Searching for The X-Factor By Lyndal Salmon

Hey, everyone! It’s Lyndal Salmon here to share my musings and hopefully open a thought- provoking dialogue with your subconscious. Today’s topic is the great creative dream.

If you’re reading this and thinking, “Lyndal has odd taste, and a lot of her stuff makes me feel icky!” Then, that’s great! In fact, that’s exactly where I want to sit, my friend.

One of my best friends once told me that when university lecturers are assessing their students’ fashion collections, they are waiting and hoping that a budding designer will push their taste and challenge their eye. It’s in the moments when our eyeballs are put to the test that we know we are seeing something original... Something that is actually NEW. And if you’re a creative that’s not trying to create, then what are you doing?

“You want to seduce but also create a repulse-and-attract dynamic. I always talk about things having a sort of vibration between good and bad taste?” Patrick Li

When educating my students at Biba Academy I tell them not to spend their train ride home looking at hairstyles on people that appeal to them. I tell them to seek out hair that they don’t like and ask themselves, “why doesn’t this work? Why is this irritating me?”

I mean, we even do it with people, don’t we? Think of someone in the industry that irritates you and ask yourself why? Is it because they are actually trying things and testing out the waters you wish you swam in? There’s a lot to be learnt from leaning into the negative, the awkward and the original... Wow, I just got side-tracked.

Back to creative work... Colours actually work in a similar way. Sometimes adding a dab of “wrong” can really make something right. Throughout my years of creative colouring and producing eye- catching concepts, I’ve learned a few things.

One mind-blowing tip is to add black to your high fashion tones. Yes, that’s right, a teeny dab of black. It’s this drop of black that turns a perfect tube of vibrant colour into a bespoke, lush, and expensive-looking tone. A dab of black into a baby blue is heaven. A dab of black into your candy pink grounds it and takes off that overly fresh “hairdresser” feel. The craziest thing about this practice is that chefs do the exact same thing. When creating bespoke icing tones for cakes and dessert, my husband adds activated charcoal into the colours for the “x factor”—the unseen unattainable wow. Can you imagine how blown away I was when I discovered the similarities between our two crafts?

In a world filled with algorithms, fillers, fast fashion rip-offs and high anxiety I say—be like a salmon and swim upstream. Search for the feeling of DIY because that’s where you will find your own flavour and your own voice. Add a dab of wrong into your perfect cut of tea and have a lovely day.

Lyndal xx