America's Next Top Fodder

Guys, quick emergency reminder post. America's Next Top Model premieres tonight! 8 pm! Two hours! Two glorious hours!


(Fourfour.)

Montreal

Next stop on the Listopad choo-choo: Montreal!

Moshe Safdie's famed living quarters against the pretty St. Lawrence river.

(ryuenishizawa.com)

We enjoyed the dreamy optimism of Ryue Nishizawa and his "Some Ideas of Living..." at the CCA.

This is a bike path. Absolument!

The bagels were such sweet, chewy, delicious little suckers.

I admit this city made me a little envious. There is a lot of emphasis on ease of transport, parks, music, fun, and food. Also, there are sweet little vintage (friperie) shops everywhere. We hope to make another stop there soon!

Music for Lovers: Sade Adu

Sure, all of my influences seem to come from the '80s, but it's a great decade for music. This week we take Sade, whose gorgeous voice is almost as gorgeous as her face. Hot damn! This woman has style:



Her international [diamond] life touched her fashion choices, but unfortunately she is often associated with the cheesy sexy sax of the '80s....don't blame her for her band's misdeeds! Still, her love songs remain relevant. And did you know that "The Sweetest Taboo" is about her lesbian love affair? You read it here!

Examples: The '80s, the '90s, and of course, the 2000s
Amazing style all around.

Get To It

Feel garden-y on Monday. Johnson's Florist and Garden Center is having a Labor Day Yard Sale! Big ol' markdowns on a bunch of stuff. (Can someone pick up a huge pot for me? I have to re-pot Planty, my Ikea plant. Thanks.)

This looks so so cool: An Iconography of Contagion will showcase health posters from the 20th century. Opens at The National Academy of Sciences on Tuesday. Plus: it's First Tuesday in Adams Morgan. Discounts abound at neighborhood shops/restos.

Friday, I am going to see The House Bunny. Dana Stevens says: "I don't even want to think about what [this film] means as a feminist allegory." Haha, me neither!

Saturday, head over the Bethesda Design Within Reach for Wine and Design, a lil' event commencing their Seating and Dining Sale. Enjoy wine, snacks, one-time discounts. And design. (Within reach.)

Sunday is the last day of Diebenkorn in New Mexico at The Phillips Collection. Do not sleep on the rich visual musings of this nuclear-ly awesome artist. Please. Or: the Kreeger Museum is having an open house today. This event is free! Bring the kiddies!

Sunday Bread

WWD reports that Michelle's dress is by Thakoon.

Hot.

Street Snaps: late August

I'm sure everyone's seen this on the Sartorialist by now, but come on! The layering is spot-on for this fall's aesthetic: long blazer, quirky knits, conservative color scheme. Lovin' it!

Fandes

Hi guys. I started school on Monday!


(American Rhetoric.)

I am taking this really awesome class: the Anthropology of Food. Today, we discussed Andean farming traditions: how they've been in practice for thousands of years with no detriment to the soil or slackening in crop yields. These dudes have literally found the perfect way to farm!


(Ilhuicamina.)

They have also found the perfect way to dress!


(quintet.)


(Walking the Amazon.)

Note: sweet headgear, 50-inspired circle skirts, jewel tones, long braids, and baby-as-accessory. Listopad approves!

Portraits of Past

I've gone on and on about the National Portrait Gallery before, but I wanted to recommend a couple shows up right now after seeing them myself.

Kehinde Wiley's pieces in as part of the RECOGNIZE exhibit that Fiona talked about earlier this year...I mean, I mostly love Ice-T because of SVU but this is on a whole other level:



watch out though...you're not allowed to photograph this exhibit even though I did.

Ballyhoo!--dumb name, but awesome poster examples of portraiture. The posters really capture design aesthetics of their time and are truly beautiful:





Lastly, the Katherine Hepburn exhibit is tiny but cute--they even have her famous red sweater!

P.S. Aren't the online exhibit pages amazing? You don't even have to go to the museum! But you should ;)

Music for Lovers: Meltdown

Lots of music on Listopad lately, but we want to take it closer to home today by featuring DC no-wave ladies Meltdown...actually I am just going to link to this awesome feature on a really awesome blog: check out Fiona in her teens here!

Vintage Vault

Because we love all things vintage, we're introducing a new column around vintage "education." We want to share the knowledge with all of you regarding all aspects of vintage clothing and accesories...so you can learn to be obsessed just like us ;)

Bakelite: there is no one better equipped to teach you about Bakelite than this obsessive European guy. He's photographed his collection, which he also loans out to museums, for your perusal. Ah, the golden age of plastics, before we hated them for killing us and our planet.








Antique dealers are always hawking the stuff in case you want to start your own collection, and Antiques Anonymous in Woodley Park is a great place to start. Good luck!

Get To It: Weekly Suggestions

Welcome back to the week! Now, get to all the awesome stuff DC is doing:

Monday: Crystal City is apparently doing a season-long James Bond film festival for free! Tonight, 8pm, you can catch Goldeneye--pretty meh for the movie but I loved Tina Turner's theme song.

Tuesday: OMG Cuteness! The Panda habitat is re-opening after its massive renovations at the National Zoo. Go before work to warm your heart, they open at 6am.

Thursday: Modernist Society hosts Whitney Matheson at Bourbon, 9pm

Friday: Massive party at 9:30 club for local DJ superstar Tittsworth's album release! All the hotties will be there, I promise.

Icons Part I

Today's stand-in music post is about under-the-radar style icons in American music.

When most people think of style icons in the American rock music world, a few names come to mind: Elvis, Bob Dylan, Velvet Underground, The Ramones. In jazz, it's Miles Davis; in funk, it started with the James Brown and led to the cowboy-outfitted, mega-spectacled excesses of Funkadelic; in pop, well, do I really have to name names?

Then there were those stylish players that should have made it huge in America, but never quite caught on. They were big in France, Australia, and the UK, or maybe they were big fish in small ponds here in the States, but they didn't win many points for stylishness in the U.S.

My favorite under-appreciated pop outfit is the still-living-and-making-music duo Sparks, originally from Los Angeles. They were enormous in the U.K., but we Americans, too enamored with Barbara Streisand and Barry Manilow at the time, kinda missed the boat.


Their posters and record covers were always bold and sassy as hell. My favorites? 1974's "Propaganda" (a top tenner in the U.K; a top 200-er in the U.S.) and 1975's "Indiscreet":

Neut, Glorious Neut

Here at Listopad, there is a lot of discussion about all things neutral. We ask ourselves questions like: Which neutrals are the best neutrals? How many neutrals can I wear at once? Why are neutrals so amazing? Why is it that no matter what I do, I can't not wear neutrals?

Real world neutrals:


Jamison


Tsubo


Gap


Givenchy


Third Church of Christ, Scientist


The Slayton House


Lebanese Taverna

Get To It

"grave decisions" from goethe.de

This is why D.C. rules - check out the freebies this week!

Monday or Wednesday: Guys, take a break from the Olympics and go see Grave Decisions (Wer früher stirbt ist länger tot) @ Goethe-Institut 6:30pm. The Germans embraced it, so why not right? $6.
Tuesday: Grab an IPA and check out Modernist Society's Current TV party with Trace Crutchfield and DJ Ian Svenonius @ Bourbon at 8pm. Free.
Through Saturday only: Eero Saarinen: Shaping the Future @ National Building Museum. Justifiably awesome- please check it out before it leaves after Saturday. Free.
Sunday: Ben's Chili Bowl 50th Anniversary Tribute Concert @ 9:30club 1:30pm. Local acts for all ages including Mambo Sauce and Pancake Mountain. Mmm. Mambo Sauce. Welcome to DC. Free, doors at 1pm.

Summer Street Snaps

Summer is starting to leave our minds as the fall collections hit stores and the days get shorter...Copenhagen is already feeling the fall in temperatures as you can see from this week's Street Snap pic:







Keeping it real in KBH--I love the tunic and the bebe's head peeking out from the bike.

Dear Andre Leon Talley

We were at the same performance last night! I loved your bright pink shirt and seersucker suit...but mostly, your black leather clutch. I really think more men should carry purses--bulging pockets suck.

Love,


Me

Sizzurp

Y'all heard about Rickey Month, right? This inspired mixology marathon--and the surrounding buzz--propelled me to Hotel Tabard Inn last week, where my head basically fell off after trying Chantal Tseng's sprightly, floral Rive Gauche Rickey. (Kathryn Bangs' Haymaker incarnation of the drink is no longer officially on the menu--but only for the time being, she said.)

Rive Gauche Rickey

1 1/4 oz. Aviation gin
3/4 oz. St. Germain Elderflower liqueur
Charles de Fere Blanc de Blanc sparkling wine
dash absinthe
juice of 1/3 medium-sized lime, rind reserved
one sprig lavender
ice

Combine gin, liqueur, absinthe, lime juice, rind and ice in cocktail shaker. Pour into glass. Top with sparkling wine. Garnish with lavender and serve.

Haymaker Rickey

2 0z. rye whiskey
1/2 oz. brown sugar-balsamic syrup*
juice of 1/2 lime, rind reserved
ginger ale
ice

Combine whiskey, syrup, lime juice, rind and ice in cocktail shaker. Pour into glass and top with ginger ale. Serve.

*You can make this mixture yourself by combining 3/4 cup packed brown sugar with 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar.

(The Haymaker was inspired by an eponymous 19th-century punch which Kat calls "the gatorade of the time": a (technically) non-alcoholic energy drink of brown sugar, vinegar, and ginger ale enjoyed by Midwestern laborers. Coincidentally, the first printed mention of this concoction appeared in Laura Ingalls Wilder's The Long Winter, which was written in Kat's home state of South Dakota. I like how she is simultaneously repping DC and South Dakota with this recipe!)

Vivian Girls/Crystal Stilts

My stand-in music post: Tomorrow night, go check out Vivian Girls and Crystal Stilts at DC9!

Bagels for the Soul

This week's flavor: walking distance.

I would encourage you to take advantage of Restaurant Week on Tuesday. Crazy-fancy places like Chef Geoff's and iRicchi are within Listopad's price range for one week only! We recommend Casa Oaxaca. (Keep your little eyes peeled for a recipe from a Restauarant Week participant later this week.)

Please do not sleep on Meeps' huge sale. It ends on Wednesday. 15% off purchases of $15 or more, 25% off purchases of $25 or more, and 30% off purchases of $50 or more. Plus there are two huge 50% off racks. Nor should you sleep on seeing the Ex at Black Cat tonight. You could potentially wear whatever awesomely discounted duds you got at Meeps.

Please do not sleep on this beautiful, slighty-cooler snap that we've been enjoying. Go to Fort Reno on Thursday to see Title Tracks.

Pillars of Silence

Welcome to another sporadic edition of Listopad Music. Today's music pick is a simple pop song from the new San Francisco-based band, Pillars Of Silence. Download "Call Me" from their Myspace site. Such a pretty piece of pop music, but not in a smiling, pert kind of way-- this is a song performed sitting down with a straight face. I love it!

On the aesthetic tip, their frontwoman Meghan is fierce as hell.


You go girl.