You may have noticed we’ve been somewhat quiet of late (Well i was off getting married I think that excuses me). I’m planning some changes to how the site runs so will off air till the new year on SASS. In the meanwhile you can visit my new marketing/trends blog: Underfield.wordpress.com or catch me on Twitter. Will be covering fashion trends and marketing stores on this site as well as broadening my beat a bit.

As spotted over on marketing blog MarkLives.com. This has to my favourite piece of marketing from a fashion brand for the year. We’ve featured Love Jozi a couple of times – big fans.  The brand recently launched a spin-off label called Luv Jozi made to look like a cheap Chinese rip-off of the original – supported with a great photo shoot and website. It seems like a lot of Love Jozi fans were take in and even leapt to the brands defence. This is the first I’ve heard of a brand faking itself. Genius.

They must have been giggling into their cornflakes for weeks.

Homegrown street brand Butan Wear launched their summer collection back in October – as you can tell i’m slowly catching up. Their collection of graphic tees, hoodies and accessories will  appeal to the Hip Hop kids (young and old). Check out the collection in full at butanwear.com.

I’m loving the photos from the ghd photo booth at the Durban and Joburg style lounges. Based roughly on the Helmut Newton’s Newton Machine its a way of shooting self portraits. You just look into the mirror – pose and click the remote control. The last stop for the ghd style lounge is Cape Town next Friday but if you want to apply do it by tomorrow here. Respect to Simon Deiner and Chrisna De Bruyn for setting it up.

So i’m back after a month off getting married and on honeymoon in Buenos Aires. I took Robyn’s advice and bought a suit from woolies for the big day and had it altered at a tiny local tailors in Sea Point (R120). Looked much better than if i’d spent five times the amount on something that didn’t fit properly. I can’t believe i reached 33 without realising that earlier. Half of my wardrobe is in the queue now.

I’d half planned to wander the hip streets of BA sucking up enough info to write some cool posts on the local trends… I have to admit after the crazyness of getting married I spent more time sucking up tapas and Quilmes. Enough to say if you like shoes and little cutesy bags (and big steaks) its great.

The blog will be taking a brief rest for the next few weeks as i’ll be out of the country (on honeymoon). Back in first week of December.

If you want to know when the site starts up again please join the Facebook group. If you’re in need of somewhere else to go visit www.ghdstylelounge.co.za and enter the competition to win a place at South Africa’s first pop-up hair salon.

Take care out there!

x

I have a bit of a t-shirt obsession so this is right up my street. And this is an interesting piece of marketing that again uses an art gallery context for showing off fashion/design this time by local designers creating limited edition t-shirts for aking (Cape based rock band).The t-shirts were displayed at the Kunst House recently and will be on show at Vide coffee shops for a month before being sold in Levis stores (as usual both of these brands are ahead of the curve when it comes to cool marketing).

Many thanks to Waldo of the Be Kind Collective for sending me the pics (his is the one with the crow).

As spotted over on PSFK. These rock. It’s a simple idea Head Hoods print someone elses head on your hoodie. Could be Marilyn, a Gorilla, Barack Obama or Elvis. Someone import them please?

Nick Berry (80s pop star) once sang that “every loser wins” how right he was at this year’s inaugural retail awards. I was disapointed to hear that Edgars has won the best male and female clothing store awards as voted by 1000 Gautengers. Guys, guys, guys you need to get out more. There is a whole world of retail delights out there and you choose Edgars!!! My experience of Edgars is of lack lustre staff too busy chatting to help people out, almost non-existent design and boring brands. The name is also so dreadful I think of some little Victorian dude with a dicky-bow. Maybe it’s just Cape Town Edgars that suck then? These guys also voted Menlyn the best shopping centre. Now Menlyn i’ve been to. But I don’t get it. Nothing wrong with the place but it’s the most average of malls in Pretoria. All I can say is i’m very very disapointed in you all and want you to really think about what you’ve done. Final thought on this: Germany actually voted Hitler into power (so that tells you something about the wisdom of the masses).

From Love Jozi. Quite.