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Fashion Week

Is my drip enough? How to stay stylishly confident during Fashion Week

New York Fashion Week is still here and the streets are littered with influencers and fashion’s elite, as well as fashion enthusiast from all over the world. And if you’re a bit intimidated – it’s ok!

Admit it, you want to go to the shows and wear the clothes from the runway or if you’re bold enough, show off your style. But if you’re not into it – Fashion Week – chances are you’re still into fashion.

So is your drip enough? Do you think you need to be the most fly and the freshest?

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I can attest to the feeling of inadequacy in a room of people who are woke when it comes to fashion and always dress with impeccable style. Sometimes standing next to certain individuals will cause insecurities of your own.

But what you should understand is that your anxiety is normal and there is still a human being under all those layers of fashion perceived elitism.

For the average person, fashion is an afterthought, if that. Getting dressed in the morning is normal for most cultures around the world. In New York City, though, it may be structured a bit differently.


Roots in Fashion

Growing up in Brooklyn, my mom would always tell me to “hurry up and get dressed before you’re late; you’re going to school, not a fashion show.”

Little did she know, fashion was the main reason for a lot of us to go to school each day. I completely understand if high school wasn’t as fashionable due to studies, athletics, or economic situations. When we care about something more than fashion that can play into our insecurities and anxieties when it comes to testing our drip.

Coming up a new pair of Jordans came out each week, while premium Japanese denim and Prada sneakers were at the peak of our classmates’ attention. The auditorium was the runway, where everyone hung out, complementing the styles of friends and rivals. It was always a competition amongst our friend groups to be the most stylish.


Fantasy Fashion League

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The fashion world is something fantastic, isn’t it? Whether you think it’s attainable or not, it allows for allure and an aura that is empowering.

In a way it enriches one’s character. Your drip makes you feel smarter, stronger, and plain old better. If you’re older, it makes you feel younger, if your younger – more mature.

Plus, most of the time, if you feel insecure then fashion is your armor. Fashion can be and is your daily amour. As we see the runway shows from afar, it tantalizes our senses and we yearn to be there and to wear those clothes.

To be invited to a show is the ultimate acceptance into the fashion industry – celebs, athletes, and important people in businesses related to fashion are some who tend to be invited. Yet, as Social Media grew, so did the number of invites.

Shows are more open and inclusive today then they were in, say, the 90s. Shows in New York City, are tending to cater to the masses who flock the city in search of Fashion shows to get content for their social media pages.

As with the traditional media, social influencers present opportunities for brands to broaden their visibility to niche markets. It’s a mutually beneficial agreement. But it remains a question — “this is what you want?”

Influencers are enthusiast just like most people who enjoy shopping. For the average social media user, to be at a fashion show during fashion week would essentially be something you would have to want to attend. Whether you spend tons of money on one brand or have a friend in fashion who can offer a +1.


More Than Enough

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As fashion adjusts to the influx and opportunity for new costumers, they have adapted through collective efforts by venues, brands, showrooms, and agencies to make shows more friendly to public viewing. Offering standing room at most shows allows for more exposures for brands directly to consumers.

The amount of brands as well as the amount of shows has grown. So to attend a show is more of a possibility. Keep in mind there are shows all over New York. Also, let’s recall the infamous Fashion’s Night Out – which has been “canceled” – where fashion lovers, who were encouraged to shop during an economic recession, would roam the streets of NYC in search of fashion parties.


Know Yourself

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Attending the shows and interacting with your surroundings, at the point in which you are exposed to Fashion Week, can afford you great understanding in the nuances of the industry. It’s intimidating for anyone to find their own style, and finding your way around the room would help.

As some may be wearing more elaborate and expensive clothes, it’d be better, not to compete unless your goal is to be the loudest dresser in the room. Then, yes, you are subject to critique as an adornment of the event.

The main takeaway is to be smart about your kit, and about how it fits. Stay true to what you feel is comfortable on you and always know that evolution is something your style can go through overtime by elevating your drip and defining your style.

Who knows? Maybe you’ll get noticed for just being you and get invited to a show.

The Wu-Tang doc is coming to Hulu: Could it be America’s best saga story?

Airing September 4, Hulu is premiering its new series Wu-Tang: An American Saga based around the come-up of one of the most influential hip hop groups of all time.

These rappers, as a collective and as individuals, energized the hip-hop game with raw lyrics and lives, meshed with sounds of blades and voice-over Kung-Fu flicks to create storylines and shaped the ‘36 Chambers of Death’ in which the members of Wu-Tang Clan existed.

Meet the Wu

 

This movie series takes us on the ‘day-1’ journey and starts with the formation of the rap crew. Leading the charge, of course, is RZA who carries the narrative to the other eventual members. We have an opportunity to revisit the days where the ability to organize a 10-man group was doable without “group chats.”

Knowing that their early lives weren’t easy through their lyrics, this series plans to show the struggles of what it took for them to become the world-famous Wu-Tang group.

Members included; RZA, GZA, Ol’ Dirty Bastard, Inspectah Deck, Raekwon, U-God, Ghostface Killa, and Method Man. Masta Killa joined the group later, towards the end of the first album, and Cappadonna, the unofficial tenth member, was always present during the earlier stages of the Wu (feature on the Ice Cream record).


Special Features

 

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As this show comes fresh off the heels of the 2019 documentary Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men, the depiction of the crew is coming full circle.

Staring young actors like Ashton Sanders as the RZA and Shameik Moore as Raekwon, and rappers Dave East as Method Man and Joey Badass as Inspectah Deck, there is enough talent in this movie series that we can count on that 90s vibe to push through the screen. This classic New York City story should be highly anticipated by young and old hip-hop heads alike.

You fashion heads also!


The Saga Continues

Wu-Tang is a precursor and template for similarly scaled notable rap groups. If you think of two rap groups based out of Harlem during the aughts, and 2010, you probably are thinking of Dipset (The Harlem World Diplomats), or A$AP Mob.

Dipset has had a list of rappers from there team on one record and Mob members all bare the “A$AP” prefix to their names, both keeping under one theme for the group remaining omnipresent.

These groups are examples of what stemmed from such numbers in a single rap group. Individuals who decided to unite their talents and create a movement.


Tune in this Wednesday, September 4, for the premiere of the Wu-Tang story and watch the “saga continue.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w37TQZwnjXY&t=3s

Will Black-Ops training keep Hoodie Melo in it for the love of basketball?

Has anyone watched a Black-Ops run on Instagram lately? No, not COD! It’s an open-run basketball gym that professional basketball player Carmelo Anthony and pro trainer Chris Brickley founded – for the love of the game.

A love that is keeping Carmelo humble. But today, for the professional basketball player, Carmelo is struggling to find an NBA team who wants him to play the game he loves.

Granted, teams want players that they feel can take them far into the playoffs, Houston has opted out on Melo as a forward to help their team win a championship.


Trial

Stephen A. Smith recently interviewed Anthony and what he found, and myself is that Carmelo was seemingly blackballed by the Houston Rockets organization – if not the NBA.

Released by general manager Daryl Morey after 10 games (and $2.4 million), Melo was left to wonder “what (he) did” that he couldn’t “be apart of a 9-man rotation.” With no definitive reason, Anthony thought this may be “deeper the basketball.”

Photo by Shareif Ziyadat/Getty Images

Anthony also stated his willingness to take an off-the-bench role which would be suitable for his age in today’s game.

Ironically, someone of his caliber, with his resume as a 10x All-Star, 6x All-NBA, 20,000+ points in the NBA (top 40), has bounced around the NBA in the past few seasons, going to the Knicks following Denver, then OKC, then Houston.

His jersey was the number one seller at one point while playing on the Knicks. This is someone that players have vouched for as a friend and a ‘locker-room’ guy whom everyone got along with. So it’s puzzling that he can’t find a spot on a team.


Tribulation

Carmelo Anthony was drafted 3rd in the 2003 NBA draft and was an immediate impact taking the worst team in the NBA to a playoff contender from 2004 – 2010.

From then he was at a steady pace to greatness with achievement after achievement and playoff appearances with the revived Denver Nuggets. The last player to garner achievements on the Nuggets was Alex English and Melo found time to break most of his records.

But, in 2006, Carmelo Anthony was offered a contract extension. And while seeking the bigger contract, “from a business standpoint”, Anthony wasn’t seeing the vision that NBA players LeBron James and Dwyane Wade had seen in efforts to unite as friends as well as teammates with hopes to win a championship together.

Anthony was “immature” in his decision making, he says. Lacking certain knowledge of the league and contracts, even clueless to the lockout, he only saw afterward that the landscape of the NBA was shifting. While James and Wade took 3-year contracts, foregoing the maximum contract offers, Carmelo Anthony wanted the most money possible as well as he was avid about playing in Denver.

Anthony wasn’t one to jump ship, having an “old school mentality” as Stephen A. Smith describes. When Anthony took a 5-year deal for $80 million, making claims of his immediate needs as a reason to, he may have set himself up for what we saw come after he took off the Nuggets uniform.

Mandatory Credit: Photo by AP/REX/Shutterstock

The Light at the End of the Tunnel

Initially, Anthony didn’t think to play with James and Wade was possible. Melo’s overlap in his contract essentially put him out of the bidding for playing with the two stars – we can only imagine.

In 2011 Melo demanded a trade to the Knicks where he was on a considerably just as good team as when he left the Nuggets.

Plagued by injury, the team never lived up to the hype, although making it to the sixth seed in the playoffs, with Amar’e Stoudemire and Chauncey Billups (also coming from Denver with Melo) injured.

Hopes for better, the Knicks attempted to build around Carmelo, with the remaining Amar’e Stoudemire, Iman Shumpert, and Jeremy Lin (Linsanity-remember that), as well as Tyson Chandler.

Unfortunately, all those players sat out games due to injuries, through to the playoffs. Tyson missed the first playoff game for flu illness.


Liberation

After a beef with team president at the time, Phil Jackson, Anthony demand a trade, and in 2017 he was off to Oklahoma City to play for the Thunder. But he did not stay. And this has been the narrative since.

Carmelo Anthony, or Hoodie Melo rather, has been working on his game with a different intensity since. Thu, Black-Ops at Life Time gym in New York City, which host NBA pick up games, where you can find Hoodie Melo working on his game with Brickley.

Carmelo Anthony can still play and people want to see him play. His position is a small forward but he can transition into the traditional power forward as an option. He would put fans in the seats, for all you owners out there.

A fan favorite who should be apart of an NBA team, Carmelo Anthony can and should be offered a contract and I’m sure that team will get their money’s worth. Melo has been humbled and we have our fingers crossed, hoping to see him back on the court in uniform rather than a hoodie.

Why the Marvel formula works and makes ‘Hobbs & Shaw’ better than average

Explosions, car chases, firepower (a lot of fire), a blow torch, fight scenes, torcher scenes, fighter jets, and helicopters; I can go on.  These are all things included in this summer’s blockbuster film, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw.

This film takes you back to the best movies we used to watch and puts it in the timeframe and context of today’s social fabrics. Not that world domination has changed much in recent years, but the ways to go about it have been explored in variety, by the villains we have quickly grown to love.

Fast & Furious: Brixton

With 2018 setting a new tone for what it means to be “the bad guy,” Marvel has provided a formula that other filmmakers are dissecting in-order to catch their wave.

We had Killmonger, then Thanos, and – oh yeah – a younger, scrappier, more vicious, Thanos. I only mention them because of fear. Idris’ character Brixton was all about instilling fear, and getting what he wants by any means.


Narrative

What Marvel did with character developments and storylines at the box office was epic. We could understand the plight of the villains as much as we did the heroes and associates alike.

Marvel gave us what no other action-hero/superhero movie gave us, and that was compassion for both sides, ironically. Also, ultimately, Marvel did the meanest movie series/sequel narrative known to Asgardians and humans alike.

Carrying over storylines from each film, whether intrinsic to that particular story or setting up an entirely new one.

Marvel Studios: Thanos

We felt the struggles of N’Jadaka / Erik “Killmonger” Stevens. Discovering the death of his father and learning the reasoning behind it fueled his vengeance. And family ties made it all the more relatable for a black audience – “Hey, Auntie!”

Marvel Comics: Erik Stevens and T’challa

The Plot Thickens

When Thanos set out to retrieve the Infinity stones earlier in the Marvel movie series, we didn’t have any connection to him. He was omnipresent in every way. But when we finally got to meet on that ship sailing through space from Asgard, we discovered his purpose.

How could you not relate to anyone who wants to make the universe – great? Not only did he succeed – in eliminating half the universes population, but he also came back from the past to try that shit again. Persistence is key!

Marvel Comics: Thanos

Now, what we have in Hobbs and in Shaw, basically F&F alum, sent to have their own stories told. Deadpool got ousted from the X-Men movie into a stand-alone, so did Venom (sorry you can’t be with us Peter — Thanks SONY!).

It’s a little bit of what we saw between “Cap” and Tony in Captain America: Civil War, but with a jovial twist. We met characters in that movie that were encroaching on their storylines; Spiderman, Black Panther, and Antman to name a few.

Fast & Furious: Shaw, Brixton and Hobbs

Hobb & Shaw saw a lot of elements used in the Marvel movies to bring this story to life. Being familiar with the characters from prior appearances is one thing. Adding back story, like, Shaw’s reunion with his sister and Hobbs reunion with his biological family in Samoa.

Shaw’s reunion was bitter, then sweet, as Hobbs family reunion was a confrontation of decisions made in the past and how they affected his father and the rest of the family. A key component to the Black Panther story.


Anti-Heroes and Villians

For our antagonist, Brixton gives us relentless and ruthless behavior, like Thanos in search of the Infinity stones. He is human none the less. But, Brixton is partially a cyborg and is unfiltered in how he handles his associates and enemies.

He possesses a rage about him and jealousy for Shaw who essentially shot him and left him for dead at some point in their history. Like when Killmonger made claim for the crown of Wakanda and sought world dominance, and Thanos wanted to euthanize, Brixton wanted to be the alpha male in a world designed by way of him.

Brixton’s return from the dead with the help of artificial intelligence led him straight to his arch-enemy, Shaw. With hopes to turn the world into super-beings via a virus –- which would kill humans — with some adjustments will make chosen ones “more human.” Into what he has become — superhuman, the “Black Superman.”

Marvel Studios: Killmonger and Balck Panther

Throw in the clichés of your favorite action movies, superhero flicks, and some over the top Fast & Furious car stunts and you got a movie for a summer blockbuster.

Packed with quotable moments, raw fight scenes, and a war cry only surpassed by the sheer numbers in screaming ‘Yibambé’ in Wakanda, when Hobbs rallied his Usos (‘brothers’ in Samoan) with some traditional Samoan War Dance which kicked off the finale of the film.

Plenty of smaller scenes in that conclusive fight had strategies similar to what took place in the final fight in Infinity Wars. While other scenes reflected more of what went down in End Game.


End Credits and Scenes

How Marvel set up their universe is incredible and it has taken movie-making to new levels of efficiency in storytelling; adding end credit scenes, stitching the worlds into one cinematic universe.

Many factors and elements that allow for Marvel to do great things are how other hero films of recent have been conforming too. Let’s not forget DC Comics’ Aquaman and how they translated the Black Panther narrative and just placed it in the ocean.

It’s something to be taught in film school, and what we can hope for is that Marvel is only getting better and other filmmakers will have to step it up to compete for the kind of cult following the MCU has.


Peep the Hobbs & Shaw trailer here

Ready to rally? Here’s our quick guide to the 2019 U.S. Open

It almost that time of year. That time we all watch Tennis like we watch, say, soccer. So, that can only mean it’s tournament time!

August 26 marks the official culmination of the U.S.T.A. (United States Tennis Association) tennis summer season and sets off the U.S. Tennis Open, featuring women and men from around the world competing for the title of champion.

With the all the tennis matches and U.S. Open Fan week being held at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in Flushing, NY, it’s the last bit of summer vibes to be had. The finals take place from Sept. 6 to 8 if you’re just looking for some Grand Slam action.

Who to look out for at this year’s US Open

Simona Halep

We can gear up to celebrate some of the greatest tennis players in the world like Serena Williams, Novak Djokovic, No. 1 ranked Rafael Nadal, even 5 time (back to back) champ from Switzerland, Roger Federer.

We can look to the future for stars to impress us, like last year’s women’s winner Naomi Osaka, 2017 winner and No. 3 ranked Sloane Stephens, Kevin Anderson, and No. 1 ranked Simona Halep.

These athletes are setting the tone or paving the way for tennis in the new generation. And most importantly opening up the world to the impact of sports and commerce. They are all competing for the grand prize money of $3.9 million – and a giant gold medallion.

Roger Federer

Fan Week

The week before the two-week-long tournament, 128 women and 128 men face-off in the US Open Qualifying rounds. Where only 16 from each group will advance to hold a place in the U.S. Open main-draw.

The qualifying tournament headlines Fan Week with five days of matches where 16 men and 20 women from the U.S. will have their shot at entering the main draw of the U.S. Open. Those who can manage three wins will at least earn $58,000 of prize money in the first-round main-drawing.


All-Inclusive

 

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An all-inclusive experience, the U.S.T.A. announces it’s “Open Pride” where members of the LGBTQx community can indulge in the culture of tennis and sports. A panel hosted by journalist and sports commentator Nick McCarvel, who spreads awareness of the LGBTQx community through social media with the hashtag #LGBTennis.

The panel will feature former NBA player Jason Collins, Olympic medalist and figure skater Adam Rippon, and tennis legend Billy Jean King to provide perspective on the topic.


To Pay or Not Pay

Fan Week is free and open to the public, but U.S. Open Arthur Ashe Kid’s day will cost you about $25 to participate. That takes place August 24, the Saturday just before the tournament begins.

As for attending the matches, ticket prices can range anywhere from $35 to $9,270 each. This will vary depending on the day or round you would like to attend, and include the prices for seating during the final rounds.

Tennis Pro Coco Gauff is competing in the Wild Card entry for the U.S. Open

Courtside or nosebleed, tennis is as quietly intense as the pricing suggest. It has been picking up popularity over the years.

Amongst the tennis lovers and celebs who can afford to attend, TV ratings have been increasing over the years with viewership between ESPN/ESPN2 up over 50 percent from 2014 to 2015, and in 2015 the ATP (Association for Tennis Professionals) and ATP media forecasted $1.3 billion in broadcast revenue over the following 10 years.

Still, for what it’s worth, do you want to enjoy a day of watching tennis from your crib or witness the real hype of the U.S. Open in Flushing, NY?


You can keep up with all things US Open Tennis Championship via Instagram

 

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