unwound floors

these things sent to dance across the room.

2010-12-30T02:26:00.000-08:00

underworld, pearl's girl.

Summer's gearing up. I'm not quite here right now: houseparties, city streets, hangovers, late nights and the thump of a kick drum. Love.

your sun flies high

2010-12-15T04:59:00.000-08:00

Tank: Bonds | Bra: Calvin Klein | Necklace: Urban Originals

I'd almost forgotten this existed!

Hi. I'm Miki. I'm nineteen, Japanese-Australian, and I live in Melbourne, Australia. I'm in my second year of a Bachelor of Arts with a major in Criminology and taking over airwaves at Radio Monash.

Here are some things I like: I dig the sound of a good beat, turned up so loud I feel it vibrating through the floors. After my classes are done, I like to pick up a coffee and sit outside the Mathieson Library for a cigarette before I head home. My best friends are all beautiful creatures. Mangoes are my favourite fruit. I tweet a lot. I enjoy finishing off a long day by constructing an excellent playlist in iTunes, lolling about on my bed. I like to delude myself into thinking I'm a good writer as I pour out my disjointed, messy poetics into the various notebooks I've amassed. I like my blog, but nobody ever reads or comments on it. I get off on the presence of enthusiastic and warm-hearted people. My boyf(r)iend Andreas is the greatest thing ever. I'm on a break at the moment, but I do fortnightly mixes for dirtyRadio.org on a show called Iconastasia. I have a tattoo - "thin paper wings" from Juanita/Kiteless/To Dream of Love by Underworld.

I enjoy aesthetics, which I suppose is why I have a fashion blog? I get inspired a lot by two main things: I really like music, and the movement and life of cities and urban environments. The feel of a city is expressed in so many different ways: its sounds, words, flashes of imagery, overheard conversation. Concrete, glass, streets, people. In terms of music, I'm a beats fiend. In a way I think these things inspire my desire to blog about fashion: translating these things into something tangible, something that I go to university or out for the evening in wearing.

So, hello. Who are you and what do you love?

blue, blue, blue.

2010-02-18T00:11:00.000-08:00

Bubble girl you feel like a movie
And bubble blow beat faster
Liquid
Bubble fish take fast slow
Fast slow
Bubble fast slow down
Big slow up

Not quite sure why, but this editorial reminds me of Cups by Underworld. I can't find the original track on YouTube, but this Salt City Orchestra remix is just as excellent.

I have something catastrophic to admit to the fashion-blogging world: I'm not actually all that great at dressing myself. I'm eighteen, I work a mind-numbing job in retail for something like twelve dollars an hour, and most of what I earn is spent on necessities - alcohol (ha!), food, and seeing my friends. It's kind of hard to put together a decent wardrobe when you haven't got much cash to play with. I do try, though.

I guess what I really like about fashion is the art behind it: the use of clothing, models, makeup, backdrops, everything that goes into styling an editorial. And translating that into something that works out and about in the real world: today, I feel moody and aloof, so this pair of boots, that coat, an old dress that Mum gave to me, and a necklace my jeweller father gave to me.

Not quite sure where I'm going with this, but: yeah. Fashion as art: something visually appealing, meant to evoke an emotional response - that's where it's at. I love this editorial - Jacques Dequeker’s 3D Story for The KRTL Collective. A very simple concept, but executed brilliantly.

silence is preserving a voice.

2010-02-12T04:41:00.000-08:00

RIP Alexander McQueen. What terrible news for the world of fashion; you'll be sorely missed.

she said, once again the superstar.

2010-02-08T21:54:00.000-08:00

Yet again, my apologies for the extended absence. Where have I been? Well, it's summer, and the days are blurry and dense with heat. I sleep through the days, show my face at work sometimes, and drink through the evenings with good people. Joints, gin and tonics, chemicals, beats, the prospect of university in just under a month - it's a good life.

In other news:

Abbey Lee Kershaw is still heartbreakingly beautiful and I'm considering breaking out of the mould and actually beginning to wear colours. That could be fun. Also: how lovely is the makeup in this editorial? All candy-bright colours and nails. Very weather-appropriate.

burberry prorsum 2010.

2009-09-23T07:00:00.000-07:00

images courtesy style.com.

How lovely. Pastel shades, perfectly executed draping and gorgeous details. Sort of makes me regret the turn of the seasons.

alexander wang s/s '09

2009-09-15T19:55:00.000-07:00

And to think I got my hair cut today.

run, run, run.

2009-08-31T03:51:00.000-07:00

Apologies for the recent lack of content. Life continues on at its rapid-fire pace.

things replace things, days replace days.

2009-07-15T18:20:00.000-07:00

( photos courtesy the beautiful taxidermies! )

My Canon film camera is being repaired at the moment. Watch this space.

i follow all around the world for you.

2009-06-29T02:13:00.000-07:00

( via jak & jil )

Oh, my. The perfect contrast between masculine, tough-girl tux jacket and that lovely detailed blouse. I approve.

in love with your strict machine.

2009-06-28T06:50:00.000-07:00

( courtesy ru_glamour. )

Abbey Lee Kershaw is so gorgeous it kind of makes me want to cry, it's ridiculous. I love this look, all leather and monochrome and and clean lines. If I were the person who could pull this look off, I'd be wearing it constantly.

spent two long years in a strange, strange land.

2009-06-14T10:14:00.000-07:00

Sleep? What is this strange and alien concept you speak of?

(ru_glamour)

Oh, Lily Donaldson, you are too beautiful.

i don't see you falling beautiful, sometimes.

2009-06-14T08:38:00.001-07:00

So I think maybe one of the first steps to getting into the lively, lovely world of fashion is quite possibly to learn how to live with my self-image issues. Or something. Because I haven't introduced myself, yet: my name is Miki. I'm eighteen, I'm Japanese-Australian, and am currently living in Melbourne. I finished my final year of highschool last year, I'm now kickin' it in an awful, awful retail job, saving up money to support my clothes habit, and hopefully get myself to Japan by the end of a year for adventures and good times. It's nice to meet you!

Like many girls my age, I’m not terribly comfortable with the way I look. I'm by no means conventionally beautiful. I barely nudge five feet, I've got hips and breasts and a reasonably-sized behind, a big nose, short legs and curvy arms. Clothes hang awkwardly on my strangely-formed frame and I look in the mirror sometimes, or catch a glimpse of myself in a glass window when I'm out, and think - god, what is that awkward, badly-dressed creature I spy?

I know that there are people out there who'd be quick to blame this state of mind on anybody but myself: no, it's the way I was raised, this hetero-normative, patriarchal society's ideals of the "perfect woman" (oh, yes - I'm one of those) being forced on me, it's all those awful expensive magazines I buy and read and consume mindlessly, that warp and destroy that delicate thing we call 'self-esteem', that fragile image I have of myself, the relationship I hold with my body. I call bullshit.

Well, to an extent. It's true that there's an absurd amount of pressure on girls these days to look just so - lose weight, paint your lips, cut your hair, pout, look pretty or men will never look twice. But then, I feel like it's too easy just to blame everybody else, too easy to wallow in self-pity. While it's true that there's far too much pressure from all sides, I feel like it's also my responsibility as a reasonable and not-unintelligent girl drowning in privilege to suck it up and deal with it. I'm healthy, I have an income (which I'm reasonably proud to say I work like a slave for - tragically, mummy and daddy aren't funding this girl's sense of style), and I should learn to love the body I've grown into.

Now, here comes the part where I try to remember this in the face of a changing-room mirror. Wish me luck?

the ocean calls us, away from—

2009-06-05T22:14:00.000-07:00

Do you remember last summer? The dense warmth of another January in Melbourne, pavements shimmering with reflected heat. That one long stretch of days and nights where the temperature refused to dip below the thirties, that week I barely spent an evening at home. Beer and friends and shorts and tank-tops, catching the last tram to Saint Kilda Beach to swim along the foreshore in our underwear at one in the morning, the lights of Melbourne a blur in the distance, and waking up to the prospect of another sun-drenched, new adventure?

Yeah, I miss it.

smeared black ink.

2009-05-25T05:17:00.000-07:00

In a perfect world I would be rich enough to afford all these clothes and beautiful enough to pull them off. Alas - as they say, you can't always get what you want.

alpha one, signing on.

2009-05-21T05:39:00.000-07:00

vogue italia, march '08

Stay tuned.