Monday , November 16, 2009
Love: Virginia Johnson
After five long and arduous years spent abroad, braving either -4357485 billion degree winter days in Montreal or intense societal pressures to "network" and "make connections" in New York City, I am as happy as a mutated clam in Lake Ontario to be back in my hometown of Toronto. Toronto is by no means the greatest city in the world, I think it would be most appropriate to bestow that honor upon Tokyo, Marrakech or Savannah (Editor's note: I have never been to any of these cities. That statement is a "best guess"). Nevertheless, Toronto is a fantastic place to be in 2008. IT IS SO HAPPENING! It's chill, the perfect midpoint between large and small (I think they call that "medium"), super-supportive, affordable, has good vegan food, and has finally attained its twenty-year-long goal of becoming a World-Class City.
I am really excited by the heaping bounds of creativity that I see in the output of Toronto artists and designers these days. It's so nice to finally reside in a place that nurtures its artistic population, and where members of said population nurture and support one another. Virginia Johnson is one of my favorite fashion designers in the world right now, and I am SO PROUD that she hails from Toronto, which, for the record, is pronounced Trawna if you're from here.
After spending this weekend on an organic farm, I have been thinking a lot about all the brute force and highly-involved processes that go into the production and creation of pretty much anything. What I love the most about Johnson's designs is that these processes are highlighted and honored in the aesthetics of her end products. Her printed fabrics and textiles are perfectly flawed; Johnson is inspired primarily by organic patterns and shapes (pebbles, birds, animals, flowers, etc.), so her collections tend to have an Impressionistic, Art Deco-y feel to them. She works with yarn, viscose, knits, jacquards, and Austrian merinos- I LOVE that her fall collection actually looks like fall! I find that the differentiation between fall and spring collections can be pretty much nothing (except for maybe using pastels rather than muted tones), and I find it highly comforting to see clothing that looks so cozy and functional. VJ's autumn collection is really perfectly-suited to going on an apple-picking date with Michael Showalter, which is my big goal for this impending October.
Virginia has a really delightful little shoppe on Toronto's hopping Ossington Avenue (it's at 132 Ossington, to be precise). Expect an installment of nogoodforme.tv to be filmed there sometime before this year is done. Personally, I think I might die of a broken heart if I don't get to be wearing Virginia's tweed pullover (as seen below) in any context at all, even if it has to be imaginary.
Showcased below are some of my favorite items from Virginia's fall collecksh:
But the most exciting thing of all about Virginia Johnson is that she has super-kindly donated a turquoise fish-print scarf to the SPIRIT ANIMAL HOUSE RAFFLE, which you could totally win! I am presently holding onto said turquoise fish-print scarf, which is totally annoying because I want to wear it every single day of my life, but can't, because I'll probably spill food all over it and ruin the raffle for everybody. However, I selflessly took some time out of my day to show you what an awesomely versatile article of clothing this scarf is:
Isn't it gorgeous? Don't you want it? Wouldn't it make your life SO EASY? Well, my babies: it can be yours. Good Luck, Good-lookin'!
Tags: raffle tickets, Spirit Animal House, Toronto, Virginia Johnson
Share | 
| 
| 
|
|
Posted by Laura in Spirit Animal House |
Permalink |
Leave a comment |
Comments (1)
+ Contact Us
+ HOME
1 Comments!!
Say something so insightful and witty, it will blow us away. (No pressure.)
Got something to say? We'd love to hear it! Name, email and "type in the weirdo drunken text" thingie are all required to comment; don't worry, we won't email you or anything, we just want to make sure you're not an evil spambot. Keeping in mind the good-times mentality we like to keep going here, we've worked hard to keep NOGOODFORME.COM as fun as possible. We welcome all kinds of comments, but insults/abuse/general bitchery are not tolerated. In other words, we put the smackdown on evil troll posts. If you want to be a hater, please go elsewhere. Now, as Salt 'N Pepa say, "Only the sexy people..."
I've only been to Toronto once, but your post is making me miss it so much! Also, dude, how cute do you look in that fish scarf.
By Meggy
on September 1, 2008 4:42 PM