Humor Chic special report on Fashion Bloggers – Exclusive interview with Paola Pollo, fashion editor of the Corriere della Sera. Fashion Blogger Killer Spray !!!

Paola Pollo, the brilliant fashion editor of “Corriere della Sera”, talks about fashion bloggers and much else to Humor Chic.

Fashion Bloggers? Only ephemeral and small time. Blogger fashion journalists? Let them have their pictures taken with a basket of live chinchillas outside the fashion shows ...

She is definitely intelligent and witty, kind and courageous, critical, direct and always surprising, as only a few sincere and still great journalists can be. A watchful gaze and an athletic body, a perfect combination for a woman who has spent nearly two decades running from one capital to another to follow fashion at first hand and write up everything the big names present. Her one fault is it’s impossible to photograph her, ever reluctant to adopt a front row pose, she prefers to nurture her curiosity and her brilliant mind.

We are talking about Paola Pollo, super elusive fashion editor for Italy’s most important newspaper, the “Corriere della Sera”. Humor Chic met her to talk about her unique and original perspective on the world of fashion bloggers.

Humor Chic - There are scores of teenagers and young adults who have started blogs where they post pictures of themselves every day in ever-changing outfits and giving advice about style to their followers. Known as fashion bloggers, can you tell us what you think of them?

Paola Pollo - I think it’s a phenomenon of the Web and for the Web. I don’t believe it has any parallel in macro life. No more than a couple of months ago I was at a presentation along with the editor, no longer young, of a weekly which deals, let’s say, with modern living. She was all thrilled to have recently discovered the fashion bloggers (I’m speaking of February!). "Yes, yes, fashion is right to court them! They pull in the crowds .... " I couldn’t believe my ears. "Crowds? Have you never been outside a high school or university? Do you really see anyone, male or female, in an outfit of that kind? " 

“No, no,” she said. “My daughter would be the first not to dress so oddly.”

“That's exactly it,” I tell her , “but definitely outside the fashion shows I see a lot like that.”

Humor Chic– So basically you think it's a niche phenomenon affecting just a small circle?
Paola Pollo – Yes. They love being in the spotlight of the world. A world that loves the spotlight. And loving the spotlight is an attitude that gratifies them first of all. Hence all the photos and the desire to show off. With more or less taste. But I’d never speak of skill, certainly not. They’re just new bit players who leap on the fashion bandwagon that keeps taking people aboard and setting them down.

Humor Chic – Yours is a harsh judgment, but what do you mean by bit players?
Paola Pollo – I’m thinking of the supermodels who don’t exist any more! A lot fall from grace, some have recovered after a string of errors (see Kate Moss, for example). You remember Cindy (Crawford), but raise your hand if you dream of being Daria (Werbowy), the beautiful model from Poland who was all the rage on the catwalks and advertising agencies for at least four years? All the guys, in fact all the girls, will have clicked on Google, because very few - I'm sure – remember her face.

Humor Chic – A lot of fashion designers have started giving away clothes and accessories. A lot of bloggers never not miss a chance to publish them online and let their followers know what was the last gift a stylist sent them, just as if they were trophies to be displayed. What do you think about this?
Paola Pollo - The fashion world loves to be adored and worshiped. Regardless. So if A loves me and even just 1000 people look at it on the web, thousands of people might adore me. And I love A.
Now I don’t know whether giving A a really cool purse will help sell 1000 cool handbags. Perhaps it’s a Carpisa costing 50 euros or a Valentino at 2000 euros, but I honestly don’t believe it. For goodness’ sake, I could be wrong. And if the fashion industry has gone crazy for them and wants them anywhere and everywhere, no problem. It’s the adulation, baby. As long as they’re happy. Personally I think it’s only the fashion bloggers that gain notoriety and attention. That's all.

Humor Chic – It was the fashion journalists themselves who gave visibility to the fashion bloggers, but now something seems to have cooled between fashion journalists and fashion bloggers, or even got blocked. Maybe they’re being perceived as a threat?

Paola Pollo – You’re right. It was the fashion journalists who started talking about them first. The web is a phenomenon with all its phenomena like avatars or bloggers. That said, no, I’ve never felt endangered by the role of fashion bloggers. I honestly have never even been touched in the slightest by doubt. My job is to be a journalist: I go, I see, I write.

Humor Chic – And so what do you think of fashion journalists who have opened their own blogs and as if they were little girls every day publish a photo of themselves in ever-changing outfits. Some of them, just to justify the sad little photo, then spice up the soup with a fashion point of view. Do you think they’re ridiculous?

Paola Pollo - Thirty years have passed since my first article and eighteen from my first fashion week and I still get excited or bored at fashion shows. I don’t want my picture taken with a basket of live chinchillas outside a show ... And I don’t hurry to post myself if one morning I see I’m cool in banana-shaped shoes! If a colleague has gone over to the other side, clearly she had that attitude and who knows, after her collection she’ll even make a movie.
My dream isn’t to design a pair of jeans but to interview John Galliano, the point here being that it makes for a confusion of roles.

Humor Chic– Don’t you find there’s a rampant superficiality and mediocrity, a dangerous carelessness that has taken over the system?
Paola Pollo - If you ask me whether a there’s a certain carelessness and a certain superficiality, I'd answer I daresay there is.

Humor Chic -Perhaps we ought to go back and put the accent on words like integrity, professionalism, sacrifice, passion and training more than improvisation?

Paola Pollo - From the time you decide to become a journalist to when you sign your first article in a major newspaper it could take – if you're lucky – ten years (graduation, specialist school, internships, the first contact). To post your picture with a basket of live chinchillas it takes just a click ... But the lords of fashion know this. Or don’t they?

Humor Chic – A lot of them have probably forgotten, wouldn’t you say?

Paola Pollo - Then the ball’s in their court. They ought to understand things better.

And we at Humor Chic look forward anxiously, awaiting the response of
the designers ...

Au revoir chicest.