designer corner: kima of norway

If you're tired of the same old jeans, take a look at KIMA of Norway's collection.

The story behind KIMA of Norway is simple: a girl with a passion for fashion (KIMA's creator Lisa Gillespie Brandstrup) starts experimenting with leather patterns and then decides to mix the leather into her denim designs.

I like the results for a couple of different reasons:

1) All styles are made with super fine, lightweight stretch denim and come in an array of washes.

2) There are plenty of bell bottoms styles, which I think I am so ready to wear again.

3) There are also skin tight styles (my other favorite), so that everybody can find something they like.

4) A lot of the shades have a shimmer to them, which makes the jeans ready for a night out.

5) These jeans look terribly sexy! :)

KIMA of Norway is currently being sold in Norway and Luxembourg, but it's scheduled to hit US boutiques and department stores soon, so keep an eye out for it.
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fashion disaster - pajama pants

Baby it's cold outside!

But that's no reason to wear your pajama pants out of the house!

I mean, you went as far as putting socks, shoes, gloves, jacket, and a hat on! You were on the right track!



And please, don't try to convince me that those are NOT pajama pants...
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new year's resolution #3: don't spend more than necessary

This resolution should be an obvious one, but sometimes we just forget, or don't think about the fact that we are overspending in products that are not really worth the money they cost.

Case in point, the Bond No.9 perfumes.

The latest one on the market is called "Brooklyn" and it comes out in March.

Oh, and it will cost $220 for a 100ml bottle.

To be honest with you, I have never smelled any of the Bond perfumes, but the hype behind them is enough to keep me away from them.

And why would I want to smell a perfume that costs $200? What if I like it?

new year's resolution #2: find the perfect nail polish color

Here's an exercise that, even if you are half as anal as me, it will kill about a couple of hours of your precious time... but it's for a good cause, so it's definitely worth it. ;)

What we're looking for is that perfect nail polish color for this season. How hard can it be, you might ask?

I'm sure this has happened to you: a color looks dark in the bottle and then it goes on clear on your nails. But you feel bad telling the manicurist you want to change the color so you keep it for a week and try not to look at your nails, because every time you do, it pisses you off thinking about such a wasted manicure...

So it can be hard, at times. And in order to avoid mistakes, a lot of us keep sticking to the usual "safe" colors.

But this year is about breaking out of the "habit" shell!

Ok, so here is a possible solution: OPI Studio. A way to help you dip you toes (and fingers) in uncharted waters (colors)...

OPI Studio is awesome, and similar to a video game, since you get to play for hours and possibly get a headache by the end (from endlessly staring at the monitor). But it's all for good reasons.

Here are the rules: pick your skin color (in my case I picked the lightest shade),

pick a collection from the drop-down on the upper right side of the screen,

and then with your mouse slide over the different nail polish colors and et voila'!

This looks like a nice red on my skin...

While if I ever wanted to try yellow on my nails, this picture helps me visualize the horror that yellow would do to my hands.



While blue looks pretty cool...



This gray would make my hands look dead!

While it might not be the final answer in nail polish selection, this OPI Studio can definitely help avoid nail catastrophes, and guide you when choosing a new nail color. :)
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new year's resolution #1: love your hair

Ah yes, the hair...

Always a problem the hair, isn't it?

It's either too curly or too straight, with not enough volume or way too frizzy, or it doesn't grow fast enough, or there's too much of it.

It's not like there is anything we can really do about the growth, the type, the size of it...

So how about just loving our hair? And instead of hoping for miracles that won't happen, focusing on having the healthiest hair we can have?

These are some of the products that have worked for me in the past, and that I will be going back to this new year:

Kerastase, for me, is one of the best brand of hair products, it works great and everything smells wonderful.

The only downside is that it's expensive. If it wasn't so expensive, I would always use it. The problem is when you finish the shampoo and start thinking that you need to go spend $30 for a new bottle, and it feels like too much money.

But still...

I love the Ciment Anti-Usure, a treatment/conditioner for damaged/fine hair. It has been the only product that has made my hair feel somewhat thicker.

And the Masquintense is great as a deep conditioning treatment.







But if Kerastase is too expensive for you, here is a product that costs a lot less and that's pretty good: the 3 Minute Miracle by Aussie.

For the price this is one of the best deep conditioners you can find at the drugstore.








And you can't just pile products on top of products all the time, to have clean, healthy and shiny hair, you periodically need to get rid of all the gunk you've been applying to it.

A great product, and extremely cheap, is the Suave Daily Clarifying shampoo.

As the name implies, you can use this every day, but I would suggest using it only once a week.

After using it you will feel your hair squeaky clean.

Another use I have for it: color disaster corrector! I was coloring my hair a deep brown, but it came out very red for some reason, so I promptly jumped in the shower and washed my hair with the Suave Clarifying shampoo, making sure to scrub hard. I rinsed and repeated. Well, what do you know, it worked like a charm! It stripped the color down a bit, toned it back to brown, and all that red was gone!

What are the hair products you will continue using this 2009?
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fashion...hmm... success?

I'm not quite sure about this one...

She is dressed in all kinds of purples, from her hat to her boots. The bags she is carrying are both purple as well...

It was cute to look at, maybe because I like purple, but I know that I would never think of wearing all that purple at once.

So is this really a successful "purple matching" or should this be classified under the fashion disasters?

I'll let you decide.