chanel ss13

blech. who wants to look like this?

my perfect shoes?

look now. i am a shoe designer.

so, i own a lot of shoes. and i wear a lot of them too. so, it's hard to declare one pair the absolute perfect, favorite pair....

but these are about as close as any pair have come:

they're ysl black suede "flatforms", which is a name i hate, but i think you'll all know what i mean...

i bought these second-hand at tokio 7.

does anyone have any idea what collection they're from?! they seem like production, so i'm pretty sure they weren't just samples....

they're such a perfect blend of luxury and comfort/ practicality that i find myself grabbing them out of the closet on a regular basis....

i wish i could point you in the direction of a pair for yourself, but i wouldn't have the first idea where to send you! if anyone tracks these suckers down, let me know! i may need to order a second pair....

 especially if they came in brown... oh, or navy....

a little late on the nyfw tip.....

a little while back, i had the tremendous opportunity to do some freelance work for alexander wang.

i wanted to share with you the fruits of some of the work that i did there, in case you didn't happen to obsessively follow all of the press coverage of the runway shoes...

you can see all of the runway styles on style.com here.

but this is not the whole ss12 collection.... you'll have to wait a bit longer for those. and there are some goodies, for sure.

working with the team there, including alex himself was a treat. everyone there is talented and professional, and the design team are sweet and funny individuals.

i'm hoping that i'll have the chance to work with them again in the future!

sounds like a watch, but just watch.....

i recently had a lovely little package show up at my house, courtesy of the folks at sseko.

the name sseko is pronounced just like the name seiko, but i was happy that my package did not contain a calculator watch. (tho, i am terribly bad at math. perhaps i should consider one....)

in fact, it contained a cute and novel pair of shoes.

the idea behind the company is pretty terrific- the shoes themselves are made in two separate parts. the bottom, which is a basic tiny wedged rubber sandal, and any number of different fabric straps.

the novel thing about them is that they can be tied any number of different ways, with any number of different straps. so, you've (kind of) got new shoes every day!

sseko works with women in uganda to make these shoes, and encourages their customers to get involved.

slow fashioned (my other internet writing locale) is doing so by partnering with sseko in their "30 ways / 30 days" contest.

so, i've been playing with my new shoes, and coming up with some pretty fun ways to wear them:

at first things went pretty simply:

 

at first i was loving the red straps that sseko provided. i even created my own "tie" in the third photo.

i played around with adding straps made of suede, which i found a bit more comfortable, since they had the natural stretchiness of leather....

playing with the thin and thick choices of straps (by twisting) made for a more girly look, which was nice.....

and then i really hit on what i think will be my signature sseko look:

conbo straps and crazy bows! 

the sseko bottoms are a little bit chunky for my tastes, and since my foot is a bit narrow, they look a bit too heavy on me....

the combo of the leather and fabric straps is great- a little flex in the front, and a little more hold around the ankle.

now that i've mastered some serious twisting and tying, i think i might try to start incorporating some other objects into the mix? i tried to use some bangles as ornaments, but they are just to darned big.

any suggestions? 

now that i've got a good material mix going on here, i think my ssekos are gonna be super comfy for running around the city....

now, if it would just stop RAINING in nyc.....