Eco Flip-Flops

Flip-flops are a lot of things to a lot of people: comfortable (for all those long walks on the beach, around malls and busy streets); practical (especially during the rainy season); fashionable (designers like Issa London, Michael Bastian and Nina Garcia have all splashed the rubber thongs with their prints). Now they are also eco-friendly.

Italian fashion house, knitwear giant Missoni and Brazilian flip flop brand Havainas team up once again with the Missoni ♥ Havainas 2012 collection. But this time it speaks a different language of “love” by having a greater conscience for the environment.

Following the success of the inaugural Missoni ♥ Havaianas collection in 2011, this year’s capsule collection features the iconic Missoni zigzag prints on the soles, designed using leftover rubber pieces from the manufacturing process. The packaging is made from recycled materials as well, complete with a signature Missoni flame stitch drawstring bag.

“For Missoni, the relationship with nature has always been a priority. Living and working closely in touch with the natural landscapes have inspired us to capture the seasons and its changing colors into our designs. At the same time, Havaianas is firmly concerned about reducing waste, reusing and recycling of materials. With this collaboration, it’s indeed a perfect match of both our passions: fashion and respect for nature,” Angela Missoni, creative director of Missoni said in a press statement.

Combining the iconic Missoni wave patterns with Bohemian design elements inspired by the patchwork and colors of Missoni fabrics, the Havaianas sole is stylishly enveloped in a new burst of dazzling colors and shapes. With further influence from the bright and colorful cultures of Brazil and Italy, the refreshing collection comes available in two styles —Slim and Top.

A favorite among the ladies, the Slim style has been given a vibrant take for this collection. Available in Lemon, Missoni Slim Rachel features an iconic Missoni zig-zag design with slimmer straps and a narrower-cut sole. The Top styles, Missoni Top Fiammato and the Missoni Top Patchwork, sport a more unisex appeal playing on the bold mix of red, white, black and blue.

The Missoni ♥ Havaianas collection will be retailed exclusively at Adora, Greenbelt 5 in limited quantity.

article source: mb.com.ph

Building her brand from scratch

Name it and Adora Adora-Penn will fashion it into a lovely cake. A Louis Vuitton bag, a stiletto shoe, Rayban shades, a bottle of wine.

She even demonstrated on YouTube how to make a pregnant lady using two molds to scoop out the cake “boobs” and two layers of rounded cakes for the “bump.” The technical part was easy. It’s how she festooned the cake with tiny pink roses, making motherhood look really nice and dainty. The cake was for a baby shower. With a hearty laugh, she remembered how the guests admired the strawberry cake, not wanting to slice it and “do a Caesarian.”

The pregnant lady cake video has generated more than 105,000 views since it aired on YouTube a year ago. Adora still raves about it. She has no bakeshop, her website is under construction, and while she’s received some orders online, baking remains, for the most part, a hobby.

Recommended Reading: In addition to YouTube, there are also numerous colleges offering online baking and pastry classes for the uninitiated.

“I think I now belong to a community of people who cook and bake,” said Adora, a marketing professional determined to make her Adorable Chef brand into the Filipino American Betty Crocker.

“I just like to cook,” she said, regaling The FilAm with stories of how growing up in Zambales to a family with modest means she whipped up ‘hamburger’ using ‘malunggay’ leaves and lots of chopped onions, garlic and pepper. “When you don’t have enough (in life) and come from a poor family, you become creative.”

Adora’s YouTube life has come full circle. She began watching videos on baking and cake decorating then enrolled at Wilton to learn about trends and theories. Before long, she began posting her own baking and decorating demos online, with husband Bruce, a technology teacher with the Wyandanch School District in Long Island, cheering her on.

While her baking method is old-fashioned – “everything from scratch” – her marketing is New Media, from YouTube to her Adorable Chef fan page on Facebook, which has an album of all her cake designs.

“I have 1,600 fans, and I don’t know many of them,” she said.

When she received an email from a minister’s wife ordering a birthday cake, Adora’s creative genes kicked in. The result was no standard sheet cake, but a Louis Vuitton red velvet cake with cream cheese filling coated with chocolate fondant — complete with the brand’s signature logo and gold trim handle.

“I make sure I have a presentable cake, and that people eating my cake get the correct, precise measurement. No instant, from-the-box cake for me,” she said.

While waiting for orders to trickle in, Adora is in talks with two TV networks for a cooking show. She is also slated to do a cooking demo for FilAm children to teach them simple recipes they can try at home. It was an idea triggered by a similar project she did in Florida recently for the Boys & Girls Clubs of America.

Is destination “Cupcake Wars” any closer?

“Yeah, I think I can do that,” she said.

source: thefilam.net