Fashionista contributor Long Nguyen is the co-founder/style director of Flaunt. REVIEW: Curated by Valerie Steele, Director of the Museum at FIT, Japan Fashion Now--an exhibition extended through April 2, 2011--surveys the past 30 years of Japanese fashion with a comprehensive view of contemporary fashion in Japanese society. In Japan, fashion has always occupied a central role in delineating gender, social and political roles. The exhibit starts with the Japanese revolution--from the designers who went to Paris in 1981 to showcase their unique creations--and moves on to the years of economic downturn that resulted in today’s youth oriented styles like Gothic Lolitas, Forest Girls, Bosozoku (biker punks), and Mambas. And those are only a few among the many diverse expressions of subcultures, depending on the areas where the kids hang out: Harajuku, Shinjuku, Shibuya or Akihabara. The show demonstrated the incredible creativity of fashion in Japan.

Apparently, Gossip Girl isn't the only thing shot at the Empire Hotel. Chuck Bass’s stomping grounds is also a prime locale for photo shoots, like the Rolling Stone cover shoot we stopped by last Friday. But will that cover ever hit newsstands? Well, you decide. For the first time ever, Rolling Stone is putting their Choose the Cover competition in readers’ hands. One of two emerging artists—either The Sheepdogs or Lelia Broussard, who we hung with last week—will win not only their very own magazine cover but also a major record deal with Atlantic. But while the prizes are up totally up to voters, the cover shoot styling was left to the professionals. So we swung by the set to see what it's like creating an image for someone who doesn't yet have one (ie. not Bieber, or Bieber 2.0) and to see if the behind the scenes action really is all smiles, rainbows, and cover subjects eating cheeseburgers in blue jeans, like those front-of-book blurbs so diligently report.

From LOL Cats to Stuff on my Cat, it's easy to poke fun at our culture's obsession with felines. But fashion has its own special relationship with the fur balls. From United Bamboo's $500 cat outfits--for sale at Opening Ceremony, if you're interested--to more standard offerings, like leopard print, there are just too many cat-fashion parallels to even try denying this pet's influence on the industry. Are we all just crazy cat lovers? Here's proof of the sad (?) truth. Brace yourselves.