ROYAL BLUE

According to Vincent Gregoire of Nelly Rodi trend forecasting agency in Paris, Royal Blue will be the trend color for the year 2014, however Karl Lagerfeld tells us that "trend" is the last stage before the "has-been".

 

Royal blue, clockwise by; Miles Davis' "kind of blue" album cover, pantone color chart No 18-3949, french artist Georges Rousse optical illusion in blue, Henri Matisse blue nude paper cut out 1952, the blue city of Jodhpur in India, Valentino 2013-2014 fall/winter collection of delft blue dresses, Robert Wagt fashion illustration of an Yves St.Laurent dress and make up artist Pat Mc Grath's eyeshade for Anna Sui.

Bad weather

Gene Kelley was singing in the rain, Milli Vanilli blamed it on the rain, Leo Sayer had it raining in his heart, for Elvis it was all he needed, and  the Weather girls had it raining men, Prince's was purple and Peter Gabriel's red, the Seekers asked themselves what they had done to it and for Aaron Neville it felt like rain, whilst Duran Duran had to hold it back and where Rod Stewart lives they had ten days of downpour, which would have been great for Garbage and Eric Clapton , because they are only happy when it rains. So they ain't going to thank Nick Cave because according to him it ain't going to rain no more.

                             

      

                 

                     

Hard rain's a gonna fall, according to, clockwise from top left; Japanese woodblock print artist Hiroshige, Pierre Le-Tan, Robert Wagt 's couple on a solex in the rain, Adrian Johnson likes London in the rain, British photographer Martin Parr's famous "bad weather" pictures, Rene Gruau Blizzand raincoat ad and last but not least Saul Steinberg.

I want to ride my bicycle

It seems that the Dutch, among the worlds most bike friendly inhabitants, are born with a bicycle between their legs.

Countless two-wheelers in more or less advanced state of ruin, have succeeded my first one, a sturdy grey colored fixed gear, which was too big for my 4 year old body, as I was soon to find out, collecting my first road rash.

Nobody wore a helmet in those days, let alone training wheels.

Since then I have had numerous encounters with fate, pushing my luck biking in big cities not particularly known for their bike-friendliness (Milan, Paris) only to find myself living in Nyack, NY a little village on the Hudson a stone throw away from New York and better known as the home of the "Runcible spoon" obligatory turnaround point for hordes of MAMILS biking from the city and showing of their latest bike gadget whilst boasting about making more mileage then your average jetliner.

         

          

     

     

        


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Spin those wheels, clockwise from top left; famous dutch illustrator Fiep Westendorp's illustration for Big Ben rain wear, Robert Wagt little girl riding her bike, the Tour de France as seen by german illustrator Wolf Erlbruch,  New Yorker cover by Frank Viva, Rogelio Naranjo, french photographer and illustrator Jean-Paul Goude's take on the Olympics for ELLE, a yarn bombed bicycle by  Guerilla crochet, dutch illustrator Joost Swarte poster for "rencontres Chaland 2010", poster for Vittorio de Sica's 1948 classic movie "bicycle thieves/ladri di bicicletta".

A cafe in Paris

        

       

      

Parisian cafes, brasseries and bistros, clockwise from top left; Robert Wagt, Miles Hyman, Kiraz, Rene Gruau, a Parisian terrace by Henri Cartier-Bresson, Irving Penn for Vogue, famous Parisian cafe "les deux magots" by Jean-Jacques  Sempe and a Parisian brasserie terrace as seen by Voutch.

To some people Paris may seem as a clutter of Bistros, Bars, Cafes and Brasseries and sure enough my earliest memories as an 18 year old thumbing my way into France are of a mixture of Gauloises cigarette smells and cafe au lait, of waiters shouting "un jambon beurre, un!" and of those famous Turkish toilets, the French sanitary equivalent of a car driving of a cliff.
A lot of water has passed under the bridges of the Seine since then, gone are the Gauloises and the Gitanes and with them the Turkish toilets, the coffee's still not strong enough to defend itself and the waiters, well.... after all it's Paris!