Smoking Break: Fashion Photography in NoLita, NYC

Fatma, enjoys a smoke in NYC.

The photos in this set feature a fashionable medical professional I’ve photographed many times. She’s one of my favorite New York-based collaborators.

Taken during an April afternoon meetup in 2019, this series features Fatma, a stylish and lively subject I’ve known for years. Hailing from Kuwait City, she moved to the US to attend university in Buffalo. Upon graduation, Fatma relocated to New York and has lived in the city ever since.

We connected via Instragram in 2015 when I was searching for a unique face to feature in an article for Dauphine Magazine. We ended up collaborating on a memorable piece about her life in the New York and always challenging fashions.

These photos were taken after a coffee and chat at citizenM New York Bowery hotel. During our conversation, inspiration struck as I was distracted by the contrast between her sunglasses and striking red lipstick. We headed over to a bright red wall on nearby Kenmare St. in NoLita to snap a few photos of her talking and smoking against the vibrant backdrop.

Despite not being a fan of cigarettes, I do love to photograph smokers.

The direction for these photos: smoke and talk. As she updated me on her life, I captured candid frames of her facial expressions and hand movements which became more striking and cinematic due to the proximity of the red wall and Nom Wah’s seasonal red entrance.

This particular set of nine photos are my favorites from that day. Fatma is in the midst of talking and smoking, emitting a range of emotions and movements with every utterance. Those fleeting moments — quicksilver — are the ones I love to preserve in photographs.