Oki-ni is opening up their private stash to bring you the first of what will become many retrospectives looking historically at collection from a slew of designers. First up is the Raf Simons Archive “Raf Simons provides our first archive installment with pieces spanning from his initial mid 90s collections to present day. You’ll find key pieces throughout as well as a real insight into what we feel were his most important collections. These garments are from a personal collection, as time goes on the product matures in style and tastes and preference change.”

More views from Oki-ni’s Raf Simons Archive showcase after the jump.

Sweden’s Plaza Watch Magazine is an interesting glossy take on the watchworld. Published three times annually with some of the more eye catching editorials we have seen, Plaza looks to move away from the flat and unchanged world of watch on wrist editorials to include themes that bridge the culinary with the surreal. (trendland)

More preview pages from Plaza Watch Magazine after the jump.

Timezone reports in with one of the more interesting timepieces to come out of Baselworld and Dior. The Dior Christal Mystérieuse Watch uses “a sapphire crystal mystery movement developed by the Quinting Manufacture. The movement is a collaboration of five engineers – three Swiss watchmakers, an automotive engineer and an electro technical engineer – who dedicated seven years and ten million Swiss francs into project.” 

The mother of pearl inserts adorning the watch were developed by the Parisian Studios of Dior Avenue Montaigne “inspired by Art Deco and Cinetic Art.” Even cooler is dial facade which rotates itself once a month from it’s initial position. I love this watch. Look for it this Autumn for – get ready – 20,000 Euros. A banger for sure.

A more detailed view of the Dior Christal Mystérieuse Watch after the jump.

How has Paris, the world’s fashion capital, influenced Milan, New York, and Tokyo? When did the Marlboro Man become a symbol of American masculinity? Why do Americans love to dress down in high-tech Lycra fabrics, while they wax nostalgic for quaint, old-fashioned Victorian cottages?

Fashion icons and failures have long captivated the general public, but few scholars have examined the historical role of business and commerce in creating the international market for style goods. Producing Fashion is a groundbreaking collection of original essays that shows how economic institutions in Europe and North America laid the foundation for the global fashion system and sustained it commercially through the mechanisms of advertising, licensing, marketing, publishing, and retailing.

The collection reveals how public and private institutions—from government censors in imperial Russia to large corporations in the United States—worked to shape fashion, style, and taste with varying degrees of success. Fourteen contributors draw on original research and fresh insight into the producers of fashion—advertising agents, architects, corporate executives, department stores, designers, editors, government officials, hairdressers, haute couturiers, and Web retailers—in their bid for influence, acclaim, and shoppers’ dollars.

Producing Fashion: Commerce, Culture, and Consumers is edited by Regina Lee Blaszcyk and appears in paper back this May from Penn Press.

Buy the hardcover or pre-order the paper back from Amazon.

France’s A.P.C. “Madras” collection joins the larger Spring/Summer 2009 collection with an array of looks that fill any gap in your casual wear. From shorts to polos and button downs, the Madras collection carries a warm feeling in color and style.

More looks from the A.P.C. Madras Spring/Summer 2009 collection after the jump.

Rag & Bone have been working on a pre-fall 2009 collection and it’s pretty stacked. We’ll show the key pieces from the collection tommorow, but for now take a look at this unlined blazer. Perfect for those who’ve been looking for a simple, clean, soft shouldered blazer (like this writer has), it’s available in black and khaki and will retail at $395. Check back tommorow for more pieces from Rag & Bone’s Pre-Fall 2009 collection.

Following yesterdays Frank Lloyd Wright post, something more directly associated with the architect – Frank Lloyd Wright: From Within Outward at the Guggenheim Museum. The exhibition opens in May, celebrating the 50th anniversary of Wright’s design for the museum building. This commission is presented alongside 64 others, with 200 drawings and models illustrating his process and his genius. (via Dezeen).

Running until August 23, 2009 in New York, before moving to Bilbao.

To be honest, we thought check shirts would have been dead by now. But due to the fact that designers finally worked out how to make a good check pattern, they’ve been going for far longer than any trend ought to. This Journal Standard shirt is a great example of why checks haven’t gone away – when a shirt is this nice how can you say no? unless of course the only method of purchase was befriending a Japanese person and begging them to send it to you. Get it if you can from Style Cruise.

Check after the jump for detailed pictures and styling shots – let it be noted that for the first time ever, we don’t like the styling.

Longtime readers will now that we have a love affair with CDG. It did falter during a pretty disappointing AW08 season, but we’ve fallen pretty hard for the Shirt collection – especially the gradient shirts that’s been dropping in stores over the last few weeks. This pink gradient t-shirt is also available in blue, the gradient seems to flow much more smoothly on this colour. Also, the yellow pocket patch adds a nice touch to it. Get it from Farfetch.

01. Backstage at Galliano’ Exhibit Is a Psychedelic Mind Trip

“For the fall 2008 and spring 2009 seasons, photographer Mark Leibowitz went backstage at the John Gallianoready-to-wear fashion shows. And rather than pointing his lens solely at the clothes and the models, he shot the chaos that goes on behind the scenes.” (NY Mag)

02. Cult author JG Ballard dies at 78

“The author JG Ballard, famed for novels such as Crash and Empire of the Sun, has died aged 78 after a long illness. Despite being referred to as a science fiction writer, Jim Ballard said his books were instead ‘picturing the psychology of the future’.” (BBC)

03. First All-White Leica M8 Spotted in Tokyo

“The first model of Leica’s chic new limited edition all-white digital camera which we scooped the world on earlier this month has just been spotted at the Audi Forum Tokyo. It’s pictured above with a velvet purple Audi R8 as a backdrop.” (Luxist)

04. Vatican to Build Europe’s Largest Solar Power Plant (above)

“The Vatican is going solar in a big way. The smallest country in the world recently announced that it intends to spend 660 million dollars to create what will effectively be Europe’s largest solar power plant. This massive 100 megawatt photovoltaic installation will provide enough energy to make the Vatican the first solar powered nation state in the world!” (Inhabitant)

05. The Symba – Return of the Honda Super Cub

“In 1958, Honda, with the help of San Yang Motorcycle company of Taiwan, introduced the Super Cub motorbike. The two-wheeler saw immense popularity the world over, but Honda stopped selling the bike in The States in 1983.” (Swipelife)