Simon Reptile, portrait for Harper’s Bazaar Australia, Rosemount Avenue Studio, Sydney, 1985. Printed by Tonia Arapovic, Blinky's Photo Store, Kings Cross, NSW, Australia, 2006

Around 1984–85 I went back to Sydney for a holiday and I was approached by a woman, Lee Tulloch, who had just got editorship of Harper's Bazaar, and she asked me if I would like to stay on in Australia and work for them as their social photographer and doing some portraits and also going to the London and Paris fashion shows and shooting it for them. Of course, I said yes, I jumped at the chance to work. Sydney was now starting to get vibey and people were much more attuned to the fashion industry, and the nightclubs were great, everything about it was perfect for me. A portrait would never last more than 30 minutes at the most, people would lose interest, they'd be tired. When they came to the studio I would have the big Nikon cameras, tripods, a couple of lamps. I only had two lamps: a red head and some other old lamp that somebody gave me. I really liked natural lighting so I would always use the window as part of the portrait.