harvest – Ann Street Studio

August Still Life

August 16, 2017August 16, 2017Posted in Lifestyle, Provence, UncategorizedTagged august, fruit, harvest, photography, photography tip, provence, still life, stilllife

I was in a bit of a creative block today.

I have so many things I want to photograph and create that at times I find it overwhelming. On top of that, when I do create work that I feel really satisfied with I have this moment of pride and joy and then the terror of oh God, what am I going to do next? To take a photograph is one aspect of photography, to make a photograph is another. Making a photograph, a process I have been sharing in more and more detail on my Instagram stories, requires a harmony of light, technical knowledge, talent and what feels like a billion…painful…gut wrenching decisions. Sometimes when I’m starting out my day setting up the camera I can feel paralyzed with the daunting amount of decisions that are ahead. Internal monolog: “What’s the theme today, what do I want to communicate, what prop do I want to use, what do I have lying around, what is missing, what does it need, where should the shadows fall, which lens, which aperture, should their be one petal…two… five… ten?… maybe turned a hair to the left, no get rid of them all. God, what I did yesterday was so much better. Did I just peak?…” For example.

A few times the past few months I’ve given in and continued my series on the history of Versailles in an attempt to bury my head in a pillow. But most days I just take a deep breathe and try to quiet my mind down to one thing. Just start with one thing. That’s my best advice for anyone stuck with where to begin, with what to photograph. I have found that once I get my camera set up, choose that one thing (today I started with plums) the wheels start turning and one thing leads to another, as it does in life, and voila! You are on the move making the decisions that were so crippling moments before. The one thing doesn’t have to be a prop either, or subject matter, you can start with just say a lens. I’m going to shoot with my macro lens. You make that first decision and then that leads to the next and so on. Other times I have just started with a spot of beautiful light raking across the floor, well the floor was dirty so I covered it, then I found something I had lying around that could play in the light and I was off to the races.

This still life started with plums and ended with a concept around an Autumn harvest, a sort of chaotic cornucopia which is a pretty accurate representation of where my mind was today. I raided my fruit bowls, tore apart my bouquets and foraged for more figs from the garden. Then, in one of the ways photography can truly become magical, a bee flew in the windows and landed right in my still life and I was once again, satisfied.

The Ruinart Champagne Harvest

October 6, 2016October 11, 2016Posted in LifestyleTagged caves, champange, france, harvest, lifestyle, reims france, reimsfrance, Ruinart, ruinart champange, ruinartchampagneharvest, ruinartchampange, The Ruinart Champagne Harvest8 Comments

Ruinart represents elegance through time. Savoir Faire – the knowledge and precision built upon generations of learning: care of and for the vines and land. While I’ve sipped their elegant rosé on many vast occasions, this particular harvest began in Paris. In a quaint Marais bistro I sat, par hazard (by chance), next to a coiffed Parisian gentleman. When I told him I happened to be attending the vendage (harvest), he expressed his intimate experience of what Ruinart meant to him.

I was utterly enchanted.

He said the beauty of Ruinart lays in the elegant curve at the neck of the bottle. The way the slender cork releases herself with just the slighted murmur. That the difference between her and other champagnes is found in both the sense of nostalgia for the past which we carry in our hearts, a tradition we capture each and every time we partake in her pétillantes (sparkling bubbles), and found in her relevance as a modern lady who has no interest in being left on a shelf. Each evening she wishes to be appreciated to the fullest.

That particular evening, in a house of Baccarat, filled to the very brim with the most glimmering crystal, we dined and celebrated the two houses, models of history and their elegance.

The following day was the harvest. Each vine must be picked at precisely the right moment. 220 hectares of grapes sweep through the rolling countryside of Reims. A vast field of vines: chardonnay, pinot noir, pinot meunier. This was apparently a challenging harvest year. Early hail and rain, followed by a sultry summer led to a smaller harvest, quick maturation and sweet rich grapes. According to Chef de Caves, Frédéric Panaiotis, the reds in particular possess just the perfect balance of elegance and tension.

I personally picked grape bunches off the vine. Extraordinary. My fingers were sticky and sweet. I felt of the land. Completely enamored. Such a far reach from the lives we spend at desks, engaged constantly with the cold feel of technology on our finger tips.

There is something profoundly beautiful and timeless in cultivating the land; an enamored symbiotic relationship between the touch of soil, the history of this legendary champagne house, the cycle of seasons. Past and future joined in intimate perfection.

Continue reading “The Ruinart Champagne Harvest” →

CHANEL N°5 L’EAU

June 8, 2016June 22, 2017Posted in Beauty, Provence, UncategorizedTagged beauty, chanel, chanel n. 5, chanel n. 5 l'eau, chanel number 5, chanel perfume, chaneln5, france, grasse, harvest, l'eau, may, perfume, perfume fields, roses, south of france, southoffrance9 Comments

When I think of CHANEL, naturally I think of France and, more specifically, I think of Paris with her white walls and perfectly designed boulevards. But CHANEL is more than one place. It’s more than a fashion house, it’s a lifestyle. If you could live CHANEL, what kind of woman would you be?

You’d probably be the kind of woman who understands heritage, craftsmanship, quality, and artistry. You are confident and current, timeless and unforgettable, you possess a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’… You definitely possess a bottle of CHANEL N° 5 (and so did your mother, and possibly her mother). Perfume, like memories, can thread together our lives, taking us to places like a mystical time traveling fairy. I know, one day, the smell of fresh garden roses will remind my children and my grandchildren of me long after I’m gone. I hope those memories bring back love.

As all things CHANEL does, its perfume is created to perfection, with the highest quality ingredients, and is, of course, made in France. There is no place better in the world to manufacture perfume than on the beautiful French Riviera in Grasse, the cradle of French Perfumery since the 17th century. For over 170 years the fields you see depicted in this story have been owned by the same family, who have passed down knowledge from generation to generation; grandfathers working side by side with sons and grandsons. You can feel the heritage and deep rooted love walking the lanes of endless roses. For the past 30 years CHANEL has had a sole partnership with this family estate. It is here where they recently brought us to experience the 5th interpretation of CHANEL N° 5 called L’EAU, or water in French. According to CHANEL,“N°5 L’EAU is not a cologne. Nor is it a diluted version of the original fragrance for, at CHANEL, each variation is a genuine olfactory creation. N°5 L’EAU is the N°5 of today. A composition under the banner of modernity, with freshness as its leitmotif. L’EAU, for water is essential. L’EAU, in praise of simplicity.”

When I arrived to the property I was struck with the overwhelming scent of roses. It was truly the most intoxicating smell I’ve ever experienced. Pure, intense, lovely; it completely wrapped around you, like being covered in nature’s kisses. Nothing will ever compare to the scent of those fields. I walked for hours among the rows of pink roses at different stages in their delicately blooming life span, the perfectly French light dancing warm and golden set against a blue sky. It was ideal bliss. Off in the distance, the chateau sits, proud and historic, like a fairytale from my childhood storybooks. I was, to put it simply, in heaven… even the photos can’t do it justice this time.

The new fragrance is wonderful. It’s timeless like the original N° 5 but modernized perfectly. Less musky, more vibrant. Less suited, more feminine. It’s all I wore while on my journey through Provence, and what I wear at home to travel back to this place… my heaven on earth.

Something that my friend, artist, and archaeologist Jean Pierre Soalhat said to me on my recent visit to Provence, “Our future is inside of our past.” I believe this quote truly represents the heritage of Chanel’s brand, their perfumes, and certainly the driving force behind behind L’EAU, modernity guided by tradition. The memories that a perfect scent creates, reflect moments in our lives, the lives of our loved ones, memories that lead into our future and last forever.

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The May Bloom: Rose de Mai

40-50 tons of roses are produced in a season, handpicked by farmers. The blooms begin the last week of April and throughout the month of May. At first light, every morning at 7am the buds will begin to bloom, two days after they have opened up their beautiful petals, they must be picked. The lifespan of one rose bush is 15-20 years.

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“And then, like a second wind, you can already hear the rustle of flowers. It sounds like the whisper of trembling tulle. Rose melds with oxygenated jasmine and a new fraction of ylang ylang, more modern than ever. You are plunged into the heart of the bouquet with a delectable dizziness that gives the impression of contact with each petal, its velvety touch, its fleshiness, its delicate lace, its changing shape.” -The house of CHANEL CHANEL_No_5_LEAU_05 Continue reading “CHANEL N°5 L’EAU” →