Another weekend, another Nike extravaganza! Nike celebrated the NBA All-Star weekend by launching their 6 minute Black Mamba video, directed by Robert Rodriguez and starring Danny Trejo, Kanye West, Bruce Willis, Kobe Bryant and Rodriguez himself. You can watch the full length video (by W+K Portland) here, I can only imagine how ridiculously fun it must have been to film. It was great to see everyone out & enjoying themselves, the party was full of dizzying lights, full size basketball court, scantily clad ring girls and an appearance by the Nike China High School Basketball league.

A job well done and congrats to the W+K and Nike families.

my camera ran out of steam this weekend so i barely managed any photos — we went to the tongchuan seafood market for a delicious feast of stone & dungeness crab, and this time we wised up and brought our own wine. so delicious! also, some friends and i checked out the newly opened moules, which is supposedly french owned but very obviously decorated by a chinese nouveau tai tai’s eye (read: super tacky decor). the mussels (pictured above) were really great though, fresh, plump and delicious, and for only 150rmb per pot (massive pots), it’s a pretty good deal. however, the lobster bisque was not delicious, unless your idea of delicous is lobster flavoured water?

the 1st photo from the above is from the opening party of the Culture Chanel exhibition at MoCA. things got pretty ridiculous so i’ll only post that photo and say no more. xoxo

my friend scotty fingers was in town a few weeks ago shooting this fantastic video as part of the Nokia N8 launch campaign. the app is a super simple to use mobile music maker that lets you make music anywhere & with anything, and once you’re finished you can share on facebook via SoundCloud or set it as your ringtone. if you have a Nokia N8 or C7, head over to the OVI STORE for your free download.

ps. check out the Welcome to Optimism special edition W+K Creative Review loop here.

Nike Sportswear China threw an amazing bash over the weekend to celebrate the launch of their latest campaign, Destroy To Create. tunes were provided by one half of the creative duo Kitsuné, and the entire warehouse space was transformed into a literal playground of destruction and creation. check out the Freshness Mag event recap, and also peep a video of the specially created tap nudemen DESTROYER EDITION iPad game created by awesome possum Francis Lam. big props to the Nike China team for a job well done!

ps. sadly, i arrived rather late and missed an appearance by Nike’s own China Flying Man, LIU XIANG! such a bummer!

coupl’a photos + nice video from the Steve Garrow: Insight Presents Garage Art Tour set up from The Source. sadly, i’ve been MIA for the last week and didn’t make the show, a horrid stomach flu slash allergic reaction to antibiotics left me bedridden (and missing out on turkey dinners!) but i heard it went very well and there are still some pieces up in the gallery for sale. prices are reasonable, starting from ¥2000 upwards, so if you want to pick up an original, i would highly recommend getting your butts over to the shop sooner rather than later. the gallery will be up for a few more days, so goooooooooooo!

lots over the last few days, here are a few photos — Converse threw a launch party for their skate film “逆”, directed by 刘泽锋 (Liu Feng/Hammer) of W+K, also squeezed in another delicious dinner at purple onion, this time with ten+ peeps and we went wild with too much food and wine and pom queens. looking forward to the weekend, it’s gonna be good. xo

i stopped by The Source over the weekend to peep a look at the install happening over at their gallery space for the upcoming show on Saturday. everything looks great, and there were a couple media folk combing over the space and doing interviews with Steve Gorrow, who’s a creative director for the brand. it’s going to be interesting to see how the event turns out, i get the feeling that it’s going to be a big one. also, joey from enovate posted up his interview w/Steve yesterday, have a look at the post and come by the party on saturday – there will be a bunch of Steve Garrow garage art pieces available for sale as well as skate ramps, bar and music by Kami.

UPDATE: just saw this video posted on the interview page of Creative Hunt. love it!

friend Brian from the Source sent me these photos of Steve Gorrow prepping work for the Beijing leg of the INSIGHT Presents: Garage Art Tour 2010. they finished up with Beijing last night and Shanghai is the next stop, peep the flyer for more details.

ps. if you’re in Bali, Taipei, Tokyo or Hong Kong, ping me and i can send you more event info for those cities. each stop will feature bands, dj’s, limited edition tshirts and some amazing pieces up for sale. xoxo

a couple photos from the GAP opening last night. feeling a bit rough this morning but it’s nearly the end of the week. the party itself was not much of a party but still an event with open bar and whatever, i guess it just felt weird to be at a store like the Gap whilst drunk. anyways, so we were given a 20% off shopping card upon entrance and the big idea was to walk around and buy things. so i walked around for a while desperately searching for something to buy because i a) didn’t want to waste my coupon and b) still feel weirdly nostalgic for the Gap of the 90s and still want them to do well. there was also a small “party area” set up outside the store (in the mall hallway), which was roped off by Gap blue curtains, small bar, runway for Gap models (who marched in and out all night) and a DJ booth for Wordy. they served popcorn in Gap cups and gave away little boxes of gummies, overall it was quite fun but we left at 1030 and walked next door to the Ascott Residences where YY had rented us a hotel suite for hangouts. i know it sounds ridiculous but every once in a while it really is fun and hilarious to party in a hotel room with bottles of champagne and dozens of broken glasses and all your friends being silly and taking silly photos of each other and generally causing mischief. i am debating whether or not i will post those photos, because it got a bit messy. hm!

ps. if you’re interested, i bought a nice grey super soft wool oversize cardigan for myself and a grey and white check button up shirt for john. the cardigan is very cozy and i’m actually wearing it right now!

pps. the best absolute best thing about the party is that there was never a point in the night where it was completely packed and everyone was frothing at the mouth to get to the bar. way to go Gap for not pulling a Uniqlo and inviting 293489234 people to a shopping mall xo.

so we’ve known for a while that The Gap is finally coming to China and last week we came upon this massive OOH site on nanjing xi lu that really drove it home. i’m digging the campaign images they’re using so far – shot by Annie Liebovitz, they’ve paired Chinese personalities with Western counterparts (such as producer Diplo & blogger Julia Frakes) and the first batch of ads include the faces of actress Zhou Xun, model Liu Wen, illustrator Wang Momo and even my friends DJ Wordy and Ceilen. it’ll be interesting to see how the launch goes, and if they can compete with Uniqlo?

ps. hoping to hell that they size their clothing differently and adjust for asian bodies, as american gap size 0s are definitely not the same as what we have over here!

pps. the shanghai flagship store opens tomorrow, THURSDAY, NOV 11 on huaihai zhong lu. find it at 282 Huaihai Zhong Lu, near Huangpi Nan Lu 淮海中路282号, 近黄陂南路.