Another reason why we should go back to fashion illustration...

"The Many Faces of Manila" by Kyle Letendre. HeyKyle.net

How awesome is this? I personally love the graphics, they have this really cool cartoony/comic styling about them. I won't got into too much detail since I hate being too descriptive. Let's just say that if you don't see why this graphic is cool, then there's something wrong with you. I might even predict that you're not a fun person...maybe you're even feeling a little...alright anyway - moving on!

As for making my case for fashion illustration (even though this technically isn't fashion illustration), since it's industry standard to photoshop people to the point where they don't look real anyway, why not just illustrate everything? Could you imagine Vogue editorials completely illustrated? It would be like high fashion comic book. Sigh. Only in a perfect world.

Being a Flip myself, I'm always looking for ways to represent. I was born on Luzon, after all. I'm probably going to buy this shirt even though I'm going to go cold turkey on the clothes buying for the rest of the year (plus a few months). At the very least, it's consolation for not being able to afford the Manila Luzon Barbie.

Going with the flow...chart

Howdy! and before I continue "Hi!" and "Hola!" to the top visiting countries for this week. International views are nice even if this blog was just stumbled upon by those looking at the pictures. Cheers!

Now, given that I like making flowcharts...

like this one, I'm contemplating making another one, but I need help deciding. I'm thinking maybe blouses, or maybe dresses, but I'm not sure. Shoes?

Flowcharts make things pretty easy, I should probably market a series of notepads with these. Anywho, what would you like to see?

Political Pants

Living in Austin, I occasionally fall into the pool of self righteous young people who feel the need to "stick it to the man" and "hit 'em where it hurts." This behavior is not necessarily a result of living in Austin.

When I was in...6th grade there was the rumor of Tommy Hilfiger being a racist, mind you many people didn't have the internet in 1998 and snopes didn't exist at the time either. Being a minority, racists are perhaps the number one most irritating group for me followed by male chauvinists and stupid people in general. So yes, I did boycott Tommy Hilfiger to the point when I got mad at my mom for buying me a shirt of his from the thrift store. I sometimes still have to remind myself that he's not a racist because the thought stuck so deep.

I like causes. Buying Putumayo CDs, fair trade chocolate, TOMS shoes, supporting local business. Likewise, I don't show patronage to causes/ideas that I am against: Walmart, Chick-Fil-a.

I feel that stupid people shouldn't have jobs ala Hollister models who behave in a culturally offensive manner. I'm glad the models got fired. If there's one thing I've learned about Korea, don't fuck with the citizens because they can get you back. I actually smiled at the thought of the people their returning their purchases because of how these models behaved. While I know it is not right to generalize that these models are representative of the brand, they were hired to be on the more visible end of the spectrum and BOY did the shit hit the fan in their faces. While boycotting Hollister won't exactly be a sacrifice on my part because I've never thought much of the brand, now I don't even have to give it a second thought as I do not want to support the idea that you can be a numbskull and get by on your looks.

I hope this is a lesson to Abercrombie & Fitch: hiring insensitive idiots is a gamble to your brand...and they can F* you up. Now I've known an Abercrombie model, he was very smart and friendly. This was at the university so maybe hiring good looking people who went to highly diverse universities could be a step in the right direction. At the very least, I hope these kids learned their lesson: No one finds stupidity appealing.

And by returning purchases, citizens showed that they didn't want to be associated with such stupid behavior. Clothes say more about you than you think.

Oh...man...

I have to say, this is probably one of those pictures that would make my boyfriend scream like a girl.

This was years ago...I think I might have still been in high school actually. In all honesty, looking at it now and having seen tons of Asian pop stars cross dress as well, I have to say this kind of freaks me out. I do kind of...yes...look like a boy. I look like a school boy. A disheveled school boy. This was my sisters idea.

Part of this was an attempt to exaggerate qualities that I thought were overtly male: looking like I don't care, relaxed posture (because face it, when my posture is good, I have a chest), and having too much gel in my hair. Essentially, drag king-ing it. This does not seem too different from looking at a picture of a long haired Asian boy and just knowing that "I know it's a boy."

Personally, I don't think I look too bad as a boy and ironically enough, my hotornot male photo got a higher score than my female picture. Go figure.

I like menswear: however, cross dressing is not one of the primary concepts behind menswear for women. Women have to feminize and tone down the sharp lines because after all, we have curves. This was just straight up curiosity. And once was enough for me.

I like being a girl. There are just more ways to be cute and I don't have to think about being cool all the time.