Archive for July 2010

Foot Patrol: A Look Inside

Sunday, 25 July 2010 Comments Off


Maybe it'll be tmrw, maybe the day after - or the week after, but the first glimpses of the new Foot Patrol store give the impression that it's definitely worth the wait.


Designed by The Wilson Brothers (Ben and Oscar) and Brinkworth, the store is a capsule built within the shell of a larger space.


The wood ceiling, walls and floor all made from recycled scaffold look sturdy and solid, yet allow for easy movement of the black steel retail fixtures.


All the shoes and garments in the store have been selected by the founder, now Creative Director of Foot Patrol, Michael Kopelman.


With the iconic gas mask logo rendered in a aged metal frame and white neon at the entrance, the space has all the makings of a luxury bunker, an exclusive safehouse for true sneaker heads.


Let's synchronise our watches.



Foot Patrol - 80 Berwick Street, London, W1
Pix by Louise Melchior.

Ah but that's Montgomery Clift, honey!

Friday, 23 July 2010 Comments Off



First heard of Clift thro the book by Patricia Bosworth. Read his biog before I saw any of his movies. It was the cover: a man in a suit and a tie carrying a raincoat - windswept. Looked amazing, intriguing, on point.

Ofcourse he was no Steve McQueen; even on screen he seemed way too vulnerable to be that cool.

He was no Brando; he never seemed to fill the screen in the same way as Brando, just the part.

And he was no Dean; he didn't possess that same explosive quality as his ever admiring fan.

No, Clift was none of the above and all the better an actor for it.

Even today, his acting style seems modern, convincing, natural.

Check out his part in From Here to Eternity or The Misfits; for all the talk about the Method, his drugs and his illnesses, there's a realism in his acting which still makes it seem effortless and true even now.

The only line that's wrong in Shakespeare is "holding a mirror up to nature." You hold a magnifying glass up to nature. As an actor you just enlarge it enough so that your audience can identify with a situation. If it were a mirror we would have no art. Clift.

Clift died on this day back in 1966.

This is James Brown

Wednesday, 21 July 2010 Comments Off


Topsider Pop of Yesteryear revisited: Yacht Rock

Wednesday, 7 July 2010 Comments Off


Pure Joy.

Maybe you need to love a thing so much you have enough insight to ridicule it. Maybe it comes from not taking yourself too seriously in the first place.

What I love about these Yacht Rock sketches is that it's obvious they love the genre but also have the capacity to step away from it; see straight through it.

I think that fun is something missing in a lot of areas right now; from the way we see today's Topsider Pop groups like Vampire Weekend, to our shared passions about Ivy style and 'cool.'

A look at the Yacht Rock series affirms that a little detachment goes a long way.



Now, mix yourself a Pina Colada, sit back and enjoy.







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