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Friday 6 August 2010

Ones To Watch Designers Announced for SS11


Charlotte Taylor
Young LiLee
A.Hallucination
Georgia Hardinge

The wait is over… the selection has been made… and today here at Fashion Scout we are extremely excited to reveal the fresh faced designers who have been chosen to show with us at our renowned Ones To Watch show. Congratulations to Charlotte Taylor, Young LiLee, A.Hallucination and Georgia Hardinge; the selected four whom will all present their Spring/Summer'11 collections back-to-back at the exclusive Vauxhall Fashion Scout venue during London Fashion Week this September.

Since its conception in February 2009, Ones To Watch has helped launch the careers of many new budding designers including Hermoine de Paula, Alice Palmer, David Longshaw, Dean Quinn and this season's Merit Award winner Eudon Choi.

Presenting together, this latest lineup of innovative designers, whose signature styles range from men’s tailoring to elegant feminine dresses, promise an exciting and eclectic catwalk… A show not to be missed!

Sarah Barlow

Thursday 5 August 2010

Wolf & Badger Concept Store Summer Party


Wolf and Badger, which opened its doors earlier this year in Notting Hill, held an exclusive summer party to a bustling fashionable crowd last night.

The concept store, owned by bag designer Zoe Knight and her husband Samir, allows designers to rent hanging or shelving space with a focus on nurturing innovative talent by giving them 90% of the profits from sales.

Unique pieces from some familiar designers, as well as many up and coming, adorned the store with a real mixture of mens and womenswear collections all set amongst unusual art pieces and accented by incredible hat lighting installations by Jake Phipps.

An array of glass cabinets filled with striking jewellery, including my personal favourite Gisele Ganne, immediately caught my attention and I came away wanting so many things including the £200 silver soldier rings.

If you don’t live West I would recommended taking a trip here after a weekend visit to Portobello and if you cant manage that you can now shop online.

Emma Drinnan

Wednesday 4 August 2010

Backstage at Masha Ma's Harpers Bazaar China October Issue



Masha Ma has caught the eye of the global press; having already been featured in publications including French Playboy and Vogue Japan, the label will once again appear in Harper's Bazaar China October issue. The photo shoot, which presented garments from Masha's beautifully tailored AW 10/11 collection took place last Tuesday. Also present in the studio was stylist, Andrej Skok, who also styled for Masha's latest look book.


Sarah Barlow

Tuesday 3 August 2010

Vauxhall Motors Bowling Club


Having previously attended the Vauxhall Ice Skate event I was even more excited when the Vauxhall Motors Bowling Club invite turned up on my desk. A weighty envelope included tickets, a bowls rulebook, an inscribed pencil (its most important to keep score) and a material badge to sew on my blazer.

Who wouldn’t want to spend a Sunday afternoon sat by a bowling green on a picnic blanket, sipping on homemade lemonade or licking an ice cream. With the ever humorous Rick Edwards hosting and incredible dj sets from Toddla T and (the rather good looking in real life) Matt Horne, it was a good day had by all.

Even after a lesson from the on hand experts I wouldn’t say I was ready to turn up to a bowls club and show off, but I am much improved with a set of woods (the name for the balls for those of you that don’t know.)

I cant wait to see what inventive and fun filled event Vauxhall come up with next!



Emma Drinnan

Monday 2 August 2010

BoF: In Conversation with Natalie Massenet


BoF Fashion Pioneers from The Business of Fashion on Vimeo.

Natalie Massenet in conversation with Imran Amed


If you are reading this blog, you are undoubtedly a follower of all things fashion and so most likely tuned into Business of Fashion last Thursday night along with myself and thousands others world wide, to watch the widely acclaimed live interview between BoF Editor-in-chief, Imran Amed, and Natalie Massenet, the founder of innovative fashion e-tailer, Net-a-Porter.

The conversation between the two took place up on the top floor of London’s Westfield shopping centre in Net-a-Porter’s vast new office space. Amongst the spectators present, were Style.com’s Sarah Mower and fashion designers Gareth Pugh and Jonathan Saunders, along with various other industry figures, journalists and guests all of whom took copious notes through out the evening.

It has been an eventful year for Net-a-Porter; As well as marking its 10th anniversary, 2010 also brought with it a look to the future when the business was bought by prestigious luxury goods group, Richemont, for a staggering £350 million. However, Massenet reassured Amed and viewers that the recent acquisition has not changed the company at all and her agreement with the new owners was that “Net-a-porter has to remain independent… so we are going to be left alone to our own devices and hopefully to Prosper.”

So how did Net-a-Porter get to where it is today? The simple answer is that an intuitive Natalie, back in 2000, set up a shopping business on the web, not only because it was something new and fresh but also because it was what the consumer required… Bringing the store to the customer, instead of the other way around, was key at the beginning of the new millennium and is even more so today: “Women are working, they are making their own money” says Natalie, “by moving the store to the desk, we were able to create the future of shopping.” Always one step ahead, Ms. Massenet realised that in today’s technology-savvy world, even a web based shop isn’t enough, stating that now “the consumer is in the back of a cab, with her iPhone or her Blackberry, on her iPad...” which of course brought the conversation to Net-a-Porter’s most recent news; a collaborative project with Apple Inc to create the Net-a-Porter iPad application, which was debuted during the interview.

The iPad app provides customers with the same ease and convenience of shopping that the website has but is presented in a more visually engaging way, with page layouts that literally look like those belonging to a high-end style publication: “This is really what we always hoped Net-a-Porter would be, because the dream was always to make a shopping magazine,” says Natalie. “With the iPad you can actually merge the magazine experience with shopping.” Massenet has obviously put her knowledge and experience from working as a journalist and editor at magazines including Tatler and WWD into good use. In fact, she states that she still sees her role within the company as an editor: “Editing is the most important thing.” She continues, “A successful retailer thinks like an editor.”

Net-a-Porter has another exciting year ahead of them as January 2011 sees the launch of the site’s equivalent for men’s luxury fashion, Mr Porter. BoF editor, Imran Amed, asked the question that has been on everyone’s mind since the new project was announced in June; ‘‘why did you choose to create a separate men’s site with a separate brand?’ of which Natalie answered “We’ve done a lot of research and we’ve got a great team behind Mr Porter, many of whom are men, who are sharing insights into how they shop and its entirely different [to women]. The service is going to be different, the brand is going to be different, the packaging is different, the voice, the tone is going to be different…” she then revealed “Why? Because we’re thinking about the customer.”

Sarah Barlow