15 posts tagged "Brian Wolk"
Can’t Beat the Real Thing
Despite last night’s spontaneous blizzard, designers and fashion fixtures headed to Finale NYC to fête the launch of eBay and the CFDA’s 2013 You Can’t Fake Fashion tote collection. Marking the pair’s third collaborative effort to fight counterfeits and support authentic design, the new range features 90 one-of-a-kind canvas tote bags that have been customized by designers like Prabal Gurung (above, center), Pamela Love, Band of Outsiders’ Scott Sternberg (above, right), and Rodarte’s Kate and Laura Mulleavy (above, left). The designer-embellished bags are available for purchase via eBay auction through March 25 for a starting price of $100. The initiative is also offering a new standard tote for a “buy it now” price of $50. Proceeds will go toward combating fakes.
“As artists, we work so hard to create something, and then it gets knocked off,” said Rebecca Minkoff. “This is a great platform to ensure authenticity.” Carly Cushnie of Cushnie et Ochs concurs, and suggested that there’s security in knowing her and her design partner Michelle Ochs’ work is protected. “The CFDA has a voice that brings everyone together to preserve design integrity,” she said.
In addition to the likes of CFDA CEO Steven Kolb, Jeffrey Costello, Robert Tagliapietra, and Rebecca Taylor, Ruffian’s Brian Wolk and Claude Morais turned up to rally for the cause. And, according to Morais, they have a particularly special relationship with eBay. “We’re always using the site as a reference point. Right now it’s all about the 1920s and the hunt for the perfect embroidered dress.” We’re sensing a Jazz Age vibe for the team’s Spring ’14.
Now In Print: Ruffian Toile
Before their runway show at Lincoln Center tomorrow, Ruffian designers Brian Wolk and Claude Morais gave Style.com an exclusive first look at what they have in store. Last time around, the duo found inspiration in the English countryside, but this season, they found the magic right here in New York. They have collaborated with New York-based artist John Gordon Gauld (who they later found out happens to be the grandson of legendary hatmaker Lilly Daché) on a Ruffian toile, which will be featured in the collection tomorrow. “We first met him at his opening at the James Salomon Gallery in Chelsea and instantly fell in love with his work,” Wolk tells Style.com. “Claude and I took a bunch of pictures of Williamsburg and he created the artwork for this new take on toile de Jouy.” Here, a preview of the print.
Designers Celebrate Christmas In July With eBay
“I’m a total eBay-phile,” said Chris Benz (pictured) at last night’s midtown cocktail party to fête the behemoth retailer’s latest buzzy collaboration, the eBay Holiday Collective. Benz, along with Billy Reid, Jonathan Adler, Steven Alan, Fallon’s Dana Lorenz, Ruffian’s Brian Wolk and Claude Morais, and Tibi’s Amy Smilovic, were on hand to present their limited-edition capsule collections for the megabrand, which ranges from silk twill pajamas to canvas travel accessories. “I wanted to give the eBay customer a real sense of what I do,” said Lorenz, who used crystals and gold-plated pyramids to recreate her signature chunky necklaces. “It’s a punk-princess look.”
Although the seven designers turned out to tout their own lines, each admitted to routinely trolling the site for vintage duds and mid-century finds. “I have a serious paint-by-numbers collection,” revealed Wolk, whose Spring 2009 print was informed by the kitschy tableaux of the forties and fifties. Some even scour the site for transportation vehicles. (Reid recently acquired a 24-foot pontoon boat from the e-tailer, which he docks at his Florence, Alabama, home.)
“I went through a serious eBay addiction, so I’m happy to get a few shekels back,” quipped Adler, who created silver studded frames for the collection. The interior design magnate’s tip to scoring big online? “Misspelling. If you’re in the market for Bulgari, spell it with a ‘v.’ It’s amazing what you’ll find.” The Holiday Collective, which ranges from $50 to $100, will be available on eBay starting November 12.
Ruffian Unveils Jewels
“The jewelry is about modernity, but with a nod to history—there’s something very Ruffian about it,” says Brian Wolk, one half of the Ruffian label with his partner Claude Morais, of their first-ever baubles (made in collaboration with Sequin). One part English Art Deco, another part Memphis Design Group, the 75-piece collection of monogram necklaces (with the designers’ ‘W’ and ‘M’ initials) and colorful bangles will make its debut on the runway at Lincoln Center this weekend. “We like to go to The Victoria and Albert Museum, they have an incredible jewelry collection that fascinates us. But we wanted to add a clash into it, so we looked at Memphis art for the colors and the playful shapes. We thought the juxtaposition of the two would be fun.”
Juxtaposition is something that Wolk and Morais have always toyed with in their clothes, and this season is no different. When their Fall ’12 looks hit the catwalk, watch out for menswear tweaked for the ladies made with English textiles. Style.com has the first look, here, at the new Ruffian bijoux.
Grey Expectations
There’s a very open, very shoppable region between art and interior design, and a new Web site called Grey Area is plunging right into it. Kyle DeWoody and Manish Vora, the two young art-world insiders behind this new e-commerce venture, launched it last night with a party at the Wooly, where some of the site’s unique and limited-edition wares were on display. To wit: rope benches by Orly Genger, a resin cast of a Birkin bag by Shelter Serra, which sold on-site, and a tablecloth on which Ruffian designer Claude Morais had made an abstracted line drawing of a male torso (that’s the piece, above, modeled by Morais’ partner, Brian Wolk). “If you see it, you see it,” Morais shrugged, adding that he’s been painting as a hobby for years.
At the moment, Grey Area’s ever-changing online inventory includes bath towels by Tracey Emin and Ed Ruscha, wallpaper by Kiki Smith, a wristwatch by Tom Sachs, and E.V. Day’s playful encapsulation of the Barbie doll—she’s mummy-wrapped in a cocoon of silver and chrome. Grey Area commissioned some of the pieces, others not. It’s hard to believe the idea was born just two months ago, until you consider the founders’ powers combined: Vora is one of the New York gallery scene’s most active gadabouts, and DeWoody and her mother, Beth, are two of the city’s most active art patrons. The crowd at the Wooly included Nicole Miller and Jenna Bush, and had designers Timo Weiland and Alan Eckstein (who have a Grey Area collaboration of their own in the works) in the DJ booth.
The site has some storefronts in its future, too, albeit temporary ones: a pop-up in Water Mill later this month, one in L.A. at the end of September, and one in Miami for Art Basel. Explained DeWoody, probably only half-joking, “We’re hoping to conquer the States and then move to Europe next year.”