I was able to get back into town in time to catch the last few days of New York Fashion Week. I can’t wait to share all the fun 2018 fashion trends I discovered with you.
Fashion week is one of the most fun, yet hectic times of the year for me. And that may or may not be one of the reasons why the number of days I attend keep shortening by the year. Both last season and this season I only attended the last three days of the shows.
Over the years, it has become much easier to spot what I want to capture. Things are a lot faster and to the point for me. I still remember my earlier days six years ago. I snapped everything that moved past my lens, and then I’d come home with tons of pictures I couldn’t relate to and which I’d never post. So, it makes sense that I am not running up and down the streets for 7 days trying to attend every show and capture everything. I am barely able to share all the photographs I take over three days. What I do these days is come home, look at what I photographed, and craft a story around it to share with you. I’ve been really fortunate to experiment with this over the years and fine tune how I want to retell the fashion story each season.
More importantly, I wanted things to be a lot easier. I have photographed in record low temperatures where my camera has completely stopped working, through hail, rain, and snow. There are long days of starting early, walking for hours, having late meals, and getting little sleep. I noticed the difference between simply working hard and hurting my body. I am striving to be smarter with how I manage my time and taking on a more intentional approach to what I want to share and how I want to share it. I never take for granted that my website is a space with infinite freedom to express my true self and creativity the way I want to and even better to evolve every day without having to customize to fit any requirements.
People usually ask me who I am shooting for when I attend fashion week and many are surprised when I say it is mostly for myself. I absolutely love shooting fashion, and fashion week is a rare opportunity to be flooded with some of the best looks in style. It is that passion, and not any photo assignment, that has kept me going year after year. Another advantage of shooting for myself is that I get to truly pick what I’m drawn to and reinterpret it how I like through edits and blog posts. As a visual storyteller, the flexibility to tell the fashion story differently every time is always the fun part. However, I won’t deny that the challenge of being able to help agencies visually share their fashion stories, be it on a photo assignment or editorials, is something I look forward to indulging in a lot more of in the future.
P.S This image, one of my favorite from the street style looks this year, was inspired by today’s highly anticipated premiere of the “Black Panther” film. I’ve been so happy about all the rave reviews and how empowering & inspiring it has been to black culture.