This is a wonderful video Medill journalism student Emily Ferber created about me for Northwestern University’s fashion magazine, STITCH. This video accompanies the article Chicago’s Fashion Facelift in the May 2011 issue, which I re-posted below. She followed me around with her camera for a entire day, documenting how I work. Hope you all enjoy seeing me in action!

Amy Creyer stands at the corner of Rush and Oak streets in an imposing Mongolian-fur coat and Ray-Ban aviators. It is spring in Chicago but hardly feels that way. Despite the inclement weather, Creyer has been out with her camera for roughly two hours, walking loops around the Magnificent Mile.

Passersby seem slightly taken aback by her petite figure roughly resembling Chewbacca with a hawk-like gaze. “I feel like I’m starting to cultivate an image of myself,” Creyer says of her unique look. “People are definitely starting to recognize the coat.” Unfazed by their glances, she continues to scour the streets for the city’s most fashionable to feature on her blog.

Creyer’s blog, ChicagoStreetstyle.com, where she posts her photographs of chic
shoppers around Chicago, has received national press since she began blogging in June 2010. Since then, she has attended exclusive parties at New York Fashion Week and has been asked to host parties for Chicago’s fashion luminaries. And she is not the only one receiving attention for having a keen eye for layering, color and style. Creyer, 24, is a part of Chicago’s ever-increasing online community of fashion photographers, writers and designers.


Chicago’s style reconstruction

Style bloggers are a new breed of fashion elite, gaining invitations to the most
exclusive events the fashion world has to offer. Creyer says the fame is a product of their accessibility. “If I say a product fit into my life well, people are going to respond to it because I’m a real person,” she said, contrasting her blog to sites like Style.com.

This personal touch has come to define Chicago’s growing fashion scene.
Once thought to take a back seat to cities like New York and Los Angeles, Chicago is establishing itself as an incubator for budding designers, stylists and writers.

“It is starting to gain focus in a very cottage industry manner, and it is maybe not
completely focused on fashion, but more about garment,” said School of the Art Institute of Chicago Professor Conrad Hamather. “And there is a difference between fashion and garment without hesitation.”

Embodying Chicago’s growing fashion reputation, Weinberg freshman Zoe
Demacela designs and manufactures her own clothing line out of Chicago.
“I think Chicago is special because it’s the perfect environment to get started,”
Damacela said. Damacela began her fashion line at 14 years old and won the nationwide Youth Entrepreneurship Challenge in 2009.

She said she may end up in New York one day but for now she is content to be designing from Chicago. “There are so many programs here where artists get the skills that they need to start without the competition. There is less press than in New York but the press that we do have people really read and pay attention to, so it doesn’t mean you’ll get less attention,” she said.

Without the big brands taking over the small fashion community, fashion
publications like Chicago Social have taken a different approach to publicizing fashion. “Everything’s a lot more local here,” said Samantha Saifer, director of marketing at Chicago Social.

“As much as we’d love to work with brands like Chanel and Gucci, I think it’s a lot more realistic to work with local brands.”

At Chicago Social, editorial photo shoots and fashion shows feature clothing from
smaller fashion lines and the magazine focuses on developing a relationship with the Chicago fashion community.

“It’s about bringing your neighbors to your neighbors,” said Talia Pines, an
account executive at Chicago Social.

At the expense of the magazines

But as blogs become more prevalent, magazines have noticed a decrease in
interest in certain areas.  “We still list sales in our calendar section of the magazine, but we miss a lot  because we’re not given the sale information as far in advance because stores rely on  blogs to get the word out quicker,” said Korey Huyler, editor-in-chief of Chicago Social.

In addition to losing content, magazines are facing the prospect of losing advertisers  looking for a quicker, cheaper way to reach a younger and broader audience.  “The blogs have certainly become a pivotal source for fashion in Chicago.  The  blogs are sidestepping the magazines and media world that mostly revolve around paid  advertisements,” Hamather said.

Blogs hold a unique position in the industry because of their immediacy and
frugality.  It is the old adage, “There’s a little something for everyone.”
This is exactly what advertisers are seeing.  While spending on apparel and
accessories increased by 7 percent among affluent consumers from 2009 to 2010,
according to research conducted by American Express, this increase is not nearly as attractive to businesses as the potential of blogs.

According to JupiterResearch, a market research company, corporate spending on online advertisements is expected to reach $4.9 billion in 2011, surpassing the $2.9 billion expected for text advertisements.  With the high traffic now directed towards fashion blogs, bloggers such as Creyer are hoping to capitalize on the trend.

Exposure is everything

Just because Chicago’s fashion scene isn’t center stage, does not mean it is not
ever-present. “New York offers immediacy and may add to a bit of ease or complacency,  whereas, Chicago has a bit more of a premeditated directive,” Hamather said.  “You have to know what you’re looking for.”

To make the community more accessible, the government has taken the city’s
fashion profile into its own hands.  Former Mayor Richard M. Daley founded the
Mayor’s Fashion Council Chicago to establish Chicago as a fashion destination and develop a pool of resources for the burgeoning fashion industry.  Those in the fashion community say they hope that the governmental support will continue.

“I think first we need exposure and second, the politics of this city need to make people aware of what’s going on,” said Ryan Beshel of the blog, The Bowtie  Memoirs.  “We have this new mayor now so we’re all just waiting to see what he does.

Mayor Daley did a lot to help elevate fashion in this city but you can’t imagine that’s the first thing Rahm’s going to do.”

Still on the fast track

Despite a smaller fashion scene than New York and Los Angeles, Creyer has no
problem finding subjects for her photos.  Even on a day with freezing rain, wind, and snow, Creyer documents the looks of six different people. “It’s hard when everyone is out in those coats that look like sleeping bags.  I get it, but I can’t photograph it,” she says.

After four hours of prowling the Gold Coast, Creyer hops on the “L” to
Bucktown. “I have to pick up the dress I wore to the Cynthia Rowley party,” she
mentions. 

After hosting the Cynthia Rowley party on Thursday, she still has several other
events to attend before the weekend is up.  Even in Chicago, it seems, the fashion scene is as fast paced as it is anywhere.