Milanese Window Shopping

You know you've got visual merchandising fever pretty bad when other people come back from their holidays with window display pictures for you. This happened when Paolo Feroleto took a trip to Milan for Salone del Mobile (which to non-design-heads is Design Week) and in-between snapping pictures of furniture managed to sneak in a little window shopping. Please enjoy Italian Louis Vuitton, Miu Miu and Stefanel windows, and my favourite, Moschino's harlequin clown. A new Manchester window shopping will come as soon as the weather clears up!

Dotty's Styling Factory

The fashion industry in the UK is worth approximately £21 billion to the economy, and employs 816,000 people; however I think young people are unaware of the scope for different careers the fashion industry holds. As a teenager I thought that designing was the beginning and end of fashion - how I thought those magazines I worshipped dropped on my doormat every month, how clothes arrived in stores, or how window displays were made, I don't know; the designers obviously magicked everything there with the power of their minds. Even now I am frequently astounded by the jobs available, with thoughts along the lines of "you get to do that for a living?!" - starting with the buyers, merchandisers, and marketers, and stretching all the way to stylists, photographers, and editors. I especially love all the new media and etail job titles - Social Media Managers, Corporate Social Responsibility Assistants, User Assistance Architects, et al. Mindblowing..!

So when The Style Factory gave me the opportunity to run fashion workshops for teens I was delighted to pass on my fashion career-related knowledge. The Style Factory makes the fashion industry accessible for young people, running pattern making, recycled fashion, and even "create your own fashion label" workshops in the North West, and for two days this week took over an (enormous!) empty unit in Runcorn's Halton Lea shopping centre for Fashion In The City. As well as the t-shirt printing, headband making, massages and make-up tutorials already running, yesterday I held styling and visual merchandising workshops using clothing from Room31.co.uk and a couple of props I'd brought along myself. No prizes for spotting the difference I'm afraid.









It was inspiring to find that kids are enthusiastic about window dressing and working in the fashion industry. They were incredibly creative, using scraps of fabric and rubber gloves to make ingenious displays. By far my favourite moment of the day was asking an 11-year-old girl what they would like to do as a job one day. "This", she said. I hope that I helped inspire her to pursue a career in the industry I love so much!

Totally Surreal, Man

Surrealism, n. Pure psychic automatism, by which one proposes to express, either verbally, in writing, or by any other manner, the real functioning of thought. Dictation of thought in the absence of all control exercised by reason, outside of all aesthetic and moral preoccupation.

In the 1930s Salvador Dalí created an installation for America's Bonwit Teller department store entitled "Narcissus". It was soon removed due to complaints from the general public; clearly it was far too outrageous for its time. Although no photographic evidence of the window appears to exist it can only be assumed the display was inspired by Dalí's painting, "Metamorphosis of Narcissus" (1937).

One also guesses the new Harvey Nichols Manchester displays was inspired by Dalí's paintings and the works of other surrealists, such as Delvaux, Magritte, and and Kahlo (top to bottom, below). The windows are utter dreamlike perfection, featuring tree people in D&G, skeletons in a Givenchy-clad clinch, and mannequins chillin' in Burberry next to an awesome interpretation of "The False Mirror".

This is by far my favourite window display I've seen - and as a visual geek I've travelled far and wide to see many - and I am so proud to say it is in my home city of Manchester!

Visual Madness

Check out my mad crazy visual skills! One of the reasons I chose my degree is that along with studying business, marketing, accounting, garment production and Photoshop, I got the chance to install a window display for a visual merchandising module. Today was the big day.

Initially inspired by Stella McCartney's spring/summer 2012 collection, I looked into tropical prints and vintage Hawaii; I was also helped out by my friends at Oasis, whose current collection of printed dresses fitted my idea perfectly.

I am super pleased with the result. Unfortunately due to the sun being so bright today the pictures didn't come out too great, but here they are for your perusal:

Parisien Courses de Fenêtre

Rue St Honoré

Issey Miyake





Diane Von Furstenberg









Miu Miu









Colette





Latin Quarter

Isabel Marant





Champs Elysées

Louis Vuitton



















Hugo Boss











Galeries Lafayette





Céline



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