They are a new pair of Portuguese designers who rely on a garment that results from fictitious operas they perfomed.

The duo consists of Marina Pires and Pedro Eleuterio decided to tackle in her latest collection a theme of the fourth and final act in the saga of Jane Doe, the history of a nuclear winter. A work that relied on contrasts, with fair and structured models as opposed parts broader and draped. The color palette also reflects this concept of opposition, first neutral colors cooler, dotted with touches of strong tones, warmer. The bourgeois describe their work and I quote, "Under the concept an urban opera develop seasonal collections and special pieces for clients. Every season is a time of opera developed in working through the collections and viewers are invited to follow the course of the plots, and why not, part of the plot ... The wardrobe is the dressing room and the floor of the city stage. Involved in some linear guides, these are the starting point for building where different forms of art are key elements. " The quality of this pair also lies in how to shape the tissues with very creative ways and at the same time complex without denigrating the fabric. Note the deep thought that is not limited only in the choice of materials, but also to create accessories that complement the ensemble. Although the collections of the Bourgeois refer us to an urban universe, more connected to streetwear, incorporating pieces that can be combined with a more classic and elegant clothing. A young couple with value in the national fashion scene.

http://www.osburgueses.com/

The dead hand released their new album to celebrate a twenty-five year career. A CD full of tracks alluding to their fervent humor much like the  taste of  scoundrels alternative rock band.

The dead hand is undoubtedly one of the bands with more corrosive music in our country. The lyrics are full of odes of irony and provocation that reflect the perception of reality that they define cleary a "media landscape and cultural set up by modern mass communication induces to the individual." The new album nightmare teddy, is the result of reflection about the world we live in uploaded with images somehow almost obscene in the paradigms of modern culture. Always provocative, always denouncing society  living on the edge of an abyss framed with media figures in  psychotic naratives.
The opening song is balls of passion that is nothing more than a verbal delirium crowed with words in velvet, accompanied by a melodic symphony. The dead hands is a classic band in the sense that if you listen closely there is always an opening for all muscial songs that makes a kind of introduction to what lies ahead. It is a wave of pleasure, as sings Adolfo   Lust Canibal .
Another song I wish to highlight in this collection of music is  perhaps "the left breast of PR." Now, I do not know who is the owner this bubby, in the virtual world the rumor  is that it is Rita Pereira’s breast, If  It is true I can not confirm it, but what attracts me to this theme is its lyrical musicality, when they say " the cerebral cortex, processes the information, and notes the reaction of the spinal cord. " Simply brilliant.
Playing dead, is a ballad full of feeling because "death is not more than one presposition for horizontality." You just end on the floor. Na absolute truth which we all return, the dust.

Captain Tiago is the psycho-drama  of  the life of a criminal, is a black song, full of obscure words and played almost as if it is a funeral march. It's a heavy subject that closes this album, but its prineted on your brain with the hoarse voice of Adolfo Canibal.
I've heard more than once, that if the dead hand had an international career they would be sacred monsters of rock. Sorry, but don’t agree. They are as alternative as their repertoire, they could only succeed in Portugal. Remember Leonard Cohen, or Skunk Anansi. We are the nation's  of alternative, and the dead hand deserved for this album an A+.

www.mao-morta.org/noticias.htm

She is a Portuguese designer currently living in Spain where is successfully selling bags that looks more like a movie accessorie for Brigitte Bardot. A style that scores by the difference.

The Juliet in Space project is the result of the own ingenuity of Julieta that could not find anywhere the kind of bag that reflect her personal taste, so she decided to create one of her own. The first was white, made of a textured material, which is used to protect the tables, and that turned out to be hughe sucess with the friends and family. Despite having studied graphic communication, this young Portuguese embarked on a project that was a reflection of his personality and sensitivity. Thus was born the Juliet in Space, which had the first test of fire,in the Alma Lusa shop, where she exhibited and put on sale its first bags.
The concept is based on the reuse of all types of fabrics that she have saved for years and remaking of grips with beautiful painting that goes according to the tissues. The materials, as incredible it seems, can be anything from shirts, dresses or even a handkerchief. Julieta transforms them, giving them a new function that can even be targeted consonants change orders. All that the imagination allows. Has reached the point of being their own friends to offer her cloths with beautiful patterns they had at home and never used. Its client base is diverse, but most are the Portuguese and Spanish, which use these objects of design as a counter-point their more conservative wardrobe. True retro style that is so fashionable nowadays, since the revival has never been so in as currently.

http://julietainspace.blogspot.com/

The Psittaciformes are endangered due to illegal trade of eggs of this species and others that are disappearing little by little from the Amazon jungle.

The macaws while being protected by the Washington Convention that bans the sale of fauna and flora endangered continue to disappear from their natural habitat due to illegal trade of this species and the disappearence of the humid forest. Every year in Portugal are confiscated thousands of eggs of various species of parrots and macaws from Brazil protected by international law, which feed a lucrative trade that ascends to thousands. Just to give you an idea, the blue macaw is one of the rarest in the world, there are only 3000 specimens remaining in the wild in the Pantanal, reach up to 50 000 euros in the global black market. Not to mention the hundreds of birds that die during transport, often in boxes with false lids and without any care to enable at least a best packaging and survival of the several species trafficked.
Frightening numbers which however does not deter, nor tears people who buy every year in pet shops and on the Internet several species of these wonderful birds as pets, they are not. A "passion" that emerged in our country, unfortunately at the expense of the discoveries. There are reports of birds of beautiful plumage that astonished the Portuguese court, birds from Brazil. They were considered a sign of wealth at that time.
The macaws are among the few animals that are monogamous in nature, living so far as 50 years. Can reach 90 cm in length and weigh a pound and a half. The biggest of all is the alreay mentioned blue macaw, which can measure up to 1.10 meters in height. Couples hatch an egg or two a year and only return to breed after the chicks leave the nest. A process that can take about two years, which further contributes to its demise in nature.
The preservation of endangered species depends only sometimes of a small gesture on our part. A civic attitude. If you want to enjoy the beauty of these animals in its most wild, the only gesture that can save the macaws is not buying these beautiful specimens. Just take a first step to cross a road. Do this, and go see and enjoy with your kids the animated film Rio.

There is a dress code that is associated with the rascals opposing the Brazilian style to the Portuguese one. They are two different sides of the same coin.

When thinking of a scoundrel wich is the image that comes to mind almost immediately? It's the kind of guy with cynical smile that has a golden tooth cover by a mustache, the Zezé Camarinha type, uses the suit of anthracite with bright colors and the hair licked with grease or gel. Uses the shirt open almost to the belly botton, the Latin male look and finishes off this "vision" with a gold necklace with the cross of Christ and wears also a ring of gold in the little finger of the right hand. A portrait that surprisingly many women consider to be very attractive. This is the rascal of the Portuguese lower classes. The current, more bourgeois, wears Armani suit, with black patent leather shoes, shirt and tie with strips and a whiter smile. Where can we find them? I leave it to your imagination. Guess!

Across the Atlantic, the style is more refined. The Brazilian scoundrel is more chic, wears a white suit with imported Japanese silk shirt, on the top of his head a Panama hat and shoes in two colors to finish off the image of this Tropicaliente men. According to Gilmar Rocha in a study entitled "The aesthetics and performance in the clothing of the scoundrel" this anachronistis style, and I quote "the aesthetic concern with his appearence represents their principal symbolic investment, since we are talking about a type of man who often has no assets, nor properties, except the clothes on their backs, as they say. " For the scholar the importance that clothing has for a rascal converge for the construction of an aesthetic representation of a character who has his costume is a major mechanism of symbolic efficacy of his social identity. She even argues that there was even a trend and over time this kind of look that was the hallmark of a scoundrel, in a later period, it was intended to create a greater distance between the the picture of Tropicalismo and with the sophistication of fifties, the suits had to be black instead of the imaculated white. A twist on the color does not change the code itself, which meant in terms of non-verbal language, it was the lifestyle of someone who does not obey the rules imposed by society, which was associated with bohemian, music, women and illegal gambling.
The clothing was found a reflection of this strange way of living to say the least. The fact is the scroundrels represents metaphorically, "variations of style and variety of ornaments that dress up the character. It is extremely rich in symbolism and social meanings. He denounces the status changes through which it passed to his identity. " In contemporary Brazil we can appreciate this code on the tissue, as they call it themselves, only in the samba schools, as the rascals of our day, no longer uses clothing as a way to reassert its status, quite the contrary. He uses a current decoded image and somehow blends itself with the urban fabric.

http://www.scielo.br/pdf/tem/v10n20/07.pdf

Lucia Sousa design is much more than an elegant simplicity is the lightness and originality in designing a collection. It is almost an ethereal style because they are closes with life itself that ripple at the mercy of the curves of the female body. They are a mere illusion in its apparent simplicity that conceals a deep work of creation, the result of nearly two decades of experience. The dresses are eye-catching and delicious to wear them because it makes women feel unique.

Can you make a review at to your career, since you’re 17 years old until now?
I think it has to do much with the fact of me being a career woman in the world of fashion design. In many respects nothing to us is facilitated by being female. This area helps up a lot men. Only when one begins to deal with the public we evolved greatly in our work, of tastes and knowledge. See what they prefer and what they dress better. How to manage time and budgets. In terms of style I think I grow a lot. When you focused only on creativity, and this is only in the beginning, the business line is very amateur. You send the closes to be sold on a shop and you have more difficulty in selling them for several reasons. And from the moment you start to deal with customers you gain a greater understanding of your work and it gives you a qualitative leap. I was how I felt. For example, the last two collections landed on the shops shortly after been showed on the catwalks were all sold out. I draw with more balanced, taking into account the creative and business aspects. That is, a piece of close that can be sell, that people can wear and at the same time is comfortable.

But there is still room for creativity?
I think there's even more. I notice that demand from customers. They come looking for a different dress that must have a touch of originality. I thought the beginning it was a geographical placement because this is a small enviroment, but is a much more broader issue. What happens is that people go to a parties and wear virtually the same brands. And they want to stand out and distance themselves from the banal. Now, they value culture more in different areas.

And what kind of customer enters the store?
Of all kinds. In a studio is more targeted. In a shop on a ground floor enters everything.

But, certainly after all these years that people who seek you already know your work and want the brand to wear Lucia Sousa?
There are two different types of customers in that area. There are those who have heard of my name, but do not know the work itself. They know it has quality and tho them I have to draw and pay more attention when I meet them. And then there are those who pass by and say something like this: Lucy Sousa is here, they enter into the shop and talk to me without knowing who I am. But thats what I wanted, that my work speaks for me.

I'll talk about the evolution of fashion in our country since the late nineteenth century to the present day. A revolution from good to excellent.

I remember the first time I read references about Portuguese women and fashion. It was a very interesting article published in the magazine Saturday, was written by a correspondent for National Geographic who visited our country, what matters here for the story was that, for the chronicler, and his was in the early twentieth century,  the Portuguese women dressed well, were very beautifull except they had strange habit, mania yes, they walked barefoot. At the time, poverty was a kinky. Maybe today is like that! Being poor is a strange habit, what do you think? After this ironic comment, in the last century, in the late 60’s you must remember the Grace Kelly suits, tufted hair, with skirts well below the knees according to morals behaviour and social customs, by now, women walked with shoes on, I know I just could not resist! Well, these shoes were pointy

and no one talked about designers, everything was done in the most fashionable dressmaker, with the fashion magazine under the arm to copy such Monegasque princess outfits.With the revolution of April, the one, of the carnations, came the hippy period in force, with the mini skirts that left the mother's height on the brink of a nervous breakdown, long hair, the famous mouth-pants will the-bell and a symphony of colors and patterns that cut off from the ideal of beauty almost chaste and classical arrangements of the new state period.
The eighties were the times of excessive brightness and shoulder pads,  the pop up  of alternative clothing stores, which were brought from the major European capitals by the hands of Ana Salazar and Fatima Lopes. Over time, both will be current references for portuguese fashion design, they began designing and manufacturing their own models that sold together with the closes they brought from abroad.

With the ninety’ s comes the recognition of national designers, besides the two names that I mentioned, appeared  names on the market as Abbondanza and Matos Ribeiro, Jose Carlos, Antonio Tenente, Luis Buchinho with Jotex, Anabela Baldaque and the Maneis. In 1991, at the invitation of the cabinet of culture of Lisbon City Council, takes place the first edition of ModaLisboa, an event that includes a rubric designated of new blood, that introduces over the years names like Maria Gambina, Paulo Cravo and Nuno Baltazar, Katy Xiomara among others.
With the end of the century approaching we perceive there’s an evolution trend in the Portuguese way of dressing,  fruit of the work of fashion designers, the terminology also evolves thru time, and also the various institutions that have always associated their  name with the best national textile production with a great tradition in our country. Today the Portuguese woman is aware of fashion trends and follow them and now they only walk barefoot becouse it pleases her! Okay, I could not resist once again!

The art of tailoring is dying wiith the same speed as the masters disappear and also a lot of customers who valued his work.

I've recently discovered that the last remaining city tailor died about a year ago. I was sad because the art of making suits will be extinguished as the masters die and disappears with them the accumulated wisdom of several generations of professionals. There is a vast difference between a suit tailor-made and one purchased in a fashion store. And one does not need to be male to know the difference. A sight even for the most distracted, the secret is in the fall as they say. The parts are molded onto the body perfectly without a flaw. I know this because I had an uncle who only wore suits made at the tailor. And when we went to town, as he liked to say, he often use the opportunity and visit this tailor master Antonio. After entering we square ourselves with a very sober environment, where everything had its place. There was no tissue remains in the floor. The fabrics with neat stripes were on a shelf, next to the squared and the flat could be distinguished by shades ranging from the lightest to darkest. It was very chic, I thought. My uncle greeted his tailor and after a short talk, they went in to action. Faced at a huge mirror, there it was rogue master Antonio slid the measure strip along the body of my uncle and everything was decided and annotated, while the devil rubbed an eye. The choice of colors was the easy part, my uncle only knew two types of cloth, the black with chalk stripes and dark gray. The man was unable to take risks. I, at a given point in my young life influenced by the "Great Gatsby" suggested once, unfortunately I might add, a more dandy suit,with a lighter colour, more fashionable, it took a horrified look of my uncle, and master Antonio complacent smile, to silence me forever. Serious self-respecting gentleman said my uncle sternly, wear classics suits appropriate to his status. Never again, get it? Never again I gave my opininon.
Taylors were for men, which hairdresser are for women, believe me. Because while Mr. Antonio did his strange dance around my uncle, they have time to discuss life, soccer and cursed national politics. Taboo subject? religion, of course. And on days when they forgot my presence? Whining about their wives and how their lives were a living ninghtmare. Ah, the hell of domestic happy life! But the most fascinating of all was that table, large, spacious, portentous, made of solid wood and that occupied almost the entire space. A shrine where he would turn a simple cloth in a winter ¾ coat. "Weapons" of his craft ready to attack the fabric without hesitation and with skill, huge scissors slid almost noiselessly through the tissue, following closely the lines indicated by white chalk. The mystery to me at the time was to understand, why some were continuous and the other intermittent. And master Anthonio did all this while swapping a chat. And then less than nothing, there he launched the first test over the back of my uncle, gently fixed by almost invisible pins. A process so deceptively simple that culminated a week after whem delivery.
I can say without hesitation that my uncle was die for in those suits. And they were in accordance with his status as a serious gentleman, as he liked to stress. I still however, think that could have varied the color palette. But as his tailor, the handmade taylors died also with my uncle. Too bad. He looked so smart in then!

http://blog-dos-alfaiates.blogspot.com/2010/02/alfaiates-arquitectos-da-elegancia-iii.html

The Elfic Wear store is like entering in a elfin fairy tale, located at 313 Rosario Street in the city of OPorto, will feel that we are invading the world imagined by Angelica. A space for fantasy, for imagination and to make a difference. It is the universe of a determined young woman, passionate about her craft and unafraid of the future. It is also a clothing brand that dares and who already sells its unique items to countries like the Dominican Republic, Spain and England to name a few. Come take a look around and maybe, dare to be an elfic being!

What is your training and how you started Elfic Wear?
Angelica Pinho: I'm trained in archeology and has nothing to do with it. I always had an affinity for the various materials have loved in an small age to work with my father to help him in this work as a mechanist. He taught me to work with leather, making the hot engraving , try combinations of paints and materials like leather, wood, fabrics. With my mother I've learned to sew from a young age. My mother is a dressmaker, I helped her to sew clothes because she worked for fashion designers. She had too much work, I helped her when I came from school. When I entered the first grade I had some clothes made by me, then over time it increase the interest in my work, my friends asked me where I had bought the closes that was wearing. I thought it was time to create this project, the Elfic. Here I give life to the images that populate my imagination!

And how is the leap from designer to archeology? Didn't you like your university major?
I love my course. And one day I would follow it. Egyptology, that is really my area. Only it is more difficult economically. And Egypt is not what it was mystifying when younger. Follow archeology because I have always loved ancient civilizations. All of them, the Mayans, the Aztecs and the Vikings. And a lot of the clothes have that, sometimes my inspiration comes from things I research of ancient civilizations. Some drawings that record, then caught a little bit here and there and make my own way. It is my vision. Another great passion of mine are Crop Circles, geometric figures drawn from fields of crops that many believe are made by aliens. Since I was a little girl this type of drawing attracts me, without quite knowing why.
Angelica, I noticed that you do everything in your studio, cut, assemble and stich all the parts. I also noticed that the fabrics have a different touch.
Some fabric are imported. Every now and then I'll buy out the fabrics. I'm going to Thailand and to Europe, when I find some different I bring them out because I can not find here in Portugal.

How to start your collection is through tissue, or have a preconceived idea?
Depends, I usually say that the tissues tell me what they want to be made off, how they want to be worked out. I'm buying fabrics that I like without having a specific idea and then sit stare at them, I start to cut up and the piece appears, and then comes another and another. And so on.

The campaign free seeds aims to conserve the European agricultural history, preventing the creation of a legislation that aims to outlaw traditional plantings.

Ten thousand years ago the man changed the course of his life when he discovered that could sow the land to ensure this subsistence. An important milestone in the history of human being, because it allowed to evolve into an unimagined progress, stop being nomadic to a sedentary lifestyle that prevails to this day. Agriculture becomes so crucial as a mechanism of propagation of our species, because a population nourished, grows and thrives.
The sowing has been for millennias a practice that became common to farmers worldwide. They collected the seeds of the best fruits, vegetables and cereals which were then passed from generation to generation for future harvests. Over time, with particular emphasis on  the 20^th century, with the mechanization of agricultural work, the appearances of pesticides and the creation of hybrid species in laboratories, the habit of storing several variety plants was lost and now the loss of agricultural biodiversity  worldwide is around 75%, according to FAO (United Nations Organization for Agriculture and Food).
With the growing interest in organic farming and creation of community gardens, have also increased the number of people who intend to return to basics. Resume the habit of collecting seeds, exchange and preservation thus contributing to a better environment and a wider variety best suited to different soils and climates of each country.
The Campaign for Free Seed was the result of a European initiative with chapters in most Member States of the European Union with the aim of reversing, as stated: "new legislation to be proposed by the European Commission to restrict the free movement of breeding and seed varieties of agricultural plant closing previously belonging to the common good in patents and outlaw unregistered varieties. The new 'Law on Seeds' aims to remove the role of curator of seed to farmers, a role he played as a boost to all mankind. " In our country, the campaign was energized by the Open Field, GAIA, Motion Pro Information for Citizenship and the Environment, Platform Transgenic Out  and Quercus, were delivered in Lisbon on April thousand signatures in order to not approve this package Laws, a grand total of one million people who have joined the initiative. The vote is scheduled for June 7 and hopefully the majority of 736 MEPs choose the path of liberalization, not restriction. Hope is the last to die.

http://zonalivredeogm.blogspot.com/