A long time overdue but this post is finally going up. After suffering complications with both my cameras used during my time at London Fashion Week i've had to postpone this post till now, my apologies to the amazing Toni and Guy team!
Fashion week surged through London like a storm last month, from the 13th-17th. On the last day of the week, Tuesday 17th September, Toni and Guy invited me to come backstage with them. Toni and Guy were the official sponsors of London Fashion Week, creating a range called
Label. M, click on the link to buy from the collection.
Everybody was lovely. A special thank you goes to the amazing Gary and Eliza, who were lovely to meet and talk to and were so helpful. Another shout-out goes to the lovely Indira Shauwecker, project manager for the last show of the season: FAD, who created an amazing hair look for the models.
Throughout this post i'll talk you through the look, the experience and give you some great tips I picked up.
Here is what it looked like when I first arrived. There was a lot less hustle and stress than I thought there would be, it did get busier and more hectic but this was taken around 3pm for the 7.30pm show.
This was the finished look. Toni and Guy went for a modern look, a simple knot down the back of their hair. It gave a 60s feel, quite edgy yet soft. Indira wanted a texturised strong braid, minimal teasing with a natural parting, to show off the great looks the models wore.
Hair was simply blow-dried and brushed through as prep.
When creating the base of the 1 inch knot you had to make sure it was smooth and directly in the centre yet not too tight as movement was still wanted but has to be tight to not get loose and prickly. Hair was pulled back in line with the models' ears and the knot was started.
If you look closely you can see how all the hairdressers were doing it at different stages. In the background you can see one model's hair nearly finished, the hairdresser is in the middle of tying the bottom of the knot as it finished at the nape of the neck, letting a mane fall down the middle of your back.
Here you have one of the models after they have finished knotting the hair down to their nape. You might not be able to see clearly as these photos are rather unclear (a lack of ability in editing due to recent problems) but a piece of netting is placed over the braid. Hair spray was sprayed onto the hair whilst it was being blow dried into shape. Each model had a team of minimum two hair dressers and whilst one would blow-dry, the other would be squeezing and moulding the braid into a tight square shape.
Another model with almost ready hair.
Again the finished look. As you can see it varied on each model as some had longer or shorter hair. This hairstyle seems to photograph to be easy but I could tell it was a challenge to do, most of the hairdressers having to repeat it till they got it right. Indira didn't want too much teasing, preferably none, as it took away from the softness of the front of the hair. Once the hair had been finished being blow dried a glossy serum coated the hair to keep all of them smooth and at bay.
How amazing is this hair look?
A quick snap of the dress rehearsal of the FAD show, how cute are these designs?
I'm so grateful to of gone backstage with Toni & Guy, it was a pleasure and an amazing opportunity I one day hope to do again. I was backstage for around four hours running around and snapping photos so I wore an appropriate outfit: a black tee-shirt smock
Motel sent me and all black converse, accessorised with a gold chain, gold spike bracelet, black Longchamp bag and obviously my statement red lipstick (Hazard by Topshop). The show I saw, FAD, was designed by under-18s in a contest who made the designs over summer. The clothes were amazing and all the models looked great. It was great to see The Body Shop UK doing all the makeup too, my favourite part was the use of the white eyeshadow, featured in a previous
post of mine, and their use of highlighter. I was told this show had a much calmer backstage then many of the previous shows that week, something I was grateful to be apart of. I loved it so much and has definitely made me appreciate all my readers and viewers for making it possible because it is true that I would not of been able to do it without any of you.
Disclaimer: The photos are not great, as I mentioned earlier all photos were taken by me and I went through major complications. These are all my own photos.
