The Fallen
I’m a big fan of Gok Wan’s Fashion Fix on TVOne Friday nights. One of the designer wearing divas he pits his styling against each week is called Brix Smith-Start. Somewhere is the vestigial recesses of my brain I thought “hang on, wasn’t Mark E Smith of The Fall married to a Brix? Could it be her?”. And Oh my Gok, Wikipedia comes through and indeed tis one and the same.
So read on, maybe she will star also in The fallen : Searching for the missing members of The “Fall” by Dave Simpson.
Or Gok Wan: the Biography! – both coming soon …
Gok
Nigella, Delia, Jamie, Gordon and his missus Tana, Trinny, Susannah, Gok, Jeremy…… You clever people don’t need their full names because all of the above are TV celebs and they are much, much bigger than piffling surnames. Titles by TV celebrity cooks, fashion gurus, dog and baby whisperers, dodgy doctorate wielding nutritionists and all the other assorted TV tie-ins are the life-blood of the publishing industry. Nigella Christmas, a tie-in for the series of the same name, saw UK sales of £1.1 million in a single week during the frantic run up to Christmas easily taking the rolling pin to Jamie and Gordon’s festive offerings. This celeb-chef turkey tussle has become an annual book event and one which the “plumptious” Nigella also won last year with Nigella express: good food fast.
Now personally I loathe cooking and equally problematically I don’t watch the box but I do love some TV tie-ins.
- Who do you think you are? currently screening on Prime has celebrities (including the ubiquitous Nigella) tracing their family trees; the tie-in title features several celebs hunting down their ancestors, some general social history snippets plus practical tips on pursuing genealogy research.
- Stephen Fry has also been doing a stint on Prime (and on Who do you think you are?) with his Stephen Fry in America series. Stephen tootles around the US States milking sheep, raiding a marijuana farm and generally casting his bemused but genial eye over all things American. The book covers the same ground but with the addition of fabulous pictures and all at your own pace.
- The 1940s house, The Edwardian country house and 1900 house were all excellent shows recreating and exploring domestic life in times past. These TV tie-in titles stand out as they do more than just parrot the shows and actually go further in building through well researched text and images a feel for life in these eras.
- But enough with the egg-head stuff , what I really want to know is How to look good naked, to discover how What you wear can change your life and most importantly to unlock the mysteries of looking 10 years younger. Bring it on…
It seems like every time you switch on the telly, Trinny and Susannah are talking about “great boobs” and manhandling someone. According to these doyennes of style, John Campbell should be wearing a Hedi Slimane for Dior suit (state the obvious!) …
Trinny and Susannah’s Body Shape Bible is their most recent book, and their Trinny and Susannah undress the nation series is on TV1.
If you want to find out if you are shaped like an hourglass, an apple or a bell, there is an online shape calculator to help you figure it out. You can also peruse some of the other books by Trinny and Susannah.
Style advisers have always had a good audience – remember when people got their “colours” done and books like Colour me Beautiful were popular? Everybody knew if they were a “Winter” or “Spring”. Some other books about fashion and style you might like:
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The irrepressible Gok Wan tells you
How to look good naked. Sensible advice on looking good, with a lot of flair.
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Victoria Beckham shows you how to gain
That extra half inch (by wearing very high heels, not gaining in the midriff)
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There are plenty more books on women’s clothing and our Fashion page.
British hoydens Trinny and Susannah started the trend for makeovers that don’t involve the word “extreme”. They simply spruce up people’s fashion style and look without resorting to surgical options.
Starting this week on TV1 is a new series called How to look good naked. Like Trinny and Susannah, fashion stylist Gok Wan takes women on a journey from body-loathing to body-loving.
The library has the book How to look good naked and it has lots of fun tips for all body shapes.
