The end.

Model: Katy Tipton
Designer: Lauren Kemp
Photographer & Stylist: Starr Crow

I think this should finish out the collection of photos I shot featuring Lauren Kemp's designs. I hope you liked everything you saw and don't mind that I stretched them out over such a long period of time. I've got more projects lined up, so hopefully I'll have some new work to show you soon!

Nothing that surrounds us is object, all is subject.

This was model Katy's favorite outfit from our shoot with Lauren Kemp's collection. She came in town yesterday for a different shoot with me and another photographer, but we had to cancel last minute because the hair/makeup artist never showed. It was a frustrating situation.

I used to get pretty bummed when stuff like that happened, especially because so much thought and planning goes into every detail of a shoot. Some models have to ask off work, others drive in from nearby cities, and you just have to cross your fingers and hope that everyone follows through and shows up like they promised. Most of the time it works out, but sometimes it doesn't. I just try to keep a positive attitude and reschedule as quickly as possible. Yesterday we cured the blues with pizza.

Wednesday

Hope everyone had a great Christmas! I got a few things from my wishlist and a few cool things that I wasn't expecting, and Jake approved of all his gifts too. I'd venture to say this year's gift exchange was a success. I meant to stop back by the blog last week to announce the winner of the Romwe giveaway, but the excitement around Christmas kept me away. So congratulations to MARILYN. You're the winner of the Romwe giveaway! Someone will be in touch with you very soon about collecting your prize.

I've still got a few photos left of model Katy wearing Lauren Kemp's designs which I'll try to share over the next few weeks. This photo is the only good one I got of that cozy outfit. Doesn't Katy look beautiful?

2011 Christmas Wishlist

I'm really awesome at making wishlists, but really awful at getting them in an organized post. Every Christmas I make a wishlist on Kaboodle for my mom and my sister to reference, but I always forget to share them on the blog. Not this year, my friends.

My wishlist starts with the letters I used to create the words "wish". They're made of cardboard, cotton, and old maps and are available at Urban Outfitters for $12 per letter. I was trying to come up with something to spell out on my wall (something short so I could get away with buying fewer letters), but Jake convinced me that I could make them just as well. So, I guess that has moved to my DIY wishlist. 

For my real wishlist. . .

1) You bloggers are killing me with all your cute Instax photos. I've already made up my mind; if I don't get an Instax Mini for Christmas, I'm buying my own. Merry Christmas to me.

2) This rug isn't for sale, but I sure wish it were. It was made by a Navajo weaver sometime in the 20s, and I found it and fell in love with it while writing my paper last month. I've shown Jake some Pendleton blankets that I might be interested in, but none have my heart like this one.

3) I'd take a million things from Madewell, but I've been loving this pair of boots for more than a year and would seriously love to cross them off my wishlist.

4) PASSPORT! This is one thing that I know for certain I'm getting. Because I have so many brothers and sisters we all get a spending limit with our parents, and this is what I chose this year. I've never traveled outside of the country, but this summer I plan to attend a study abroad trip with the art history department. We'll be going to the Yucatán to study ancient Maya art and architecture, and I'm verrry excited.

5) It's my goal to learn how to play the guitar this year. I'm bummed I don't know how already! I don't want to be a rockstar or even play any live shows, I just want to be able to sit by myself and write a song if I choose to.

6) I saw this book at my friends house a few weeks ago and wasted no time flipping through the entire thing. Things are so different in Little Rock now. I would love to do a photo series where I recreate each photo just to show how drastic the changes have been.

7) A good set of watercolors is another thing that's been high on my wishlist for awhile now. I have a vision of a little sketchbook I'd like to start in 2012, and a set of Winsor & Newton watercolors would be the perfect way to kick it off.

Catching Up

Sweater & Shoes: Goodwill
Vintage Fedora: Estate Sale
Skirt: American Apparel
Tote: Modcloth
Necklace: Saver's
Nude Heart Tights: Forever 21

Things have been pretty busy around here despite the fact that finals have been over for more than a week now. I still don't have a Christmas tree up or anything remotely festive around the house, and I haven't even thought about buying a single present yet. I'll be scrambling to get all that together this weekend (wish me luck).

The good news is that I have a couple of new outfits to post! I haven't found much time to edit photos until now, so there were a couple of sets just hanging out on my camera waiting for me. This one is pretty recent. Kristi and I met for lunch and a trip to a few local boutiques, and she was sweet enough to take some photos for me. I've been carrying this Moby Dick tote around non-stop for the past month, and the sweater pretty much carried me through the second half of the semester.

I fell in love because it reminded me of a combination of two shirts I wanted from Urban Outfitters in 2007 or 2008. I never bought either one of them, but I did cut them out of the catalog and glue them into my sketchbook. I was ecstatic when I finally found something similar at Goodwill, and it's cropped too which is perfect because I can wear it over most of my dresses.

Leigh Lorraine

I took a month off from writing my fashion column for Sync during the busiest part of the semester, but I'm back this week with a feature on the most precious vintage shop manager in town, Leigh Lorraine Bondurant. I've been trying out this new article where I select a stylish person who works at either a creative or interesting job, and I interview them about how it has influenced their style. I ask them to bring a few of there most favorite things to the shoot, and they tell me about where they came from and why they love them. Most of the time they're family heirlooms, and that was no different with Leigh Lorraine. I've attached a few photos below of her favorite things which include two necklaces, one from her grandma and the other a gift from her mom, a fur coat which she got from the vintage shop she runs, and a pair of boots and a bag which were both hand-me-downs from her mom.

You can read the article here if you'd like.

Leigh Lorraine and I hit it off so well that collaborations are now in the talks. Collaborations with a vintage shop manager = fun times ahead.

Lauren Kemp + Katy (Part 4)

Photographer: Starr Crow w/ Vintage Canon TLb
Model: Katy Tipton
Designer: Lauren Kemp
Art Director: Heather Canterbury & Starr Crow

Just a few more shots of Katy to show from our shoot with Lauren's collection. If I had to pick one outfit that I was most looking forward to it was this one. A cutout dress with a boater and a bike, and a basket just big enough for a furry muffin to play in. Maybe my excitement was a distraction when it came to loading the film because I certainly failed at that. My friend Heather helped me with the first set, but she took my training wheels off for this one and my lack of experience showed. Improper installation coupled with the exact opposite ISO settings required = a waste of film. I preserved my most favorites so you guys could at least see the dress; notice the criss-crossed neckline and the cutout detail at the waist. Perrrfection.

P.S. -- one more test before school's out for the semester, andddd Corey's back in Little Rock for good. Hope you're ready to see my face again.

How to Wear: Hetterson

S/S Crenelle Sweater: by Hetterson

Skirt, Shirt, & Hat: Thrift

Socks: H&M

Shoes: Madewell

Bag: Gift from Lee

Necklace: ModCloth

I meant to have these photos up earlier today, but the moving sale has been going so well that I haven't gotten around to posting them until now –– a good problem to have, I guess! A while back, Hannah Elise, the brains behind the beautiful label Hetterson asked me to be apart of a "How to wear series" where a few different bloggers style her S/S Crenelle sweater. It's a honor because I've been in love with her label for a while and because I adore all the other bloggers involved! It's been fun watching how they've styled it over the past few weeks.

If you followed my blog last spring, you'll know that this hat doesn't leave my head much once the temperatures start to warm. I figured this sweater would be the perfect piece to pair it with to reintroduce the spring season! After shooting a few Sync photos at the Old State House museum this weekend –– and not being able to wait to show them to you –– I decided I'd go back and shoot this outfit there, too.

Besides the interesting state history that's packed inside it's walls, the building is one of my favorites in this whole city. We just went over Andrea Palladio's work in art history, and the facade of this building reminds me so much of his Villa Rotonda (which was inspired by Roman and Greek architecture). I'll have to go back and do a real post on all the fun historical facts it has to offer, but for now here's a photo overload of our afternoon on the lawn.

P.S. The sweater has one more stop before the series is complete, and I'll give you a hint: it's going across the pond next!

Photos by Corey!

I'm having a sale!

My sister is moving out of her apartment and Jake and I just put down a deposit on a new and bigger place, so we decided to have a moving sale. There's tons and tons of good vintage in the bunch, so if you're a local reader and you don't have much to do this weekend you should definitely stop by! Kristi is an owl collector, our friend Christy is a movie collector, and I, of course, am a clothing collector, so there will be lots of 70s decor, cameras, shoes, clothes, movies, purses – pretty much anything a 20-something-year-old girl would have. I'll be there every morning (until I have to go to work), so please stop by and tell us hi (and buy all our stuff)! :)

P.S. I'm going to try to post some pictures on facebook soon!

P.P.S. Big thanks to Jake for laying out the font on this flyer. If you like the art work, then you're going to love Clarence Coles Phillips. You can read more about him here!

My New Job: Fashion Writer for Sync!

I can't believe I didn't get to this on Wednesday when I promised – I'm such a liar – but I'm finally here to tell you about my new job. I was waiting on my employer to update the website with the latest round of content before I posted. They usually do it on Wednesday's, but with the holiday's going on, it wasn't updated until today.

It must have been about 6 or 8 months ago that I was talking with a friend about how much I missed  the fashion section of our local culture magazine, Sync Weekly. The girl that used to write the column moved to Brooklyn to pursue photography, I think, and they replaced it with a weekly piece about the local kickball league. I missed the fashion section so much, and I was afraid that the magazine lost a certain young female demographic when she left.

With the help of an awesome co-worker (thanks Spenser!) I was able to get the contact information that I needed to get in touch with the people behind Sync. I wrote a letter pitching a few ideas of things I could write about, and to my surprise, they loved them. I was offered a job as the fashion writer for the publication!

I certainly don't think I'm the most qualified for the job as "fashion writer", but I'm thrilled to have the position. I plan to work really hard to improve my topics and my writing over time. My articles will alternate between two topics each week, the first will be an article about current trends with photos from the streets, and the second will be about finding an look that inspires you and translating it to fit your own style. Now you guys know why I created a tumblr! It's provided a great way for me to organize the photos and trends that are inspiring me right now.

I've always loved Sync because it covers everything local and interesting. Because of them I know about upcoming shows, new restaurants, building plans. . . pretty much everything I need to know about what's happening in Little Rock. The newspaper is very well distributed with an incredibly high pick up rate, and I am just so honored to be a part of what they do!

I'm a little embarrassed by my first article (about the capes) and the incredibly "vanilla" writing, as Jake called it (he's not mean, I forced him to be honest). I think easing my way into the position was tough, but now that I've completed my fourth article, I'm starting to feel a lot more comfortable with my writing. Big thanks to Ashley and Cait for letting me borrow their photos for my inspiration piece this week.

Would you guys be interested in reading my articles each week? That may be silly I guess, but I'd be more than happy to post them on the blog if you'd like. Just let me know! For a look at the rest of the magazine, visit Sync Weekly and click "digital edition" at the top left side of the page.

Local Designer Spotlight: Lauren Roark

On Saturday night I went to an event called HarvestFest in a well-known and very well-liked neighborhood, Hillcrest, here in Little Rock. HarvestFest is pretty much a massive block party, except for the fact that they have a yearly fashion show! It's put on by a great little boutique called Box Turtle which carries a lot of great independent designer pieces. I've always loved the shop because there's a room upstairs that's dedicated to nothing but local designers!

I think in all there were something like six or seven designers who showed, all very creative and unique with their own different styles and influences, but my favorite designer had to be Lauren Roark. I had a feeling that would happen since she loves vintage as much, if not more than me. She's got a pretty vintage shop in one of the local flea markets and I know she sells a few things online too!

Her background in vintage radiated through the silhouettes in her collection, though the vibrant prints and inventive headpieces rounded it out with a much more modern element. I could see myself wearing the first dress more than anything, but I know it's a one-of-a-kind design and there's no way that model is the same size as me!

If I had a fancy flash for my camera like the guy beside me, I'd definitely have more photos to show you. I wish I would've gotten more of Lauren's line and of the line that went right before her, but my camera doesn't do so well at night. I just ordered a Canon Speedlite 580ex on Ebay today, mostly because I have my first paying photo gigs coming up in a few weeks and I want to be prepared, but it'll be nice to have it for nighttime events like this too.

If you're interested in learning more about Lauren or want to get your hands on one of her pieces, just let me know and I'll try to get you in contact with her.

Biking to the Clinton Library

It's been a bit of a delay getting to my Labor Day photos, but between listing clothes, styling outfits, printing tickets, making lists and Wal-mart trips, and still going to school and birthday parties, I haven't had much time to devote to pictures.

I wish I could say these photos were taken during a Labor Day picnic at a serene location with my honey, but that would be a big fat lie. Jake spent the holiday playing video games at a friends house, and I did a lot of the things listed above, along with riding my bike to the Clinton Library for some outfit shots. The clouds were real pesky that day, and every time I'd have the perfect shot setup, the sun would hide behind the clouds again. It was annoying, and I spent half the time sitting and waiting for the sun to get out and do it's business.

I love the steep heels on the lawn of the president's library though. I love that they make me look like I'm in a vast place—assuming you don't see that helicopter in the background, of course—and I love that they shield me from any tourists passing by. It's just me surrounded by three walls of grass!