Fabulous Doodles Fashion Illustration blog by Brooke Hagel

Summer Sketches for Copic

Copic fashion illustration by Brooke Hagel

My friends at Copic Markers reached out a few months ago to team up with me on some summery sketches using my favorite markers, the Copic Sketch markers. I jumped at the chance to work with my favorite marker brand again and the two sketches I created were recently published on their social media pages so I thought it would be fun to share with you a little behind the scenes of these illustrations.

The team at Copic was open to anything I'd like to do as it relates to fashion illustration, my area of expertise. They provided me with a list of prompts I could use as inspiration and I chose "roses" for the first and "airy" for the second. I chose roses because there was a dress by Sachin and Babi worn by influencer Racheal Martino that I loved and had been wanted to sketch which was covered in different shades of blue roses! And this was the perfect project to sketch that look (shown below.)

Copic fashion illustration by Brooke Hagel 2

For the airy illustration I was inspired to create a flowing white dress with flounces that rippled in the wind as figure walked. (See top image) I love drawing walking poses and having the figure walk would add airy movement to both the dress and hair. I made her skin tone a dark shade of black to contrast nicely with the white/gray dress and I love how it came out! I hope you enjoyed this little behind the scene insider info into what went into making these sketches for Copic!

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Happy 14th Blogiversary Fabulous Doodles

It’s my fourteenth Blogiversary! I don’t blog often anymore now that social media has taken over however this blog is important to me, it’s where my business started. It marks where I began, how I began and how far I’ve come. I started blogging all those years ago soley as a way to share my sketches and designer sketches I loved. I wanted Fabulous Doodles to be a fashion illustration treasure trove. At the time I didn’t realize my passion could or would become my livelihood. To look back now and scroll through the hundreds of posts of sketches and luxury fashion brand client work is really something. I’m proud of this blog, my portfolio of work it shares and the incredible client list I’ve been able to build with it. Happy Blogiversary day and cheers to many more!

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Ralph Lauren Mansion: Live Sketching

Live sketching custom fashion illustrations at the Ralph Lauren mansion NYC flagship store was a career highlight and even though it's been a minute I thought it deserved a highlight here. The stunning space and meticulous merchandizing have made it one of my favorite Manhattan stores for decades. I've sketched events for the brand previously under both the Ralph Lauren label and Polo but this was my first time sketching in their iconic flagship--and it did not disappoint!

The desk where they set me up to draw for the day was at the base of their notorious staircase. It's the key spot of the whole store, where everyone who walks through the store passes. It's also raised up on a small staircase platform and was styled, of course, to perfection with large spheres at my feet, a grand antler candelabra to my side and flanked by luxurious curtains.

It was a regular shopping day in the store, open to all and not a private event, but to my pleasant surprise there were many influencers and notable people who came by, including a former Miss. America, an actor as well as numerous fashion bloggers and influencers. Over on the gram I shared a bunch of videos from the event, the one of above being one of my favorites! There's nothing better than seeing the twinkle in a persons eye the moment they see their custom sketch.

My first time live sketching at the Ralph Lauren mansion was an experience that did not disappoint! I had a wonderful time sketching and meeting an array of Ralph Lauren customers and employees (including the President of RL!) in a stunning setting. The event went so well that they flew me down to Miami about two weeks later to live sketch there for a few days as well as booked me to come back for Mother's Day weekend!

Holiday Pop-Up at Anthropologie

I am so excited so be partnering Anthropologie this year to be hosting my first holiday pop-up shop of the season. I'll be selling my fashion illustration prints, hand painted ornaments, holiday cards, and as a special treat I'll also be hand painting Anthropologie candles with customers names! It's always wonderful to work with a global brand but this one in particular is special, as I've been such a long time loyal customer. (Even my nightstand and a bunch of items here on my desk are Anthro!) I have to say I'm so excited to be working them. It's also only our first event of the season. The next one I can't share just yet, but its even more exciting! Invite above and details here:

Anthropologie Westport

59 Post Rd E

Westport, CT

12-3pm November 20th, 2021

Hope to see you there today! --It's also actually my very first live event of any kind in CT, so that exciting too.

Ralph Lauren Team USA Uniform Sketches | Tokyo 2021

The time has finally come, the Ralph Lauren Olympic fashion illustration's for the Team USA Uniforms have been been released and tonight we get to see them in action. “Team USA’s 2020 [now 2021 since the pandemic postponement] Opening Ceremony Parade Uniform is a classic all-American look that incorporates sustainable materials within each piece,” a press release from Ralph Lauren read. What it left out was that it incorporated elements, or better yet accessories and illustrative details we’ve yet to see from Ralph Lauren for any Olympic Games ever before such as athletes sporting face masks, and for the first time a press release illustration incorporating the disabled community with a Paralympian and a wheelchair as well as a multitude of ethnicities for the croquis. The inclusive nature of the team USA uniform illustrations released by Ralph Lauren of both opening and closing ceremony looks for 2021 are truly like none we’ve ever seen before from the brand!

In addition to the added elements mentions above, from what I can tell (and now I can’t be 100% certain but I’d be willing to bet money on it) these illustrations also appear to be digital drawings which is quite the departure for a brand with such a rich history of hand drawn illustrations behind their designs. (At the end of this post I’ll share links with examples of older works.) Specifically the opening ceremony illustration, with the multiple figures, and the way the flag and fabrics are rendered, appears to me to be evenly filled lines are that are rendered with digital brush strokes. Of course it’s still in the same beautiful Ralph Lauren illustrative style and well drawn croqui’s that are quality examples of the brand. But it’s a modern drawing technique, a high tech fashion illustration version that parallels the high performance gear and sustainable clothing elements the illustrations are representing.

Bravo Ralph Lauren! For being all-inclusive with the disabled community, representing multiple ethnicities, not ignoring the pandemic with masks and stepping out of your comfort zone by doing digital illustrations for these 2021 Olympic Team USA looks! Can't wait to see the illustrations come to life on the athletes in tonight's Opening Ceremony.

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Halston Fashion Illustrations from Halston Style Exhibit

This weekend I, like most fashion lovers, devoured the new 5-part mini series Halston that premiered on Netflix. To my pleasant surprise the series was peppered with Halston fashion illustrations and it got me thinking about Halston Style, an exhibit I went to 4 years ago, in April of 2017 at the Nassau County Museum of Art. (Side note: a museum I actually volunteered at as a docent, many moons ago in my high school years!) I've been to countless fashion designer retrospectives throughout the years but this one is engrained in my head, as it had hands down the most fashion illustrations of any I'd ever even been to and illustrated by the likes of Halston, Steven Sprouse, Joe Eula (Halston Creative Dir. of 10+ years), and Andy Warhol. The collection of illustrations, garments, iconic designs like Jackie Kennedy's inaugural Halston designed pillbox hat (shown below), personal notes and memorabilia from a life long fashion career was curated from Halston's personal archive which he bestowed upon his neice Lesley Frowick with the directive to write a book "because she would have everything she needed to tell his story. She wrote the book, after 25 years, but always felt a companion exhibit was necessary to share Halston's style and sensibilities given the rich volumes he left behind."

Halston was "ahead of his time in more ways than one, he considered all body types, his designs flattering all ages and sizes. He recruited plus sized vaudevillian Pat Ast to model and be a member of his entourage. Although he was trained in fashion illustration at the Chicago Art Institute, within a few short years he hired Steven Sprouse as official fashion illustrator. Sprouse worked by his side for a few years before making his own mark on the fashion world. Then came Joe Eula [a featured character in the Netflix series] and fashion illustrator extraordinaire, whose gossamer brush strokes brought Halston's flowing fabrics to life in full color."

As the illustrations are all for Halston they are not signed by the different fashion illustrators that may have penned them, which is typical of any fashion house. But all have a very similar aesthetic: bold confident thick markered lines, filled in with solid washes of color and the occasional pattern. Halston figures are almost always faceless given sometimes a lip and once in a while an eye, but always have a air of personality and elegance to their stance and poses.

The exhibit took up the entire museum, each gallery filled with a different era of Halston's career. His beautifully design garments on mannequins in the centers of the rooms, sketches lining the walls, countless orchids, and timelines of his career and personal notes from the likes of Liza Minnelli, Lee Radziwill, Beverly Johnson and Elizabeth Taylor in the corridors. It was such a treat to revisit my camera roll and this exhibit again. I hope you enjoyed the Halston fashion illustrations I chose to spotlight, because I have to tell you, there were many to choose from! Who knows, maybe the popularity of the series will have them put the exhibit on again! Wouldn't that be amazing. But in case that doesn't happen you could always pick up Lesley's book.

(Quotes taken from Halston Style exhibition at Nassau County Museum of Art)

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