This past friday, Kim and I headed to Pittsburgh, Pa for a photo shoot. This was my first Chickdowntown shoot and I must say it went really well. Can’t wait for the pictures to go up on the site! These are some behind the scenes images I shot throughout the day.
(images via alaina lackman and ed rieker)
Alaina
Literally on Wednesday of last week, my boss found out that I was going to Pittsburgh for a Dave Matthews concert that Saturday and proposed that we schedule a photo shoot for the following Monday since I was going to be out that way. I immediately thought, “Is he crazy? Put together a shoot within two working days, one of which I was going to be out of the office for a meeting? Impossible.” However, I then realized that I could expense my travel so I got right down to business – kidding 
Fortunately our photographer, Ed, and his staff were available, including our hair & makeup artist, Rachel. Now for the models – after many back and forth calls and rescheduling on the models behalf’s, we finally secured two. And not just any two, our favorite model from the previous CDT, Alyssa, was back from London (yay!) and our other model, Taylor, we had been trying to get for the past couple shoots, but she had been booked. The only person we were missing was our stylist, Richard, but fortunately our Assistant Creative Director, Ashley, was accompanying me and my boss was going to let my intern, Jamie, join us also (she has been doing such an awesome job, that we wanted to reward her for all of her hard work). So we figured with the three of us, we’d be able to hold down the fort.
Ashley and Jamie met me bright and early Monday morning at the studio. Our game plan was to get as many head-to-toe looks as possible photographed on models – as I told you with our last shoot, we have a new lookbook coming out, so this is very important for our new design. We also got in a large shipment of Vince, so we really wanted to highlight their key pieces for fall. The day went relatively smoothly and we finished with enough time for Ed, Ashley, Jamie and me to stop at one of my favorite restaurants, Seviche, before our flight took off. Check out some of my favorite shots below (please keep in mind these are untouched!):
xo kim
Growing up, I can vividly recall a quote that my mother would reiterate every summer, “Well it’s like my Uncle Stanley always said, ‘It’s the 4th of July, summer’s over!’” As a teacher, my mother’s summer is really just beginning, but as an online retailer, our summer IS over. Throughout the past couple of weeks, we received pre-fall shipments from Elizabeth & James, Halston Heritage, Jay Godfrey, 7 For All Mankind, Rock & Republic, Hudson, Joe’s, etc. etc. With the arrival of our first round of deliveries, we scheduled our first pre-fall photo shoot. We have a new lookbook design coming out any day (which I am really excited about!) called “What Kind of Chick Are You?” In order to incorporate this new idea into our shoot, we decided to separate the outfits into our first round of “chicks”: the trendsetter, the classic fashionista, the downtown diva and the uptown socialite.
The trendsetter was the first to make an appearance on the homepage, but here’s a sneak peak at her three companions:
The Classic Fashionista
The Downtown Diva
The Uptown Socialite
Don’t forget to check back soon for our new lookbook!
xo kim
I often get asked to describe a typical day at Chickdowntown. Because we all do such a variety of things, a “typical day” simply does not exist. This past week is a perfect example of just how different one day can be from the next, so I thought it would make a great blog topic – plus I was seriously lacking on posts this week and I wanted to give you an explanation…
Monday we had a photo shoot in Pittsburgh. Because the last shoot started out as such a fiasco, I thought I would get in the night before so I wouldn’t fly into any surprises (and of course avoid that dreadful 4:30am pickup). Fortunately everyone showed up on time and things got off to a great start. Going into the shoot, our stylist, Richard, and I decided upon three distinct stories which were all based off of a certain color palette: brights, pastels, and army/khaki mixed with pops of blacks and whites. I also wanted to try to fit in some white denim shots; because we have such a variety of styles, I thought it could make a great blast and potential homepage. As we started mapping out the day to include all of these ideas, I was informed that my manager wanted to do a story around a new denim line that we just got in called Vintage Revolution. At the last shoot, we did two stories with a few quick shots taken at the end, and now this time we were going to try to fit in FIVE…it was going to be a long day…
For each story, we wanted very distinct backgrounds to really set them apart. Our photographer, Ed, mentioned doing the army/khaki story near the river so that we can have the water as the background – having grown up on a lake, I am obsessed with the water so I thought this was a fantastic idea. However, once I was informed about the Vintage Revolution shoot, I knew that I also wanted to do this outside so the water idea may have to go by wayside; plan B was to do it next to these army green and grey walls in the studio (although the walls are very cool, I was extremely disappointed).
The first shoot was the brights story. We used a plain white background and had the colors in the clothes be the main focus. We also added a little extra pop by using bright pink and teal ribbons in the model’s hair. Next we took it out onto the streets for the Vintage Revolution story. At first, the photographer had the model go down onto the street and he took the photographs from up in an old warehouse. It was very cool. For the remaining pics we accompanied the model ON the street…literally (see pics below). After this, we did the pastel scene. These photos were shot on a really pretty pink background (although in the pictures it looks sunburst orange, which we decided went better with the colors in the clothes). After this we still had the army/khaki story and the white denim shots. With not much time left, Ed made the snap decision to take it to the water (yay!). It was quite a hike for the model, especially in the heels she was wearing, so we had a car transport us back and forth (where we nearly got hit by a tractor trailer and a train!). We had to leave two outfits out of this story because we ran out of time, but it was definitely worth it. You can see some of the untouched pics below. Finally we got in some super quick white denim shots which were taken back in the studio. With literally 45 minutes before our flight was taking off, we left for the airport. We checked in with 28 minutes left to go and they would NOT let us bored. They said that 30 minutes was the minimum and there was nothing they could do about it. Being that it was the last flight out, we were forced to stay over another night and fly out first thing in the morning…of course there would have to be a glitch in our otherwise perfect day.
We returned to Philly relatively early the following day. I always love the day after the photo shoot, because I get to go over the hundreds (and I think this time there were well over a thousand pics) to narrow it down to the final selection to be retouched for the lookbook and homepage. Also, the day before the actual photo shoot, the photographer does a product shoot for the images that you see on the actual product pages. Because we hadn’t done one of these in a while, I had a ton of products to upload (I am still not finished). So the two days following the shoot was spent editing and uploading.
Thursday I went to NYC for a few showroom buying appointments with our head buyer. We went to see 7 For All Mankind, Free People, Elizabeth & James, Corson and Peace Treaty. The latter two are in the same showroom as Citizens, Iro, Sunner and Bailey44. We noticed them last time we were there so we wanted to go back and review them. They are both very cool and have very interesting stories. Details to come.
When I returned to Philly that evening, I was able to escape the city and get out of town a day before the Jersey shore traffic madness took place. Friday I worked from home (I’m originally from the Poconos), writing orders and uploading product.
Like I said…Oh what a week!
I hope you’re having a wonderful Memorial Day weekend!
xo kim
On April 26th, we had our first photo shoot with the new team. Dawn (another CD Team member) and myself decided that we were going to fly to Pittsburgh for the day to oversee the shoot. Because I had a very early pick up (4:45am), I decided to get to bed early. I woke up around 1am to three missed calls and two texts from Richard, our stylist:
11:38pm Call me asap. Rachel (hair/makeup artist) is stuck in Tampa.
12:38am Rachel’s flight is canceled. Definitely cannot make the shoot.
With nothing I could do at that hour, I rolled over and fell back asleep. When I woke up, I was terrified to check my phone again; I just laid there praying that what happened a few hours earlier was just a nightmare. It wasn’t. Shit. What do I do? Do I postpone the shoot one more day? Can I find someone else to show up in 6 hours? It was 4am, so there was no one that I could call to help with my decision. I decided to just hop on the plane and I would figure everything out once I got to Pittsburgh.
The moment we landed, I called Richard. Richard explained that he called every hair/makeup artist that he knew and everyone was booked. So I started frantically calling everyone that I knew. Because it was still incredibly early (7am, which in the fashion industry might as well have been 4am), no one was picking up. I left a ton of voicemails and just hoped that someone (ANYONE) would get back to me. One hour passed – nothing. Two hours passed – nothing. At that point, it was about 9:15am and the shoot was supposed to take place in 45 minutes. Talk about panic mode! Not only is a hair/makeup artist an essential part to any photo shoot, but it was our first one with the new team and I really wanted it to be amazing (not to mention it was my birthday – yeah, happy birthday…). Finally my friend, Alexis, returned my call. Alexis owns a salon outside of the city, which I used to go to when I lived there. She said that she couldn’t do the makeup, but she was available for the day to do the hair, and on her commute in she would try to find someone for makeup. AWESOME.
Alexis showed up 30 minutes later, but unfortunately she was unable to find someone for makeup. As if it were a gift from God, a voicemail came through at that very moment from an old customer of mine (I used to own a boutique in Pittsburgh prior to working for Chick), “Kim, it’s Dana. I just went on your facebook page (yes I posted it on facebook – desperate times, call for desperate measures) to wish you a happy birthday. You are one of the only birthdays I remember, because it’s mine too, and I noticed that you need a hair and makeup artist. I can’t do hair, but I can do the makeup. I worked at fashion week….” I didn’t even listen to the rest. I immediately called her back and she agreed to come to the shoot for a few hours. DOUBLE AWESOME.
By the time everyone got there and the hair and makeup was finished, it was a little after noon, so we got right down to business. We chose two models, Alexa, who was one of the first models CD used, and Shawna. Richard suggested doing this photo shoot a bit more “editorial” then the previous ones (kind of like in a magazine), that told our “story” for that month. I thought it was a great idea. We chose two stories: Urban Attitude (the one currently on the homepage) featuring Alexa and Neutral Zone (which will debut later this week) featuring Shawna Sunday (yes that’s her real name). Last year for our Denim Guide we did a bunch of shots on the street. I loved the array of different backgrounds that we used, so I wanted to do something like that for Urban Attitude. For Neutral Zone, we used this really cool yellowish wall with gold flecks in it. Because we were incorporating metallics with neutrals, we thought this would really make the metallics pop.
Despite the early morning fiasco, I thought everything came out amazing! Below are a few of my favorite shots from the shoot. I also have to thank Alexis and Dana as they really saved the day. Thanks ladies!
Urban Attitude:
Sneak Peak at Neutral Zone:
xo kim