Susanna Lau | Source: Citizen Couture

Today, BoF launches The Business of Blogging, a new series on the rarely discussed business side of fashion blogging. First up is Susanna Lau of Style Bubble, one of the fashion blogosphere’s most original and influential voices.

LONDON, United Kingdom — In recent years, bloggers have had a tremendous impact on the fashion community. Using the internet to build their own platforms and attract an audience, they have helped turn a once closed industry into a more dynamic and democratic global conversation, earning thousands of fans and followers in the process. But are they making money? Have they been able to successfully monetise their celebrity and their craft? Is blogging a viable business?

“In my second year at Dazed, I was turning down all these different projects that could have been money spinners and I just couldn’t commit myself to them, because I was working 12 hours a day,” says Susanna Lau, the candid and adorably quirky voice behind the highly popular personal fashion blog Style Bubble, who left her position as Commissioning Editor of DazedDigital.com in March of 2010 to concentrate on her blog and pursue the unexploited economic opportunities it was generating. “Saying ‘I don’t need the publication to anchor onto, I have a publication essentially,’ was a big thing for me,” admits Ms. Lau, whose blog currently attracts some 25,000 visitors each day.

But how exactly has Ms. Lau been able to monetise her platform? “I have advert space at the side of my blog, but it’s not a big money spinner,” she says. “How I’ve done it is working on projects that relate to the blog but aren’t necessarily always visible on the blog.”

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Marco Santaniello T-Skirt | Source: Marco Santaniello

MILAN, Italy — And now for a fun BoF Spotlight post to end your week. We couldn’t resist a bit of colour to spice up the Spring that is finally blossoming.

Marco Santaniello‘s pop art portraits of fashion models, editors and the ubiquitous bloggerati caught our attention when we stumbled across his Facebook page a couple of months back. Since then, he has continued to churn out images of the industry’s legends and new stars, with alarming regularity.

So where did all of his colourful inspiration come from?

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Tavi Gevinson's Bow at Dior Couture | Source: Twitpic by SteffiSchuetze

LONDON, United Kingdom — A veritable firestorm erupted across fashion blogs and twitter streams this week in response to an article that appeared in London’s Independent newspaper over the weekend, highlighting Tavi Gevinson’s front row presence at the Haute Couture shows in Paris.

In a piece entitled “Fluff flies as fashion writers pick a cat fight with bloggers,” The Independent reported that “senior fashion insiders believe blogs have turned into little more than mouthpieces for fashion brands, which are increasingly using bloggers to regurgitate their press releases.”

As those controversial words rippled through the blogosphere and twittersphere, the protest and outrage came from all quarters of the fashion blogging fraternity and sorority. And, while we at the BoF were hesitant to take the bait and join the fray — the whole ‘editors versus bloggers’ story is becoming tired — it would be even worse for us to remain silent. Indeed, the Independent article raises very important issues which merit further discussion and debate, and perhaps, a more balanced perspective on this so-called “backlash” against bloggers.

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Christian Louboutin Laceups, courtesy of Jak and Jil

NEW YORK, United States — In seasons past, industry-watchers have spoken of the growing presence of bloggers at the New York shows, but this is the first season where bloggers have come to New York from all over the world, gaining backstage access, front-row seats and even juicy scoops, in a full-on, international blogger invasion. Bryanboy is here from Manila. Susie Bubble is here from London. And Julia and Jessie from Les Mads are here from Germany.

What’s more, at many of the shows, bloggers and web editors have been seated together, allowing for some spontaneous exchange and an opportunity to meet the faces behind some of the finest fashion websites around. Already I have met the super-smart Tommye Fitzpatrick of Fashionologie, the stylish Christene Barberich of Refinery29 and streetstyle maven Phil Oh of Streetpeeper.

But most of all, I was delighted to meet Tommy Ton, the man behind Jak and Jil, which recently won the public vote for the best fashion blog in the Dazed Digital RAW Blog awards. If there was one blog to which BoF was happy to lose, it was to Jak and Jil’s genius photography, editing and fashion moments, as captured by this humble, soft-spoken young man.

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