JANUARY/FEBUARY 2019
Petra-Smith Event Design Creating unique & memorable events
315 W. Grand River Ave. East Lansing, MI 517-336-6991 PetraSmithEventDesign.com
in this issue WOMEN’S FASHION born to be “extra”
MEN’S FASHION what’s old is new
CREATIVE floral
HEALTH & BEAUTY
meditate your way to success
CREATIVE BEAUTY the oil spill
LIFESTYLE giving pottery a chance
THE TEAM
bo
orn to be “extra”
BORN TO BE “EXTRA” By: Noel Thomas Overstated eyeliner, hot pink lipstick, oversized hair barrettes and sequins — oh my! Bold statements have made their return to the world of women’s fashion, and with them comes the sweet nostalgia of our childhood dress-up days. Dress is a form of self-expression. It outwardly communicates something about us as individuals and showcases our personalities without words. People can change the way they are perceived by simply changing the way that they dress. In previous fashion week runway looks, we have seen the inner child take over adult fashion. It takes the rules of fashion we follow on the daily and adds a playful twist. Remember trying on someone’s sunglasses that were half the size of your face as a kid? Today the same look just so happens to be one of the season’s biggest trends worn by celebrities from Gigi Hadid to Kendall Jenner. Neutrals are a great base to every outfit and will always be our go-to, but why not mix things up? As kids, over-the-top dress was all the rage. The brighter the color, the better. If someone were to ask us to choose between neon eyeshadow or colored mascara, the obvious answer was to reach for both. Somehow over time, this wild style has been tamed in our everyday lives. We started to incorporate more and more neutral colors with hints of metallic or red tones when feeling adventurous. All this nostalgia has caused people to stop and wonder: what’s next for fashion? Within the last year, the phrase “extra” has been used to describe someone or something that is over the top, dramatic and maybe a little outrageous. Extra fashion takes accessorizing and dress to a new level by repurposing nostalgic trends and compiling them together. Maximalism or “more, more and always more,” is alive and well. In the past, we frequently heard “less is more,” but people are pushing those limits. Gucci’s 2019 Cruise collection is a perfect example of this. Its collection embodies multiple trends, color palettes and materials. It includes tropical patterns, neon tights, gothic chokers, oversized shades and more. The key to being extra is to compile different, extravagant pieces into one outfit to truly maximize the look. Overstated fashion may seem like an intimidating concept, but it is far from it. It takes fashion as we now know it and returns it to fashion as we used to know it. This season allows us to have fun with fashion, so let’s enjoy it. Platform shoes, colorful fringe earrings and that new tube of blue mascara are screaming your name. Multiple neon pieces in one look? Why not? Remember, there are ways to try this new trend while staying within your comfort zone and style. Put yourself in the extra mood, and go for it!
PHOTOGRAPHY Sadie Layher WRITING BY Noel Thomas STYLE BY Haley Poag & Hannah Pace MAKEUP BY Kathryn Remy & Michaella Anderson CASTING BY Tori Tullio
what’s
old is new
PHOTOGRAPHY Julia Hennemann WRITING BY Claire Balderson STYLE BY Vanessa Hanna MAKEUP BY Dianne Avila CASTING BY Brianna Elizalde SPECIAL THANKS Point Laundry
What’s Old is New: Shoulder Pads Have Returned By Claire Balderson People often say history repeats itself, and so does fashion. Shoulder pads are not just a thing of the past — 80’s fashion trend is coming back into style with full force. Shoulder pads are fabric-covered padding that are worn in garments such as blazers and jackets to give the appearance of broader shoulders. They became popular in both men’s and women’s fashion in the 1980s, however, the trend originated in the ’30s and ’40s specifically for women’s formal wear. The trend took off in ’80s when it became a fashion statement for pop stars and movie stars to wear exaggerated shoulder pads, thus making the style popular for everyday men and women. It became so popular that the pads were sewn into garments rather than bought separately. Manufacturers even began putting Velcro on the shoulder pads so people could wear multiple at one time. Shoulder pads were not solely about making a fashion statement; they became known as a status symbol. If someone had them, it meant they were successful. The higher the status they wanted to portray, the larger the shoulder pads they would wear. The image wildly important to men, particularly because they wanted to prove to themselves — and to the world — that they were important figures. This hot trend became almost extinct in the early ’90s and continued to lose popularity, until now. Shoulder pads are becoming more popular again because of the power dynamic they exude. This is an era of “do anything, be anything” and shoulder pads allude to that philosophy. Many people think of shoulder pads as a women’s accessory, since they were popular in an era of women rising to power. However, they are still relevant to men’s fashion. Shoulder pads are not only a fashion statement but also make shoulders appear broader and less sloped. Fashion is all about bringing confidence to yourself and bringing shoulder pads into the picture is an essential way of doing that. Shoulder pads were brought back starting in 2018 when designers such as Marc Jacobs, Versace, Givenchy and Miu Miu began putting oversized pads in fashion shows to sport an avant-garde look. Not everyone is going to wear the oversized look for everyday fashion, but including them in men’s suits, blazers and sweaters adds a level of sophistication and authority.
PHOTOGRAPHY Julia Lobello WRITING BY Madison Walsh STYLE BY Hanna Darnell, Meghan Lloyd, Eve Voci & Lydia Reynolds MAKEUP BY Michaella Anderson CASTING BY Caroline Semler SPECIAL THANKS Petra Flowers
F L O R A L
floral floral floral floral floral
HEALTH AND BEAUTY HEALTH AND BEAUTY HEALTH AND BEAUTY
&
Meditate Your W
Way to Success
Meditate Your Way To Success By Zena Kashat Your alarm blares at 7:15 a.m. You roll over in bed to silence it, and the first thing you do is peer at your brightly lit phone. A few more likes and follow requests on Instagram, three more Snapchat videos from a loud night out with your best friends and ten new school and work emails that are demanding your attention. Unfortunately, this is nothing new. You end up scrolling and clicking for God knows how long, and suddenly realize that you’re running late for your morning class. No breakfast for you again! You lock your phone, look up at the ceiling and refuse to start your day, even though you’re now in a rush. Your blood pressure slowly creeps up, and you slip into a negative mindset. The way you start your day, and even your state of mind throughout the day, can infiltrate your outlook and affect how you physically and mentally perform. To combat the incessant demands of your daily grind, meditation is a crucial habit to implement that helps your mental well-being and ability to be succeed. As you take on more prestigious positions throughout your career, employing mindful practices will be even more important for your mental sanity. If you feel you’re lacking the time for meditation, consider this zen proverb: “You should sit in meditation for twenty minutes every day — unless you’re too busy; then you should sit for an hour.” CEOs, billionaires, triumphant athletes and overall high-ranking human beings all mutually agree that their success can be attributed to practicing meditation and intentional exercises. Richard Feloni from Business Insider states, “regardless of how one chooses to meditate, there is proof that it’s like a workout for building the skill of emotional control and that in turn is a valuable skill to have when you’re a high performer in any field.” Due to the higher stakes associated with upper echelon jobs, it is crucial to have the mental agility that meditation perpetuates so that you are able to put out fires as they ignite. LinkedIn’s CEO Jeff Weiner, founder of the world’s largest hedge fund Ray Dalio and co-founder of HuffPost Arianna Huffington all equate their depth of prosperity to one common factor: meditation. Meditation doesn’t always involve some hippy yoga instructor striking an ancient gong as you try to hold some contortionist position while incense infuse the air. Meditation is about regaining emotional control and fostering mental clarity. The simplest of meditation practices require just 20 minutes of time in a quiet, undisturbed and tranquil place to help you focus on breathing and letting go of your thoughts. Meditation can also be a brisk walk with no music other than the birds chirping and flapping their wings. It may even be practicing your favorite hobby with meditative flow in mind. More advanced meditation strategies can be sought out in niche apps such as Calm, Headspace and Mindbody. Now imagine starting your day methodically — a soft, rolling alarm echos without brightly lit blue technology, persistent emails or mind-numbing social media. The smell of coffee, eggs and crackling bacon fills your dimly lit kitchen. You’re stretching, it’s quiet and all you can hear are hushed thoughts to ponder and ruminate. A mindful mentality like this will influence the rest of your life and could be the key to your success.
PHOTOGRAPHY Maria Grigg WRITING BY Zena Kashat MAKEUP BY Michaella Anderson CASTING BY Molly Gundry SPECIAL THANKS Yoga State
CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE CREATIVE
PHOTOGRAPHY Julia Lobello MAKEUP BY Hannah Kutchinski & Sakina Abedi CASTING BY Camryn Cureton
lifestyle
Giving Pottery A Chance: A Chat with Dan Nunez Written by: Elena Bulthuis and Monique Ross
VIM spent a Sunday evening making pottery with Wheel House Studio owner, Dan Nunez. This fairly new busines Michigan State University’s campus in REO Town. Starting out as beginners learning from a new studio, we did no prised to have experienced an impactful night consisting of spontaneous live music, fresh-baked goods and the ove community.
He was born and raised in the city of Lansing and attended Western Michigan University to obtain his bachelor’s d he was the only student in the program. Alone in his workshop with only his torch and metal music, Nunez was su unique sculptures and turned what seemed like a brutal amount of labor into graceful art. Although he enjoyed th sion, Nunez felt there was an audience missing, leaving him dissatisfied and prompting him to open Wheel House
Q: What makes you love the art of pottery making so much? A: I love it because it attracts all different kinds of people for all different kinds of reasons. I love it because there i together science and art in a way that people are always trying to force, but it does effortlessly. Whether you’re talk reactions or the proper heat for that to catalyze… this is one of the few instances where that doesn’t seem forced to
Q: Throwing pottery can be challenging to many people. How long did it take you to become comfortable on the w A: Oh, I’m still not comfortable. After you make 30 of something, you kind of got the muscle memory and you’ll be a half — I know I said I started my senior year, let’s not do the math on that — to even get decent at it… Then I did parks and recreation job open up to teach it, and I genuinely was like, “I don’t know if I can do this,” but I went ov you should make more ambitious stuff. Your standards should always outpace your skills.
Q: What ideas do you have for the future? A: I might take on an employee. That’s crazy to me, but I think it’s becoming more and more evident that I could use that. I’ve got a bunch of things that I’m working on that are more infrastructure for t about the website for REO Town. We made a committee about that because we’re in this weird bohemian entrepre and not everyone knows the difference between Old Town and REO Town yet. It’s a real thing, around here I feel l rative that “it’s community,” but it really is. People actually look out for each other around here, it’s good.
Q: What mistake do beginners always make, or what is the most common misconception people have about pottery A: The misconception is that it would feel like it looks — it looks like it’s a finesse thing when it’s way more about b a way that refuses to be moved instead of strong in a way where you’re trying to push or pull something. It is the st position, but it looks like it’s, “I’ll get out of its way and let it become pottery.” Nunez’s goal for his studio is to build a safe and light-hearted learning environment where sparks can continue to the worst student in his college ceramics class, he believes that this has allowed him to become a better teacher.
“You never want to learn from a natural,” he said. “They will think that the way is intuitive, but it’s also kind of proc
Nunez found that his true passion is linked to teaching the art of pottery, leading him to the decision of opening hi his own pieces. Wheel House Studio classes are open to people of various skill levels. Nunez emphasizes that there is making what they want. I’m not going to spend four weeks teaching people who don’t bake how to make cassero
Aside from classes, Wheel House Studio also hosts various creative and successful events open to the public. In th the Dead,” “Holiday Sweater Jubilee,” “Dog Bowls and Ashtrays,” “Chia Pets and Planters” and an incense burner w ideas sprout from browsing the Internet and receiving recommendations from locals. Once announced, these work well as additional private events such as “Date Night” and group parties, can be arranged through www.wheelhouse or (517) 712-9013.
Lucky for us, Nunez has no intention of relocating anytime soon. Comfortably surrounded by creativity and his clo other places too, but I like Lansing better. I didn’t know how cool Lansing was until I was like 22 — I was in a shad studio reach its full potential, continuously growing in the right direction so that his neighborhood is able to exper during the REO Town revival.
WRITING BY Monique Ross & Elena Bulthuis PHOTOGRAPHY Eseraa (Esra) Ali SPECIAL THANKS Wheelhouse Pottery
ss is located just 15 minutes outside of ot know what to expect and were surerall generosity given by Nunez and his
degree of fine arts in sculpting, where urrounded by sparks as he created hese moments of solitude with his pasStudio.
is a functional aspect of it, and it ties king about mixing glazes for chemical o me.
wheel? e fine, but it took me about a year and dn’t do it for two years, and I saw this ver there. If you get really comfortable,
the area, like today I had a big meeting eneurial niche. I feel like it’s inspiring like a lot of people try to make the nar-
y? bracing yourself and being strong in trength and steadiness to impose your fly — figuratively that is. Claiming to be
cedural.”
is own studio rather than simply selling e is “no syllabus required, and everyone ole dishes.”
he past, Dan has come up with “Clay of workshop. He modestly reveals that his kshops and seven-week-long classes, as e.studio, YourWheelHouse@gmail.com
ose-knit community, he states, “I can like dow my entire life.” He hopes to see his rience many more magical moments
the
team . . . EDITORS-IN-CHIEF Kara Dempsey & Zoey Berghoff ASSISTANT TO THE EIC Wolfgang Ruth FINANCE Hannah Huehn assistants Nina Kirchner Alyssa Mills LIFESTYLE Charlotte Beers Katie Kalass assistant Monique Ross MARKETING Courtney Monge Alaina Warbuton MEN’S FASHION Molly Harmon PHOTOGRAPHY Gemma Darr assistant Nicole Ma PUBLIC RELATIONS Holly Kitts assistant Mattie Milne MANAGING EDITOR Jordan Sickon
WOMEN’S FASHION Mackenzie McDonell assistant Meghan Provenzano FASHION SHOW Thomas Messenger VISUAL MEDIA Amanda Schlau Lauren Wallenfels SOCIAL MEDIA Mady Emerson Wolfgang Ruth assistant Madeline Strintz EVENTS Morgan Schwanky Schwany assistant Katie Telder HEALTH & BEAUTY Jessica Hanna assistant Steffany Kim EDITING Caroline Johnson
ADVERTISING Whitney Thalheimer Eve DeMeester assistant Taylor Anderson ART Kelly Phalen Anna Warbel CASTING Abigail Rothe Shannon Parr assistant Caroline Semler CREATIVE Hanna Darnell CREATIVE BEAUTY Hannah Kutchinski Sakina Abedi DIGITAL CREATIVE Taylor Sterenberg Taylor Stack assistants Lindsay Simos Maddie Stoy DIGITAL BLOG Heather Haely assistant Nareh Vartanian
{
ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE ADVERTISE IVE CREATIVE CREATIVE
ADVERTISE WITH US EMAIL @ { vimadvteam@gmail.com }