October is the breast cancer awareness month. Instead of looking on how every labels, designers and their stores are doing their own “pink euphoria”, let’s take a look on what’s available in terms of fashion for breast cancer survivors.

Besides ovarian cancer, breast cancer remains the most common cancer among women. Breast cancer death rates are reported to decline significantly since 1990, although the number of breast cancer survivors is growing. Not all survivors, who have undergone mastectomy (the surgical removal of one or both breasts, partially or completely), want, could have nor could afford reconstructive breast surgery. In the past, the only clothing, especially undergarments available for women who had lost their breasts, were the medical bras that most hospitals sell in the US.

HIGHLIGHTS: Hillary Boyajian, a New York based fashion and product designer graduated from Parsons, New York and Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, London, created Chikara, a fashion line for women with one or no breasts, and those who are experiencing breast asymmetry following a single or multiple mastectomy, lumpectomy, radiation therapy and reconstructive surgeries.

ABOUT THE LINE: Chikara, which means strength, power and energy in Japanese, offers Greek-inspired clothing, which are draped across the chest and cover up the chest in such beautiful way, that compliment left, right, and bilateral breast treatments. Some of their flirty tops and dresses are definitely wearable for every women. Chikara also offers alternative lingerie to medical bras, swimwear, activewear, and loungewear.

HOW IT FISRT STARTED: Boyajian first began designing post-mastectomy clothing while working on her thesis at Parsons. In her research, she discovered that many women who have received mastectomies are not candidates for immediate reconstructive surgery, or decide to move ahead without any breast reconstruction. She also discovered that wearing prosthetics could easily shift and uncomfortable due to its unavoidable asymmetry, and there are also those who simply do not like to wear prosthetic breast(s). Seeing this, Boyajian wanted to cater to these brave women and help them to empower their confidence by creating a fashion-forward line that balances the the body post breast cancer treatments and surgeries.

It is good to know that this option exist, and we hope there would be more upcoming designers who are thinking out of the box. Learn more about this line, here.  And see some of Chikara collection below.

Sources and images courtesy of: Chikaradesign.com, Metro New York, wikipedia, cancer.org

Whether you LOVE or HATE it, I’m certain that we’re all pretty much entertained by the Upper East Sider teenage drama of Gossip Girl. I wasn’t tempted about this show when it first came out, the title itself turned me off. On one lazy evening I watched one of its episode. Oh boy, I was hooked ! It’s what I’m looking forward to watching every Monday evening, it makes Monday a pleasant day *here in the States, starting this new season, Gossip Girl airs every Monday nights. The impact of these teenage series is pretty remarkable, they manage to capture the hearts of young girls and adults alike. Some of my girlfriends who despise soap operas, have converted to Gossip Girl. The cute dramas, the clothing, shoes, and accessories are definitely the ones who entertained me the most from this show, even more than Lipstick Jungle or Cashmere Mafia. Have you ever wondered who actually styles all its casts? Meet Eric Daman, the wardrobe stylist /costume designer of Gossip Girl. Here’s what I’ve briefly compiled from his interview with WWD and various sources.

We can’t deny the tremendous influences of Swedish fashion today (and Scandinavian fashion in general), from the photos of Swedish street look on The Sartorialist, the hip denim labels of ACNE, NUDIE, and Cheap Monday, to the retail giant, H&M, and many more.  Helena Hörstedt is an emerging Swedish designer known for her intricate constructions, pleats, frills, multi-layering material, origami /geometric foldings, lots of volumes, elaborate techniques, and using solely BLACK as her primary color. 

Her collection has caught the eyes of everyone in the industry, from hintmag.com, stylebubble, V magazine, Nylon magazine, WWD, Diane Pernet of ASVF.com, the Fashion Spot forum to every fashion blogs have mentioned her amazing collection since last year. I’m sure some of you have heard about her, a FD member has posted a Helena Hörstedt‘s LBD on the forum a while ago, and I think it’s not too late to have her as our designer du jour on FD.. *After all, it’s better late than never  

Helena Hörstedt, courtesy of majsanmaja.blogspot.com 

An amazing number of talented fashion designers have emerged from “the underground”, from the brilliant Rodarte sisters, Doo.Ri, Mike & Chris, ThreeAsFour to Ohne Titel. Yet, there are still many undiscovered designers with extraordinary talents which haven’t been widely exposed. Let’s bring those hidden gems to the surface and explore their marvelous journey surviving in this cut-throat industry. We will try to BRIEFLY feature a variety of talented individuals from various creative fields *hopefully related to fashion, art, and beauty, whose dedication and hard work could serve us as inspirations. Our very first designer “du jour” is Alexander Wang, an upcoming designer who has taken the fashion industry by storm at the tender age of 24! Named “the coolest kid in Manhattan“ by Teen Vogue, Wang’s recent collaboration with UNIQLO created a “chaos” during its first launch in Japan.

Alexander Wang, image courtesy of style.blogs.com