Brazilian fashion bloggers land in London

There were plenty of highlights during London Fashion Week this season, but I wasn’t expecting this: to meet Brazilian fashion entrepreneur Alice Ferraz. Alice runs Ferraz Moda, a luxury brand agency in Brazil with clients including Marc Jacobs, Stella McCartney and Issa London. But we met in London last week to discuss her latest venture, F Hits*, a platform for 26 Brazilian fashion bloggers. She is now scouting for number 27 and wants this one to be from London.

“I remember being front row at Calvin Klein’s catwalk show in New York Fashion Week five years ago and being asked to move to make room for someone. I didn’t know who she was, but remember thinking that she must have been important. It turned out she was a blogger,” Alice tells me, the moment that led to the creation of F Hits*. “But it’s only really in the last two years that bloggers have become important in Brazil.”
F Hits* currently attracts 3.5 million unique users and her target is to reach 5 million by the end of the year. It’s ambitious, but so is Alice, and the criteria for a blogger to join her platform is tough. The blog needs to notch up 10,000 hits per day.
Such is the strength of Alice’s business and contacts book that she managed to get TAM Airlines to sponsor 15 of her bloggers to come to London during fashion week (pictured, with Alice in the middle wearing the floor length, printed dress). Not only that, she set up meetings for them with the likes of Net-a-Porter, Selfridges and Liberty. “It wasn’t difficult to organise,” she shrugs.
As well as the 10,000 hits, Alice is looking for “another point of view, someone different and avant-garde” in her London blogger.
And what’s in it for the blogger? A percentage of the advertising revenue (although Alice won’t tell me what that percentage is…) and exposure in a market that the rest of the world is watching.
Alice insists that her bloggers are – and always will be – free to express their opinions, regardless of upsetting a brand. “They are very critical and that’s good. They love to criticise celebrities, too.”
For Alice, the role of the fashion blogger in Brazil and technology as a whole will only grow in importance, much like the country itself, and she wasn’t all that impressed with Tom Ford's top-secret strategy at London Fashion Week, where only a handful of fashion editors were invited to his presentation. Photos, tweets and immediate reporting on the collection with product information was banned. “It’s never going to work,” she says of Ford’ insistence on protecting fashion’s traditional two-season (and arguably elitist) cycle. Burberry, by contrast, tweeted pictures of its models so that the public saw the looks from its spring 12 show before the front row - a democratic move. “He’s trying to protect [fashion] too much."

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Issa London or Issa Rio?

The suffix “London” could easily have been substituted for “Rio” in Issa London’s spring/summer 12 collection, which the Brazilian designer Daniella Helayel showed at Somerset House during London Fashion Week on Saturday night. If the brand hadn’t made enough of its Brazilian roots before (I don’t think it has), then Daniella changed all that for next season, going as far (too far perhaps?) as using “I heart Rio” prints. Tropical fruit and banana leaf prints also cemented the more clichéd Brazilian aesthetic, while super-skimpy swimwear – modelled by Ana Beatriz Barros – showed off Brazil’s love of the female form.

Elsewhere, there were plenty of references to two of Issa’s favourite clients – Kate and Pippa Middleton. A shift dress with matching cropped jacket worn with a fascinator had royalty written all over it, while body-skimming dresses cinched in at the waist could go straight into Kate’s wardrobe.
The 1970s was also key, with jumpsuits and elegant floor-length kaftans, but the dress ruled the day, as some 40 styles walked down the catwalk accompanied by a speeded-up version of The Girl from Ipanema.
But perhaps what encapsulated the Brazilian mood best was the finale. Ana walked down the runway in a jewelled and feathered – and skimpy – leotard, giving the audience a wink and cute smile as she turned to walk back. She also joined Daniella as the designer took her bow; the two did a little dance on the catwalk.



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Issa London promises Brazilian influences at London Fashion Week

London Fashion Week invitations inevitably get me excited: Burberry’s seasonal metallic card, Matthew Williamson's gold-edged, blurry floral tableau (although Matthew’s biggest draw is the location of the show this season, at the Turbine Hall in the Tate Modern. Can’t wait.). But this season, another invitation caught my eye, from Issa London. The designer, Daniella Helayel, is Brazilian and whilst I’ve never really thought that her collections were defined by any particular Brazilian aesthetic, I’m intrigued by tomorrow’s show at the BFC Tent at Somerset House. You couldn’t get more Brazilian that the invitation, pictured above, with its "I love Rio" phrase and illustration of the Corcovado and Christ the Redeemer. As always, I will report back from the show. Who knows, maybe Kate Middleton, a huge Issa fan, may grace the front row… Read more!

Spotting the Havainas in Brazilian art

As I stood admiring one of Luiz Zerbini’s huge paintings at the private viewing of his UK debut at the Max Wigram Gallery, I heard a lady next to me say in Portuguese: “Let’s play a game. Who will be the first to spot…. A red fish!” I looked over to find her talking to two little girls. “Me! I found it,” said one of them, rightly pointing to a red fish among the foliage, geometric block prints and a loose light bulb. “Now, who can find…. A Havaiana flip flop?” It takes longer this time, but eventually the older girl spots it (not before I do, though…).

Games aside, I liked Luiz’ work. Maybe because they were so large, people lingered in front of the paintings longer than they might normally do, and the juxtaposition of colourful landscapes fused with figurative painting certainly made you question the themes in each piece.



I spoke to Luiz about his work, but also about Brazilian art in general, as part of my feature for The Bulletin. I asked him if he thought it was possible to characterise Brazilian art. He said no. “Brazilian art is free,” he added.
The exhibition runs until October 1. If you’re in the West End, I’d recommend dropping by for a spot of Brazilian culture.

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Brazilian Style at Fashion's Night Out

I was wandering through the St Germain district in Paris on Monday evening when I came across a lovely book shop on rue Bonaparte called Assouline. The exterior was beautiful: a soft, matte-black frontage with a large cut-out of a glamourous-looking lady wearing some sort of animal (I imagine the intention is genuine not faux) over her shoulders. Inside, travel and fashion books mingle with art tomes and stationery knick knacks, all perfectly pitched to a literary aesthete.



As I admired the merchandising technique used on books about high-profile fashion designers along the single, thin shelf on the right hand side of the store, I noticed ahead of me a cover featuring a Carmen Miranda-like image against a bright green background, with the words Brazilian Style emblazoned across it.





Flicking through it, the book is a celebration of Brazilian "style" across the board, from obvious references like the Campana Brothers and Gisele to less obvious, but equally ubiquitous images of feijoada and beach volleyball.
It's a strong, picture-led book with some great images. I liked the juxtaposition of the Campana Brothers against a single pair of Havaianas flip flops; a wall lined with cachaça bottles (what you make caipirinha from); and the peachy volleyball shot.





If I had one criticism, it's that - at times - the book felt like a bit of a cliché, with its green and yellow cover palette and iconic Samba images. Only yesterday, I was on the phone to Jude Kelly, who was responsible for the Southbank's brilliant Festival Brazil last summer in London, and she told me how important it was to show the diversity of the arts in Brazil and “get away from Samba-city”.
Not that references to Samba and the like should be ignored. These are important aspects of Brazil’s culture, but it’s a culture that goes way beyond that, too. And the book does pick up on more subtle references, including Doces Bárbaros, the name of an album and band made up of legendary musicians Gilberto Gil, Caetano Veloso, Maria Bethânia and Gal Costa.
The book officially launches today in Assouline’s US boutiques to coincide with Fashion’s Night Out. It will be available worldwide, including in the UK, from mid October, or you can pre-order now.
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At the Brazilian film festival premier in London

The organisers of the Brazilian Film Festival in London, which opened last night, did a stellar job of attracting producers, actors, journalists, the general public and other creatives to the BAFTA’s screening of Man from the Future (O Homen do Futuro); with every seat taken, the PR team had to sit on the stairs to see the film. Not only that, but they also managed to bag Brazilian model Ana Araujo, the girlfriend of Ronnie Wood, to open the ceremony and bring Ronnie along for support. She needed it, too. I was surprised by how nervous she was, as she struggled with her script. But like all great professionals, she managed to giggle her way out of it.

As for the film itself, Man from the Future had a Back to the Future quality to it. A scientist, called Zero, goes back in time after creating a revolutionary energy source and has the opportunity to correct his mistakes. The writing is quite funny in parts – although it probably works best in Portuguese (the film has English sub titles) – but I felt some of the acting was slightly over the top. Sci-fi films aren’t my thing though, so judge for yourselves. Or try one of several films showing until September 10 at the Odeon in Covent Garden.
Tomorrow, it’s the preview of Brazilian artist Luiz Zerbini as he marks his UK debut at the Max Wigram Gallery in Mayfair. I’ll bring you all the news. What a great week of Brazilian culture in London.
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Penguin Classics to launch first Brazilian series

Today, I bring you some news from the world of Brazilian literature… After a chat with author Benjamin Moser, I discovered that Penguin is going to launch its first Penguin Classics series focusing on a Brazilian author: the acclaimed Clarice Lispector.

Benjamin, who I interviewed last year after he spoke at the Festival Brazil on London’s Southbank and Brazil’s important literary festival FLIP in Paraty about Lispector (he wrote her biography, Why This World), is editing the series and translated one of Lispector’s novels: A Hora da Estrela (The Hour of the Star). The series will comprise five translations of Lispector’s novels and launches in April 2012 in the UK and US.
“I’m working with four other translators and editing all the novels so that they have a single voice,” Benjamin told me. “Everybody who translates her comes out with something different. Five copy editors read my biography and tried to correct her. She has such a strong voice – Brazilians would recognize her work from one sentence – that I’m trying to get people not to correct her too much.”
Moving from books to film, London's Brazilian film festival starts on Tuesday and I've been invited to the opening night at BAFTA. Will tell you all about later this week. Read more!