Blogs | Welcome Home | Faking It
March 7, 2008
Faking It
Ever wonder about being in those pretty rooms you see in magazines? Well, the truth is a lot of them aren’t rooms at all! They are often empty spaces in studios that some stylists/photographers/art directors/editors and hardworking interns have taken hours to build into rooms to showcase fabulous products. Case in point, the shoot I did last week for a story on real couples' registries (Wish Lists in Bridal Guide’s July/August ‘08 issue) where an amazing team, including the awesomely talented photographer Anastassios Mentis, his opera-loving assistant Alex, a couple of our deeply fabulous home department interns, Allison Imparato, from FIT and Giovana Coluccio, from NYU, and yours truly, built out several faux rooms. These included a beach house dining area and a modern French-style bedroom, both seen below.
When you build a room from scratch you have to think of every detail ahead of time, and make sure you bring everything you’ll need from wallpaper to baseboards, decorative accents, flowers and garbage bags because once you get to a studio there is usually nothing there. And the days are lo-o-ong. You start early and end late: I was painting wallpaper at 7a.m. and printing out return labels at 8:30 at night. But it’s a highly creative process that I look forward to doing for every issue. And getting to collaborate with talented photographers to make the most beautiful shots you can is the best!
The photographer Anastassios Mentis hands |
Allison hanging the lace-patterned wallpaper. |
Monica pushes the mattress into place. |
For the bedroom shot, we first started by wallpapering the wall area with pretty lace-patterned paper. Intern Allison proved to be an expert in this field so we let her take charge. Then we set the heavy headboard in place. Anastassios and I decided we were going to crop in the shot on the bed so we faked a base for the bed—note the cardboard boxes holding up the mattress I’m easing into place. As long as it’s not in the shot, you can use whatever makes sense to safely prop things up. Then we laid on the gorgeous Martha Stewart bedding from Macy’s, eased the curvy Brocade Home bedside table next to the headboard and propped with pretty flowers, Allison’s watch, a French wooden bed tray and a good book (mine) to round out the pretty scene.
Allison pours the "tea"—really iced tea spiked with coffee. |
The beautiful boudoir. |
For the dining scene, Anastassios suggested we shoot in the early morning to catch the pretty light coming in from the window. We had to tape the legs of the table in place because they were a little wobbly. I covered the table with a beautiful linen fabric I found in a local fabric shop, and Giovanna helped unpack. Anastassios and I laid out the pretty blue casual tableware by Noritake and fun dot-patterned glassware by Mikasa, loaned from Bon-Ton store.
Giovanna unpacking glassware. |
Monica and Giovanna setting the table. |
In the end we created some beautiful rooms I’d personally love to live in, if only they were real.
Posted by Monica at 10:41 a.m.
Submit a comment
To make something bold:
<strong>Text to bold</strong>
To make something italic:
<em>Text to italicize</em>
To make a hyperlink:
<a href="URL">Text to link</a>
tags:
