So here we are in Nylon

Last month, Nylon Mexico was awesome enough to write a little bit about us. It says that Margarita bikinis will make you feel like an authentic little mermaid and a sexy surfer. ✌

♪ ♫ Legalize Bikini in THREATS music video ♪ ♫

"Crónicas de la Prenda" interview

http://lascronicasdelaprenda.blogspot.mx/2012/10/personajes-margarita-calderon.html

♡                   ♡                   ♡                   ♡                   ♡                  ♡                   ♡                   ♡                   

♡♡♡ New website in the making ♡♡♡

http://margaritaswimwear.com

Babes on Babe Island

Being from Cancún I feel so lucky and blessed to have grown up in such a magical land. There are so many beautiful spots in the Riviera Maya; hippie Tulum, sexy Playa del Carmen, old school Puerto Morelos, Mystical Bacalar, and so many other islands and towns that have some of the most precious beaches I have ever seen and the yummiest seafood on the planet. So many places to love, but my favorite has always been Isla Mujeres. In my 26 years that I have been going to that island on the 15 minute ferry ride (which I love because you can sit under the sun in the open air, drink beer and be entertained by a random mariachi all while passing through the crystaline aqua water) in all this time that island has not changed at all. Maybe because it's so small and has nowhere to grow to. These are a few of my favorite things about it: 

Every building is painted a different pastel color or is shaped like a seashell

The restaurants with plastic tables laid out on the sand serving tikin chik and ceviche

Ridiculous heat and establishments rarely having air conditioning

The mix of merchandise being either really traditionally mexican or super tacky targeted to americans turns out to be kind of ironically cool

Seashell stands, coconut stands, popsicle stands

The super pretty and colorful cemetery decorated with conch shells and flowers doesn't make death seem depressing, I think I want to be buried there (photos below)

Last month my sister and I went to take some photos there of my new designs with the idea of creating a story of a beautiful Island Girl just living daily life in her little Caribbean town full of life. So we took a bunch of bikinis and the gorgeous Sofia, rented a pink golf cart and drove around finding spots for photos. We had an awesome time and I fell even more in love with the Island of Women. These are some of my favorite shots from that magic day:

Dreamy cotton candy flavored editorial in the latest TASTE issue, featuring the Wildflower Tea Bikini. Yum! ♪ ♥ ❀

Fashion Vandals features the Mermaid Melody Bikini ♡

Pecha Kucha

Last weekend I was invited by Alicia Rodriguez to give a presentation at the 3rd Pecha Kucha Night in Cancun (organized by the lovely boys from Horno Producciones).

For those of you who aren't familiar with Pecha Kucha, it's an informal and relaxed way to talk about your work in front of people who are there just out of curiosity (nobody is judgmental, pretentious or competitive). The PK format consists in showing 20 slides and talking for 20 seconds about each one. So your presentation only lasts about 7 minutes. So simple and effective. 

I was happy to put together my photos and words for the event and relaxed about it as I imagined it would be a small gathering. When I got there I was surprised to see that there was lots of kids and that they kept coming in... I don't know how big these events get in big cities, but I was happy to see that so many people would show up in a small town like Cancún, where there isn't necessarily a huge following for the arts or counterculture or alternative thinking. I was also getting a bit nervous because I had never spoken in front of so many people. I'm not very good at calculating person density by looking but I imagine there must've been about a 100 people! Not sure... but it looked and felt like a lot.

I was quite pleased to see that while everyone was having a good time and drinking beer, they were also serious about paying attention to the presenters and just interested in the work and process of what everyone was talking about: the pecha-kuchaers ranged from make up artists to bike licence plates to culinary students... By the time I got to the mic it was almost the end of the night and everyone had had their fare share of beer, including myself, so I was significantly less nervous about talking in front of an audience. It felt great to share because at the end of the day this is why we do it. I am definitely not the best public speaker, but the good thing about Pecha Kucha is that no one gives a damn. So I'll leave you with my presentation here.It gets a little silly but we all had fun!

All in all it was a positive experience and I will definitely speak at another one and most certainly recommend participating or going to check it out... Gracias! ♥

Clockwise from top left: Mermaid Melody, Nymph, Daisy Lipstick, My Little Pony, Baby Hearts

♡ Mexican designers who love pastels ♡

http://www.melusinabombay.com/?p=1744

These are a few of the outtakes from the photos we shot for the collection last month. The model is the lovely Shevelle Staples from Australia. She has a beautiful mexican-australian baby girl named Serena (I call her Sirena which means mermaid in Spanish!) and she's one of my favorite girls to shoot with. She has great energy, I've never heard her complain and I'm simply in love with her sort of cinematic beauty: the pale skin and big blue eyes wich she doesn't get why is such a big deal in Mexico haha. She says in Australia everyone is pale and lighteyed. She cracks me up and my favorite photos of her are the ones where she's caught smiling!

The photographer is the amazing Daniela Rangel aka Dani Fotos. This girl is amazing with how much she does and how good her work is. She also has an alternative style and culture magazine called TASTE. Which in Cancun to be successful with this is no easy feat. We met a few years ago when she put some of my suits in her magazine and we've worked a few more times together and I hope and plan that we will continue to work together.

All the photos were taken just a few steps from my house in Cancun. It's incredible how accessible paradise is in that area of the world. Truly the most magical and beautiful land I have ever seen.

Two of my favorites from this collection: "Baby Hearts" and "Rainbow Sailor"

♡♡ Moodboards for The Mermaid Lagoon SS2010 ♡♡

None of these images are mine. Collages not intended for commercial use. All images from Tumblr and weheartit.