“Red Alert”

Photography_ Emma Summerton

Fashion editor_ Charlotte Stockdale

Location_ Dover, England

Pages 226 – 243

 

I thought this shoot was incredibly beautiful: unexpected, modern and out of this world. Shoot red clothes on the white cliffs of Dover. Simple, precise and clever. Lara Stone may rock the issue’s cover and stars in the headliner shoot by Mario Testino but this wins hand down. The editor’s letter talks of Vogue representing ” fashion, style, extreme beauty and a sense of the contemporary.” This shoot does it. The Lara Stone shoot, “Stone Age”, doesn’t. How can a faithful pastiche of a Norman Parkinson shot from 1952 of a model in a ballgown reclining on a chair read as contemporary? Even if shot on the model-du-jour, Lara Stone. Lovely? Yes. Escapist? Ditto. Old-fashioned? Un-huh. It totally misses the point. The “Red Alert” shoot, however, does extreme beauty, shows us winter in a fresh way, is achingly glamorous and yet alien at the same time. It doesn’t make sense but the strongest fashion imagery doesn’t. The red against the white, greys and cool blues is graphic. You wonder where these creatures have come from. Latter day castaway mermaids? Pale and interesting never rang truer. And the cinch? Its shot in Dover for crikes sake! HOW MUCH MORE BRITISH CAN YOU GET?

Amazing.

Pretty Obvious: Lara Stone shot by Mario Testino