Paris Fashion Week Diary Part III, Thursday

I’m a little behind, I’m sorry…. Real life is kicking in, I’ve got an eye issue and I’m still overwhelmed by the amount of pictures on my laptop, which I have to look through and edit….. Anyways, my third day started with Balmain at Grand Hotel Intercontinental in Rue Scribe, not that far away from my language school luckily, so I was able to get my “fight the heat” miniskirt on the way and quickly changed in the changing room.

But in the end I was late once again, and probably missed a lot of the Fashion Business celebrities, but before I had even fully arrived at Rue Scribe I bumped into Hanneli Mustaparta again, accompanied by Emily Weiss. This time I was feeling a little less alienish in the group of bloggers and photographers,  than the day before. Actually the scenery was quite bizzar, since on our side of Rue Scribe there was that whole fashion circus crazyness, while on the other side at the Pierre Mercolini store a crowd of people wearing cooks’ hats gathered in front of a big coach saying “French National Team” surrounded by a lot of media as well. Some photographers changed sides from time to time.

So I took pictures, watched photographers and especially other bloggers taking pictures of celebrities, each other and themselves (big mirrors on a building), until the show was over. Then I got to talk to a very nice blogger, Christina from Vienna, who is just studying in Paris, and we shared our (pretty similar) experiences. You can find her here, btw.

outside Balmain

satin loafers?? I can’t really see…

I’ve seen so many asymetric skirt outfits lately… might write a seperate posting about it

After the show I seemed to miss most opportunities to take nice pictures because the models disappeared quickly in the huge mass of people in front of the entrance (hello Karmen…). Staff from Mercolini brought chocolate cakes for the models, but too many people around.... Then suddenly Christina made me turn round and I discovered Freja standing RIGHT BEHIND me, talking on her phone and not yet spotted by the crowd. Thank you so much, Christina! I got really close and she  - as I’ve heard others saying about her so often – seemed to be so laid back and nice, signed an autograph and was told by some guy that he loved her. Then Abbey came over, carrying a Mercolini cake, everybody else discovered Freja and peoplewent crazy when Abbey was feeding Freja with the cake. Find more pictures here.

After that little episode we decided to walk over to Barbara Bui just around the corner at Hotel Ritz, Place Vandome. Again the whole, well, I can’t help but call it “circus” – I’m going to write about THAT particular aspect seperately – was meeting up in front of the hotel. Pictures will be posted…

those who had to wait outside of Barbara Bui

transport sevice for accredited journalists (and yes, I liked the guy….)

My next venue was going to be Rick Owens, unfortunately pretty far away in the east. Again, the colourful fashion crowd, journalists, photographers -  but after the show  we are left quite irritated – where are the models?? Apparently they took another exit. I was upset because I came all the way there, and went back to the underground station. Where I run right into Olga Sheerer and ended up standing right next to her and her company all the way in an overcrowded metro train. She eyed at my camera suspiciously, I still carried it in my hand and haden’t even shut the lens. But I think she realised that I was not about to turn into a paparazzi and so she didn’t pay attention anymore, but talked about her plans for the future, which places in Paris she liked best etc, munching jelly bears.

Here I thought my Fashion Day was over, because the next show I was interested in – Nina Ricci – was to take place at a secret venue. But then I received a text from that super-sweet girl I had met the day before at Gareth Pugh. She’s working in Paris for a Fashion Magazine and therefore had to cover every single show at Fashion Week. She gave me the address and I was off to Nina Ricci – scared that I would be too late to see the models leaving the show.. And really, it was not only late when I start at Les Halles in direction Bois de Boulogne, I also had to walk quite a bit down Avenue Foch, and when I arrived at the venue, big limousines were leaving already. But there were still so many people waiting outside that I asked the woman next to me what was going on. She told me that the first show was over already, but there would be a second one, starting in a short while. I moved some meters further to the backstage entrance and just saw Arizona Muse and another girl going inside – lucky me, the top girls were still there, and though it was really dark by then, I decide to wait. Like after Rue du Mail, all the crazy fancy, “look at me” bloggers and fashion people had left, probably getting ready for tonight’s fancy parties, and it was just me, a few photographers, and the drivers. So I was (almost) the only one who wasn’t there for a real purpose, and I felt some of the drivers were looking at me in a strange way. But I simply liked to watch what was going on. Through a window I could even see how the girls were getting done, but I scrupled taking a picture through a window like that. After a while Daga Ziobers driver started talking to me. He’s a very nice (and handsome) French-Congolese guy,  which made it easy for shy me to practice my French a bit. So I waited with him and Jacqueline Jablonski’s driver. While everybody else  carried a written note with name and agency of the model he was waiting for, Jacqueline’s driver had a fancy, electronical tablet thing and her name was running from one side to the other. Then the models came, meet up with their drivers, discussed what to do later in the evening, and gave interviews to a camera. The girls burst out laughing when they spotted Jacqueline’s high tech name tag. Karmen again left too fast for my camera, again accompanied by her agent. Find all pictures here.

In the metro on my way home finally, I was sitting right opposed to Patricia van den Fliet. (I wasn’t able to identify her, but I looked through model threads on tfs and it must have been her). She first spoke on her phone. Then a young family with little children got into the train. The father took the last free seat right next to Patricia, the woman remained standing and Patricia jumped up to offer her seat to the woman (who refused it). I was feeling a little ashamed, totally didn’t pay attention for what was going on around us and wouldn’t have offered my seat in this situation, anyways. Yepp, just another little episode. ;)

I hope I didn’t bore you with this entry, which got pretty long and is full of tiny, personal anecdotes. Somehow I liked to write it down and share it. For those who aren’t into the fashion circus in particular, and photography in general, it’s probably the most random thing on this planet…. Those who are already part of the circus will call me the most naive (26 year old….) girl on this planet…

all outside Rick Owens – the outfit on the left was one of my favourites of that day

 

ehum yes, it’s the same pic twice….

don’t miss the beautiful necklace on the left!