Dubiously competent fashion photography at the National Museum's Ancient Egypt party.

Yesterday I went to the National Museum of Scotland adults-only night, because anything that puts sarcophagi and booze in the same locale is A-OK by me. Compared to some of the late-opening museum parties I've been to in the past it was a little underwhelming, partially because tickets weren't free, but since this is only their second event I'll let that slide.

The theme was Ancient Egypt, which meant gold, jeweled body-art, mummies, and the sort of Egyptian-themed cocktail only a Scot could make up -- the Tutankhamorangie, a Glenmorangie whisky promo. To my disappointment not many people had come in costume, outside of a few performers and the dressing-up area.. However, having my camera with me I decided to do a spot of extremely amateur fashion photography. The Sartorialist I most definitely am not.

London Fashion Week, Fall 2012: Mary Katrantzou.

Digital prints have been on the rise for a while now, but Katrantzou is still queen. She's been on the radar for less than four years, but youth and the fact that she runs her own label give her liberty to pursue her strengths. And what that means at the moment is that she's producing entire shows of unique digital-print clothes season after season. Thanks to a combination of critical accolades and publicity for her new Topshop line, Fall 2012 was her true breakthrough London Fashion Week show.

pics from Style.com

Mary Katrantzou shot to the top of my favourite-designers list as soon as I saw her Fall 2011 collection last year. She deserves her good reviews for a multitude of reasons, but most importantly to me, she's creating clothes that are drastically different not only from the current fashion zeitgeist but from anything I've seen before. She's the sort of expert that creates itself -- an artist who has been developing her own visual brand for years, waiting quietly for the rest of the world to catch up. I have no doubt that there are other, lesser-known designers who don't have London Fashion Week slots who have explored prints in equally innovative ways, but Mary K is the only designer in mainstream fashion whom I'd describe as a true master of the art.

NYFW Fall 2012: Ralph Lauren, Alexander Wang, Badgley Mischka, Creatures of the Wind, and more.

Ralph Lauren

As someone on twitter put it, this is like looking into my brain. Ralph Lauren's Fall 2012 show was heavily influenced by pre-war British menswear, included multiple flavours of tweed, and was soundtracked by the Downton Abbey theme music. At least half the collection was made up of Edwardian/1920s trouser suits for ladies, about which I could not be happier.

catwalk pics from Style.com

This was one of those situations where objective criticism falls by the wayside. I love early 20th Century suits, especially on women; I love knee-length trousers; I love Downton Abbey and continue to masochistically watch it despite the fact that I spend most of each episode shouting obscenities at Julian Fellowes' soap-opera hack style of screenwriting. Yes, this is something of a pastiche collection, but I think it plays around enough with 1910s/20s style (plus being genderswitched) that it doesn't fall into the category of directly-copied period costume.

Movie Costumes I Have Loved: Hanna.

Regular readers will be unsurprised to learn that last month's Oscar nominations did not exactly wow me in the Costume Design category. All five nominated films are period dramas (if you're interested in more detail as to why this irritates me, try my Introduction to Costume Design post), and in my view only one of them deserves a win: Hugo, whose costume designer Sandy Powell has already been nominated ten times and won three. Her acceptance speech for The Young Victoria last year mostly amounted to, "This one's dedicated to all the costume designers who work on films that aren't about dead monarchs -- you know, the ones you guys routinely ignore." COME ON.

As for what I'd nominate, the easiest answer is Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Although perhaps not an obvious contender for its costumes, my other favourite movie of 2011 was Hanna. It stars Saoirse Ronan as a girl raised in complete isolation by her father, a former spy. When Hanna reaches her mid-teens she decide that she's ready leave the forest where they've lived for her entire life, but in order to live freely they must first escape the clutches of Marissa Wiegler (Cate Blanchett), the CIA agent who has been hunting Hanna's father for years.

Spring 2012 Haute Couture: Dior, Mabille, Valli, Givenchy, Versace, and Armani.

Christian Dior

It's rare for me to agree with anything the Guardian' Fashion Editor Jess Cartner-Morley writes, but today's "Has couture lost its edge?" article was pretty spot on. So far the shows at Couture Fashion Week have been lacklustre, when ordinarily they'd be the highlight of the fashion world's year. That's the danger of working in an art form that relies upon funding from retail business and work from hundreds of disparate corporate employees worldwide. In times of economic difficulty, imagination and creativity have to fall by the wayside in favour of saleability and broad appeal. The Dior show was a textbook  example of this: sumptuous quality combined with a back-to-basics approach to the classic New Look silhouette -- a collection that could have been released at any time in the last 60 years, and sold well in any of them.

I have less criticism for Dior than I do for many of the other designers who resorted to trotting out entire collections of tired gown clichés this season. The New Look is Dior's heritage and legacy, and the quality of their Couture is so high that I can excuse a season or two of relatively bland designs. Plus, when Dior stages a Couture show they really know how to go for full-on glamour and allow the models to work it for once, instead of making them strut and down like seething, expressionless droids.

Fall 2012 Menswear: Givenchy, John Galliano, Ann Demeulemeester, Berluti, Commes des Garcons, and Walter van Beirendonck.

Givenchy
The title of this show was The American Dream, but before I learned that I assumed it was more of an American sports theme than anything so metaphysical. The striped shirts were close relatives of the rugby jersey, and the skirts reminded me of cheerleading skirts thanks to the star patterns. "Leather sweatshirt" isn't really a look that works in real life, but by and large I approve of this show since it avoided the obvious red-white-and-blue stereotyping of a typical USA-themed collection. As is typical, the skirts were balanced out by heavily masculine touches over the rest of the outfits -- clumpy shoes, bullish nose-rings (inspired by the Minotaur, because apparently that's a thing that people are inspired by), hints of sportswear, and a lack of close tailoring. The concept of designers feeling the need to compensate for skirts in menswear collections is one that I find irritating, but easy enough to understand.

And no, this isn't a kilt. Kilts don't have pleats at the front.

The progress of man-skirts from the far outer reaches of high-end menswear to everyday high street fashion is slow-going, but I'm heartened to see more of them on the runways every year. The stigma of wrapping some cloth around your waist is idiotic -- especially since skirts or kilts can often be more flattering than trousers to certain body types.

Dolce & Gabbana Menswear: Fall 2012.

I think this is the first menswear post I've made on Hello, Tailor, so let me begin with this obvious yet necessary disclaimer: menswear is different from womenswear. Due to the way our society views men "dressing up", menswear tends to be a lot less daring than womenswear. I guarantee that when Fall Fashion Week comes along, there will be multiple looks that will make you go, "What the hell is that?" and then think, "Well, I suppose Lady Gaga/Tilda Swinton/Beyonce will be wearing it by next month." During Menswear Fashion Week there will be some bizarre and wonderful outfits on the runway, make no mistake, but I highly doubt that you'll be seeing many of them on men in the public eye. There will always be people willing to spend a three-figure sum on designer t-shirts, but there's less pressure for menswear designers to explore much further than that. Happily, there will also be an awful lot of well-tailored suits, so you can expect to see a lot of suit pictures in the upcoming weeks.

photos from Style.com

Dolce & Gabbana is only the second show I've looked at this Menswear Fashion Week, but I'm already sure that it's still going to be one of my favourites come the end of the season. D&G have expertly trod the line between traditional suits and eye-catching runway fashion, ending up with something that mixes unexpected fabric choices, three-piece formal suits (always a winner), and old-fashioned luxury without often straying into the territory of over-the-top opulence.

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

Previously: A fan's introduction to costume design.

This is something of a follow-up to my post from a few months ago, in which I criticised the way the American remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was being marketed. Having now seen the film itself, I can say that it's just as excellent as all the reviews say, although I still prefer the original Swedish version. Rooney Mara's performence was brilliant (and often surprisingly funny -- she's a master of the deadpan "fuck you" one-liner), and different enough from Noomi Rapace's that it didn't seem like a retread. Daniel Craig's was a little trickier. He was a lot more likeable than Michael Nyqvist, the actor who played Blomkvist in the Swedish film, and I think the story benefits from Blomkvist being an appealing character since Salander is so intent on being unappealing. But Craig almost seemed too polished and charming, whereas Nyqvist was more believable as a middle-aged journalist. It feels cheap to namecheck James Bond, but Craig came across as a little too charming and heroic for my tastes, for all that Salander still bore the brunt of the violence in the film.

Craig was far more dapper than I expected for the character of Blomkvist, which made it more difficult for me to separate Daniel Craig from Michael Blomkvist in my mind, particularly since he's otherwise famous for another very well-dressed character. This new, stylish Blomkvist wore tailored trousers and was rarely seen without a fitted waistcoat -- in other words, he was often almost indistinguishable in appearance from Daniel Craig in red-carpet mode.

To my surprise, I had no problems with the alterations Fincher made to the ending. In fact, it counted in the film's favour since I no longer knew what was going to happen next. My main criticisms come down to personal taste rather than the objective quality of the film.

The most important thing about BBC Sherlock's "A Scandal In Belgravia".

I love Sherlock Holmes. Not just the new adaptations where Robert Downey Jr and Jude Law slap-fight in 14 layers of tweed and drive a steampunk rocketship into Benjamin Disraeli (or whatever pseudo-Victorian thing it is this year). Those movies are great and everything, but I also like to read the books. In fact, once I made a timeline bookmark for my Complete Sherlock Holmes so I could read them in chronological order from "GLOR: 1875" (The Adventure Of The Gloria Scott) to "LAST: 1914" (His Last Bow). Simply put, the reason why there's less plot/characterisation analysis than usual in this post is because if I started I wouldn't be able to stop. I'd just hulk out into an ultimate Sherlock nerd and start word-vomiting a treatise on why Mycroft's cigarette choices indicate that he and Sherlock were neglected as children.

Photo from one of GQ's many articles about Sherlock's (apparently) endlessly fascinating coat.

The costumes of Sherlock are, to be honest, not hugely exciting. In the first series they establish Sherlock Holmes in a uniform of dark, expensive designer menswear, and John Watson in a selection of porridge-coloured jumpers and dumpy cardigans apparently chosen to make him look as nondescript as possible. You could probably knit John and Sarah Lund from The Killing together into some kind of BBC crime-drama knitwear Megazord.

Dressing for the Apocalypse

Glasgow is currently experiencing one of those Grey Christmasses that are so often inexplicably ignored by song and story. Grey because the sun only rises for about two hours per day; grey because of the unrelenting sleet. Today, a trip to the shops was not unlike one of those Lord Of The Rings scenes where Frodo and Sam are trudging up Mount Doom. Or The Road:

As a further illustration of how much of a Feral Sweater Person one becomes in this climate, this is what I was wearing to go out on said shopping trip:

Caveat: I haven't actually seen The Road. However, I know what it looks like, and was reminded of this when I met up with my friend J the other day. I should mention at this point that J has been living in a forest for the last six months, although in the interests of fairness I should also mention that he kind of dresses like this anyway. It's awesome:

REVVVEEENNNGE: Nolan Ross costume analysis RETURNS.

I've already written quite extensively about my love of the character Nolan Ross in Revenge. Not only is he the best character in what is already an extremely entertaining show, but his dress sense is eye-bendingly awesome. He has this whole peacockish prepster-satire thing going on, and once you start looking out for it you notice that he appears to be wearing themed outfits in certain scenes. Last week he donned a sleazy-looking brown silk patterned dressing-gown to lounge around in after a sordid, loveless tryst, and I'm almost certain this was on purpose.

At the start of this week's episode (1x09) Nolan is wearing a fairly everyday ensemble: top half normal-looking, bottom half douchey prepster. (Tragically, you can't see the white dress shoes he's wearing to go with the white jeans and white belt. But rest-assured they are very white and shiny.) 

This is his "I'm not going to be hanging around anyone important today so who cares" outfit, the one he wears to do minor household tasks such as purring threats into the ears of people in bars at 11am, and spying on murderous identity-thieving strippers. (I know, right? This show is amazing.) However, later on he's invited to a party full of financial types, there to invest in the probably-corrupt company of his part-time-rentboy fuckbuddy. Aside from the show's protagonist and the aforementioned part-time-rentboy financial advisor, he's the youngest person at the party by about 20 years. So he wears this:

Leyendecker and the Arrow Collar Man.

Because I feel this blog has been tragically short on vintage suits so far, here's a post all about Leyendecker and the Arrow Collar Man.

The Arrow Collar Man is a creation of J.C. Leyendecker, a German-American illustrator of magazine covers and advertisements in the 1900s-30s. Leyendecker worked on a variety of illustrations and ad campaigns, but his speciality was these hyper-masculine, square-jawed all-American guys who spent their days smoking, posing in a manly fashion, and playing sports. The Arrow Collar Man is kind of The Man Your Man Could Smell like of the early 20th Century.

Movie Costumes I Have Loved: Doomsday

photo from here.

At some point I'll go back to writing serious reviews, but having spent the day wandering around Glasgow, my thoughts turned to Doomsday instead. In this film the costumes, like everything else, are nonsense and should be taken with a pinch of critical salt. Doomsday is the film that would happen if someone put every 1980s dystopic/apocalyptic movie in a blender and then set the resulting mish-mash in mid-21st-Century Scotland. This quote from Cheri Priest will hopefully give you an idea of what I'm talking about:

"...it’s got humanity-eating plagues, tribes of cannibal punks, medieval-style fiefs with knights and torture chambers, rubber-wrapped gimps, futuristic soldiers with wacky hardware, cyborg eyeballs, embittered but noble old cops, corrupt and power-mad politicians, tanks, humorous decapitations, and Malcolm McDowell dressed like Henry the Eighth."

Also there's a dance sequence set to Adam Ant. This film came out in 2008, by the way. Not back when Adam Ant was still on the cutting edge of the anachronistic pop-culture zeitgeist. To ease you gently into the logic-free world of Doomsday, here's comparatively subdued screenshot:

Movie Costumes I Have Loved: True Romance.

I'm taking the "costumes I have loved" theme very literally here, since True Romance is unlikely to make anyone's top ten list of films with cleverest costume design.

I was reminded of this film when I saw Drive this weekend. Drive and True Romance both have this sensitivity/brutality, garishness/darkness dichotomy thing going on, and despite wildly differing in tone, both stories are in similar veins of "petty criminals get in over their heads" + sweet romance. Ryan Gosling's scorpion-pattern jacket is already iconic enough to have inspired fan-made posters, but it comes from the same school of cheap, artificial-fibre colourful Americana as the less famous costumes of True Romance.

True Romance is an early '90s psychos-in-love romantic thriller: Badlands or Bonnie & Clyde by way of Quentin Tarantino. In fact, in true Tarantino referential style, the theme music of True Romance is adapted from Badlands itself.