Issue link: https://www.balharbourdigital.com/i/867968
J enny Walton's gestural, minimalist fashion illustrations offer a refreshingly anachronistic reprieve from the inescapable deluge of fashion photography—some of which she is partly responsible for as the site director of Scott Schuman's pioneering street style mecca, The Sartorialist. While it may seem like these two professional antipodes would contradict one another, they actually share common ground. The Sartorialist captures pointed, singular moments that are as much about the subject's outfit choice as they are about the élan and mood with which the person wears it; similarly, Walton's illustrations distill the spirit of the clothing or pattern she is drawing and eschew the literal. "I like to leave out as much as possible," she confirms of her distinctive style. Walton, however, didn't begin her career with the intention of portraying fashion, but rather creating it. After graduating from Parsons, she took a job working at Calypso as an assistant knitwear designer. "Looking back on it, it was such a small company—only two people per department, and I was sketching and drawing, doing embroidery layouts, beading layouts and really handling the technical side on my own." Living in the far reaches of Park Slope, Brooklyn at the time, she had hour- long commutes to and from her office in Long Island City. "I had two hours every day where I was like, what should I do with this time—so I began drawing a lot. This was the time Instagram was taking off, so I was DRAWING THE LINE The Sartorialist's Jenny Walton strikes a balance between real-life image-making and her whimsical illustrations inspired by the fashionable world she inhabits. BY MIEKE TEN HAVE 82 BAL HARBOUR TKTKTKTKTKTKTKTK Illustrator Jenny Walton's website, markersandmicrons.com, provides a platform for her to share her illustrations, which have been commissioned by magazines and retailers.