Garance Doré
Photo courtesy of Scott Schuman

Garance Doré: “I want to keep the distance”

 Listen to Audio Excerpt Listen to Audio Excerpt
Short Profile

Name: Garance Doré
DOB: 1 May 1975
Place of Birth: Girolata, Corsica, France
Occupation: Blogger, Illustrator

Garance, what makes you a good blogger?

I don’t separate and I don’t try to hide parts of myself. Also, what I do is my passion. I make money with it, but it’s something I want to wake up for. That’s why I am very careful to not grow too much, because I know that then it becomes a job. I don't think of it as business.

But you do differentiate between your work life and your private life, don’t you? You write about weight issues and your underwear, but leave out your love life.

It’s not because it’s too private; I would totally share it. It’s just about the identity of my blog – I don’t want to put everything on it. I’m trying to write a book right now and will be more open to other things like that. I set some limits to my blog, but it’s not the limit of my privacy.

It's just a limit of the concept.

Yes. I really believe in sharing. My mother is a psychoanalyst and I lived in a very open family so I know how to talk about myself without being obscene. I could talk about sexuality or big family problems and if you were to read it, it would feel like it’s all right.Woody Allen can share so much and it’s never embarrassing for anybody. I think I have the same thing. And then people feel, “Oh you can talk about yours I can talk about mine.” People tell me that often.

How often do you regret something you have posted?

When I talk about something I don’t truly believe in it feels so wrong that it makes me sick and I want to see the post go away. I never did it for money, but sometimes I do a post about something I don’t truly believe in and later I always regret it. It always gives me a good lesson to be very careful with what I chose to publish. Sometimes people would like to be on the blog and I don’t do it and they don’t understand. But people know my taste, they can feel when it’s not true so I don’t have a lot of problems turning people down.

Do you have to keep a certain distance from the industry in order to keep that perspective?

If you want to change something – and it’s not that I want to – but to change something, you have to be different. If you’re inside, you have too many connections, too many people you want to please and I think Scott and I have been able to keep a healthy distance. My dream was never to be in the front row at a fashion show. It’s really great but it’s not something I thought, “That’s going to be the best thing ever!” Believe me I’m like everybody, sometimes I’d like to be cool and know all the right people and everything, but I know to step a bit to the side and not become too much part of the “it” crowd. I want to keep the distance.

Nowadays most people share a glorified version of their lives online through channels like Facebook and Twitter. Do you do that with your blog as well?

We all do that. I show a more idealized version of my life and the things I see. I was never trying to show reality, but rather the world as I want to see it and myself as I want to be. So we’re all the same, we edit ourselves, we show the best things, but it’s also sometimes good to say, “Okay, there’s also crap happening and it’s fine.”

Do you ever worry about putting your “crap” online?

Sure, but everybody has the same crap so I don’t feel like I have to be perfect. I think the problems we have are interesting. It’s not a problem for me to say when I’m scared, when I’m impressed, when I’m not impressed, when I feel fat, when I feel on top of the world. I think everybody goes through this kind of stuff. So I think it’s something I’d like to do more, share more. People want to read honest stories.

What do you want to read online?

As a reader, if I go to a website and feel overwhelmed by information, I leave. It’s like Twitter, the more people you follow the less you can read. If you buy a magazine, you read it, you stop, you take it back, you know what it’s delivering to you that day and that month. But when it’s all over the place and you feel like it’s not well edited, it’s exhausting. I think the more content there is on the Internet, the more it will need real editors like me, people with a real voice.

How do you see the future of blogs developing?

It’s becoming something much more commercial – the one changing factor is the money. So when you have money the system will be more like magazines. To make more money, you need to make more content because you have to have people come back to your blog. And to make more content means you lose your focus; you talk about more things and you edit less. So you need to have talented people who edit and are able to put in a lot of good content, which I don’t think is very easy with the Internet. The Internet is very hungry, constantly.

How do you feel about television, a much more undemocratic version of entertainment?

Last time I watched a movie on TV it took me 3 hours and the movie was only an hour and a half! I was like, “Scott, I’m never watching TV in America ever again!” That’s not possible in France. I think they have the right for one advertising break in the movie or two maximum, but I mean, in America it’s every 5 minutes! But I don’t think that money is evil.

Why not?

The wonderful thing with TV is that it makes so much money that it creates wonderful programs like the big TV series. But there is going to be a big shift. In 15 years maybe YouTube will be a huge channel. I think it’s a great time to create a network now, to take the power and make a difference. You have to create your website now, your videos now, cause after that, the space will be occupied.

You have been working more and more with video yourself. Can you imagine making a movie yourself one day?

Yeah, I’d love to make movies! Video came naturally to me and I’d love to do a film. But even for the book, for a long time people had been asking me to write a book – agents, publications houses – and I said I’d love to, but I couldn’t imagine how to do it. And then it came to me and now I have a book! So, I don't know if it will be good or anything, but it’s going to be the same with a film. Maybe one day I will have it inside, but for the moment I’m experimenting with video and having a lot of fun. My idol is Woody Allen, but I also love reality TV. I think I want to mix reality and fiction.

You love reality TV, seriously?

I don’t think there is a reality show that I love, but I love the idea. I think usually it's just that these people are not very interesting, but if it were about people that I’m interested in, I would love it!

But since reality TV is usually terrible I don’t think any interesting people would ever do it…

True, but just imagine the most wonderful reality TV: Bruce Weber’s studio, you know? I mean, I would like to be there and have a camera there all the time and see what they’re doing and how they’re working. I would love a reality show like that!