any cloud.. and all that

On the last day of LFW (Man Day) we were in the tent between shows, just totally wiped out, and while Charlie May (girl a la mode) and I were talking I noticed sweet Lexxi (am I spelling that right?), Charlie's good friend (and roommate), kind of melting into her coat. Napping with her eyes open.

There is something about Lexxi - like with Charlie - that is so sunny and cool and creative and delightful. So when she got some kind of disappointing news the other day, I loved her response. 'Any cloud, and all that jazz'.

I woke thinking about how nice you guys were about Major Bobby, or our UMS car.. and both are totally well now, and who knows, maybe they'd be anyway, but still. And this might not be totally fashion related but you gotta love the lyrics 'each morning I wake up, before I put on my make-up.. while combing my hair now, wondering which dress I'm gonna wear now...' so today, I'm saying a little prayer for Lexxi: this one's for you. And for other friends: you know who you are!

16.67% of the antwerp six

Many years ago in NY, my sweet and talented graphic designer friend Robin (blackbird design), who now resides in Chicago, introduced me to the '24 hour theory': if you hear of something new, out of the blue, chances are you'll hear it again from an unrelated source within 24 hours.

When I first met Charlie May (Girl a la Mode), at the Next event, and discovered she'd graduated from Central Saint Martins and is a fashion designer, I asked what her work is like. It's like the game I play with my NY friend Lisa, before I'd meet her boyfriend, for example, it's 'who would play him in a film?' (it's a great game: everyone can either resemble someone, or in a pinch, a cross between two). Charlie said her influences are Celine and 'Ann Smushmushsmush'. 'Ann who?' 'Ann Smushmushsmush'. After a few rounds, I finally asked her to spell it: Ann Demeulemeester. And I realised I'd never actually heard the name spoken aloud. But of course, I knew OF her. And less than 24 hours later, I forget why now, Mr. Dot brought up her name.



Ann Demeulemeester sounds fascinating. She's married to a photographer and lives in Belgium with their son in the only Le Corbusier house in Belgium. And she emerged as a designer in Antwerp in the 80s along with a kind of 'school' of Belgium designers, including Dries Van Noten, who became known as the Antwerp Six. Charlie's friend Amy worked for her and she'd visit Antwerp and that's how she started collecting her clothes. I mean, check out her website, isn't it amazing? I love how in her 2011 collection some of the details on the white jacket are echoed in the boots Charlie's wearing here (also by Ann D). And she was saying that, for example, with the white top, her friend wears it back to front, with the ties in the back.

I love wearing things backwards. V neck jumpers especially. I just like having more detail in the back and a plain front. I can see this top worn that way. Sorry it's so blurry: I really want to shoot Charlie in this in brighter light, but there's something about these blurs that I think are just so beautiful.



So when I met her for late lunch @ Vapiano the other day, and she was wearing almost head to toe Ann Demeulemeester, I had to snap her. But while I'd brought my camera I'd forgotten my battery, so we used her camera - and it was dark - and it all came out these lovely blurs. (Charlie's done a post already but I'm purposely not reading hers before posting mine).



At a time when it seems to much of fashion is looking backwards, to the Seventies, mostly but still referencing the Fifties, Sixties, bit of the Eighties, this is the direction that, to me, feels most like the future. It's not 2001 Space Odyssey astronaut futuristic, but something more organic, layered, fresh, comfortable, clean yet still feminine, asymmetric, geometric yet soft, and above all, beautiful.

smile

Just stumbled upon this shot I took of Lily Allen right after the Topshop Unique show back in September fashion week. Totally forgot to post it, sorry about that.

Now I can't get Smile out of my head. I love that her boyfriend, Sam, isn't in the 'industry': hope they do indeed tie the knot.



Caught this shot literally a minute before, as we were leaving the show.

Hope you're all having a nice day. I'm having an okay one - feeling a bit flat - but I know it will pass. It always does, and besides, as Scarlett O'Hara would say, tomorrow is another day.

le bomber, and the harem

This partly me trying to be more like Kate Lamphear - i.e. less chatty, more mysterious. But also I really want to go see Wall Street and it's starting in 10 minutes and is at least a 15 minute walk to the cinema. But I've been meaning to post these for a while:

The bomber jacket is made of old cable knit jumpers and is part of the Goodone collection for Topshop. Besides the black crochet'd dress, this was one of the most popular of the bag of clothes I brought to the shoot.

My friends, Natayla, top, who is Egyptian (she edits 'It's Fashion Week', the first online Egyptian fashion magazine) and whose family lives in Geneva, and Hedvig, who is Norwegian, both recognised the style as a 'bomber jacket', which I thought was just an American word for the style. Wikipedia has a whole interesting story about the name, apparently it's also a skinhead thing.

But also, really, what I'm more interested in talking about today is the miners' rescue in Chile, and there's just no way I can fit any of my photos into a post on that!




So I will say that it was pretty weird about that day: not just Nat, or Hedvig, but also Tobi showed up in black harem trousers. I had done a whole rant the first spring I started my blog, back in 2009, about how no one would ever wear those droopy drawers. But I consider each of these girls really stylish, so there you have it. Once again, I was wrong.

Oh btw I know Hedvig's black chunky heels are Acne, she told me who made the harem trousers - Hedvig can you remind me again? - and I'll let you know who made Nat's later - and her wonderful burgundy suede high tops, she's told me about three times now and I keep forgetting (Jen just reminded me, they're Lanvin, and Nat just said the trousers are Topshop). The thing I love about both girls is they mix their style with really good quality designer stuff, and brands like H&M: glamorous street chic.

don't you know who i am

On Day Two of LFW, I was running to the loo, camera in hand, when I saw a nice shot of a girl sitting (crossed legged, actually) with two older women. I was about to take it - just off the cuff - when the more Alpha Female of the group moved ever so slightly to block the shot.

That caught my attention. It was so subtle, but didn't seem like an accident. So I asked the girl, politely, if I could take her photo. Alpha Female said she'd rather not. It all seemed a bit.. weird. Alpha Female didn't seem like her mum - she just didn't seem a mumsy type - and I realised the girl must be a model. But models, even big models, don't normally have minders. I mean, sometimes they do, but normally they're just running - late for something - alone or with other model friends.

Sorry, said I. I didn't mean to.. 'It's just, her hair, you see.' (No, actually, I didn't. And besides, like I started out saying, I REALLY HAD TO GET TO THE LOO.)



But the girl took charge of the situation and smiled at me and said, it's fine. I guess there was nothing Alpha Female could do about it, apart from smash my camera. So I took two quick shots and as I was running off (crossed legged, I might add) I asked her name. Alpha Female glared at me with a look that clearly said 'You idiot, you want to take her photo and YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHO SHE IS?

The girl herself told me her name. Just a first name. That clearly was enough to go on. I must have written it down somewhere because a day or so later I did google 'model, famous. Xxxxxx', and turns out she is hugely famous. But now I can't for the life of me remember who she is.

Help! SOMEONE out there must know. Anonymous? I'm counting on You.

. . . .

NOT BAD: less than half an hour later, thank you AG! It's Imogen Morris Clarke, model and 'IT girl of the moment'. Now it's all coming back. And she's absolutely lovely, I might add. Deserving of any success that rolls her way.

Hope success is rolling your way today, too, Dudettes.

little snippets of shiny thoughts

A colourful departure from my BWT (black white tan) series: the lovely, effervescent Lucy, of Snippets of Shiny Thoughts. I love that name, and I Love Lucy.



I haven't known her that long, or spent that much time with her - I'd guess I've known her about six months - but she's one of those rare human beings who you just feel so safe with. She listens. She's kind. She doesn't seem to have a bitchy bone in her body.



And she has such a contagious smile. I defy you to spend time in her company without smiling, too.



I didn't crop these shots, which I took in the press room of fashion week on Day Three, just got really close in. Lucy had already coloured her hair herself, but stopped into the Mac beauty salon place to get a trim. It wasn't until later when I looked at them that I realised: little snippets of shiny thoughts, sprinkled like fairy dust on her perfect, English rose skin. Oh and p.s. when I went to her blog to tell her I'd finally posted these shots, I saw she's assisted on a shoot for a really brilliant eyewear line called APRIL EYEWEAR. Click here, see the post, isn't it fabulous!!

geneva

In keeping with my black, white and camel/tan series: I've been meaning for ages to do a post on Geneva, of the relatively new yet fabulous blog called (I love this name) A Pair and a Spare. Besides being clean and focused and well designed, it really is a practical guide to DIY fashion, just like it says on the tin.

Case in point, shown here: when I started asking where she got things she was all 'it's nothing expensive, I DIY'd the shorts..' Hang on: what do you mean? 'Oh, they were from a charity shop, much longer, I just chopped them off, hemmed them..' and she demonstrated her stitches.. just made it seem so effortless.



Geneva was one of the first people I spotted and dotted in the first few minutes of the first day of fashion week. I hadn't seen her before and she's got such a great look, and is really nice. I was surprised later when I saw her blog that she doesn't do more of her own self style on it. She said she will, now that she's getting more positive feedback. I'm hoping to do more shots of her soon.




When I took this shot - and, mind you, this is within literally two minutes of meeting her - I started adjusting the way her shirt was open - the shape of what looks like a black leather bustier underneath didn't seem right. 'Normally they'd buy me a cocktail first', she said, and it took me a moment to realise what she said. Total deadpan delivery. Totally my sense of humour. Instant new friend.

I almost called this post The Geneva UnConvention but that is so lame. Why am I even telling you this?

silence is golden: portrait of kate lanphear, in coat worn as cape

When I saw Kate Lamphear in London recently for fashion week, I wanted to respect her time. After all, I'd already asked to shoot her in February ('don't you know who i am?'). This time, other people were shooting her and I just piggy backed along. (People did it with my shots, too: it was weird. You'd ask to shoot someone, set up a shot, and suddenly, a flock of other people with cameras - bloggers, mostly, bless them - would gather around. I've seen several of 'my shots' up on blogs - shots I haven't even got round to posting yet).

I was actually contacted by the NY Daily News, for that post on Kate. They wanted to know my thoughts and experience meeting Kate Lanphear, and I replied that I was sorry, but for once, I really didn't have a story. They quoted my blog anyway, verbatim, but instead of crediting my name, as they did the others, I was simply 'a London blogger'. What can you do.

Notice how, in the nice weather, Kate was rocking a trend that's been going around: coat worn as cape. It looked like a clearly deliberate choice, too.




Curious to learn more about her then, I tried googling around. It unnerved me a bit that two sources of information about Kate Lanphear led to my own blog.. she's not in Wikipedia, I can't find anything that talks of a private life, even the word 'boyfriend' brings up 'boyfriend jackets' or someone else's boyfriend.. but I did find this one piece which really says it all, titled 'Kate Lanphear fed her interns pizza'. One was quoted as saying: "The editor also treated her underlings like real, sustenance-needing human beings: “She is honestly one of the nicest people that I’ve met in the industry..."




A friend, who shall remain anonymous as she works for a high profile fashion company, also shot her during LFW, and she said Kate was cool about having her photo done. Of course. But when she realised that she was actually filming the conversation, she put her hand up - politely, almost wistfully, and said 'Sorry, I don't do videos'.

There is something incredibly powerful about a beautiful woman who never seems to speak. Look at the Mona Lisa, for example. Remember how enigmatic the other Kate, i.e. Moss, seemed, back before we heard her wonderful Croydon accent? The idea of a woman who lets her image speak for her, absolutely fascinates me. I'd love to be like that. I should try it, for a week. Go on a verbal diet. Do all my posts with just images. No long comments on people's posts, either. I bet I wouldn't last an hour.

Whenever I see Kate Lanphear, she is almost always alone, being mobbed by people who want to take her photo. It's as if they want to solve that mystery. There is something vulnerable about her, I feel: that slightly haunted, hunted look. She reminds me of another beautiful icon who also fiercely guarded her privacy, who famously wanted to be alone: Greta Garbo.

another good one

You might have noticed by now: I'm not objective. I don't make the news, ma'am, and I don't report it either: not objectively. There are plenty of trends around at any given point but I tend to the plainest, safest, what I call 'Virgo style'. I read that once, as a teen, and it stuck: we Virgos favour neutral colours like black and tan, or black and navy. I said that recently to a model, for something we did with Next (which I haven't posted on! Just remembered!) and I guessed from how she dressed that she was a Virgo. Very simple, Kate Hepburn, androgynous.. she couldn't believe it. Sure enough. Another Virgo, our birthdays were days apart.

Anyway, yes, this dress: I love it. Black and midnight blue, all these interesting panels (you should see the back). It's probably my favourite in the Goodone/Topshop collection. Here Hedvig (Northern Light) wears it simple as possible: bare legs and Acne heels.

I don't believe it! It IS online! Click here. Bodycon panel dress in black and blue by Goodone (it's hard to make out the different colours, but they're there). Thank goodness, I thought it was just in the Oxford Street branch. It's £160.00 which isn't Primark, but it's not bad either for something so original.

p.s. Just found a great example of 'Virgo style' on my lovely friend pret a porter p's post: Azzaro FW 2010.

when i say jump

I guess I should explain the jumping thing: when I started this blog about 18 months ago, just doing street style was a challenge for me as an artist. My photography up til then had been quiet, 'fine art': still lives, landscapes, a kind of photo-collage using myself, shot by me with a timer... to approach strangers, explain myself and why I was doing this was a real hurdle to overcome because altho I'm rather chatty, I'm also inherently shy.




BUT.. as an artist, I need to move forward and grow. And by last week at London Fashion Week... let's just say the whole idea of shooting fashionable people standing around hoping to be made famous by bloggers was wearing a bit thin for me. And shooting models is way easier than shooting fish. Fish move around. Models, especially after doing one of these shows, are generally hanging around, moving fairly slowly.

EXCEPT when you ask them to jump.



Why do I occasionally ask people to jump for my shots? Partly to keep things interesting, partly for the challenge of catching them in motion.. partly to amuse myself, partly to break the ice.. sometimes (not in this case) I feel the person is really quite photogenic but they're putting on that bored pouty face because they think that's what people want, and I ask them to jump simply to shake things up. Literally.

In hindsight, this fabulous model from the Unique show was really quite a sport. A generous, lighthearted spirit. I mean, she had just done a really difficult catwalk show in death defying heels, on the old Waterloo station Eurostar tracks.. most of the girls were just finding it difficult to stand up, let alone jump around.



It happened quite impulsively. Shini and I were about to leave - she had just said hi to Tommy Tan - we each got a similar shot of him with the model (damn I wish I remembered her name! She told me.. plum forgot*) - you should see Shini's shot, she had TWO extraterrestrial lights in hers - and suddenly, while I was shooting her, I just asked her to jump.

*Two people so far have told me this is Dree Hemingway, great granddaughter of Ernest. That sounds about right: I think she said her name was Dree. Okay, it's worse then: I made DREE HEMINGWAY, Ernest's great granddaughter, jump up and down having just completed a catwalk show. What is my problem. Just because I was feeling a bit of creative malaise.

I mean, REALLY. What would Ernest say.




Now I'm trying to figure out which one she was on the catwalk.. this might be her. I can't tell. I've been spending hours playing some kind of matching game with my photos, and I'm going a bit cross eyed, and Mr. Dot is getting hungry, and so I am.




I mean, we're talking a SEA of models in that show. And I shot every one. When they came out for the end, it was like an army of amazons walking down along the train tracks. A beautiful army of frizzy haired amazonians on crazy tall lucite platform heels.






It was only today, looking through, that I saw the shot I caught of her minutes after she did her jumping shots. The face she was making at a friend. This is someone with a real zest for life, someone who doesn't take herself, or the madness that is the fashion world, all that seriously.

I just can't believe that a) she told me her name was Dree - several times - and I didn't put two and two together b) I bossed her around like that. But she was a good sport about it.

olivia olivia

Okay, it's time for the Olivia story. I know it's going to be so stupid and anti-climatic: it was just at the time I did the Julia post ('being Julia'). It was all at the same event, Day Two (Saturday), at the Topshop Unique show at Waterloo Station, and there were just so many photos and stories from that day I said I'd tell you the Olivia story another time and then I just got so busy... and I just can't tell anything simply, but I'll try.

Last February, I met and photographed Olivia Palermo ('deer in the headlights') but I didn't know who she was. (I'm always meeting famous people that I often don't know are famous: one of these days remind me to tell you the Hugh Grant story). The City was already on one of the channels here but it wasn't in our listings.. I eventually started watching the show and I saw what people meant about her character but frankly, I didn't think she was bitchy. Maybe it's because I met her and liked her so I"m biased, or maybe it's because that other one - the big blonde - the one who's actually supposed to be nice.. but I don't think she is. I think she's kind of manipulative by playing the victim. But that's just me. I haven't watched the show much, frankly.




Anyway, because of the strange situation I found myself in (as explained in the Julia story) I found myself just kind of hanging around because I hadn't gone to the little party that Shini had gone to (I had a ticket, I just had gone straight to the photo pit) so I'm just standing around, waiting for it to start, taking photos of people, shoes...





... watching Olivia talk to the famous Telegraph fashion journalist, Hillary Alexander (that's another story)..



and finally I introduced myself again, said we met last February.




She seemed really pleased to see me, seemed convincingly to have remembered me (or it could be good acting), and yet, like in February, it felt like this kind of friendly moment passed between us: like she was relieved that I wasn't treating her like a strange creature, an object to be Papp'd, and just that quick nanosecond moment of 'we're all just normal people' before she got swept into more photos, more taped interviews..

..then the show began, and I'm sitting there next to her (separated by one person)..



.. with a view of her hands on my right, like Julia's was on my left..






..more shots of the show, and then after, I was talking with Julia and left Olivia to the hoards and masses, and that was it, really. Then back outside to the craziness of shooting civilians and models with Shini and the other photographers (and yes, that's another post, or two, or seven).

Not really much of a story, is it? I mean, hardly worth spinning you along this long, and I apologise.


Okay, so this is where the story starts veering into Implausibility Land: my lovely friend Natayla (editor of the online fashion magazine Its Fashion Week) asked me what the 'Olivia' story was. I said I'd tell her when I saw her, it was no big deal. Meanwhile we're both running round to different shows, trying to find each other.. at one point (and this is all within like 48 hours) she ends up in Kurt Geiger, and who should she see alone in the shop with no one around apart from what seemed to be a 'minder', but.. Olivia herself. So she introduced herself and took this shot:



Now Nat also felt that Olivia Palermo, the person, is really nice, sweet, warm. So which is it? Is she a really good actress who can play a bitch well, but in real life acts nice? Or is she THAT good an actress that she's really a bitch and just acts nice in public? Frankly, I don't think anyone's that good an actress.



Anyway, enough on the Olivia stuff. Fame is such a weird thing: there are so many lovely people I meet and shoot all the time, and they could just as easily be famous, they're just not. Yet.

I think I like this shot most of all, when Olivia Palermo, the actress, the celebrity, is simply being a human being. All these shots are unretouched and if you look closely you will see it: a spot. A teeny, tiny spot, granted, but it's there. Proof that she's just as human as you or me, after all.

confusion vs. indecision (holly says relax)

One of the strange and yet flatteringly lovely aspects of blogging is that, if you stay with it and your blog takes roots and grows, people start getting in touch asking to swap links, promote their clients, etc. So the other day when I got an email from someone who started off by saying 'I'm Nina from confused.com's press office' I was like uh-huh.. she was writing to say:

"Given that LFW is on I thought you might be interested in a statistic that has come from a national survey, that we have just conducted, of 5,000 people. We wanted to find out just how confusing the UK finds fashion. Interestingly one of the stats that came from the results showed us that over half of us (53%) are worried about being inappropriately dressed at big events and as much as 67% of us are confused about the term “smart/casual”."

She went on to say if I wanted to know more about the results to drop her a line. Which I did. I was laughing my head off because it's so true! What the HELL does smart casual mean anyway? Would this dress fall in that category? It's definitely smart, and it's not black tie red carpet... yeah I'd call this frock smart casual.




Apart from that what, you may ask, does it have to do with this post? Well I was sitting there with Mr. Dot, not watching Mastermind while he was shouting out the right answers and the contestants getting them wrong, and I start looking at the shots I took at Holly Fulton's show and just thought, this is insane. I can't post every single shot but I can't decide: I love them all.

Holly's catwalk paper on the seat thingy (is it a press release? is there a term for it?) says 'the look is rooted in 1960s cruise wear reworked for the modern woman..' but I didn't expect it to blow me away like it did. I feel disloyal to my other favourite designers like Ashish and Kinder Aggugini but following swiftly in the heels of David Koma, which was amazing, this show just knocked my socks off.




Still, this post is made up of six shots I took within seconds, of the same dress. At this rate, I'm going to have to start a blog and call it The Holly Fulton Catwalk S/S 2011 Blog. I mean, I am THAT wishy washy right now. Does that make me confused?

As I asked Nina, what is the difference between confusion and indecision? Because it seems to me confused means you need more information from someone else where as indecision is.. well, indecision. In any case - how cool is this - she's not asking me to promote anything, but she did tell me about a website they've built called 'confused nation' - a 'a one stop shop where people get support in dealing with confusion around a number of different topics' which will even have a 'leading psychologist' with a Dr. before his name, which will be an on-going site to help people deal with 'decision crises'.

I wonder if that applies to editing photographs.

Oh! I love this one:

"The most confused person in Britain is likely to be a 17 year old girl living in Cardiff, whereas the least confused person is likely to be a 60 year old man living in Edinburgh." You may think I'm sad to find this fascinating on a Friday night but hey- I've just come off fashion week and this is my way of relaxing.

And as Holly's handbags said on the catwalk: HOLLY SAYS RELAX. I've got some great shots of a model wearing a bag spelling it out in sequins but I don't dare go there. Tomorrow, maybe. But we've still got the Olivia post to contend with.

kit kat @ kinder

Before the wondrous Kinder Aggugini show, I got my friend Kit Lee aka the Style Slicker, stylist, blogger extraordinaire, and 'companion' to Matthew Zorpas'*, to pose for me. (*Note to self: I really must ask her what that even means). I got some amazing photos of the show (Did anyone reading this, see it? What did you think?) - I'm not just saying that to spin you along - but I just popped in and must run out again and it takes time to go thru all the shots. I choose not to stay in the 'pit' and get the boring end-of-runway shots, so mine are shot from the middle aisle or if I'm lucky, front row, and it's very hit or miss: it's like big game hunting, those models do move like gazelles on the Serengeti Plain. Which is fitting, given his African theme this season.

Oh btw I just was with my friend Natayla who is now part of the Olivia Palermo story and we agreed, I really must tell you the story because it's like when someone says 'oh you must see this film' (because they weren't expecting anything and they were pleasantly surprised) and then, by the time you eventually see it, you go to your friend 'I didn't think it was all that great'.

It's the law of inverse proportions: the longer I drag this out, the more banal the story will seem. I know!! I can make shit up! You'll never know the difference.

jaeger sings the blues

Deep greens and blues are the colours I choose at the moment. And so, apparently, does Jaeger. (And rose. And black and white, but I'll save those for a future post). It was thrilling actually to be at the show and see the exact colours I've had in my head since a magic day on holiday in the Dominican Republic when it rained during lunch at the beach and I thought: this is the palette I want to wear right now. Jewel like blues and greens and indigos and some ochre and forest green. And they've channeled that exactly!




And I"m so wanting this rain hood: it's like the old classic yellow 'slickers' - I mean, how lovely would it be to go out on a rainy day with a lovely trench and instead of an umbrella, just bung this thing like a waterproof snood on your head and when it's sunny, just carry it around, rolled up in your bag. Just in case.

It's just so gosh darn practical.

I just simply don't know where to begin with posting: I am flooded with a sea of images - memories - that I want to share with you. But the sun is out and as Mr. Dot pointed out, I'd absolutely kick myself if I didn't scoot over to Somerset House HQ one last time.



Btw: anyone have a clue who this girl is? Must run, but after today we've got all the time in the world, you and I, to catch up. How are you all doing today? Hope you're all well & rested & feeling good, wherever in the world you are.