Christmas Blooms

Manchester yesterday, Brighton tomorrow… I seem to be both speeding up and winding down for Christmas… I’m sure many of you can relate! Here’s a quick update of some slightly Christmassy portraits from Paul Lock, who I had the pleasure of modelling for again recently.

Wishing you all a wonderful time full of love and joy, and only minimal crass and over-electric flashing neon. I’m off to a Christmas carol service with my family tonight in a tiny, tiny village church which was bedecked beautifully this time last year for my older brother’s wonderland wedding. 🙂 Can’t believe how time zooms!

Merry Christmas and I am looking forward to seeing many of you next year, all over the world!

 

 

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Doors & Chandeliers

You can read all about my recent trip to Brussels in the wake of the terror threat over here on my other blog, which I enjoy updating with various thoughts and pieces of writing now and then (and which you should definitely be following..! :-)), but over here, I thought I’d add some images taken while I was there by Luc Bollen. He took us to the same beautiful house as last time (some previous images here), but this time we used different rooms. I loved shooting there again. I should be able to show you more soon (this is just one set, really), but it’s very kind of him to send me some already.

Of Castles & Gold

From one long-standing shooting tradition to another, how lucky I am to have worked again recently with J H on another little adventure – this time in the north of England, around Northumberland!

It was the usual (finely) organised chaos of early starts and day-time cat-naps, so that I lost track of what day was what, where I’d been, who I was… etc… by the end of the fleeting trip, but we had such a lovely time! I love the results – dramatic beach scenes with castles and vistas as the sun winds up or down – and we even managed to squeeze in a trip to Alnwick Castle to see where some of the scenes in Downton Abbey (and Harry Potter) were filmed (and by the way, I hope you’re all glued to your screens this season in case I make a fleeting appearance in a couple of scenes; I’m going to miss it while I’m away and am making my Mum record it all for me!); and for me to be utterly beaten by the world’s biggest ice cream, which covered me in delicious chocolate and had me rooting around for tissues to clean up me/my clothes/the bench. I was such an embarrassment; clearly out of ice-cream-eating practise (I don’t normally ‘do’ ice creams, but had a sudden craving. It was all very ungraceful.).

Anyway, I’m off to Indonesia for a month now, so things here may get a little slow, but will be back and raring to go in mid-November and am (by the way) taking bookings now for November, December and January; and from April onwards. Things are getting all a bit inter-continental again, and I like it! 🙂 I will be snapping away while away on this trip, I’m sure, so my instagram will floweth over in all likelihood, since I am clearly addicted to it these days. (and oh, I am going to miss Sir Fluffalot terribly while I’m away; I hope I survive without his enormous fluffy face looking alarmed at me. I know, I’m ridiculous, but LOOK AT HIS MAGNIFICENT FACE!!!)

OK, those mermaid scenes and so forth, forthwith (thank you so much again J!):

You can also read J’s version of events here. (I’m so glad he posts these threads, not least so I can remember where exactly I’ve been. He knows me well enough to know how terrible I am at knowing my way around places (and knowing whether to turn left or right out of a hotel, despite having been there for three days, for example), so it will come as no surprise that the place names became a slight blur after the early morning starts, even if the places themselves are spectactular; it really is a miracle that I can travel solo as well as I do. Nevermind. If I was the sort of person who would end a blog post with a hashtag, it would be #cantbegoodateverything (but I wouldn’t do that, because then where does the full stop at the end of the blog post go?) – I’ll put it here: .

Lavender Blue

I had a really stressful dream last night in which one of my friends secretly borrowed one of my bellydance costumes (the mermaidy one) to wear to a club night. I was too polite to mention the graveness of the situation; delicate embellishment getting knocked around and ripped off in neon-lit tree houses, etc. I don’t know what she was thinking. I forgave her when I woke up. (Also, I fell in love with a man in a lift.)

Anyway, since we’re (well, I’m, anyway) in the mood for whimsy, here are some images taken by the lovely and talented Elle Hicks in one of my favourite locations of all time, the humble (but glorious) lavender fields here in England. Such a pleasure to be in their midst, even if we did have a bit of trouble at the start of the shoot that threatened to put a stop to the whole thing (I think the less said about that, the better!) 🙂


Make up by me as usual; clever prettiness by Elle:




Additionally, here’s Sir Fluffalot, much famed over on my instagram accounts (here and here), having been disturbed while reading. He’s a bit cross about that, clearly.


Another Post, Another Coast

… This time I’m showing off some pictures of me taken in Dorset by the very talented and widely published Joana Kruse, who booked me again for some book cover images.

Ah, I do like to be beside the sea side!

A bit of Victoriana, a very brief foray into Dante and a quick shot (snort!) at Bond; and to fit the travel theme (we couldn’t resist using the vintage suitcase again), I should mention that I will be doing a bit of trip-planning this month, gradually, as I attempt to cohesively orchestrate the next few months; look out Holland, Belgium, Australia, US and Canada!

I also spotted this on Joana’s facebook feed: I modelled this rather wayward cloak, which Joana somehow managed to make into an effective image! I’m not sure it’s one for my portfolio, but the work was there. 🙂

A story full of sea

Having spent this morning unpacking from yesterday’s trip and re-packing for tomorrow’s, and while listening to Eska’s debut album (she fits somewhere between Joni Mitchell and Laura Mvula, I think; though those elements are disparate and she very much does her own, unique thing!), I thought I’d show some photos I’ve just received. In April, I was able to fit in a shoot with Perry (Imagesse), who I’ve worked with many, many times now, while in Cornwall primarily for another shoot for The Wool Company. We always end up in some very beautiful places (often beaches!) and I love his storytelling imagination which whirs while I pose. In fact, these images were delivered to my inbox yesterday with a long story written to accompany them! In between the images below, there are some snippets of his words and phrases…

‘…When I was walking a quiet section of the coast path on the rugged wreckers coast…Somehow I had stumbled on a secret cove…


‘I made my way down a set of steep steps I found myself absolutely alone in that pure new world...’



‘…The rhythmic mantra of the ocean…’



‘…I made my way, to the glowing brightness which led me out of the cave…’



‘…I discerned something else…’ 


‘…something smooth and curvaceous…’ 


‘…moving through the cove…’


‘…My mind started to work overtime…’ 


‘…if she had not come from the land…’ 


‘…she must have come from the sea…’



‘…she remained in my vision…’


‘…then she turned and walked purposely towards the sea…’

Balancing Act

I’ve just finished packing for my third shoot with a photographer who’s working with me this time in my nearby ancient woodland tomorrow morning, just for an hour. Having amused myself with the curation of some very fanciful outfits (I love it when I’m given free rein with styling, even if there are only so many sets you can get through in such a quick session!), I thought I’d update with some images sent to me which were taken in Vienna.

(I need to get myself back to Vienna again soon – SO much to see and do there!)

As you can imagine, some of these were a bit challenging, but challenges are fun, are they not? 🙂

(Organisation and set design by Roland Pum)

By Peter Eibler:

By Manfred Klejna:

More by Peter Eibler:

Hope you are all having wonderfully balanced weeks.