Ok, here’ a little fashion fondue for all you boys and girls who love fashion. Over the next three days, I’m going to share some superb style recipes – tantalizing tips that I’ve stumbled across over the last year.
Dip in and find out what the fashion mavens have to say. Warning: The following delicious and nutritious excerpts are good for your style sense and great for your fashion aesthetic; they could be both enriching and enlightening.
Who is Scott Schuman? Schuman is the acclaimed fashion photographer and celebrated blogger of TheSartorialist.com. The dapper gentleman behind the lens has captured rare and iconic images of Anna Wintour, Carine Roitfeld, Franca Sozzani, Giorgio Armani, and Mario Testino.
The New York Times christened The Sartorialist as “the bellwether American site that turned photo blogging into an art form.” Schuman has authored the coveted fashion photo journal The Sartorialist. From Amazon.com:
Scott Schuman just wanted to take photographs of people on the street who looked great. His now famous blog was an attempt to showcase the wonderful and varied sartorial tastes of real people – not only those of the fashion industry.
The Sartorialist is a beautiful anthology of Scott’s favourite shots from around the world. They include photographs of well-known fashion figures as well as those shots of the anonymous passerby whose imagination and taste delight the viewer.
From the streets of Rio to Bejing, Stockholm to Milan, these are the people that have inspired Scott and in turn, inspired designers and people of all ages, wages and nationalities with an interest in fashion. Intimately designed and created with Scott, the book is a handsome object in its own right.
Text is sparse throughout The Sartorialist, and this is purposeful. Scott Schuman wants people to “draw their own conclusion, to find inspiration without the influence of a guiding hand.”
Schuman asks, “What constitutes great personal style?”
Ok, folks, here’s his well-thought out and eloquent answer: “We tend to think that to achieve great personal style someone must have perfect clarity about who they are and what they stand for. I politely disagree. I think conflict about who you are often leads to even greater self expresion…. These contradictions produce the most interesting looks.” Ah, sigh of relief.
The following excerpt accompanies an image of a gamine beauty in the photocentric fashion book The Sartorialist:
This is Julie. She is one of my favourite subjects to shoot for the blog [www.thesartorialist.com]. Often when I post a picture of her she receives comments like, “Oh, she is sooo perfect, so chic, a modern Audrey Hepburn.” Well, she is very chic, but she is far from perfect, physically at least. Julie has one leg slightly shorter than the other…and walks with a slight limp. However, she has never let her physical challenges alter her appearance or diminish her presence. This young lady stands tall. In a world of fashion that celebrates a certain kind of beauty, I have so much respect for the people who don’t let their non-fashion-world physique stand in the way of expressing the beautiful person that they know themselves to be. I find that type of inner strength the most captivating of all, and it is a major reason why Julie is on the cover of this book.
Find Schuman’s delightfully stylish book at The Book Table. Not in stock? They’ll order it for you at a discounted rate, and it’ll be there in a jiffy! For store hours or prices, visit www.thebooktable.net.
