Bonds, Knits and Smiles

Alright, I can assure you this week is a bit of a travel anomaly.  Some of you may have caught from my Twitter that I am currently in New York to be a skulking observer at the final winners of the It's My Time online casting competition United Colours of Benetton A/W 10-11 campaign shoot, with the amazing Josh Olins photographing the 19 winners (was supposed to be 20 but one of them pulled out…).  I've not yet managed to articulate my thoughts about the winners and the concept of the casting (quick summary: non-pro models were asked to upload online profiles and were whittled down to 100, and then to the final 20), and I have a ton of video footage to edit down but I did want to post some of my random snaps along with the more official ones…

In short, it was a bit like being a strange observer to a school trip of 'kids (the ages of the winners ranged from 14 to 32 yrs though…) where everyone had clearly undergone a compressed bonding process.  I guess I'm having trouble articulating what I saw, without sounding overly trite because you can get easily jaded about the idea of a bunch of people from all over the world coming together and making connections, learning about each other's cultures, communicating in the common language of English and bonding over their common love of Justice (there was a lot of impromptu group dancing on set…) and sharing their experience in New York and for most of them it was their first time in the city.  That said, it is what it is and I'm not overstating that this was what genuinely happened.  I'll get there with the thought articulation bit eventually though…

Then there was us bloggers hovering around, probing the winners, who were more than happy to be in the limelight, for photos and words.  We too were doing a bit of hanging out, learning and culture exchange…

Or… food exchange… sweet sweet Mai from Tokyo was handing out soya sauce, strawberry cheesecake and wasabi kit kats…

One of the finalists Kiko from Philippines had a great wristful of bracelets accumulated from friends… he also chucked me a Filipino delicacy… something floury/almondy/palm-sugary…

Kiko is something of a local celeb I gather as he was on the first series of Survivor in the Philippines and he also hosts a show about local wildlife… I loved that he physically brings a leather-bound journal with him everywhere…

Zee winners…

Yo… skulking bloggers here… me, Mai and Mau…. other bloggers present were the lovely Jackie from Show Me Your Wardrobe, the amazingly dressed trio from Paris of Montaigne Street, Miguel of El Bosquejo and Chiara of The Blonde Salad, 

Glenn O'Brien has also been heavily involved with the project and was on set too… I was too nervous to ask him for a photo so chicken-me asked Mai, a party photography pro to go up to him…

The clothes…everything I expected from a A/W Benetton shoot… the knitwear that got me through the 90s…

 

… a TON of accessories…

The colours that make the ads pop…

…and a few nods to the flow of the season… sheepskin lined boots…

… checks and ear-muffs…

 

…and an unexpected element…Benetton Bling… what can't I pull off?  Gold hear shaped-hoop earrings with the Benetton logo in them…

Janelle on the other hand wore them extremely well…

I love the floral headpieces used on Elizabeth… it was interesting that there wasn't necessarily a clear cut running theme of styling throughout the campaign and that their outfits were moulded to the styles of the contestants too…

Clare Richardson was the primary stylist though and I love the way she has layered the cardigans on Soraya here… I think she pinned them to keep them in place so that all three colours show through….

Soraya is one of the UK finalists, though I actually had more of a chat with her about her Ghana roots as she goes back frequently to have Ghanian clothes made for her and I was intrigued by the way she mixed her African pieces with more contemporary clothes…

Tereza and Patricia looking exceedingly cute in these matching hyper-colour hounds tooth ensembles… I didn't see them on set but they were already a walking-ad-in-making as they bounced around together, not wanting to take the clothes off… 

(Where photos looks out of focus and generally crap, they are mine.  Where they look spot-on, beautiful and more demonstrative, they are taken by Chris Saunders from Benetton's own site)