Dressing Room

'No-shave November' grows into bushy year

Local poet and teaching artist Chris James has long sported the “hipster beard,” and for it he’s sometimes compared to the Houston Rockets’ James Harden.
Local poet and teaching artist Chris James has long sported the “hipster beard,” and for it he’s sometimes compared to the Houston Rockets’ James Harden.

It's hard not to have noticed that for a while now, young guys who aren't even Amish have been sporting epic beards ... yes, even in this heat. It's not just Willie and Jules Robertson of the Duck Dynasty family; cats like James Harden, the Houston Rockets shooter, now sport Old Dutch, Darwin and other facial-hair styles.

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Bolle’s Italian-made Diamondback ($89.99-$109.99) is a men’s shield style that’s part of the company’s Sport LifeStyle collection. It is stylish enough to be worn on the tennis court and on an outdoor patio in South Beach.

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Part of Serengeti’s fall 2015 Cosmopolitan line, the round, sturdierthan-they-look Sirolo sunglasses ($269.99) ride the retro wave in fall 2015 sunglasses trends.

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Sporting a hipster beard but don’t want it all over the place? The versatile Panasonic Allin-One Men’s Electric Trimmer ($99.99) is among the more upscale grooming devices. It boasts a 45-degree blade for a more precise cut, adjustable dial with 40 settings to easily trim one’s hair to desired length and three comb attachments for hair, beard and body. It’s at shop.panasonic.com and bedbathandbeyond.com.

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It’s still “fashionment”: Little Rock Fashion Week makes its seventh trip around the sun July 13-18. A model displays the work of ThurshPulKair by Thurshala Banks during Fashion Week No. 6.

Chris James of Little Rock has worn a substantial beard since 2013. "I grew tired of being naked," he says. "I was also going through this 'nomad' phase when I just didn't care to shave ... to be accepted by my peers. It was a time of peace and finding myself."

Although it took James' daughters a while to get used to his beard, which he maintains via beard oils and natural hair care products, the reactions of others have been "uplifting," he says. "People often come to me and say I look like James Harden. The ladies love it and the men respect it. The beard is truly a sign of power.

"It's like all of sudden, 'no-shave November' is all year-round now."

Online sources indicate that beards, which were big in the 1800s, reached a high-water mark in 2014. "From hipsters to Hollywood stars, facial hair is all the rage," according to dialogue for a November radio show at scpr.org, the website for Southern California Public Radio station KPCC-FM, 89.3.

The trend has had its negative nellies. A University of New South Wales (Australia) study, published in 2014 in the Royal Society journal Biology Letters, warned of the "peak beard" effect. Researchers found that the more guys embrace the beards, the less attractive they become. But the beards have continued to flow in 2015. According to a trend blurb on the "mug rug" in GQ magazine (gq.com), "now even CEOs in corner offices are bristling."

Specifics on specs

Jeepers, creepers, where'd you get those ... shades? Hope you got them in time to sport them on Saturday, which was National Sunglasses Day.

It seems as if sunglasses are skirt hems and pant silhouettes right now: You can wear them just about any way you like, because there's something for everybody. You want to rock Ray-Ban Wayfarers? Fine. "Extreme" sport frames that make you look a bit alien-ish? Fine. Cat-eye shades that make you look like an extra in a '60s-era musical? Fine!

Here are some eyeglass/sunglass trends coming up for fall, according to Eyecessorize, The Vision Council's campaign to increase awareness of the fashion and lifestyle aspects of eyewear. These trends, many of which are holdovers from spring/summer, are divided into four categories:

• Editorialized -- "Almost anything goes" in frame shape, whether shields, cat-eyes or squares, the folks at Eyecessorize say. For men come vintage, '70s details like clip-on lenses, keyhole bridges, wire accents. Women's sunglasses come complete with animal motifs, lace effects, hounds-tooth prints or abstract swirls, coupled with edgy cutouts.

• Old-school fever -- Retro, as in the disco era, but with updates. Men's sunglasses detailing include circular frames, teardrop aviators and bold square frames. Women can draw from hexagon shapes, cat-eyes, two-toners and frames with prominent brow lines.

• Tried + True -- Clean, basic shapes of metal or combinations of materials. Rectangular frames, clear or a tad translucent, show up in men's sunglasses, while big Jackie Onassis-style shades, butterflies or cat-eyes manifest in women's wear.

• Upbeat Charm -- "Eclectic pieces and vibrant pops of color." These are showing up in wraparound and navigator styles as well as those shields and aviators. Colored lenses, especially blue, green and orange, are prominent in men's and women's glasses, according to Eyecessorize.

Brian Talkington, resident optician and manager at the Oakley sunglasses store at Park Plaza, sees customers gravitating toward the aviator styles. Aviators, like Ray-Ban's Wayfarer style, will "be around forever," Talkington says. And these customers prefer their aviators with a twist. "They want the big, bright flashy mirrors" as lenses. The Feedback, a women's teardrop aviator style by Oakley, is the most popular style, Talkington says, adding that Oakley retrofitted its new Feedbacks with mirrored lenses in such shades as gold, blue and green.

By the way, do nonathletes favor sporty frames for fashionable purposes? "Yes, they do," Talkington says. "Some of them just ... have a certain look to them."

People go for the fit or the features, whose benefits can be considerable as they've gotten highly specialized. Golfers, baseball players, skiers, fishermen and even shooters have lenses targeting them.

"Sunglasses have come a long way," Talkington says. "They're not what they used to be."

Little Rock Fashion Week

It's almost that time again: OneofaKind's Little Rock Fashion Week is July 13-18.

Here's the schedule for this year:

The week kicks off with an Arkansas Travelers game night featuring Fashion Week promotions, 7:10 p.m., July 13, at Dickey Stephens Park, 400 W. Broadway St., in North Little Rock.

The Fashion, Beauty, Modeling & Photo Shoot Workshop is scheduled for 10 a.m.-2 p.m. July 14 at the Comfort Inn & Suites Presidential, 707 Interstate 30.

Beyond the Runway takes place from 12:30-2 p.m. July 15 at the Hillary Rodham Clinton Children's Library, 4800 W. 10th St.

The For Kids by Kids fashion show will be held from 7-10 p.m. July 16 at the Doubletree Hotel, 424 W. Markham St.

The Bare fashion show (no, it's not what you're thinking) will happen from 7-10 p.m. July 17 at the Doubletree.

The finale, the Big Night, will go down from 7-10 p.m. July 18, on Main Street between Fourth Street and Capitol Avenue.

Tickets, $30-$150, are available at Littlerockfashionweek.com.

Send Arkansas fashion-related tips and news releases to:

[email protected]

High Profile on 06/28/2015

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