Every year I host a Great Clothes Swap - you bring the clothes you dont want and you leave with clothes you do want that someone else didn't.
As this is particularly kreppa friendly I have organised a substantially larger one on the afternoon of 23rd January.
RULES: * No swapping/grabbing until the whistle is blown. * Bring clothes you don't want/haven't worn/will never wear. * Don't bring utter shite - but you'd be surprised that what you don't want that someone else does. * You have 2 piles of clothes. 1 is stuff you will just give away. 2. Is stuff you will sell for 500isk or would directly swap for something of the 'buyers'. You will have to mark your 500isk stuff to collect cash when the mayhem subsides. You must have 2 piles of clothes, you cannot only have 500isk pile. Personally, i have a much bigger free pile than 500isk. * DO NOT expect to be selling stuff for more than 500isk. Its not allowed. If you don't want to get rid of the clothes and join into the spirit of the event then hire a booth at Kolaport.
Lots of what people bring is not what others want - but usually everyone takes away at least 5 or so things they are really pleased with for free - some take much more, it depends if you like to alter stuff yourself etc.
When everyone is 'set up' i say GO and you grab what you want from everyone elses stuff. Once everyone is finished, if you have clothes from someone else that have 500isk label with their name on you either pay them 500isk or check if they have one of your 500isk items to 'swap' instead.
At the end, you can leave any clothes you dont want to take back and i am taking them to the red cross in support of Haiti.
And as promised even earlier... photos from the festive season, some of which are triple exposed - something my camera has done 3 times....makes for some interesting shots.
Well the aftermath of the Episode 9 has slowed to a steady pace allowing a brief moment for retrospect.
Although Episode 8 was the largest in terms of equipment and the number of girls, this one was the most epic for me yet. It involved - as per usual for me - a dance with the devil in terms of the weather, and it seems I learnt to foxtrot. The filming actually took place over two days instead of just one - but still fulfilled the project's element of surprise ruling in that the girls didn't know the main costume nor location until the actual 'day' which was the second date. The day before was spent filming what I have called 'approaching' shots. Every girl was taken to a different location and filmed heading towards the building Höfðatorg which was where the main crunch of the storyboard took place. Mostly on the 80 metre high roof.
Due to the height and the minus twelve degree weather (icy as hell) the rescue squad (Björgunarsveitin Ársæll) were on set to help with harnessing girls and crew for safety. There were a few girls with fear of heights but the guys helped them to feel safe enough and even Sunna who was at first very uneasy even on the highest indoor floor made it out and into the shoot fine and dandy.
The crew busted their guts out all day and I have to give extra special thanks to Chris Rowe, Hrafn Garðasson and Ari Bjarnasson as well as the makeup artists Flóra Buenano, Berglind Rögnvaldsdóttir and Alma Ösp Arnórsdóttir.
The 6am start was tough on everyone but we needed to capture the solid dark and then every shade of the very long winter sunrise. The freezing weather and clear skies meant that the range of colours spreading through the sky in the 12 hours filming was nothing short of Epic.
The concept I began with developed well through the planning and thanks to the amazing help I had within the crew the end result is very close to what I had sketched out way back in early November.
The video is in post production and will be complete and released by the end of this month. Before that, there are some behind the scenes clips taken by Anne Walsh on her new FLIP which I will upload tomorrow.
You know when you were little (or possibly just drunk) and you span round and round in circles, and when you stopped your vision and the world around seemed to keep spinning even though you were definitely standing still? Well that's more or less what I feel like now.
I have to admit that maybe it was a teeny bit much to have Christmas abroad, the big new years eve gig and a few days later be shooting a major video production - all with a small baby. So busy I have been that I have several rolls of film in my bag which need processing since mid december and on and I just haven't gotten round to it. So I will write now whilst I have a moment and add the photos I am missing later.
Way back before Christmas we held an Open house - as I like to do. The smell of mulled wine and mice pies filling the house and friends and family just dropping in for 5 minutes or 5 hours.
A few nights prior to this I attended the CCP Christmas Buffet which was 50s themed. Everyone looked awesome, including DJ duo Hits and Tits (Mokki and Maisol).
Just to make sure that we were fully saturated in festivity prior to the day itself Lilja held a jolakosy afternoon at her house with hot chocolate and jolananas (you had to be there).
The final Christmassy event before we headed to England was Diljá's legendary annual National Lampoons Christmas party. Her apartment was as per usual practically collapsing under the weight of decorations. As the party goers started to warm up her entertainment arrived in the shape of Helga Möller! Katrin got all overcome and declared it the most Christmassy moment ever.
Daníel, Lil Lilja and I then headed off to the UK for Christmas. I was so so so very happy to be home for a bit.I needed a top up of family warmth, and although my Icelandic friends are outstandingly lovely, Christmas the year before simply didn't feel like Christmas.
Mum's house was full to the brim. As well as us and them, Hannah Mark and little Ava were staying - as was step brother Nick. Sadly Grandma took a slip and fall on the insane ice which was everywhere during our stay and Christmas Eve I spent several hours in hospital with her. This wasn't all toe tapping for me as whilst Mike looked after her for an hour I could run to the other side of the hospital and see Dad who was in hospital all Christmas with a booked major operation. Because he didn't get to see us very much I am going to take Lilja back at the end of this month. Jet set little madam she is.
As per my blog on The Day, I was up cooking the feast for the 8 of us from 7am. I generally hate turkey so challenged myself to make something I adored with it. I stuffed the skin with marscapone and lemon and this sealed all of the juices in which meant it lost absolutely no moisture. I also stepped up the traditional cranberry sauce by making one with chili in it. Triumph I tell you, triumph!
The whole day was spent as it should be - eating and drinking with pauses for nps and board games in between. I had brought comedy antlers and noses for everyone and much foolishness prevailed.
Whilst back in the hood, I took the opportunity to see friends with relaxed morning coffees at mum's house. It was beyond amazing to see my friend Kate who lives in Shanghai and who had a baby boy a few months after I had Lilja. Once I have the photos developed you will see how adorable he is.
Back in Iceland - I almost couldn't breathe from the moment our toes hit the ground. The last new year's eve gig for Curver and I was approaching and I had very much to set up for Weird Girls Episode 9's commencement.
The 90s gigs on New years at Nasa have been fun and have been a good economic boost for my januarys. But I was very pleased to have done the last one. I have lived in Iceland for 4 years and have never spent 31st December doing anything else but working on that stage. RIP Gamlárskvöld Partý.
I took this snippet on my new awesomeFLIP video camera which was a Christmas present from work. Its 2hours of HD footage on a camera smaller than my mobile phone. So expect more badly filmed snippets in the future....
The first days of 2010 we spent saturated in Weird. I am releasing the photo gallery this week and so will write a seperate entry about the event. For now, take a look at Episode 8s gallery I only just launched as its not complete but after waiting half a year for the photographer to finish what he started I decided to cut to the chase and just let these out. More viewable in the gallery.
As one last thing - here is the news piece which I snapshotted below.
