a bespectacled, studious youth

I've known I would need glasses for about a decade now- both my mother and father have two pairs of glasses each so it's always been something I've secretly looked forward to. I thought that this would happen during a later stage of life, specifically in my late thirties or early forties if I really looked after my health. The long hours I've spent scanning through specimens on a microscope is beginning to take it's toll though- and I frequently complain about sensitivity to light as well as eye strain. It's time to face facts: shopping for glasses isn't all doom and gloom although the sudden prospect of wearing glasses did slightly upset me. It seemed serendipitous that at approximately the same time, Eyeglass Discounter contacted me it seemed too good to be true! Although my eye tests came back as a negative on the glasses I did enjoy perusing their online catalog as well as finding photos of badass babes rocking their designer eyewear. For my North American and European readers it's also important to invest in a good pair of sunglasses for the upcoming Summer! They offer further discounts on their cheap range of both glasses and sunglasses, so I would highly recommend in buying a spare pair if you're thinking about traveling during the break as well. They also have some really cool hipster style glasses, along with many of the classic clubmaster and wayfarer styles to choose from.

*All glasses via Eyeglass Discounter
1- Arabelle Sicardi. 2 & 11- Tavi Gevinson. 3, 6, 9, 12- via Eyeglass Discounter. 4 & 5- How to Find the Vintage Eyeglasses of Your Dreams via Rookie Mag. 7, 8 & 10- Advanced Style.

made in japan

By some sort of accident I found this book at a thrift store for $4 containing information about some of my favourite Japanese designers including Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garcons, her protege Junya Watanabe, mainline Issey Miyake as well as Pleats Please and Yōji Yamamoto. I was pretty much speechless that I found something so relevant to my interests and containing a wealth of information in the suburbs of south eastern Melbourne. More importantly the book's preface put the historical nature of Japanese clothing to better understand and contextualize its origins. Importantly it looks at the ways in which the brands advertised, how they conducted their runway shows (with pictures you won't find on style.com) and the way in which people interact with the brands. It's always more interesting to me when people wear their archive pieces, rather than passing their pieces along in order to wear current season.

While you could read it from cover to cover the book isn't quite structured to give the same satisfaction or indeed organisation. Instead it's something that would happily live on a coffee table to entertain guests or spark a conversation. This particular version has also been translated into Dutch and artfully balances the visual nature of these clothes while reinforcing their intellectual content. The above photographs are merely a selection of what I found to be most enjoyable but I suppose there are aspects which it did not include which I'd love to uncover. It echoes this sentiment of 'cool having a certain mystery to it' (thanks Chloë Sevigny). While that's something which I cannot personally live by, I love reading and gaining insight into different things especially when I cannot discuss the subject matter in day to day life. It's a handy little book to hand so if you do come across it in a pokey little book store and you have a love of Japanese designers I implore you to invest in it- you won't be disappointed!