Our new song!

a-l-i-v-e!

I'm dead. BUT HAPPY!!! :)
Last month was really very chaotic.
There was the japanese presentation of my new knitwear products and also some other work situations to deal with. Still, there are a lot of work to be done and I am very glad about it anyways because I love my life and work.. As you all can see, these pics are from the new products ! There will be more stuff soon, the japanese collection will have new items and also the brazilian/european collection too.. so let's all stay tuned!

New portfolio, band video, Phd,Düsseldorf and Mr. White

First of all, and thanks to the universe, I'm very active as person and professional. And it's not connected to the feeling of never being satisfied, is more connected to the feeling "I can do and i feel good doing it!" I can't see myself living in a world that I can't have fun with all the projects I'm involved. I'm very glad for everything I'm involved and working on. I'm a little bit unstoppable and I'm very glad to find people around me that it's the same. We're always having tons of ideas.
So, since there will be new and good news coming soon concerning my fashion knitwear label, I updated and created a new portfolio where you can glance some stuff I've been doing in the last years: mariecastroknitwear.tumblr.com

That's Isa (she was my fashion pupil some years ago, and also, very pretty!) modeling with the turbant.

As I was talking about the projects, there's also the band. We recorded some live sessions in the HoBo Studios (For those who does not know, Rabbit owns a studio now with another producer and works in several projects of music production). And also we have a new song that it's finished and we will release soon. To explain a little bit how the band works (because I got a call from a knitter asking if I will stop my designer carrier forever and so on --- I WON'T!!! hahaha), here we go... But first, let's watch our video:

The band is a project we do for fun, and pleasure to play music. As Rabbit said in the Radio Fritz's interview, this project is based in doing music with our fists and hearts --- and not putting too much thinking behind it(or judgments). It's a band where we have fun playing our indie-crazy-rock-funny music...Playing honest music that we would like to hear. Everything is done with love and we are very glad that this is touching all the people that believe in our music. It makes us very happy that we get more 10 000 plays in our single "Home", and this invitation we got to play in a live session in the radio, and etc-etc-etc, but we are not working 100% of our time in the band, we LOVE playing together but we also have our other projects concerning design, business and music. So we won't stop anything we do, we are just doing now everything at the same time and having our fun with that. The band got a very big and importance significance in our lives and we take time to that. If you like it, share with your friends and everyone you know (we are personally very glad with people that are supporting us and also if you guys are doing some artistic project please let me know and I can help to promote it on my twitter).  If you don't like it (and plus don't like indie music, thinking we should sing like Whitney Houston or something.. hahaha), simply don't listen to our music and try to find something that you enjoy. It's simple like that. And we all can have fun :)

My brother just concluded his Phd in São Paulo. I was not able to be there to support him, but I'm always sending my energies, does not matter where I am. For those who does not know, I have a very applied older brother. He works as lawyer and loves academic life, I'm very proud of him. We both share some passions for music, language and traveling (he traveled even more than me)... Well, as I said, I'm very glad that in my life I'm always around very interesting people with interesting lives.

Well-well, I just came back from Düsseldorf, and it's unbelievable the quantity of fashion high end shops there.I surely want to start to sell my new collections there.  The whole trip was actually a matter of family matters, I trained a little bit of german, we ate awesome japanese food and warm weather really got us.

Maki and sushi being prepared by a real japanese woman in our family

How are you people surviving in this new Breaking Bad's season? I don't want to throw some spoilers for those who are not watching now, but Breaking Bad is basically my religion and I'm totally tense to see how it is gonna end. Mr. White is getting creepy and Jesse is awesome as always.

YEAH BITCH, MAGNETS!

That's all for now, I need to prepare dinner for tonight and relax a little bit... It's sunday!
I'm happy I'm managing to come here more often. I hope you are enjoying it :)

Kisses,
Marie

Radio, drums and knitting

Hi readers,
It's been more than a month that I don't write here. I feel a little bit guilty to not being able to come sooner to tell you guys the news but at same time I fully understand it was basically impossible in the last days.
For those who knows the basics about my life, the biggest deal in the moment is that: my home and heart is based in Germany, but I'm very often going back to Brazil to work and see my family. It can be very exciting from the outside, but from the inside, it really can create some lack of time to come here, sit down, and...write (even more difficult when you need to organize furniture and details in the new flat)! There are so many things going on, projects, work, blablabla...

We were some weeks ago in Berlin, at Radio Rbb Fritz, to play a live session and give an interview to Christoph Schrag, the very cool and sympathetic host of Fritz's "Unsigned". For those who have no idea, I am part of a rock band, that it's actually a rock duo, with my life partner and very talented musician/producer, the Rabbit. Together we are "Rabbit and the Snake" and you can check us rocking out the Radio Fritz studios here:

It was our first time with this project playing in a live session. The results were pretty good and we totally enjoyed  it. Now we are at studio again, recording new sounds, recording some of our live sessions and also I am learning how to play drums (and hurting my hand in the process hahaha).

While my new collection is not public yet, check it out this new turbant for the winter japanese collection. It arrived in Japan in the last days:

Movimento Hotspot and the band

Well, last week I was invited by Movimento Hotspot (event for creators in many different areas such as Fashion, illustration, photography, music, graphic design etc) to participate in the festival. It was held in Belo Horizonte (state of Minas Gerais). I've met so many creative people, had fun in a funk party under a brigde(!) and also had one of the weirdest flights of my whole life.
It's always good to be into a creative mood and meet other creators. Even though people cannot bring magical solutions to ours doubts in the creative process, just having conversations around really helped me a lot to decide important questions around my fashion work. It was great, I'm glad that I got to know so many people and was able to be there in the festival, that of course, was amazing. I was very proud of my work in the exhibition, people were coming to talk and give their feedback, and mostly, they were amazed by my work, so I am so happy that it touches people somehow. I would like to thank everyone that was there and also my curators Paulo Martinez(ffw magazine) and Suzana Barbosa (Elle Brazil). It was a "positive" vote to my work and the experience was just incredible! And of course,i could walk around Belo Horizonte a little bit and enjoy the city's vibe, eat the local candies and die of too much sugar in my blood (or not hahaha) :D

*having fun with creative people! 

This was basically what was happening in the last days. I'm also finishing a collection, it will take more time than I planned in the first time, but everything is gonna be worth! Since I'm a constant traveler, I'm bringing my stuff there and here to work, which is a very positive thing about my collections: I can create the prototypes from all the places since it's basically handmade work.

I also have my rock duo with the Rabbit (be-parallel.com). We were recording some songs in the studio, we uploaded them at Radio rbb fritz website and we have now more than 15 000 views in our songs. Crazy and amazing, right? It was totally made with our hearts, we just wanted to sit down and play rock music. There were no intention behind that and now we get such positive feedback --- We are gonna play a live gig in Radio Fritz!!! So, listen to Rabbit and the Snake live on 18.8, 18:00-20:00 in a live radio session on Radio Fritz RBB (online stream also available). Don't forget that ;)

*Guitar recording session

Soundtracks

I'm  into projects in the last weeks. There are so many things to be done !!! And they all will be announced in the next months. We will have a brand-new collection coming soon, and I feel that this collection will make me feel very proud of each garment I design. I love my profession! Just give me more time to organize everything (work gets more serious and full of events and things to be done).  Also I will update more this blog here and try to share more things that I like with you guys, even though I'm not writing that much, I saw that people are regularly coming here to see if I wrote something, this is so cool :) 

I've watch severial movies/tv series while I knit/crochet, or in my free time. I have a big passion for crazy and innovative directors and screenwriters.  And of course, I love to pay attention in the soundtracks. Music really moves me. So here it goes some songs that caught my attention lately:

Receita para os fios Fazenda Caixa Dágua

Receita de turbante lá no blog da Fazenda Caixa Dágua, um de nossos parceiros:

http://caixadagua.com/blog/?p=601

news from japan, new project and music

Hi guys!
My Summer collection already arrived in Japan! And also the lookbook of our next winter collection, as you can see in the pics.

I'm  preparing a new project (fashion) and it will be released in October. I can't tell too much about it now because its a surprise. but its gonna be amazing, and it will involve other countries, not just Brazil and Japan as usual :)

I'm also in a new music duo now, we recorded 3 songs that SOUNDS AMAZING and I will share this gift with you guys very soon.

I'm so hyper, there are so many things going on :)

Receitas para o site da Círculo

Quer aprender a fazer um gorro turbante ou um headband para o outono/inverno? Dá uma olhada nessas duas receitas que desenvolvi para a Círculo!

http://www.circulo.com.br/pt/receitas/acessorios/gorro-turbante

http://www.circulo.com.br/pt/receitas/acessorios/headband-torcido

2013 - the beginning!

welcome, 2013!!! The year of the snake ;)

Movimento Hotspot

Hello friends,
My project "Black Hole" was elected as one of the finalists in "Movimento Hotspot" competition here in Brazil. 391 submitted their projects and mine was picked with another 22 finalists. We will be exposing our works in the local festivals (they will have festivals in 16 important cities here in Brazil) and the winner will get a place at São Paulo Fashion Week and also some money to develop their next collection.  The curators are Suzana Barbosa (Elle magazine) and Paulo Martinez(ffw_Mag!) , very important people in the fashion area around here.

For now, I'm so happy with these exciting news and I would like to thank everyone that helped me to develop this project. Special thanks to the photographer Mariana Quintana, who gave her amazing point of view in these designs taking awesome pics and also to the model Lidia Zuin who totally understood the concept and really did great poses and presence.

direct link to these exciting news in portuguese http://movimentohotspot.com/noticias/hoje-e-a-vez-da-moda/

Unfolded Magazine Issue 11

japanese turbans

gloves ~ jp Fukuoka

Japan - winter

Japanese Summer 2013

for special orders (outside Japan) please contact marie.castro@gmail.com

Breaking Bad

At first sight, I had in my mind that Breaking Bad wouldn't be the kind of Tv series I'd feel attach to.  For real, my ex-boyfriend told me "there's one series everyone is talking about and I think you'll like it" and I was like "nyaaaa no way", so I watched the first 2 or 3 episodes and I got addicted. It was some years ago, and for now, I feel obligated to write about it in this blog. THE SERIES IS FUCKING AWESOME.

 The plot sounds pretty simple and weird at same time: A chemistry teacher called Walter White just discovers he has cancer and that his life is not going through a good direction, so, he teams up with a local stoned kiddo called Jesse Pinkman and together they start their business of cooking meth. But obviously, the  series is not just about that, and that's why it is so brilliant. It goes deep to all moral, society,  right/wrong aspects involving the human existence plus they have a perfect team of actors, directors, soundtracks.. Everything is just so perfect that you can't avoid it: it's a piece of art. If you never watched it and have some free time (or you can watch it while knitting/crocheting) .. WATCH IT. And tell me your impressions later.

B.A.N.D.

Hyper and the Hi-Fi
http://soundcloud.com/hyperandthehifi

That's my newest and most exciting project at the moment.
Playing music make us feel alive.

last days

Hi everyone!
Well, last days were not that easy.
I'm rushing my japanese orders, and also preparing and fixing some small details of my japanese summer. It's a long, hard and tiring process ~ all to make you look stylish and pretty within my clothing line. :)
Actually , in my point of view, there always a lot of sacrifices behind a pretty garment --- or face. People usually forget that, and that's why pretty things are so valuable (real beauty, to me).
I mean, we are kinda living a world, nowadays, of easy stuff. Easy-going smiles, easy friendship, easy beauty, easy words.. everything too easy, too flat. I heard a song these days called "Warm smiles doesn't make you welcome here" and my mind just connected it with this subject I'm talking about  even though it may sound a little bit senseless in this whole conversation :)
I don't like easy things. They are mostly flat and go away very quickly. Always doubt of people being too easy over you. Probably it is fake.

I often write about wishes. "I wish that something was blablaba" and so on. I'm trying to force myself to this kind of thought. Otherwise we will just loose a good amount of time wishing stuff and not really doing something to make it true. Even all that horoscope thing says people from my star sign are kinda subjective, I find myself very objective in everything else, but love. Maybe is my moon, I don't know. I highly believe in those things. Maybe it is just one of that things that shows how everything is so connected in this world. Nature, people, stars.. All in the same vibration. In this world it's all about the right tuning.

Well, today I already worked in my label stuff, so I'll save some hours now to relax, and I'm using it to write here, but doesn't matter, for me writing is very relaxing. I feel often relaxed when I express myself, and very tense if for some reason I'm not able to express it. I'm just releasing I was not writing too much in the last years because I was always afraid about some reaction I would generate on people while exposing my thoughts. NO FEAR, NO FEAR, NO FEAR. That's the motto now :) Being in a band is helping me a lot on that. It's amazing, actually, how people are exposing themselves while doing music even though they think they are protected in some comfortable zone or something like that. I'll get out of mine in some hours, it's a recording day, again.

Actually, there's no comfort zone. When you think you are in one, that's the moment the world says: "Hey, I'll throw this brick over your sand castle and let's see if you ruin it completely or if you re-build it". Life makes it everyday, but sometimes we don't notice that. But it's always there.
We've been too distracted.

yarnbombing project?

Life is always connected with work.
At least in my life.. it is like this.
But anyways, I'm thinking about starting a new yarnbombing project.
Agata Olek is here in Brazil, since the beginning of this week. I've met her (and actually now collaborating with her yarnbombing project in SP) and it was really something cool to do: it motivated me in another level. I mean, I just finished to show my second japanese collection, and everything went fine :) We will be in Japan again. But it was a hard process, and still, there are a lot of adjustments to do. But, there was a strange voice inside of me saying "relax, take your time in this week". And that's what I did. I did not stop working, since Olek is here and I'm crocheting, but also I was able to re-think about a lot of things going through my mind these days. I even had time to do my band's logo in crochet:


Well, so since I'm gonna travel to Europe in some months, I thought maybe I could do some nice yarnbombing project there. I mean, it's a good opportunity to take advantage of the nice cities I'll able to see.. and do art with that.
Yeah.
Art.
I question myself , actually, everyday, about what I'm doing.
I don't think it is fashion at all. I mean, I run a fashion label, but it is not just that, and I'm not putting all my forces into the 'fashion thing'. I mean, I'm trying to develop, in my own style, my vision of the world. And  it is not just about clothing, but anything else. It's a long way to go, but I'll follow my heart and see what happens.