NEW ORLEANS FASHION WEEK | ASHLEY ANDREWS DESIGNS | FASHION PHOTOGRAPHY

A while back, my friend Ashley Andrews approached me about photographing some of the looks from her collection she had been designing for her project as an LSU Senior in the Fashion department. She ended up getting accepted into New Orleans Fashion Week as one of 10 emerging designers and showed her designs on the runway in late March! Her work and my photographs of her work have been published by The Advocate, inRegister Magazine, and NOLA.com. Here's an excerpt of her inspiration, courtesy of NOLA.com:

“Andrews first learned to sew when she was about 10 years old when her grandmother passed down her own knowledge of the skill. By the time she attended high school at St. Joseph’s Academy, she was making her own prom dress.

”St. Joseph’s (has) a really good clothing construction department,” Andrews said. “By the time I went to LSU, I had fallen in love with it, and I went for it.”

The collection Andrews is putting together for Fashion Week is a reflection of where she is now, on the eve of graduating from college and beginning her adult life. She’s calling it “Blackbird.”

”It’s inspired by the bird losing his feathers and involving different phases of life,” Andrews said. “I’m moving on to a new stage, and this is me coming out.”

The collection focuses on mixed textiles like alligator leather, feathers and handmade lace and is primarily black and gold.

”A big part is the features of the garments are detachable,” she said. “You could wear them to different events ... as the phases change.”

— NOLA.com

It was my pleasure to be asked to photograph her collection on the runway, and I can't wait to have another stylized shoot with the rest of her pieces!