And look at me – I just take pictures of it all. We’re all coming at it from different angles, I’d say. Between the two of you, me, and this minor difference of opinion, the only weird one is really me and my camera!

*oops, retracted. There are no dogs in Seoul capable of walking under their own power. Proper Seoulites always carry their oversize hamster- er, toy dogs in a Louis Vuitton tote.

Am definitely a fan of this site and expect me to drop more comments.

Also its funny. Being a Korean American a lot of women in the states always commented to me on how I’m always dressed up or how I always have mani’s and pedi’s. I always just shrugged it off and thought it was just something that was what I liked and appreciated. Looking nice and put together.

However, after my recent trip to Seoul this summer I realized that it wasn’t a “Yoomz” thing, it was a “Korean” thing. Who knew that I could still be effected by a national/cultural phenom that was was happening on the other side of the globe! I’m sure having a Korean mother who always made sure I looked presentable and chic from a young age had a huge influence, but it was very nice to walk around Seoul and see everyone actually taking pride in their appearance. It wasn’t a vanity thing so much as a “this is the proper thing to do” thing. Not seeing people walk around in their sweatpants was very refreshing =).

Much of it was from my fascination with the fact that I could take pictures of whatever I wanted, as much as I wanted, and it was totally free! No developing costs, days spent waiting for film to come back and scans to go through, etc.

I’m glad you “got it”, and that’s why I decided to leave everything up, down to the first post, since I think the site’s an interesting evolution and, if you excuse me getting all art theory for a minute, completely informed and made more interesting by the male gaze and the power of fetishization, both of which helped me develop my own photo content into my own interesting style. In other words, you can’t have the kinds of pictures I have now without having started with the ultimate symbol of fetish – the foot – so this is, quite literally, “fashion from the ground up.”

My idea was that you can’t start with the whole without perfecting the ability to capture a part, which is actually much, much more difficult photographically. Go out and try to get beautiful shots of just FINGERS, for example, or BELTS. It’s much harder than photographing entire people from a distance. Go and take pictures of beautiful fingers without letting the subject know – if you can do that, many of your photo skills will be honed to a T.

In any case, I am working hard to always push myself into different angles, exposures, lighting types, and other things to make for more interesting fashion photos and portraits. I hope to encourage the other content producers here to do the same. And I believe that the only way to produce content that is powerful, compelling, and something that somebody else would actually want to look at is to start with a love for the thing itself, a desire so strong that you want to document it with an obssessive tenacity. Otherwise, one is just faking the funk.

In a large sense, fashion is just fetish, anyway. The colorful baubles with which we adorn ourselves – pointy shoes, shiny bags, sparkling jewels, dangling accessories, fuzzy hats, or ticking timepieces – these are all fetishized, both in the societal and Freudian senses of the word. To fool ourselves into thinking that this is anything but the reality of the world today is to live in a state of denial and Puritanical fantasy.

And back to the “foot” – does the woman who pumices, prunes, and paints her feet, who stands in front of a mirror marveling at the line of her ankle and calf descending down into a 4-inch pair of Manolo Blahniks, who owns 40 pairs of just such shoes – how is she any less of a “fetishist” than the onlooker who simply appreciates all this from a distance, or even dares to acknowledge all this and simply take a picture? In the game of fetishized visual display, it takes two to tango; it’s a game much more fun to play with others than in front of a mirror, alone.

In any case, that’s all a long-winded way of saying “Thanks!” for just simply getting what this is all about – being able to acknowledge our common fetishes here for what they are: fun, fabulous, fantastic – and sometimes just quirkiness and camp.

Yoomz, you da woMAN, and it’s because of readers like you that I keep on trucking.

Thanks for coming to the blog and for the words of encouragement.

One day I might share with you a photo of my ridiculous shoe collection. Being in the states I have access to higher quality brand name shoes for a lot less then in Korea and I don’t discriminate. Ballet flats, stilettos, platform, wedges, slouchy boots, equestrian boots and etc…. I love them all!

We’re based in Korea, not the US, and we take all the pictures marked with our logo ourselves. We get all our pictures by going out into the Korean streets and getting them! Ain’t that the best way? Thanks for coming and tell all your friends about us!

우리 미국에 있는 것아니라 한국에 와있어요. 모든 우리 로고로 표시된 사진들은 우리 사이트 스스로 찍은 거예요. 제일 좋은 방법이죠? 방문해주셔서 고맙고 친구들에계 우리 사이트에 대해서 꼭 알려주세요!