Happy Heart Shaped Sweets Day!

It's valentine's day. Surprise!!! I've chosen to use this day of extra sugary sweets as a time of reflection. Much like the millions of jagged edged crystals glistening on the New Year's Ball reflect the millions of wide eyed smiles of hopeful and optimistic time's square revelers, today i'm taking stock. thinking back and sharing my loves. Some are fun and fancy free, others are sentiments that i've long ago shared. Diaries, journals, and hidden love notes be damned, the secret's out and herein lies my most recent loves. It's part resolution to enjoy the little things in life, part thanksgiving grace and part Valentine's day love-fest. It may be fluff or overly sweet but so goes a day devoted to pink. 

Donuts. This morning i had a donut in the shape of a heart... sure, that alone may make it valentine's appropriate but instead of custard or jelly, it was stuffed with frosting. Frosting you say, yep... whipped deliciousness coated in chocolate chips. 

Stores that offer champagne while you shop. Decadent, you bet, diabolical, i think so. As Nathan and I wandered around Paris this spring, trading time at museums for time at Cartier and Hermes, we learned the secret underside to the city. If you pretend to know a bit of French and act as though you're one bad decision away from a new Birkin, the champagne starts flowing. 

Layering on your wrist. Some guys wear a strong timepiece to make a statement, choosing to showcase their fashion savvy with a budget busting Breitling. Recently I've started layering up. Sure, a button down, under a vest, under a blazer will keep you warm, and toasty but a stack of glistening arm candy may say even more. Not one for rings or necklaces, I vote to let your wrist share your adventures. Currently stacked: a vintage LOVE bracelet once worn by my grandpa, a nautically inspired matching Miansai cord wrapped around thrice given with love by the one I love, and a rotating schedule of a few watches I've acquired over the years from momentous occasions and trips abroad. 

When you can't say it out loud, write it down. Hand written cards are far and away my favorite keepsake. Papersource is my new go-to spot for the best selection of cards. Sure, they may cost 5x as much, but they somehow find a better way to inspire the sentiment. 

Sunny afternoons laying out in the backyard at home. Don't be crazy, I live in Chicago and surely don't have a yard. I'm talking about my first home, my family home. Saturdays on the recliner with my family and a cold lemonade flipping through Vogue. Bomb dot com. Makes me appreciate Ben Folds and his ability to rock the suburbs, just like Michael Jackson did. 

Throws. Easy enough. Faux fur, cable knit, cashmere or crew. Throw it on a bed, throw it on a couch, throw it over yourself. 

Running until you sweat. And I mean like puddles of water, sprawled on the ground, can't catch your breath, could eat an entire pizza exhausted. Carry me home, I'm spent. 

Ever considered standing in a room cranked up to 100 degrees and twisting your body into a pretzel? One of my favorite after school activities is Core Power and Bikram Yoga. Stretch it out, sweat it out. Gym membership and added expenses don't always allow funding, but when you get in a really great class, you can't feel any better. 

Flannel. Plaid and ALL things Madras. You like one color? I like 5. Bam. 

It's no secret that if I could exist on one food alone, it would surely be cake. Wedding Cake, Birthday Cake, Saturday Cake, Cookie Cake. I don't discriminate as long as it's delicious and covered in frosting. 

My nephew eating mashed potatoes. I don't care how many times I watch it or that I know the amazing faces he's going to make, nothing makes me smile more. He's the cutest, sweetest, and funniest little man I know. 

Nathan. Period. 

Dinner Parties. Give me an excuse to create a tablescape, spend all day cooking in the kitchen and the chance to invite people into my home and I'll give you a hug. Something about hosting gives me insane anxiety but also such pleasure. My goal in life is to be featured in a coffee table book. 

Margaritas and dancing on top of a bar. What?! who does that. Well, with the opening of DS Tequila this summer, apparently me. Frosty drinks, good music, good friends, and a bar with steps, sold. 

When September hits and the temps start to temper just a bit, it only means one thing. Well, two if you consider that Thanksgiving is only a few months away, but otherwise it's College Football! And with that comes tailgating. Give me good food, good friends, 100,000 screaming fans, a few turnovers and a table embellished with a giant block M and I'm happy as can be. 

While this list could surely go on for days, and maybe it will (could be the continuation of a series I started last fall) I'm happy to report that some of my favorite things in life are free. Granted champagne in Paris was free, but at the same time, I couldn't be more thankful for the friends and family that I've been blessed to surround myself with. Whether you're in a relationship or in search of something new, may LOVE always be back in Black. 

Streaming Life.

The interweb as I like to call it, is filled to the brim with videos, diaries and blogs posted about every topic one can imagine. What I often find most interesting are the ones that tell a story without ever saying a word. They may cheat just slightly and use lyrics from a song or bold words on a poster, but they find a way to pull you in and hold you hostage while you find your mind rambling over images, and deciphering undertones. As an amateur story teller, I'm always looking for better ways to express myself. The creators of these videos found a way to tell beautiful tales of life, love and understanding all the while never having to say a thing.

I recently stumbled across this video advertisement and was struck by the sheer simplicity of it. The video follows the natural lifecycle of a couple. From first awkward butterfly inducing moments through first dates, meeting the parents and best friends, the ups and downs, the fights and the sadness, the joy and the celebration. The video chronicles the every day. It isn't until the very end when a man gets down on his knee to propose that the camera flips to the other side to show that the partner he has chosen for life is a man as well. Scandalous, I know.

While it's called rather simply "possibly the most beautiful ad for marriage equality" its message goes deeper then the beautiful people who take on the starring roles. The ad isn't overly sexualized, it isn't vulgar or crass or even overly sweet. It's real. It's powerful and moving and emotional to the core of its being. Anyone who has ever dated someone knows that life isn't always rosy or perfect. Life is sad, it can be hard but it's also a beautiful struggle that when shared is an amazing journey. The story is delicate and awkward at times, but forces you inside the secret world that only two can share. I think the strongest message is that the couple never seemed to hide or be embarrassed to share their love with one another. The awkward moments that would be uncomfortable for a straight couple, were uncomfortable here and the joyous moments were equally celebrated. It's a story told through the reactions of one man to another.

For years I've been transfixed by the sounds and sights of "Where the Hell is Matt?" Whenever I need a moment, to pause and breathe I watch the video that shares an incredible story of reaching past what you know and what you may see or expect and just enjoying everything life has to offer. In 2006 Matt took a 6 month trip to 39 countries on all 7 continents. In that time he danced a lot. A year later, having met thousands of people Matt decided to travel again and this time invited everyone he'd met along the way to dance with him. He took a journey; one that lead him around the world and back and in just over four minutes he finds a way to share the power of the experience with the rest of us. At first he starts alone. Dancing in town squares, on panoramic bluffs and in forests, you're pulled in by the unclear randomness of his dance moves, the haunting sound of the music and the curiosity of what's next. And then, Matt makes friends. In every location he's joined by 5, by 10 by 100 strangers brought together by the power of dance. The unifying strength of the sheer joy people find in standing together and going crazy. The music is adapted from a poem called "Stream of Life" which again invites you on a journey. Never stay complacent, never settle. The world is waiting.

Each of us lives our life one year at a time. Last year I decided to hold off printing the thousands of pictures (seriously, it's a sick addiction, I know) I took during the course of 2010 until very late December. Instead I compiled everything in to one book. Because I waited, I was able to look back a bit more clearly and select only the best and most important images to include. Andrew Clancy did something similar but took it to an entirely different level. I can only imagine the incredible deluge of stimuli that someone who lives in NYC is faced with each and every day. Clancy, ever the story teller, took a step back and caught some of the cities most indelible moments and spliced them together into a video that shares a year in HIS life. He notes that he can't speak for every New Yorker or possibly catch every moment, but he shares the journey that he took in a story in which most people could find pieces of their own.

Each of these videos is a glimpse inside someone's world. There's a story teller, but no real narrator leaving an open ended opportunity for every viewer to connect on their own terms and in their own way. From political to emotional to just plain fun, these stories and millions more just like them have been created to share something, to offer a look inside and to express an emotion that the creator was feeling. Never do they directly ask for a response but rather invite participation. If video is the new diary, here's hoping self expression is the new black.

for when you need an umbrella

This entry isn't about fashion. It's not about celebrities or models or actors or comedians. It's not about technology or popular culture or even about the recent questions about whether Dan and Serena ever really took their love life off the small screen. Over the past few weeks I've been in home owner hell. Several months ago Comed or the City (depends who you ask and how quickly they shift blame) came to fix/edit/manipulate an electrical pole directly next to my apt. Rather than filling the hole they'd dug, they simply backfilled it with the rocks they'd pulled out. At the time, I thought well that stinks, I was hoping they'd add a bit more security to my somewhat dated alley but left it at that. Chicago has seen it's share of rain this summer. All consuming, overwhelming rain storms that seem to come from nowhere and douse anything in its path. I kept thinking how lucky I was; here I am with my second floor space being below ground and I'd never had a problem. And then the gods laughed. I moved a large box in my downstairs closet and thought, that's so weird... why is this wet? And for the next several days every time it rained, there was more... more flooding, more panic attacks, more towels to clean. Outside the backfilled hole had quickly become a sink hole, allowing direct access to the sides of my foundation and clearly a way in through the bottom half of my walls. A week later I was still fighting with the city, with Comed, with insurance companies, trying to figure out what I needed to do. And the problem isn't even quite fixed. Thankfully Comed did come out to fill the hole with cement (fingers crossed this holds and stops any more damage... no seriously, cross everything you have!) and my downstairs is tentatively dry with a water remediation expert coming out tomorrow to take a look and hopefully let me know I dodged a bullet.

This post, however isn't really about any of that. It's about the people in your life who carry you through. I've had more than a few stumbles in my life and it always amazes me the consistency of those important people, sometimes even those you never expected to be there to pick you up. In my last apt when I woke up on Christmas Eve morning more than a little bit still drunk to the sound of rain, I thought how pleasant. 2 minutes later when I realized that rain was actually a burst pipe from the apt above running down my walls, I thought something far less pleasant. On cue, my friend Hilary showed up in gollashes up to her waist and a bucket. For the rest of the week, my friend Katie let me share her bed while my walls were rebuilt. There are countless times throughout the past several years I could name any one of you for being the one thing that held me together. This time around the duties fell to Nathan and my parents. Both put up with daily calls and a rather downtrodden Hunter moping about. You propped me up and got me through each day, when (maybe a bit melodramatically... sure sure, maybe a bit) I didn't think I could deal with anything else. Neither complained once. When I began to worry that the hole hadn't fixed the problem and that I'd be away the first time it rained, more than a handful of people volunteered to come over and check for me.

You call them your rocks, your sounding boards and your best friends. You call them siblings and co-workers, roommates and relatives. They are those select few people in your life. The people you may see regularly or those you don't see nearly enough who you know will always be there. This post is a general thank you. While it will never be enough, it's the most public way I could think to let you know how much I care. It's a call to action to each of you (or ya know, maybe just the few twitter followers I have) to thank people. It's sometimes simple things, like saving you the last slice, or helping you paint a room or the big things like holding your hand and propping your up but they're the things that matter most.

It's funny how as time goes on and I meet new and exciting people I begin to understand the qualities that matter most in a friendship. I understand that having parents who are some of your closest friends is a rarity and how having the luxury of multiple ICE contacts makes me luckier then I could've possibly imagined. I have coworkers who offer advice when I come in upset and friends who take keys to be there just in case. I have people I've met very recently who live in other cities who I already know will be at the play dates I someday make for my imaginary kids. There's a quality in these people that just makes you feel safer.

We're a world of individuals who are brought together sometimes by seemingly random acts of fate. We build families and carry memories with us when we move somewhere new. We're bands of brothers who find in others the ability to get through. Soo, it may seem silly, or generic or uninspired but it's life and for those of you who help me to live it, I say thank you. Thank you for always being there and for being the basic black that gives me the confidence to just be.

and this week...

In an effort to get my creative juices flowing again I've decide to devote this post to Aaron Karo. Not the actual person, I don't even know him... that would be weird, but rather his style of blogging. Every few weeks I get an email with a random dialogue of things he's been thinking about. Sure he's a comedian and I often find myself re-posting or making his rambles my status messages but until I get there, here-in lies my first bout of Hunter goes rogue.

If you ever wanted to be a pilot, you should probably be on SYTYCD... the acronym may be long but I'm more than a little obsessed with this show that seems to send more people flying through the air that an afternoon at Skydive Chicago. It's the only series on TV I would willingly devote three hours a week to. Five hours of rehearsal and they're on the stage leaping into the unknown with the faith that their partner will be there to catch them. My top 4:
Caitlynn and Mitchell
Ryan and Ricky
Melanie and Marco
Sasha and Alexander

Summer Reading may be totally 9th grade but if Borders hadn't closed up shop from every strip mall in the greater Chicago area, I'd be there just like it was that 90's August afternoon before I panicked and bought the Cliff's Notes version. Summer 2011 is all about The Help... Nathan and I have started a book club. Sure, it's just the two of us, and maybe we only agreed to do it because we said we'd go see the movie at the end, but so far I'm hooked. Sitting in the sun, on the couch or before bed, the stories are heavy but seem to intertwine and move forward with a lightness that makes the subject more manageable. Only five chapters in but I'm already shouting sequel!

If you find yourself sitting idly at your gate or waiting for the bus, you'll probably look to at least one side and see someone sliding their finger through their twitter feed. The Twitter, as I lovingly refer to it has become my favorite go to, "I'd rather not make eye contact with you" hobby. I love it, with its sound bites, random notes from friends, news reports, and up-to-the-minute update on what color Lauren Conrad's hair is this week... and that feeling of being re-tweeted or when your @ signs has a blinking red asterisk, you bettcha!

Need to get lost in your thoughts, dance till you sweat or put a soundtrack to your workday, play Lights by Ellie Goulding on repeat and get to it. The entire CD is like a marathon for your emotions.

As the subject matter of this blog clearly states, I've had a bit of writer's block over the past few weeks. Work took over, I had a headache, I was waiting for Karl's Fall 2011 Couture show to debut in Paris... yadda yadda...  I'm beyond amazed at the ability of 2 of my favorite bloggers to keep it going on a nearly daily basis. Want to laugh, read non-sensicle diatribes of the famous and utterly absurd, bookmark Colin's blog The Flint Skinny and if you want to feel motivated, connected and explore an entirely new world of possibilities, follow Meggie's See Meggie Run. Beyond two of the most loyal friends I know, they are my blogosphere A-Team.

Sure, she's a Dutchess, Princess or something else with a name that I don't entirely understand, and sure she's about my age but someday will rule a country and it doesn't seem to alarm her one bit, but what I find most amazing about the newly minted future queen is her closet.... her seemingly endless rotation of designer duds. Once a gauntlet reserved for a friendly feud between the first ladies of the US and France, the former Ms. Middleton has suddenly put Great Britain on the map.  

....and so on and so on and more. 

Membership has its Perks

This morning in a team meeting we were brainstorming around how to develop a runway for an upcoming store's ribbon cutting event. As we sat throwing out ideas I grew increasingly giddy as I pictured models stomping their way down an acryllic runway under ivy covered canopies, elevated far above the reach of fans packing the store's very public street corner. Looking at an inspiration photo from the 2010 monstrous fashion's night out event set in Lincoln Square where models miraculously dodged one another, I suggested maybe we steer clear of asking non-super models to maneuver anything much harder than a few stairs. Asked by a co-worker how I even knew what the event was, I just looked back and said, it's what I love. It's not just fashion or clothes or even beautiful people, but rather an entire industry devoted to helping people express who they are. 

Right on cue this week hosted the CFDA Fashion Awards with Lady Gaga receiving the Fashion Icon Award. From born this way to discovering who you want to be, the organization is the lone proponent (albeit along with Bravo shows ranging from Project Runway to Design House) who actually funds and inspires the development and research for young designers to grow. A rather small blip on the radar of most people, the awards are an annual hail mary to those who spend their lives toiling away in the darkness of a warehouse moving slowly on the long path towards success. While the Emmys, Oscars and Met Gala offer designers a chance to dress the best, the Awards throw the spotlight back. Why does it matter? To me, the awards are just the most visible presence of a very amazing organization. 


The Council of Fashion Designers of America, Inc, (CFDA) is a not-for-profit association that leads industry-wide initiatives and whose membership consists of more than 370 of America’s foremost  designers.  To young designers, membership is like getting your first SAG card, union card or being taken in the NFL draft. From professional development programs, internships and scholarships, the organization aims to offer young designers strategic opportunities. 


Sure the group isn't curing diseases or solving world politics, but it does inspire creative uses for re-useable goods, hosts fundraisers that aid in researching and bringing awareness to global epidemics and creates common bonds between worldwide leaders. The members of the CFDA, are multi generational but woven together via a common bond of passion, inspiration and determination. 

Each year the CFDA and Vogue magazine collaborate to fund an endowment supporting the next generation of American fashion designers.  While winners received amazing monetary prizes, often the most significant distinction is the industry wide awareness and the year long mentorship with a specific fashion professional whose expertise is "tailored" to the nominees needs and future goals. 


No one is turned away from applying, noting their universal acceptance related to race, color or national origin, sexual orientation, disability, age or sex. 

2011 Award Winners Included Lady Gage, Marc Jacobs and Alexander Wang

So, an all-inclusive organization which seeks to support up-and-comers, mentoring, grooming and inspiring go-getters to reach for their goals, along the way showing them how to deal with their successes turning it into future gains? Seems like the new black to me.

Savage Beauty, Simply Stated.

So, it happened again. The Oscars, Grammys, Espys, Tonys, VS Fashion Show and the White House Correspondents Dinner imploded upon one another at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Annual Met Gala sponsored by the Costume Institute. Hosted by Colin Firth, Stella McCartney and Anna Wintour, the triumphant of Hollywood, Rock and Roll and Fashion is symbolic of the event itself. So here we are almost 3 weeks post mortem of this all holy event and I'm still fascinated by it. For those apt followers to the gods of fashion blogging, this may seem a bit out dated or behind the fray, but I think on the contrary, serves to show the ability of an event to live on. 

The gala acts as the launching point for the museum's most celebrated exhibit each year with this year paying tribute to the late Alexander McQueen. If for nothing else, other than the beauty, the mystery and the delicate rampage the 100 or so pieces of art (spanning his 20+ year career) exude, the exhibit, titled Savage Beauty is a standing ovation to one of fashion's most celebrated yet often besieged designers. "London might have the royal wedding, but we have this, " Mayor Michael Bloomberg told the nearly 1,000 guests. "And this ticket is harder to get." On the heels of the world's other most anticipated dress, the exhibit offers a look behind the creative curtain that often veils a designer's inspiration. 

The exhibit itself is a thing of beauty. As McQueen often pushed the boundaries of the expected, so to do the photographs chronicling his last line. A mix of models dipped in alabaster paint, strings tied to limbs, photoshopped magic and a dash of blurred reality, the images share the designer's often unapologetic pursuit of the different. “You are not certain whether it is real or fake,” said Andrew Bolton, the curator of the McQueen exhibition. “The beauty of McQueen is that simultaneous feeling of awe and wonder mixed with fear and terror,” he said.

“His fashions were an outlet for his emotions, an expression of the deepest, often darkest, aspects of his imagination.  He was a true romantic in the Byronic sense of the word – he channeled the sublime.” - Andrew Bolton, Curator of The Costume Institute

So why did this topic seem blogworthy? Sometimes it's ok just to appreciate something truly special. To stare in awe at something that stops you in tracks and begs you to take notice. Like many of my posts that look to celebrate the misfits among us, those that walk the tedious and exhausting line between laughing and crying in the face of animosity, Savage Beauty is a nod to the very essence of honoring that dedication. I wanted to share a piece of my inspiration and join in the celebration of something that I believe offers so much more than just fashion. Through his dedication to his art, he pushed forward. He was determined, motivated, humble and inquisitive and here's to always hoping those qualities define the new black. 

Determined to be born this way.

As an under the radar Gleek I pride myself on knowing what's going on, never missing a show and being an avid iTunes purchaser of everything new the Warblers put out featuring Blaine (swoon, sorry Nate!) but draw the line at fanaticism. I rarely get involved in the politics surrounding an episode. It's just TV, right? Last week's episode "Born this Way" definitely had me thinking though. The premise is that in highschool, and really throughout your life you have to learn to understand and hopefully appreciate the parts of you that make you special, those aspects you may not like but that often times set you apart. It's funny because when the teasers aired during the prior week I wasn't sure which character I would invest in. I think what surprised me is that while I found myself seeing a little bit of me in each of them, it was Quinn with her perfect persona but screaming insecurities that seemed the most raw and honest. You never know what's hiding behind someone's doe eyed expression and therefore you can't really ever judge.

I've been dying to get writing again (expect a flood of posts hopefully soon) and as I walked home from my friend's house after watching the show, I found that my head was suddenly spinning, dissecting, analyzing, interpreting and trying to understand. I was inspired and maybe in ways I hadn't expected. While the assignment for the week was to find something you were born with, that you have to deal with or accept and put it out there, I knew that the underlying tone was to love yourself the way you were born. Don't try to change who you are. But for me, it seemed to go further. Again I was drawn to a quote from Q. When challenged as to why she'd undergone her drastic transformation pre-highschool with the snide comment, "because you didn't love yourself", it was her response, "no, it was because I did", that struck a chord (chord overstreet, aw snap!). She saw her potential and found a way to get there. Suddenly I got it. People wear contacts, they dye their hair, they get elective surgery and try to lose weight. None of this changes who they are on the inside or who they were destined to be. All these minor changes do is make them feel better about themselves and maybe even inspire a bit of confidence to actually go after who they wanted to be.

In middle school I was a pretty normal teen. Slightly overweight with glasses, freckles and a hell of a honker. A set of contacts, several pounds lost and a "Rachel Berry" elective surgery later I was a college junior on an entirely different track with an entirely different level of confidence. And last night as I sat watching, laughing a bit that I was a brown eyed man with a big smile who couldn't really sing or dance, sometimes had a bad attitude, with a pension to fixate on things I can't control and a love for boys, I knew that in each character was a part of me, and likely in each character to some extent was a part of you.

A self made man is someone who takes what they're given and makes it something more. It's someone who sees the potential against the impractical and isn't afraid to want it. I think so often we get lost in judging others for the decisions they make and never really stop to understand why they made them. Born this Way doesn't just teach you to settle for what you've been given, or even to appreciate what you're born with but challenges you to take what you have and make it something incredible. Yes, physical traits are sometimes harder to alter but physical traits aren't always what holds you back. So Quinn changed her outsides to match how she felt on the inside and she was fortunate enough to do so. The fact that she was able to accomplish her goal isn't what sets her apart, it's her drive to try that does. As the flock of girls who once looked at Lauren as their ideal Prom Queen for being just like them, changed their opinion so did I.

And it's not all about looks. Some people are born with more inherent intelligence while others have jealousy-inducing traits of survival skills, motivation, determination, physical prowess and mad humor. Wanting to challenge yourself to achieve any of these doesn't mean you're not happy with who you are or appreciative for what you have but rather someone who wants to be the best possible version of who they were always meant to be.

So we've all felt it. If not un-pretty, maybe inferior or at the very least less than amazing but it doesn't mean those imperfections that make us feel that way have to define the path we take. And no you don't have to change how you look to change how you feel, but if it helps you get there, no one else should make you feel worse for doing so. If accepting others for who they are becomes the silver standard while accepting yourself becomes gold, maybe striving for who you want to be will be the new black.