All the young dudes.

Taking a moment away from all the tech talk to get back to my roots with a post on fashion.

When my contemporaries and I were teenagers, we didn't have the Gossip Girls and Willow Smiths of today's world to look up to. In the mid-nineties, tweenage fashion was defined in three key moments: Cher's knee-high socks in Clueless, Ginger Spice's Union Jack dress at the Brit awards and Britney's school uniform in Baby One More Time. The last correlating directly to my parent's decision to send me to boarding school.



But before all that, and before Girl Power with its ghastly Buffalo boots and belly chains, there was one TV show setting the benchmark for post-grunge tween style. Blossom. Blossom was an American series which managed to combine important life lessons with some fashion statements even Carrie Bradshaw couldn't compete with. No other show before or since and been single-handedly responsible for the comeback of hats. Hats baby.

I recently found this interview with the costume designer on Blossom who explains how she mixed ethnic materials with vintage pieces to create a look that defined a generation.



Talking with my friends, its seems we are all in agreement that teenage fashion was not easy to come by in our youth. For those of us not into the pint-sized prostitute look peddled by the likes of Tammy Girl and Miss Selfridge (pre-overhaul), we had no choice but to be creative. Our response to a waif-like Kate Moss on the cover of Dazed & Confused, and the final days of Kurt Cobain manifested itself in Doc Marten's, slouch socks, floral leggings and our Dad's washed out denim shirts. Fashion inspiration didn't just come neatly packaged from celebrities and magazines, it was much more a reflection of our culture, our moods, music, art and movements.

To illustrate my point, I had a quick dig through the family albums. Having a photographer father means that my developing style - for good or bad - has been painstakingly documented. In the shots below - both from the mid-nineties - you'll see my fashion homages to both Nirvana and Pulp Fiction.





However odd us Nineties kids must have looked at times, I'm glad we didn't have our fashion fed to us quite as prescriptively as we seem to now. The grunge-y, ramshackle look not only gave us freedom to express ourselves as we pleased, but also allowed us to remain kids, if only for a couple more years. Covered in baggy tees and stomping around in DM's meant we didn't feel the pressure young girls must experience today of having the "perfect" Nicole Scherzinger body. We weren't about being "so hot you'd melt a popsicle", we came as we were. Fake boobs and botox? Ugh, as if!

Kinder not-very-Suprised

Kinder Eggs clearly had no idea who they would be dealing with when they Kinder Surprised me with an Augmented Reality toy. The only related video I could find on YouTube was this one from the makers - Total Immersion.



Unlike these happy-go-lucky kids rocking out to a bit of Phoenix and enjoying the "Engaging Digital Experience", I was left struggling with a UI exclusively in Polish while waving a marker around. After trying several games (one of which required a different marker to the one in my egg, and another which filled a white screen with red dots), I finally ended up on one where you "bop" the characters in the corners with your head to win points. Fun times.



If I'm 27 and felt more than a little jealous of my friend cracking on with assembling a self-propelled boat, I can only imagine the frustrated tears of a child attempting to get this thing going. The Kinder Magic smacks of a bored creative team attempting to band-wagon on the "cool new thing" yet ultimately alienating the very digital instinctives they were trying to engage with. Kids today may be digitally savvy, but they are still kids - they won't love something just because it's on a computer, they will love it if it's simple, fun and - ideally - in a language they speak.

Then I saw his face, now I’m a Belieber

Last night I went to see the Justin Bieber movie – Never Say Never. In 3D. Now, before you forever delete Camilla’s Store from your Google Reader, please give me a few paragraphs to explain myself.

I’ll admit, it just sounded like a fun thing to do with @celialikesbooks on a quiet Sunday night. But more importantly, as a digital strategist it’s important to know what’s going on with the kids (da kidz) and millions of hysterical teenage girls worldwide can’t be wrong.



Bieber may be a study in poorly managed ADHD but he is also a carefully curated, expertly executed, cross-platform brand who rose from a few YouTube videos to an 86 gig tour culminating in a sell-out show at Madison Square Gardens. There’s got to be some social media strategy lessons in there somewhere. And if they’re delivered in 3D, so much the better.



Firstly, The Bieb. He’s alright – ticks all the boxes of cute, non-threatening, triple threat youth dynamo. But it’s his team – consisting of Mom, grandparents, vocal coach, costume designer, manager and “jester” (their words, not mine) – who really run the show. This is pushy parenting taken to whole new levels, and you are left wondering whether stardom is an excellent outlet for Bieber’s effervescent energy, or a depressing theft of his youth.

In the film, Justin is joined on stage by other celebabies Myley Cyrus and Jaden Smith (“my papa is a guy named Will”), both of whom have an unnerving world-weariness. Poor Jaden only found out his parents had made the helicopter to NYC moments before he went on stage at The Garden. And to think I freaked out if I lost my mum in the supermarket.



Secondly, the film. I hate to admit it, but part of me feels it belongs in the “Films of our era” drawer along with The Social Network. It’s by no means as beautifully crafted, but it’s the first example of large-scale storytelling via YouTube videos, Twitter updates and comments sections I’ve seen.

Justin is the perfect product of the “Digital Instinctive” generation – discovered, followed, and loved by a dedicated online community. And he gives the love back – tweeting his fans to let them know how he’s feeling, giving away front row tickets to kids outside the venue, and regularly updating his YouTube diary. His hit “Baby” has had 468,497,309 views on YouTube. 21,665,394 people “like” him on Facebook”. And he has 7, 481,097 followers on Twitter. That is power. That is a massive slap in the face to any brand who thinks it doesn’t need to engage its customers – and most importantly its future customers – online.



You may not feel a slow-motion hair flick in 3D is an entirely necessary part of the cinema experience, but if you’re wanting a crash-course in the art of digital strategy driving both brand and comms, Bieber is your guy. Never say never.

Photo credit: @celialikesbooks - you keep me real.

Kids today

Arranging play dates on their mobiles, while the nanny cruises them around in Maclaren pushchairs, tots today are pretty tuned in. According to a recent survey, these little ankle biters are more likely to be swayed by brand advertising than their own friends.
Walking yesterday on that green bastion of upper-middle class Guardian readers - Hampstead Heath - I overheard one pre-schooler exclaim "Daddy, people like skinny". Referring to her preference for Starbucks lattes or commenting on our modern preoccupation with size 0? Who knows, but let's say I won't be surprised to walk past the play pit next time to find debate raging on Suri Cruise's wardrobe and the benefits of micro-biotic baby food.



Above: the GlowPhone from Firefly Mobile aimed specifically at kids.