We decked out Uncle John with all of these new, innovative fashion accessories, and—well, he got a lot of funny looks. (Try it on your favorite friend or relative.)
EYE-CATCHING JEWELRY
You may have thought that there was jewelry for every possible body part: fingers, wrists, neck, toes, ankles, ears, lips, bellybutton—but now you can wear jewelry on your eyeballs, too. Dutch designer Eric Klarenbeek has come out with a line of contact lenses that have thin metal wires attached to the center of the lenses. The wires hang down and can be adorned with the jewels of your choice. So you can walk around with a short string of diamonds hanging from each eyeball (or, if you’re really chic, just one). “People who have worn my eye jewelry are amazed at its comfort,” Klarenbeek says. “You can’t feel the wire dangling, it doesn’t affect your sight, and the lens moves along gently with your eyeball.” Asked what would happen if someone were to tug on the wire connected to a contact lens, Klarenbeek said he was quite sure that it would not cause your eyeball to fall out. They cost about $300 per lens.
When it comes to men’s underwear, left-handers have always been at a disadvantage. The vertical opening at the front of most briefs and boxers, which allows men to do their business without dropping their drawers, is made with right-handed people in mind. Watch a lefty try to take a simple tinkle while wearing right-handed underpants and you’ll think he’s been drinking, or perhaps he’s missing several fingers. British underwear company Hom has come out with a new design—drawers with a horizontal rather than vertical opening, making it just as easy for a lefty to open as a righty. “In our view,” said one retailer, “this is a vital step toward equality for left-handed men.”
Ladies, if you’ve ever found yourself thinking, “I wish I had a bra that could be easily converted into a 1.5-meter putting green,” wish no more. British lingerie maker Triumph has introduced the Nice Cup in Bra (it was made for the Japanese market). When it’s worn, it’s a functional, green, corsetlike bra. But when you get the urge to putt a few golf balls, just take the bra off, unroll it—and it becomes a putting green. The bra’s cups become holes at the end of the green. It even has pockets for extra balls and tees, and if you sink a putt, a recorded voice says, “Nice shot!” But there’s more—the Nice Cup in Bra also comes with a miniskirt printed with the words “Be quiet” that can be converted into a flag to hush the crowd while you’re concentrating.
The U.S. military has designed an “indestructible” sandwich. It can stay fresh for up to three years.
Do you want to be able to wink at people behind you while you’re walking down the street…without turning around? Well, thankfully, some enterprising clothes designers in Everett, Washington, have invented “Winkers,” pants that have eyes painted on the butt, just under the crease, so that as you walk, the eyes seem to open and close. So you “wink” as you walk. Winkers cost between $140 and $160.
Let’s say you’re walking down the sidewalk dressed in an ordinary skirt and—Here come the bad guys! And they’re chasing you! Run! Hide! Too bad you weren’t wearing this special piece of clothing: the Vending Machine Skirt, by Tokyo designer Aya Tsukioka. It looks like a normal skirt, but when you need to become invisible, it quickly unfolds into a large, rectangular piece of cloth that looks like a soda vending machine. Just hold it in front of you and hide behind it, the idea goes, and you’ll blend into the scenery. “Vending machines are on every corner of Japanese streets, and we take it for granted,” says Tsukiokais. “That’s how I came up with the idea for this dress.”
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“Fashion is what you adopt when you don’t know who you are.”
—Quentin Crisp
Per capita, it is safer to live in New York City than it is to live in Pine Bluff, Arkansas.