Fashion Flashback at the British Library

Another inspirational night, and an excuse to wear my glad rags... 

Created by Julie Verhoeven for the festival

Who ever thought we’d see fashion catwalk’s occurring on the escalators of the British Library?! - of all places! 

Thanks to Central Saint Martins, this has been done and I’ve got the t-shirt after quite a fantastic night! The evening featured a number of talks, a scrapbook workshop where all could create a collage of their own, makeover sessions, costume drawing sessions and a history of fashion press through magazine covers.

Advertised with the famous Oscar Wilde quote, “You can never be overdressed or overeducated”, visitors were urged to dress as they dare! Why this put some of my friends off of accompanying me, I have no clue, for this is the perfect excuse to wear all those clothes you haven’t quite found that occasion to wear yet! So out came my gold foil skirt, and Topshop platform heels, these being the type of shoe that if you ever tried to club in, you’d be mistaken for a Bee Gee.

The featured talks of the night provided some great advice and inspiration for prospective fashion journalists. GQ Editor in Chief, Dylan Jones, talked of how he fell into journalism at the age of twenty-three, and advises simply to: “be tenacious. Go right to the top when applying.”

Iain Webb later that night made a very important observation, that it is “really important not to just look for fashion in fashion magazines – because its everywhere”. Sunday supplements for example, produced from the 1960’s were ground breaking in terms of fashion, providing advice for the common reader. Iain acts almost as an archaeologist, sitting in the Collindale section at the library matching up newspaper pictures of outfits to their designers, and urged his listeners to create their own sketchbook or portfolio. As like a book from the library, with that oddly attractive smell, and yellowed pages that you feel within your fingertips, you create something real and not another pigeon hole in cyber space.