Fashion Model: W Magazine: Where Troubles Melt Like Lemon Drops

W is Anti-M.

W Magazine October 2010 Issue
Editorial: "Where Trouble Melts Like Lemon Drops"
Photographer: Tim Walker
Hair: Malcolm Edwards for D+V
Makeup: Val Garland for Streeters London
Stylist: Jacob K
Model: Karlie Kloss (NEXT)
Set design: Simon Costin for CLM

W Mag decided to get their Dorothy on, although it's an editorial that pulls from a range of classic children's stories and poems. It's interesting to us how much fashion editorials are using other media to inspire their work lately. If it's not Mad Men, it's classic movies, books, and now, children's literature. We make no judgments as to what it means or if it means anything at all. We suppose one could make a post-modern argument or to claim that there is nothing new under the sun and it's all about appropriation in the 21st Century. We'll leave that up to the scholars. Us? We'll talk about the clothes.

Except we don't feel like talking about the clothes. We feel like talking about the styling. This editorial provides a rather clear illustration of what a stylist does during an editorial. As we've said many times, it's not about presenting the clothes, catalog-style, so you can see every detail. It's about using the clothes to promote a certain feeling or image in the viewer's mind. Even though these shoots cost exorbitant sums of money and are used to sell magazines and brand names, in the end, the stylist, editor and photographer are trying to produce a form of art out of commercialism.

Anyway, there's a reason we include the runway shots when we can. It's so you can see how the looks differ in two different milieu. Look at, say, the Carolina Herrera dress (third from bottom). Notice that the stylist put a black tank top under the dress. Now, no one would reasonably advise anyone to wear it that way in public, but here, pairing it with the thigh-highs, the retro shoes, and the straw hat (all of which also wouldn't be advised in the real world) turn this pretty 2010 dress into a fantasy costume from the early part of the 2oth Century.

Here's your assignment for today: go through the pictures and note all the ways the stylist changed the outfit and all the things the stylist added to the look to change the way the outfit feels. Also note the work of the model and photographer. What are they doing to make the outfit feel different from the runway version? It's a real talent and in fact, we consider it one of the most difficult things to do in the fashion world (aside from designing); taking someone else's vision and reinterpreting it while at the same time ensuring that you're not contradicting it.

Oscar de la Renta Resort 2011 Collection
[LaCrasia gloves, Alexis Bittar pins]

Christian Dior Fall 2010 Couture Collection
[John Rocha socks, Louis Vuitton shoes with Mokuba ribbons]

Valentino Fall 2010 Couture Collection

[John Rocha socks with Mokuba ribbons, Louis Vuitton shoes]

Givenchy by Riccardo Tisci Fall 2010 Couture Collection

Chanel Fall 2010 Couture Collection
[John Rocha socks with Mokuba ribbons]

Jean Paul Gaultier Fall 2010 Couture Collection
[John Rocha socks with Mokuba ribbons]

Armani Privé Fall 2010 Couture Collection
[Eres’s polyamide and spandex bra]

Carolina Herrera Resort 2011 Collection
[Eres’s polyamide and spandex bra. LaCrasia gloves, John Rocha socks,
Louis Vuitton shoes with Mokuba ribbons]

Worth Couture by Giovanni Bedin Fall 2010 Couture Collection
[American Apparel’s nylon lace and spandex briefs. LaCrasia gloves,
John Rocha socks, Louis Vuitton shoes]