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All photos courtesy of Avery Ashmore and Daryl Love Photography.
On her blog “Stylish Rubbish,” Colorado State University sophomore Avery Ashmore models, styles photoshoots and narrates her take on fashion in Fort Collins.
In a Feb. 5 post, following pictures of Ashmore standing in the snow, wearing a gray Charlotte Russe crop top and black ASOS skinny jeans, she wrote: “It’s funny because I never really even considered black jeans until last year, and now they are all I want to wear. … And yes, Dad/Every other parent out there — I bought them WITH the rips in the knees. Why? Cause I like it. K? K.”
In each post, Ashmore tells her readers about her thought process when creating an outfit and lists each piece she wears.
Although she began her blog as a creative outlet with a focus on recommending inexpensive clothing options for high school students, Ashmore said her focus has shifted.
“Now it’s more just kind of sharing my favorite styles at the moment and how I wear things and kind of educating people, because a lot of people are like, ‘How can I pull this off?'” Ashmore said. “I mainly just kind of go through what my daily outfits are like, and we’re starting to have guest models … (readers) can see what my style is like, but they can also take inspiration from other models and their other styles.”
Over her nearly four years working on the blog, Ashmore has collaborated with many friends, photographers and models to create posts for “Stylish Rubbish.”
“Looking back on it now, I’m kind of cringing a little bit as to where we started, but it’s good because there was room to grow,” Ashmore said.
Most recently, she has consistently collaborated with Fort Collins photographer Daryl Love to create content for “Stylish Rubbish.” Love, 24, was a lifestyle and portrait photographer before meeting Ashmore and now hopes to work on more fashion-related projects.
“Stylish Rubbish is unique because I feel it is not temporary or just a gig,” Love wrote in an e-mail to the Collegian. “Both me and Avery are passionate about what we do so therefore, I feel the blog will become much more than a fashion blog. I do not get tired of doing it. I love the feedback, and even if the blog ends, this entire experience will lead us to something greater as long as we both stay consistent.”
One of Ashmore’s guest models, senior fine arts major Eri Matsumura, had not modeled outside of student art projects but enjoyed working with Ashmore.
“It’s like a self-portrait that someone else is taking,” Matsumura said. “I’ve painted myself several times for painting (classes), but just to see it as someone else capturing who I am and my essence, that’s cool.”
Ashmore has always been interested in fashion, but her blog has allowed her to recognize its career opportunities.
“It went from something that was a hobby to something that has really grown,” Ashmore said. “I’ve gotten offers to be (a) stylist for companies, I’m styling photoshoots for some photographers — it’s quickly growing into something that really could be a career, and I never really thought that that could sprout from this hobby-slash-passion of mine.”
Collegian Reporter Ellie Mulder can be reached at news@collegian.com or on twitter @lemarie.