The Look Blog Tour: INTERVIEW (with a twist!)

I am delighted to welcome the lovely author, Sophia Bennett to A Reading Daydreamer as part of the blog tour for her newly released book, The Look!  I really enjoyed reading The Look (click HERE to see my review) and I hope that once you've read the interview below, you'll go out and get yourself a copy!

So you've probably read the typical interview about Sophia and her books but have you ever wondered what she would do if she was approached by a scout or which fashion designer she would like to spend the day with.  If so, read on for an interview with a twist...

Welcome to A Reading Daydreamer, Sophia! Can you tell us a bit about yourself?

Hi Beverley!  I live in London and have four children - two sons and two stepdaughters. I've wanted to be a writer since I was small, but it was only when my first book, Threads, won the Times/Chicken House competition in 2009 that my dream came true. Since then, I've written two more books in the Threads trilogy and my new book, The Look. I was many things before I became a writer - a lobbyist, dictionary researcher, earring packager, tour guide, management consultant ... - but never anything to do with fashion. It's always been an interest, rather than a job.

Fashion appears in the Threads trilogy and The Look, can you explain why this element is significant to you?
 I actually never expected to write about fashion. I've always been interested in art and literature - creative things - and fashion was an extension of that. My family helped. My uncle was a sailor and collected costume dolls from around the world for me. My mother and both my grandmothers knitted, smocked and sewed things for me, too. I think it started there.


Beverley's note: I certainly
don't think Sophia is

rubbish at drawing, do you?

Then, as I grew older I became more interested in how beautiful clothes are made, because there's a real craft to it. It's the craft side that appeals to me, and the history of fashion, rather than the labels. Having said all of that, I don't sew much myself, I'm sad to say. And like Nonie, I'm rubbish at drawing. So the career of a fashion designer was not for me. But I'm fascinated by how you have to work together as a team to create a catwalk show. That was the spark of Threads, really - the idea of creating a show, and all the hard work that went into it.

Also, I wanted to inspire my readers to think about art college, if they were creatively inclined. Nobody ever really talked about it as an option when I was at school, but so many of the people who've shaped our culture went to art school, from designers to musicians. It's worth looking into!



As for dressing - I love it when people dress eccentrically, to express their personalities, and that's what my characters tend to do. Like me, they're not interested in just wearing designer clothes. One of my favourite things is when a fan writes to me to tell me she's started using her sewing machine to make her own designs.

Why did you think it was necessary to include names of real-life designers and fashion houses in your books?

I wanted the books to be secretly educational! I didn't feel the need to invent names and labels when the real ones out there have so much history and are so interesting. I hoped that a reader would know more about the great names in fashion when she finished than when she started. And if she was curious, she could go off and find out more about them. As so often - the truth is more fascinating than any fiction we could invent.

What are your sources of inspiration for the fashion elements?

Working out Nonie's eccentric outfits for all the scenes she's in in Threads was hard work! I'd sit down each morning and think - oh no, what's she got to wear today? I had to stay one step ahead of the crazy It-girls in the papers. I think I'm proudest of the Astroturf skirt. I saw one in a boutique in New York many years ago, and never bought it. I always slightly regretted that. I'd never have worn it, but it would have been so cool to own it. I'd think through all the crazy things I'd never wear to school myself - like wellies, or Lederhosen, and put Nonie in those.

I'm a constant magpie for style ideas - always reading news articles, magazines and books about them, and seeing what people are wearing in London. I have been all my life, so sometimes I use little stories and anecdotes I learned twenty years ago. Plus, I love the Oscars. I was following the fashion on the red carpet long before it became such a big public obsession. In The Look there is actually less fashion because Ted, my main character, isn't interested in it for a long time. I still had to work hard to think of crazy outfits for Tina, the book's big baddie, who's a style guru. But my favourite outfit was the one I created for a lady tramp in New York. That was inspired by a photo from the SartoriaList - my favourite street style blog.

What sort of fashion ‘research’ did you have to do for The Look and tell us about something you learnt in the process?

Fashion research - none! I just kind of know this stuff by osmosis and the endless magazines I read. I might have to check the odd spelling, but that's it. It was very helpful that I attended a fashion shoot for Bliss magazine as a result of writing Threads. I used everything I learned that day in several scenes of The Look. Plus, I had to research the world of modelling and modelling agencies, because I knew almost nothing about them. I did a lot of it on the internet, and watched some of the classic programmes on TV, like ANTM (although you have to take a lot of what they show with a pinch of salt), but the best research was interviewing models - including one who was retired after a very successful career, and one just starting out.

I learned that there's a lot of hard work and rejection involved in modelling. You have to be incredibly tough to handle being told all the time that you're not what they want. It's an unpredictable lifestyle, with potentially lots of travelling (possibly on planes - but often just on public transport around big cities) and financially precarious. The people I've met on shoots were all lovely - creative and friendly. But they're there to do a job, not to be your mother or your teacher. I can imagine an 18 year-old enjoying the life for a while, if she's successful, but I have a big problem with expecting under 16 year-olds to do it. And an even bigger problem expecting 16-18 year-olds to do it without a chaperone or member of their family to help them handle the pressure. The fashion industry adores youth at the moment, but it isn't very kind to it.

What would you do if, like Ted, a scout from a model agency approached you and asked you if you were interested in modelling?

Be incredibly flattered! But if I was younger than 17, knowing what I know now, I would ignore them and get on with my studies and my life. If I was older, check them out and see if they were legitimate - or if it was just a scam to get money off me. If they were legitimate, I would maybe give it a go for a while, as a laugh. But I'd bear in mind that most models are retired by their early thirties. What do they do then? I'd want to make sure I had some qualifications and some money saved up, because there is an awful lot of life still left after you're 30. And if too many people started to nag me about my weight, I would stop. Whatever it says, the fashion industry's attitude to models' weight is not healthy.

Have you ever been to a fashion show?
I have. Since Threads came out, I've been to two London Fashion Week shows. Before that, the only one I'd been to - for research - was run by my local fashion boutique in the back room of a restaurant in Wandsworth. I loved the music, the lights, and the sense of occasion of all of them. But I couldn't relate to the fashion of the two posh ones at all. All the clothes were shown on exhausted-looking, skeletally thin young models, so I couldn't imagine them on me. And I just wanted to take the models home and give them a good meal. I think a great fashion show could be a fabulous event. I'd adore to go to one of Sarah Burton's for Alexander McQueen, for example. The craftsmanship and theatricality there is amazing. But I'd really, really like the models to start looking like women, not underfed young girls.

Sophia's gorgeous wedding dress :)

What is the most expensive item of clothing in your wardrobe? My wedding dress. It's by Alberta Ferretti, and I chose it because it's cranberry red/raspberry pink (one of my favourite colours), and velvet (my favourite fabric). It was a joy to wear. I actually planned to spend money on a pair of Jimmy Choos, rather than a dress, but the pair I most liked were too uncomfortable to wear. So I splurged on the dress instead.

What was your worst fashion disaster?

I've had too many to mention. One after another, basically. My electric blue, needlecord rara skirt was possibly not my best choice. But I was a teenager in the eighties, which were a decade-long fashion disaster anyway. I'm very jealous of my stepdaughters, who have much more natural style than I did at their age. Damn!

What was your fashion sense like as a teenager, were you more of a Ted or an Ava?
I veered wildly and unpredictably between the two. I tried to be an Ava, but often ended up as a Ted. There are many, many outfits I'm not proud of. But if I could go back, I would be more eccentric and outrageous. Your teens are a time to be experimental. Go crazy and have fun!

And finally, if you could spend the day with a famous designer to talk about fashion, who would you choose and where would be the perfect location to do this?

What a fabulous question! Oh my goodness - where do I start? I admire Vivienne Westwood tremendously. She practically invented punk in the 1970s and she's still going strong - dressing Helena Bonham Carter for the red carpet, among other things. But she looks a little bit scary. There's Phoebe Philo at Celine, who used to work for Stella McCartney ... and Sarah Burton at Alexander McQueen, who designed THAT wedding dress .... But I think I would choose Miuccia Prada, who's been designing quirky, lovely things for decades now. I love the way she likes to make one-off dresses with vintage fabrics. She's just launched her collection for H&M and I want ALL the accessories. So I'd pick her, somewhere in Milan (a city I love), ideally close to a stash of her H&M necklaces, so she could kindly give me some before I left ...


QUICK-FIRE QUESTIONS

Louboutins or Jimmy Choos: Louboutins. I have a pair. Woo!
Shoes or handbags: Shoes
Christian Dior or Vivienne Westwood: Very, very difficult. At a push, Dior.
Ted or Ava: Oh no! By the end of the book, Ted.
Jesse or Joe (Drool): Jesse. Joe is mean. No girl should end up with him. (Although he does look rather like Zac Effron.)
Cornwall or New York: Aahh! The things you make me do, Beverley! Can't decide can't decide can't decide. Oh, OK - Cornwall. I got married there, in a little church overlooking the sea. Beat that, New York!

Thank you for letting me be part of your blog tour, it's a wonderful privilege!
Thank YOU, Beverley. It's been great!

***

Remember to go along to Sophia's blog tomorrow for a bonus stop on the tour!

Places where you'll find Sophia when she's not writing:

Check out her website

Read her blog

Follow her on Facebook, Twitter and Goodreads 

Now remember to buy a copy of The Look if you haven't already done so :)

And you can get your hands on one for £3.49 HERE, so you have no excuse not to buy it ;)

Happy reading,

Beverley x