From Sidewalk to Catwalk

So I haven't written on here in a couple of days as I have been busy researching into, what I believe to be, very important fashion masterminds of the 90s! To be frank it became a bit of an issue finding anyone singing the praises of fashion stylists, photographers and designers of the 90s as most people seem to be utterly repulsed by the colour clashing cults that thrived in the day. After a little bit of research and a heads up from my tutor I came across Ted Polhemus; a writer and photographer who specialises in fashion, anti fashion, identity and the way a person expresses themselves through style. When finding out Ted based a lot of his work on the 90s, I ran to the library only to find his book 'Street Style' published in 1994!

Instantly I couldn't put the book down, from b-boys and flygirls to ravers and indie kids. This style dictionary had every thing a girl doing a project on 90s fashion could need! I instantly connected with Ted's writing style and I fell in love with his photography. I was amazed by how each image seemed so natural and showed the nitty gritty of the 90s, not just a clean fake portrayal of the 90s.                                                       

When looking deeper into Ted's work I became more and more aware on how important street fashion was in the 90s. It seemed to give people some sort of freedom and a right to say what they want through the way they look. What with social and economic times being hard, I think people started to have a 'I don't care' attitude or 'How much will it take to shock you?' opinion. These ideas are captured in Ted's work. I love the idea that ordinary peoples styles from the street influenced some of the biggest names in fashion and this then changed the catwalk. How amazing is that? Looking at 90s 'Street Style' has given me huge inspiration to create realistic, natural 90s fashion shoots. I don't just wanna capture fashion I want to capture feeling, emotion and power. 

Nothing 90s About That Nightmare

So just like I said I would, I went to the 90s party at Wonderland Maidstone, and I am sad to announce last night didn't feel very 90s at all!

Me and Ally Rocking the 90s look

Okay so the occasional tune came on where me and my friend would reminisce good times but apart from that, the evening was very much 2013. I don't know whether its just me but when I saw the dress code I got super excited. The fact I got bop around in my babycham trainers with pedal pushers and crop top on was beyond amazing! So why didn't anybody else kick of there heels, slip out of there figure hugging body-con dresses and join in?! It just got me thinking, how much do people really hate 90s fashion? Is it that embarrassing?
Today I have decided to go back to the drawing board, so to speak, and have a look into 3 big artists from the 90s; Ted Pothemus, Mario Testino and Gianni Versace. Hopefully they will make fashion in the 90s a little clearer.

Born in the 90s?

Walking through college today I spot this poster! Its almost as if someone has made this event specially for my project?! I got out my laptop and found the event page on Facebook. As I read in intrigue I became more and more excited! 'Expect to hear Alanis Morrisset, Backstreet Boys and Blink 182' count me in! I then found the dress code section which got me even more hyped. 'Air Max, Reebok Pumps, Adidas Poppers, Shellsuits, Denim, Kangol Hats and Grunge wear all OK!!' I had to go! So tomorrow me and my friend, who I am dragging along with me (probably kicking and screaming in a pair of disco pants and high tops), are going to be dancing the night away at Wonderland Maidstone reminiscing over our favourite 90s tunes! Post with pictures from the night will be up tomorrow! 

For more information on Wonderlands 'Born in the 90s' click here!   

A Nostalgic Questionnaire

Since my crop-top idea I felt intrigued to know what everyones memories of the 90s were! I wanted to know what they were watching, what they were listening too and more importantly what they were wearing. I decided the easiest way to do this was to hand out a questionnaire! Here it is:

90s Fashion and Pop Culture Questionnaire 

1. What year were you born? 

2. If born in the 90s do you consider yourself to be a typical ‘90s kid’? 

YES          NO           NOT BORN IN THE 90s 

3. What’s your favourite 90s TV show? 

4. Who’s you favourite 90s music artist/band? 

5. If I said to you ‘Dress like you’re back in the 90s’ what would you wear? 

6. Do you think 90s clothing was fashionable? 

YES           NO 

7. (If answered ‘YES’ to question 6) Who would you consider a 90s fashion icon? 

8. (If answered ‘NO’ to question 6) Who would you consider a 90s fashion disaster? 

Thank you for answering my questionnaire! 

Some of the answers I got were great! I couldn't stop going 'Oh remember them!' and 'Haha my mum used to make me wear that too!' I had endlessness fun listening to everyone reminisce over there 90s fuelled childhoods, chatting about Fresh Prince, Bewitched and Britney! With the answers I received from my questionnaires I hope to pick 5 top themes and use them as inspiration to make 5 90s inspired crop-tops. I plan to use methods such as dying and embellishing to create the different looks, I then hope to style them into 5 different photo shoots, focusing closely on the different themes. 

My top 5 themes so far are: 

• The Spice Girls 
• The Fresh Prince of Bel Air 
• The Power Puff Girls   
• Trolls 
• Sports Wear 

Please feel free to re-live your 90s memories and do my questionnaire, just leave your answers in the comment box! 

Rest in Peace My Pretty Pink Babies

Today hasn't been all smiles and laughs, today has been somewhat sad.

I went on eBay to see what was going on with my second pair of jelly shoes, I clicked on my watch list and thats when my heart sunk. I had lost a bidding war, I lost my beautiful pink heeled jelly shoes. Thats right someone out bid me! And now they will never ever be mine! I have pretty much spent the rest of my evening searching every possible website to find another pair, so far this had been unsuccessful! However one must not give up! I am determined to find myself another pair, I am an eBay warrior on a mission!

My Urban Education

Today I went for a quick shop in Maidstone. Yeah okay, so kinda for myself, but also to spy on any 90s inspired trends that were creeping onto the high street. My first port of call was of corse Topshop! To me Topshop can never do wrong (well most of the time) and are always bang on trend.
 As I walked in everything screamed 90s, I got very excited, grabbed most things in sight and ran to the changing rooms! Beastie Boys band tee, neon crop tops, bomber jackets and tracky bottoms with crazy prints. My most exciting finds were a grey letter print tube skirt with matching long sleeve crop top and a floral and dogtooth mini skirt with matching crop top. When exploring 90s fashion I found that two piece items were extremely popular however when going to vintage shops in London I hardly came across any, especially 90s inspired ones! So you can imagine how happy I was when coming across two today!

Another 90s inspired outfit I put together today were a pair of light blue high-waisted denim jeans and a sunshine yellow crop top. The outfit was inspired by style icon Dionne from Clueless. I loved this look so much I ordered the top, with the vision of styling it in a shoot soon!
After my shop, I realised 50% of everything I had picked out was a crop top! Blimey. I think its fair to say I had fallen for these midriff baring beauties! Thats when the idea popped into my head! My very own 90s inspired crop top collection?! I could look at all different bands, TV shows, topics from the 90s and make a hole collections of crop tops from them! Then from this I can create the most fabulous styling shoots. HORAH! My shopping trip was even more worth while than expected.

Click here to view Topshop's 90s inspired 'Urban Education'!

All Mine!

Success!
I won the yellow jelly shoes! There I was panicking that there would be a secret last minute bidder, counting down each second, biting my nails...
Then BAM 'Congratulations on your new yellow Juju Jelly Shoes' Yippee!

 

Jelly thats Suitable for Vegetarians!

There I was surfing the net, when I wandered into dangerous territory, ebay.

Yep thats right, I've started a war and not just any war, a bidding war. 

Look at them? Arn't they perfect? Bright pink jelly shoes, with a heel and big white buckle. Classic! When I saw the price £1.50 I nearly choked. Can something this cute really be sold so cheap? Thats when it started, into the little box I typed £2.50. That was 2 days ago, and I'm still the highest bidder, HORRAH! 

But it didn't stop there! After my first success I wanted more and searched for more jelly shoes to see what I could find and then I stumbled upon these, bright yellow jelly shoes! This time £0.99p?! So I bided £1.20! And I am proud to announce, I am also the highest bidder on these little babies. Finger crossed I win! For now though I think its only best I stay well away from ebay... and jelly shoes. 

Act Like a Dumb Blonde

After my shoot in the mall I headed home where my model was meeting me for my next shoot of the day. Now for this I needed a typical blonde bombshell, someone worthy to play Cher in my second Clueless inspired shoot. The first person that sprung to mind was my friend Alannah, who lets just say does Clueless blonde very well! I knew I wanted to style 5 different outfits on my model and create some full body simple styling shots, as well as pick 3 of my favourite scenes from Clueless and recreate them, incorporating my own styling. I picked the scenes; Cher is teaching Tai the importance of squats, doing her make-up in the mirror and picking what to wear for her driving test.

So starting with my models hair, I wanted to keep everything very natural so I just used straighteners to create cute little flicks and give her hair a little more texture and volume. I then re-did her make-up, pop art pink blush, shimmery powder pink eye shadow (all the way to the brow, that were filled in with a light brown crayon), two coats of mascara and glossy pink lips. What a betty!

Starting with the scene where Cher is picking an outfit to wear, I chucked a load of my most brightly coloured/interesting clothes onto my bedroom floor and arranged them in an interesting way. I then got my model to sit within the mess and pose in a vacant doll like way.

























I then moved onto my next scene where Cher is putting her make-up on in the mirror. I wanted this image to feel very romantic and feminine, hence the dim, moody lighting and the deep warm pinks.

And then finally I had great fun making my model endure a mini work out (evil stylist/photographer!) to create the last and final scene.

Here are my five key Clueless looks! 

From left to right: 

• In look number one Alannah is wearing plain black leggings and a leopard print crop-top (both from Topshop) teamed with a pink and blue shell suit jack (from Beyond Retro) and her own baby pink Adidas trainers.  
• In look number two Alannah is wearing a bright yellow sports crop-top (from Beyond Retro) and a pleated brown high-waisted mini skirt (from Topshop) accessorised with black knitted knee-highs (from Primark) and yellow and brown wedges (from Newlook). 
• In look number three Alannah is wearing midnight blue disco pants (from House of Fraser) and neon diamond print polo blouse (from Absolute Vintage) worn with pink velvet platforms and chunky gold chain (both Topshop). 
• In look number four Alannah is wearing silky pink slip dress (from a local charity shop) with pale pink and mint green heels (from Irregular Choice). 
• In look number five Alannah is wearing baggy white crop top with leopard motif (from Topshop) and baggy zebra print sweat pants (from River Island) team with cute floral head scarf (from local a local charity shop). 

A Fashion Illustration of my Five Key Looks 

Down at the Mall

So yesterday I was super busy creating fashion styling shoots based around my favourite 90s movie, yep you guessed it, Clueless.
First stop The Mall, you can't get more Clueless than that right?

I wanted to style my model based on Clueless character Tai Frasier (the new girl and new project of Cher Horowitz and Dionne Davenport). I wanted to create a cute and casual look using a baggy tie-dye tee, dark denim dungarees and doc martins. I made her lips glossy and pink, eye make-up neutral and hair high. To send my model even further back into the 90s I photographed her buying, drinking and holding a slush puppy (remember them?!).

The nice italian man at the ice cream stand was flattered that he would be in my photographs and even asked if he looked okay, bless! After taking some snaps at the ice cream stool, I moved on to taking some full body shots of my model in front of a 90s style café, this way I could get some good images of the hole outfit I had put together. I also got her to lean against a blue wall outside a sweet shop. The lolly-pop print on the wall have a great tacky pop 90s feel.

I then took a few of my model sitting down at the café, to try and recreate a scene in clueless where the three girls are chatting away in a mall café after a party in the valley. I wanted my model to have that typical 'I live above sunset' 90s girl expression, if you get my gist? 

One slush and 94 images down we headed home and I started to prep for shoot number two...  

The day I spent far too much.

Me in Prince of Bel-air style jacket and my neon yellow hockey crop top.

So with my Clueless shoot in mind me and a couple of the girls decided we would hit London on Wednesday so I could see what little treasures I could find to assist me in my project and on my shoots. I had a couple of shops in mind that I new we had to visit! Beyond Retro in Soho being one (http://www.beyondretro.com). I had a little bit of money saved and thought it would be very well spent    on my project (plus I get to indulge on some new clothes!). Armed with my sketch book, filled with many images from Clueless, I had a million and one ideas of things I was looking for. Dungarees, an offensively bright shell suit jacket, crops tops, MC Hammer pants, jelly shoes, reebok classics; oh the list goes on! After mooching around London for most of the morning, we then started our travels to Soho where we lunched at our Amsterdam favourite, Wok to Walk, before going on to Beyond Retro. This is were it all went wrong.
There is was Aladdin's Cave, and in it were things from the 90s only the Spice Girls could dream of. Neon crop tops, more dungaree's than I knew existed, shell suits, gold glittery jelly shoes and all of it seemed so cheap!

My gorgeous dungarees! 

90s tie-dyed hooded top

  Well we must of been in there for a good couple of hours, I think the shop assistants thought we were moving in! In the end I sadly had to pick just a few items that I was gonna buy. I did this quick before the girls either ran off and left me or started to break into tears! It was super hard but I tried to pick the bits which I thought could be the most versatile when being used in a shoot, and in the end that was a dark denim pair of Revolt dungarees, a neon yellow cropped hockey top and a neon baby blue and pink shell suit jacket. Just when I thought that was it we happened to stop off at Absolute Vintage and I somehow managed to buy a bright diamond print gold button- up cropped shirt, oops!  

As If!

One of the first things I had to look at when studying 90s fashion was trashy american rom/com Clueless. I mean what says 90s more than a tartan two piece and knee high socks?! I have to admit when watching to film I quoted most lines and felt deep sympathy for anyone listening to me coping Cher's catchy sayings, but I had such fun, freeze framing moments of pure fashion genius and then snapping away with my camera at my laptop screen. 

I just adore Cher's prim and proper pleated mini skirts teamed with Mary Jane's, not to mention Dionne's outrageous hats and super 90s neon and who could forget Tai! Okay she was tragic on the fashion front at the start but once Cher and D got hold of her she looked super cute in pastel shades and dungarees! 

 After putting all my images together from the film I came to the conclusion I was still obsessed by Clueless and wanted to look deeper into the fashion side. Why hadn't anybody recognised this film as fashion brilliance before? And thats when I started grinning with excitement.

Wildfox has only just made there entire spring collection Clueless inspired! From T's with captions on such as 'whatever' and 'as if' to cropped neon knits! OMG HEAVEN. 

I was so delighted at what I had found. It had felt like finally the 90s was making a come back, and at just the right time! Not only was Wildfox selling garments based on Clueless but they had also styled and photographed some amazing images (which I will show you on here). This then made me think 'I wanna create a Clueless inspired shoot myself!' But first I must get my hands on some Clueless clothing...hmm. Off to the mall as Cher would say. http://www.wildfoxcouture.co.uk/store/collections/wildfox-white-label.html

Final MAJOR Project

So I'm going to start by saying why I choose to do my FMP on 90s fashion and pop culture, I think it's only right that I should give you some sort of explanation!

When given a long list of themes, words and phrases in order to spark off ideas I panicked. 'Sid and Nancy' was one? 'Death' another. These are so not me I thought. I wanted to do something fun, something that when I said it everyone would have something to say, something trashy and embarrassing, something like, the 90s! 
To me the 90s has always been a questionable one when its comes to fashion. Some would even go as far to say that the 90s wasn't even in fashion, I found that fascinating. When looking deeper into the pop culture at the time my mind was set. I don't wanna be parading around in black for 8 weeks studying coffins and what not. I want to be dancing around to Mc Hammer in leggings and a crop top!

When looking back I also felt a great sense of nostalgia. 'OMG I remember these', 'God how awful were they?!' (many of the phases I was coming out with). I knew from the start that this was going to be a project I could completely sink my teeth into. And thats when I came up with 'A Neon Nightmare'!