I enjoy spring fashion because it tends to be exuberant. I get to dress girls in splashy colors or floral on floral concoctions that would seem cuckoo any other time of the year. The daily newspaper is not Vogue, we can not always celebrate fashion for fashion sake. It  has to make sense. So each year, I pick a story, a theme, a focus and we try to have a little fun. In these two spreads, my focus is color, especially mixing color, but in the first I latched onto the vibrant oranges and limes. I got this fabulous teal-turquoise nail polish so we sent her to a manicurist. I was in love with the color.

This spread has one of my favorite shots from our spreads and that’s the girl under the tree losing it’s pale pink blossoms. She’s looking lovely and a little wistful and a little surprised that we found her there. To me, she looks as if she just discovered that spring (the season of youth) is beautiful but fleeting.

The main shot on this spread was not my favorite. I loved that tutu-skirt so much that I decided to shoe horn it into the shoot and it didn’t really work with the shirt I had. I didn’t want something structured because that didn’t feel right for the park and serenity. I didn’t want something too cropped because that felt a little 80s and that’s not what I was going for either. I like the shoes but I think the top should have been fitted, probably jersey or a light sweater, and it should have been unadorned. I wish another outfit had run huge like that, but que sera, sera. I guess maybe the headline, if directed at me would read, “Lighten up.”

Read my full story on a single page here: Bright Colors Reflect Youthful Spirit of Spring.

“Aside from Popsicles and pedicures, the easiest way to embrace spring is to slip into something colorful. Why should the sun get all the attention?”

The previous spring my focus was clashing florals. I will admit that I kind of hate prints. I just don’t wear them because I always feel like they are fighting me. I find it hard to accessorize them and I just hate how busy prints look next to my face. It’s an odd self-conscious thing, but I have very few print items and I wear them sparingly. However, I love prints on other people. It’s like hat people. Some people are hat people and some people are not. And I’m not really a hat person either. My head’s kinda big.

So I preach that others should embrace the freedom of print, but it’s really more of a do as I say, not as I do thing. But I do think it’s easier to get lost in a print, to feel cozy and protected. Girly and flirty without being a vamp. It’s hard to be sexy when you’re wrapped in daisies or whatever flower pattern is trending, but it’s easy to look innocent and sweet and inviting. This was before the season of the power florals and tribal influences circulating today. These print clashes are daintier, smaller, more subtle.

View the full text of the Frolic in Flirty Spring Fashion piece here and you’ll also find a sidebar of advice on how to incorporate winter layers into spring outfits in Look Before You Leap Into Spring Wardrobe. We shot this piece in a friend’s home. His cats cowered in fear the entire time. They thought we were very suspect.