Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Neon Good Time

It is taking me forever to do this blog entry because there were so many great pictures from the Crafting Community weekend at the Ace in Palm Springs and so many different things I could write about.
I mean, the setting! Replete with sunshine, mountain views, swimming pools, and even Confetti System piñatas.
The crafting was extraordinary - check this bird Oscar made with architect, turned rock-animal-maker, David Alvarez (who also happened to be a secret EMT wannabe in the best sense, as he ably and swiftly treated my freshly-brewed-scalding-hot-coffee-burned hand. Thank you, David.)
The hipster quotient was pretty high and maybe a bit intimidating, just check the children. They are way cooler than me. And you. Probably. But nothing to worry about, they were nice! ;)
There's the very exciting fact of my bags being at the Community Shop at the Ace, and also the punk rock bonus that they've written the featured designers' names on the wall in the store in Sharpie. As Oscar pointed out: mama's in the house! And in good company - Free City, Heath Ceramics, Robert Lewis, Kathryn Bentley and more...
There were the junk food-light, but Kanye-esque sunglasses and rainbow terry wristbands-heavy, filled piñatas!
There was an intoxicating amount of NEON colors which just drove me crazy in the best of ways. It's like I'm addicted to these colors right now. Weird.
And, my own crafts! That's right, the parents were invited to craft as well and I made this necklace and bracelet out of jersey scraps donated by American Apparel. In my opinion, they are a bit Lanvin-like in my own way.
Thank you Karen Kimmel, I'd attend another Crafting Community weekend anytime.

Also, please take a look at the very cute Austin, TX store called Spartan which is carrying my bags and featuring them on their website.
AND, this great mention in today's Refinery 29 piece about the raddest things in the Standard New York's boutique. Their wording, not mine.

Friday, April 23, 2010

Artsy Crafty

I often feel bad* that I'm not more of a "crafting mama" so I was super excited to see the crafting weekend spearheaded by artist Karen Kimmel taking place at the Ace Hotel in Palm Springs this weekend. I'd been wanting to check out the Commune designed Ace for a while now and this seemed like a wonderful excuse to do so. (I'm also excited to see my bags for sale at the Community Shop at the Ace, neat!)
Artists David Alvarez, Clare Crespo, Confetti System, Elizabeth Halpern, Erik Ian and Geoff McFetridge along with Kimmel will be hosting workshops and crafting things with kids and grown ups.

*Which is why it is with great pride, Oscar made this bag yesterday. It was "bring your child to work" here at CViv HQ. His school has one of the latest Spring breaks, and he's mostly been loitering around the house this week, so yesterday he came into the office to help J and I make bags - because that's what we do...
I met the multi-talented Clare Crespo on Facebook. I kept seeing that I should "friend" her as we had a lot of friends in common. Just the fact that she spelled her name like me was enough for me to send her a friend request along with a note saying, "we live in the same neighborhood, we knew a lot of the same people, and we don't have "i"s, so we should be friends." She concurred and we are now Clare-without-an-i-friends.

*With scraps of leather he cut the hearts and pasted them to muslin, added a strap and then sewed it all together by hand - which he learned how to do at school - not here.
Check out the detail-stitch on the Tour Eiffel key chain he insisted upon adding. I approve, Oscar, a little bit of metal takes it out of the realm of cutesy.

So we're off to PS today, have a great weekend! Pics from the Ace upon return! xoxoC

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

I Bike Therefore I Am

SELF MAGAZINE, May 2010. Pg. 30.
I'm wearing: winter white CVIV messenger bag, vintage Hermes scarf from my sister, silk circle dress by J.Shokrian and shoes, er well, shoes, get ready, no, well first look at another picture of my shoes:
Hot right?
They're Stuart Weitzman! I know!
Weird thing is, I saw them first at Le Bon Marche in Paris. JS and I walked the shoe floor and didn't see a thing we wanted. Then after perusing the clothing for a while, I thought to myself, I need to go back and see the shoes. I did, and the only thing I tried on were these. I had them on when JS walked up to me and said they were hot and I should get them. I said, "guess who they're by?" She said, something I cannot misquote and cannot really remember but something along the lines of Sander or Balenc, when I dropped the S.Weitzman bomb, her jaw fittingly hit the floor. Then she told me they were still hot, but that I couldn't buy them in Paris as it was an American co and they were much more expensivo there. So I bought them upon return. But if anyone asks me about my shoes, my response will still be: "Oh, I got them in Paris."
Don't tell!
(And No, I have never worn them with those socks - strictly for illustration purposes.)

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Weekend Recap

I've been putting out feelers for artists to paint the canvas workbag.
On Friday, I saw my first one so far - painted by Anonymous (for now) we'll do a show of all them soon where the artist will be revealed. The natural canvas has always screamed out to be created upon - seeing the first one reiterates the idea for me - it's majorly cool and we shall auction them all for charity...

Still getting use out of my Rihanna jeans. Hey hey hey.

Here's a little Summer bag we're kicking around...Flat work tote in khaki green canvas - quintessential summer camp vibe so we stenciled "Camp Vivier" on it with white pencil. It'll be on the site soon, but the Camp Vivier part will be painted or silk screened.
This is a first look at my iPad case, you can't see it really because it's open, it's just the sample that I made, but it's a beautiful natural aniline dyed brown leather. It makes quite a nice story next to Camp Vivier and the white clutch.

The other night Mohawk very graciously invited me and a few other designers they carry in store to meet the editorial director of Refinery 29 who was in town from New York. They served white sangria courtesy of the Tere and Gabriela Artigas, the jewelry designers and visionaries behind House on Genesee.
Yesterday, while the hipsters of Los Angeles were away at Coachella, I'm pretty sure the hipsters of Norway would have been drooling-jealous of our trip to Malibu in a 1973 Dodge Dart packed to the gills with sandy-haired Lord of the Flies-esque children, driven by a major Norwegian rock star.
Today I FINALLY got a pedicure (Else and I both got neon pink, natch) and I feel like a new person.

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Tracy's Haiti Tee

My very talented friend Tracy used to have the lovely clothing line called mon petit ouiseau and now she designs Velvet for Anthropologie and she keeps this inspiring blog, which I visit regularly for eye candy of the most delightful variety.
She designed this t-shirt for Velvet and all the proceeds go to Haiti.
It looks yummy and soft and I love the handmade wood-cut prints!!
Tracy's Haiti tee on sale here. I'll buy it. At $42 seems like someone's paying me to help out.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

KK Is The New Black

Here are some beautiful pictures my friend, Michael, the star photographer, took of my bags a couple of weeks ago when he and his wife Karen and adorable daughter Ava, were staying at our house. Karen used to be the fashion director at Real Simple and she's recently started a new blog called KK Is The New Black where she'll be collaborating with her husband and featuring other hot fashion stories. I'm honored to be her first original content - this is gonna be a good one - keep posted.
Years ago, Michael and I were waiters at the the venerable, but tiny Universal Cafe in San Francisco, back when it was first opened by Bob and Gail, the chef was the amazing Bernadette, and the interior got a ton of attention designed by Jeff and Larissa. Working there was a crash course in design, food & wine snobbery for the both of us.
I dated one of the cooks in the kitchen, a guy named Ivan, who was half Russian and half French and had long hair. It was the only time in my life I dated a guy with long hair. But he was the reason I moved to Paris. He used to show me old French movies like Jules and Jim and Pierrot le Fou, and that was the start of my infatuation with France. Our long distance relationship lasted about 1 minute, I think he slept with my hairdresser (appropriate) as soon as I left and I, very soon after my arrival, met Le [future] Mari, who had short hair.
Michael dated another girl at the time, too. He told me that she and her friends used to make fun of me by calling me Eclair - only that's not even funny.
Michael moved to NY and we grew apart.
Years later I found out that he ended up marrying Karen who, it turned out, was friends with one of my besties, Greta and we've all become friends again. The world is small.

All images via tellmewherethisis and more images of me in my studio and such on his proper site.

Friday, April 9, 2010

Chain Me Up

This is what I've been staring at, and stepping over, all week:

This pile of metal has been on the floor of my studio, just sitting there waiting to be chained to bags. They're staring at me as if to say, "Come on, make handles out of us. Put us on something cute. You can do it. Make something chic out of us...I know you want to." Oh, darling chains, I will! Soon. As soon as we get this order for a stylish Danish company out the door!

Okay. Done. J just shipped these lovely greens off to Copenhagen.

The company saw the bag I did for Target (via my valuable Danish connection) and they ordered 15 for a project they were doing where they wanted a green bag, literally, (if not figuratively,) the same shape as the Target clutch and, the kicker, it also had to vibe "Sex in the City 2."

Yeeokay. Done. I could totally see tiny Carrie looking Fieldsianly fabulous (I just coined a new adjective and adverb, you heard it here first) wearing this with a THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU plastic bag-cum-dress cinched at her 18-inch waist with a mass of colorful fuzzy pipe cleaners and some toweringly, terrific & bizarre-o Balenciagas at the bottom of her shiny, bare and incredibly sculpted legs. For example. Right?

Next up for CVIV (besides talking to chains and dreaming up outrageous Carrie attire): Summer bags - some with chains and some with no chains. Also, unveiling the clarevivier iPad case. Very, very excited for this. Pretty cute!!

Monday, April 5, 2010

S. Alan + C. Vivier = TRL

True Retail Love:
While previously the line was only carried at the Tribeca Steven Alan store, last week we shipped Abbot Kinney, West Hollywood, Brooklyn, Tribeca - and readied the Hamptons, too - that store doesn't open until May so we hold off on shipping until next week.
I snapped these pictures while J was packing the boxes.
I'm so excited to be in all those locations! Go visit your local SA...

Saturday, April 3, 2010

I'm not M. Stewart

This was me and Oscar's attempt at Easter a far, far cry from M. Stew...ah well, tomorrow, we have big egg finding plans with parties in Malibu and Hancock Park, will let you know who hid better.
This was me and JS's attempt at happiness in clutch form.
Both wildly successful, I'd say.

Well, maybe not the Easter part...when Oscar went to bed the Easter bunny came. I'm so lame at holidays, I don't even think he expected there to be a basket when he wakes. (That Christmas presents appear on the 25th of Dec is already something.) I remember David Sedaris saying that in France, they have something like an Easter bell, Oscar's probably more familiar with that from his school. Anyway, mother guilt makes me make him an Easter basket. I couldn't find the basket I thought we had from previous years, so I used my African market basket and put plastic grass (made in USA!), his dyed eggs and a few chocolate eggs from the supermarket. I remember better baskets than that when I was little! I feel inadequate. But then again, kids eat too much crap these days anyway, Jamie Oliver's even got a Food Revolution going for god's sake, so I'm happy to not give him too much! There. I'm self-justified. Now I can sleep.