consumerism at its worst.. or shall I say best? blog #6

This past weekend, I took my sisters and my nephew to the bay for a family day. While at Pier 39, my nephew wanted to go into the krazy hat store and he asked if he could buy a hat. Since it was on sale, I told him that it was fine. After trying on countless hats, he couldn't find any that he really liked. I then told him that the next time we come back, he could continue his search. He

trade offs... blog #5

While finishing the class paper this past weekend, I found that through my research, couture clothing are produced in a "friendly" environment (Kawamura); which obviously makes sense. But as a student I can't afford the high priced, couture lines, therefore in order to keep up in a sense with what is fashionable, I have to shop at the cheaper alternative places. I'm placed in a dilemma; buying

it only gets tougher... blog #4

This weekend, my friends and I went out to the bay to hang out and check out some clubs. I was VERY tempted to buy new outfits for the weekend. So I went shopping in the morning on Friday with the mind-frame that I would buy something if I found anything that I really, really liked. We frequented one of our usual stores, Forever21. While looking around, it made me think about the article "

Vietnamese ao dai... blog #3

Last weekend my mother attended a typical Vietnamese wedding and wore a fushia and purple "ao dai," the traditional Vietnamese dress, that she purchased in Vietnam a few years ago. I've always looked at the ao dai as being the same as other ao dais that I see other ladies wear. But since taking this fashion class, it made me wonder what would an "authentic" ao dai be like. Is there are

necessary evil? ... blog #2

This weekend while cleaning out my closet, I decided to actually look at the labels of the clothes I own. And of course most of the items in my closet were produced abroad in countries such as China and Vietnam. When you shop for clothes, you don't think what were the conditions that these clothes were made under, whether or not it was humanitarian ("Santa's Sweatshop"). You think about

Hello Kitty... blog #1

Sanrio has always been one of my favorites stores ever since childhood and through this class I have began to look at it through a different lens.I can remember the days in elementary school when things like Hello Kitty and Lisa Frank were popular items. I remember as early back as the third grade when I would buy different stationaries that featured characters such as Hello Kitty, Twin Stars,