Countryphile: The Make-up

Today's blog comes from the very talented Zoe Della Rocca, who designed the looks for the Countryphile photo shoot with Gareth Gregg and Brighton Fashion Week.

Zoe is a freelance make-up/hair artist and stylist, and can easily command the task of creative direction without hesitation. If you would like to hire Zoe for any of these jobs I would highly recommend her.

Here is the final look:

Copyright Gareth Gregg

And this is how Zoe achieved the look... now over to Zoe:

Website:  www.zoedellarocca.com

E-mail: info@zoedellarocca.com

I designed the hair and make up for Chrissie's Countryphile Collection at Brighton Fashion Week and subsequent fashion shoot, this involved making bespoke false nails, hair pieces and lashes. I then provided detailed instructions, face maps and photographic references for the hair and make up artist team working on the show.

After meeting Chrissie Nicholson Wild a year ago in a cafe for a casual chat over coffee, it soon became clear that I had found someone that shared my passion for experimental creativity.
Some one who is not scared to 'give things a go' and viewed anything possible until proven otherwise.
I liked this energy and we were soon lost deep in creative banter which blossomed into an ongoing productive working relationship.

During our initial meeting we talked of many ideas, one of which being Countryphile.
We discussed Chrissies design ideas, began a pinterest board and soon had ideas flourishing between us.
The Countryphile collection is, as the name suggests, a sexy play on tradtional english country trappings of the gentry. Tweeds, brass fittings and classic leather all feature heavily, there's even a flash of country fowl.

The Make Up and overall styling, strongly influenced by the obvious equine link was something we wanted to remain prominent throughout.

When considering the make up I instantly thought about the contours of a horses face.
Contrary to the common unflattering term 'she looks like a bit of a horse!', we discussed the elegant elongated nose, chiselled cheekbones, strong brows, dark sexy eyes and luscious lashes and felt a desire illustrate subtly.

Copyright Zoe Della Rocca

Highlighting and Contouring

For all the models I used MAC Vanilla pigment to highlight down the centre of the face from the forehead down the bridge of the nose.

I used a mixture of MAC 'Wood Winked' and MAC 'Tempting' eye shadows' to strongly contour under the cheekbones and down the inner sides of the nose....to elongate.

Eyes
The eyes were given a 'longeye' style this was achieved by firstly applying MAC Bronze eye pencil to the top and bottom water lines and subtly smudging to the outer edges.

Next I gave the eyes a gold base this was followed by MAC 'Tempting' in the socket. Using the blending brush, I gently 'pulled' the shadow out towards the outer edge of the eye. Finally I applied MAC reflects 'Antique Gold' in the corner 'triangle' of the eye, continuing to pull the colour outwards whilst seamlessly blending.

This look was completed by applying mascara and the false lashes.


I had attached the very fine green quills from a peacock feather onto the end of the false lashes using lash adhesive. Although it was a very fiddly job the results were stunning and really enhanced by the lighting.

Lips

This is the lip effect we created for the photo shoot up close:

(cropped from original edit) by Gareth Gregg

The high impact catwalk lips were achieved in the following way:

Firstly I colour matched the lipstick to the jacket lining, blending several lipsticks which I applied to the lips with a brush. I dotted DUO adhesive on the centre of the lips working out towards the corners of the mouth. Then, using an orange stick, I applied tiny pieces of flaked gold leaf.

Nails

I made bespoke false nails for the shoot inspired by the fabric linings and trimmings as I felt this would compliment and complete the overall styling concept.

Feather Nails

I painted a bronze base coat and applied the very ends of the pheasant feathers whilst the varnish was still tacky. Once dry, I trimmed the feathers and sealed with a clear top coat.

Tweed Nails

I used the nail adhesive sparingly to glue the fabric onto the nail and trimmed the fabric once dry.

copyright Zoe Van Spyk

Countryphile Style- Hair and Make-up

Countryphile Style, and introduction to the massively talented Zoe Della Rocca who defined the hair and make up style for this collection. When I first wrote up my proposal for Brighton Fashion Week I had to submit 'looks' for the hair and make-up for the collection: now, I'm not that into hair and make-up so after submitting my original concept of make up as 'uber English Rose' and the hair as 'Equine dressage plaits' months and months ago, I got a surprise visit from Zoe Della Rocca who had been hanging out in America at Burning Man and doing other supercool stuff like the supercool chick she is.

Original hair and make-up concepts copyright: C. Nicholson

After telling her what I was up to for Brighton Fashion Week and what Countryphile was all about Zoe brought her high octane energy to the project. Well, it was exciting and invigorating to have someone on board who has such a great vision for styling as sometimes I am far too close to my collection to think about anything but the clothes.

For the fashion show we had to pick the overlying look as it would have been impossible to have created a different look for each model, but originally Zoe had come up with so many great idea's to compliment my clothes that I just have to share the full vision with you, because it was immense.

But first we had to sit down and refine the concepts.

Make up,
After many hours of banter we chose to concentrate on the tweed/bronze, black and gold as our colour palette with some possible wine red toning that matched the lining of the jackets. Then we scrapped the wine lips in favour of nude with some loose gold leaf to bring an edge of faded opulence and because we wanted the drama of the eyes to play out without interference of adding an extra bold colour. Highlighting down the forehead, nose and high on the cheekbones in opulent white and contouring in bronze to hollow out the cheeks gave us a strong base to play out our equine inspired theme with dark dramatic eyes and huge eyelashes for the finishing touches.

Face map copyright: Z Della Rocca

Zoe bought the Eyelure lashes, which were stipulated by the Brighton Fashion Week team and then set about making them unique by adding gold dust and peacock feathers...each pair tailored to one of four looks as created by Zoe. We didn't find out until the week before the show that all eyelashes had to be vetted by the Benefit make-up team, and luckily they passed them. Lucky because we had already made them and if we couldn't have used them I would have got pretty upset.

Hair,
There were four looks for the hair all relating to the overall concepts of equine dressage or ruined aristocrat and one look for the men. Each involved some gold 'marcel wave' pin in hair pieces which Zoe and I had designed and Zoe had made especially for the show. We had originally planned to weave in extra hair for volume on top of wadding for some extreme height and Zoe had sourced some real horse hair tails for some super long pony tails. Zoe had worked tirelessly to produce some amazing concepts and pieces and, had worked it all out. Due to sponsorship issues Zoe was not able to join me backstage on the day to complete the looks or assist in any final touches which was hugely disappointing for us both.

Hair concepts: Countryphile

On the day of the show it proved far too complex and time consuming to do all the looks as Brighton Fashion Week's industrious hair and make-up team had in excess of 66 models to prepare. In the end they had to outsource to do the braids so Emma Hellier and her super talented team did the honours on the day. We ended up with one style consisting of a lifted plait that began as a mega quiff, rose high over the head in a plait and then finished with two plaited tails down the back as long as each models hair would allow. The hair and make up for the show looked great on the night, but it didn't compare to what we had hoped to achieve so we will save these greater plans for photo shoots to follow.

Nails,
The nail concepts were to use the tweed style fabric used for the tailoring and pheasant feathers that tied in with the whole collection. Some feather pieces are yet to be added to the collection and will, no doubt be used when we start shooting for the website. Again, Zoe took on the task with great enthusiasm and successfully produced some amazing false nails. Again, on the day this just didn't happen so we'll be saving that for the future also. Hence no piccie...it would spoil the surprise.

I have really enjoyed working with Ms Zoe Della Rocca, and cannot state fully enough how her support and enthusiasm have enriched the culmination of the Countryphile Collection. To commission Zoe as creative director, make up artist or stylist extraordinaire here are her contact details:

07973637356
info@zoedellarocca.com
Zoe website: www.zoedellarocca.com

Curve Couture on the catwalk:Brighton Fashion Week

After the fashion show: feelings and thoughts from the Evelina

Please note: This post, was originally written on 21st June, and I have simply copied and pasted rather than re-editing because I simply didn't want to dilute it.

After the massive high of the fashion show I now find myself in the Evelina children's hospital in London waiting for my 3 year old to return from kidney surgery and I am feeling very reflective.(21st June)

I have closed the Curve Couture studio for a whole week, an unprecedented event since I was on maternity leave. Despite the hugely inconvenient timing sometimes life comes first, and this week is no exception.

So while I have a few hours to kill instead of dwelling on the current events, I am writing my blog to bring it up you up to speed with how Brighton Fashion Week went down.

The week long run up to Brighton Fashion Week I spent mostly wired, tired and downright determined to finish what I had started. At the beginning of the week I had all but the men's corsets and breeches and skirts, shorts and bra's finished. It sounds like a lot; and it was. Aside from this I still had three commissions to complete that week...so it was full on stress.

I had some great assistance from Zoe Van Spyk who is cutting her teeth in the workshop whilst she puts a fashion business proposal together, as she is a wonderful fashion designer in her own right and the hugely creative Zoe Della Rocca who came up with the styling for hair and make-up from my original brief. I will be introducing Zoe Della Rocker as a guest blogger very soon for the Countryphile style as she had such a massive creative vision that the peeps at Brighton Fashion Week had to hold us back.

So, we were busy, super fricking busy. The night before the show we were working until the sun came up and after a sleep that was way to short, in my opinion, the time had arrived to shake our tail feathers and show just what Curve Couture is made of.

Well, as it turned out, St Barts in Brighton (a church more renowned for taking the assumed dimensions of Noah's Ark than fashion) was packed. The ornate windows and beautiful brickwork being a great foil for the drama that was the Showreel Show, the first of it's kind in the world where the world of vintage,costume and cosplay strut it's stuff instead of the elitism of a strict catwalk show.

For my part, I didn't get to see the first half as I was too busy backstage dealing with 'on-the-day' problems such as lost bags, shoes that didn't fit and the surprise of a quick change for one of my wonderful male models Joe...as he had been booked back to back on the designers either side of me. Stress. A fashion show, like any event, is full of nerves, stress and high emotions as well as unexpected changes, problems and an aura of excited expectation.

Whet your whistle:

photo by Sarah Olivier, model Ellie Watson

Gypsy wedding dress part 2

So, I left the last blog at building the foundation and just beginning to decorate it.

I must say when I had finished this dress I sat back and properly admired it. The finished piece:

It was decided that we would only put the top hoop in and allow the dress to hang rather than put in all 5 hoops realising as we went along just how impractical it was in real life to fully load it up.

Close up of the bodice detailing. In an ideal world I would have preferred to have had pink spikes like the metal ones but I couldn't get any that were the right shape so I had to settle for spike beads instead. It was unfortunate because they had to be constantly made to stand proud as they has a bit of a mind of their own.

The feather shoulder pieces were total fun to make, but a total bitch to fit and stay in place. and they looked magnificent, as can be seen by her arrival at Brighton Fashion Week.

used with kind permission from Gareth Gregg, Sunshine Lens Photography

Welcome Back! My gypsy wedding inspired dress commission part 1

In the last month I have been superbly busy with preparations for Brighton Fashion Week, which came to a close today.

So now the schedule isn't quite so crazy I'm going to take this relatively peaceful Sunday evening to catch up with all the work I have been up to.

I'm going to start with the creation of the largest dress I have ever made that wasn't a wedding dress.

The dress I am about to go into was commissioned as a "gypsy wedding big" style dress. So naturally I went for it. The lovely lady who commissioned the dress wanted to wear it for the opening night of Brighton Fashion Week and she requested it to be pink and black with spikes and studs.

Original sketch for the piece:

 

I had to start by building a huge petticoat. I have watched almost every episode of My Big Fat Gypsy Weddings on  4od and it provides insights into how they are made by the now infamous Thelma Madine. In the program they claim that the brides wear numerous petticoats and that they are so heavy that they leave scars. Well, no matter the brief I certainly didn't want that to happen to my client so I set about trying to figure out a more elegant solution.

So, I built the foundation corset and petticoat: this is the petticoat without it's full bottom hoop,which actually took up the whole floorspace in my studio.  This is the petticoat half way through production. At this point I had used a 40m bale of dress net. I decided I needed more to really make this dress stand out.

 So, another 20m later I had my petticoat. Then I started work on the bodice. The first layer of decoration is a bold guipure lace in black.

This is the first positioning of the lace, I eventually decided on a different layout, then the studs had to go in/on it. Being the kind of spikes required were quite weighty there was no other choice except to punch them through both the interlining, and extra layer of foam wadding and the outer fabric to stop them from pulling clean out of the fabric. It started out quite funny that every time this dress was fitted I was asked to put more on, but as my deadline started looming I was starting to get stressed about all the extra detailing. But my client is amazing, so she was totally worth it.

Final installment of the gypsy wedding dress coming soon...

READ THE NEXT POST ABOUT THIS DRESS HERE

Countryphile meets the catwalk

To buy tickets for the show: http://apptap.co.uk/bfw

Brighton Fashion Week: it's official

Today I appeared on the Brighton Fashion Week website, how exciting.

Check me out:

http://www.brightonfashionweek.com/curve-couture/

Breeches, breeches, breeches!

So menswear, I hinted in my last post that I was going to produce a menswear line sometime soon. Well, today I took my first steps in that endeavour. A couple of weeks ago I started to scour my pattern cutting books to find some interesting points to start my collection. As always I am deeply attracted to sharp military styling, and strong silhouettes and want to echo the Countryphile collection that I am about to launch.

Today I had some help in the studio from Zoe Van Spyk and we had a great day mocking up my first breeches pattern for an upcoming photo shoot for a calender in aid of Mind charity later in the year. I have worked with Zoe previously, as she co-organised the Guerilla Fashion Event II in February, so I knew already that we were going to work with each other well, that she was capable and up for the challenge. In her day job she works for renowned Brighton tailors Gresham Blake and working alongside her is a great pleasure....and it helps that we share the same sense of humour and have a boner for Game of Thrones.

So, tonight I present my very first draft of the very first piece of my Menswear Collection. It has little detailing currently as I am just in trial stage but I really wanted to share it....here begins my mission to make modern dandies and gentlemen of all you men folk.

I really like the hang of the breeches and my boyfriends bum looks especially good in these breeches in my opinion. From here I will start to figure out what details I want to add where and make some minor fitting adjustments. Stay with me and Zoe as we both work together on some show pieces that will be given their debut in June at Brighton Fashion Week.

Fan lacing...experimenting...

Experiments with fan lacing going well.

I've been  trying to incorporate concepts of fan lacing with the aesthetics of the Victorian corset. Been having loads of fun finding different ways of lacing up the back to get the most out it. I have surmised from  my experimentation that considerable fitting must be made to the lacing to make it 'fit' correctly, so upon purchase of one of these models an assistant will have had to adjust these laces to the wearer exactly before the freedom of daily self lacing could happen. Presumably, the design itself allows a certain amount of flexibility for the wearer top loose/gain weight as all they would have to do (unless weight change is dramatic) is go and have the laces re-fitted at the retailer.

Interesting.

Also of note is that the fan lacing corsets are not meant to be tight laced like their predecessors. There is just not enough flexibility to gain the 4" difference you could expect from a traditionally designed corset.

I love the idea of incorporating fan lacing as a decorative feature on a traditional shaped corset. This is a first propper attempt, very pleased with it...further experimentation required. Took me three lacing's to make it work. Phew!

Couture Fashion inspired by the British Engineerium 2

In less than a month I have to make this absolutely fabulous outfit for the Brighton Museum as featured in my last bloggy blog. Current status is searching for just the right materials and colours with which to set this piece alight. After I set up my new studio up at home I'll be getting onto pattern cutting. Still designing the detail for the front of the corset, am torn between my love for figurative embroidery and the abstract beading that seems more appropriate for the piece. It is a battle of style I hope I can resolve shortly...