Shirt – COS mens. Skirt – Topshop. Boots – Russell & Bromley ‘Outlander’. Sunnies – Blyszak

Puffer coat – WAVEN. Turtleneck – Uniqlo. Boots – Russell & Bromley.

I’ve always lived close to children. Well, doesn’t this sound wrong, let me start this sentence again.

London is littered with schools everywhere, and one cannot avoid living away from a school unless one owns a farm or lives inside a Sainsbury’s car park. In all of my seven apartments in the past ten years, our windows would immediately face onto nursery school playgrounds (which at any given time resemble a Ryanair plane-full of devil babies), ‘meet-me-by-the-bike-sheds’ bike sheds, and music rooms inhabited – every Mondays and Wednesdays – by not-very-musically-gifted sixth form kids. The noise was unbearable at first, but funnily after a while it became white noise that I needed in order to get about my day.

Now, hearing kids spilling out of the 336 bus, rumbling on about homework and Snapchat at 8:05AM is my cue for that first cup of coffee, and the school chime (in England there are no bells to be saved by apparently) is my green light for a cheeky mid-afternoon snack. This borrowed Back to School routine has never been more reassuring post-fashion month (DECADE, I swear). Here’s a digital spritz of L’Eau de Box of Crayons and some primary colours by way of Russell & Bromley Autumn picks to lure them kids into throwing a Haribo or two into our office windows.

Dress – POLO by Ralph Lauren. Bustier – Fenty PUMA by Rihanna. Bag – Louis Vuitton.

True story: In August we shot a story for a one-pager print feature (coming to newsstands near you come October – more on that later), which involved a few extra bodies in the studio than usual. You know, stylist, hair & makeup, light people, sandwich people, champagne and massage people…etc, the whole jazz. Halfway through look two, the theme of the shoot was determined: COULD WE TRY AGAIN THIS TIME WITH SHINI’S DAMN LEGS CLOSED, because apparently this harlot kept posing with her legs wide open like it’s peace sign.

Glasses – Ferragamo. Dress – Lavish Alice.

Top – 3.1 Phillip Lim. Trousers – Just Female. Heels – Bally.

Top: Shoes – Christian Louboutin. Luggage – Vintage via eBay.
Left: Glasses – Miu Miu via David Clulow. Earrings – Joumanna Jewellery. Bag – Louis Vuitton.

Dress – HariTHanD. Hat – Vintage.

Blazer & trousers – Filippa K. Shirt – Iris & Ink.

Glasses – Miu Miu via David Clulow. Jacket – HariTHanD. Skirt – Dagmar. Earrings – Joumanna.

Tux jacket & Trousers – Filippa K. Blouse – Iris & Ink. Bag – Vintage Louis Vuitton

Necklace – Cartier Amulette

You know what they say, if you’ve done a round of Scrabble, it’s time for some Charades and beers. Then Karaoke. Then more beers. A plate of quesadilla too if you can distinguish pan from pot. If not, just toss everything into a bucket of KFC Assorted Wings and eat it with a ladle, it all looks the same when it comes out as chunks later. Who says that? I don’t know, probably somebody famous, and fabulous. Somebody last Friday night maybe, who may or may not have had one too many glasses of boxed wine, who sang Swan Princess until the cops showed up at the door. DEREK! YOU AND I WERE MEANT TO BE…

I digress. Ladies and gentlefolk, welcome to the charades and karaoke part of the night. Everything is downhill from here. If you’ve been following this blog for the past eight years, you know I’ve shuffled a LOT of shameless face cards and tiled many a Scrabble board with bad grammar and nonsensical rants. It was only time that we moved the party onto the singing and dancing part*.

UNLOCK • Watch the full video below

In all frankness, it took exactly one year and two months – to the day – to muster up the courage to put this up here for you to see. One rainy Sunday in June 2015, I took two buses to get to the On.Cut studio shack up in Hendon, and within about 20 minutes of warm-up** and a packet of Cheesy Dorito’s, we got to recording. At Emarr at the helm, song practically wrote itself. Jam mixed it on the spot. Ten days later we shot the video under an incredibly menstrual July sky and amidst a field of lavender. I could barely remember the words.

It’s not a Billboard topper, heck, it’s shower singing at best, but it’s a small dream come true. Thanks are due to Cartier’s relentless support, to my assistant Simon (who judges Rihanna yet curiously reserves comments on my wailing) and to hidden talents like Emarr & Jam… here’s Unlock.***

* More on Snapchat (ID Sparkncube) and Instagram Stories
** Basically yelling ‘WOW. WOW. WAW. WAAAW’ until the dudes say that’s not really a thing.
*** On hindsight, let’s all pretend that blue smoke grenade is a gassy Pokemon in the wild, and not a hipster filming gimmick that I thought was a great idea at the time. AIN’T IT SO 2015.

Dress – Zara. Shirt – ASOS. Hat – Zara (similar).

Dress – Razan Alazzouni

Top & bottom – BACK. Boots – Bally. Bag – SAVAS via Farfetch

Top – JWon. Velvet culottes – Versace via Nordic Poetry. Shoes – Proenza Schouler. Bag – SAVAS via Farfetch