Valentine's Day is coming up, and this usually means guys go through a series of emotions when their girlfriend is expecting something big, extravagant, fancy and romantic. First there's panic, then there's doubt about whether they can come up with something great, then frustration, and finally, they settle on a dinner in a nice restaurant that's dimly lit. Good choice, guys - especially if you dress for the
occasion with a nice blazer and nice slacks. Then your girlfriend really won't be able to resist you.

How To Wear It: 1.) Jean Paul Gaultier grey button-down 2.) Hugo Boss charcoal pants 3.) Moschino navy blazer 4.) Cesare Paciotti shoes

While the rest of the world is feeling the recession, even fashion designers (there will be a lot of scaling back this year, reportedly), Mattel's Barbie will be taking Fashion Week 2009 by storm. It is the doll's golden anniversary, after all, as well as the American International Toy Fair. Great timing. And life in plastic? It's fantastic.

Mattel has formed partnerships with IMG, Vera Wang, Bloomingdale's and Fred Segal, among several others, to prep fashionistas all year for New York's fall fashion week. To kick things off, the 5th Avenue Sephora will have two days for customers to get Barbie makeovers from Stila make-up artists February 6th and February 7th from noon to 6 pm.

Stila is also releasing some limited-edition Barbie Beauty Cans. Each one's full of the necessary make-up you need to make your face look like Ponytail Barbie, Malibu Barbie, Foxy Barbie or Jewel Barbie.

Ponytail Barbie? Pshhh. Everyone knows Ken always goes for Malibu Barbie. She's got that sun-kissed glow all year round!

Here is the second installment of the Kentucky Warehouse casting call for employee models! We encouraged them to mug for the camera while they tried on this week's trends: neutrals, grays, boyfriend jeans, and casual wear! Not surprisingly, the photos are amazing and the looks are to buy for! (wink wink!)

Shop Zappos.com!

Actress Chloe Sevigny announced last week that she will launch a men's unisex line. Yes...a men's unisex line.

So, I can wear my boyfriend's jeans and they won't be as baggy, because they're also made to fit women? We can mix and match menswear vests? Sevigny told Women's Wear Daily she will showcase the line in Paris. Lots of the pieces will have "girl versions," she said, smaller sizes but not different tailoring. Ah, that's where the unisex part comes in.

"It's skinny, chain-y, stud-y," she told the website. "Not only did I want to do something for the guys in my life, but a lot of my girlfriends prefer to wear men's stuff."

We recently held our very first casting call for employees at the Kentucky warehouse! We encouraged them to mug for the camera while they tried on this week's trends: neutrals, grays, boyfriend jeans, and casual wear. Not surprisingly, the photos are amazing and the looks are to buy for! (wink wink!) Shop Zappos.com and find your favorite trends.

This spring's hottest trend is now at Zappos! Taurie M., Photographer, knows that looking good is all about the basics! You can pair a neutral blouse, pant or jacket with just about anything. Grab the basics and quit worrying about what to wear!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute is already planning and executing its Spring 2009 exhibition with their new exhibit looking at models as muses. The idea that models are muses for the designers of the clothes they inhibit is not a new notion, but one rather worth exploring as the Met’s upcoming exhibit, The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion, showcases. The show aims to explore and explain fashion, the shifting ideals of beauty through out the decades, and showcases models as diverse as Veruschka, Marion Morehouse, Peggy Moffitt, Iman, Nadja Auermann up to today’s beauty ideal, Gisele Bundchen. The show will also showcase how these models inspired, contributed and defined trends during the 20th century and continue to influence how fashion is perceived currently. The exhibit will start on May 4th with the Costume Institute’s annual gala benefit with designer Marc Jacobs serving as the night’s honorary chairman, along side co-chairs Kate Moss, Justin Timberlake and Vogue Editrix, Anna Wintour.

The show will feature over 70 Haute Couture and ready-to-wear looks accompanying photography, runway images and video footage of models, socialites and rockstars alike who have set the tone for the decades. The show will feature images of models from the time of Worth and Poiret, to Fifties sensations Sunny Harnett and Dorian Leigh, to Sixties icons Jean Shrimpton and Peggy Moffitt, to Seventies goddesses Iman and Janice Dickinson, to the Eighties supermodels and Nineties ‘It’ girls. The curated items will feature designs from the likes of Marc Jacobs, Azzedine Alaia, Balenciaga, Chanel, Armani, Donna Karan, Helmut Lang, Lanvin, Claude Montana, Prada, Chistian Dior, to name a few, as well as photography works by Horst, Avedon, Bailey, Meisel and Helmut Newton. The exhibit will be open to the public from May 6 through August, with it being held at the Met’s Tisch Galleries.

The 'Lady Lynn' is quite the fashion icon. She is always turned out in vintage designer pieces (a little Missoni here, and little YSL there), mixes high and low fashions, wears the most fabulous shoes this side of Vogue's closet and never, ever looks like she is trying to fashionably hard. Having owned a vintage clothing boutique in the New England area, she knows a thing or two about clothes, how they fit and what works. Mix in her being uber fit, what more is there to say? Couture bows down to this BFF (that is beautiful fashionable female, in case you were not in the know).

When the word “chic” is in the city’s name, you know it has to have some fashion sense. And it looks like New York and Paris no longer have a monopoly on haute couture – Chicago’s History Museum has a vintage couture exhibit: “Chic Chicago: Couture Treasures from the Chicago History Museum.” It features couture dresses from 1861 to 1996 – Chanel to Lanvin to Versace, as well as Pingat gowns from the Gilded Age. The exhibit will also show fashion-related films such as Unzipped, a documentary chronicling Isaac Mizrahi’s work after his mixed-reviewed 1993 show, and The Fashion Frontier, about the relationship between political statements and clothing.

The best part is it will be at the museum until July 2009. There’s plenty of time to check it out.

Dear Reader, last week we asked you to illuminate us on your
favorite shoe style and why. This week we are delving into the what
the contents of your handbag says about you.

So tell us what's in your handbag and what it says about you.

What do the contents of Couture's handbag say about us? We travel often and like to capture the little moments (hence the notebook and camera), we are always prepared for inclimate weather conditions (the wrap); we understand the essentials - make-up for touch ups, car keys (how else would be get to and from), hair spray for the fly-aways; that we love a little bit of technology - yes the latest iPhone (feel free to wretch now); we like to be seen but more importantly, to see (eyeglasses), smelling good is always important (thank goodness for pocket-sized products); and finally that we love a little bit of couture, hence the handbag (Gucci) itself and the card case (Goyard).

Or so it would seem for Louis Vuitton with its latest design collaboration with film director Sofia Coppola. Hot on the heels of their extremely successful collaboration with Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garcons for their monogrammed leather goods in Tokyo (currently completely sold out), comes the announcement that Ms. Coppola was tapped to design a line of handbags and shoes. The products are said to be launching in Japan, Vuitton’s recent international test market, with the intention of selling worldwide. Of course Ms. Coppola is no stranger to fashion, as she is often front and center at several designer shows, in particular Marc Jacobs, the creative force behind the Vuitton label. Sofia’s choice should prove to be a very interesting one, both from her perspective and detailed eye from behind the camera, to her being a well known francophile, to her love of pretty ladylike flats. Both Sofia and her father, director Francis Ford Coppola, star in Vuitton’s ‘core values’ ad campaign. Viva la Vuitton!

Why go for dull, regular-colored shoes when your heels can really shine? Metallic high heels, like these Be&D heels, liven up a dress or black pants. Just don't go overboard - maybe carry a metallic clutch, but anything else and it's veering on metallic overload.

It is not often that a fashionista has the opportunity to come face-to-face with a classic, quilted Chanel bag circa 1955 that is large enough to sit inside of with a few friends, a DJ and a mini turntable, but that is exactly what the traveling Mobile Art: Chanel Contemporary Art Container, a collaboration between design innovator Karl Lagerfeld, and the celebrated architect Zaha Hadid, presents to you. The collapsible mobile pod designed by Hadid, will house all of the rotating exhibits that will travel to Hong Kong, Tokyo, New York, London, Moscow, before settling in its final destination of Paris. The twenty artisans received a brief from Lagerfeld with the instructions of creating an exhibit that revolved around Chanel’s back catalog of the iconic handbags and would capture the essence of the house’s most famous bag, the quilted handbag. The original collaboration between Lagerfeld and Hadid began when the two were photographed for a W 092 Power Couple magazine photoshoot, where Lagerfeld chose Hadid as his architectural hero. The interpretations of the Chanel bag are vast and inspirational, from the oversized 2.55 quilted purse with a video installation, to a room lined with leather as though walking inside of a handbag, to a photo essay shot in an American landscape interpretation of the Chanel workshops. The exhibit will be making the rounds for the next two years, so don’t miss a truly unique experience, because if you do, fashion shame on you! For more information check out the following link at Chanel.com. http://www.chanel-mobileart.com/?lang=en_eu

When you go out to dinner with your diva friends, they may be your friends, but they expect you to always look your spectacular best. This outfit is sure to impress -- matching deep purple bag and shoes and black accessories give the little black dress a different, edgier look.

The What: An outfit worthy of an attitude.

The How To: LOVE Moschino dress, Giuseppe Zanotti bag, Sergio Rossi booties, CC Skye enamel deco ring and Jessica Elliot hoop earrings.

The When: When you need to pull out an impressive outfit for dinner with friends.

The Why: Edgy and sexy, this look knows no wrong.

We here are Couture are continuing our presentation of the 'fashionably fabulous' folks here at Zappos.com. One of our fashion favorites, due to her effortless elan and quick smile, is Ms. Terra E. Whether she is rocking the latest skinny jeans, a form-fitting dress, killer heels or a funky rock-inspired tee, she is always on point. So Terra, we tip our couture hats to you!

How can one not be a studdette when you’re carrying a studded bag. Hardware’s coming back and it’s on bags in a big way. This Betsey Johson handbag is a perfect example.