A Little Portfolio Teaser...

As graduation looms over my head with only 3 days to go, I've been putting the finishing touches on my portfolio and still have quite a few things left to do. One of the things I needed to do was make an "intro board" for my portfolio. Basically it is a concept board for what inspires me as a designer, not necessarily for any one particular collection and I wanted to share it below!

Anjelica the Muse

Watching Wes Anderson movies, in this case more specifically The Royal Tennenbaums, always makes me think of Anjelica Huston in her younger days running around modeling, acting as muse for designers Valentino and Halston and being photographed by the most iconic photographers of the seventies. She was discovered by Diana Vreeland and her career rose from there. Not many people knew she was a model before she was an actress and these pictures are too good to not show. Enjoy!

Clockwise from the top left: In Vogue 1972, with Halston in his studio, photographed by Gian Paolo Barbieri in Valentino and for Walter Albini, by Bob Richardson (Terry's Dad), and by Richard Avedon.

The 3 RRR's

This past Friday was a culminating point in my fashion design existence; I had my very first photo shoot (EVER) and my senior collection was the subject at hand, plus a few garments that had never really been in front of the camera before. My FANTASTIC photographer AJ Ragasa does amazing work so I knew from the start it would be him to shoot my work. I also enlisted my equally talented friends Alexander Aesthetic and Jake Treat to do makeup and hair respectively, and the looks are modeled by Kaylee Petter and Christina Wu-Martin. The shoot took a little over 9 hours and I am so thankful for everyone there to help! This collection is designed for Spring/ Summer 2011 and I hope you enjoy seeing my work! (Please be aware that if you click on the photos below, they will become larger and clearer!)

This is the first delivery called Revelation. There is very little structure, lots of draped fabric and pastel colors.


The next delivery, Reformation, is all about illusions with fabric layering, cut-outs and bright colors matched with muted colors.


Revolution is all about the bright and metallic colors, structured silhouettes to the extreme with a serious Lady Gaga influence.

Pin THIS Up!

I know, I know. I am so clever with my post titles. In any case, pin-up retro fashion is officially back! Flipping through this month's issue of Vogue introduced me to the most amazing editorial I have ever seen! Titled "Sweater Girl", Grace Coddington was the fashion editor for this spread and her taste is impeccable. The styling perfectly replicates every photograph from the fifties EVER. Not really but you'll see what I mean:

Model: Lara Stone

Photographers: Mert and Marcus

Slick BP

So I don't know if you've heard but there was this big oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico a few months ago... just kidding of course we ALL know about the BP oil rig explosion which sparked a massive hemorrhage of oil that is basically going to kill the seafood industry in southeast America. In the August issue of Italian Vogue, Steven Meisel shot a 24 page spread of Kristen McMenamy as a wounded animal covered in oil. I feel like she interprets the effected animals really well and that this editorial was such an unexpected yet effective way to illustrate the effects of the Deepwater Horizon explosion. My favorite images are below:

A Fall Preview Indeed

The Fall Preview 2010 issue of V magazine is proving to be an excellent issue indeed. While I haven't seen it in its entirety in print, I have seen many of the spreads in digital form via their website. This issue is one you may have heard a lot about because this is the issue in which five models (Adriana Lima, Isabeli Fontana, Natasha Poly, Lily Donaldson and Eniko Mihalik) each have their own cover with strategic parts of their body covered by a scratch-off V.

Above: The issue I bought with Isabeli Fontana on the cover looking crazy fierce!

I graduate this quarter and my obsession with pin-up girls is going to be the focus of my portfolio booth when I present my work at Benaroya Hall in September. The spread below named "A Woman in Full" is a big part of my inspiration for an extra line I'm designing which will focus on creating clothing for a modern and sophisticated pin-up girl.

The color palette, the hair and makeup, the poses of the models as well as the type of undergarments which make the silhouette is what makes these pin-up inspired pictures so representative of that era.

A Movement I'm Excited For!

It's no surprise to me that curvy, plus-size models are starting to show up more and more in the fashion world. And while being overweight isn't the healthiest thing to be, there is NO good reason why anyone's self esteem should be in the crapper. These plus-size/ NORMAL size models have become a large (no pun intended, haha) part of the modeling and fashion industries in a very short amount of time and I think shows that the industry is moving into a more positive, all-body accepting direction. This movement is something I've been paying a lot of attention to and this post is dedicated to all the plus-size model tidbits I've come across.

Last Fall model Lizzi Miller was commissioned by Glamour for what the editor called a "comfortable in your own skin" article and following the September issue, there came an outpouring of POSITIVE feedback about the photo featuring Miller.

Above: Lizzi Miller in the now infamous Glamour photo.

More recently Italian Vogue started a blog focused on curvy women called, you guessed it, "Vogue Curvy." And during London Fashion Week this month, Canadian designer Mark Fast used plus-size model Crystal Renn in his Fall show.

Above: Crystal Renn in Mark Fast's Fall 2010 show.

Even more recently, V Magazine did a "One Size Fits All" spread, photographed by Terry Richardson, with skinny model Jacquelyn Jablonski and plus-size model Crystal Renn wearing the same clothes.

Above: Images from the V Mag shoot.