Latest news with #LucyOwen
Leader Live
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Leader Live
Flintshire and Wrexham heroes nominated for Make a Difference Awards
Launched in Wales for the first time this year, the event will celebrate and recognise people who do incredible things for each other and their local communities, shining a light on these everyday, unsung heroes. Over 700 entries have been whittled down to 32 finalists across eight categories. Leading this year's awards in Wales are BBC Radio Wales' Lucy Owen and BBC Radio Cymru's Shan Cothi. Lucy Owen, said: 'We're absolutely blown away by the nominations we've had. There are so many wonderful stories about community groups making a huge difference in their local areas and outstanding individuals committed to bringing people together, fundraising for good causes and caring for others.' Shân Cothi added: 'Over 700 nominations for our very first Make a Difference Awards in Wales says so much about who we are as a nation. It's incredible to hear about some of the amazing things that people are doing right across Wales, we've had nominations in from Ynys Môn to Swansea and Wrexham to Carmarthenshire. A huge congratulations to everyone who was nominated and to all of our brilliant finalists.' The awards are being judged by presenters from across the BBC, including Katie Owen, Lauren Price, Gethin Jones, Owain Wyn Evans, Bronwen Lewis, Iolo Williams, Olivia Breen and Aleighcia Scott. Winners will be announced at the BBC Cymru Wales Make a Difference Awards ceremony in Cardiff on September 20. Here are the Flintshire and Wrexham heroes nominated for prizes... Awarded to an individual or group of people who have used physical activity or sport as a way of improving the lives of those in their community. Farm Fit founder Robin Jones. (Image: Farm Fit) TOP STORIES Awarded to an individual who helps to make the neighbourhood a better place to live or work in, either on a regular basis or through a single act of kindness.
Telegraph
01-06-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
How midlife women are influencing fashion
Relatability. Authenticity. Sense of humour. Knowledge. They sound like qualities you'd list as requirements on a dating app. But we're not here to talk about finding love; we're talking about finding shoes, and the app in question isn't Bumble but Instagram. Then again, the quest for the perfect partner has much in common with the quest for the perfect shoes (or bag, dress, coat or trouser suit – not to mention dinner plates, rug and mascara). So endless is the choice, so manifold and confusing the products, that the right ones can feel as elusive as the right romance. In which case, think of Lucy Owen as your Cupid. You might not know her, but she knows you. In fact, she's probably dressed you. If you're a woman of a certain age (ballpark: 35 to 60) with a love of fashion and an Instagram account, the chances are that Owen has influenced your wardrobe without you even knowing. Owen, 49, is not an influencer herself ('Absolutely not!' she splutters) but she manages some of the most successful ones in their fields, including Vogue 's global beauty and wellness director Jessica Diner, Red 's editor-in-chief Sarah Tomczak, writer and interiors guru Katherine Ormerod, lawyer Thandi Maqubela, beauty journalist Sarah Jossel and author and stylist Erica Davies – Owen's first client, and among the ones with the most followers (281,000 and counting). But as anyone in the social-media influencer game will tell you, it's not really about follower numbers. It's about engagement – and expertise. In an era when anyone can (and often erroneously does) call themselves an influencer, Owen's USP is that her clients are experts in their areas, carefully chosen for the depth and wealth of their experience. 'They're real women, not just content creators, in the sense that they also have full-time jobs as editors, authors and lawyers, and are balancing those with their commercial work at the weekend,' she explains. 'That's what makes these women real.' It's also what makes them desirable to brands. As mostly 'midfluencers' (mid-life influencers), they're connected to a demographic of women – their followers – who trust every pronouncement they make. Trust doesn't come lightly: it has to be earned. And once it's earned, you'd be remiss not to monetise it. That's where Owen comes in. At this point, it might be useful for Owen to explain what an influencer is. 'An influencer is a person of influence who works commercially with brands to produce content that they then share on their social channels,' she says, with the practised air of someone who has rattled this off many times before. 'I don't particularly like the word,' she adds. It's certainly become a divisive term, one that even influencers themselves sometimes shy away from. As for how they monetise their influence, this varies enormously, and can range from being paid a fixed fee per post, to longer-term arrangements that might include brand collaborations, special 'edits', ambassadorships (being contracted to promote and wear a brand) and event hosting. When we meet for coffee in Soho, central London, Owen looks as stylish as her clients, and certainly not in need of any fashion advice. Married with two young adult sons, after decades working as a fashion PR (her first job was with the industry legend Lynne Franks), she founded Lucy Owen Talent (LOT) in 2018, with a mission to match the right labels with the right influencers. So far, she's brokered deals with brands including John Lewis, Hush, Dune, Radley, Sézane, Ruggable, Vinted and L'Occitane. Sometimes she pitches, sometimes they approach her. 'I have a network of contacts, who are also my friends. They trust me, and I respect them. Brands know that when they give me their budget, I'll help them spend it wisely. They are going to get the ROI [return on investment] they need.' From the beginning, Owen knew that she wanted to have a niche: 'Women with authority, who had a background in fashion, beauty, interiors, lifestyle, styling, art directing and journalism. They were the women who inspired me as a consumer. It was them who I wanted to tell me what the best white T-shirt was.' Both high-street and high-end fashion labels were slow to grasp the fact that midlife women are the demographic with most of the spending power, despite rarely being courted and routinely being underserved. 'They just didn't want to go there,' says Owen. 'A lot of brands still don't get it. There are still some that put out collections that only go up to a size 12. It's horrifying. But I do think the landscape is changing.' The companies that Owen works with view her as a conduit who can connect them with her clients, who will in turn connect them with their own highly engaged followers. 'It's making them understand that on the internet, life doesn't stop at 40 or 50. Everything's been reconfigured with social media growing and developing as it has. Now, women have accessibility to people – to midfluencers, as they can be termed – that they didn't have before. They didn't get that constant flow of content from a magazine. You can also shop from Instagram. You can see what this person of influence is wearing – someone you admire and respect – and you can press the button, buy it, and have it delivered the next day.' The appeal to brands is neatly illustrated by Erica Davies, whose post about being unable to find boots that fit her led to a collaboration with John Lewis in 2021. 'Erica had thousands of DMs [direct messages] from followers who also couldn't find boots to fit their calves. We pitched it to John Lewis, and they jumped on it. They were really agile and smart. That led to Erica doing a coat collection [in 2022]. She's still a brand ambassador. I like to work with brands that want to partner long-term, because that's what resonates with people's communities. When they see that repeated moment, it makes sense.' View this post on Instagram A post shared by John Lewis & Partners (@johnlewis) Emma Moran, head of PR at John Lewis, reiterates the value of these collaborations – and has the statistics to back it up. 'Our 2021 boot collection in collaboration with Erica Davies was incredibly successful and testament to [the reasons behind] our long-term partnership with her. The Viola style sold out within 24 hours, and during the launch week, 50 per cent of our bestselling women's footwear styles were from the Erica Davies collection.' Owen declines to name the most successful midfluencer on her roster ('They all have a place'), but Davies seems to be among those who have netted the most brand partnerships. You can see why she's so in-demand: her Instagram Reels are warm, informative and self-deprecating, so she comes across more like a friend than a teacher or preacher. That she's a contented size 12-14 also connects her to a demographic who are more likely to be persuaded to try a trend that Davies wears than if it was worn by a remote 18-year-old model. Davies' power to shift product makes her an attractive prospect to retailers. 'We wanted to work with Erica on her own edit after seeing the 'Erica effect' for ourselves,' says Jill Gate, brand and marketing director for George at Asda. 'She shared our tiered dress on her [Instagram] Stories last summer and it went viral, with customers up and down the country asking for it. We've really seen the power of her influence with our leopard puffer coat, which has been the highest-searched product this year on the George site.' Another of Owen's clients, fashion journalist Katherine Ormerod, has also carved out a niche in interiors, after turning her hand to DIY in a bid to perk up her rented London home. Her frank, informative posts have amassed a loyal following that brands are keen to tap into, and have led to partnerships with Dune, Baukjen and Ruggable. 'Our audience has reacted so positively,' says Ruggable's senior marketing director, Charlotte Ford, 'with Katherine's edit driving a 40 per cent increase in traffic to the rugs on-site.' As for how her clients retain authenticity when their followers know they're being paid to promote things, it's a question of trust, Owen explains – provided the transactional element is transparent (which it has to be by law). Followers have faith that the influencers will only promote products that align with their values. Things get more opaque when I ask specific questions about money, and Owen understandably demurs from talking numbers. A recent report by the influencer-insights agency Corq, based on 50 lifestyle influencers, found that creator fees for a single video asset for Instagram or TikTok ranged from £450 to £2,500 for those with audiences of less than 100,000, rising to £7,000 for those with one million. Longer-term brand ambassadorships will be worth considerably more, and could rise to six figures, especially if they involve product development. While she might manage them, Owen says she never manages her clients' content. 'I leave that to them. They are the experts. Of course, I check in. I meet with them regularly, talk about any worries or concerns. But I wouldn't dream of telling them what content to create. They all have their own unique tone of voice, and I will always strategically allocate work to them so there's space for all of them, and I can work differently with each of them.' As with any profession, being an influencer is not without its challenges. In her 2018 book Why Social Media Is Ruining Your Life, Ormerod writes honestly about the disconnect between her real life and her Instagram persona, and the pressures of creating and maintaining the sort of perfect lifestyle that appeals to followers and is lucrative for brands. 'There's always going to be pressure when you're professionally popular,' she says now. 'As a woman in mid-life, I've definitely passed my palatable-to-everyone era, which can be tricky. This industry can sometimes feel like the more innocuous and basic your brand, the more you're rewarded.' But, she explains, 'While I always want to keep the quality of my work high, I don't labour over the reaction to what I post or say. I don't care to try and control that, because it's an exercise in futility.' While tales of backstabbing and jealousy abound in the influencer community (among everyone – not just women), Owen insists there is no rivalry between her clients, largely because she's mindful about who she represents. 'I'm very careful and curated in my approach to who joins the roster. It needs to be balanced. I'm constantly thinking about diversity in terms of having women of colour on there, and also in terms of size, and representing mid- and plus-sized women.' She turns down far more people than she takes on. 'I don't want the agency to be huge, or to scale it in a way that means I lose control.' Even after being in business for seven years, her team still numbers a modest three, representing 12 clients. 'We're full-on,' she says, smiling. 'I still speak to all of my clients all the time. I'm still the one who negotiates the deals. Our job is to support them, and give them the bandwidth to be able to do their commercial work in addition to their demanding [day] jobs. That's not easy. They need someone in their corner who can fight fires for them. I'm emotionally as well as commercially invested in these women. They're my friends.' And she's their mentor. 'I've taught them all that there's great power in saying no, something that can be really hard for women,' she notes, citing one of her recent signings, who 'had been saying yes to everything'. 'I told her she needed to trust me, be brave and let me help her to work out what the right fit was.' Does she have a crystal ball that can divine what women will want to wear in six months' time? 'I don't,' she says, laughing. 'Although I do think people are tired of dresses. I know I am.' As for her own future, she says, 'I just want to carry on doing the best job that I can. I'm very happy being in the background, doing the work, and helping these women's dreams come true. I feel I'm on a journey with them. I just want them to win.' And to make the rest of us look more stylish while she's at it.
Powys County Times
26-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Powys County Times
Special guests attending 2025 Powys literature festival
This year's Montgomery Literature Festival will also include a mini-festival aimed at children and young people. As Montgomeryshire pupils return to school after the Easter break, the annual Powys literature festival has announced that a number of children's authors will be festival as part of Monty Mini Fest. The Mini Fest takes place in Montgomery on Sunday, June 8, the last day of the weekend's main festival. Guests include TV news broadcaster, Lucy Owen, who will be appearing along with Rebecca Harry the illustrator of her new book for 5-8 year olds, The Sea House. Older primary school age children can also look forward to meeting Mid Wales author of The Sleeping Stones, Beatrice Wallbank and hear her inspirations for writing magical stories, sparking ideas for young writers to think about where the magic happens. Also visiting will be Claire Fayers, shortlisted for her second Tir na N'Og prize among her other awards, this time for Welsh Giants, Ghosts & Goblins. Cyndy Hymphreys and Georgia Dickinson will be at the festival to host a special storytime session for under five-year-olds. The mini festival has been named the Jill Kibble Monty Mini Fest in honour of a Montgomery's favourite resident who passed away last year. Describing the namesake of the Mini fest, a Montgomery Literature Festival spokesperson said: 'A community dynamo, and a dedicated supporter of Montgomeryshire Literary Festival, Jill is very much missed. 'The organisers of the main Monty Lit Fest hope that this new venture will inspire young readers and writers.' While the Mini Fest is taking place on the last day of the main festival, during the week before pupils at Montgomery Church in Wales School will also be visited by another very special guest of the main festival, appearing as a 'Secret Reader'. A spokesperson for the festival added: 'We're not telling but if you want to try and guess, take a look at the programme on where you can also find full details of the Mini Fest.' Tickets for the festival are on sale via the website, the Montgomery Bookshop, the Ivy Cafe & Post office, Montgomery, as well as the website.'
BBC News
09-03-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Towards Zero: Matthew Rhys admits he wouldn't make 'real-life detective'
Actor Matthew Rhys has said he wouldn't make a great detective in real life, despite playing one in a new Agatha Christie adaption. The Cardiff-born actor plays Inspector Leach in murder mystery Towards Zero, which also stars Hollywood royalty Anjelica Huston and Clarke is known for his role as Philip Jennings in Russian spy drama The Americans. Speaking to Lucy Owen on BBC Radio Wales, he said he couldn't "buy a clue" if his life depended on it. "I'm not the sharpest tool in the box. When I did The Americans people would say that to me, like, 'do you think you make a good spy?' And I was like, no," he said."I don't think I make a good detective, because there was even times when I'd finished the script, and still I went to the director, 'I don't quite understand how it happened' and he's like 'oh boy we're really dealing with one here'." Set in the 1930s, Towards Zero centres on an explosive love triangle, a house party of deadly enemies and a formidable matriarch, Lady said the allure of acting alongside Huston was an enormous draw."I was incredibly nervous. There's only one family who has three generations of Oscar winners, and her and the Hustons are those," he said. "I found myself at a slight tremble when the immortal words of 'and action' were shouted. "But those people are those people for a reason, because they are full of grace and understanding and incredibly talented, and she certainly went out of her way to put me at ease." During the final crucial scene in the drama, Inspector Leach takes to the tennis court to play one of the suspects Nevile Strange, played by Oliver Jackson-Cohen. While Rhys may have played rugby back in Wales, the only time he attempted tennis was on video games and a bit of ping pong, while his co-star also had little to no experience. Both had emergency tennis lessons before filming, but even they could not help."It just got to a point where they were shooting it and the director went, 'you know what? You just pretend like you're hitting it, and we'll put the balls in after'," he said. It has been a busy period for the actor as he stars in the upcoming Apple TV series Widow's Bay and the Netflix series The Beast in Me opposite Homeland's Claire now lives in New York, but remains a passionate Welshman, celebrating St David's Day with his family in second episode of Towards Zero is BBC One at 21:00 GMT on Sunday. All episodes are available now on BBC Rhys' interview with Lucy Owen on BBC Radio Wales was first broadcast on Saturday and is available to catch up with on BBC Sounds.
