By Thalia Reisi, Communications Manager at Studio Alterego, founded by Michael Guez.
Picture a Paris Fashion Week event photographer and your probably see the end of a runway: a dark room, flashing strobes, a row of lenses. For a brand flying in from New York or Los Angeles, though, the show is a few minutes inside a very long week. The rest happens in showrooms, in salons, around dinner tables. That is where the images that get used the most are actually made.
Our studio is in Madeleine, in the heart of Paris and five minutes away from the shows. When a loght needs checking, a presentation runs an hour late or a picture is needed before breakfast, we don’t have to cross the city. Here are four moments off the runway where a photographer makes the difference.
1. The showroom: light before the crowd
A showroom takes two days to set up and about an hour to photograph, right before the buyers walk in. The room is quiet, the pieces are perfect, and no guest has touched anything yet. Racks are aligned, garments are steamed one last time, and daylight falls wherever it likes. The job of a PAris Fashion Week event photographer is the show the collection the way buyers will meet it: legible fabrics, true colors, no trace of last-minute adjustments.
Those images then feed lookbooks, press kits, and of course, infinate conversations with stories.
2. The presentation: one take
A presentation lasts a few hours. Guests drift through, an editor pauses at a look, the designer answers a question, unaware of the lens. There is no second take. You have to photograph the garment and the moment: a hand brushing a fabric, a glance that lingers.
Those are the images editors pick up because they show what the press release can’t.
3. The dinner: the image that stays
The brand dinners are often the events people talk about the least but remember the most. Guests are welcomed as clients, partners, and friends of the house, and the mood matters as much as the menu. Low light, candles, people who forget the camera after 10 minutes. So, a photographer has to know how to blend, stay discreet, stay in the shadows. We photograph the tables, the hands, the laughter, never a guest caught mid-bite.
The next morning, those pictures tell the evening to everyone who wasn’t there, and there are always many.
4. The morning after, delivered on time
At Fashion Week, a late image is a lost image. Editors, buyers, and teams back home across the Atlantic are not waiting. Time zones add pressure: when Paris goes to bed, New York is sitting down to its first meeting. We agree on timing with the brand before the event. and at least a first selection can be arranged so the pictures circulate during the buzz, while the week is still in full swing.
We retouch with the same restraint we bring to a portrait or an event report: nothing that shows.
A photography assistant for even the darkest rooms
Some of the best rooms in Paris are also the hardest to photograph: a basement showroom, a candlelit dinner, a stone chapel where the sun never reaches. In those rooms, a photographer needs light, and someone to handle it.
Through Studio Alterego as well as Libre Comme L’Art, we now offer photography assistant services. An assistant sets up and moves the lighting, looks after the gear, and keeps the photographer free to watch the room instead pf the equipment. Even in the darkest corner of a venue, the picture still has light.
It works on many kinds of days:
- Fashion Week events: showrooms, presentations, and dinners where space is tight, schedules slip, and the light changes by the hour.
- Corporate events: conferences, launches, and evening in venues that were not necessarily designed for photography.
- Weddings: ceremonies and receptions in churches, gardens, cellars and candlelit rooms, where the light has to be there without anyone noticing it.
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Your Paris Fashion Week event photographer and their assistant, 5 minutes from the shows
Studio Alterego is a Paris photo and video agency working with brands and companies, based in Madeleine. Whether your house is Parisian or flew in from across the ocean, we are the Paris Fashion Week event photographer for your showrooms, presentations, dinners, weddings and team-buildings events. We offer the discretion those rooms call for, so, if you are planning your next session in Paris, let’s talk before calendars fill up.
[Get in touch with Studio Alterego to plan your Next Fashion Week]
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FAQ: Paris Fashion Week event photographer
Can you photograph the official runway shows? Official shows are by invitation and depend on each house. Our work focuses on what surrounds them: showrooms, presentations, dinners, and brand events.
When should I hire a photographer for Paris Fashion Week? As early as you can; calendars fill up well before the week. A month or more lets us prepare calmly, but we adapt to each brand’s needs.
Do you need a brief? Yes, a short one: venues, schedule, the people not to miss, and where the images will be used (press, social, lookbook).
What does a photography assistant do at an event? An assistant handles the light and the gear: setting up and moving lighting, managing equipment, and supporting the photographer(s) so nothing slows the shoot down.
Do you offer photography assistant services? Yes, for Fashion Week events, corporate events, and weddings (through Libre Comme L’art luxury wedding photography agency).