Serious Slashes Trend Report

Welcome Back!

Thursday was the presentation day of our trends, it was was safe to say I was very nervous!

Preparation for the presentation was tiring to say the least- late night study sessions in the library till gone 11pm are not something I'm use to.

I thought it would be good to give you all a brief overview of what we found on the trend "Serious Slashes"...
For the presentation we needed to do 4 mood boards: Trend Forecasting, Media, Retail & Consumer.





For the Trend Forecast board we looked at various historical context such as the Edwardian era & the Punk movement as we wanted to explore how the trend had evolved over time.
We looked at current trends on the catwalk with designers such as Victoria Beckham, and we explored other designers such as Dion Lee's SS17 collection (although we were later told that this doesn't fall under the category of trend forecasting). In addition to these we also wanted to explore various design cultures that potentially could have influenced the trend, so for that we looked into architecture & graphics.



For the Media board we looked into the trend slashes within sportswear so we looked into brands such as Nike & Adidas. As their brand advertisement campaigns explored slashes in a very graphic way. On reflection we should have looked into the "body shaming" topic more, as we did touch on this but we didn't feel confident enough with the research we'd found. Body shaming & serious slashes would have gone better together, as a slash exposes the skin in an unpredictable way, this shows that society has changed because it is now acceptable to reveal body and be proud of it.
(Which is a great thing!)

On our retail board we wanted to explore the various sub-categories within the term "Slash". So we looked at slits, vents, a slash, cutout and a rip. This enabled us to compare what was a slash and what wasn't. We also looked into various colour trends we had come across, we noted that it was mainly stone, muted colours- this could be due to the autumnal time of year.
Again on reflection we concentrated more on what a slash wasn't rather than what it actually was.



Our fourth & final board was "Consumer",  we thought it would be a good idea to create a consumer profile of our ideal target market for the trend. We thought that the sort of person who would invest into the "Serious Slashes" trend would be someone who is very fashion forward, most likely doesn't have children so they have the time/ money to invest & they will most probably live and work in the city. In terms of the brief we didn't stick to it at all here... We should have looked into street style and how the consumer wears the trend rather than who would be most likely to invest into it. 

Overall I enjoyed this project, everyone worked hard in my group & we did what we thought was right. Yes it was a learning curve because now we know what we should do & what we shouldn't. Our presentation could have gone better but I guess that just means we'll improve for next time. You are never going to walk into something the same level you want to be when you leave otherwise it would be pointless doing it in the first place!

Hope you all enjoyed this post, I'll be back on Wednesday with another post.
Happy Halloween for tomorrow everyone!

Take Care 
X

Exploring London

London is one of my favourite cities in the world!

I just love how it's constantly busy, something is always going on & most importantly street style there is on point!

I've only been London a couple of times in my lifetime, so when my lecturers announced that we were going on the Monday 17th October I was so excited. Although less excited for the fact that I had to wake up at 4.30AM (Yes I was internally crying) but still I made the coach on time which is the main thing.

The whole point of the London trip was to collect retail & street style images for our trends in groups, my group split into two parts because we felt we'd cover more ground that way.

This trip was different to any other trip to London I'd done because I felt I wasn't there to be a tourist- I got to see backstreets & independent shops that I probably wouldn't have ever found if I just went there for a "shopping" trip. Luckily for me I was shown around by Londoner which helped us not get lost that's for sure!

The retail images were pretty easy to get although I did get a few looks from sales assistants & security guards which made me feel slightly awkward. For the street style it basically consisted of running after random people who were wearing our trend which again was very awkward, but once we'd done it once it was a lot easier.

I'm not going to bore you all anymore explaining about the day as I took a LOT of photos on the day & I feel they say a lot more about what we were doing then anything I could say....

Hope you've all enjoyed this post- it should have gone up yesterday but time just seem to fly.

Have a great Halloween weekend!

There will be another post tomorrow.

Take Care 

X

Magazines: digital or print?

I am a lover of magazines... always have been, always will be...
I don't know what it is about them- whether it's the glossiness of the pages, the eye-catching images or the stylised articles.

Magazines are my passion!

Whilst researching my trend this week, I went slightly off topic and came across a question- "Magazines: Digital or Print?". It struck a cord with me because I would say I'm 100% a digital person but I can't read magazines online because for me they just don't have the same effect. Some of you may have heard that InStyle magazine announced recently that from 2017 they will no longer print their magazine. This makes me feel so sad. I wasn't ever a great lover of InStyle magazine but the fact that yet another magazine has felt the need to close the doors on it's printed version, just makes me wish that maybe we didn't live in such a technological world.



This amazing world of the internet is at our fingertips 24/7- we would be silly not to take advantage of it, what with YouTube, Google and of course blogs- none of these would be possible without the internet. Let's face it if the internet wasn't what it is then I probably wouldn't be writing this now.
But society knows that there is a difference between print & digital, maybe digital is popular because it requires minimal effort to get your hands on the latest copy. After all it only takes a couple of taps away on a keyboard & your there.

InStyle has said that they are closing their printed edition to "fit with a new audience", I completely understand their reasoning behind this but no matter how many readers they gain they are still going to lose some along the way- that's just how it works. 

InStyle released this statement:

“What we have achieved with InStyle over the last few years has been hugely rewarding … but the fashion world is changing dramatically, the way our audience interacts with it is changing and we have to change to meet that challenge,” said Moore in a statement.

“With a focus on delivering the InStyle experience across all digital platforms, we can really give our audience 24-hour access to all the fashion and beauty looks, trends and brands they clearly have such a huge appetite for,” she added.

The decision comes at a tough time for print magazines, which are battling against a challenging backdrop of falling advertising sales and circulation figures. With the majority of editorial content being consumed digitally, most publishers have acknowledged that the future of the content industry lies online.

Image taken from Google.

"The future of the content industry lies online"

This is not the sort of sentence I want to see at quarter to 10 on a Wednesday morning.  I understand why digital magazines have taken off but now printed ones are suffering because of it.

All I know is that I will continue to read printed magazines as long as magazines continue to print them. I do believe that one day all magazines will say no to print & move to digital. When this happens because it no doubt will, I think I will change my opinion too- maybe digital magazines are the way forward?
Although I'm not sure I'm ready for this "change" just yet...

What do you think?
Magazines: Digital or Print?
I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Hope you all enjoyed this post, I think I'm going to try to stick to my schedule now so my next post will be Friday, followed by Sunday before coming back to Wednesday again. 
3 posts a week is going to be a challenge that's for sure!

Take care & enjoy the rest of your day.

X

University: A month on.

Cannot believe I'm already writing this post... today is a little update on my Uni life after a month of being here. It honestly feels like yesterday I started at NTU but at the same time it strangely already feels like home...

I thought it would be good share what I've learnt from uni in a month, I know there are lots of posts like this out on the internet, but I thought it would be fun for me to reflect on what's been one the greatest months of my life.

'What have I learnt what from Uni in month?'...

1. Homesickness doesn't last forever- everyone is different when it comes to moving away from home, but in my opinion I would say I no longer feel homesick. Yes I do miss "home home" but at the same time I feel really happy & independant about life in general. 

2. It's socially acceptable to stay in bed till 4pm and your flat mates won't even judge you for it. You can do whatever you want, when you want, if you want to eat a mug cake for tea then you can do it (Yes I've actually tried this!)

3. Although you'll stop feeling so homesick you will still crave home cooking or just any cooking that you haven't had to do yourself.

(Flat breakfast- it tasted as good as it looks!)

4. Food shopping will become something you have a love/ hate relationship with, because you will go shopping and not get any of the things you needed but all the things you just 'wanted'.

5. B&M is very good for alcohol, it's cheap & cheerful- what more does a student want?

6. Pre drinks can be more fun than the actual night out, if you've never play a card game before uni you will be a pro about 2/3 weeks in. 

7. Washing your clothes is so expensive & such a lot of effort. When you actually do a wash you feel like you've trekked about 50 times to the laundry room (slight exaggeration).

8. 9am starts are the worst thing ever invented... but Fridays off are the best thing EVER!

9. If your not in uni then you still are expected to do work, I got in a very bad habit of thinking when I had no classes it was basically free time- It isn't!

10. Everyone goes for the obligatory clothes shop once there student loan comes in, then when their first rent instalment goes out they instantly regret it but don't take any of it back.

11. Cheese will become the most expensive food item ever- like I never realised how pricey it was till now?!?

12. It's okay to share your food etc. with flat mates but ask first before taking. Too often food goes missing...

13. Take it in turns to clean the flat, it shouldn't be just one person's job, it's everyone's mess so everyone needs to clear it up.

14. Collecting all your alcohol bottles and calling it 'art' doesn't fool the cleaning staff.

15. Online shopping is so dangerous for your bank account! I've been loving ordering everything & anything to my halls and the best bit my parents can't moan about yet another parcel. 

Boohoo.com even offer free next day delivery!

16. 'Do you do student discount?' is a question you'll ask way too often, I even asked at Primark 

(like they're already cheap)

17. Your body clocked will be so messed up, 1am turns into 9pm but those 9am starts are definitely 9am!

18. Societies are so fun! I joined the drama society which is something I've never done but before. I haven't been to any socials yet due to the dreaded freshers flu (more on that next) hopefully I'm going my first one soon.

19. Freshers flu hits you like a bullet in the head, I'm still recovering from it... it's been like 2 weeks!

20. Basically university is the strangest but best thing ever!

(It looks so much like Hogwarts it's actually unreal!) Picture not my own.

It's weird but every time I walk into my campus I just feel so happy to be part of NTU. I did worry I'd hate the uni when I got there but I honestly couldn't love my FCP course or the Uni anymore if I tried.

My course mates, flat mates & lecturers are all so lovely and friendly!

I'm so excited for the next three years of my life because I feel like it's going to be a very good chapter of my life...

Hope you all enjoyed this post, let me know if you agreed with any of the points in the comments below.

Take care & I hope you all have a great day!

X

Pinterest: A new beginning

Pinterest for me has always been something I've had a love/ hate relationship with...

Sometimes I can get lost for hours into the pinning world of imagination and other times I just can't be bothered.

As part of my FCP course we're expected to keep a professional Pinterest board that represents not only us as a person but also represents what we're doing on the course. Pinterest is a fabulous tool to locate & acknowledge trends that maybe would have gone unnoticed otherwise.

Yesterday I spent most of the day (dedicated student alert) just redesigning and sorting out my Pinterest boards. I already had Pinterest so I didn't have set one up specially but I wasn't happy with how it looked. So I wanted to spend time making it something I would be proud of & something I could potentially show to future employers. 

Pinterest is a really great tool for fashion, I spend way too much time admiring people's style on there & wondering why I don't look that stylish. (Please say it's not just me who does that?)

My Pinterest isn't looking great just yet because it's still a 'work in progress', but I managed to sort & title all of my starting boards- hopefully I'll be adding lots more boards as I go along. Having the boards already there waiting to have things pinned to just means that whenever I have a spare 5 minutes I can just spend my time researching them. 

I always feel so awkward when self-promoting but if your on Pinterest and want to give me a little follow then feel free too. I'm hoping to add more to my boards in the up-coming weeks so they look something more than just blank spaces. 

I hope you all liked this short post, I don't yet know when I'll blog again because I'm trying to organise a proper blogging schedule rather than just blogging whenever. I think my next post will be about the London trip on Monday which I am SO excited for! Although I would be lying if I said I wasn't slightly terrified at the thought of getting lost in London & missing the coach back.

 (Hopefully that won't happen)

Hope you've all had a fabulous day & I'll back back very soon.

Take Care 

X

Images: Own taken from Pinterest. 

Lulu Guinness Collaboration with Vaseline

As some of you may have already heard Lulu Guinness recently teamed up with Vaseline to do a collaboration with their lip balm. 

I have always been a fan of Vaseline- it was the first lip product I ever used when I was younger. So when I was lucky enough to be sent one of the products, it was a nostalgic moment. 

Vaseline for me has always been a product I've used and always come back to, and Lulu Guinness is one of my favourite designers- so when I heard they were collaborating I was so happy!

Lula's designs are so quirky, I love them- her trademark red lips is such an iconic image which I absolutely adore. 

I love it when Vaseline collaborates with designers to design limited edition lip tins because it turns a standard product into something very special and unique. After all everyone wants to own something designer in their lives.
(Plus they always look great in your handbag #handbagBFF)

I might be the only one who does this but I often find myself keeping the tin after to store little items in it - it's good to use as an earring holder whenever you're travelling away from home.

"Lulu has created a charismatic and playful doll face for the tin that is reflective of her own, distinctive style. The tin will be the very first item to feature in the Lulu Doll face, as a hint at what is to come from the brand's exclusive pre-spring collection. "

I would like to say a massive thank you to the Halpern Vaseline team for sending me my new favourite lip product! This limited edition tin is now available nationwide at Boots, Superdrug & Tesco so be sure to try & get one if you can.

I hope you all enjoyed this post- let me know what are your thoughts on the #luluXvaseline collaboration in the comments below.
I hope you are all having a good weekend & I'll see you all very soon.

Take Care 
X


Images- Own

Trend: Serious Slashes

As part of my course this week we were divided into groups & given a trend which we had to  research in order to be able to produce a mood board collectively.

My group trend 'Serious Slashes', I'd heard of the distressed look trend before because like 90% of people aged 25 & under, I too own a pair of ripped/ distressed look jeans.

(Although I can't pull them off as well as other people can, so I never really wear them.)

'Serious Slashes' basically means cuts in clothing that hasn't been placed there to distressed but to show flashes of skin. Normally slashes are placed up the centre seam of skirts/tops from the hem up or as added arm detail, either going up the arm or on the shoulder.

As Vogue said: 'Slashes, slits, and cutouts of a variety of geometric shapes have found themselves carved into just about every piece of clothing imaginable.'

I hadn't really noticed just how popular the 'slashing' trend is... every website, magazine & even on the street I've started to notice it more & more.

"There’s something arrestingly sexy about a few artfully placed windows onto the skin in an otherwise solid gown, and red carpet–goers have certainly caught on. Take a glance at this year’s Met Gala, where cutouts reigned supreme on everyone from Brie Larson in Proenza Schouler to Karlie Kloss, who brought risqué ab-revealing cutouts to the next level in a Brandon Maxwell number. Whether you’re a Hollywood A-lister or just someone hoping to spice up her summer style game, there’s never been a better moment to consider revealing a little skin. Ultimately carrying the look off really comes down to the simplest thing, as Zalopany put it: “You just have to own it.” As said on Vogue.com



Slashes have either been incorporated into the garment, during production or they have been added DIY later on by the consumer. The difference between slashes & the 'distressed look' seems to be that slashes are more clean, cut whereas the 'distressed look' seems to have more of a raw edge, that's been allowed to fray. Personally I would say that in order to get the 'slashes' look you need to buy it already on a garment because it would be hard (near enough impossible) to do it yourself.

Later today we are going to put all of our own individual research together onto a mood board, I think it will be interesting to see what resources other people have used. I already feel I need to use more trustworthy sites when looking online... Wikipedia is just too easy to use.
Overall though I have enjoyed researching the trend, it was harder than I expected it to be but I felt I gained a lot more knowledge by doing it.

I'm hoping to blog again at the weekend about the Lulu Guinness collaboration with Vaseline which is very exciting. And I'm also off to London on Monday for my first university field trip- again I can't wait although I'll have to get up at about 4.30am to make sure I get the coach in time.
(And to think I thought getting up for 9am was bad)

Hope you all have a great day & I'll see you all again very soon.
Take Care
X


Images: Google

FCP Pre-arrival activity

Welcome back!

Today's post is something that I really wanted to put up a couple of days ago but I just couldn't seem to get in the mood to write it, so I thought it was better to hold off and write something that you would actually want to read...
As you probably all know by now I recently started my FCP (Fashion Communication & Promotion) course, before we'd even started we were set a 'pre-arrival' task to do about our own fashion interests within the retail, digital & printed markets.


Image taken from Google

The Brief:

Identify examples of what you feel are some of the best Fashion Communication & Promotion touch points. Who, in your opinion, is translating, projecting or exploring fashion codes and messages in an innovative and exciting way? What are you watching, reading or following?
Select, print, photograph or collect the following:
- 3 digital examples (blogs, websites, twitter feeds)
-3 printed examples (magazines, brochures, brandzines)
-3 retail examples (shop windows, visual merchandising, shop interiors)

Not going to lie when I saw the brief I was a bit nervous about what to do, I wanted to do it 'right', but I quickly learnt that there was no right or wrong way of doing the task because it was just your personal opinion.

After reading the brief endless amounts of times, doing some rough planning & exploring all different options, I finally chose to create 3 mood boards. I opted for mood boards because I feel that although I would say I'm a digital person, I felt I could express myself the best by creating mood boards because I am a creative person. Having just finished an Art Foundation course where I'd learnt what media format suited me the best, helped me a lot!



The digital board for me was probably my favourite one to do (and the easiest), social media is a click of a finger away - a lot of my past time hobbies revolve around it. I looked at a blog, YouTube channel & Instagram because when it comes to fashion for me personally these are some of the first places I will look!



Printed was the hardest by far!
I don't really know why, I just really struggled to find different options because like I said before I'm definitely a digital person- I don't really look at a lot of printed stuff
(This is something I'm trying to change)
Although I do much prefer to read magazines in a physical form rather than online!



Retail was the most interesting one to do- I could have honestly sat and done it all day!
I'd never really looked at the differences between shop interiors & layouts before, but when I got looking it was really amazing to see how the shops represented the clothing items they sold. Zara for instance have a very clean cut store which is very minimalistic and I would say that describe their fashion as a whole.

Overall I did enjoy doing this task once I'd got past the initial thought of 'summer work', whilst on induction week we were asked to make notes about everyone's responses and say something about what we thought were key trends amongst everyone's work or what stood out to anyone as unique & individual.
I was dreading presenting the work but it was a 'chilled chat' rather than 'stand up at the front & tell us what you did' sort of presentation. Which made me much less nervous!

I hope you all enjoyed this post, I'm hoping to do another post tomorrow about my first 2 weeks at uni because they've FLOWN by!

Take Care & I'll see you all very soon

X 

Images: Own (Unless stated otherwise)

Buying straight from the catwalk: good or bad?

To say it's been a while since I last blogged would be an understatement, life has just been so hectic I feel I just haven't had the time. What with the dreaded "Freshers Flu" & lots of social events- time has quite literally flown by...

Let's get straight to the point.

Today is my first official post as a FCP student & honestly I couldn't feel anymore excited!

I want to know what are your opinions on the latest 'see now, buy now' market?

Burberry began the revolution last month at London Fashion Week allowing people to purchase the clothes as they walked down the catwalk. This instant fashion is a massive advancement in the fashion world, in the past we have had to wait months to buy the clothes that we've seen on catwalk because the demand wasn't there. 

Nowadays fashion is so instant that brands such as Zara can take a trend, design it and have it in store within 6 weeks to keep up with the demand.

Can there really be a bad side to this instant market?

Yes there can be!

 Although it's amazing to be able to buy products straight away, there is the downside that will affect smaller brands who couldn't possible afford the costs involved with "Ready to wear".  

Surely their fashion wouldn't be as current if they don't enter the 'See me now, buy me now' market?

 All brands have to start somewhere if we take away opportunities for them to succeed then surely the ever growing fashion market will stop growing?

Bigger brands such as Burberry & other designer names are only going to get bigger pushing out the smaller, 'we just need a chance' brands. 

Yes fashion is cut throat and I understand the need to want more instant fashion in our throw away society but do we really need to push the smaller brands out in order to do so?

I think the 'see now, buy now' is a good thing as we don't have time to forgot about what we saw on the catwalk because we can have it straight away. Yet if you like me then you might buy something on impulse & massively regret it later. Whereas in the past you've had time to think about (and justify) the splurge. 

Whichever way you look at it "Ready to wear" fashion has it pros & cons like most things do. 

One thing it is doing is creating a talking point for fashion, whether you love it or hate it, guaranteed you'll be talking about it and isn't that after all what fashion is all about? The talking.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on this post in the comments below.

Is there anything that you've been loving/hating in the fashion world lately?

Take care & I'll see you soon with another post.

X

Images: Google 

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