BLAKE WOMAN - KATHERINE ORMEROD

We are so pleased to welcome our next Blake Woman - Katherine Ormerod.

You will have probably come across Katherine through the fashion industry where she has worked since interning in the early days of her career or more lately seen her gracing the pages of many a stylish magazine. A street style favourite.

We met up with Katherine at home to talk about her career, her best selling book, that TED talk alongside motherhood and the challenges we all face through social media.

We hope you enjoy!

Tell us about your background and how you got into the fashion industry.

I did a Master’s degree in Fashion History at the London College ofFashion, but it was really the interning I did for close to two years during my post grad that helped me get my foot into the industry. My first job at matchesfashion.com where I worked as their first copywriter and then a little later I got a staff role on Sunday Times Style where I’d interned for a year preciously.

You worked at Grazia maazine. Did you always know you wanted to work in magazines and publishing?

Before I went to uni I thought I wanted to be a barrister, but a lot of my priorities shifted dying my BA. I also started working at Harvey Nichols part time on the contemporary floor. It was while Phoebe Philo was at Chloe and let’s just say I was hooked.

You then launched anti perfectionist platform - Work Work Work - tell us about this platform and why you wanted and felt the need to launch it. Did you feel there was nothing out there or that you wanted to be a voice to a generation?

Back in 2016, the whole world of social media was so focused on perfection and I felt really strongly that more nuanced female stories were being edited out of contemporary culture - at least the culture that young women were consuming. During my time at Grazia I’d been building my social media profile as part of my job role and when I left I started collaborating with brands and making some of my salary from Instagram. I’d been feeling uncomfortable about the mirage of the glamorous life I was personally presenting and just wanted to cut through and remind everyone that no-ones life is just one upward success trajectory.

You interview women from across fashion, interiors, food, publishing - all successful in their own right and field. Is there a common thread running through each women you have found in terms of anxiety, ambition, motherhood etc?

I think the thread really is that the women have a story that they want to share. They want to be part of that move to dismantle this idea that things are picture perfect - even though they all work in glossy industries and from the outside have aspiration lifestyles. However, without specifically targeting it, there has ended up being a theme around the impact that social media is having on women’s expectations and sense of self.

2018 saw you publish your best selling book - "How social media is running your life". Tell us how this came about, the journey of writing it and the response you have had from it?

It was tying up a lot of the conversations I’d been having amongst my peers and the stories that had been shared on my site. The world has changed so significantly for us all so quickly due to new technology and we just haven’t had the moment to stop, breathe and look consciously at the shifts in our behaviour. The book was really taking that moment and the response, especially from young women has been that it has articulated a lot of what they were feeling and shone a mirror.

You did a TED talk regarding you book. Tell us more and how did you prepare?

It was the most overwhelming experience of my career in that it was a short 15 minutes but the pressure I felt under was like every exam I’d ever taken rolled into one. I learnt the whole speech by heart - some people just go up there and roll but with 3000 faces sitting in the audience, that wasn’t an option for my nerves! I covered my prep on my Instagram - using visual aids and memory devices - and lots of people have told me it’s proved really useful for them working on presentations and so on!

You had your first baby Grey in 2017. Tell us how you coped with pregnancy and work as well as the 'juggle' post Grey. Is there ever the perfect equation? What advice would you give to mothers?

I think at the beginning there’s no solution, it’s just personally tailored versions of hell. Caring for an infant and working are entirely incompatible but over time you get used to the compromises and the hormonal surges calm down and you start to clear a path. Number one, don’t believe that anyone else has it better than you. No one is the most focused mother and most focused employee at once. But that doesn’t mean your career has to be derailed and you can achieve steps forward professionally. It’s just not going to necessarily be at the same rate as if you hadn’t given birth. Unless you get childcare 8-6 and have someone to help at home, which isn’t an option financially for most of us, you may not have the bandwidth to work to the level you did before. But it’s a moment - a few years in a career of forty plus and you have to keep that context in mind (when it feels like you’re losing it )

What are your top tips for freelance life

Don’t compare yourself to a single other person. We all have such different niches, home lives, starting points and professional tracks ahead. Someone might be steaming forward right now, doesn’t meant there aren’t leaves falling ahead and vice versa. Be incredibly firm about invoice payments, if it’s overdue by a day ask for confirmation of payment date and don’t get fobbed off. Say what you mean in emails and don’t be a snob about money or work that at you might once have felt you were beyond.

How do you see the future of social media evolving?

I think as millennials and digital natives flood into every tech business, a change in attitude will inevitably occur. Our discussions around mental health and awareness of the dangers that social media can pose have become bad PR for the industry - there has to be at least lip service paid to the issues. Obviously the bottom line is that these businesses make profits from your attention, meaning they will do everything possible to capture more and more of it which mean ultimately only each of us as individuals and collectively by voting with our feet can change things.

What does Autumn mean to you?

Crisp cold days, ankle boots, bracing walks and Sunday pub roasts.

Best winter activity?

Skiing. It’s my absolute favourite type of holiday and having grown up partly in Bavaria, I’m a sucker for the Alps. Reading Jilly Cooper in front of a fire with a tin of Quality Streets is a close second.

Which piece from the Blake AW19 collection will you be wearing this Winter and why?

The Ardmore cable knit is a classic which will work with tailoring and denim. I also love white on white for winter.

Katherine was shot at home in North West London, wearing pieces from the new AW19 collection. In order - Roslin sweater, Ardmore sweater, Lion sweater and Redfern sweater.

Photos by Ollie Ali