Only seventeen years young, and Margaret Zhang has already established for herself a group of devoted followers and industry friends. From her inspiring interviews with emerging designers to her relaxed outfit shots, Shine by Three reflects the mantra that “style is individualism and charisma and the tendency to be drawn to the obscure”.

Studying commerce and law at university, Margaret proves that she is no one-show pony. Trained in the classical art of ballet, piano and violin, she thrives in the creative arts as well as the more ‘serious’ side of things. She’s interned with fashion label, stylestalker, having assisted them with on their online marketing – skills and quirks that she has learnt from maintaining her blog. With a penchant for heels and pretty, braided buns, we met up with Margaret on a hot summer’s day to talk fashion, blogging and inspiration.

What made you start blogging?

I started blogging about halfway through 2009. At the time I started this really strange obsession with all the runway shows in Paris – the Jean Paul Gaultier Fall/Winter show in 2009 with their amazing tights, this is all I remember, they had these amazing tights and I really wanted them but nobody made them and I couldn’t find them anywhere and I was talking about them at school and nobody cared so put it on my blog and then it just progressively got more fashion-y and then I thought, hey, maybe I should show people what I wear in real life and it just peaked up.

Who/what are your inspirations?

I think I’m inspired by fashion as a sort of art form. I’m always on FashionGoneRogue looking at editorials and sometimes I think of the model as an artist – the way she understands the clothes and things like that, it’s really amazing. I’m like Wow! That’s really cool and sometimes with the photographer’s concepts that they use in their photography of certain garments – that’s really amazing. And the garments themselves as a sort of art form – things off the runway that people wouldn’t necessarily wear day-to-day, I think that’s really amazing but then again I also love the people who actually do wear the stuff off the runway that other people wouldn’t usually wear because you can show that you can wear art every day.

How would you describe your style?

I think my style is really eclectic. If you look through my wardrobe, everything is really different and you think ‘how is this even coherent?’, but I think that my style is coherent within the outfit and then somehow it fits into something else – I wear things upside-down and back-to-front and things like that and people ask how I own so many clothes, but I just adapt things. I mean sometimes it’s girly, sometimes it’s like rock star, if you want. I think I take inspiration from genres rather than actual things.

Who are your favourite Australian designers and why?

I love stylestalker. I think because they’re so new, their take on things is really fresh and they take inspiration from a lot of places like their mood boards are just really crazy. I love Gail Sorronda – her stuff is just beautiful to look at. I love Dion Lee, he’s only been around quite recently and he’s already making a massive impact, stocking on Net-A-Porter. I think I really like designers who treat their clothing as art. I think it’s really good that there’s a lot of new designers coming out now like Max Tan, this new designer from Singapore, just because he’s not stuck in this frame of mind that he has to do a certain something that people are used to, they can bring a lot of things to the table that no one’s ever seen before, so that’s really amazing.

Who are your favourite international designers and why?

I love Rebecca Minkoff. Just because her stuff is so classic but at the same time she brings stuff from the future, I guess. I really love Alexander McQueen, I mean, it’s a given, but I think I like looking back at his collections and looking forward to the house’s future ones just because it was him with his crazy creative mind and stuff. There’s this beautiful German label called F.rau. They’ve just got the most bizarre, avant-garde stuff that somehow manages to be street wearable.

What blogs do you like to read?

There’s blogs that I go to for inspiration. I read Fashion Twist – I think her blog ethics are a bit arguable sometimes. I love Cherry Blossom Girls because she takes beautiful photos. I like different blogs for different reasons like, Pandora, in France, Louise Ebil, I think her name is, the way she takes medieval art and uses that to inspire her style and compare it to, I think that’s very cool. I love Susie Bubble, just because, she’s crazy. A lot of stuff she wears is really ‘wow’ and it’s really cool that she’s comfortable wearing that and when people question what she wears she just goes, ‘whatever’. I love my fellow Australian bloggers like Zanita and Love More. It’s cool to see how even in Australia, even in Sydney, how people have such different style.

What is your favourite piece of clothing?

Currently, my favourite piece of clothing is this amazing teal skirt I got at the Rozelle markets – it’s long and chiffon and just amazing. It’s vintage but the colour hasn’t faded, so it’s just never going to fade. It is this amazing bright colour and it blows in the wind and is all floaty! It’s a massive skirt and it is so beautiful. I think I just love it because of the colour; the colour is really intense and I just like that.

What do you love to blog about?

I have blogged food, sometimes, but it’s mainly fashion. I like blogging art and photography as well. Just recently I did a music post, which was interesting and I got a lot of emails after that asking me about what music I would recommend which is interesting, I mean, I never thought that would draw so much attention. My outfit posts are really popular with readers, I mean, they get more views, more comments and more emails and things like that. I just like blogging about fashion and it’s just like refreshing sometimes when I blog about something else, so it’s good to shake things up a bit sometimes.

What is your favourite thing about Sydney?

I think Sydney is the best city in Australia because it is just comfortable – people are friendly and the weather isn’t too extreme. I really like that it’s relaxed, I think that’s my favourite thing. My other favourite thing is probably Bondi. I haven’t been enough times this Summer, I really need to get over there – it’s a bit of a trek for me but Bondi’s good.

Check out Shine by Three to see more of Margaret’s amazing projects and style.