Milan Men’s Fashion Week – Day 2
The second day of Milan Men’s Fashion Week and it can’t get any better! Here are some images I took today, Enjoy!
zaidd'or
By Zaid Taji Farouki
Tag: Milan
June 21, 2014
Milan Men’s Fashion Week
So fashion week finals kicks in and Milan is going crazy as usual. Endless parties, endless outfits, and endless good looking people. Here are some images from today’s street style! Enjoy!
June 14, 2014
SHISEIDO Event
To kick off the world cup in style and fashion I was invited to the Shiseido event in Sephora in Milan. The theme of the event was “Brazilian Summer Party”. Everything there was perfectly setting the mood for the first game of the season! The music, the drinks, the fruits being passed around, and not to forget the scorching heat! (Yes Milan has been having an abnormal heat wave, where two showers a day won’t even cool you down). Here are some images from the event!
Also an update on my life I just got to Rome today! I will update you about my first day here in Roma tomorrow! But for now I better start getting ready for dinner! Arrivederci!
P.S. It looks like I am doing some sort of a dougie but trust me I wasn’t. I was just rocking some great harem pants (shirwal), a top from Zara, a shirt from Ralph Lauren around my waist, and my favorite Dolce & Gabbana shoes.
June 7, 2014
Manolo Blahniks Under A Burka
Today was one of these relaxing saturdays, waking up at noon I rolled out of bed and read texts from my friends that they are planning on going for lunch later in the afternoon asking me if I would like to join. After meeting them for lunch, off I went to the gym, for a much needed workout. Spontaneously afterwards, I decided to end up at Parco Sempione, I texted a few friends if they wanted to join, bought magazines, and off I went for a relaxing day at the park. Yes as relaxing as it gets, forgetting the fact that mosquitos somehow find their way to a place where the sun don’t shine, or the fact that I am probably allergic to 70 % of all plants, or how irritated my skin gets from the sun because of how white I am. Well lets put all these beautiful things aside, and focus on the few hours of relaxation I ventured out to get. None of my friends showed up so by the end of the day I had 4 hours of me,myself, and I. See we are always punctual to any plans I have thats the good thing about this friendship or lets put it that way companionship.
After going through many pages of Times, Vogue, I finally stumbled upon an article at L’officiel Hommes that grabbed my attention “Modesty” by Glenn O’Brien. Glenn O’Brien is an American journalist that writes about art, fashion and culture. He is best known for being “The Style Guy” for GQ magazine. And in this article he had a subtitle called “Manolo Blahniks Under A Burka”. He argues that no longer are high heels and thongs sexy “on a contemporary beauty there is nothing more alluring, except Manolo Blahniks under a burka. Modest fashion is made to be removed, layer after layer. Trying to look sexy is so f*&^ing out”
I will leave you to wrap your heads around it, as I still haven’t stopped thinking about it for the past few hours. It reminded me of a verse from Usher & Ludacris’ song Yeah “I want a lady in the streets, and a freak in the bed.”. I’ll leave you to this and some images from throughout the day.
March 23, 2014
Catching Up!
Soooo I haven’t blogged in a while and I don’t like where this is going. I need to be back on top of my work. I haven’t been posting things daily ever since I moved to Milan and its because of the hectic non-ending work lifestyle I have. During the winter break I had promised myself that stress and over-exhaustion should not lead my life in any form. The first few months I got here I managed to gain back all the weight I had gained in the past year, and never in my life have I had to go through nervous breakdowns as much as I did. Studying and creating in general is very stressful deadlines are set and clear, but its not like any other kind of career everything truly has to happen in the last minute. You can plan for months but everything has to take its course and it can come down to just a few days for execution. Therefore, after I got back to Milan in January I vowed to myself that I would go back to my gym schedule, de-stress my life, and the end of the day I am here to improve creatively not destroy myself. It has been baby steps, I don’t go to the gym 6 times a week like I used to the same time last year now I go 3 or 4 times a week. And as for the stress, that never ends but you start having this belief that everything will turn out ok in the end. As for the all-nighters those never end, I can see a lifetime of them ahead of me and I don’t know how to feel about it.
So to update you about my life and what has happened in the past month and a half that I haven’t been online as much. I personally managed to travel a lot. I went to Amsterdam for one weekend with a friend of mine, the city was beautiful, we rented bikes, went to the flower markets, went to the museums, and took the tour along the canals. The weekend after I had to fly to Saudi Arabia for 3 days to renew my residency there and as soon as I got back to Milan the two weeks of finals slammed me in the face. Two days after my finals great friends of mine came to visit me in Milan for a few days (and we managed to squeeze a day trip to Lake Como). I really appreciate them for coming all the way to visit me! I love having people, especially close friends of mine! After Milan, we took off and went to Barcelona for a weekend. Oh dear lord! What a beautiful city! I personally got inspired in every step I took in that city, we went to the Sagrada Familia, the Picasso Museum, Park Güell, and other Gaudi buildings.
So here is a quick update of my life and stay posted for more! And I am proud to say that I have created two collections so far and I am currently working on my third one! Here is a picture of me sitting in Park Güell.
January 29, 2014
Theft and Suicide… A Day In Verona
A week ago a friend of a friend had just visited Milan and while we were having brunch on Saturday afternoon we decided that we should go to visit Verona that night and we would be back to Milan the next day at night. We tried calling car rental companies but none were answering or the prices were obscene -As we were sitting next to the Duomo – we went into one of the hotels there and asked if the know a car rental company. We found a car at a reasonable price, then the same hotel informed us they had another hotel in Verona and if we would like to book with them. We were given a great rate and we saw the pictures it looked like a good 4 star hotel. We hopped into the car an hour later and off we went. Driving on the way there we booked at a restaurant called Osteria la Fontanina. Our plan was to get to the hotel, change, and get to the hotel for our reservation. As soon as we arrived to the hotel we were surprised by how the hotel looked so different from the photos. We decided to suck it up and stay a night, after all it was just one night. We got changed, hoped into the car and off we went to Osteria la Fontanina. It was one of the best meals I have ever had I advise everyone thats going to Verona to go there. AFter the amazing dinner we decided to go back to the hotel early. As we were driving up to the hotel we saw a police car, we were worried as why would a police car be at the hotel at this time at night. We asked the officer he informed us that everything is ok there is nothing to worry about. Being assured by the officer we went up to our rooms, but we were astonished by the amount of people standing next to our rooms, walking faster to see whats going on we realized that it was the room right next to ours’. We asked what was going on and they informed us that they were robbed. All their money, bags, and jewelry were stolen. We didn’t even think about it for a second we didn’t even give them a reply we all sprinted into our rooms in order to check if our belongings were still there. Everything was ok thankfully. The next day three of us decided we want to head into town early to go sightseeing. Our fourth friend wanted to sleep in.
We spent the day in Verona visiting both Juliet and Romeo’s houses and seeing the town. While at Juliet’s house everyone was putting locks on her door and they say its a bad omen to put your name with someone you don’t love. I wanted to join the experience though! So I bought a lock and wrote “me, myself, and I”. The three of us were present and we love each other, so whats the bad omen about that? We then headed to Romeo’s house and I had to take a picture of the door. It was flooded with names of Arabs in love. After a few hours we decided to head back to Milan. But we needed to pass by the hotel to pick up our stuff. As we were going in we see fire trucks, an ambulance, and a police car in front of the hotel. We were surprised again saying what is it this time. It turns out a woman jumped of the ledge into the river in front of the hotel to commit suicide, it had a very fast current as it was raining all week.
Ps. The picture are uploaded in the order they were taken in. Click on the images to enlarge them.
January 12, 2014
Milan Men’s Fashion Week
Today is one of these days where I can go to bed and say “it was a great day”. Like a typical Sunday, I got up early but forced myself back to sleep. I was woken up with a call from a friend of mine informing me that she had just seen the Ferragamo fashion show and they are planning on going to see Vivienne Westwood’s runway show as well. I got out of bed, got dressed, and ran out like a maniac. We met up and off we went on our crazy fashion show adventure. We got to see the Vivienne Westwood show, as well as Missoni, and sadly we couldn’t get into Prada but we got to see the street style there.
During the fashion shows we got to see many style icons. The first people we actually met actually work in fashion and they live in Washington DC (Represent!) and then we met a Marangoni alumni Yu Lee who is a stylist, fashion blogger and reporter she runs the blog theyutopia.com (she can be seen In between the images below, wearing a blue fur jacket while mixing it up with red.) Then at Missoni we got to meet Angela Missoni, Mariano Di Vaio as well as Riccardo Pozzoli.
While I was waiting for the Prada show I saw Anna Dello Russo, Brian Atwood and his partner Jake Deutsch, Olga Rink, and Suzy Menkes.
The images below are a mix of street style as well as famous people. Hopefully tomorrow will be as crazy as today was! Enjoy!
December 31, 2013
The Year In Review!
Happy New Year Everyone!!!!!! I can’t but be thankful for all the change that this year has brought to me. I started off the last year being on a boat in Dubai watching the fire works with acquaintances. I ended this year with my acquaintances being the closest friends of mine and we embarked together on trips to different countries and continents together. And I can definitely say that those trips where the best I have been on. From Miami, to Punta Cana and West Virginia. I will always remember the crazy way we arrived to Punta Cana where it took us 24 hours to get there rather than 6 hours. The time where we got into our cars one weekend, and randomly went to Cracker Barrel and white-water rafting. And the amazing weekend we spent in Miami. Also the trips I took along the year to Milan, Venice, Bologna, Pavia, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Washington D.C.
This year also means a lot as it is the year I graduated from University and the year where I embarked on the journey of following my dreams and moved to Italy to pursue a career in fashion design. I recently realized that I have lucky streak with odd numbered years. I was born in 1991, graduated high school in 2009 graduated university in 2013.
This blog also turned 1 year old in September. With 62,000 hits this year and views from 141 countries. I would like to end this year by thanking everyone the good people for making me a happier person and for the bad people that I have met that taught me not to care as much anymore and that my happiness is the most important thing.
I can’t wait and see what the next year has to offer!!
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!!
Here are some pictures that summarize the year:
December 8, 2013
A Week In The Life
So as you may all have known I had finals for the past two weeks and I was tortured by the amount of work I had to get done. I had to submit my collection, fabric book (a personal fabric encyclopedia), discuss fashion history, as well as submitting my own dress, pants, and skirt.
After I was done and I am safe to say I think I did well. I slept for an entire day, explored the city, went out clubbing, went to Bologna. I can finally say I have had a weekend at last after 3 months of working non-stop.
I have to share these small anecdotes with you about what went on while I was out clubbing one night. My friends and I decided we should go to a club called “Old Fashion” the music was really good. It was very old school, it reminded me of our 6th or 7th grade dance parties. But a disadvantage of the club is how hot it gets in there. So there is this door at the end of the club that opens to the outdoors smoking section, as I was standing next to the door trying to get some fresh air yes, it is an oxymoron catching some fresh air in the smoking section. I was greeted by two random people a guy and a girl (the girl I have seen before somewhere though). They point at me and just scream out “Marangoni right?” I was like “yeah” in a weird way trying to figure out what the hell is going on here. So they ask me which program I am in, I reply, I ask them the same question. Then some other friends of there’s now stood by our side. and they looked at me and said “we see you around in school a lot and we realized that your straight, right?!” I shook my head in agreement. They continued by saying pointing to the other 3 or 4 guys with them “we are the straight group in Marangoni”…. Yes it was confusing I don’t know what they were trying to get to there, I just smiled and said nice to meet you and left. Yes, I am still confused. (But hey if I get noticed in fashion school I ain’t complain’n) On my way back into the club I decided to use the bathroom. While waiting in line this guy who was extremely drunk looked at me started saying in Italian what I understood was “You look like Gesù” and then just looks at me and says “Gesù, Gesù, Gesù” I was so confused thinking in my head was he calling me Jesus?! So I blamed it on my bad Italian and was like that is not possible I probably understood it wrong. Then the people in line also started calling me “Gesù”. Some of them later in the club when I bumped into them even continued calling me “Gesù”. I finally realized that it truly meant Jesus when I asked my Italian friend.
So all I could think of is having to leave before creating some form of cult in a club in Milan, and the fact I had to be up in 4 hours to be on a train to Bologna.
The next day I was off to Bologna! I was in love with it, the food I must admit is way better than Milan! It is also very Medieval due to the castles and churches being in the center of the city. Here are some photos of the trip.
Ps. Click on the images to enlarge them.
November 2, 2013
Venice
So just a few days ago my friend and I decided to take a one day trip to Venice. Never would have I expected how beautiful it is. As I was telling my friend, I felt like I was seriously walking through a painting. The majority of the trip our conversations surrounded the idea of being transported to the past and being able to live in Venice in the medieval times.
As we arrived there on Halloween we soon went looking for Venetian masks to be able to wear to go out at night. We toured the city, bought our Venetian masks, had dinner and went straight for a night out in town. As great minds think alike, without planning or talking about it we both had brought a full black outfit with us thinking by just adding a mask to the outfit voila we would have a costume.
The next morning we went out sight seeing and toured the rest of the city. Here are some photos from our trip.
October 28, 2013
My First Skirt!
With so much going on and everything being up in the air, I just realized today that it has been 8 days since I last posted on my blog. Yes days feel like hours to me at this point. Yesterday I had to the opportunity to visit Pavia as one of my friends invited me as well as a few other friends to her home there. I found the true meaning of a small Italian city. I have to visit again soon, as it is only 30 minutes away from Milano.Below you will find pictures of the cathedral and views from my friends balcony. As well as visiting Pavia, I got to execute my first skirt. Please don’t look at the type of skirt as its a basic exercise everyone had to do from a book. Will I be able to give designers a little run for their money? NAHHHHHHHHH I know this is such a short post, but I am swamped with work tomorrow as I have to hand in my sketch book which includes “my aliens” as well as have some of my aliens colored in using Pantone. Ohh the joy of staying up all night, I am pulling more all-nighters than my freshman year at university (which was record breaking for all-nighters)
Ps. Click on the images below to enlarge them
October 13, 2013
Going “Nude”
So I personally thought that this year was going to be the year where I jet of to Europe study during the week and travel and party during the weekend, WORNG. So This weekend I spent my entire weekend dedicated to finishing up my work. I did a fair amount of it. But perfectionist me, I am planning on repeating a large part of my homework. And I personally cant get myself to do it tonight, it has been a long exhausting weekend. But I have to admit never have I ever been so worried but so at ease and relaxed at the same time. Even without enough sleep I always manage to wake up before the alarm, waiting to see what the world has hidden for me. Its an oxymoron where I am so worried and tense but I feel somehow in center with myself and happy. These three weeks I believe had taught me something I never learnt before, is coming prepared and full of confidence but somehow in a second everything comes crashing down. Everything becomes wrong, I know this is a cliché but you dust yourself up and move on and find a better way to do things.
I haven’t posted a daily obsession recently, so here I am posting about the new shades of “nude” a new line that Christian Louboutin has launched for this upcoming season. Explaining “The shoes disappear like magic and become a fluid extension of the woman’s legs, as in a sketch, elongating the silhouette.” In order to achieve this appearance he launched the 5 different shades. And if you are finding trouble knowing which color best matches your skin, you can use a newly launched app to assist you with that. Here are the new shades of “nude”.
October 10, 2013
Rain, Rain, Go Away
First of all I would like to thank everyone that has followed me and liked my pictures on Instagram so far. If you haven’t gotten the chance yet it’s @zaidfarouki. A special thank you for everyone that did! So today was my day off from school. In the morning I had to go run some errands as I had to prepare my papers for tomorrow when I go get my residency in Milan. While I was running my errands I passed by my favorite place for gelato here, its the best I have tasted so far. So I had gelato for breakfast yes I felt like I deserved it on my day off with my stressful week. But I must admit as I lay in bed reviewing what I ate today I feel guilty hahaha.. Later on in the day I went shopping, I knew I had to be ready by 7:15 as I was invited to an event at the BVlGARI store at 7:30. And it is a 15 minute walk from my apartment. As my friend and I arrived to the event it was going really well until it started raining, it wasn’t just raining but it was a torrential downpour. So here is how I look before I got home soaking wet. I can hear the rain now while in bed. I have an early start tomorrow as my class starts at 8:30, Good night everyone!!!
I was wearing An Armani jacket, Theory pants, and Fratelli Rossetti shoes
October 7, 2013
The Day of Changes
Well today it was one of those things that I had to do. I had to create a public Instagram account @zaidfarouki. I will try me best somehow later integrate my Instagram feed into the blog. Well as we all know if social media if used correctly is one of the greatest marketing tools the world has to offer. Because of what I want to do and the work I want to go in. I need to synchronize everything from twitter to Instagram to my blog. Therefore, I have created an Instagram account with the same username as my twitter account, so I will be easier to find on social media. So follow me on both Twitter and Instagram at @zaidfarouki
So after clearing this issue, today has been one of those hectic days, long working hours and getting frightened by my old smoking neighbor that stands between the pots. I think this week our relationship took a new level. We saw each other on the street and greeted each other, I am worried that our relationship is escalating to fast…. So now whenever she sees me she smiles and says “Ciao”. The only conversation that goes on between us is “Bonjourno” and “Ciao” but then she smiles whenever she sees me. Anyways so today I was late to leave my apartment and it was probably the third time I come back from standing in front of the elevator after remembering something I forgot. After I left my apartment for the third time. There she was in black and a grey shawl in between the flower pots smoking and our typical conversation of “Bonjourno” and “Ciao” took place.
Today has been a long day. I woke up early and finished the sketches for my class. And of course the internet limit decides to end today so I had to walk to Vodafone and recharge my account. As this took time there came the lunch hour which every place in Italy closes from 1-3 pm. No one messes with the Italians and their lunch break, So I had to wait around for the art supply store to open again. I met up with a friend for tea afterwards and then I headed off to my pattern making class. So to add even more work to the work. We are supposed to sketch 4 different patterns of skirts and ready by Wednesday and have 1 actual skirt made by Monday. This is going to be a fun weekend. I don’t know whether to be excited or worried.
So below your going to find some sketches that I have made. of course only the presentable ones, not the alien formed ones hahah. Now off to create 2 things on Photoshop and then off to bed because tomorrow is going to be a long day! Classes from 11:15am – 8pm.
Ps. Click on the images to enlarge them.
October 6, 2013
The Weekend
This weekend after doing some work and running errands, my friend and I decided to go sightseeing around Milano, we went to Castello Sforzesco, the castle which is located in the heart of Milan has many museums as well as a fresco made by Leonardo da Vinci as well as Michelangelo’s last sculpture Rondanini Pietà which he worked on before he died. Below you will find photos of my day as a tourist in Milan. Hope you enjoy it!
Ps. Click on the images to enlarge them.
zaidd'or 