almostink

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

Pierre Huyghe | Nymphéas Transplant (Fall 1917), 2014. Live pond ecosystem, switchable glass,… [+]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

Popeye No. 860 Cover

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

[almostink]

Simultaneously Insightful and Pretentious

Albam is another one of those brands that do a limited selection of understated wardrobe essentials with a sharp eye for detail and focus on high quality fabrics, except instead of hailing from Japan like most other fabric-first brands we collectively thirst over, the brand hails from the cooler, moodier climates of England.  The brand offers the staples of elevated basics, such as Japanese Selvedge denims, cotton oxfords and English wool knitwear, but for some reason up until now I had glanced over a couple of their previous collections and responded with little more than a shrug. 

For their latest F/W collection, however, Albam really dropped the heat with one of the greatest lookbooks I’ve seen to date.  Their ‘Portraits’ series shows a mixture of new garments for the brand, with an emphasis on high necklines, collaged with paintings in gorgeous earthy hues.  The hero of the collection is by far and beyond this turbo hooded smock, a curveball from the British traditionalists which legitimately looks like the outerwear of choice for white-hat hackers freelancing for government organisations everywhere.  They would probably remark that they were drawn to the brand because the typography of their logo is reminiscent of Segoe UI, or some other observation that is simultaneously insightful and pretentious.  

[almostink]

Wistfully Nostalgic and Kind of Uncomortable

For basically the entirety of my youth, I was a half decent competitive swimmer.  As such, the swimming culture will always occupy a strange place in my heart.  On one hand, it afforded me lots of travel and experiences that I would not have otherwise been exposed to, and on the other, I spent years waking up at 5am every day and pushing my body to its extremes, only to do it all again that night.  So naturally to me Hiroshi Fujiwara’s concept store The Pool Aoyama invokes a strange sense of intrigue, making me both wistfully nostalgic and kind of uncomfortable. That being said, the overall concept and look of the space itself, in addition to Fijiwara’s product under the Pool line being so tasteful that it is probably my favourite store that I’ve never been to, and most likely never will.

The Pool just dropped a collaboration with everyone’s high fashion gateway brand APC. I wear a considerable amount of APC due to their great Melbourne flagship and incredibly solid product for reasonable freight, so this collaboration really seems like it was made especially with me in mind. It features both Petite and regular New Standards, with an accompanying denim jacket each done up in a deep black denim as part of the Pool’s ‘MELANISM’ project.  That will all make a whole lot more sense if you understand what melanin actually does, and if you can get a grip of this through the proxy then you can enjoy beautiful selvedge as black as the hole left by your failed sporting aspirations.

[almostink]

Avant-Garde, Verging on Batshit Crazy

As those of you who don’t live in Australia might not be aware, the iconic Someday store in Melbourne’s Curtin House was recently completely overhauled and relaunched as the city’s flagship Perks and Mini (P.A.M.) store.  Whilst the new space still carries Someday mainstays such as Wtaps, Visvim, Neighborhood and Cav Empt, the store’s interior is now much more stylistically in line with the label whose name it carries, with the entire store coked out and featuring brass clothing racks that emerge out of structures hand made by co-label boss Misha Hollenbach.  The space harmoniously complements the avant-garde, verging on batshit crazy aesthetic P.A.M. has going with its graphic heavy streetwear, and feels like a contemporary art installation moreso than a retail venture.

Seemingly in celebration of the opening of the Melbourne spot in its current iteration, P.A.M. has dropped an exclusive collaboration tee with fellow streetwear heavyweights with a penchant for the abstract; Cav Empt.  The tee is mostly traditional C.E. fare, with some gorgeous internet 1.0 typography over a black and white print, with nods to the two P.A.M. flagships now open in Australia at the bottom.  The shirt is made in Japan and limited to 30 pieces in store and online, well 29 as I already copped before penning this post.  That way when you’re forced to size up because all the L’s are already sold out I get to call #influence and for once feel like I came out ahead in this invidious wasteland of hypebeasts.