ASOS AW2012 preview | Shake it up baby, twist and clash

Fed up of waiting for the ‘New:In’ sections of ASOS to update, we sent Craig White and Katy Spry charging at the new AW2012 collections, beady fashion eyes and cameras at the ready.

The emergence of ASOS as a major player in high street fashion without a single store is proof that online sales in the UK matter, not only in cash terms but in directing trends. The bold ASOS creative team continue to take risks and push high street style into occasionally perplexing directions (check out the woolen houndstooth onesie!) and their mix’n'clash styling suggests new twists and turns while allowing you to cherry pick what’s right for you.

The influence of British designers like Christopher Kane, Osman and House of Holland on this collection are occasionally blatant, but who doesn’t enjoy foxing friends with a well executed knock-off?! Here’s a round up in pictures of the key ASOS looks for AW2012.

Can Mary Portas be the Queen of Shoes too?

Versayce went along to the Clarks’ press day last week on behalf of S&TS to preview the autumn/winter collections. 

Given some of the excruciating situations and characters on TV show Mary Queen of Shops, anyone would think Mary Portas was addicted to pain. Her current level of ubiquity certainly suggests she has a schedule punishing enough for an incarcerated criminal.

Not so her capsule range for Clarks‘ autumn/winter 2012 collection, which despite featuring dangerously high heels, is constructed, we were told, using comfort technologies allowing for striking looks without so much as a squished little toe. This continues Mary’s relentless quest to make businesses better understand and provide for their customers. Her line is squarely aimed to meet the demands of women whose lives are chock full of kids and work, and who insist they’ll look stunning while keeping the entire dinner service spinning. Running around maybe more conducive to trainers and flats, but where’s the fun in that?

Clarks unquenchable thirst for collaboration continues in their main and Originals collections. Harris Tweed and Jaguar Shoes Collective are recruited from the UK, while Velour (from Sweden) and Rocky Mountain Featherbed (US) bring accents from further afield. While the shape of the shoes are on the whole conservative and comfortable, you can’t fault Clarks for their determination to balance these core values with relevance to today’s trend-led shoe buyers. Where they succeed is with those designs which eschew the clunky and deliver on sharp lines, or where the choice of material really hollers quality and charm. Here are our pick of the pairs…

Flight BA2012 | Fasten your seatbelts for British Airways’ new pop up restaurant

Lucky Craig White of the hilarious but now sadly defunct blog I got it at Versayce managed to nab a ticket for Flight BA2012, the latest pop up restaurant to hit East London, and he wrote us this guest post about it.

Flight BA2012 is the new high concept pop-up restaurant launched by British Airways this week in Shoreditch, to bring together and promote several strands of BA’s high-profile, high cost Olympic marketing strategy. Sounds sexy doesn’t it? Well, as flight attendants usher you to your table in the sleek mock-aircraft interior, it certainly is.

The cabin’s clean colours, sharp lines and crisply uniformed staff make you feel at once relaxed and like you’re at the start of a futuristic adventure. It’s quirky. It’s fun. And the glass of chilled champagne as you take your seat makes for a smooth take off. A look at the menu brings you right back down to earth though.

Inspired by BA’s in-flight food from around the last London Olympics in 1948, you can’t help thinking the average episode of Ready Steady Cook! would have turned out a more enlivened set of ingredients: beef, beetroot, cabbage, mashed potato, mackerel, duck egg. The futuristic ambiance of the cabin definitely sagged under the weight of the bucolic dishes on offer.

Where was the great British food of today? Is fish pie or beef topped with piped mashed potato – no matter how beautifully presented (and it was) – any way of trumpeting what puts the Great in GB 2012?

I should add that all the dishes will be served in either Business or Club Class on actual BA flights this summer, so certain technical considerations limit what is achievable. Nevertheless, most M&S pre-packed salads show more inventiveness than the frankly workaday combinations that chef Simon Hulstone offered up. While well executed, these dishes were examples of British food at its most comforting, conforming to a pervasive and persistent stereotype that British food is unadventurous and rather drab.

If British food was meant to be celebrated and championed by this menu, then it’s a British food of a bygone era. It was a trip into the past which left me feeling that our national airline is misrepresenting us. I just hope visitors from abroad manage to leave their expectations of Britain at the airport gate and discover just how adventurous and inventive we really are.

Dining seats on Flight BA2012 have all sold out, but you can still go for drink in the gallery, no booking required. Visit the Flight BA2012 Facebook page for more info.