no avantgarde no.

Two things.

One is the fact Karl Templer is one of my alltime favorite stylists. I hope to assist him one day, I hope he'll continue on whatever he doing in the creative field, I believe he's a pure genius and I very much respect him for what he brings as a stylist. Maybe in real-life he's a jerk, I dunno. But I don't care either. Ha.

Second is the fact that here in The Netherlands simply arn't that many good and powerfull (high)-fashion magazines. Surely we have the dutch ELLE and Glamour. And ofcourse, the dutch L'Officiel, who I love. But, that's mostly all.

However, for a long period we also have Avantgarde who I used to like. Or I actually do, but the cover-stealing from the Italian Vogue for example, or what I'm about to mention now.. I can have a sleepless night from this all. No joke.


The Story
Roel Schagen is one of our best stylists here in The Netherlands. His work is sublime and I love it. Plus as far as I know him, and despite the fact quite some people dislike him, I think he's cool. However, flipping through the latest issue of Avantgarde, for who he works for quite a lot.. I saw this shoot which immediately reminded me of Interview x Karl Templer. Looking at the trousers, the headbands, the makeup, the shoes.. hmm!

If it wasn't Roel I would probably just be in shock. But looking for the person who did this, looking at the photography and back to the styling and the name. I was, I dunno, without any words. None. But after the shock, I needed to have people their opinion, before screaming they can't do this, the magazine and Bastiaan van Schaik the Fashion Director at Avantgarde and all others, not forgetting about the photographer, you guys can not do this! But you did.


I see it happen every month in a zillion magazines. Or the fact smaller ones will re-use shoots and stories from the big ones, which happens a lot in ELLE and Glamour for example. But that's nothing compared to this one.

So Roel, so Bastiaan, if you guys are un-inspired or if you simply want a sophisticated black and volume slash shape story; you could've easily called me. But please, looking at it again, I know you guys can do so much better then to deliver shoots like these. It's unfair to your team and it's taking down the rest, for example Venus Waterman.

Maybe it's time for me to move already, but then, if this will happen again, I can't. Don't sell people a bad version of something that has been done, better, last year. That's just.. no. Not done in any way. x


source: tfs.