The Fashion Bomb

All fashion writer Claire Sulmers wanted to do was put together an online portfolio of her fashion clips to keep from hauling around a portfolio to interviews, but she wound up with a lot more than she bargained for.

"I didn't want to at first," Sulmers said. "I had heard that some professionals got fired from their jobs for keeping online journals."

While creating her online portfolio, Sulmers asked her Web developer if she could make it personal by adding things like music and quotes. The Web developer suggested she create a blog instead. Putting aside her fear of getting an unwanted call to her boss' office, Sulmers built the Fashion Bomb, a blog, in August 2006.

For a while, Sulmers' blog, www.thefashionbomb.blogspot.com, was only attracting 300 hits a day. Today, The Fashion Bomb draws more than 3,000 hits daily and averages about 20,000 hits a week.

"I discovered The Fashion Bomb through a link on concreteloop.com," sophomore fashion merchandising major Andrea Hart said.

Hart is a daily visitor to The Fashion Bomb. "It gives a lot of good advice on how to look like the stars and on finding great bargains on great clothes," she said.

Sulmers said when she decided to blog, she thought of her long-term shopping addiction and continued from there.

"I started off talking about me shopping in New York, but decided to make it more global, bring in celebrities, and also bring in a bit of knowledge I had learned from fashion writing," she said.

A 2003 graduate from Harvard University, Sulmers, who majored in French and minored in African-American studies, said both degrees lent something to her craft.

For example, the inspiration for the subject matter of The Fashion Bomb came from a realization in her African-American studies that most fashion magazines don't pay enough attention to women of color. The Fashion Bomb targets women of color and features commentary on issues as well.

Most recently, it discussed the controversial April cover of Vogue magazine featuring LeBron James and model Gisele Bundchen in the staple "Breaking Into Fashion," which gives career advice from professionals in the fashion arena. "Even if mainstream doesn't embrace the 'minority,' I know that I enjoy looking at the style of stars like Beyonce, Rihanna and Kimora Lee Simmons," Sulmers said. "I just realized there was a definite vacuum in terms of black fashion. Who better than an African-American studies fashion-obsessed girl to write about it?"

Logging on to The Fashion Bomb, it's easy to see that Sulmers is dedicated to the craft of blogging because the Web site is updated daily. She says it's the time commitment that helps to set The Fashion Bomb apart from other blogs. Junior film major Cassondra Rodriguez plans to start her own fashion blog to keep people posted on trends and fashion advice. She said her site would be similar to, but a little different from. Sulmers.'

"Looking at the blog [The Fashion Bomb] for the first time, I think that it's definitely fashion forward and she [Sulmers] seems to be enjoying herself at fashion shows, which is cool," Rodriguez said. "As a fashion person, this would help out a lot."

To those wishing to start a blog, Sulmers cautions that there are a lot of competitors out there.

"There are dozens of celebrity gossip blogs out there," she said. "How can you update more? Perez Hilton is known for writing on pictures and also updating several times a day. So if you want to be the next Perez Hilton, figure out how you can make your own mark and get the most attention."