9 Days to LFW: F&S speak to fashion insider Ioannis Dimitrousis

What is your profession?
Foremost I am a Fashion designer/ Creative director for ioannisdimitrousis, but I am also a stylist for several magazines and I do some fashion consultancy as well.

A dedication to Knitwear

With knitwear set to grace boulevards, avenues and streets Fox&Squirrel hunted down Alex Feechan, designer for the 'about-to-launch' knitwear brand Clan Douglas Cashmere Studio. We leave you with the interview. To accompany Alex's answers Jojo, Fox&Squirrel's in-house stylist, has selected images of her favourite Clan Douglas designs.

Space In Between present INTER-ALTER

Space In Between present an exhibition of work by contemporary artists and designers - exploring the boundaries between the two practices - as part of London Design Festival 2010.

Natasha Hoare on Yi Zhou @ Hoxton Square

There is something strange going on in Hoxton Square. No, not the emergence of actual grass. No, not a badminton tournament. Rather the beer sodden square is playing host to a small cinema screen with strange wailing and chopping noises emanating from speakers. The reason for this interesting intrusion, which follows that of sculptor Marc Quinn for White Cube, is that chinese, multi media artist Yi Zhou is in town. Thanks to 20 Hoxton Square, her unique, witty and haunting films, which blend 3-D amimation, Illustration and film, are being shown both in the gallery and the scrubby environs of the square.

100 Days of Active Resistance

Today Vivienne Westwood & Lee Jeans have officially launched their online installation entitled '100 Days of Active Resistance'. From the 8th of Septmember for 100 days you are invited to submit an idea, an image, an installation or a slogan that embodies Westwood's ethos of Active Resistance. All your submissions will be showcased online. 

"The priniciple idea of Active Resistance is that you get out of life what you put in and that real experience of the world involves thinking" Vivienne Westwood

We strongly encourage all Fox & Squirrels to submit work click here

Rodrigo Passos De Guimaraens

With just a little over a month for the launch of Fashion Weeks Fox& Squirrel thought it would be ideal to start getting you in the mood. We leave you with a film made by a dear Brazilian friend Rodrigo capturing all the the preps before a fashion show in Brazil, undeniably an emerging fashion destination.

Penelope Sacorafou on FBC event featuring Michael Herz & Edward Enninful

Michael Herz interviewing Edward Enninful

Though I have always written with pride about Fox& Squirrel's activities this time I write with butterflies in my stomach too! JoJo and I have just come back from an inspiring event organised by FBC featuring Michael Herz, creative director of Bally and Edward Enninful, one of the world's most sought after stylists and creative director of i-D Magazine. The interview was incredibly inspiring. There was an additional twist to the whole event too  as Fox& Squirrel's photographer Venetia Van Hoorn Alkema was appointed FBC's guest photographer!So a very big congratulations to her too.
I leave you with the story that was the FBC event featuring Michael Herz and Edward Enninful accompanied by some of Venetia's pictures.

'In Her Shoes Again', 'Tell No-One Boutique', 1 Kingsland Rd

A welcome transfer from the hallowed halls of Liberty to the slightly grubbier banks of Kingsland Road, In Her Shoes is a witty and eye catching show of illustrations and products from the fair hand of young illustrator Daisy de Villeneuve.

Her illustrations are deceptively simple graphic representations of all the things that make the world a little bit more stylish. From shoes, dresses and hats, to perfume bottles and portraits, these images document the artist’s belongings, obsessions, friends and fashions.

Her thickly outlined paintings convey a child-like naivety and acute sense of colour and pattern which render her work sweetly disarming.The boutique Tell No-One which hosts the show in the perfect venue for this plethora of homage’s to the material and bonus features include her range of scented candles and notepads. Fashion fans take a peek; Daisy’s hand-made aesthetic of cute will go a long way.

This blog post was written by Natasha Hoare for Fox&Squirrel.

Natasha Hoare on Alice Neel Exhibition at Whitechapel Gallery

The Whitechapel Gallery’s new show of the paintings by Alice Neel struck me as a slightly strange choice of show for a gallery with such a forward thrusting curatorial line. Her figurative oil paintings from the 1930’s – 1980’s stand outside of mainstream art history and criticism. Whilst the big American muscle of her heyday in the 1950’s was in Abstract Expressionism, she was producing a stream of portraits of the cerebral celebrities of her day. Coming so soon after their Elizabeth Payton show, in which wistful watercolours of Jarvis Cocker et al adorned their walls, I wondered if the Whitechapel hadn’t come over all celebrity worshipful.

I am extremely glad, however, that they have decided to give this travelling show a European home. Fresh from exhibition in Huston, Alice’s paintings are beautifully wrought canvas’s which tell the story of the past 100 years of American domestic culture. From labour movements, to Harlem, the Upper East Side and the domestic space, each reveals the turmoil, strain and joy of the times with an honesty and directness. Their lightness of touch and deftness of form is testimony to her incredibly individual and developed painterly skill. Each figure is a transient and immediate rendering of the inner psychology of the sitter – she never sketched or prepared her images, instead marking straight onto the canvas the blue outlines of the figures.