November gray on my mind

BCBGMaxAzria Fall 2010

Gray is maybe the color that has the most impact on my mind. A gray snow slushy suburb square is so totally depressing, while a bare birch wood in november encourages me to breath life.





'It's gray' doesn't sound very positive. Gray sounds dull and gloomy, out of spirit, neutral. It's an everyday color making no difference. It doesn't require any attention. And exactly this can be relieving, soothing, meditative. It' lets the mind rest and focus on it's own path without getting interrupted.


It's amazing how different you can experience a gray landscape. To some extention it has to do with the materials. Concrete and steel connote construction, non flexibility and forced order while organic materials as whool, wood and stone signals wisdom of age, memories and hidden secrets. It's also possible to copy these two different versions through combining different shades of gray with eachother or just using one plain shade.

wall art fr Germany

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Lace and Purple - Women's only

Lace is something of the most feminine you can wear. You see a ruffled shirt sometimes on some guy trying out the leather rokoko rock style, but a sheer layer of white lace is very rare to spot.

Also the colors of purple and purpur are often reserved for women. Especially in soft materials. As well as the overall - in soft materials, and knickers or bloomers.

Until 200 years ago the fashion was different. Men posed in lace and purpur to show off their financial grandeur. Purpur was the most expensive color to produce, gathered en masse from small shells and lace the most expensive fabrics. The men were just as much as the women porters of these signals of wealth.

With the industrial revolution wealth came with work and men started to wear more practical and dull suits, while their women got the one and single task to still represent the status of the couple with expensive and fantastic outfits. The women became the beautyful, the jewellery great to look at.


At the same time Darwinists concluded that men and women had different purposes, they were different and it got important to show those differencies by all powers. So the purple, still worn by women became the color of the weak, of fragility close associated with trembeling flowers. The lace became as female as can be, and the blommers are only seen as women's underwear ever since.

There was an attempt in the 70s to brake these associations, but I believe it only made them stronger. Will we ever see them on men again? Do we want to?