The location: Shoreditch studios, London EC2A, 18.07.09.
The photographer: Tung Walsh.
The models: Melo Dagault @ Elite, Hannah Rundlof @ Marilyn.
The stylist: Tamara Rothstein.

Having read Sarah Water’s The Little Stranger and getting immersed in its aesthetics, I do love next seasons trend featuring strong 1940s Film Noir Femme Fatales initiated by, for example, Dior with their maxed-out feminine power, glamour and elegance. Besides, how can looks for mysterious, duplicitous, seductive, promiscuous, self destructive and beautiful archetype of the femme fatale not be exciting?

On the shoot, the combinations of Margiela with Westwood, McQueen against Watanabe’s padded extravagance or Scervino’s leather on naked skin typified the mood.

The pairing of extreme and contradictory materials resulting in bold lines and dramatic silhouettes added to the already a strong look; creating an opulence totally displaced by the abandoned and run down setting. This gave the shoot a mysterious and other worldly feel, and with big hair and dark eyes the models seemed like untouchable evil temptresses or fallen angels.

Tule. Fur. Leather. Beads. Feathers. Platforms. Thigh highs. Ruffs. Padding. Shag pile. Mesh.

It’s time to buy a portable smoke machine (emerging mysteriously from hidden doorways) and a cigarette holder. Perfect your nonchalant dismissive gaze and husky voice. Drink whisky, peer through venetian blinds with dramatic single poise lamps, and find an innocent Bogart lookalike to lead astray…

Related Pops:

• POP 222 Weekend, 7 February 2010
• POP 156 Sunday, 15 November 2009