Embark on a journey through the vibrant mind of Simão, a communications consultant behind a prominent talent agency in Lisbon. At just 30 years old, Simão’s eclectic influences range from nostalgic reflections on 90s fashion to cinematic inspirations and personal anecdotes from the bustling streets of Lisbon. Join us as we uncover the unique blend of curiosity, Sagittarian spirit, and relentless passion that drives Simão’s innovative approach to the world of fashion and communication.
“What led you to a fashion column?” This question could be from any job interview, in a boring and grey office, but it isn’t. This question serves to introduce myself and, as we are in that mood, I do the honours of the house: I’m Simão, I’m 30 years old, and I live in Lisbon.
I was born when Kurt Cobain’s grunge made people start to look differently at work boots and lumberjack shirts, at a time when hair was losing volume, but the term heroin chic was becoming more and more popular.
The statement and tone were to shout out to the ten years ahead of us before entering the new millennium, we had to make the most of it: we started the decade with baggy clothes and primary school teacher shoes and ended it in metallic tones, cold, straight, with square heels that elevated us into the future, a bold and elegant 2000. Nothing is by chance. The style of clothing that we find at the end of the 90s touches on several lines with what was worn in the last years of the ’60s: it was the future on Earth in the eyes of Mary Quant, André Courrèges, Paco Rabanne, Vidal Sassoon or Neil on the Moon Armstrong.
But how did I end up here? Aesthetics begins at home and mine began with a careful look at old photographs, hundreds of albums of parties, dinners, and my family’s and others’ daily lives, forever portrayed on paper to the point of having a blog in which I scanned photos from home and then wrote a text about the look in question. A pseudo ‘Lisbon Tailor’ behind a “Windows Vista”, embarrassed to appear, but not ashamed to write.
With writing comes reading, and I have always enjoyed reading: novels, essays, and magazines. One of my favourite painters, Otto Dix, discovered him in an old book that my tutor had on her shelf, the painting in question was Big City and it quickly fascinated me due to the grotesque way in which it appeared through its lack of perspective, the disfigured faces, but elegantly dressed, in a luxury environment, from the 1920’s.
In 2007, I remember reading in a pink publication the following “These are the glasses of famous people”, it was the Ray Ban Wayfarer model and I thought “I want this”. I didn’t want fame, I wanted them, I wanted the experience that glasses from the 50’s could give me, I wanted that lifestyle. I ended up buying some from the 80’s, in a store owned by a friend’s parents, and in August of the same year, I landed in Italy, the first time of many, with them on my face.
Following this trend came others such as the diamond sweaters worn that same year and which hinted at a 2008/2009 with pop-gothic tendencies, translated by emos or bands like Paramore or Tokio Hotel. I bought it in downtown Faro. I used it a little, until my dog ate it.
With these two pieces, I quickly realised one thing: trends are cyclical, even more so when combined with the contemporary, they are the perfect symbiosis for a fashion that wants to be cultured, attentive and avant-garde.
I like television. It was common to watch films and there are two important points for my relationship between cinema and fashion, the first because I watched a lot of them with my grandmother, namely Hitchcock or Marylin Monroe, in which we commented on the costumes, later, in a Fashion History course, I realised that many of them were created by Edith Head, who in 2004 was honoured in the film ‘Incredibles’, in the character Edna. The second point concerns the film ‘Mon Oncle’, by Jacques Tati, which in a boring zapping session captured me due to its colours and something bizarre that I saw in the clothes of those characters, inhabitants of such a strange world and house. In 2009 I had my first contact with Almodovar in ‘Os Abraços Desfeitos’, and I understood the importance of colour, in everything. Even today, many of the outfits I make are links to his films. I can’t forget the long episodes of Poirot and his Art Deco aesthetic, including ‘Le Loup’, the first advert I remember on TV, for Chanel, with Estella Warren and… a wolf.
I moved to Lisbon in the same year that Infanta Elena wore a dress to the wedding of Victoria of Sweden that reminds me of a bullfight in every way: from the fabric of the skirt that resembles a bullfighter’s cape, to the jacket and the hair, it was an impactful look and without a doubt a turning point in my perspective of seeing fashion: it is tradition.
With so much sea, it would be impossible not to end up at ModaLisboa, where I worked for ten years, at a time when the Jeffrey Campbells reigned, with studded sweaters, short skirts and high tops shadowed by an economic crisis with hints of Troika, Passos and Coelhos. I witnessed the colonisation of sneakers on all feet, as well as the arrest of high heels. I left ModaLisboa which seemed more comfortable and clean than when I arrived.
Taking several turns on my CV, I currently do communications consultancy at L’Agence, where I combine fashion and communications, but before that, having started in productions for the digital department, I had three essential points of reference: Annie Leibovitz, Guy Bourdain and some vinyl covers such as Capuccino, Cappuccino Kiss, in which eroticism mixes in a caustic aesthetic that is very tenuous between class and audacity.
In conclusion, I return to an already said phrase “aesthetics begins at home”. It’s like our citizenship card, it’s unique and part of our DNA. Associated with changing mentalities and attentive to everything happening around her, if I had to characterise her I would say that she is a curious being, with a Sagittarius sign, like me, Simão, 30 years old who lives in Lisbon.
