403 Forbidden

Six and a half years of blogging and this is my first Editor’s Letter (just renamed with a more blog-colour-appropriate definition, ha). I thought it could be interesting to look back on what happened during last month and look forward on what’s coming next.

I closed 2015 complaining about my lack of inspiration and I’m happy to say that things have changed a lot so far. On January I started to search for new inspiration: I subscribed to newsletters and new blogs, I started reading more (well written) fashion related articles (see BoF, WWD, T-Magazine, WGSN) and less crappy ones. I also started again to pin on Pinterest and it’s incredible how many great things you can discover through Pinterest, not just the photos, but great accounts, people and articles are linked there! And pouf!: new interests + new good readings = new inspiration! And in 2016 I’m back to blogging with renewed energies and my old passion. And I have a better concept of my blog and myself: cute posts with flowers and !!!! everywhere and posts on “how to live a perfect life” or faking a perfect life all the time are just not my cup of tea.

Last month I started two new blog series called “blueWEEKLY” and “5With” that I’m proud of and that are not just fashion related but include, arts, design and photography. I don’t want to sound cheesy but I also wanted to thank all of you for leaving comments on the blog in the last weeks. Some of you took your time to write very interesting and articulated opinions on my past blue notes which were also so inspirational for me. And a good motivation, too, since feedback is so important when you write a post. It just proves that someone’s really out there. But thank you also to all of you who are still reading (without commenting) since I know you are there too! (Hello google, analytics). Thank you for your attention and time.

And speaking of blogging and social neworks: these words by Sociologist Zygmunt Bauman (an “old friend” from my social science studies, I read three of his books at the time) interviewed by El Paìs gave so much to reflect on:

“The question of identity has changed from being something you are born with to a task: you have to create your own community. But communities aren’t created, and you either have one or you don’t. What the social networks can create is a substitute. The difference between a community and a network is that you belong to a community, but a network belongs to you. You feel in control. You can add friends if you wish, you can delete them if you wish. You are in control of the important people to whom you relate. People feel a little better as a result, because loneliness, abandonment, is the great fear in our individualist age. But it’s so easy to add or remove friends on the internet that people fail to learn the real social skills, which you need when you go to the street, when you go to your workplace, where you find lots of people who you need to enter into sensible interaction with. Pope Francis, who is a great man, gave his first interview after being elected to Eugenio Scalfari, an Italian journalist who is also a self-proclaimed atheist. It was a sign: real dialogue isn’t about talking to people who believe the same things as you. Social media don’t teach us to dialogue because it is so easy to avoid controversy… But most people use social media not to unite, not to open their horizons wider, but on the contrary, to cut themselves a comfort zone where the only sounds they hear are the echoes of their own voice, where the only things they see are the reflections of their own face. Social media are very useful, they provide pleasure, but they are a trap.”

And I don’t desire a hollow network with impersonal followers. A community is what really matters (to me).

P.S. Lettering & blue brushstrokes on the cover are by Alessia Landi, you will know more and see more of her works here since will collaborate with my blog, welcome Al!

[Cover Photo via Tilde Bjerregaard, drawings by Alessia Landi, artwork and editing by me.]