"Hello, Tailor" garners approximately 1,000 hits per month. Due to the success of her blog, she has gained freelance work as a writer, mostly for the Daily Dot. She is heavily involved in the online fan fiction community, and is a managing editor at Big Bang Press, a small publishing company that focuses on fandom writers.
Hello, Tailor updates about once every two weeks, usually commenting on recently released movies. Her recent posts have been a three-part review of "Captain America: The Winter Soldier," and she has a long history of posting about Marvel movies. She has also shown herself to be dedicated to NBC's "Hannibal" and MTV's "Teen Wolf."
Her strongest posts are those that combine fashion with feminism, such as her popular post about the H&M fashion tie-in with the American version of Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. In this critique, she demonstrates an understanding of the ways in which marketing tie-ins with popular movies can undermine the intentions of the original characterization.
"Salander... dresses with explicit aim of coming across as scary and unappealing. She isn't part of any goth subculture, and she has no difficulty attracting a partner when she wants to get laid and therefore does not dress with the aim of being sexually appealing... As a physically small woman who is justifiably wary of abuse and attack, she goes out of her way give off as many negative signals as possible. The way Rooney Mara has been styled, however, doesn't quite match this. Firstly, her hairstyle looks expensive and trendy instead of home-cut and messy, and secondly, if ever there was a role for which an actress should "ugly up", Lisbeth Salander is it."
Baker-Whitelaw is a feminist, pointing out the ways in which women are treated as objects for visual pleasure in ways which don't agree with the character. Her main critique of the marketing for "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" is that it turns Lisbeth Salander into a submissive, sexualized figure in order to appeal to an American audience. We, as movie-goers, are so used to this objectification of women that we rarely even notice it. When Baker-Whitelaw points it out, she does so as a feminist and as a media critic. Portraying Lisbeth Salander in this manner isn't just offensive to women, it's also offensive to accurate storytelling.
I began following "Hello, Tailor" almost two years ago, initially attracted by her compelling and conversational tone that she uses in her "Teen Wolf" recaps. These posts were far more casual than her posts about the Avengers, as she sounded much more like a fangirl discussing her obsession with an MTV show than a woman critiquing a multi-million dollar movie. These posts generally began as thought-out-but-still-initial reactions to the episode before devolving into bullet points using internet-speak. For example, her review of season three episode six ends in this manner:
- Luv the music in the final scene. SCOTT/STILES FRONDSHIP!!!!
- I feel like I say this every week (who am I kidding, I definitely say this every week), but SCISAAC/ALLISON THREESOME NEEDS TO HAPPEN!!
- How many thunderstorms does Becaon Hills have each year? 200?
"Hello, Tailor" is a special blog in how Baker-Whitelaw uses her critiques of media to bring about feminist understanding. Her audience is mainly women who are interested in this media, and these women are then more informed about feminism because of her posts. Furthermore, her conversational tone is admirable. The way in which she transitions between formal critique and carefree text-speak is something which I wish to emulate in my own way. My blog has more to do with theories of feminism, but it also deals with the everyday sexism that I face, and media of course plays into that.
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