TAIWAN... Tea,Temples and Twining Cherry Blossoms
Intertwining cherry blossoms…fragrant, fragile and soul inspiring…guided me along the path at The Lingxiao Chapel of Chi Nan Temple and The Jiu Tian Temple in Miao Li County where I ascended all 606 arduous steps with a wooden statue of Taoist saint San Nai Fu Ren cradled in my arms.
Margette’s Indian Summer
Margette’s table setting of blue and white Limoge china, centerpiece foliage with peacock feathers on top of mandala design table cloth
Cebu’s most evolved host and my favorite yoga
teacher Margette Sarmiento recently came back from a month-long training at an
ashram in Kerala, Southern India. She invited her closest friends and this
jotter to an Ayurvedic dinner at her Maria Luisa home. The indian summer soiree
was to celebrate her return and, at the same time, as “despedida” for Jiji Gulllas and my publisher Eva who
are going on a European hiatus.
|
1 comments
|
Labels:
ayurcedic,
Jing Ramos,
kerala ashram,
margette sarmiento,
rajasic,
sattvic,
tamasic
The Magical Glow of ANGKORIAN AETHER
In 2004, my good friend Jing Ramos and I flew to Siem Reap,
Cambodia to see the temples. We stayed at a private home owned by a couple of
educators and moved to Grand Hotel d’Angkor on our last day.
There, we saw
portraits of the hotel’s
famous guests: Somerset Maugham, Charlie Chaplin, so on and so forth… Transfixing us however, were
images of Lee Radziwill and Jackie O. Thus on our last day, we traveled to
BANTEAY SREI, the Temple for Women, and took on the roles of the two sisters.
My recent holiday collection for FashionWatch called ANGKORIAN AETHER is colored by our adventures, and
misadventures in that holy land of Devatas and Apsaras…
Devatas @ Angkor Wat
STYLISHLY SIMIAN VIBRAMS
I’ve read so much about the trend
and benefits of bare-foot training for runners, and outdoors bare-footing from
athletes, enthusiasts and physiologists on the net. It all sounded like sales
talk to me, anyhow, after a call to Carlos Alvarez for directions to their
outlet at Rockwell, I sought out to experience the truth about this barefoot
phenomenon myself.
if i ...
...... were an elderly impolite white man who has burned too many bridges
in Hongkong and in Cebu, would I elicit disfavor from this city’s respected grand
dames by maligning them? Recently, the above mentioned aging social
mountaineer (let’s call him Ripley) had
a heated exchange of words with another guest at a wedding reception after he
disapproved of what the guest wore at a previous party. When the guest told
Ripley that he was in no position to publicly and rudely ridicule what he
chose to wear, and that he should be more careful with his words especially
when he is around Cebu’s genteel ladies, Ripley retorted: “oh, those old women
don’t know fashion anyway. They haven’t traveled enough, so why should I even
care?”
Inno @ 30
In 1995, my closest designer friends in Cebu Jun Escario and Jojo Romoff insisted that we travel together to Manila to watch the fashion gala “Inno Sotto: Anno XV.” Top model Suyen Chi had gotten us three tickets, and the prospect of seeing Inno’s 15th year collection mesmerized us, thus we packed our suits and headed for the capital.
Art
of Kaiseki Cuisine @ Nadaman
Kaiseki or Kaiseki-ryori, is a traditional multi-course Japanese meal, which
puts emphasis on artistry, graciousness and the changing of the seasons. It
also refers to the collection of skills and techniques that allow the
preparation of such sumptuous exclusive meals analogous to Western haute
cuisine.
The Valera Redux
Design genius Ramon Valera, the first
National Artist for Fashion, is celebrated in a 24-piece ready to wear
collection by Freeway, a local brand that offers clothing and
accessories that follow current international trends at reasonable price
points. Valera’s
signature creative cut, grand silhouette, unusual colorization, and opulent but
tasteful embellishment are reinterpreted and given renewed relevance in the
company’s Valera, National Artist Collection-- the fourth installment of Freeway’s
successful National Artist Collectors Series.
Style-Spotting @ Japan Fashion Week 2010
(Part IV)
(Part IV)
I saved the best for last---this is the ultimate installment
of your jotter’s style – spottings @ Japan Fashion Week.
MIHARAYASUHIRO
Meeting this unassuming designer was worth the unmanageably
hectic schedule and the flight anxiety one had to go through.
I wore my favorite gold trainers that he designed for Puma
and congratulated him after the show for designing the best Fall-Winter 2010,
collection on the Tokyo runway.
Every piece that came out was polished and esthetically
appealing.
The soft, suede boots that the girls wore
draped around the shin and ankles looked beautiful with their short sack
skirts.
The extra long cable knit for men elongated the look of lean wool pants
and washed chambray shirts.
A wool jacket with large shawl collar worn over a
beaded vest, grey chiffon shirt, ikat-print shorts and deep brown combat boots
makes for a youthful winter.
The open knit-work on dresses, tunics, and pants gave garments a poetic, disheveled appeal that complimented the girls’ hair
and makeup.
Yasuhiro is indeed an artist;
his chosen medium is fashion.
Style Spotting @ japan Fashion Week 2010
(Part III)
Third installment of your jotter's recent style spotting @Japan Fashion Week.
These are the best Japanese collections for Fall-Winter 2010.
YUKI TORII INTERNATIONAL
Style Spotting @ japan Fashion Week 2010
(Part II)
(Part II)
Here's the second installment of your jotter's style spotting @Japan Fashion Week recently.
These are the best Japanese collections for Fall-Winter 2010.
GUTS DYNAMITE CABARET
These are the best Japanese collections for Fall-Winter 2010.
GUTS DYNAMITE CABARET
STYLE SPOTTING @
Japan Fashion Week 2010
Your jotter put on his most comfortably fashionable
clothes and went style spotting @Japan Fashion Week last March. In this four-part post are the
best Japanese collections for Fall-Winter 2010.
DRESSCAMP
A Whiff of Freshness
Five years ago on my birthday, I received a gift from one of my muses and
closest friends. From the shape of the simple white paper
package, I could tell that it was either a cologne or skincare product. True enough, I received a bottle of clear scent.
JIRO’S CIRCLE
At the MOMAT last March, (Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo) I spent the whole morning going through the museum’s collection on my free day.
The 4th floor had art from the Meiji and Taisho periods from the
1900’s to 1926. The 3rd floor highlighted the Pre-war Showa Period
and art during and after World War II--rather depressing , I struggled to get through this particular section but ike light at the end of a tunnel however, I found my favorite Japanese painting
on the same floor—Jiro Yoshihara’s White on Black Circle.
Terrific Day in Tokyo
If you had a day to spend in Tokyo where would you spend it?
Topping my list were three places: Ginza, Omotesando and The National Museum of
Modern Art.
The Tokyo National Museum of Modern Art
Summer HUGS in Wintertime
cary santiago, merce brenner, emanuel hamoy, & jun escario
Last winter, a friend took a two-week break from his 5th
Avenue work at Blanc de Chine, New York. Escaping the freezing cold of the Big
Apple, Emmanuel Hamoy warmed his tropical days in the company of friends and
family in the Philippines.
|
0
comments
|
Labels:
arcy gayatin,
cary santiago,
emanuel hamoy,
Jing Ramos,
jojo romoff,
jun escario,
merce brenner
if i
…were to name the three most stylish women today they would have to be Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, Carine Roitfeld, and Zoe Kravitz
The Subanen Princess
During my visit to Zamboanga Sibugay for the
holidays last year, I sought out indigenous fabrics for a possible garment presentation/auction
in an art gallery abroad. In my earliest collections, I incorporated fabrics such
as the T’nalak from Davao and Langdap from Marawi into garments of clean, linear silhouettes.
These fabrics were readily available through sources provided by my aunt Henrietta Ele who is the founding director of Darangan Dance Troop of The Mindanao State University. Her company globe-trotted for fashion presentations with Ben Farrales in the 80’s and today, she owns an extensive collection of indigenous fabrics from the South. She showed me this collection a couple of years ago and it sparked off an idea.
These fabrics were readily available through sources provided by my aunt Henrietta Ele who is the founding director of Darangan Dance Troop of The Mindanao State University. Her company globe-trotted for fashion presentations with Ben Farrales in the 80’s and today, she owns an extensive collection of indigenous fabrics from the South. She showed me this collection a couple of years ago and it sparked off an idea.
if i
…were to host dinner for other parents from my kids’ PTA, I wouldn’t brag about the cost of my Birkin. Especially if one of the parents know that I haven’t settled a million-peso debt with one of Cebu City’s high profile designers. Would some really just go broke for a Birkin?
...were throwing dinners at my private abode I wouldn’t be brazen when inviting guests over to my powder room. One stylish hostess called the girls in for some white truffles leaving a chocoholic guest feeling bad.
He was clueless that the post-dinner dessert had absolutely no chocolate content.
He was clueless that the post-dinner dessert had absolutely no chocolate content.