Long-distance call
Susie Lau has been blogging about all things stylish since 2006; in fashion years that's a lifetime. As a veteran who has served time in the trenches with the likes of Scott Schuman (of The Sartorialist), Garance Dore and Tommy Ton, the 26-year-old Briton has become a blog spokesperson on ... well, blogging.
'It's brilliant that [certain fashion blogs have] absolutely blown up in the last two years, but, in general, I'm wary of too much media attention on blogs,' Lau says. 'I feel people are not concentrating on what the medium is actually doing for fashion but rather they are building bloggers up to be personalities.'
In the case of Style Bubble, which she updates three times a day under her childhood nickname, Susie Bubble, Lau's personality is built into the content. There is photographic evidence of her presence backstage at major international and boutique fashion shows but Lau also posts self-styled musings on anything from driftwood-like wedge heels to a 'mild obsession and fascination with people who collect fuddy-duddy porcelain figurines'. With the site logging more than 10,000 visits on a slow day and her Twitter account listing over 26,000 followers, Lau's popularity would seem at odds with her philosophy, but she explains that the mark of a true fashion blogger lies in the attitude.
'I feel a bit like a grandma [when] talking about blog ethics,' Lau says. 'But I'm concerned with how bloggers are thinking - whether they are truly passionate about the content they are putting out there, or [doing it] purely to get the attention of brands and infiltrate the industry. It's disconcerting when I get e-mails asking: 'How do I get front-row seats?'
'What should be happening is that the content should speak for itself. You should be blogging because you love whatever you are putting out, love the feedback, or you just really want to hone your voice and put that out there.'
Born to immigrants from Hong Kong, Lau was raised in London and is the eldest of four daughters. She began expressing herself through clothing while rebelling against her academically rigorous girls' school. In doing so, she discovered vintage lingerie, which would become one of her trademarks. Although she speaks fluent Cantonese, Lau doesn't consider herself 'particularly Asian'.
'I've always grown up thinking I was British - and happened to have a Chinese kind of face.'
That face has led to misunderstandings on the London fashion circuit, where younger sister Louisa, editor of an independent art and fashion magazine, has been mistaken for Susie on more than one occasion.
'We don't look much alike but ... I know lots of people who think Chinese people kind of look the same. I'm not ashamed to agree that a lot of Asian people look similar and I'm not devastated when someone mistakes me for someone else.'
On the other hand, Lau believes her online image serves as inspiration.
'Because there aren't a lot of Chinese faces in European fashion media - there are more in the US and among behind-the-scenes designers - I've accidentally become someone people can look up to. I get these e-mails from young girls who say it's so great [that I] look Asian. There is this idea that Asians, girls in particular, are introverted, reserved, quiet - again more cliches - so it's refreshing for them to see somebody who looks like me popping up in Vogue or around town, around fashion.'
'I have learned things about the industry I'm not particularly enamoured with' - Lau worked in digital media and online publishing as an editor for Dazed & Confused before striking out on her own - 'the whole hierarchy of fashion, people shouting at PRs, using phrases like, 'Do you know who I am?'; a lot of the fashion cliches are true. On the other hand, there are a lot of people doing it for the love of it - the London creative industry is about living on dreams, not money.'
