BLOGGER: Adelle McElveen

FEATURED BLOG(S): Fashionista Lab

TWITTER: @FashionistaLab

FACEBOOK: Fashionista Lab

Full disclosure: I’ve known Adelle McElveen, the woman behind the San Francisco-based blog ‘Fashionista Lab,’ for well over a decade now. In fact, it was actually Adelle who suggested I apply for the open Community Manager position at Outside.in, a job I am now lucky enough to call my own (good call, Adelle!).

Still, those are not the only reasons Adelle is a ‘Blogger We Love.’ What I find most inspiring about Adelle and her blog (besides the drool-worthy fashion photos she posts, obviously!) is that her blog exemplifies the idea that a local blog can take many different forms. By spotlighting her, I hope to diversify our ideas about what a local blog could or should be – and just maybe inspire a person or two out there to join the conversation by launching a ‘local’ blog of their own.

So, without further ado, I give you…

The Top 10 Things I Learned from Fashionista Lab

1. Trust Your Instincts

“I had a personal blog for years – and basically it functioned as a travel blog. Then one day I blogged about tank tops and how much I loved them – and I thought to myself: maybe it’s time I just blogged about fashion, because I realized I had a lot more to to say about fashion. I knew I wanted a different audience, so I started the fashion blog.”

2. Give in to Your Creative Impulse

“One of the biggest benefits of blogging is just starting the blog and acknowledging that creative desire and giving in to it — and then, once you give in to it, it just opens you up to so many other things.”

3. Don’t Sweat the Blog Stuff (‘Cause It’s All Small Stuff)

“There’s always this tension [between work and blogging], because I [blog] for fun, but it’s really what I love — and I’ve networked with a number of other fashion bloggers who do it and do it well and have big audiences… and I want that, too. But then it’s like, OK, they’re students, and they have all this free time – or they work in the fashion industry and it’s part of their job. My job takes up most of my time — but sometimes I feel myself naturally competing and trying to achieve what they’re achieving, and sometimes it gets stressful and I have to realize: OK, this isn’t my job. My job is my job. This is my hobby – I should do it and do it well, but at the same time, I can’t let myself get stressed out about it.”

4. You Don’t Have to Be an SEO Guru to Get Started

“Oh, um… I don’t know how to optimize.”

5. Blog What You Know

“The original Fashionista Lab [was a blog] run by a friend of mine and I when I lived in Tokyo. It was called Fashionista Lab because it was for ideas. We decided: we don’t want to tell you what’s ‘HOT’ or what’s ‘NEW,’ or to compete with that area because it’s already saturated. [Instead, we're] going to tell you our unique perspective on Tokyo fashion: this is what we see, living in Tokyo. I just kept the name because [the blog's purpose is the same] in San Francisco. It’s a lab – it’s for ideas.”

6. You Can Start with a Simple Blog Design or Platform

“I use WordPress.com. I’m slowly building it. Like: I have my own domain now. Eventually, I want to have my own custom WordPress.org blog so I can change themes and add widgets and stuff – those are all things I want to do. I have so many aspirations for the blog – but my time-line is just a lot slower.”

7. You Have to Be Your Own Biggest Fan

“I was featured a month and a half ago on this site called Independent Fashion Bloggers. It’s a really great fashion blogger resource – they did a conference during Fashion Week in New York, for example – and every week they have something called ‘Links à la Mode,’ which is like 10-15 of the best fashion blog posts from the world’s fashion blogger community that past week. I look at their links every week, and I’ve submitted blog posts for consideration like three times, and finally, the fourth time, they chose one of my posts – and that was really exciting.”

8. Shorter = Better

“I volunteered at a benefit fashion show in San Francisco recently – part of it was this silent auction and live auction. The live auction was really exhilarating and really crazy, and I wrote this really long post and I thought it was really engaging, and then one of my friends read it and talked to me about it, and I realized she hadn’t finished it. It was just too long. Short things are better. That was a post I could have easily broken down into two parts.”

9. To Be a Good Blogger, You Have to Be a Good Reader

“Once I started the blog and realized how much I had to say, I really started to pay more attention to other people who were saying things, and seeing what they were doing and where they were going and where they were getting their information – and that was just the beginning [of the evolution of my blog and blogger network].”

10. San Francisco is Home to Unique, Edgy Fashion

“It is really creative. As I was telling a friend in New York: New York women are really chic, especially in Manhattan, but I’ve noticed that San Francisco is a little bit rougher, you know? It’s not as put-together, per se – but there’s just lots of creativity and lots of different outfits that you see. It’s not just ‘hipsters,’ either. It’s temperate all year round, so you can play more with jackets and layering tops and leggings. I never understood the appeal of those open-toe booties, but then I got a pedicure in January and I was like: this is perfect! I can cover my foot and have my toes showing!”

There you have it: you don’t have to only write ‘hard news’ to be a ‘local’ blogger, nor do you have to make your blog into your life’s work (though both of those things are totally awesome things to do!). As it turns out, a local blog can also be comprised of fashion-related musings (some of them locally-oriented, some of them not).

So, would-be ‘local bloggers,’ please know: as far as we’re concerned, blogging more casually doesn’t make the contributions you do make to the local content pool any less valuable than the contributions of a more ‘professional,’ blogger. It’s OK to blog without an agenda.

P. S. Local bloggers, don’t forget to register your blog here. It’s quick, simple, and will help drive traffic to your blog.

P.P. S.: If you’d like to be featured in our ‘Bloggers We Love’ series (or you’d like to nominate your favorite local blogger(s) for inclusion), we’d love to hear from you! Simply send an email to esther@outside.in