slurping celebrity?--"No, that is not how we're going to do this.". These are the instances that remind you just why you know this person's name in the first place.

Council of Fashion Designers of America presented the following 2008 fashion awards.

Womenswear Designer of the Year: Francisco Costa for Calvin Klein Collection. See the Resort 09 collection.

Menswear Designer of the Year: Tom Ford

Accessories Designer of the Year: Tory Burch. See the Fall 08 fashion show.

Swarovski Womenswear: Kate and Laura Mulleavy for Rodarte. See the Fall 08 collection.

Swarovski Menswear: Scott Sternberg for Band of Outsiders

Swarovski Accessories: Philip Crangi

Lifetime Achievement Award: Carolina Herrera. See the Fall 08 fashion show.

Sometimes the bells and whistles are not required. Realizing we sort of missed the Band of Outsiders Fall 08 collection during the madness of fashion week, we poked around to catch up on the happenings of the brand. Boy, the labels womenswear collection, is probably exactly how we'd dress if we lived in the fantasy world we invent while walking with our headphones on (okay, maybe not all of us). What convinced us even more, of the brands alignment with our fantasy world, is the simplicity of their website. Two blogs, one for Band and one for Boy, are made up cleanly with press images, goofy polaroids, and You Tube videos. There's no godawful Flash Player (something we all do agree on) there are no links to previous collections. There's simply a rolling log of succinct, clean images, and some links to likeminded websites. The feeling is like visiting an old friend, someone who you don't 'network' with, who you just like. Before long, you realize that this relationship is just much, much better than peripheral nonsense because, without the flash player, your left to enjoy some funny polaroids and cool clothes.

You Tube video courtesy of Hint Mag




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