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What is ‘A Personal Style’ and who’s got it? Is it someone who spends a tons of money for fashion and follows the latest trends? Or a person who has found the perfect silhoutte, hair-do and colour-range 20 years ago and sticks to it for the rest of his life? Or is it the fleamarket lover who doesn’t care about pricetags and designerlabels, who shops from other people’s clear-outs?
‘A Personal Style’ is a blog who answers this questions – no check-lists, make-up tutorials or style counselling, just a few carefully chosen people with a very distinctive style that are followed and observed for a long time. Slow blogging – the big picture will slowly develop.
My models are fellows like you and me who maybe pay a bit more attention to what they are wearing than the average. They live in Munich, Paris, London, Berlin or L.A. Women and men, different ages, most of them I have known for quite a while and always liked the way they dressed. I take their pictures on a more or less regular basis depending on where they live and how often I manage to see them. I don’t tell them what to wear, they come as they are.
Each model has its own gallery, a time machine that lets you see changes and developments from the very first to the most recent picture: hair colours that vary, beards that grow and grey, colour preferences that change with the seasons, faces sometimes more happy sometimes less, depending on life’s circumstances. Each photo comes along with a little article about the outfit, the person or the thoughts that cross my mind when I see the picture.
They are all different. What they have in common is their very special, intuitive way to pick their clothes, they all know their bodies well, they know what suits them and what they want to express.
Fashion is not a status symbol, price tags and labels are secondary. Old can be as precious as new. Shop and dress conciously.
Re-tail therapy
Spice up your shopping pleasure with a little bit of world improvement. Re-cycle, Re-use, Re-think.
I provide you with a very special insight into my personal shopping habits. Shopping world of Julia. What I buy, where I buy it and why. No secrets here. Pricetags are still attached. A classic Armani blazer? Unaffordable? No way – 30,00 € at the Multiple Sclerosis charity bazaar. Those cute, green patent leather pumps with the square heel? 4,00€ at the thrift store. The big golden hoops with the textile tassles? 150,00 € from a concept store in Portland. Fashion’s not always what it seems to be. That’s so cool about it.
My fondness for second hand shopping also goes very well with my ambition to treat nature with care. Not always easy since our modern-day lifestyle provides us with everything we need a for a smooth day-to-day routine. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that we have to happily sail into environment’s sunset on a raft of plastic bags, dressed in made-in-Bangladesh from head to toe with a take-away coffee cup in our hands, correct? We are used to it, certainly, coffee-to-go, ready-to-eat, mountains of plastic bottles that contain our shampoos, body lotions and smoothies. Not to forget the great comfort of online shopping! I am the last person to tell you: Stop all that now! Because I am a realist, things just don’t work like that. What does work instead is becoming more aware. Try to start with 10 or 20% consciousness, something that doesn’t hurt (second-hand shopping, textile shopping bags, no plastic lid on your take-out-coffee), then slowly increase the standards (up-cycling, avoid packaging, fair fashion, take your own cup with you), you decide for yourself how far you want to go. 30% environment-friendly is better than giving up 100%. And there is still room for improvement. And imagine everyone trying. We could be on our way to save the world…
‘A Personal Style’ went online in August 2011 with 1-2 new posts each week.
All written content, photos and illustrations are by Julia Richter if not stated otherwise. If I use other photographer’s work I have their personal permission (e.g. lots of my ‘Icons’).