Current Fashion, the 10-store Vancouver-based women’s fashion

Posted on 4/15/2011 at 1:18 AM - Link

Current Fashion, the 10-store Vancouver-based women’s fashion chain and its associated factory, are in receivership.

“We really wanted to try to stay a locally manufactured company,” said Sandy Hayden, co-owner of Kudos Fashion Corporation, which owns Current. Kudos, which has 80 employees, went into receivership April 13.

“There’s just been too many challenges, from the Canadian dollar becoming on par with the U.S. dollar, to manufacturing going offshore and [us] trying to pay fair wages here and run the factory here, and lots of big retailers coming into town that we can’t even begin to compete with,” Hayden said.

Women in Current’s demographic of mid-40s and up have become very cautious shoppers, Hayden said. “You read the business sections of the newspapers christian louboutin shoes and they say how well the Canadian economy is doing, but my experience on the ground is that is not the case. Money is very, very tight. I think our age group is starting to think, ‘Do I really need this?’ I think the way we consume is changing.”

“I think our story is just the tip of the iceberg because we work with so many clothing suppliers and fabric suppliers and it’s just been gloomy for months,” Hayden said.

great Sidney Lumet dies in NY at 86

Posted on 4/10/2011 at 7:33 PM - Link

He rarely did more than two or three takes and usually cut "in the camera" — essentially editing while shooting — yet his efficient ways captured some of the greatest performances in American cinema: Al Pacino as Sonny Wortzik in "Dog Day Afternoon," Peter Finch as Howard Beale in "Network," Paul Newman as Frank Galvin in "The Verdict."

His actors, with whom he always rehearsed for at least two weeks before starting Louboutin Sandals  production, were nominated for 17 Oscars for their performances in his films; several, including Faye Dunaway and Ingrid Bergman, won. The director was, in four nominations, always shut out until he was given a lifetime achievement award in 2005.

"I guess I'd like to thank the movies," the director said in accepting the award.

Lumet, 86, died early Saturday in his Manhattan home after suffering from lymphoma.

He was always closely associated with New York, where he shot many of his films, working far from Hollywood. The city was frequently a character in its own right in his films, from the crowds chanting "Attica!" on the hot city streets of "Dog Day Afternoon" to the hard lives and corruptibility of New York police officers in "Serpico," "Prince of the City" and "Q&A."

Mayor Michael Bloomberg called Lumet "one of the great chroniclers of our city."

"It's not an anti-L.A. thing," Lumet said of his New York favoritism in a 1997 interview. "I just don't like a company town."

Fellow New York director Woody Allen called Lumet "definitely the quintessential New York filmmaker," though Allen noted he considered one film Lumet made elsewhere — 1965's "The Hill," shot in Spain — his finest.

"I'm constantly amazed at how many films of his prodigious output were wonderful and how many actors and actresses had their best work under his direction," Allen said Saturday. "Knowing Sidney, he will have more energy dead than most live people."