A day in the life of a designer..

Is London Still Swingin’?

As spring and summer 2009 are pretty much put to bed now, we are just praying that we get all the photographic samples back in time for the next shoot which is in about three weeks!

Last week Deborah (Long Tall Sally’s product manager) arranged a special jeans shoot and I have to say our jeans have never looked better. You’ll see the evidence in just a few short weeks. I’m also hoping by next week Carly and I will finish designing and selecting high summer and then it’s on to Autumn/Winter 2009…

However, rather than looking forward this week I have been looking back- Back in time that is! I went to a 60's exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum. There was a film running in the background throughout the exhibition called “Look at Life – Swingin’ London – In Gear “. It was really fab all about life in London in the 60s. One of my favourite lines in the film has to be: “Everybody thinks London is Swingin’ –but is it really? You look around and here and there you see someone who looks like they might swing….”

It made me wonder, has London changed that much? Maybe it has? The clothes were truly amazing particularly the “retro look” of the 60’s which was mostly influenced by 1920’s fashion- You know the whole Biba thing with cloche hats and feather boas. However, saying that the 60’s really did design something truly special– the MINI!
That’s what I am really jealous of- it’s so hard for anyone to come up with anything completely original these days. Fashion seems to be a constant revival of something from the 20th century; from the 20’s through to the 80’s eighties everyone has their favourite decade.

Personally, I love them all but I’m on the look out for something new. Maybe London was swingin’ then or at least going in the right direction!

Talking of new and swingin’ Carly and I went to a party this weekend with pampas grass in the front garden. …Don’t worry we held on firmly to our car keys…

Carol