Gatsby- Existentialism Shoot

This was the script I re-versioned to go on the website along with the relevant images. I added in additional detail describing the background of the shoot as well as fashion 'get the looks'.

We began our recent shoot with our 1920s ‘Great Gatsby’ inspired shoot, a dazzling vivacious depiction of the ‘roaring twenties’, a time of economic prosperity in the United states, Canada and the UK. In the wake of the First world war, change was imminent. ‘Normalcy’ returned to politics and the ‘flapper’ a new breed of women, had emerged in time to appreciate the cultural flourish of art deco and jazz music.

Flappers created new breed of young western women in the 1920s who wore skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to jazz music and flauned what then seemed to be acceptable behaviour. Flappers were associated with wearing lots of makeup, drinking, treating sex in a casual manner, smoking and promoting social and sexual norms.
Flappers had their origins in the liberal period of the roaring twenties, the social, political turbulence and increased foreign cultural exchange that followed the end of WW1, as well as the export of American jazz culture to Europe.

The flapper dress, drew influence from the Parisian designs of Coco Chanel, as well as the emergence of sexually charged jazz music and dancing. Ideally, a flat- chested boyish figure suited and epitomised the flapper style, dressesas they had straight dropped waists and floated around knee length. They were often adorned with jewels, the spaghetti strap dresses were light and subtly coloured.
The implications of such dressing were explicit, they implied pre-marital sex, liberation,birth control and a general disrespect towards the old values. Modesty,chastity, morality and traditional concepts of male and female were seemingly ignored.

Women had thrown caution to the wind and decided to wear the clothes they truly wanted to,restricting corsets and heavy fabrics were a thing of the past. The booming economy of the United States in particular, is attributed to the mass increase in consumer spending.

For this shoot, I managed to find a local clothes designer ‘Airyn Erickson designs’ to make the flapper dress for my shoot. We did have an appointment with Hampshire Wardrobe, however they along with other companies wanted a large fee due to the cost of the dresses. However, I think the dress follows the style of those in the 1920s with the headband and beading along the bottom of it. We completed the look with a pair of classy silver sandals which were similar to those worn on the film 'The Great Gatsby'. You can find flapper dresses similar to this style on the high street in shops like House of Fraser for £154 and Bank fashion for £125.

The twenties man was thriving in the growing industrial world, moving away from manual,mostly dirty work,towards a shinier office oriented career. This was mirrored in the new styles and fashions for men. A sleek, sophisticated breed of man was being introduced. Although the classic suit was still highly in demand,the younger men started to rebel against this and wore clothing that was specific to day or evening wear. We used one of the main characters from 'The Great Gatsby', Jay Gatsby to be the inspiration behind our planning for this particular shoot.

The influence of the educated ruled this look, so sporting casual style clothes along with references to US colleges and hints of English private school entwined to create a sophisticated yet relaxed look that embodied class and luxury. Men imitated the style transformation,less controversially, but still in the spirit of true modernists.

In keeping with women’s hems, the trouser lengths were shortened purposely to allow mens socks to show. Jackets characteristically had short lapels and were often double breasted, whilst sweaters were worn as a more casual alternative.

We exhibited the casual nature of Jay Gatsby style, in particular referencing the recent film in which he is often dressed in luxuriously understated colours like cream and navy blue. The mens fashion today takes style inspiration from this look as we often see this type of jumper in the high street shops such as Topman for £40. Men dressing comfortably but smartly is the main fashion this season and it is interesting that it follows that of the 1920s.

Our main male model wore light coloured cotton slacks which are similar to chinos costing around £40 from shops like River Island. The crisp white shirt and beige cashmere sweater are usually in branded ranges such as Paul Smith for around £200 for the jumper and £80 for the shirt. His camel suede loafers and similarly contrasting socks were unpretentious, but small elements like his chunky watch and carefully slicked back hair indicated prosperity.

We used the Benefit makeup artist to add bronzer to the models cheeks to give them an extra glow. A hair stylist gelled his hair back to re-create the 1920s slick back style. Some of the clothing belonged to the model whereas others were borrowed frm various sources.

In the early part of the 20th Century the anti-tobacco movement was aimed primarily at women and children. Smoking was considered a dirty habit and women smoking was seriously frowned upon by society.

As the century progressed so did women’s desire for equality.The suffrage movement gave many women a sense of entitlement and freedom and the tobacco industry took advantage of the marketing opportunity.

Cigarettes did not have filters in the early 1900s which meant that smoking was quite harsh and dangerous. However, it did create an essential part of ladies fashion by introducing the cigarette holder. This was an essential but practical accessory for women to have. Not only did it stop their fingers from getting yellow, but it became a way for women to look elegant and seductive. Smoking was the iconic symbol representing the changing attitudes towards womens power.

In the1960s,the new innovation in tobacco marketing was the filtered cigarette. During the 1950s -1970s many existing brands, re-created their product to target certain audiences. In 1968, ‘Virginia Slims’ were created and were the first cigarette to target women. They were longer, slimmer and overall more elegant and feminine.

Our inspiration for this style, was Audrey Hepburn. We used some of her most iconic poses to influence our shoot. Her famous accessory was a cigarette holder. We couldn’t get hold of one of these so improvised with a cigarette instead.

In one of her most famous films 'Breakfast at Tiffanies' which was a romantic comedy, she was seen wearing a black dress holding a cigarette holder. This was one of the most iconic images of the 20th century.

For our shoot we focused on her casual style that she usually wore during the day. This consisted of a black roll neck jumper which can be found online at Asos.com from around £17. She used to combine this with black leggings of a similar style to the disco pants that are popular today (£20 River Island). She would wear a pair of black pumps to accompany the look usually containing some silver gems to glamourise the look. You can find a pair similar from Next for around £35.

We re-created her ‘look’ by getting a hair stylist to copy her bob. We added the red lipstick to reinforce her sexual but elegant pose she used to do.