STREET SQUAD: LOVEBOX 2012!

WE HIT LOVEBOX… HARD…

You can check out our expolits on Grazia Daily and see Harriet and Mimi on Vogue Online.

LOUIE: The other weekend the Street Squad and I set off to Lovebox with disposables in hand to snap stylish people for Vogue, Elle and Grazia… My Lovebox virginity was broken and it was one of the best weekends I’ve had in a long time!

Highlights: Grace Jones, Chaka Khan, Chic, dancing around on peoples shoulders

and Dalston Superstore + Vogue Fabrics after party’s on Sunday!

Downfalls: How I felt on Monday!

See you next year Lovebox.

SAMI: Expecting the worst weather wise, I turned up in dungarees and wellington boots, but I needn’t have! A glorious day, if a little windy, was had by all. Highlights included bopping around to Little Dragon, and Maverick Sabre on the main stage, as well as watching Mimi and Harriett’s pastel barnets whirl past on the giant carousel. 

Unfortunately I think the expectation of bad weather caused most attendees to opt for substance over style – but not for the streetsquad – we were lauding it up in our finest wares, from booty shorts to bindi’s and back again!

Roll on next year!

HARRIET: This year the English countryside has made a comeback: to London. Not only are we told that the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics will feature 70 sheep, 12 Horses 10 chickens, 3 sheepdogs or “Green and Pleasant’ as described by the imagination and creator behind the ceremony Danny Boyle. This years Lovebox gave us a taster of what is to come in terms of scenery and setting for 2012, dubbed as “England’s Year”. On Saturday afternoon at Lovebox the street squad and TIGI Bed Head stormed through the 100,000 strong audience, armed with truant rainbow hair, silly-slash-courageous platformed Buffalos’s and disposable cameras.

The arena and backstage area mimicked that of a bohemian’s garden. Bushes trimmed in the most falic of shapes adorned the hilly lawn, 3 arches draped in lilac and pink flowers hung above you as you walked in. A “W.I” (Women’s Institute) tent with polystyrene “vegetables” were being heavily molestered by the drunken festival goers.

Music Muff Andy (street-squad’s musical connoisseur) glued me to a spot where i was persuaded to watch Little Dragon, her porcine nose and over energetic limbs really captured me.

That was me and mimi done for the day. We queued for hours for the 2 minute thrill of “Helter Skelter”, I nibbled on  a foot long. (Hot dog).  As the sun set and with the prospect of a full moon looming i disappeared into the night.

Lovebox was great, on par with Butlins (which is also great). Would i go again? Maybe Baby.

STEVIE: Lovebox on Saturday was terrific fun, filled with hipsters and muso’s alike, Victoria Park packed out to see a myriad of acts including Friendly Fires, Kelis, Little Dragon, Rita Ora and Emile Sande to name but a few and had some terrific highlights in smaller forms including the Sweet Toof graffitied car, and the african drummer in the smaller tents earlier in the day getting the atmosphere lifted to make way for a cracking day.

LUCY: UNLOST BY K L GILLESPIE

In the night she cultivates orchids …. and at dawn she talks to birds… I’m talking about K L Gillespie and yesterday I went her UNLOST book launch held at Antenna Studios in Crystal Palace SE19, London.

The book launch delighted and unsettled as much as the book promises to. There were blood thirsty Bloody Marys and Gillespie’s Gin and Tonics, a master of ceremony and a narrator called Max. We were plunged into darkness and submerged into the mind of a blind fantasist. This is erotica but K L Gillespie is no Jilly Cooper, its macabre, lyrical and thought provoking, a drum sounds and its attack of the senses, we are surrounded by an exhibition of the illustrator of UNLOST Mr Jeff Conways’s explicit colourful although monochrome fierce in your face prints with a touch of humour for good measure.

Jeff Conway and the beautiful Urania Li

I was asked to read a passage from the book, 8 of us were plucked from the crowd by a very persuasive Max to read Datum the alphabet of lovers. I got to read G, G for Geoff which thankfully was rather less explicit than the rest. After the reading, we were subjected to some throbbing climatic music to which we swayed and wondered what on earth was going to happen next. When the music climaxed there was silence and that was the end of a most enjoyable yet ‘very unusual for a Sunday’ experience.

Heres my friend Paula with one of Jeffs prints.

Punk looks in on Jesus

About the book… “Unlost is an absorbing collection of dark, sensual, fantastic stories with a flamboyant sense of the absurd that dips into the lives of masturbating surrealists, blind fantasists, sadomasochists and provocative pickpockets. One by one they explore life, death, sex – lost minds, lost love and lost ways. In one breath macabre and relentless but also wildly funny…. Revelling in the sense that life is stranger than we can imagine, this anthology will delight and unsettle in equal measure.”

Above K L Gillespie
http://www.klgillespie.co.uk
Photographs by G Dalton check out more of his work at www.gdalton.tumblr.com
UNLOST GET IT, IT WILL NOT DISAPPOINT.
I’m off to Dubai now so catch you lot in a bit….

LOUIE: COCO FENNELL

Do you know Coco Fennell yet? If not then why the hell not?

She is the hot new designer to watch, and when I say hot I mean she is also very hot, she is signed to Models 1 I’ll have you know! Her dresses can be seen on the likes of Daisy Lowe, Pixie Lott, Gizzi Erskine and many more… I am lucky enough to work with Coco, shooting her look-books along with my team (and TIGI BedHead Street Squaders) Sami Knight, Lucy Wearing and Mimi Wade… I asked Coco a few questions…

LOUIE: So Coco, tell us a bit about your new collection and what inspired you…

COCO: My new collection of prints are inspired by images of antique decoupage and circus posters… the shapes are inspired by 60’s designers and aim to be flattering to lots of different shapes of ladies.

Daisy Lowe in Coco Fennell

LOUIE: Who is your favourite designer?

COCO: My favorite designers are The Blonds and JC de Castelbajac if I had lots of money I’d buy everything they make!

LOUIE: What are you listening to at the minute? Any golden oldies or hot new tracks we should hear about?

COCO: My music taste is that of a 14 year old girl – I’ve just made a playlist made up of Misteeq, Destiny’s Child and 3LW that is really special. I am also loving Dry the River lots of lovely sad beardy men harmonising.

LOUIE: If you could dress anyone from any era, alive or dead who would it have been?

COCO: I would love to have dresses Jayne Mansfield she was a hot buxom lady with a ridiculous figure and a heart shaped swimming pool.

LOUIE: If you where an animal what would you be?

COCO: If I were an animal I would be a sloth because they look all cuddly and slow.

LOUIE: Who you rating, who you slating?

COCO: I am loving Joseph Gilgun and not really hating anyone…hating someone’s always going to come back and bite you in the ass.

LOUIE: Lana Del Rey’s lips…. hot or not?

COCO: Her lips are kind of hot …her whole face looks brand new….I should get the name of her surgeon.

LOUIE: Well Coco I agree she is hot, however I recommend leaving the surgery for now you certainly don’t need it!

Check out Coco’s dresses here… and buy one while your at it! http://www.cocofennell.com/

LOUIE: THE LAUNCH OF BLOC SALON – AND MY EXHIBITION!

A while ago, me and the lovely Carianne Moore held an exhibition to launch the photographs from our recent collaboration… The images on display where shot by me, the subject; fellow TIGI ambassador Mimi Wade with Makeup from yet another Street Squadder Lucy Wearing, and hair by Louis Byrne.

The private view was a huge success, thanks to everyone who came down – we had such a brilliant night. Thank you so much to the

theprintspace  for providing the prints and to BLOC for hosting the exhibition. ICN were on hand to provide the delicious japanese food and we had Miguel Alvarez taking wonderful pictures. The lovely Josh Quinton & Alpha Deluxe supplied the night with a disco soundtrack – perfect evening.

http://www.theprintspace.co.uk/home1

http://blocsalon.com/