Once Upon a Photoshoot-Pre Photoshoot

At Vintage Colette, VC, we recently had our first photo shoot of the year. The first half of 2016 has been relatively quiet for most fashion designers in Nigeria. Perhaps this is due to the economy and a reduction in the amount of eager shoppers we usually encounter. I asked around and realized businesses were facing the same challenges. So for the first Vintage Colette photo shoot of 2016, I decided to change things up and do something that had never been done before. I was going to use REAL WOMEN to model the VC brand and remind everyone that these were real clothes for the EVERYDAY woman.

I needed my customers to relate well with the VC brand…to be able to say, ‘I know that woman. I can also wear what she is wearing.’ It was no longer about using perfect models for the shoot- not that I have anything against using models. I have used quite a lot in the past and they were wonderful. This time around was just about being an everyday woman.

The first selfish call I made was to my entrepreneur friends. I briefed them about my idea to use them in the VC photo shoot. To my delight, everyone I contacted was interested. They were women from different industries, chefs, writers, medical doctors, fashion designers, event managers and so on. Some ended up cancelling their photo shoot appointments due to last minute travel arrangements, but they made promises to indulge me in my next photo shoot. I contacted everyone from housewives to public servants for this shoot and my list was much longer than I expected, as they all said yes!

I then went on to contact Henry of BigH studios in Abuja, a highly creative photographer that I’ve always wanted to work with but never could because of timing. I discussed my idea with him for the VC editorial and VC high street brand and he came on board right away. We also discussed the number of participants, possible locations, permits required for the locations, a 2 day period for the different shoots and color themes. At the end of the meeting, we both agreed to meet at the VC office to see the finished products and finally conclude on the entire shoot.

After I had secured my ‘models’ and photographer, the next thing I had to do was contact my cinematographer of choice. I wanted to have GLAM SHOTS for this particular shoot….not the type you see on Instagram that came from and IPhone, but real GLAM SHOTS from a professional cinematographer. There was already someone that I knew named Luke, who was a highly skilled professional. I had prepared him for this idea about 8 months beforehand and when we sat down to discuss the technical aspects of the shoot, I briefed him about changes I wanted to make since we had initially discussed this project. We went through samples of his work and played around with my ideas and vision, how many team members he would be required to work with, props he needed from the brand, and so on. Then just as I had agreed with Henry, Luke and I also agreed to meet at the VC office when the final garments were ready and conclude on the entire shoot.

Next, I contacted all parties involved in the shoot and requested that they come over to the VC office to have their measurements taken and to discuss their individual personalities so that I could design what they would wear. I discussed each of their personalities with them, what they liked to wear, their style preferences, colours they hated, weather conditions, their availabilities for the shoots, preferred hairstyles and finally, what they would never be caught DEAD wearing….lol.
 After meeting with all of our photo shoot participants, I developed the mood board and designed all the garments in a tiny part of my brain….no, actually a large portion…lol. Sounds crazy but I did that mentally because it was easier for me to alter anything at anytime without having to pick up a sketch pad and a pencil. We had a total of 20 garments to create after all- 14 high street and 6 couture/custom made ones. While sketching my last garment on CAD/CAM, I got a call informing me that my son needed emergency surgery. He was on holiday with my husband and was 500kms away from me. I was in a state of solitary conferment until the surgery was over and my husband, who is a physician, told me that my son was fine and there was nothing to worry about. By the next morning, quite a few greys had popped out of my scalp and I quickly picked up my hair dye and did you KNOW WHAT.

Over the weeks preceding the photo shoot, I went fabric shopping and began production while doing all my fittings concurrently as soon as any garment was ready. All the custom made garments took a minimum of 76 hours to make and then an additional 3 hours for alterations and a second fitting. The high street garments took less than 24 hours alter after every fitting. The best part of designing the garments were the women who would be wearing them. They all loved their individual garments. 

 Days prior to the photo shoots, I met with Henry and Luke once again and also introduced both of them to one another. It was during this meeting that we discovered that our earlier dates of May 20th and 21st for photo shoots had not been saved with Henry due to technical error and unfortunately he had already booked another client for the 21st. So we had to reschedule our photo shoot to the 19th and 20th of June 2016. I made a mental note to call all the participants to find out if their schedule was clear for the 19th and they were all available. We moved to talking about possible locations and decided on using BigH studios for the 19th and the Abuja World Trade Center (WTC) for the 20th. The WTC fitted the construction site setting we were looking for and I contacted my friend who worked at the WTC. The next day, we were able to schedule an appointment to see the marketing manger and also the location. The prospects were high even before we met because they sounded very excited about the idea of a photo shoot in their location. We had a warm welcome at WTC by the entire team and especially after we had briefed the marketing manager. We went and checked out all the possible locations onsite and finally decided on the 22nd floor which gave us the perfect view we had all hoped for. All we had to do was wait for the marketing manager to talk to the main manager and who would probably also be requesting a meeting.

A WTC staff member called me the following day to set up appointment to see the manager at 3pm that same day. I showed up on time and was unfortunately met by an arrogant personality of Indian descent who continuously waved his Nigerian passport around his face. I smiled as I began to answer all his questions and concerns about the publicity the shoot would generate for his project. He requested for the name of the photo studio and immediately checked them on Instagram. “They are below my standard,” he said…. Then he proceeded to say that if we were in real estate, he might have considered the option of letting us use the space for the shoot but that he wouldn’t agree at the end but asserted that his consideration was to be measured as a level of great evaluation coming from his image. He said fashion editorial was a NO NO and that besides myself, my brand and my entire team did not and would NEVER meet his customer profile or even know them, considering the fact that none of us could afford his NGN 500,000,000 3-bedroom apartment within the residential complex of WTC or a Rolex watch….lol…his words not mine.

What an arrogant short man, I thought, as I clearly got irritated by his words while still remaining calm. He then said that the best he could offer was to get back to me in 2 weeks with a likely YES or NO answer, which I could already see was a NO. I sternly told him that it was either a yes or a no now, this very moment. That the fact that we cant afford his property doesn’t mean we do not have the resources to market them to family and friends who could- that just because we didn’t wear a ROLEX to his meeting didn’t mean we couldn’t afford one…Michael Kors was good enough, I figured…lol…. he couldn’t partner with the WTC to build in India but decided to do so in NIGERIA where there was free unaccounted money and invest in real estate.

By the way that was 2 days to the shoot.

Back at the Vintage Colette office, the team arranged all the garments for the 19th by name and then styled them with jewelry from my private collection. On this particular day, 2 days to the photo shoot I received three calls from three of the participating women who were cancelling due to work and personal emergencies. I was sure my blood pressure went up that day but I still moved on to plan B and called upon an interior architect who was great at what she did. I explained the situation to her and politely asked if she would be willing to participate due to the short notice. She fell in love with the idea instantly and came in as soon as she could for her fitting, which was perfect. That was one person taken care of. I sourced for a model from an agency and they sent 5 models, who had all lied about their sizes as they didn’t fit into any of the garments. One of my interns volunteered to fill one of the two remaining slots and she was a perfect fit. It suddenly dawned on me that I had to mentally alter the sequence of all the garments as these cancellations were going on to other garments that were initially planned in the shoot. I then made contact with the caterer, 2 makeup artists, and VC staff team members who would be providing services on both days of the photo shoots. I then arranged the details of the entire logistics plan with my husband, who would be in charge of that for the 2 day shoot, and also serve as an onsite emergency medical helper if any situation arose. Yes…… I like to be prepared for anything just in case.
This preparation took me back to when it all started for me, more than 33 years ago, the day my father got me a sewing machine when I was only 3 years old. The same machine that I still use for quick onsite alteration. I packed it up along with zippers, threads, dress makers pins, pin cushions, scissors, legal agreement documents for participants to sign, hangers, racks, steamers, mannequins, beads, measuring tapes, barcode scanner, clothing tags, wigs, hair pins, industrial fans and a check list of participants and what they were wearing and when they were wearing them. Some of these items were going to be used for props also. I also sent the address of the shoot to the participants.

We closed our office at 10.30pm that night, ready for the 19th, but still short of one model and a location for the 20th.

I was in desperate need of SLEEP.