Paper Bags and Plastic Hearts

I made these paper installations featuring the beautiful Rhiannon Rees who I previously features on this blog in some Dreamy Polaroids. They were part of a pitch for a competition set by London College of Fashion and River Island, and the prize was £1,000 and the opportunity to shoot a series of seven images to feature in the new River Island store...

And guess what? 

I won!

Though they want me to draw the figures by hand instead of photographing models, which is a bit of a shame, but I'm super happy about it nonetheless!

This was how I shot them in my bedroom:

What's a Girl to Do?

Wednesday was the private view for my class's graduation exhibition at the Richard Young Gallery in Kensington. The show runs from now until the 9th July and features one image from everyone in my year on the BA Fashion Photography course at London College of Fashion. 

It feels so exciting to be part of this cohort, and I have been so inspired by the amazing photographers, and wonderful people around me for the last three years. The standard of work from the course is really amazing and if you like cutting edge contemporary fashion photography then I would definitely recommend a visit.

You can read more about the exhibition on the Richard Young Gallery website.

This is me next to my photograph looking furtive at the private view:

It was a lovely evening and a really great end to my three years on the course. 

Now I'm totally terrified of leaving university and entering the real world... so if anyone would like to employ me please get in touch: teanroberts@live.com!

I am the Rocker, I am the Roller, I am the Out-of-Controller!

Here are a selection of images from the lookbook I shot for Chloe Reynold's graduate collection.

The theme of her collection was a post apocalyptic dystopian world.

 Chloe's collection is made entirely from black fabrics, involving a lot of different textures like leather and fur. This made it pretty difficult to shoot, especially against the stark white landscape of this abandoned asphalt quarry, but I really love the high contrast images we made.

Modelled by Jessie Metcalf.

See more of Chloe's work including her working process and incredible fashion illustrations at: 

www.chloe-reynolds.tumblr.com

Family Album

I am so incredibly excited about these images I have just discovered!

About two years ago I found an old 120 roll film in a box of things my grandfather had given me along with his old cine camera. I researched the film and found that it was an extinct film type that was popular in the 1960s, but no longer existed. Nonetheless I took it to a lab and they processed it for me through black and white chemistry because this is cooler than colour processing and therefore less likely to damage the film. 

I was excited but when I went to collect the film the image were really dark, and only a few shadowy figures were visible on the negatives. The negatives themselves were really brittle and curled up so tightly that it was impossible to fit them into a film holder to scan them. Disheartened I squashed the film between two heavy books in the hope that it might flatten out, and forgot about the whole thing.

Until that is the other day when I rediscovered them all nicely flattened out, and scanned them into the computer. At first the images were so overexposed they looked like a bright turquoise mess, but after adjusting the levels on photoshop these amazing images of my mother and brother and some family friends as children in the late 1960s emerged. The photos are summertime snapshots taken on the beach in the Isles of Scilly where my family have lived since the 1700's.

 

 

The way the film has deteriorated means that the nostalgic element of the images is even stronger.

I absolutely love the effect.

But now I don't know what to do with this very exciting, but also very personal discovery...

There's a Brand New Dance but I Don't Know its Name

I've been having a very fashionable time lately with some of my friends who are just graduating from the BA Fshion and Performance Sportswear Design course at University College Falmouth. I shot three final collections for Jessie Metcalf, Suzannah Punchard and Chloe Reynolds and I turned up to party with them at both their graduate shows, one down in Falmouth and one here in London on Brick Lane. 

I actually missed the catwalk show because I was at a pagan wedding, but according to everyone who saw it it was an incredible spectacle that culminated when supermodel Sophie Anderton closed the show in Suzie's incredible devore dress, which apparently miss Anderton was reluctant to relinquish after the show.

(Thanks very much to Fern Berry for the use of this photograph)

 I arrived just in time for many celebratory jägerbombs and had a brilliant, if quite messy, time at the after-party. 

Suzannah Punchard and I.

Designers Annaleigh, Suzie and Jessie.

Jessie and Jack.

Chloe and Joe.

 

Suzie and Jessie.

The following week a select few of the designers made their way to London's Brick Lane to showcase the collections.

 

Sophie Hawkins (who you may recognise from one of my first ever blog posts Wild Things) , Suzannah Punchard, Trinity Tristan Higgs, Chloe Reynods and Jessie Metcalf. 

Chloe Reynold's Collection.

Suzannah Punchard's Collection.

Jessie Metcalf's Collection.

Myself, Suzie and her collection. 

 

Stylist Jennivi Jordan and me.

Designers staying limber while invigilating the show in the day time:

Falmouth designers invigilating their show: Haden Gaynor, Jessie Metcalf, Suzannah Punchard, Trinity Tristan Higgs and Chloe Reynolds.

All ridiculously talented and really sweet people, hopefully you'll be seeing more from them soon in the future of fashion design.