Like any fashionista living in a rented house with disgusting wallpaper, the walls of my bedroom are covered in postcards, posters, photographs and pages torn from magazines. One much-loved shoot features underrated actress Romola Garai doing her best Julie Christie impression in a beauty shoot for In Style. When I was searching for the snaps online to show a friend, I stumbled across an even better shoot featuring the same girl. Taken from the fourth issue of the awe-inspiring Lula magazine, it's unwittingly become my style inspiration of late, sometimes without my even knowing it...
[scans from Lula magazine via Romola-Garai.com. Click to enlarge]
I love the way this mixes eras and textures without looking too much like fancy dress. Often looks from cult magazines are near-impossible to pull off in reality if you don't live in Hoxton and hang out with Nathan Barley. But this has elements that anyone can get away with. It's a bit 40s, a bit 60s, a bit 80s yet still completely modern. The super-glossy set hair, bright tights and beautiful Yves Klein blue are all things I love have been trying out recently, and I'm sure it's because these images have been in the back of my mind. Though I've never set out to 'copy' the look, I think things are sometimes there in your subconscious without you realising it.
And that, to me, is the sign of a good photoshoot. So I'd love to know which images have stuck in your head over the past few years. Be they Vanity Fair covers or Sartorialist snaps...
