Keanan Duffty performs at David Bowie World Fan Convention 2023

bowie fan con

New York City - Bowie Ball  at Racket- June 17th.

Keanan Duffty and Fabio Fabbri joined this  David Bowie Worl Fan Convention in New York City, June 2023.  

The convention, at Racket New York City, was filled with panels from David Bowie's friends and collaborators.

One of the key highligths was the Bowie Ball. An outlandish and fun celebration in Bowie style. On stage the Bowie Band brought togheter Jeff Slate, Michael T and special guests that included Ava Cherry, voalist who sang with Bowie in the '70s, Carmine Rojas, bass plyer who played with Bowie from 1983 to 1987, Omar Hakim, who played drums in the Bowie's Albums "Let's Dance" and "Tonight", and Carlos Alomar who played guitar in many Bowie's albums from 1975 to 2003. 

In this video, made by Fausto Fabbri, Keanan Duffty is performing 'Jean Genie' with Ava Cherry and 'Star Man' and 'Ziggy Stardust' with Jeff Slate & Friends. 

Fabio with Carlos Alomar                                                                                 Fabio with Omar Hakim

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Keanan Duffty shows us how to cook a Vegetarian Carbonara

brutally delicious
Brutally Delicious Productions began as a cooking show with the biggest names in metal and punk performing for you in the kitchen, far from the stage and the studio. Their goal was to give the viewer a behind the scenes look at their favorite artists. This eventually led to many other videos that range the gamut from short & funny to full-length documentaries all designed to give the viewer intimate access and footage they won't find anywhere else. From an award winning documentary, "Metal Missionaries" to many other off the wall segments there is truly something here for everyone.
In this video Keanan Duffty, singer of Slinky Vagabond,  is cooking the weirdest Vegetarian Carbonara you have never seen!!
Asparagus, garlic, tagliatelle (fettuccini), paprika (my God!) and yolks....of course!
When Fabio Fabbri , producer and guitarist of Slinky Vagabond, saw the video told: "It's the craziest Carbonara in the world, I have never seen paprika in a Carbonara dish, and I hope I never taste it !!"

 

Rock and Roll On The Runway with Keanan Duffty

Keanan Duffty

Rock and Roll On The Runway with Keanan Duffty

 Keanan Duffty was interviewed in "Instinct Magazine" by Jeremy Hinks, about Slinky Vagabond, Music Fashion and much more. 

The link here

 

keanan dfuffty instinct

 

"Keanan Duffty is one of the most successful fashion designers in the world. He’s worked with David Bowie, Gwen Stefani, you get the idea. He and I have spoken at length about music and fashion, how they cross over and what works for creating a successful enterprise. He is also the frontman of the band “Slinky Vagabond” which has some Rock Royalty in the band. He is the most down to earth, and non-pretentious guy I have ever met, and so much of his success is because of the LGBTQ Community. You all have seen his work, now let’s talk ROCK & ROLL.

H: SO Keanan thanks for taking the time.

KD: My pleasure, good to be here.

JH: Well, this is part 2, we are covering the fashion side of things, which is what the LGBTQ community is always very busy with because we did talk about you being the musical mastermind in Slinky Vagabond.

KD: Well, the melody maker in my band Slinky Vagabond is my buddy Fabio, who is the producer and guitar player. I am his partner in crime.

JH: Well, this is the thing about Slinky Vagabond, who could say “Yeah, I’ll get Earl Slick (Guitarist for John Lennon, and David Bowie) to play guitar, or Richard Fortus (Psychedelic Furs, Guns & Roses), or hey lemme get Midge Ure (Ultravox, Band AID, GOD) or Glen Matlock (Sex Pistols) to play on the album, that “King Boy Vandals” album you have a fabulous cast on there. 

KD: We are really lucky is that most of the players are good friends of mine, and it was a pandemic project. I think that a lot of creative people have been able to put the pandemic to good use, a lot of people have been stuck at home, in lockdown, and it’s terrible, but the positive side of all of us being at home in lockdown we let the creative juices flow. For us, it was this new Slinky Vagabond record, I haven’t done any fashion, to be honest. But that is all going to change in March, we are doing a fashion show in Palm Springs. We are dipping our toes back into it, and it should be lots of fun.

H: You had been teaching in Italy, you are not a big “Brand” line fashion designer, you seem to be the individual fashion designer. But you also have this book “Rebel Rebel, the Anti-fashion” about fashion and music. You had Bernard Patrick (BP) Fallon write the forward. He was responsible for getting U2 pushed into the mainstream in the early days.

KD: Yeah he was also the publicist for Marc Bolan (from T-Rex), and Led Zeppelin, Ian Dury (Ian Dury & The Blockheads), some of the iconic acts in the 70s. BP Fallon is a guru, he is a magic impish character through the history of Rock and Roll.

JH: So where were you teaching in Italy?

KD: I was teaching in a place called “Polimoda” it’s in Florence, which isn’t a bad gig to be going to Florence regularly to teach. There were some great young fashion students from all over the world that had chosen to study in Italy. That was a magical time for me, that started in 2017, by chance. In fashion and music, it has been very serendipitous.

JH: You were also teaching in New York right?

KD: Yeah I work with Parsons, which is a fashion school that is probably known to your listeners (Readers) from that show “Project Runway”. So it helped that school become a household name globally. There is an endless list of great graduates who have done wonderful things. It’s like in London there is St Martins, so they are both sides of the same coin. If you are lucky to win a place in either of those schools, it will put you on the map. I studied at St Martin’s, so I am very lucky to be able to be affiliated with both schools.

H: Well we joked previously about that PULP song “She came from Greece, she had a thirst for knowledge, she studied sculpture at St Martin’s college” but then you wrote that song about the PULP experience.

KD: Yeah, that was all SEX, DRUGS, and Rock N Roll, It’s all part of the human experience and I think that every young person should experience that sense of freedom. I was lucky to be in London in 1982 and that was just after the whole “New Romantic” movement. Which was really in 1982 the explosion of what they called “New Pop”, with bands like Culture Club with Boy George, and his sidekick Marilyn, who was one of the biggest glamour boys at the time. And then all of these great bands like ABC and Duran Duran all went on to have great global success. It all came out of this one club in London called “The Blitz”. So when I moved to London that little Amoeba was dividing and growing, you could go out every single night to see something inspiring. There was one club called “Heaven” in the back of that club was called “Cha-Cha” and the person who did the door was a young woman named “Scarlet”. They recently had an exhibit of photographs of her, she was very hardcore. She had her head shaved except for this cross, and cupid lips. And you had to try hard to pass the test, but once you got past her you got into this club that had lots of High Energy music, Patrick Cowley, The Flirts. Like Divine, who was adopted in London, not from John Waters’ movies, but as an icon of that time. Which was brilliant, it was the moment that the underground started to cross over and inspire the mainstream.

JH: Yeah, you are talking about these bands, ABC, and Duran Duran, I have stacks of their vinyl, I grew up on that. But I remember back then, the mid-80s, we were all looking at Europe as the place where it was all happening, so we looked at it all for fashion as well. So those of us who were listening to U2, and Depeche Mode, that is what we were trying to dress like, because that was European fashion. And you had said before, that the bands that “Made it” had a note “Look” to them, like Adam Ant, he was very distinct, but there were also bands like Theater of Hate, that was very much like U2, and even looked like U2.

KD: Oh yeah, Actually Kirk Brandon and Boy George were a couple for a while. But London at the time was very polymorphous, I think everybody slept with everybody else back then.

JH: Right, you see how Theater of Hate could have been huge because of their sound, but they didn’t have that “Edge” that little whatever U2 did and how they delivered that caught everyone’s eye. But if you go listen to early Theater of Hate, and early U2 they were almost the same thing.

KD: Yes, I think Kirk Brandon was extremely good looking and with U2, unfortunately, the best-looking guy in the band was the drummer. He looked just like Kirk, and they both looked like James Dean. They had that neurotic boy “Outsider” going for them. When I got to London, there was this fashion magazine called “The Face” which was the arbiter of style, it set the standard for the club scene, and what designers were doing. There was a journalist Robert Elms, he coined this phrase “Hard Times” and in one month everybody in London went from everybody looking really glamorous to wearing ripped jeans and brothel loafers, and “Teddy Boy” shoes, and having that Theater of Hate hairstyle, the boys and the girls, it was very androgynous, and from electronic music to funk, rockabilly. That was one month and then went on to something else. It was an amazing time, we were all chasing what was becoming the standard.

JH: SO, what was it that made the ”Right” guys hang on for so long? I mean U2 and Depeche Mode managed to do it with the looks and the sound, and there was Martin Fry in ABC, everyone referred to him with his macrame suits. But then Frankie Goes to Hollywood had their shtick, they were really into fashion (they sold clothes in their cassette covers catalog), but they also had their “Eye Candy” which was Paul Rutherford, all the gay men loved that guy, and all he really ever did was just dance and sing a little.

KD: Frankie was playing the circuit and they came and played in London at Camden Palace, which was the place where Madonna played her first gig in the UK. Nobody paid attention to most of them because they were all too cool for that. Except everyone was watching Frankie Goes to Hollywood, because Paul came out in leather chaps with his ass hanging out, with whip marks painted on him. And they had these two girls called “The Leather Pets” in their bondage gear. They sounded fantastic, and they sounded nothing like they did once Trever Horn got ahold of them, they had all the same songs, Two Tribes, Relax, Crisco Kisses, but they were this sort of white funk act. They were eye-catching, they had two singers, Holly and Paul, Paul was a great mover, dancer. Paul had the look, and Holly had the voice. Yeah, it also had to do with the fact that from Liverpool, they had that cheeky Beatles sense of humor, and they were transgressive, there was an interesting dichotomy of the band, two out gay men as singers, and 3 straight guys on the instruments. Holly would dress them up in leather bondage gear and they would do it.

JH: Yeah, you could see they were so straight they weren’t into it.

KD: Yeah, the look that Paul went for, it was the clone look, that was a bit controversial at the time, that became the mainstream. Nobody thought that Frankie was going to be on major television shows or have hit records, because what they were doing was so transgressive.

JH: Yeah, their videos were insane, they could have kept going, they would have been amazing. (*one Frankie video had a businessman going to an underground gay sex club. Another video had Ronald Reagan and Cherneko the Communist Chairman in a gladiators ring trying to cut each other’s gear off, that was pretty out there in 1984)

KD: Yeah, young people having tremendous success, and too many people having agendas. You know, Trevor Horn first offered “Slave to the Rhythm” to Frankie, which ended up that Grace Jones recorded. They didn’t want to do it. And their second album didn’t really hit the nerve of the public consciousness like “Welcome To The Pleasuredome”. Their first 3 singles were number 1 in the UK, the only people to do that were ABBA, The Beatles, and Frankie.

JH: I have my “Gay list” which is my music by queer artists, and “Pleasuredome” is still at number 1 and has been for years. SO, I know that you have seen the movie “Zoolander” and I know you laughed at everything in it.

KD: Sure it was very real. But, there was this one friend when I was growing up, he was the first friend when we were young to tell me he was gay. When Frankie Goes To Hollywood and then and Divine, and Do you wanna Funk by Sylvester… These hits were all big in 6 months, and my friend said “They have taken OUR music from us”. That they had taken what was part of the gay culture, from the underground. He liked it that way because it was special, that it wasn’t part of the mainstream. But what I have noticed is that things that come from gay culture have a very big influence, and they happen first in culturative minorities. Like In African American culture with hip-hop, and a lot of the music coming from the gay clubs in the UK, they kind of change culture, I think that has been a pattern. If you see who manages bands for example, in the ’60s Brian Epstein molded The Beatles, I don’t think they would have been as successful without him. There was an amazing gay woman Vicky Whickham, the producer of “Ready, Steady, Go!” (Ready Steady Go! Was a British TV show about music in the 1960s.) And as a “Taste-maker” she had incredible influence, you can’t underestimate this, and it still happens to this day, for example, we lost Thierry Mugler yesterday. I didn’t know him but I met him once at a fashion show in Paris, it was amazing. He had a model coming in on a winged horse in this gown that was worn by Jerry Hall (supermodel). A great showman who dressed some of the biggest icons in the world, Bowie for example, and Bowie’s wife Imam were in his shows too. These people all came from the 70s and they all merged at that time. 

JH: See, you said to me many times that whatever the big creative movements were in music, and fashion, you would see it in the gay clubs where they were being quiet about it, at least a year before the rest of the world got it.

KD: The things that I liked, as a kid, they weren’t mainstream, and I think Punk allowed a lot of outsiders to come together en-masse, so whether it was a geeky kid in school, or someone questioning their sexuality, I mean, the clothes I wore were always very experimental, and punk allowed all of these young people to come together and to share ideas. Punk was so much a part of the gay subculture in the UK, especially in the town where I lived, if you were going to wear clothes that were not part of the mainstream was the only gay club in town and feel safe, you might not be hearing punk rock in this club, maybe more melodic dance music, but you could go and express yourself without any fear of violence. 

H: So what I thought was interesting at the time and you can explain it better than me, you had “The Sex Pistols” and the “Punk” look, but then you had the whole “Post Punk” thing when these bands had this very dark punk sound, but bands like Joy Division all dressed like blue-collar guys. WIRE was the same, they wore normal button-up shirts. Doing this highly developed punk music, but making a statement of NOT having a “look”.

KD: When punk started there wasn’t a uniform, and there weren’t rules you could wear anything. I remember someone turning up at a punk gig in a Beekeepers outfit. Someone once showed up with a box of chocolates tied to their head, it was like living surrealism. But in the UK then there were only a handful of newspapers, and it was them showing “This is the latest trend if you want to wear it”. So punk became associated with the Mohawk hair, the leather jacket and ripped jeans, Doc Martin boots, and violence. It wants like that in the beginning, it was a reaction against the mainstream culture, and there weren’t any rules. As soon as there were rules the original people involved didn’t want to have anything to do with it, so that was what happened in “Post Punk”. Like, Public Image (Public Image Limited, the John Lydon project after the Sex Pistols broke up) originally wanted to make dance music. They were pulling from Dub reggae, and funk, and probably getting it all wrong, but they created something new that became identified as Post Punk. Thus the “uniform” of the button-up shirt and skinny tie. Then as a reaction to that, there was this “New Romantic” which was a reaction to the Post Punk, so let’s put the makeup back on and try to do the Ziggy Stardust in more of a “street” way, and that really appealed to me, because I LOVE makeup.

JH: Yeah, the New Romanticism, the stuff I loved about that, you had Duran Duran’s Nick Rhodes with his green lipstick. Limahl with his two-tone Ziggy Stardust mullet and man, Midge Ure’s sideburns. I loved the whole clash of the cultures when Grace Jones was dating Adam Ant, I would get Smash Hits, or NME, months-old issues cause we just wanted to see this as yank kids. All the gay kids at the dance clubs I went to, were getting these magazines, and man, they had it all down, music and fashion. They would see these magazine articles, or import album covers, and dress like they saw the artists dress. We always got to it, just later, cause it was out in the UK first.

KD: I don’t think that’s true, New York had an amazing scene where the art world, the underground cabaret, and the music world were all coming together. There was a club called “Club 57” it was in the basement of a church, my wife used to go there. They had an art exhibit about it a few years ago, and we went to the opening, and what it showed me was this club culture in the late 1970s early 80s, and what the New York scene did better than what happened in London was they integrated the art world. At Club 57 one of the guys working the bar was Jean-Michelle Basquiat and the other was Keith Herring, and they were artists, and they hung their art that you could buy, at the bar. These places had lots of artists all working and starting there, along with clubs like the Pyramid, and the Palladium. And there was this scene going on in New York that we just didn’t know about in London, it was pre-internet. So we heard about it happening in New York 6 months later after it had all changed. I think that if we had the kind of communication then that we do now, we would have had this mutually uplifting scene. I’m sure that today there are really cool things going on in Jakarta or China that we don’t know about that hopefully are percolating and creating that next wave of youth culture.

JH: I remember you saying recently that with the internet and the DIY world, for the young gay kid out there, we are on the verge of another “Andy Warhol” moment.

KD: Yeah, what is interesting about society today is that we are all interconnected via social media, which is great, but it doesn’t give time for things to gestate. It sort of happens and is over quickly, Andy Warhol said everybody would be famous for fifteen minutes, today it’s for fifteen seconds. The downside of that is that someone could take that fifteen seconds, and make a career out of that, but be seen as exposed too soon and then deemed sort of “over” amongst their peers, and in more mainstream society and I think it’s hard for a music artist, for example, to look at the long term career, of someone like U2, because they are exposed to the bright lights of celebrity very quickly, and then be deemed “over” because of cancel culture, on the extreme left or right, and be canceled rather quickly. I think young people are under that spotlight. You do and say stupid things when you are a kid, it’s part of growing up. It was funny when I was a kid in school, I was about 16, I went to this gay club, and this guy was the school bully he showed up. He came and asked, “What are you doing here?” I said “What are YOU doing here”, and he said, “Well, I can’t really be myself, and I have to have this tough image”. I felt really terrible for the guy then, but I think kids even today have to have a front, and an image in media, and social media, and be themselves behind the scenes.

JH: So in your book who were some of the big names you have designed for? I mean, from the toes to the hair you have done it all. How many pictures of David Bowie can you have?

KD: When I was about 12 years old, I worshiped David Bowie, but he was only a part of the pop music I was listening to, but I was also buying albums buy “The Sweet”, Marc Bolan, and “Slade” all those glam rock bands of the early 70s. I would glue glitter on my jacket even. But I didn’t “GET” Bowie until a couple of years later, about 75 when I started listening to Lou Reed and Iggy Pop. And I got the New York Dolls albums on vinyl, and that was where I started to get Bowie, and he was a great teacher to young people, he was always name-checking people like the beat writers, Jack Kerouac and William Burrows, so many things I learned about from David Bowie. I learned about fashion and performance art from Bowie, and then I got to meet Bowie and then he told me he didn’t like fashion. I know he was lying through his teeth. 

JH: Did you ever work with Grace Jones?

KD: I never did work with Grace, I did one show called “The Chocolate Club” it was funded by the chocolate lobby, for that show you had to create a garment of chocolate, and I had this friend who worked for me as a sort of “Grace Jones” look alike. We had to keep the girl slightly frozen. We did try to get Grace one time, her publicist said that Grace is really difficult? 

JH: Did you ever work with Madonna? Or any other musicians.

KD: I did with Gwen Stefani, but never did work with Madonna, though my wife knows her, she knew her in the early days. Madonna was great, she took that Paris high fashion runway and brought it into the streets. Along with that, today all of the fashion boutiques don’t exist, and you have these fantastic designers doing it all online, and the question is “how are you going to be heard above all other noise?” you have to be heard, the traditional way was to get readership in a magazine. That was a formula, that would still work if the stores were there to support it. Bowie said to me once, you HAVE to cross over into the mainstream and be seen, you can retreat into the “Cult” status if you kept your audience, if you were TOO far into the mainstream, you left them behind. When you’re back on your heels the people who keep you through that are the cult following. Nick Jonas doesn’t have that, it doesn’t matter how much he spins his celebrity, he doesn’t have the cult audience that Lady Gaga has. It’s important to know that. 

H: So, what’s on the calendar for you then?

KD: On the 22nd of March, I am doing a show in the retail area of Palm Desert, it’s the 15th-anniversary fashion show. Every night there is a show, they have major brands, and I am doing “Rebels on the Runway” this rebellious Rock and Roll Fashion show. With a soundtrack of full-on Rock and Roll, I haven’t done a runway show for a few, it’s really a privilege to get back out to do a fashion show in front of these people. It’s going to be a lot of fun. 

JH: That does sound like a LOT of fun. I hope you have a great turnout, thanks for your time Keanan.

 

Ukrainian Fashion Designers at New York Fashion Week

ukranian fashion

 

 Ukrainian Fashion Designers

Discuss War, Perseverance and New York Fashion Week

 

BERLIN, GERMANY - SEPTEMBER 06: A

 

Doused in soothing lighting and the sounds of waiters’ popping corks of Champagne bottles and two jazz musicians playing in a nearby room, a few Ukrainian designers and about a dozen industry supporters mingled in the clubby Ned Hotel in Manhattan’s NoMad neighborhood on Sunday night. That scene could not have been more counter to their war-torn homeland, where they are trying to keep their businesses going. 

Seven months after Russian troops first invaded Ukraine, six designers will be presenting their collections Tuesday before venturing on to London, Paris and Milan. There also was a stop in Berlin for some. Designs from Elena Burenina, Bobkova, Frolov, Litkovskaya, Kovalska and Gudu will be showcased, but not all of the designers were able to travel to New York. Fueling the Ukrainian economy is an edict that was put forth by Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky and his wife Olena Zelenska that multiple industries are trying to meet.

Around 7.2 million people have fled the country for other parts of Europe and an estimated 8 million people have been displaced to other parts of the country. 

Lilia Litkovskaya, whose designs are often worn by Ukraine’s first lady, described deciding to leave Kyiv on Feb. 24 to ensure her three-year-old daughter’s safety. “My husband stayed in Kyiv. I did not want to leave,” she said.

Once she, her mother and her daughter were settled in Paris, the designer decided it was time to get back to work, driven partially by a large order that Selfridges had placed two days before the Russian invasion. She reconnected with her team, including those who had relocated to other parts of Ukraine, and shifted production temporarily to a large manufacturer of wedding dresses. “I feel that it is very important to save the future of my team,” she said.

Litkovskaya is once again working in Kyiv and its founder is dividing her time between there and Paris, where her daughter remains. Encouraged by advancements made by Ukrainian fighters in recent days, she said, “I believe in my country. I believe in the United Nations. And I believe that every Ukrainian’s goal is for a victory.”

During Paris Fashion Week, she will stage a fashion show on the carousel in the Tuileries Garden. “Everyone in Ukraine can remember how they were in childhood and think about that peaceful time. I would like to show my Ukrainian vision and contemporary Ukraine,” she said.

Litkovskaya said her collection is coauthored by those who wear it. Removing her blouson jacket with a satin side-tie belt to show how she intentionally covers her name on the inside label, she explained, “The clothes on hangars are nothing. But the people who buy it, continue the story.” 

Global Fashion Agenda’s CEO Federica Marchionni explained why she wanted to be at Sunday’s event: “From the moment that the war started, you really understand the importance of solidarity and how the people of Ukraine need to feel that they are not alone.” 

Ivan Frolov arrived in New York from Los Angeles by way of London, where he had traveled to check on samples production. Angel for Fashion founder Jen Sidary has been instrumental in coordinating the seven-year-old brand’s production. When the war started, he canceled all of the pending orders to save money. He exited Ukraine on Sept. 3 after gaining approval from the Ministry of Culture, which has authorized people who work in the arts to temporarily leave for cultural events in other parts of the world. “September is the high season for a lot of events in the arts. This September is very important. We need orders from buyers. The livelihoods of our whole team and the life of our brand.”

All of the 35 employees are still on the payroll at the same salary they earned before the war. “They are my biggest inspiration this season. It’s not anything having to do with fashion, or the artistic world, cinema, books, artists or paintings. My team is my only inspiration this season. Mentally, it’s very difficult when you are in the midst of a war to create something beautiful,” Frolov said.

To that end, he noted how Frolov has two initiatives to help raise money to aid those impacted by the war. “We are here to support the economy of our country and show our brand in the best way. All of our production is still in Kyiv,” he said, adding that all of his team, with the exception of two employees who were traveling with him, are in Ukraine. As one of the brands that is being represented by Tomorrow Ltd. this season, Frolov will travel to Milan, Paris and London as well. 

Although Kyiv’s main department store Tsum has reopened, sales there, quite understandably, have changed since the invasion. Frolov continues to sell direct-to-consumer. As for whether Frolov felt guilty being so removed from the situation in Ukraine, he glanced around at guests in the The Ned’s library and said, “Our forces and our army are fighting for freedom for the whole world. These people here, who are having cocktails and are going to their special events, can’t understand what is happening in Ukraine. But it’s nice. I wish that no one in the world would ever have to understand what we are going through.”

Fueling the economy in Ukraine is a form of fighting, Frolov said. “In order to continue to develop and save our brand, I need to be here and go to fancy cocktail parties and speak with people about the war. It’s very important because it’s still going on.”

Although he is not required to take part in the war, that could change. “Right now I feel that I can do more if I continue to be a designer, do my best work and develop my business. That can give me the opportunity to donate to the army [through designated sales] and support the economy of country. After the war, we will have even more problems with the economy and soldiers, who have lost legs and hands,” he said, adding that he sees such wounded soldiers walking past a hospital on his daily commute to work. “This has motivated me and my team to continue to work and to continue to fight. Everything is OK with us: we still have hands and legs and we can go to work to do our jobs as well as we can.” 

The 28-year-old Frolov also speculated about how effective he might be in combat on the front lines. “I still don’t know if I am ready to kill someone even if I was the angriest person. I don’t know if I have the power to kill someone.”

The fact that this Ukrainian initiative came together is an act of goodwill by several individuals and companies. Having participated in the Kyiv Art and Fashion Days last year, Parsons School of Design director of programs Keanan Duffty checked in with the event’s organizer Sofia Tchkonia soon after Russian troops had invaded Ukraine to inquire about the safety of the Ukrainian designers he had met last year. From the start he was intent on figuring out how Ukrainian designers and their businesses could be represented during New York Fashion Week.

Sunday night’s gathering included several of the people who had helped to make that happen, like Parsons chair emerita Kay Unger, Coresight Research founders Deborah Weinswig and Mazdack Rassi. Tuesday’s presentation will be held at Mastercard’s Manhattan offices. 

Duffty said, “One of the first people I called was Kay Unger and she immediately said yes. One of the people she introduced me to was Deborah, who jumped right in..[and arranged for] the opportunity to show at Mastercard. She also introduced us to FashWire’s CEO and founder Kim Carney, who has been incredibly generous. I reached out to Tommy Hilfiger, who was very kind and pitched in with some of the travel and hotel rooms [costs]. Kay connected with us with Donna Karan, who has been extremely generous.”

Hilfiger planned to attend Tuesday’s event and Karan planned to host an event for the Ukrainian designers Wednesday night. Public relations executive James LaForce provided his office space for the designers to do their castings and fittings Monday. After singling out his events producer wife Nancy Garcia for her help, Duffty said, “When I came up with this idea, people said to me, ‘Why is it important to support fashion when there is a war happening in Ukraine? People are dying. Children are suffering. Why not give to those organizations?’ It’s a great question. My answer would be that art and creativity are really important to all of us because they make us human. They allow us self-expression. That’s why it’s important to show all of your creative talents and to show solidarity.”

Read the whole article here: Ukrainian Fashion Designers

Keanan Duffty at Fashion Week El Paseo, CA.

Keanan Duffty fashion week

The Greatest Showman

Designer and rocker Keanan Duffty let music drive style at Fashion Week El Paseo. 

 

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Keanan Duffty thanks the Fashion Week El Paseo audience during the March 22 show in Palm Desert.
PHOTOGRAPH BY ROGER MORALES

When an award-winning fashion designer, musician, Parsons educator, and author brings his posse to the runway, you can be sure he’s not there to orchestrate a one-note show.

A night under the big white tent with Keanan Duffty was, for those at Fashion Week El Paseo on Tuesday evening, a music-fueled stage show and retro, feel-good event, just as the multi-gifted British designer intended.

“Turn and face the strange” – the apt lyric to “Changes” by David Bowie – kicked off this fashion party, which opened with video clips from many of Duffty’s New York fashion shows. Bowie’s music and creativity shaped the designer from the time he was a tot. Two stars aligned in 2007 when they collaborated on a collection for Target. Duffty has worked with John Varvatos, Dr. Martens, and Ben Sherman, in addition to helming his own line and dressing musical legends like Bowie, the Sex Pistols and Steven Tyler.

Duffty’s own personal brand of strange – hand-embellished streetwear dropped into a week of resort wear, gowns, diamonds, and couture – is a bright, refreshing twist, like lime in scotch whiskey. Neat. 

Music revved the show’s engine and music drove it. Covers and remixes of “Like a Virgin,” “Wonderwall” by Oasis, “The Boys are Back in Town,” “We Will Rock You,” and “Riders on the Storm” blended with Duffty’s own music and videos, from his band, Slinky Vagabond. The on-screen images of his prolific past collections kept time with the beats.

For Duffty, and for the record books, music and fashion are inseparable. “Fashion likes to think it’s leading trends, but the industry takes so much from music,” he recently told "Palm Springs Life".

Fashion week catwalk

Keanan Duffty Fashion week

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Ma.Ra.Cash.Records interviews Slinky Vagabond

interview

Ma.Ra.Cash Records interviews Slinky Vagabond.

A new interview by Monica Franzon and Gabriele Boati from Ma.Ra.Cash Records the label that distributes "King Boy Vandals", the band 's latest album.

Fabio Fabbri and Keanan Duffty are asked about who they are, where the name Slinky Vagabond comes from, how they got in touch with the illustrious line up of artists who participated in the album...and much more!!

Fausto Fabbri helped with the translations and is the producer and director of the videos that were shown during the interview.

 

 

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