Another fashion week down, who knows how many more to go. This season, we expanded Racked into Racked NY and Racked National, and with more on the team, I was able to cool it a bit with the dashing from show to show, a contrast to the frantic schedule of last September.
It's Fashion Week in New York. Again. And I am getting PISSED OFF. Not only does this seem to be the year for everyone to plagiarize my work, but it also looks to be the year that blogs play right into the hands of marketers, and stay there. This is mainly happening with "independent" fashion blogs, who accept a stream of free packages from brands, and then promote the company via social media streams as a "thanks."
It is a drug to them. Once they've accepted a free pair of Nike shoes in exchange for a tweet, why not take a pair of exotic-skinned Jimmy Choos for a little blog post? And you can imagine how this snowballs until we reach the point we're at now--where most fashion blogs are simply paid mouthpieces for brands. Even though they've lost the innocence and objectivity that came before the glut of free stuff, the readers are still there; they just don't have a clue that their favorite blogger is only recommending a shampoo because he/she's getting a kickback for doing so. There are very very very few fashion blogs--ones that have been around for more than two years--that aren't exactly as I describe above. Refuse to believe me? Fine. No one discloses the swag anyways, so for readers--ignorance is bliss.
Back to how Fashion Week comes into this. If you are on the MB Fashion Week official press list as I am, then you receive all sorts of offers. Salons want to give me a makeover "to build a relationship" = you talk us up on your blog, and we'll give you hundreds of dollars worth of salon treatments. Jewelry designers offer to send me free pieces, and wannabe fashion designers try to lure me to their showrooms with the promise of free champagne and "a gift." Apparently bloggers will be the celebrity billboards of this decade.
NO THANK YOU. All this business gives me the creeps. And I am extremely fortunate to write for a fashion blog (2 years and counting) that has a contract that forbids me from accepting these offers, just in case I am ever tempted. If we receive advance copies of books to review, we review them without bias and then do a giveaway of the book for our readers. We fight the good fight to retain credibility and build authority. And it's working.
And about the bloggers that accept everything that lands on their doorstep--we get the same pitch emails you do, and when you tweet or blog about your hot new kicks or that trip you just took, or when you wear the ill-gotten goods to the same events and we see you bragging...we know that you are a sucker for it. Minus one point credibility.You are compromised. It's only too bad your readers can't see it from this angle.
Dear Suzy Menkes, please put all this into better, Brit-accented words for me...
So above we have what is a very rare photo of me. I am only posting it because it's one of those rare occasions where the story behind the image is just so damn good, you can't simply throw onto Flickr and make it "private." Here I am in the restrooms of the Virgin Atlantic Upper Class Clubhouse at JFK Airport, where there is a full wall of mirrors. It's about one hour before my departure on Flight 046 to London-Heathrow, and I am in heaven already.
You see, I enjoy midcentury modern design and the style of the jet age. I have been known to pick up Atomic Ranch magazine and even Airways magazine. Virgin Atlantic happens to have a similar aesthetic and thanks to the crack PR folk, I was able to punctuate my trip with visits to three of the slickest airport lounges, ever: New York-JFK, London-Gatwick and--the flagship--London-Heathrow.
I'll spare you the details, since I've already expounded at great length on them over at Jaunted, but let it suffice to say that now, I don't see how I can fly economy on Virgin Atlantic, knowing what there is on the flip side in Upper Class. I've been in first class lounges before and flown business in the past, but damn. I really can't find the words. So let's have the pictures! *Remember, you can click any of the pictures on this blog to see the larger size, hopefully.
And, in case you're curious about the flight experience, here's the account (and yes, more pics) of VS Flight 046 from JFK to LHR. Thanks for putting up with my sporadic blogging, but you know--a girl about town has got girl about town stuff to do these days.
...is where I am. You see, this train I'm on to London-King's Cross (the 10:30am East Coast out of Waverley) has free WiFi, and it's a freaking dream. Zipping by fields of sheep, green hills with leftover snow drifts, the occasional peek of coastline (such as in the video above), and I've got a table and outlet to boot. It's times like this that drive me closer, bit-by-bit, to assuming the expat life in a country that has its transportation shit together.
Climbed a mountain this morning...or really, a dormant volcano in the center of Edinburgh. "Arthur's Seat" is what it's called, and thanks to our choice of a less than ideal descent route, I landed on my own seat quite a few times as well. Ha--bad joke.
Yes, that's the Tate Modern museum as seen from the Millennium Bridge. I'm in London and other European parts for the next week, for work and for fun, because travel to me is the essence of fun.
London hates free WiFi, I love blackcurrant food items, and the weather loves me. The snow that dumped on the country in the last weeks has melted away completely and now we walk miles and miles each day, holding our Oyster cards for emergencies like "oh crap, I need to be on the Gatwick Express from Victoria Station in 30 minutes and I just woke up!" Everything is awesome except for the exchange rate from USD to GBP; that is the opposite of awesome.
Look what advertisement occasionally pops up on Jaunted! If you're on the site as much as I am (because umm I'm the editor), then you'll even be privy to seeing the full range of Louboutin ads. How did they know...?
I remember the day that Bergdorf Goodman started advertising on Racked; it was a confirmation that if you mention Linda Fargo enough and continuously shoot their amazing windows, that eventually she starts noticing. No discounts or special treatment though; blog advertising has nothing to do with us writers (at any of my blogs, at least).
Is this not the most awesome watch you have ever seen? Well, that's how I feel about it at least, and when I first spotted it a couple years ago on some website or another, it was wrist lust at first site.
I printed out its picture and specs, and taped it within easy view in my office at the time. At $500, I wasn't about to run out, buy it and slap it on my wrist; no, it was a dream of ultimate multi-timezone design perfection. More an inspirational image than anything else.
And then I got this boyfriend. And this guy (I'm thinking) understands or at least flatters my infatuation with international travel, and for Christmas this landed on my wrist. Granted it's been a few years, so the price has come down as the deadstock hit online auctions and such, but I doubt I still would have made the jump to buying it on my own; that's how elevated this product had become in my psyche.
The good news is that it's everything I ever dreamed it would be; it blends so well with my style and is shockingly more understated than my other watches, a Turin Olympics-edition Swatch and a concrete grey Alessi piece with a dead battery. And the even better news is that now I have a little connection to New York City, London, Dubai, Hong Kong and Los Angeles--the cities I chose to occupy the five faces--on my wrist, instead of declaring allegiance to just one. It's the best aspirational product ever.
Another fashion week down, who knows how many more to go. This season, we expanded Racked into Racked NY and Racked National, and with more on the team, I was able to cool it a bit with the dashing from show to show, a contrast to the frantic schedule of last September.
