Thursday, November 27, 2014

Mary Katrantzou x Adidas Originals


When I heard that Mary Katrantzou was collaborating with Adidas Originals, I nearly lost my marbles. She is one of the few fashion designers I am truly in utter awe of.

For those of you who are unaware of Mary Katrantzou and all her glory, she is the queen and god of digital print. Her attention to the placement of prints to flatter any and everybody is impeccable. Not to mention her use of colour just makes me giddy every time I see her collections.

And this collaboration was no disappointment. Mary Katrantzou x Adidas Originals is a kaleidoscope of colour, her signature graphics and everything in between, has created a synergy of strength and femininity. 

She has taken her inspiration from track shoes worn by medal winners in the 1970s and 1980s. Her graphics are made up of elements of these track shoes, whether it is the strong lace print or the panelled lines to suggest the form of a shoe. All the while maintain a flattering design for all forms in bursts of electric blues, ruby reds and emerald greens neoprenes. And she has even designed some hella awesome sneakers to match her garments, making the ultimate sports luxe collection whole. 

Sadly though, the price range of this collection is way beyond your bank balances or mine. So for now, we can just sit back and admire this beautiful fusion of high end fashion meets sportswear.     

- S.P



*Mosaik does not take credit for any of the images used in this article

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Combi

With the sudden craze for clean eating, super foods and healthy living - Combi has all of that covered for you (as well as delicious-ness! :)) Located in Elwood, just a short walk from the beach, Combi sits on Ormond Road. The vibe from the outside will instantly draw you in - simple walking past will force you to have a peek inside with its adorable takeaway hut at the front of the store. Inside is quite small, however, anywhere you sit, you'll be surrounded with the delicious healthy snacks, craziness of the smoothie-making and gorgeous tropical decorations. 

Myself and O tried the apply crumble, zucchini spaghetti, and both tried a different super-smoothie (I tried the 'Velvet Cacao' - a lovely mix of berries, coconut, banana, cinnamon and loads of other tasty stuff, and O tried the 'Liquid Passion' which is one of their most popular smoothies!) Overall, we had a lovely experience visiting Combi and would go back again. The menu is filled with a bunch of exciting juices and smoothies - whilst the foods may seem a little limited on the menu, there is so much more to pick from in-store from the mouth-watering cake and slice windows! Definitely a place to go and visit (and take gorgeous, colourful photos for Instagram too!)

- C 






Thursday, November 20, 2014

What Is Success?

When you hear the word 'success', what comes to mind? A multi-million-dollar businessman or businesswoman? A person who has ticked off all items off of their bucket-list?

I recently discovered the brilliant works of The New Yorker journalist and author Malcolm Gladwell. I came across a (kind of lengthy) quote from his book, Outliers: The Story of Success, that got me thinking:

“Do you see the consequences of the way we have chosen to think about success? Because we so profoundly personalize success, we miss opportunities to lift others onto the top rung...We are too much in awe of those who succeed and far too dismissive of those who fail."
It's a fickle concept. It seems that success is majorly viewed as a personal thing, and linked to an individual's accolades or achievements. A lot of us look at 'success' as such a scary and powerful word. Some of us are so frightened by the term that we accept mediocracy and are afraid to push boundaries and explore our capabilities. What is commonly viewed as the opposite of success is failure. I don't think this should be the case, though. I think that the opposite of success should be submissiveness; accepting normality and conforming to the way that everyone else thinks. I say this because 'failures' are merely unpolished gems - they are brilliant forms of learning, and they highlight a person's attempts at pushing boundaries, much like success. 

To me, success is waking up every morning and being given the opportunity to work, to learn, interact with others, and move towards bettering yourself and your view of the world.  Personal victories are fantastic, but I believe that it is important to understand what you want - not necessarily in life, but more so what you want in this particular point in time - and how other people have a direct impact on that. To explore human potential is one of the most interesting and exciting ideas, and to explore it with others is even more thrilling.


This might just be me, but I constantly think about how the people I'm surrounded by influence my decisions, my growth, and my thought processes. It's silly to think that others don't have an effect on your successes in life. Everyone is both a teacher and a student, and we interact with one another to learn. Sharing moments, experiences, ideas, and thoughts with others allows you to think more open-mindedly and challenge yourself. Different people have different strengths. It is through human interaction that we work together to achieve our successes in life. 


Success can be anything from a job promotion, to making someone smile, to helping a friend with an assignment. Look at those examples - other people are directly involved in each scenario: someone must give a promotion in order for someone to receive a promotion. Someone must act a certain way to initiate a smile in another person. Someone must ask for help to receive help. The people around us are - more often than not - a catalyst to our own successes, whether we realise it or not. 


Remember that success does not define you. You define success, and you are the one person who can determine exactly what it is and how successful you believe that you are in the life you live. There is no outline for how big or small a success can be, or how personal or widespread a success is - you are the judge of that. I urge you to challenge your ideas on what makes a 'successful person' and to think about who you consider to be successful people in your life and why. Know that one exam, one lost opportunity, or one mistake does not dictate your whole life. As long as you are happy with the person you are becoming and you can find meaning in what you do each and every day, you're already writing your success story. 

-N 



http://www.partfaliaz.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/studiofolk_5.jpg


Tuesday, November 18, 2014

Having HSD.


I have always been highly sensitive, that is to say I feel all the feels. 

I think the first time it happened was when I was 9 and I was presented with a surprise birthday cake at someone else's party; I was so surprised and happy that they did that I became overwhelmed and I started crying a lot (like a lot, a lot) and then everyone felt bad for giving me the cake and making me cry. I didn't understand why I was crying so I couldn't explain it to them either and they didn't know what to do so they just took the cake away.

As I’ve gotten older it gotten worse, and as Kristen Bell once said "if I'm not between a seven and a three on the emotional scale I'm crying." So I've had to come to terms with the fact that crying just means I am extremely full of emotion and not that I am sad, I am either just too happy, or too excited, or too overwhelmed, or I'm laughing way too much (I have also fainted from laughing too much... maybe I should look into that). 

People who know me well have now come to terms with the fact that I can't control my tear ducts and they have accepted it as one of my many quirks. I used to think I was the only one - apart from Kirsten Bell that is - but then just the other day hellogiggles.com published a blog post titled 22 Signs you're a highly sensitive person (and that’s OK!)  I realised I was one of the 1 in 5 people who "suffer" from being highly sensitive.  In the article it says that "This trait reflects a certain type of survival strategy, being observant before acting" (so really it’s all just my way of preparing for the Hunger Games or something).

However, ever since reading the article I have used the symptoms as an excuse to seem less melodramatic, you see I have always overreacted to things. I tend to exaggerate my emotions and I now just coin it as a symptom of being highly sensitive. For example there have been a couple of times that I have gotten the flu at the same time as someone else in my family (namely my brother) but I will always insist that my flu is worse or more severe and of course I just get eyes rolled at me because how am I even supposed to know that? According to the article though, I do have a lower pain tolerance, so maybe my flu is worse or it just feels a lot worse and I am suffering more. 

The article also suggests I scare easily which gives me an excuse for all the times I have been randomly scared by people, and I have literally screamed and thrown myself on the ground.

Another of the signs that I'm a highly sensitive person according to the article is that I struggle to take care of my body, which is now going to be my excuse for when I eat a whole block of Cadbury chocolate, or an entire jar of Nutella, because really I can't help it. But it actually does explain why I don't care about taking food breaks at uni... like at one point I worked 15 hours straight weaving only taking water breaks (this was all my own fault) and I then had to go to the doctor to get checked and they told me I had to start doing eye exercises and my strict diet of chocolate, things covered in chocolate and chocolate milk probably means I'm low in iron and missing out on a lot of nutrients. 

The 22nd item on the list hellogiggles.com published is that I like things before they are "cool" this not only explains my love for jazz music but also my love for nerdy/dorky guys who only seem to get cooler after I stop seeing them. 

So all in all I feel like I know myself a lot better now that I have been self-diagnosed as "highly sensitive."  
-A  





*Mosaik does not take credit for any of the images used in this article

Thursday, November 13, 2014

Thoughts from a Thoughtful 15 Year Old.



I recently found the diary I kept when I was 15-17. 

It was so interesting (and also very embarrassing) reading back through it. This journal was the only period in my life where I documented things. I wasn’t the girl that kept a diary about boys she liked our things that happened to her that day. I instead used to wake up in the middle of the night to record a dream and analyse its connection with life, or draw up a mind map of how lions were my spirit animal or write a list of the awkward/embarrassing things I had done that day. And occasionally I would write a statement that summarized my complete confusion with the world. 

It was these few sentences in my old diary that I found completely perplexing, as I flicked through pages of thoughts that still haunt me now. I couldn't help thinking that maybe I was much wiser and more intune with the world when I was 15. The things that were written made a lot of sense, so I thought I owed it to my wiser 15 year old self to share them:

“Objects are worthless and yet they determine wealth.”

I don't remember when I wrote this or why. It was written on a page by itself at the back of my journal, but there is so much truth to it. People value materialism so much, everyone wants more then what they have and when they get that, they are still not satisfied and in the end none of it matters anyway... its all just things and stuff. 

“If ignorance is bliss and knowledge is power how is anyone supposed to find middle ground?”

This was a reflection on the difference between me and my brother. I constantly contract anxiety because I have a need to know exactly what is going to happen and when I don't know (which is often) I start to get overwhelmed and anxious. It is something that I have learned to control over the years but I still see the power in knowledge and knowing what is next. My brother on the other hand is the complete opposite. He seems to only live for the moment. He stays ignorant to things until he has to face them and he seems to get through life a lot easier because of it.  I even used to worry when he didn't worry about things.

"Life is a perfect imperfection, and I wouldn't have it any other way."

I wrote this after an embarrassing episode of pure awkwardness in front of someone I liked at the time. The entry was pretty funny and it is still one of my favourite stories to tell but this line stood out among the reflection of utter humiliation. It reminds me that my life is less like the lives of the characters in a TV drama and probably more like the lives of the characters from Seinfeld or any other sitcom. 

"It is both extremely wonderful and enormously excruciating that we must feel such intense emotion."

I wrote that statement after crying because I was so happy about something that had happened - (this was probably the start of my highly sensitive disorder where I just feel all the feels.) It was the first time that I thought maybe crying isn't about being sad but rather it is something that happens when we are so full of emotion we have no other way to release it then through tears. I had written this under one of my favourite quotes:

"There is a sacredness in tears, They are not a mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition and of unspeakable love." - Washington Irving 

This sentence I wrote in my diary also reminds me of one of my favourite conversations with B when we agreed that if you don't live life passionately you are not living it at all, and letting into your emotions is part of that. 

However, my favourite was one that is most relevant, especially now in the middle of war and conflict, hatred and suffering:

“Much of the world makes no sense”

I found that statement alone on a page that had become crippled from my tears … I had written it just after watching the news.
-A





*Mosaik does not take credit for any of the images used in this article 

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

People Profile: Tahli Kornhauser


I had originally seen the Dagny accessories on a quick visit to the Nicholas Building in the city. I admired their woven structure and beautiful colours; it wasn't until a couple of weeks later that I realised the creator of it all, Tahli Kornhauser, was infact a friend of a friend and I just knew I had to interview her!

 Moving from Queensland to Melbourne Tahli studied Interior design before becoming one of the Exhibition designers for the National Gallery of Victoria. The last exhibition Tahli had to design for was one on eastern art and jewellery and as she researched and delved into the movement, she became fascinated. Little did she know this was going to be a precursor to the fate that awaited her. After leaving her job at the NGV, Tahli went back to Queensland to recollect herself and it was there that she was reminded of her childhood in which she had learned Japanese and had also spent many afternoons with her sister making jewellery. Fate's hand then pushed her to travel to Japan, where she discovered the woven belts of the kimonos and the art of Japanese woven jewellery. 
Upon her return to Australia, Tahli started a correspondence with a lady in America who was also weaving jewellery and slowly she started to teach herself through the pages of instruction books and the emails of a virtual friend. 

With help from a community of friends and family, Tahli started Dagny and she has seen it through to the success that it is today. She just recently returned to Japan to source more silks for her next collection and more woven kimono belts to inspire her. I was lucky enough to visit her studio in Collingwood and have a chat with her and also watch the complex weaving of a belt she was creating. Being a weaver and just a lover of all textiles and handmade things, I could not help but be in awe of her. She is truly an incredibly creative and beautiful person! I am so glad I got the chance to meet her and see her working on such intricate pieces of jewellery.

What are you most excited about right now? 
I’m excited about working on a community arts project with the Banyule City Council in early 2015. It’s been a dream of mine for a long time to be able to use my skills to do something constructive for the community. This project will be a great start in that direction. Onwards and upwards! 

What is the one piece of advice you will never forget being given? 
My super awesome dad always says, ‘You’re here for a good time not a long time.’ Lately, this sentence has started to make a lot of sense. 

What is one thing you wish you could tell your younger self?
Be your own guide and have the courage to change directions if ever you want to, because nothing is written in stone. Listen to your intuition and don’t let those around you influence that unless it’s truly warranted. Also, (and this is something I wish all women can come to understand) - ‘natural' is an incredibly sexy look!! 

Favourite thing about living in Melbourne?
It’s flat! You can ride everywhere and the public transport is amazing. Melbournians might attest to this, but I would then say, ‘go live in a city where there are approximately ten buses!

Favourite place in Melbourne? 
This is easy - The Heide Museum of Modern Art! This is because I love nature as much as I love art and Heide is all about both! Plus, it’s just beautiful on so many levels. 

Check out Tahli's work and support her here:
Official Website:http://dagny.com.au

- A





*Mosaik does not take credit for any of the images used in this article