Jean Jeanie

This morning I had a pleasant surprise when rushing to get dressed - one which was incredibly unexpected. Anyone who knows me and my particular style will very rarely see me in jeans. I'll wear high waisted skinny jeans if I'm planning on crawling around a studio shooting all day, but other than that I love my tea dresses and 50s shapes. With an hourglass shape, anything other than high waisted jeans just don't fir properly and will either slide down or give me the worst muffin top imaginable.

Despite that, for no reason other than self inflicted torture, I had a pair of skinny jeans which I had given up all hope of ever getting into. My body has steadily increased in weight through no fault of my own despite constantly dieting and fighting with it and the idea of them ever fitting again seemed a bit too out of reach. However this morning having done a bit of a colder weather wardrobe shuffle, I came across them and they actually did up.

Now don't get me wrong, they look AWFUL. They are low cut, too tight and have given me the worst muffin top in the world (it's made me appreciate my high waisted jeans all the more!) but I don't care. They zipped up, and that it something which even six months ago, they wouldn't come close to doing.

Mmmm... muffins...

It may not seem like much to most people - Newsflash: "jeans which don't fit still don't fit" - bit it was a complete revelation to me as I honestly thought I was currently at the heaviest and biggest I've ever been in my life. I've been fighting against it - eating better, increasing my jogging circuits and although I felt healthier, couldn't see any sort of physical change. The fact that stress had been making me run back to the cheese laden arms of my beloved carbs hadn't helped too, but I was persevering with making better food choices and continuing with my running. Frozen grapes, pomegranate seeds and spiced pumpkin soup are pretty much my food BFFs right now.

It made me look a little harder at myself, and see that there are changes. Only a small change, but any change in the right direction is a good one. When you're criticising yourself day in day out, it's difficult to look past any assumptions we've already made. Clothes are a great indicator for telling us that we're wrong!

It's not been easy to make these small changes, but this has given me the boost I needed to continue with them and not feel like I was both wasting my time and fighting a losing battle.

For anyone interested, I absolutely hate jogging but have found an app called Zombies Run! to be very helpful as it makes the process more interactive and, dare I say it, fun. Just to make sure I keep pushing myself, I'm doing every third run with Couch To 5K  as I can get very lazy and complacent with exercise. I keep forgetting you're meant to always be struggling to reach the end and that it's no good just running towards the café for a hot chocolate post workout!

I try not to talk about the health / exercise / weight loss side of things too much as it's not particularly fun or interesting for most people, but this felt like a real milestone for me, both mentally and physically. I'm almost looking forward to my next run across the heath! (Almost...)

Until next time,
Diana xx

Pattern Recognition

www.fashionising.com/pictures/s--Movement-by-Diana-Thompson-17594-1.html

Hold the front (web)page!

This morning, I had quite a nice surprise in discovering that a series of images I'd worked on had made the front page of www.fashionising.com. The concept of the shoot was devised by Alex Hardy, Hair stylist extraordinaire from the home of RUSH Hair Salons and with an incredible team built up, was one which grew.

The shoot was intended for competition usage, with colour and texture at the forefront. However we wanted to shoot the series of a proper fashion story to fit in with Autumn / Winter trends with publication at the front of all our minds.

We were incredibly lucky to find Coco Syed to take care of the make-up, with independent designers Sasha Louse (Latex) and Lovechild Boudoir (accessories) taking care of the edgy look we were going for.

There were also lots of out-takes which didn't make the final set, but I still loved.

Models: Hope Obertelli, Natasha Boyce, Holly, Lou, India Elise Graham, Megan Darkes-Seddon.

Hair Stylist Assistant: Adam Furczyk.

Down By The Water

On a dull, rainy day in London where we waved goodbye to the last rays of Summer, I took a drive with one of my favourite people to work on a series of images which will become the "Behind Room 8" series. Luna DeLovely is one of my favourite people in the world, as well as being a fun person to shoot with. Whilst the series is very much a work in progress, here's a sneak peak of what we were getting up to.

You can see some of the behind the scenes images from my previous post here.

Until next time,

Diana x

Burnt Toast and Black Coffee.

It's been a busy few weeks, and as ever time has completely run away from me. Between shooting, editing and DJing, it's been hard to find a few moments of peace, but it's certainly been as fun as it has busy!

It all began with me taking a turn behind the other side of the camera. I'm not a complete stranger to modelling, and absolutely jumped at the chance to be shot by Tom Perry  who works almost exclusively with film.

Tea and red lipstick - the essentials for any photoshoot!

Pearls & Swine Headdress.

Whiskey Kittens and Photo Geek Necklaces by Punky Pins and Bette Noir Jewellery.

The view from the other side of the lens!

Tales from the dressing room.

So in love with this headdress and ASOS Bodysuit.

There have been lots of other photographic adventures where I've been the boss with my camera firmly in hand.

The first included roadtrips for country weddings and 50th anniversary celebrations.

Sunday Morning Meeting.

Stonehenge.

Back in London, we had promo shots with both Bettie Wishes and Lord Dicely.

A secret location was found for the "Inside Room 8" series with Luna DeLovely.

And continuing the theme of glamour, there's the usual product shooting. At least this came with wine.

I managed to escape to the V&A for a second viewing of it's incredible Bowie exhibition with Howard.

I briefly saw my darling Bink of Pearls and Swine.

I managed to celebrate the birthday of the lovely Lana (Al) Pillay.

And even had the time to squeeze in one more event shoot by London Bridge, meeting the adorable Albert The Pug..

Of course there was also the usual rock and roll revelery at Whiskey Kittens.

This was followed by a hungover day in Brighton with #TeamHylda.

#TeamHylda

And a few other bits and pieces here and there...

I'm currently drowning under a pile of editing, but am making sure my blogging is more frequent. I've got lots of exciting shoots, events and outfits lined up, and can't wait to share them with you!

Until next time,
Diana xx