Start the day with Scissors

Yesterday I woke up thinking I didn't have the right pair of pants for the day. 

You know how it goes, you've got, oh, 30 or so pairs in your closet, but not one is the right one. What I needed was a pair of high-water flares, yep, that's what I was in the mood for. Since I'd recently bought two pairs of long flares, one of them was going to become high-waters.

 

I have a very scientific method of cutting off jeans, see above. I decided that roughly two widths of my wood floor would be the correct amount, lay them on the floor and cut straight along the crack.

Voilà high-water flares. Gosh, I love an ankle length. I know people think Isabel Marant has brought them back, but I'm sorry I've always felt more comfortable in them. And I love to call them "high-waters." Is that Minnesota? There's also "floods." We used to call them that too. As in waiting for a flood. High-waters. As in...you get the picture. And there's "petal pushers." It all sounds a bit country.

As a matter of fact they did feel a bit hillbilly-ish when I put them on. Like I need a stalk of wheat to chew on to complete my outfit.

So I counteracted this bumpkin-ish feeling by pairing them with a white blazer, a pebble silver fold over clutch and some fierce python wedges and just like that: it was hick-be-gone.

Later in the day, the very cosmopolitan (read opposite of hick) Sophie Assa came into the store with her  extremely chic and worldly mother. Both of them had CV clutches to match their outfits.

Sophie paired her old school Camp Vivier canvas clutch with army green skinny jeans and old Alexander McQueen sandals to die for...

I love this clutch. I think we'll do more canvas clutches. "Screen printed with the CV chain link", Jocelyn just said. Yes, great idea.

Here's her mama, Gabby. An seasoned fashionite, she is beautiful and German but lives in London. She worked with Katherine Hamnett in London during the heyday.

Now she reps lines like Current Elliot throughout Europe and wears all white outfits (avec high-waters no less) with Chanel ballerines. Chic mama. As with the last entry about Coryander, the most amazing thing for me with this business is still actually seeing people carrying the bags. I'm so honored! Cool mama/daughter combo wearing CV, that's It.

Coryander Friend

That is really her name. Coryander Friend. 

So I think we can all agree that she possesses the best name in the world.

She's also gorgeous & a set decorator & has great style.

I met her at a Mohawk Gen Store party. It was a winter evening and she walked in the store wearing a red plaid, ear flap hat à la Elmer Fudd, a ridiculously chic black wool coat, a lovely warm smile and a bright green CV clutch that went so well with all of it.

 Last week, she stopped by the store (wearing a black CV messenger) because she had to find a replacement for her beloved green clutch which she'd worn so nearly to death, she brought it to a shoe place to try to bring it's life back. A week later when she went to pick it up, she found the same well-loved and worn bag only now with a boatload of green shoe polish all over it. She wanted to cry.

Instead she decided to come get a new clutch.

What ensued was an epitomic bag shopping episode, every girl knows well:

 She loved the bright peony colored foldover...

 But the pebbled grey was sooo fantastic...

 But the peony pink replaced her badly missed green by being another burst of brightness.

 Oooh, but the gray was just suuch a good neutral.

 

This is the mirror she was reflecting her choices in...I swear none of this is acting I was documenting Coryander's real shopping dilemma.

Dilemma being the operative word as then she saw the royal blue pebble and all hell broke loose in the decision process.

 Grey pebble was then shoved to the back burner and the race was now between oversized royal blue pebble and peony pink. 

Peony pink won. 

After all, it was Coryander and  she was looking to replace a dear bright Friend.

Pink is a Relative Word

My friend Greta went to Zara the other evening and shopped for me with text pics.

She bought me this double breasted, very pink blazer. Or, I told her to buy it for me rather, from a text photo and when I saw it en vrai, it was definitely not the color I thought. In reality, it is more purple-y pink-y than the neon-y pink-y that I'd have liked and I couldn't deal with cheap-y looking the gold buttons. I wore it into work to get the colleague opinion anyway and Jocelyn had the idea of covering the buttons with pink gaff tape to get an idea of what it would look like sans buttons. With the different pinks, we did not get an idea of how it would look without buttons, however, it looked kinda cool in a punk sorta way with the taped buttons. Matilde loved it. However, when I had to go out later in the day to a movie set to deliver bags, I occurred to me that maybe I was a bit too old to have taped buttons, no matter how avant-chic it looked. We all have to draw the line somewhere. So I cut off all the buttons and I was off to Hollywood in a purple-pink haze.

 
We also received a plethora of pink pochettes on Friday from production. Is one of them yours? I hope so!

 More random pictures from around the studio. The clutches will never get old for me: zippers+leather+CV medallion = cool photo.

 
I never cease to be inspired by the people with whom I work. Here's Scott cutting twill tape for our hang tags, the most pedestrian of duties and yet he does it with such style! xox

Au travail

Back to work.

Scott, Matilde, Jocelyn and I are back to work with a fury. Not that we ever stopped, but we had a major opening party sponsored by the very generous Veuve Clicquot on Saturday night (I'll post pics soon, but already you can see some on Mondette and Refinery29 and even here, on Fashion Intel ) and that is always a bit, er, distracting to say the least.

We received wonderful flowers from our friends and family for the opening, like this purple one from Anne and Francois.

 This terrarium from Heather and Alex

These amazing yellow I-don't-even-know-whats from Holly and Becky at Holly Flora. Is that a peony from heaven? I had more then these even: thank you mom, thank you Bo and Kevin and thank you Jessica, among others. :)

One good thing about a party is that is forces you to get your decorating done! We all know this is true: that curtain you've wanted to change for months in the guest bathroom? Try having a guest. That'll get it done. Knowing that a hundred or so people would be at our studio on Saturday night? As you can see with the top photo, it got me to hustle (with a little help from my friend) and get these Simone Shubuck pieces framed and hung.
How amazing is this one above? It is my favorite. But that changes everyday because I love them all so.

This is a very early piece of hers. It is a Fendi Baguette - very appropriate art work for a bag maker's studio, no?

 I wish I knew the name for this piece. It is a head with flowers and people and leaves and intricate minute characters. These oeuvres are over my desk in the studio, I'm so happy I get to look at them all day long. :)

Opening Shop Today

We've accomplished a lot in the month and a half we've been in our 1404 space:

We put together furniture,

 

David built us a wall,

Richard painted us a sign,

Thomas painted us a rug,

Scott shaded our windows,

Heather hung art work,

 we've got a Frohawk Two Feathers,

 a large Kyle Field (along with a mirror built by David,)

and 5 small Kyle Fields, along with other artwork from Taylor De Cordoba artists like work from Jeana Sohn and Timothy Hull,

 

Kathryn had a twig cast in brass to hang my bags on,

 

 to finally get to the point where jewelry is displayed and  

bags are out and

  we are ready for people to come visit. 

Vivier and Bentley is open today. Come see us!

1404 Micheltorena at Sunset in Silverlake.

Lucky Shipping

 I wrote about our "massive" number of orders for Lucky. Here they are going out. I love posting the process of the things...So here goes:

Scott loading the clutches into their sleeping bags, ie manila, padded envelopes, to go camping with UPS until they get pulled out of slumber in their new cozy homes

 Waste. Sorry it has to happen sometimes. How can we reuse the back sides of UPS labels...?

 They move from behind the wall (our workspace), to in front of the wall (our store) in prep for the UPS guy to pick them up. 

 I love the used and abused United Parcel Service boxes. They looked like neat and tidy soldiers all ready to go.

 When I was taking these pictures the UPS guy said to me, "May I ask why you're taking these pictures?" I felt mildly stupid for a second, thought about and then told him the truth:

"Because I'm a really small company and it is still a big deal for me to have this many orders go out." He smiled and said, "oh, I get it." It was nice.