Freckles is a new Paris based band created by Quiksilver woman Julie Boulanger and Michael Clement. Their sound is a mixture of acoustic and rhythmic folk melodies, with Julie’s husky voice transporting us to an inspired, bohemian new world. 
http://myspace.com/yeahfreckles
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Ellie Lawson is an artist whose compelling voice and rich sonic landscape reflect a life journey of personal determination and self-discovery. Following the success of her debut album “The philosophy tree”, Ellie has just released independently her much-anticipated second CD “Lost songs”.

http://myspace.com/ellielawson

Gabe and I in LA

When I found out my Irish film Waveriders (written by me and directed by Joel Conroy) was nominated in the final five for the best documentary at the SURFER POLL AWARDS in LA, I thought it might be a fun trip to fly over and simply soak up the atmosphere.  The awards are the Oscars of the surfing world; a night when the Who’s Who of surfing come together in their glad rags to celebrate the past year and party together.  Gabe was also nominated in the Heavy Water category for big waves, which is a huge accolade for a European surfer so we thought, let’s go and at least have a chance to dress up and party with our friends.  Never in a million years did we think we would have to take to the stage in front of surfing royalty to accept the award.

I chose the Quiksilver Women NYC dress for the night.  Silk, double layered and floaty, it is so easy to wear and effortlessly glamorous.  I teamed it with the tuxedo jacket, which Marta had given me hot off a fashion shoot the day I left France.  Sleeves rolled up, high shoes on, camera in my bag, I was ready to take pictures of all the winners!

The event really is fantastic.  A red carpet greets the surfers at the door of the huge venue, which is lit up like the Disney fantasyland castle.  The Top 44 and the industry bigwigs have never looked so smart and the girls go all out on the glamour.  A few commented on my outfit with Californian enthusiasm – ‘Oh my God, girl, that is so cute!’ – ‘I love your outfit, it’s fly/fresh/hot (and other great American compliments)!’  Buzzing, I took my seat at a table of our lovely friends, next to Kelly, making sure he had space to slip out and accept his number one surfer award.

Gabe, I and Kelly

The other films up for best doc were ‘One Track Mind’, ‘Fly in the Champagne’, ‘Echo Beach’ and ‘Musica Surfica’.  Commentators on Fuel TV called it the toughest year yet.  Benji Weatherley announced the winner while Gabe and I predicted one of the others.  When Benji said, ‘This film comes from the country with the best pint in the world…’ everything seemed to go into slow mo.  Gabe gasped, Kelly looked at me speechless and our whole table slowly erupted.  Flapping with excitement, I basically threw my camera at Kelly and said, ‘Take pictures!’  He very kindly did.

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On the big screen !

Pat O’Connell bounced into the aisle to hug us as we were staying with him, I gave a speech thanking the surfers in the movie – Gabe, Richie, Kelly, the Malloys and Kevin Naughton – and Gabe thanked Quiksilver. 

We were then squirreled away backstage for Fuel TV and photos where everybody was thrilled for us.  I think I was hugged by everyone in the surfing world!  The event was everything we could have imagined.  When I first wrote the treatment for Waveriders in 2001, I never thought 8 years on we would have won several film festivals, an Irish Oscar and now the Surfer Poll.   I still haven’t stopped smiling! 

So-o-o-o-o proud of this amazing award

Hello, I played my biggest gig yet this weekend at Harvest on Jimmys farm in Suffolk. 10,000 people went down for the weekend at the sold out festival and me and my band opened the show for their first ever festival and was introduced by Jimmy himself.

Ellie, on stage, wearing the lovely Quiksilver Women Sweet Thing dress

For those of you that haven’t seen the TV series, Jimmy is a childhood friend of TV Legend chef Jamie Oliver who campaigns against processed food in schools and against unhealthy diets in the UK. Jimmy is a ‘rare breed’ pig farmer and ‘Jimmy Doherty’s Farming hero’s’ is a show on BBC 2.

Lots of lush animals down on the farm from the meditating mountain goats to cute pigs that look like little dogs with snouts and gorgeous satin coated cows. Feeling secretly proud to be a vegetarian as the animals looked too lovely to eat to me!!!

Ellie and Hils (Quiksilver Woment Little Wing tee)

Made lots of new friends and watched brilliant sets by indie folk cool cat Jose Gonzalez, the very beautiful and charismatic KT Tunstall, the legend and personal favourite of mine Badly Drawn Boy, other-worldly violin extaordinaire Seth Lake man (who I had never heard before but am now a big fan) and soul singer Sam Lewis, KT Tunstall’s guitarist as well as loads of other cool artists.

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I was able to hang out back stage and got a kiss and hug from the lovely KT, who is one of those women that is even more beautiful in real life and chatted with one of my hero’s Badly Drawn boy (who I thanked in the credits of my first album) whose an extremely sweet and creative guy dubbing me and Hils (my keys player) ‘chess board sisters’

Alexi, Tennille and Jen gave up ten days of their summer to bring life to a small town in Tanzania and in return their lives were impacted greatly. Here is their story!

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Alexi describes the hardships these families face just to have water, and how much we take for granted here in America.

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Over the years, Tennille and I have seen a share of hardships that the people in Tanzania live with; from drinking from a swamp like hole in the ground, to walking HOURS for water from a filthy river, but today paled in comparison.

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Today we saw a group of women, all with their buckets in line, gathered around a hole no more than 6 or 7 feet deep, waiting.  As we got closer, that hole contained inside of it a small “spring” of water about 12 inches in diameter.  Now when I say “spring” please don’t confuse it with the “spring” water that all of our fancy bottled waters come from.  And it’s certainly not flowing as you would expect a spring to flow.  It was a measly little puddle, and a muddy one at that.  THIS was their water source.  When we got there it was about 1:30pm, and we found out that the woman who just put the last cup’s worth of water into her bucket had been filling that single bucket since 7:30am!

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The average African FAMILY uses five 20L buckets of water PER DAY.  The AVERAGE AMERICAN (that means ONE person, people!) uses the equivalent of 400 20L buckets per day!  WOW.   (I bet if we had to walk for our water and carry it back on our heads bucket by buckets we wouldn’t use as much!)

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Jen fills us in on what it these women go through everyday just to have water in their homes.

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Today we went to Mangalali, the village where the well was built last summer with donations from Quiksilver Women’s eco-friendly product revenue, as well as private donations raised by E.P.I.C. We began the morning by meeting some local women at the well. They brought us buckets and took us to the Ruaha River where they used to gather water before the well was dug.  It was a beautiful walk due to the natural untouched landscape; however, this walk can be very dangerous for women and children walking alone.  Many have been raped along this route. After about 45 minutes, we arrived at the river with our buckets in hand. The water was so dirty it look brown and very cloudy.  We picked up the buckets we had filled with water from the river and placed them on top of our heads.  My bucket was the same size most children carry, holding 10 liters of water, half the size the mamas carry!  It was so heavy that I needed help placing it on my head.

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This walk was an eye-opening experience to say the least. My neck was hurting, my shoulders and the top center of my head.  At one point, I was holding the bucket with one hand and the back of my neck with the other.  I heard a giggle from one of the mamas because she saw me holding my neck.  I wanted to give up to stop the pain, but I knew I had to complete the walk without putting the bucket down.  If these women did this every day 3-4 times a day, I had to do it at least once.

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Tennille describes how much joy a clean water well brings to a village in Tanzania.

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One of the most memorable experiences of the trip for me was going to Mangalali, a very rural village in Iringa, about eight hours away by bus from where we were staying in Kawe.  Mangalali is where we drilled our second well, with the help of the royalties from QSW.

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The well at Mangalali was incredible to see, especially after knowing how much it is needed there!  The people in the village have taken such pride in it too, and have already built a wall around it in order to protect it, and were digging a drainage system for it as well while we were there.  We are so proud of everything they have been doing in order to properly maintain both the hand-pump, and the well itself, so we feel very confident that it will provide the people with all of their water needs for many years to come!

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It is impossible to come here without realizing how necessary it is to keep doing what we have been doing, in order to provide as many villages as we possibly can with sustainable access to safe, clean water.  Water here really is more important than gold, it is life, and to be able to give life to people who truly cherish it, is the greatest gift of all.

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Our girls, Alexi and Tennille of E.P.I.C. (Everyday People Initiating Change) recently set out on an adventure to  continue their mission to drill clean, sustainable water wells in communities that don’t have access to clean water. Inspired by our E.P.I.C women, Jen Barrios of Quiksilver, felt a desire to join in on the efforts and booked a ticket to join them in Africa.

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Three women willing to give up their free time and comforts of home to make a difference – AMAZING! Over the next few days we will get to hear some of their stories and find out what they were feeling on this E.P.I.C. adventure.

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Let’s tune in to their initial thoughts as they began their quest.

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Jen

“I’m due to arrive in Dar Es Salaam tomorrow afternoon.  I have a layover in Dubai and I’m sitting in my hotel room thinking to myself…I’ve read about so many people doing amazing things, volunteering their time to help strangers, and I’ve always had great respect for them, admired them for leaving what they know.  It takes courage because leaving your comfort zone can be quite scary…and to leave it for someplace halfway around the world, even more so.  I know the kind of person who can do this; I’ve just recently married one.  But even when my husband left last summer for 3 months in West Africa, I never thought that someday, I would really ever have the guts to do it.  Mind you, I’m not reaching so far out my comfort zone, I’m only going for 10 days, which actually bums me out because I’m not sure I can honestly see and feel, truly understand the people I’m going to learn from in such a short amount of time.  But this is my opportunity, so no matter how short, I’m going to take it all in, let them into my heart, and see what I can take back with me to share with everyone at home.”

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Alexi

“Our fourth year in Tanzania… I can’t believe that we’re here again.  It seems every year times goes a little faster, and the days in between trips grow shorter and shorter.  I have mixed feelings as we enter our “Africa home” in Kawe, Tanzania: anxious, excited, tired and (always) hungry.

We have a lot to do this trip: drill a well at Kibebe Village and hopefully one in Kibaha Village (if the hydro-geological test says we can find water!), conduct our hygiene and sanitation program with both the kids and adults of Mangalali Village (the site of our water well from last summer) AND scope out some new villages for next year!  (And I must add, I’m quite excited to bust out the “good teeth” – “bad teeth” sock puppets Tennille and I made during our hygiene program!)”

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Tennille

“When we pulled into Kawe, feelings of excitement filled me as I anticipated seeing everyone again!  First there was Babu, sitting outside his shop, awaiting our arrival.  The children in the neighborhood all greeted us with enthusiastic cries of, “Wazungu! Wazungu!” which means, “white people” in Swahili!

In Tanzania, life is about love, and respect for the community.  It is about fulfilling basic needs, and coming together in order to survive.  We come here to help in whatever small ways we can, but each time we come, we remember that they do so much more for us than we could ever do for them.  I am forever indebted to them for opening my eyes up to what really matters in life, and I hope that I will never forget!”

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More on http://www.epicthemovement.org/

In this neck of the woods.. it sure ain’t fall! The heat is melting our fall closet dreams, and who knows when it will end.

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Ok.. let’s look at the bright side.. there are a few ways to channel our favorite fall looks without causing heat stroke.

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Case in point – the statement tee! While it swelters keep it simple and if you are one of the lucky ones who feels a chill in the air – by all means, layer it up. Either way you will razzle and dazzle!

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Quiksilver women Fall 09 : Lashes tee and Je t'aime tee

Photo : Timo Jarvinen

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Coming from Prague, in the Czech Republic, Bara Prasilova is an accomplished artist and an awarded photographer. Either being a model, a hairdresser or a make up artist for her own photoshoots, her world is all about images, lights and shadows.

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Her images are composed of elements in our life, yet they bring us to a world of fairies, dreams and nature. “During my childhood, everything around me was so intense. My imagination was so strong and alive; the forest was so much deeper and the night so much darker… the best souvenirs of my childhood are things that actually never happened…”.
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Discover the world of this incredibly creative Quiksilver woman on the video below and stay tuned this winter as she unleashes her photo collection Quiksilver Women by Bara Prasilova.

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www.baraprasilova.com