BOFFO PRESENTS MICHAEL BASTIAN + BITTERTANG

The centerpiece of the main room featuring Michael Bastian shoes and George Frost jewelry 

Surrounded by a mound of hay and walls of wax, BOFFO presents Building Fashion 2013 featuring Bittertang and Michael Bastian. A bit off the beaten path, design farm (yes farm!) Bittertang has crafted a 2-room lair furnished with Little Red-Ridinghood-esque oddities at 15th Street's SuperPier 59. Patterned off painter Andrew Wyeth's melancholy fields, the 3-week pop-up is the 11th in a series of creative crossroads where culture, clothes and customized curiosity meet. From November 1st to 21st, the public is welcome to partake in the experience and purchase the goods. 

Entrance, hidden underneath a mound of hay

Enter the house of hay and step into a man-cave of backlit, soft molded walls. A lone spliced bed styled in synchronized stripe showcases slippers and select special pieces. Stuffed sock dolls settle under the stern stares of a lone portrait. Commerce is secondary to a sensual introduction of spook and smell--and thus stock is segregated into the store's second section. Traverse through the black feathery curtains into a back room furnished with a dark red rug and a bright red table. Tailored tops and trousers from Bastian's Fall 2013 line are sorted in staunch sequence, under the watchful gaze of an endlessly looping catwalk.    

 Illuminated wax walls

Used during the Great Depression, boffo was a slang term for success. Adopting that as their namesake for creative collaboration, Faris Al-Shathir and Gregory Sparks embarked on a mission of matchmaking between artists, architects and designers alike. The result? Stunning retail partnerships and installations the likes of Simon Spurr + Collective, Richard Chai + Snarkitecture and Ohne Titel + EASTON + COMBS. Michael Bastian + Bittertang is the latest realization of BOFFO's mission to be "the conduit between the emerging and the established, the obscure and the adored, the profound and the profane" [source: BOFFO site].

Looking back, from the front

Rug + rugged wear

Michael Bastian Ouiji Board sweater, scarf and tails