Asia Street Style | Frivolous Universe

WAITING ON MY FASHION MULE: What to wear when you haven’t done your laundry in a month, your dry cleaner closes at six, and your wardrobe has to make an international border crossing

By: Kim Philley

13-02-2012

Ho-hum skinny jeans and tank top collide with red coral and turquoise Tibetan breastplate:

The New York Times says the fall runways abound in “harmonious collisions“–Ruth La Ferla’s elegant euphemism for fashion mashups. I was feeling a bit the collision myself last night after jumping off Evel Knievel’s motorcycle (a.k.a, the Thai moto-taxi who drove me down Chong Nongsi doing a breezy 65mph).

Ten months ago, I left 90% of my wardrobe in a restaurant storage closet in Phnom Penh. Long backstory. Cambodia being tropical temperature, my beloved clothes proceeded to grow technicolor mold. My good friend has been assiduously removing the Spore Life with a spray bottle of grain alcohol and water, and will be arriving in Bangkok tonight with my resurrected clothes in tow. Which brings me to the subject of today’s post: What to wear when you’re waiting on your fashion mule:

Tank top: J. Crew

Skinny jeans: Genetic Denim (Fancy Pants, Boise)

Soda water is perfectly legal, but there should be a law against dry cleaners that close at 6pm. Yesterday I ran out of clothes–shirts that don’t double as underwear; jeans that hadn’t been worn so many times they stand on their own two legs. When you must wear something predictable and shopworn, pair it with an over-the-top ethnic breastplate. I received a lot of compliments yesterday on my mashup. As long as the coworker wasn’t within whiffing distance, I nodded a demure “thank you.”

Tibetan ceremonial breastplate: Armor Bijoux (Christmas present from Bethany Walter)

Having to photograph myself this week gave me a new appreciation for the contortions Nicole Orabona pulls off. But as G.K. Chesterton said, “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.” And while you’re at it, why not have cheesy fun with FxCam filters? Oh, Nana Chen, please come back!

Only do this alone. Say “David Bowie” ten times and then open your eyes.

Saddle oxfords: ZARA (Bangkok)

Jacket: AXARA Paris (Saigon)

Belt: Fly Now (Bangkok)

Days after styling me in the green hot chili peppers dress for last week’s FU / ASS posts, Asia Street Style’s Nana Chen came across this new Dolce & Gabbana creation in American Elle. Apparently, the collective unconscious is a Thai-Mexican love child. Nana will be returning to Bangkok in March. Thank goodness I’ll only be photographing myself for two more weeks.

If Robert Frank could be resurrected and rephotograph The Americans, he’d find a lot of us in mirrored elevators in Bangkok, Shanghai, and Hong Kong, taking furtive photos of ourselves at work.

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RAISE THE RED LANTERN: Green Hot Chili Peppers, Year of the Dragon, & Asia Street Style’s Nana Chen

By: Kim Philley

07-02-2012

Kim

Even when you’re scared art is no dictionary. –Frank O’Hara

Green Hot Chili Peppers Dress: Street stall next to Sala Deang BTS, Bangkok

I once read an interview with Daniel Craig where he explained why he accepted the hefty mantle of becoming the new James Bond. He didn’t want to be a sad sack in his dotage, Craig said, sitting on a barstool, knocking back the Jameson and saying to everyone and anyone who cared to listen that he could have been Bond.

I moved to Bangkok for the same reason. Because I never wanted to explain to anyone–myself in particular–why I didn’t. When I could have. When I was not yet old and no longer young.

Red silk belt: Thrift store, Oxford, UK

For RAISE THE RED LANTERN, Nana Chen of Asia Street Style photographed me at midnight off a not-quite-deserted intersection in Bangkok’s Sathon district. An International Herald Tribune photographer out for a late dinner, tattooed drunks, and the occasional cockroach scuttled by. Bangkok being Bangkok (hard to surprise), none of them paid us much mind.

I picked up the green hot chili peppers dress from one of the Sala Deang street stalls I mentioned in last week’s post, FU MEETS ASIA STREET STYLE. I forgot exactly how much I paid for the dress, but it was under 250 Thai Baht ($8). Nana and I found the lurid blue-green peppers a little phallic at first blush; both of us agreed that a belt would solve the phallus problem.

White leather bracelet: leather accessories street vendor in Shida night market, Taipei

My favorite (& only) black leather bag: this bag has no label; I swear I’ll find the little Bangkok shop again one of these days

Nana also styled me and did my makeup for this shoot (see the bottoms of this post for product details). The nightlight is vintage Southeast Asia–an eerie mix of halogen and Chinese lantern. Chinese New Year has come and gone and now we are left with the Year of the Dragon. Dragon years are volatile to say the least–anything can, and will, happen.

Today I’m housebound with a wretched Bangkok flu. An hour ago I dragged myself down from my apartment, to my local market street, for a chicken-broth resupply. As I walked past the mango lady I heard an obnoxious cacophony of cymbals. I winced. I cursed. I reached for my Tiger Balm. And then I looked up: I was headed straight for the jaws of a dragon.

Bow-tied wool pencil skirt: Diane Von Furstenberg

Jade windchime earrings: by U.S. jewelry designer Hazel Cox (gift from FU’s Anna Demetraides)

Black plastic bracelet with elastic: H&M, Geneva

Tube top: Benetton, Taipei

Keep in mind this happened on a Tuesday at 11:30am in the middle of nowhere. The “dragon” was comprised of six Thai boys in matching red t-shirts and paper-mache. I put a 20 Baht bill between the monster’s fangs and watched him go on his jangling way. I watched the mango lady feed the beast a handful of 10 Baht coins; the noodle soup man slapped a generous 50 Baht note on the dragon’s tongue.

A few things I know about myself: I’m pathologically restless. I build on nothing. Like the Chinese, I burn my paper houses and walk away. This Dionysian photoshoot with Nana reminded me of lines from a favorite poem by Frank O’Hara:

becoming ultimately local and intimate / repeating the phrases of an old romance which is constantly renewed by the / endless originality of human loss the air the stumbling quiet of breathing / newly the heavens’ stars all out we are all for the captured time of our being

–“You Are Gorgeous and I’m Coming” (1959)

Notes on makeup by Nana Chen:

Eyesliner: YSL

Eyeshadow: Chanel

Blush: Bobbi Brown

Blot Powder: Mac

Lips: Mac

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FU MEETS ASIA STREET STYLE: Faux Chantilly Lace from a Bangkok Street Stall and Boise Moonstone

By: Kim Philley

30-01-2012

Kim

A large part of Bangkok is, to quote Beck, shopping malls coming out of the walls. And then there are the street stalls. And then there’s Nana Chen.

Lady Luck, happenstance, lot, pluck, providence–whatever you choose to call it, my first Friday night in Bangkok I got lost in a freight elevator with Nana Chen. Nana is a Saigon/Bangkok-based photographer with an exceptional eye for portraiture. She has a fashion blog called Asia Street Style (ASS). I blog for Frivolous Universe (FU). If that isn’t a match made in a stalled freight elevator, I don’t know what is.

On Sunday, to initiate me into the city of cheap thrills, Nana trotted out her collection of subtly-slutty faux-lace: tiny, tatted Matador jackets, Chantilly-esque trenchcoats, and ultra-feminine DayGlo ballerina-necked cotton tops. Turns out she had purchased them all for a pittance–150 Thai Baht or under $5 USD–at her local Silom street stall.

I love the detailing on this top–so much romance for under five dollars! And all I had to do was slip it over my James Perse tank top and my thrifted skirt by Maria Bianca Nero. Nana styled my lacy top for this photoshoot and posted three of these photos yesterday on Asia Street Style. These peekaboo cotton tops get snapped up fast in Bangkok–Pepto-Bismol pink was the only color left when we reached Nana’s favorite clothing stall. The fact that I was already wearing matching Cece ballet flats by J. Crew? Kismet.

This is my Idaho grandmother’s moonstone necklace. Every now and then it sheds a moonstone like a seven-year-old loses teeth. Despite their translucence, I always manage to find the lost moonstone. Perhaps if I sleep with one under my pillow, the Lime Fairy will come . . . .

My handbag is Dooney & Bourke, and it’s getting dirty. I could take it to one of Bangkok’s hi-so bag spas for a good shampoo, but I’d rather save my baht for cheap, glorious street clothes. By the way, the above photo is what you look like when, in the Bangkok heat, you reach full-wilt.

And this is what you look like when you recover! It’s hot here and life moves fast. Sometimes you just have to trust where you are and who you’re with.

To find the faux-lace clothing stall: Take BTS to Sala Deang. Exit 2. Walk along Silom until you reach the junction with Convent. Bring a little baht.

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Newer posts

WAITING ON MY FASHION MULE: What to wear when you haven’t done your laundry in a month, your dry cleaner closes at six, and your wardrobe has to make an international border crossing

RAISE THE RED LANTERN: Green Hot Chili Peppers, Year of the Dragon, & Asia Street Style’s Nana Chen

FU MEETS ASIA STREET STYLE: Faux Chantilly Lace from a Bangkok Street Stall and Boise Moonstone

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