Meet the creative agency behind these Dazed viral covers – The Business of Fashion

Last fall a pair of Stunned photoshoots featuring Rihanna dressed as a giant seal and Harry Styles on a motorbike have put design agency New School on the fashion map.

These carefully composed images are the result of an eventful week that saw photographers, stylists and art directors crisscross the country in a frantic race to photograph Rihanna in New York and Styles in Los Angeles back to back. Sam Ross, the agent who had founded New School a few months earlier, had to fork out £ 7,000 ($ 9,500) of his own money to pay for travel and hotels, including a two-week quarantine in Mexico so that British talent can enter the United States.

The investment was worth it. Both covers took to social media, with one of Styles’ images generating more than 200,000 likes on Instagram. It was also a proof of concept for New School, which Ross said BoF is built around the idea of ​​a community of unique individuals whose various creative disciplines complement each other.

The New School’s roster of talent draws on Ross’s longtime friends and collaborators, many of whom were met at Central Saint Martins ten years ago and for whom Stunned today. Among them, the magazine’s editor-in-chief, stylist Ib Kamara, Stunned artistic director Gareth Wrighton, choreographer Yagamoto, set designer Ibby Njoya and stylist Mobolaji Dawodu, who is also global fashion director at GQ.

All the pieces came together on the set of Rihanna for dazed 30th birthday: She wore clothes designed by Jawara Alleyne in collaboration with Raw Materials, a creative partnership of Kamara and Wrighton represented by New School. Kamara and Wrighton took care of the styling and artistic direction, while Njoya designed the set.

Creative and talent agencies have long been designed to provide clients with access to an interconnected network of talent that they can hire for projects. Art Partner, for example, started out as a collective of friends in the early 1990s. Ross brings the collaboration aspect to the fore at New School.

“It’s kind of a crowd thing, it’s godfather shit,” Ross said. “It really doesn’t exist anywhere else.”

Ross said he decided to launch the agency after the Kamara buyout Stunned in February. Since then, the profile of the stylist has continued to grow. He is known to facilitate the creation of clothes and accessories for his sometimes very conceptual shoots. In November, he received the Isabella Blow Fashion Designer Award at the British Fashion Awards.

Kamara is represented by Art & Commerce for his one-on-one styling work, but New School represents projects he’s leading with Wrighton, a longtime collaborator. They worked together for a decade, but only recently formalized this partnership under Raw Materials.

“Dazed’s vision right now is under Raw Materials,” Wrighton said, citing the September cover shoot with Rihanna as the best example.

New School’s client list goes beyond their talented writing jobs to include campaigns for Mercedes Benz, Apple and Klarna and castings for brands like Alexander McQueen, as well as creative direction of a show for Thebe Magugu. .

“Our plan was to always do that someday – to make kind of a collective, to bring people in and uplift them,” Ross said. “The idea is to develop it and grow it to that ad agency level, but for now, it has to be this little thing.”

Ross and Wrighton said their unique understanding of each other helps them navigate potentially chaotic situations like back-to-back photoshoots last August. When Ross needs to outsource talent for specific projects, he turns to talent already in the New School’s creative circle to keep the collective vibe going.

New School’s work began to permeate the market at large, both influencing and benefiting from broader trends. Gradient-style decor backgrounds, a signature of Njoya, who incorporates their own original hand-painted artwork into the design of sets, appear more often. This style has been used as a backdrop for the American Music Awards, among others.

“The overall feel and vibe of the imagery has changed,” Ross said. “Apple, a very traditionally quiet tech company, has been bursting with color lately and playing with faded colors in its interface.”

Ross said he understands the fast-paced nature of the industry and wants to keep an open mind to make sure New School is always well positioned to capture the zeitgeist of current fashion.

“I feel like a lot of companies are out of touch with what’s going on culturally,” he said. “As we move forward, we want to make sure that we stay open to new thoughts and ideas, and we don’t become one of those unconscious institutions.”