101 5 ways to wear a camel coat
[Pics: The Sartorialist]
Photography
Sail away
“…And next to me I have a July 1981 Cosmopolitan (with Paula Yates on the cover) which has a 10 page fashion spread by Caroline Baker, shot in Antigua and almost all exclusively using Vivienne Westwood’s World’s End collection (with a bit of Laura Ashley, Laurence Corner and old-style Mulberry thrown in). Photography is by Neil Kirk, hair Trevor Sorbie (ringlets and rags a plenty) and makeup by Yvonne Gold*.” This appeared in an email from my PR buddy Rossana, so of course I insisted she send me the pictures. She duly Blackberryed them over to me, cover included.
If you don’t know who Caroline Baker is then here’s some background… As well as being among the first of the super-stylists, she also had a stint working for Vivienne Westwood, hence the abundance of squiggle-print. And look! World’s End T-shirts were £16 in 1981! Plus I have to laugh at the ‘ribbons from John Lewis’ credit. Caroline loves a bit of customising and on your head be it if you forget to pack her beloved bag-o-ribbons for a shoot…
Don’t miss the cover. Isn’t this brilliant? I believe there is still a wall of framed Cosmo covers in the Soho offices to this day…
*who is mentioned here
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The beauty pages
I’m having a makeup moment. To look at me you’d never guess – my make-up arsenal consists of cheek-coloured blush, Carmex cherry lipbalm, barely-there lipgloss and a blot of powder but that’s not the point. It’s make-up imagery I’m talking about. When it comes to photography, it’s the fashion imagery that tends to get all the love while beauty is the neglected sister in the attic – ridiculed or ignored. One of my friends who is something high up on a UK glossy openly sneers at the beauty pages. During our regular magazine critiques this contributing editor will skim past with a dismissive hand-wave, ‘Ew, beauty pages – nobody reads those.’ Er, excuse me, I do!
In particular, I adore a product-heavy still life page – smears of eyeshadow, great shiny blobs of lipgloss and scribbles of eyeliner will stop me in my tracks on my way to the horoscope page – especially when supersized to heroic proportions. And sitting in on a beauty editor’s meeting is the best thing ever – all the products are arrayed in front of you while decisions are made on how to shoot lipsticks – ‘shall we do slices or smudges?’.
Harper’s Bazaar are currently doing the best still life beauty pages – they’re like artists’ paint palettes. Actually, the face shots aren’t bad either…
[Pics: Harper’s Bazaar]
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Toast meets Turbeville
I may not buy their clothes but Toast is a label I am totally visually seduced by. From their stores to their catalogues, everything is meticulously art-directed and now they have brought that vision to their website. The brand, which excels in what I call rustic lifestyle chic has introduced editorial features to its site, kicking off with this intriguing film of fashion-turned-art photographer Deborah Turbeville talking about her work. Toast shot its latest catalogue in a house in Mexico, only to find it belonged to the fascinating Turbeville. So… what kind of person lives in a place like this?
