Turning Japanese with the Fashion Heroes of Libertine
Shibuya, Stevie Nicks and Hot Toilet Seats. What More Could You Want?
By Lesley Arfin
 After working as an assistant to Cindy Greene, who is one-half of the bicoastal fashion design team Libertine for five months, I was awarded with a free trip to Tokyo. Celux, which is a members-only wing of the Tokyo's Louis Vuitton shop, invited Libertine to Japan to meet clients and throw parties! Aces! Libertine is Cindy's clothing line, which she does with partner Johnson Hartig, who lives in LA -- maybe you saw them featured in PAPER's Beautiful People issue. I however, was not in that photo shoot. Weird, I know. So instead of bitching about [this injustice] like I usually do, I decided to get my revenge by printing out Libertine's biggest fashion faux pas during our trip to Japan. The truth is, though, there aren't really any faux pas (unless you count impromptu lip synching sessions during interviews, but I think that's just plain fun). Instead, I'm giving PAPERMAG a full-on travelogue of our exciting adventures. A lot of people have said to me, "Wow, I wish I could go to Japan." The good news is that you can! Trust me. If I got there, so can you. And you better fucking go 'cuz it totally rules. Just make sure you have a translator, otherwise you may think "arigato" means "cat." (It doesn't).
Holy Fucking Shit. Maybe it's just me
and I haven't been in that many nice hotels, but this place seems like
the fucking Four Seasons right now. Maybe it's because I'm so tired. I'm
so tired and I'm so in Tokyo right now. Weird, weird, awesome weird. I'm
gonna have to take a picture of every angle of this room. It has a
seat-warming toilet (!), a regular bidet and a butt bidet! I've already
used, and have grown to love, all three. We also saw a bunch of kids
playing soccer on the roof. Apparently everyone in Tokyo play sports of
rooftops because there's no land space. But it's not like ghetto style,
I mean, there was a huge arena on the roof. It's 9:25 p.m. here but
really like 8:25 a.m. in NYC and I haven't slept in 24 hours so I hope
to sleep like a snugglepuss right now. Tomoko is our translator. I have
a huge couch in my room and a vanity table. I feel like Eloise at The
Plaza.
Quote of the day: "I love the taxi cabs here. They look like a cross
between a police car and... a police car." -Cindy |
|
Quote of the day: "Yoshi, do you have an arigato? Oh, wait, what's arigato mean again? 'Cuz in Spanish, a cat is 'el gato.'" -Cindy |
|
This city just keeps getting more and more amazing. The high school kids
in Shibuya are where it's at. A J.Lo/ P. Diddy subculture that is
retardedly amazing. We switched hotels from the fabulous butt bidet
warming Prince Akasaka to the Holiday Inn-like army base. Kinda sucks
but we're in a better neighborhood, Roponggi. We did so much today. Went
to a Temple, a flea market, this department store called 190 where
everyone looked like a Barbie doll, dinner where we sat on the floor and
Don Quixote, a five-level super Walmart-type place that had everything
from shoelaces with pot leaves on them to Chanel jewelry. So fucking
pricey though. Tomorrow is the trunk show, work to do at Louis Vuitton.
Karaoke at night? I'm worried about money a little bit.
|
|
|
|
Me and Johnson and our new cute friend Nobu went to Kiddyland where I
bugged out for a little while. We made big plans for action while Cindy
and Tomoko were at Tokyu Hands, but of course once we all got back we
ordered room service and passed out. We're switching hotels again
tomorrow and moving to Shibuya. It's becoming a fun game, this hotel
switching. Tokyo isn't so romantic to me, not like Rome or Paris or
Prague. However they do make a special case for one to put their stamps
in. Fucking genius.
|
|
Today Cindy and Johnson had like 20 million photo shoots and interviews
so I went to PARCO, which is a series of huge department stores, and I
bought a sweet looking gold Casio watch and a bunch of crap for my
family. I walked around Shibuya for a while and actually saw the Kid
America Show on the huge Times Square-like screen in the center of the
city. Weird and totally rad. I also saw my friend Lizzy on a billboard
in the subway. Both things were sweet reminders of New York and I was
starting to miss it a little bit, which feels really good actually. You
gotta leave NYC in order to love again sometimes. The war is weird and
in the new hotel they don't have CNN or BBC so I have no idea what's
going on. All I know is that there must have been some kind of protest
today because the cops were all lined up like a pack of wolves. After
spending lots of money, I felt exhausted so I went back and took a nap.
Johnson insists that I wear high heels all the time so he and I went out
and I spent even more money on a dope pair of shoes. We went to
McDonald's, which is like the boom spot for teenagers. You're allowed to
smoke in there so we did some serious cruising and drank chocolate
milkshakes. Not very Japanese but whateves.
|
|
What a day, what a night, but all in all it ended
with a fucking bang. Fifteen Japanese people saying goodbye over and over and
over and over...It's hard enough to get Cindy out of the Hole on a Wednesday night, and yet even in Japan where we kinda don't really know anyone, it still seems to take forever to get her out the door. Homegirl is the most popular wherever she goes. She had her eye on this cute waiter all night and they finally made out at like, 2 a.m. Good shit.
At the trunk show, everyone bought Libertine clothes and they actually got Johnson and Cindy
to autograph most of the shit they bought. Imagine spending like $500
on a shirt and having it say "You're pretty and Japan rules! Love
Johnson Hartig and Cindy Greene." Well, I guess that is kinda dope now
that I think about it. We were all sad to go at the end of the night.
Johnson even cried. I have so much shit to bring back, plus one of Cindy's bags, plus I left behind the bag of gifts for my parents and Celux, which really pisses me off. Oh well, nothing I can do about it now. I have to wake up soon enough to take a two hour train ride before a 12 hour plane ride. No, it ain't quite over yet.
|
(End of travelogue but P.S... Johnson and I missed the train the next
morning. Thanks to some random Japanese guardian angel we found out how
to take the bus, but not after lugging 200 pounds of luggage everywhere.
I also tried to buy tampons at the airport and no one had any idea of
what I was talking about, even after pointing to my vagina numerous
times. I had to wear a maxi pad for 12 motherfucking hours. The seventh
grade diaper. It felt really good to land in New York, even if there
were scary army dudes with guns. It felt better than anything.
|
Cindy and Johnson had photo shoots and interviews
all day, which meant fantastical lies and lip synching to Stevie Nicks.
Tomoko and I went to this crazy five-story (maybe more) mall where girls
from ages 15 to 18 go shopping after school. Holy shit, A.D.D. in full
effect. I wanted to buy EVERYTHING. They even have those goth/Lolita
stores which are really like an expensive Hot Topic -- cheap material
but nicely made gothic clothes. But they don't look like Jersey girl
goths. A lot less Marilyn Manson and a lot more Salem Witch Trials.
Those girls are straight up dedicated. I couldn't believe I saw Cutie
magazine come to life. This mall had the hippie store, the crazy girly
pop store, the punk store, the hip-hop store, etc. I bought yellow shoes
and considered a gothic tulle skirt with stars. When Cindy goes in there
she's gonna have to be medicated. Yoshi took us to his restaurant which
had amazing food but the dinner lasted about three hours and Johnson and
I were passing out while Cindy took it up a notch and provided us all
with spastic entertainment. Tomorrow we're switching hotels to be closer
to the action and hopefully more shopping because I'm already repeating
outfits. I brought no clothes. Pretty stupid because Tokyo is THE most
stylish city ever.
We got to sleep late today (11:30 a.m.) and then went to Louis Vuitton
for bullshitting. I did laundry and walked around this neighborhood that
was like midtown, and that was boring so I made up some top ten lists:
Top ten things I love about Japan: 1. Taxi cab doors open automatically
2. Stylish peeps EVERYWHERE 3. Seat warming toilets 4. Shibuya 5. Nobu
(our new friend, not the restaurant) 6. Changing hotels 7. Bonding with
Johnson 8. Vintage kimono's 9. Everything looks really fucking cute 10.
Mushi-mushi (what peeps say when they answer the phone)
Your Comment