unique: topshop @ the tate modern

We were so excited, Jessi and I, to be seeing the Topshop Unique show yesterday at the Tate, that I made a decision not to even try to shoot the show. I wanted to be present, to watch it like a regular person, and I'm glad I did. It was gorgeous: perhaps the best of all the Unique shows yet.

Watch it here.

Got it? Good. Don't you love that pale blue cropped chunky jumper 3:42 in? (this is much better: I can type and see it again, in real time). Some amazing wide legged trousers that you had to see from where we sat - a kind of shaggy cashmere, at 4:29. Amazing.

LOVED the patent poodle skirt in a kind of mustard, at 4:55, paired with a cropped chunky jumper - this one a kind of variation of giant leopard. The pale dusty pinks - for fall!! - at around 5:56, especially another fifties poodle skirt in pink, with a white bomber jacket - very Sarah Jessica Parka, S&tC season 2.. the show felt like the love child of the fifties and the eighties. A hybrid I'd never considered possible, and yet I can't stop thinking about it.

And Jourdan Dunn in that gravity-defying Merlot coloured sparkling gown, at 7:55.. I can't see, frankly, anyone else wearing it that well.

So we loved the before party, and when I saw Olivia we greeted like old friends, and I didn't even feel like doing the obligatory smile shoot (that's her, walking to her seat in the pink pants). I did, later, at the Matthew Williams show - when she'd changed outfits.

Trends I'm noting so far on the crowd: black and white bold prints, (as on Victoria Pendleton, second down), and putting the colour and pattern on the trousers rather than the tops. Fun shoes: the crazy bovine platforms that caught my attention at my first fashion week - 2009 - are gone. Instead, what's cool is flats - like what Pixie wore with that big purple pattern dress - or ladylike  kitten heels, like what Kate Bosworth was wearing across from us on the front row, with clear stockings, a pretty skirt, and fluffy jumper. Another plus to not shooting during the show, but rather letting the big boys do the work: you get to see the dynamic of the girlfriends, clutching their men's arms while watching them watch the girls on the catwalk.

And of course, it gave me a little frisson of pride, to see my little friend Cara, all grown up and leading the show. BOTH shows. Click here to see her do the Harlem Shake backstage with her friend Jourdan Dunn.

Off to Burberry soon, sun's out, life is good.

21.12.12: still here, feeling fine

Yesterday - the day before the end of the world as we know it - I was having lunch with my friend Sophia, and couldn't stop staring at her hair. It looked just like Olivia Palermo's, shown here in a shot I took of her at fashion week. I'm extra noticing gorgeous hair at the moment because I can't stop stroking my own. It's like having a cat on my head: it's so silky and just feels so good.

And the reason my hair is feeling so good is because of James Brown. Not the singer, although you can play his song by clicking here, but James Brown the hairdresser. Besides being basically hairdressing royalty here in London - I mean, he does the best people's hair - he's also making these products that are just so yummy.One thing I find particularly great about the JBL Signature range is that the products don't contain any silicone - personally as much as silicone gives great shine and 'slip' to hair, I prefer products that contain natural extracts for their conditioning and detangling properties. And the High Gloss conditioner has been formulated with red seaweed extract to give a silken feel and a reflective sheen, but it is entirely plant derived so won't build up on the hair.

I mean - I wouldn't want silicone in my lips or my boobs, why would I want it in my hair?

So yesterday, after what feels like weeks in a TB ward, surrounded by mountains of Kleenex and drippingly dirty hair, to shampoo with these beautiful white products, and the heady scents - my husband even noticed, when I came out of the shower, how great the room smelled - well, I'm hooked.

And my friend Stephanie - Odyssey - has reported in from Texas, and so far, they're still feeling fine.. as another friend, Melinda, said yesterday 'I guess it's not the end of the world if the Mayans turn out to be wrong about tomorrow.' (Love that line: I mean, think about it).

It's already twilight here - I've bought these cool little blue pinpoints of light that are winding around the olive tree we smuggled back in a suitcase from a holiday in Spain, and the scent of these vanilla ricotta cheesecakes I've been baking is wafting round our home - and I'm feeling rather good. So far, I think I like this new Mayan phase!

two hands clapping

As before: two shots, taken moments apart: someone's shoes in the front row of the Topshop Unique show at Waterloo Station, then Olivia Palermo's hands, clapping. Note the slight cut on her pinkie: proof that she is, after all, Human.

Once we get into the winter season, I always wish I could do red. I see girls with pale skin and perfect red lips, or even nails, and wish I could do it. But red is not for me. So I settle for cool fuschias and pink. But it's not the same thing. I can't even do orange. But that doesn't stop me from trying!

Oh, new addiction: LookBible. Like Pinterest, for fashion. It's great for people like me: lazy people. Once I've posted this, I can just click on the button on my bookmark strip, click on anything I want, and it posts to my wall - and even if people re-post, the original source link comes with it. Great for budding bloggers who want to raise their profile. It's just launched, spreading through word of mouth, invite only, but really easy to set up. Simply click here - or on the button on my sidebar. Tell them Jill sent you.

shiny happy people holding hands

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The Topshop Unique catwalk show on Sunday, 19 September, was.. what can I say. Unique. Celebrities, normal people who looked like celebrities, models with gilded hair, and the clothes. Did I mention the clothes? Tribal influence, my favourite colours like aqua with shiny gold.. like they were painted by Keith Haring, but he's not in this world any more. But on Sunday, it felt like he could have been. I might have even seen Michael Jackson, in the front row. It's possible. Anna Wintour was definitely there, and Kate Lamphear, and I can't even fit all my photos of them into this one post, so for now, you're just going to have to settle for my old friend Olivia, for now. And Keli. Two of the many shiny, happy people.



Thank you to Liz S, as always, for inviting me, and to Susie Q: hope you're feeling better.

And R.I.P., R.E.M. I once saw Michael Stipe in a small really cool clothing shop in Soho, NY, back when the area was like Spitalfields is now. He was with Patti Smith. I was the only other person there, and was mesmerised. I can't embed the actual video but click here, it's lovely.

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.

being julia

This is Julia Restoin Roitfeld, the 29 year old daughter of Carine, editor of Paris Vogue. I ended up a sitting between her and Olivia Palermo yesterday at the Topshop Unique show. By accident.


Granted, I was sitting on the floor. And I was invited to the show, held this year in old Eurostar part of Waterloo Station. But as this year I have the special photographers' pass this year, I thought I'd try to be one of the guys in the pit: I'm entitled, after all. There were actually some girls there, too, especially a tiny cute one with a tripod but no camera. These bodyguard type guys in blue ties were being great about reigning us into area behind tape, and one pointed out that the fence we were leaning on wasn't secure (the train tracks were 10 inches past the fence). Then he announced that the little girl with the tripod was the only one with the 'Topshop camera', and to clear her view of the show. And I was basically standing in front of her: if I moved the way I tend to during shows, the Topshop streaming would consist of a big hot pink blurry torso that was me.



So I asked someone in charge, politely, if I could sit in the aisle and pointed to the first space. She was lovely and said sure.

Then it turned out that I was sitting between the front row seats with Olivia Palermo to my right, and Julia to my left (more about the sweet Olivia who I met last February in a future post: I got some great shots of her, too, but this is Julia's post, and it's taking forever to tell this story as it is). It was surreal, yet normal, to see them politely greet each other and chat: 'Where are you going after this?' 'Paris'. Of course.





The show was fabulous, by the way. Lots of ethereal seventies influences, fabulous shoes and hair: really gorgeous setting, fun retro music that I was actually singing along to. I'll post more shots next time, promise.



These are Julia's hands: so graceful and well groomed. I watched her clap and in the midst of all that was going on, thought about the Zen line.. something about one hand clapping.




My father used to say, we don't choose our families. I was very lucky with mine: in our own way, in our town, we were held in high esteem as a family, and we understood the responsibilities, and the privileges, that come with that. We don't choose the situations we are born into.

Or, perhaps we do. The Hindus say we do. Feel we're here on this earth, with our own set of challenges, and our family and place of origin of course informs those challenges. Today I saw firsthand what it must like to be someone like Julia.








Don't get me wrong: I'm sure she loves her life. When I asked to take her photo after, she was sweet and polite and patiently waited while I tried to figure my own camera out: I forgotten to turn it on. She's clearly a happy, well brought up girl. It just started me thinking, waiting quietly for the show to start, that someone like Julia Restoin Roitfeld's life is no easier, or harder, or happier, or sadder, than the girl serving the champagne, say, or the girl with the camera in the photographers' pit, or the girl running around in a maxi with a walkie talkie device in her head.

It's just different, that's all.



I left her - and Nicola, and Lilly, and Olivia - as they were being swallowed up by the circus, and went outside, into the sunshine.

p.s. All photos are mine: if you'd like to use them, please ask me first. Thank you.

dress me up in elber albaz

Those of you who knew me way back in November 2009 might remember how excited I was about the Dress Me Up charity thingy at Topshop. I posted on it a few times (for example: here). Our favourite celebrities and designers donated their dresses for charity, and people were able to rent them for their Christmas parties, with the idea that later, the dresses would be auctioned off.





Anyway, the auction is now happening, thru the wonderful Kerry Taylor Auctions. (The Christopher Kane 'Atomic Bomb' resort dress, for example, starts @ £50). By bizarre coincidence, I went to their Audrey Hepburn pre-auction viewing. Which I posted about a few times. I didn't realise that Kerry Taylor was doing the auction for Dress Me Up as well.



(I should add: Topshop doesn't get anything for this, and neither do I: it all goes to charity for Age Concern, and since we're all headed in that direction if we don't manage to get ourselves killed first, I feel it's a pretty good cause).




The auction is Tuesday March 16th at 10.30am, with viewing open to the public on Sunday 14th 12-4.30pm and Monday 15th 9.30-5pm. It's too large to be held in their Pall Mall space, so it's out in Dulwich at their warehouse: 40 Martell Road, West Dulwich, London, SE21 8EN
Just go to their site, or via Invaluable. Should be great fun, I'm going to try to make it on Monday, so maybe I'll see you there. If not, please spread the word!




As you can see I'm in a kind of sea green/nudes sort of colour mood today, altho I've shot a ton more than I'm showing here. From top to bottom: Patricia in Kate Moss's Lanvin by Elber Albaz, Nicola Robert's custom made tour dress, Olivia Palermo's Armani frock, Kimberly Stewart's beaded number by Antik Batik, Richard Nicholl's print dress + Christopher Kane's Atomic Bomb resort dress (starting price: only £50!!), Jourdan Dunne's Herve Leger, me trying to stuff myself into said Leger, and back full circle to Patricia in Kate's Lanvin dress.



No wonder she's smiling. I bet Kate's got plenty of happy memories in this dress. Have a lovely weekend, everyone. Hope you're busy making your own happy memories.