Elle Canada - The Elle Word

Finally, my first full day of shows … and it did not disappoint. I woke up to snowflakes outside—and inside—at Lacoste, my first show of the morning. The center of the runway showcased giant rectangular snow-globe boxes filled with flurries. The soundtrack? Sleigh bell music. The look from Lacoste artistic director Felipe Oliveira Baptista was “rugby dress meets ski suit” inspired by pics of the French national men’s ski team circa 1966 (outfitted by Lacoste, of course) and a mountain motoring expedition from the 1930s. The oversized “egg-shaped” parkas with morphing hoods and multiple zippers were standouts. And the ski sweaters with alligator patterns were a nice touch.

Later in the day I met up with ELLE Canada’s Anthony Mitropoulos for the Herve Leger show where equestrian corset-harnesses added a layer of complexity to Leger’s famous bandeau dresses. Plenty of pleats, fringe details, and models sporting true PONY tails, swished and swayed down the runway.

Anthony’s take: “Leger had Gladiator women emerging from the Colosseum ready to fight for fashion in knee-high, stappy stiletto boots!”

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Day 3 of New York fashion week started off with a light snowfall, but the style barometer remained high as the beau monde took to the chilly streets in their furs, hats and winter boots. The wintery scene had a cinematic quality that may have influenced some of these film-inspired looks.

THE GIRL: Toronto-born Christine is a fashion stylist and an editor at Mudd magazine.

SPOTTED: Lincoln Center: New York Mercedez-Benz Fashion Week central hub.

HER STYLE: Sherlock Holmes-inspired daywear for fashion sleuths.

WHY WE LOVE IT!  Hits of gold—from the leather-applique detailing on her Brian Atwood shoes, to her Hermes scarf, were the perfect fashion antidote to a grey, snowy day. Bonus: The canary yellow leather gloves popped against the Aldo clutch.

FASHION WEEK MISSION: “I love visiting New York seasonally for the shows and I am looking forward to Jeremy Lang on Sunday as it’s always a real Canadian highlight.”

For more street style shots from Day 3 of New York Fashion Week, click here. Read the rest of this entry

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I arrived in New York with just enough time to pick up my accreditation pass for Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week and catch the Rebecca Taylor show at Lincoln Center. As I waited for the doors to open, I had my first chance to check out the crowd.

Stand out in the crowd: Some eccentric looks at New York Fashion Week

Fashion week is always full of eclectic dressers—the people-watching is one of my favourite parts. And I didn’t have to look far. I couldn’t help but notice the man standing beside me wearing a colourful graphic suit. “I picked out the fabric and had it custom made, I have lots of colourful suits in my closet,” he told me as he handed me his card. His name is Shail Upadhya and he’s a freelance stylist from New York. While he’s not the typical subject of high-fashion-focused street-style photos, he’s definitely one of the people that keeps fashion week interesting. Read the rest of this entry

Yesterday was a real fashion trip—literally. Designers had the fashion tribes flocking across Manhattan from Soho to Uptown. Each area attracted its own signature stylish breed. Here are some of the best:

THE GIRL: Lara is a buyer for a downtown showroom.

SPOTTED: Studio 5 on Washington Street in Soho.

HER STYLE: Upscale boho.

WHY WE LOVE IT!  Lara offers up a sartorial patriotic nod to American designers with a Jason Wu shirt, Derek Lam fur vest and Alexander Wang handbag.

FASHION WEEK MISSION: “I try to wear a piece from each one of the designers I will see this week. Today is a bow to Jason Wu.”

For more street style shots from Day 2 of New York Fashion Week, click here. Read the rest of this entry

Members of the stylish set were primped and ready for Day 1 at New York’s Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week. The spacious plaza outside the Lincoln Center was the unofficial catwalk for scenesters on the fashion prowl. Here’s who caught my street-style eye.

THE GIRL: June is a celebrity stylist.

HER STYLE:  She’s channelling a marching band look—perhaps a fashion nod to the Giants’ big win last Sunday.

WHY WE LOVE IT!  Creative mix of designers with a L.A.M.B. plaid suit, DSquared skater boots, Hermes bag and tasteful arm candy.  Bonus: Her posh lid! She’s ready to prance out at this week’s fashion parade.

FASHION WEEK MISSION: “I’m here to get ideas for my VH1 style show, which is launching this summer.”

THE GIRL: Toronto-born Joanna lives in New York and is a senior fashion market editor at Harper’s Bazaar.

HER STYLE:  Upper East Side, urban, casual chic.

WHY WE LOVE IT: She’s on trend for spring/summer with her light pink fur coat, rose polka dot shirt, accessorised with retro tortoiseshell sunglasses and her signature red lipstick.

FASHION WEEK MISSION: “I’m a regular here—I can’t wait to see my favourite designers.”

For more street style shots from Day 1 of New York Fashion Week, click here.

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It’s hard to think about fall/winter 2012 when we’re in the thick of winter 2012 right now! (I’m SO over my puffy parka and boots!) But the ELLE Canada team is packing their bags and heading off to the shows for the next month. Denis Desro is tweeting about Montreal Fashion Week (@denisdesro) and our managing editor Christina Reynolds is off to New York later today. She’ll tag team with associate fashion editor, Anthony Mitropoulos, and together they’ll tweet (@elle_canada) and post daily blogs about the New York style scene. Our beauty director, Vanessa Craft, will be hanging backstage with top makeup artists and blogging about what she sees/hears. Associate editor Alannah O’Neill heads to London, Denis will be in Milan and I’ll (@noreen_flanagan) join him later this month for Paris fashion week. We’ll also tweet behind-the-scene details and post daily blogs on the shows.

This year, we’ve also invited Nicole Comeau to join our team as our official fashion week street photographer. The founder of The I on Fashion will post daily blogs on ellecanada.com from New York, London, Milan and Paris. “My schedule for the next four weeks will be wrapped around shows, presentations, and parties, while having my camera and venti bold glued to my hands,” Comeau says laughing. When she’s not behind the lens, Comeau is a retail and luxury strategic consultant. (She has an MBA in International Luxury Brand Management from the ESSEC University in Paris and she’s also worked with fashion heavy weights such as Balenciaga, Chanel, Cartier, Gucci, YSL, Louis Vuitton, amongst others.)

Below is one of her first shots from the New York shows this morning. “With the weather being on the cold side, I have a feeling we are going to see a lot of fur and great coats!”

Akiko was attending the first show of the day, BCBGMaxazria this morning at Lincoln Center. She is wearing this season's statement dress by Givenchy, Chanel jacket and a Celine bag.

Click here to see more of Comeau’s shots from Day 1.

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Day 3 at MFW included some looks that went for more drama, including the unique hairstyle and heavy eye makeup at Samuel Dong.

To go with the theatrical, royal collection from Samuel Dong was equally extravagant makeup look. The eyes were the main focus; Amelie Ducharme, Cover Girl Makeup Pro, created the look using Cover Girl Liquidline Blast in blue to draw in the shape. The line comes to a rounded outer corner, as though done with a blunt pencil so the look appeared as though the models had done their own makeup. Once the shape was penciled on, she applied eyeshadow in Shimmering Onyx overtop; it was also used on the outer third of the lower lashes, too. Lashes were played  up with 24 Hours Lash Blast mascara in black (top and bottom lashes). The brows, however, were downplayed by washing them out slightly using Simply Ageless concealer.

On the lips, Ducharme applied Lip Perfection lip liner in Sophisticated 220, followed by Lip Perfection lipstick in Embrace 335. Then to give the lips the look of more volume, she added a highlight in the middle of the lips in Lip Perfection lipstick in Hot 305.

As for the hair, Denis Binet explains that Dong often likes there to be two textures in the hair look, in this case controlled and sleek. To start this look, Binet applied Pantene Classic gel directly from the tube onto the scalp. Then, using a comb, he combed the gel from the roots into the first few inches of hair then pulled the hair into a high, smooth ponytail, leaving a triangular section of hair at the front out of the ponytail. Using a large barrel curling iron on low heat, he wound this section of hair around the iron and left it for 60 seconds. Releasing this curl from the into into his palm, he then sprayed the piece with Sebastian Shaper Zero Gravity, then inserted the plastic cap from the top of a can of mousse into the curl and bobby pinned it into place. It was placed there simply to hold the curl, but the label’s stylist saw it and insisted Binet leave the plastic tops in the front bang for the runway show, which had the hair team MacGyver-ing the hair product caps, slicing off the closes ends of mousse and hairspray covers.

What do you think of these looks? Would you wear your hair or makeup in this way?

Day 2 of MFW had us coveting everything from loosely swept up hair and icy cool makeup.

Martin Lim

The hair at Martin Lim was inspired by Egypt, with the hair pulled up into a loose swirl so as to highlight the profile of the chin and jawline. “The look is chic and glossy in a high updo but with the ends left natural,” says Denis Binet, Pantene Consulting Stylist.  The overall shape of the swirl, though, is not round, but more contemporary and loose. Using Pantene gel and hairspray for fine hair, Binet  pulled hair into a  high ponytail and then swirled the hair up and casually tucked in the ends, less fixed and precise than a bun.

For makeup, Amelie Ducharme, Cover Girl Makeup Pro, looked to the 50s for inspiration and gave it a sportier twist. “We wanted a strong lip, so we kept skin pure and very natural using Cover Girl Tone Rehab and Simply Ageless concealer adn the lashes just have some NatureLuxe mascara on the top lashes,” she says. On the lips, you can get a similar almost fluorescent coral-y shade by combining Cover Girl Lip Perfections lipsticks in Fairytale. Read the rest of this entry

With the first day of Montreal Fashion Week done, we highlight some of the key beauty trends that made it down the runway.

Marie Saint-Pierre

Hair
“For Marie Saint Pierre, the look is about texture, and it’s anti-commercial, more editorial,” says Denis Binet, Pantene Consulting Stylist. Using Sebastian Microweb Fibre, he worked the product into the hair at the roots but not the ends, to plump hair at the roots and give texture at the scalp. To the rest of the hair, he worked in both mousse and gel and let it rest in the hair for two hours. Then sweeping hair to one side, he started the beginnings of a braid, only doing two to three weaves and then tied it with a black ribbon, leaving the rest of the hair loose and textured. The result? Pretty and undone, as though the models woke up late and quickly tied hair to the side as they rushed out of the house.

Makeup
To emphasize the mix of strength and femininity found in the clothing, Amelie Ducharme played up femininity by making the skin appear Photoshopped. She applied foundation, and before the foundation set, she swept on some Cover Girl Smokey Shadow Blast in white to the skin at the nose, cheeks and lips to add highlight, blending it into the foundation. “It makes them look almost unreal, like mannequins,” says Ducharme of the effect this creates. For a bit of contouring, she used Cover Girl Clean pressed powder. To the lips, she went avant garde, filling them in with two dark shades of Liquiline Blast (in Black and Grey). Read the rest of this entry

We can’t wait for our March issue to hit newsstands! Our cover girl is Amanda Seyfried, whom I interviewed late last year in Manhattan at the Crosby Hotel — one of the bubbly, charming actress’ favourite spots. The night before, Amanda and the Japanese beauty brand Cle de Peau hosted a party at a huge mansion in Chelsea to celebrate her 26th birthday – complete with an insanely glam crowd, copious amounts of champagne and a whole ‘lotta Madonna tunes on the soundsystem.

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