Glasnost at POP UP...the Shop

POP UP… The Shop, located in the heart of Gastown is an exciting concept in Vancouver retail. POP UP provides local designers, vintage dealers, and retailers the opportunity to showcase their wares for a couple of days in their very own shop.

On October 16th and 17th, local designer Stephanie Schneider will be unveiling her Fall Collection to Vancouver. Her line, Glasnost, consisting of skirts, shirts and jackets complemented with leather work designs including hip-sacks, wallets and custom flasks for the gents will all be priced to sell.

Come down and check out Stephanie’s exciting new line on October 16th and 17th between 11am-9pm.

glasnost.ca

More information on POP Up… The Shop:

Located in the heart of uber-hip Gastown, this unique concept store offers an ever-changing installation of retailers and products from emerging designers & vintage dealers to bigger brands blowing out discount stock and samples.

Parade of Lost Souls

I spent tonight in the company of a three-year-old and a cacophony of bubbles and the beating of drums during the Parade of Lost Souls on Commercial Drive. The candle-lit tables and shelves scattered throughout Grandview Park caught my attention first. Perhaps it was the opportunity for the slightest of heat that drew me to the fire, or my fascination with the strange edifices that they adorned.

Parade of Lost Souls

The streets that surrounded the park were covered with decorations as unique as the costumes around me. I am amused to see faces in windows and the lifelessness of houses that have been left vacant of surprises. There is a unique fascination that we westerners seem to have in Halloween, and I wonder where its origins lie. Why we find cause only once a year to dress silly and traipse around escapes me. Often I find it merely leaves us feeling obligated to outshine others or perhaps guilty for not partaking. Needless to say, this festival is a gift to the neighbourhood and the city, bringing light and sound to an otherwise deadly still season.

A sign proclaims to honour the dead, above me, and white birds born of paper dance around our heads. It is in the delicate nature of these things that I find us to be celebrating life more than anything. And, amongst all these various forms of death, it is the vibrancy of the changing of seasons, the fire, and the musical accompaniment that shine through.

The clear skies send the chill in the pavement through the soles of my converse and up into my legs and abdomen. As I walk away I can feel the heat of the festivities on my back and hear the fireworks fading in the distance. Soon my companion and I reach 1^st Avenue, and I’m reminded of the existence of cars and pavement. We are forced to walk once again on the sidewalk and the shock of reality sets in.

I wonder sometimes, if to an outsider, it is the traffic jams and the regular routine of our work-weeks that seem peculiar. If it is in the honouring of the dead that I find such warmth, why is it still, that in what we call life, I find such a cold embrace? It seems sometimes, that all our struggles need to dissipate, is the closing of roads and a certain balance of chaos, fuelled by candles, bubbles, and fireworks.