In June 2011 i-D online started flashing its bits, scrolling through pics, rolling around and pulling faces. We called the new design a facelift, but it was more like a nip, tuck and reconstruct…
Finding friends in a talented team of photographers, stylists, writers and artists, we built i-D online 2.0 from scratch and 6 months on it’s a good-looking, Daydreaming, SOUL-searching, talent-touting .com! From fashion on the faces that stuck out, to experimental film, international fashion weeks through iPhones and i-N sessions with the biggest artists of 2011, it’s been a year of trial and error, pixel number crunching, hard work and far too much fun. This year i-D online also fully metamorphosised into social network butterflies, adding Tumblr, YouTube and SoundCloud in addition to our scene-stealing Facebook and Twitter. Well without further ado, may we three present our very top moments from the year gone by.
Fronting Haruki Horikawa’s colour happy, sparkle motion pictures was Patrick O’Donnell, also coincidentally the first boy to grace the cover of i-D this year in The Hedonist Issue. Following this shoot, incredible teams of photographers and stylists have contributed beautiful, creatively brained fashion and beauty stories especially for i-D online. Of course a picture is perfect printed full bleed on a page, but there’s something to be said for web resolution too, it makes it come alive. SR
Scouring the bountiful musical territories for juicy fruits, fresh for the plucking, i-D online stayed ahead of the trends this year by ignoring genres. House, pop, electronica, acoustic, ambient and experimental; our tastes stretch far, from the bizarre to the sublime. If a tune’s good we get it heard and what better way to introduce you all to seriously slick sounds other than a homemade mixtape full of delectable beats, unearthed from all our best secret sources. The i-D online monthly mix-tape is more than a round up of top, new tunes, it is a regular radio show on NTS and a platform for unsigned talent, everywhere. Don’t click play anywhere else. Keep it locked on i-D online. MM
Clothes, clothes they’re everywhere; they’re in our thoughts and in our hair! As the fashion pack dashed across NY, London, Milan and Paris for the bi-annual sartorial extravaganza, darting from show to re-see to presentation and back around again i-D online trotted the globe to deliver you the best wardrobes and walk-throughs from the SS12 show season. Cheeks rouged, hair scraped at Vuitton; veiled and tottering at McQueen; bleach-browed and booted at Balenciaga, we zoomed from show to show and even found time to scoop some cheeky winks from some of favourite fashion faces. SGB
Whilst headlines with the names ‘Joe Jonas’ and ‘Lydia Bright’ might more likely be found on the nation’s red tops, ever eclectic, i-D online was delighted to welcome a pair of pop culture iconoclasts onto the webwaves in two exclusive shoots by Nik Hartley. We got lost in Joe Jonas’ big, brown, dreamy eyes as he got kitted out in some mighty fine William Richard Green, and material girl, Lydia Bright dished out her top tips for looking REEM as she popped, pouted and posed like a pro. Gee-whiz! SGB
Brutally brilliant, Drive was one of the stand out films of 2011. So much style, the substance (though substantial) was kind of irrelevant. Attending more screenings than we probably should have, i-D online were thrilled to interview director Nicolas Winding Refn who asked as many questions as he answered and was equally as enigmatic as his lead character. If you haven’t seen the film, you must stop whatever you’re doing [obviously continue reading this on your phone] and watch it. SR
There’s as much in a haircut as in a face. But if you have both, well that’s the dream. 2011 was the year we found Jeanie Annan-Lewin, or was it the other way around? The most super stylist of all the stylists who don’t say super, Jeanie crafted this film for us with filmmakers Chad Pickard and Paul McLean. It is, for me personally, a perfect fashion film. Clean and simple but quick enough to hold your attention. This year we found a handful of really great filmmakers and also found that they’re hard to come by! But plenty more where that came from in 2012. SR
Earlier this year, i-D popped up at London’s Red Gallery, showcasing more than three decades of historic covers and laying on a fortnight of interactive events in celebration of i-D NOW. Transforming the space sometimes three times a day from a fashion shoot set in the morning, to a book swap in the afternoon, to a packed out Boiler Room session going on to the early hours, the ‘NOW’ part continued around the clock. We photographed new faces, fought for our breath in dance classes and listened in dead silence as Patrick Wolf performed to an intimate crowd accompanied by a harp – and the road noises outside. Organised in two weeks flat, i-D NOW was a test of our wits, guts and ability to improvise! Giving us food for thought, expect to see more in 2012.
