Chillin' and paparazzin' in the backstage

My friend Concetta asked me to come and help her on a photoshoot she was styling for. She and Kristina (the photographer) have been collaborating for a while now. Have a peek;)

The shoot was held at the Romeur Academy Studios. This where we actually met in the first place - a few years ago when the academy started a fashion & media oriented website I started writing articles for it and they both made part of the editing (Kristina is the editor in chief).

Concetta is showing the editorial which inspired her to the model.








Concetta posing for the light check.








The wardrobe. THE WARDROBE! Concetta was so lucky to get to borrow some pieces from our friend Emanuele's private collection. I'm telling you, I think I haven't seen someone more obsessed with fashion than he is. So we have here some pieces of Hussein Chalayan, Stella McCartney, Margiela and last but not least Prada (the fur jacket you see below). Plus the bags- LV,Fendi, YSL, ..








This is the model- Danilo. Though he's not a professional model, he's natural charm and charisma filled the whole room the minute he walked in. He didn't notice I was taking a photo of him - I love his profile! And that hair...




Kristina is a great photographer, she knew exactly which buttons to push to get the right attitude out of the model. Would like to be photographed by her one fine day myself too, maybe:)




As soon as Danilo noticed me, he took one of his zoolanderish poses and Kristina stopped him right away, telling him not to do THAT on the shoot..
























Everybody, this is Concetta presenting Fendi.












Everybody, this is Danilo presenting The Muse (YSL).




















I ADORED THESE PANTS.







With Kristina not seeing him, Danilo does not lose the chance to pull off some other of his zoolanderish poses...







;)

Thanks to Kristina and Concetta, it was a blast.

I just thought I'd mention it..

“My technique is the absence of technique,” said Mr. Richardson, “The lens is my eye, my charisma, my ability to capture moments of truth, whatever they may be, picture angles, use of color, light, scenery—these have always been the essential aspects of my photographic art.”

Today Pirelli released their 37th calendar.

(click!)

Let me tell You few things about Italian Men

This is going to be fun.

I'm going to dedicate this post to men. Yes. To MEN, and more precisely to Italian men. But I won't bother you with annoying stories about love or relationships or god-knows involving something else sentimental.. (although lovestories with Italian men can never be boring, it's like saying "Obama is bronzed." And YES, this "joke" was said by mister Berlusconi himself, what a shame!!!).

I'm going to talk about fashion. Now we all know that the italian fashion is world-widely appreciated and pretty much everyone who understands and gets the meanings of "elegance" and "style", connects these two conceptions firstly to the italian tradition of dressing. It couldn't be differently as in Italy everybody loves fashion. Everybody lives from fashion. Women love fashion, children love fashion (already at the age of seven they ask from their parenst for the coolest sneakers there are in shops), grandmothers and grandfathers love fashion (their way of dressing is really ageless: Classy and Elegant, just like it was in their golden-age in the sixties when the Dolce Vita just started to blossom)... But the ones who really take the risk and really take it on the edge... are the men.

There are three things, 3 crucial things without the italian men just can't live without: the football (the football.. God! Take it away and they die. Make their favourite team lose and they die.), the food (their OWN traditional Italian food ofcourse! Nothing else can ever beat their mom's home-made pasta-asciutta, never ever), and ofcourse the women. THE WOMEN, wonderful creatures made exclusively for them.

And I don't think I'm so wrong after all if I say that the 4th crucial thing is fashion. Yes, I'm quite sure of it. Fashion is not only the way they dress, it's their lifestyle, the expression of their personality and, most importantly, their origin in the deepest meaning. So it's totally normal and cool, if men look in the mirror more than their girlfriends. (It's the women that get bored and rather avoid going shopping with their fiancès.)

These pictures are ALL taken by Scott Schumann.

Their way of dressing is rather special. But it's traditional.
A little bit dandy.
Oh no, sorry, it's quite A LOT DANDY.
So very very elegant.
Soft.
And if I said edgy and risky before I meant colourful.
It's the quality they're looking for.
The tradition.
The unique piece, not so easily found, is the key..

Here is a shoot taken by Mario Testino (for Vogue) two years ago of the most dandyish italian public-display persona Lapo Elkann. You may have heard of him before. He's a New York-born Italian industrialist, former marketing manager and heir to the automaker Fiat. As famous for his outrageously unique sense of flair, it couldn't be other way that Vanity Fair included him in the International Hall of Fame: Best Dressed Men list. (check!).
And there's a whole blog dedicated to the way of italian men dressing. (check!)

PS! Of course there's a bit of humour in this story, please take it ironically!:)

"In your message you said, you were goin' to bed, but I'm not done with the night..

..And I, don't know how, to slow it down.. "
The new Norah Jones song, I just love it. The beat the melody, the voice, everything. Too bad it's so short.

Ciao everybody, I've been spending my time at my grandparents at the center of Rome, and only because my mother came to visit me (with her computer) I'm able to write you guys:). I know, it's such a busy period and I can't really dedicate myself on blogging, it really makes me sad though, I've got so many ideas... flowing and flying right through my mind everytime I'm on the bus, on the metro, on the train, on my way somewhere. I'm always on the road! ... If only I had a netbook(it's definitely on top on my wishlist!), and IF ONLY IN ROME THERE WERE WIFI AREAS! (Italy is actually REALLY behind when it comes to tecnological things). So never mind if in the middle of the week I post rarely, but in the weekends I try my best to blog a lot. Let's say mine is more a weekend blogging blog. Or something.

I bought myself another trench, navy blue this time and I'm so exited about it. I really belive in classical style, something I got to study here in Italy from italian woman AND men. They have great sense of elegance, something not so easy to copy. But years and experimentation do their work.. I'll make photos of it and post about it later on, when in home. For now take a look at these shoots taken by Scott Shuman by himself! Stay Beautiful everybody and check here Saturday!!