Here is an interview with Arielle from the fashion blog: Somethingnavy.com.
Tell us about yourself and how you started blogging?
I’m 24 years old from New York. I started blogging about two and a half years ago!
Everyone has a favorite/least favorite post. Name yours and why?
I love all of my posts, for many different reasons. One being that they each represent a time in my life, and I would never go back and change any of that.
Where do you find your inspiration and how do you keep coming up with material/content for your blog?
My inspiration comes from so many different things every day. I love sitting on the subway and checking everyone out, I love reading magazines, I love interior design, movies, etc. Each one can contribute to inspirations.
What is your lastest purchase, and do you have any advice to people who love fashion but want to avoid bankrupcy?
My latest purchase were my Steve Madden flats with an ankle strap. Avoid bankrupcy by purchasing affordable pieces while splurging on special items once every few months – then mix and match!
What are the best aspects of running your own blog? What are the hardest aspects?
The best aspects are the flexibility and the openness to my creativity.
Any advice for anyone who is starting her or his own blog?
Do it for yourself!
How would you describe your own personal style?
My personal style is ever changing. My style is based off of my mood, which is different every single day!
What makes you happy and why?
Family, friends, my boyfriend, my blog, and my puppy.
Do you have any guilty pleasures that you want to share with us?
If you don’t know where to go for your summer vacation, La Jolla Fashion Film Festival in sunny Southern California is a great suggestion.
This year La Jolla Fashion Film Festival will take place from July 26 through 28, 2012. It is North American largest of its kind and over 20 fashion films will be screened each day. Not to mention people from the fashion and film business will attend.
This title may be totally gibberish to most people, but it should not be to the serious blogger. And if it is. I will tell you why this is important.
Getting backlinks or linkjuice by posting comments on other blogs
You have probably already engaged in commenting other blogs with similar content as yours. Perhaps you have even placed a link to your own blog on others people’s blog secretly hoping that Google would find your link, and give you a plus and thus climbing the ladder to achieve a better place in Google results.
Blogs deny Google webcrawling of comments
Many blogs have by default a HTML code preventing Google to webcrawl and index their comments. Some blogs also prevent your name and your URL that you submit for authorization for being indexed by Google. This is to prevent spam. If you look in your e.g. WordPress dashboard, you might see your own spam robot Askimet looking for spam on your own blog. And many times Askimet finds spam in your comments.
But it is not all blogs that have this prevention. So therefore you should look out.
How to find the blogs where linking is allowed.
If you are running web browsing using Firefox, there is a little nifty add-on module for Firefox that you can install.
If you install this plug in, you can activate it in your menu bar “Functions” clicking on the tab “NoDoFollow”.
Here is how it works:
If you visit a regular blog and scroll down to the comments, you have no earthly idea if this blog is allowing Goolge to index blog comments i.e. follow.
But by engaging the “NoDoFollow” in Firefox, this will happen:
The Follow links will be highlighted in BLUE, and the NoFollow links will be highlighted in RED.
Remember to disengage this plug in when you continue to browse, since it can be a little annoying that things get highlighted when browsing.
Many blog comments are NoFollow, should I then just avoid writing comments on other people blogs?
NO! On the contrary. You should keep engaging other bloggers and other readers by commenting as much as you possibly can. And dare I say it, throw in a link when it is appropriate.
Granted you won’t get linkjuice to your own blog by Google standards, but the writer of the blog where you commented will be thrilled that someone is actually taking their precious time to write a comment. Then they might want to reply to your comment. And better yet, they will check out your blow to find out who you are.
And if they like what you are writing on your blog, you may be added to their blog roll and/or linked in their future blog posts.
Street Fashion plays a huge part of fashion blogging. There is no way around it.
It is obvious. A photo says over thousand words. It is so easy that everyone can do it. Well. Not really because if that was the fact, then why do we return to the same street fashion blogs over and over?
The truth is that not only does it take a certain of skill as a photographer to capture the right moment and right frame. But you also have to find the people you want to shoot, and that takes a great sense of fashion. Depending of your own style, you also need to have a certain personality to ask a person if you can shoot them for a street fashion blog, especially because the person probably don’t have a lot of time.
There are various styles of street fashion photography. Some prefer to engage the person they are shooting and having them look directly into the camera, and others are more documenting style photographers where they find their person and then shoot them without them knowing. Others roam the streets in the more urban part of town and shoots hipsters and other focuses to shoot around big fashion events like during fashion week where they know many of the audience will be dressed up.
I have added a handful of interesting Street Fashion blogs to my blog roll, and I have borrowed a few of their photos for this blog post entry.
The Satorialist The Satorialist by Scott Schuman has become world famous as a street fashion photographer which has led to jobs to shoot commercially for e.g. Burberry and DKNY Jeans. His style of street fashion photography is both the engaging style as well as the more documenting style photography.
Photo: The Satorialist.
Photo: The Satorialist.
Photo: The Satorialist.
Photo: The Satorialist.
Street Peeper Street Peeper by Phil Oh has focused to shoot street fashion at fashion events and fashion weeks around the world. A side from his blog Street Peeper he also shoots street fashion for the British newspaper The Guardian. His style is mostly the documentary style.
Photo: Street Peeper.
Photo: Street Peeper.
Photo: Street Peeper.
Photo: Street Peeper.
Photo: Street Peeper.
Streetfsn Streetfsn by Nam is what I call a classic street fashion blog. Nam is shooting documentary style with a great eye for detail. He is clearly spending a lot of time walking the streets finding people to shoot. His blog and shooting style is oozing authenticity.
Photo: Streetfsn.
Photo: Streetfsn.
Photo: Streetfsn.
Photo: Streetfsn
Stylescout Stylescout is two street fashion photographers based in London. They mostly shoot people with the engaging style photography.
Danish designs have over the past years been the cute and artsy girl in the class, so it was a huge relief to see the new Danish brand GESTUZ at their first Copenhagen Fashion Week show AW12 to launch their new collection.
Photo: Copenhagen Fashion Week
GESTUZ is a brand that screams rock and roll, attitude, leather and biker boots, but has kept the subtle, feminine look and focus for details.
Photo: Copenhagen Fashion Week
GESTUZ head designer Arina Woron can be proud of her new collection, and I am sure many women across the world will buy GESTUZ to express and assert themselves and be more edgy than the more classical designers.
It was also a great show where the rock duo BLACKOUT BABIES were performing live. It gave the whole show a great rock and roll fee. Here is a link to see the whole GESTUZ show.
Here is the video MEATMARKET from the BLACKOUT BABIES.
Have you ever wondered what other people have done to get a cool Twitter page?
Well, look no further.
I will walk you through how to customize your background image on your Twitter page.
1. Find a suitable image. The photo needs to be of rather a high resolution otherwise it will look pixilated.
2. Use photo editor such as Photoshop, and resize your image to: wide=2.048 pixels x Height=1.317 pixels. Remember that the image will more visible on your Twitter profile’s far left and far right hand side, since your Twitter feed will be placed in the middle of the background image.
3. Save image as in a .jpg format, and no bigger file than 800 Kbit size.
4. Log into your Twitter profile, and choose “Edit your profile”.
5. Then choose “Design”.6. And choose “Upload image”, and save profile.
Here is my top 15 list of must see Fashion Documentaries:
1. The September Issue (2009)
Directed By: R.J. Cutler
An impressive documentary following editor-in-chief Anna Wintour & her team as they struggle to write Vogue’s largest and heaviest number of all times (840 pages and almost 5 pounds). The viewer observes the complicated process through which everyone goes through while working for a fashion magazine. Viewers can also admire Grace Coddington, a former model that became a creative director after a car accident, while she passionately helps the magazine evolve and even stand up to some of Anna Wintour’s ideas. (by imdb.com)
2. Bill Cunningham New York (2010)
Directed by: Richard Press
An intimate portrait of Bill Cunningham, the 80 year old New York Times photographer who for forty years has been riding around New York City on his bicycle, documenting fashion trends on the street by day and New York’s social scene at night for his two weekly columns in the Sunday Times. Known and beloved by most New Yorkers, and with an international following in the paper and on-line. Bill has been likened to Garbo in that, until now, no one has known a thing about him. Intensely private, and with an aversion to any kind of recognition.(by imdb.com)
3. Picture Me: A Model’s Diary (2009)
Directors: Ole Schell, Sara Ziff
A documentary filmmaker follows a model for several years, chronicling her rise from a fresh face to one that adorns billboards and magazines around the world. Go behind the scenes and chronicle the glitzy world of high fashion modeling, from photo shoots with celebrated photographers to runway shows in New York, Milan, and Paris.(by imdb.com)
4. Catwalk (1996)
Directed By: Robert Leacock
A camera follows model Christy Turlington through the spring fashion shows in Milan, Paris, and New York one year in the early 1990s, probably 1992. She and others dash from one designer’s unveilings to another. Extended footage looks at Versace and Armani in Milan, Galliano, Gaultier, and Langerfeld in Paris, and Isaac Mizrahi in New York. With Kate Moss, Naomi Campbell, and Turlington, we see the nature of friendships among models. With the engaging Mizrahi in particular, there’s some exploration of the relationship between designer and models. (by imdb.com)
5. Unzipped (1995)
Directed: Douglas Keeve
Using a variety of cinematographic techniques, the world of high- profile fashion designer Issac Mizrahi is portrayed as being driven by excitement and creativity, despite the concomitant chaos and cacophony. Mizrahi’s frenzied genius and rollercoaster emotions paint a humorous and personal portrait of a brilliant designer. Famous “SuperModels”, actors, and actresses populate Issac’s rarified world, but Douglas Keeve’s cameras capture the stress and turbulence beneath the placid coolness of glamour. (by imdb.com)
6. Seamless (2005)
Directed: Douglas Keeve
The grit behind the glamour is the subject of “Seamless,” a congenial new documentary by Douglas Keeve (“Unzipped”). Shot on digital video, this low-fi look at high fashion tracks four upstart designers as they compete for a career-making award bestowed by the Council of Fashion Designers of America and Vogue magazine. While the competition lends Mr. Keeve the silhouette of his story, it also distracts him. There are a half-dozen interesting stories here; the deliberations of the jurist Anna Wintour is not one of them. Given the material, “Seamless” can’t be faulted a certain star-struck superficiality. With a hip-hugging running time of 75 minutes, however, neither should it feel padded. (by Nathan Lee/NY Times)
7. Marc Jacobs & Louis Vuitton
Directed: Loïc Prigent
With great energy and panache, fashion designer Marc Jacobs established himself as one of the most original minds in haute couture during the early 21st century. Time and again, Jacobs consistently broke new ground with innovative and idiosyncratic designs that carried fashion per se off in unanticipated directions. Jacobs did much of this work under the aegis of fashion conglomerate Louis Vuitton, fulfilling its many taxing obligations even as he charted new waters with his own eponymous label. The documentary Marc Jacobs and Louis Vuitton both etches out a biographical profile of Jacobs and provides candid, unrehearsed glimpses of Jacobs caught up in the throes of creative invention. Interviewees include: Catherine Deneuve, Uma Thurman, Sofia Coppola, and many others. (by allmovie/Nathan Southern)
8. Yves Saint Laurent – His Life and Times/5 Avenue Marceau 75116 Paris (2002)
Directed By: David Teboul
A record of the Yves Saint Laurent from his sketches to examining final versions of his designs. The clothes themselves have a starring role: spectacularly beautiful, made of the most exotic and fragile materials, modeled by women whose dimensions defy reality. (by imdb.com)
9. Viktor & Rolf: Because We’re Worth It (2005)
Directed: Femke Wolting
At the end of the nineties, Viktor & Rolf broke into the international fashion world as innovative designers with their theatrical catwalk shows and avant-garde creations. Now they are ready to conquer the world with their own fashion house, their perfume ‘flowerbomb’, a matching catwalk collection, and new lines of glasses and shoes. The film Viktor & Rolf: “Because we’re worth it!” takes the viewer up close and personal with the Dutch fashion duo at this turning point in their career. Over the period of one year, documentary filmmaker Femke Wolting follows Viktor & Rolf every step of the way as they take on a new course. The film shows how they capture the flame of the international fashion world, not only thanks to their exceptional creative and conceptual talents, but also thanks to their unique collaboration that has lasted for over a decade. (by imdb.com)
For the first time Karl Lagerfeld has agreed to let someone create an artwork on his every day life and to trust in the director. Until today there is no authorised biography existing and the memories who Karl Lagerfeld would compose stay perfectly confidential.
After three years of work, and over three hundred hours of footage, Rodolphe Marconi discloses the daily life of the star through his personal lens as a filmmaker. (by LagerfeldConfidential)
12. Valentino: The Last Emperor (2008)
Directed By: Matt Tyrnauer
A story of friendship, a retrospective, and a look at haute couture as business: we watch Valentino Garavani (1932- ) and partner Giancarlo Giammetti from preparation for the 2006 Spring/Summer Collection in Paris to a July 2007 retrospective of Valentino’s 45-year career, which included dressing Jacqueline Kennedy. The film documents a year of work, shows, business changes, and decisions. We follow a creation from sketch to runway: he’s always in pursuit of beauty. We’re in Paris, Rome, and Venice. He receives the French Legion of Honor medal; his acceptance speech brings tears. Reporters ask when he’ll retire. Is the Roman retrospective his career’s finale? Cue Puccini. (by imdb.com)
13. Signé Chanel (2006)
Directed By: Loïc Prigent
One of the labels spoken in as much bated breath as its iconic designer, Karl Lagerfield. Watch him take on a breath-taking haute couture collection from draft to runway.(by SingaporeFilmFestivalI)
14. Les falbalas de Jean-Paul Gaultier (2004)
Director: Tonie Marshall
Documenting the process before the designs take the runway, this series of films is a must-watch. Jean Paul Gaultier, renowned for his unforgettable costumes for Madonna and Kylie Minogue, mixes wit and magic in a Parisian haute couture show. (by SingaporeFilmFestivalI)
15. The Secret World of Haute Couture (2007)
Director:Margy Kinmonth
Pure fashion or an evolved art form? You make your decision as the film takes a look at the world’s most elite club in the fashion world. (by SingaporeFilmFestivalI)
