Tag: london

RAW POWER

I still can’t help thinking of London as the greatest city in Europe, at least when shopping is concerned. Calculating pounds sterling to euros only adds to the sheer fun of it. On one end, the well known Oxford Street shopping giants, and on the other, more arty and alternative streets and squares of east London. Just the place to wave your plastic about in exchange for the bags full of goods.

Less likely found on the high street, Shoreditch harbors smaller one-off shops and vintage markets (in abundance), and it’s pavements and bars are patrolled by often edgy and cool looking people.

Walking through the first Topman General store in Shoreditch (they recently opened a second one in Covent Garden) made me think of one particular T-shirt label of two guys I have met, sold at Topman.

Michael started RAW POWER in 2002 and re-established the brand together with Ben two years ago. So, for their ten year anniversary, I think they deserve a little blog party here with us.

What they are on about, besides of hand printed graphics on 100% cotton, is celebrating both the success and failure of celebrity culture. The rise and fall of a star. The birth and death of an icon. Mugshots in your face and bold slogans in print put a social comment on our times of reality soaps, social media and style icons. Let’s hope they can be more then a hype themselves, because they are doing insanely good! Selling points like Selfridges, Topman, Asos.com and Harvey Nichols make it even odd to me that they are not yet available in Dutch stores. So if anyone knows a good agent, give me a call and I’ll hook you up with them. For now, you can take your digital earoplane: http://shop.rawpowertshirts.com/ and they have Twitter  And Facebook obviously. Lets ‘like’ the page, as a present.

London & Art

Visiting London is always an inspiring experience. Since Amsterdam’s museums have been closed for several years, there haven’t been any interesting exhibitions in the city for a long time, so the desire to visit another city where you can see art is enormous.

Just walking through London you can feel the difference. Art and culture are under pressure everywhere in Europe, but this city is still bubbling with creativity. And that’s very important as we attempt to deal with the economic crisis and all the negativity that it has caused.

A funny thing happened when I was at the ticket desk at the TATE Modern. I was asked if I objected to the fact that, by purchasing a ticket for the Gerhard Richter exhibition, I would be making a financial contribution to the museum. That’s a typically positive, polite British way to make clear that it’s vitally important to make a personal contribution at a time when culture is in crisis.

 The Gerhard Richter exhibition, PANORAMA  (a major retrospective exhibition that groups together significant moments of his remarkable career) further reinforced that feeling. A stunningly beautiful exhibition in which you see and feel the progression of time and the painter’s perspectives over five decades.

Not your average market

Concept stores have become some sort of fashion pilgrimage. They pop up in many world capitals now, and I think it’s a good progress. Still, there are those who initiated this trend of inspirational showcases captured in a store (or in some cases small warehouses). One of them is Dover Street Market in London.  Besides having a close relationship with Comme des Garçons, the other brands represented there vary from upcoming designers to the established avantgarde.

Each floor could be a shop on it’s own, or sometimes just tell you a story from a designer’s point of view through an arty installation. In my opinion this is how a good concept store should work: like a chameleon. The same entity, but adaptable to its environment. At Dover Street Market they do a ‘tachiagari’ – a new beginning in Japanese- at the start of a new season: a total shop makeover to introduce the new collections. Well, whatever the name, just keep surprising us.