hippy hippy hop

Thought this looked very 70's hippy print. Now all I need is a big floppy hat.... peace out!

Cardigan: Otto sample sale
Dress: Otto sample sale
Tights: Accessorize
Boots: Hugo Boss

Time for tea?

Necklace: My cousin made with ribbon, wire and beads
Dress: Otto sample sale (Oli)
Shoes: Carvela

Ride 'em cowboy!

My cow gal outfit!!! Wore this to go out around town the other day...

Jacket: Vintage French Connection (was my mum's)
Shirt: Miss Real
Leggings: Tabio
Socks: Christmas present from a friend
Boots: Hugo Boss (with the tassles!!) Thought I'd show you a close up- as it's my fashion love of the moment!

Gossip Gal

Feeling Gossip girl today... thought I'd channel some 'Blair from gossip girl' into the outfit. If you don't know anything about her, here are some pics of Blair from the show:

























I'm wearing:

Ribbon in hair from Net-a-porter
Multi strand necklace: made by me
Dress (inside): American Apparel
Dress (outside) with the ruffles: Marc by Marc Jacobs
Socks: Ralph Lauren
Shoes: Guess

You're in the army now...

Long black cardigan: Gap
Army dress: designed and made by my cousin (Greta Lee fashions)
Tights: Black opaque tights by M&S
Ankle boots: Hugo Boss (worn without detatchable fringing)

While we're on the subject of dressing up as the forces, I saw these cute shoes online, I have to have!!! I wonder how much shipping costs....

Party Season

Sorry for the serious lack of blogging... but the lead up the Christmas etc. has made me very busy! I promise next year, there will be more constant updates... in fact, I'll make it one of my new year's resolutions!

I like organising things, but whenever I do organise an event, something is bound to go wrong and I am the one to blame. For example, the office Secret Santa didn't go as well as planned, with some people being ill on the day and some people not knowing who they were meant to buy for! This meant that some people got their presents late and some just got a 'unisex' present such as a box of chocolates or a bottle of wine! But oh well... I think everyone got something eventually....

So now it comes down to my birthday which is in Mid January. I want a themed birthday... just beacuse I enjoy dressing up and making a special effort! A lot of people I know however don't like dressing up, so I thought of a compromise and thought of a 'James Bond' theme. Its not very original but I like the glamourous aspect to it and I may finally get a chance to wear my amazing Bodyamr dress that I got in their sample sale a while back.

Talking about sample sales.... there have been a lot on this month, especially before Christmas! I went to the Vivienne Westwood sale which was held in Battersea. It was probably the worst sale I've been to, very poorly organised and they seriously underestimated the amount of people that would turn up! Firstly we had to queue for around 1 1/2 hours before we could go inside in the freezing cold, secondly, as we got inside, there was barely any clothing left and a few shoes, but the only really nice ones were sooo tiny size 2(35 EU) or size 3 (36 EU)!! Near the back of the room, there was a huge crowd of people, from the other end of the room, I could see rolls of fabric, so I thought that they were selling rolls of fabric or fabric samples, but it was jewellery! People were queuing up to choose and buy jewellery at the desk. Everything was bundled into small clear plastic bags so you had to ask the assistants to take it out for you so that you can have a look. Which I thought was very badly organised, it meant that you took ages looking through a lot of items cos you didn't want to leave without spotting a bargain! My star buy was these earrings- I grabbed the last pair. I saw them in the assistant's hands and asked her if I coudl have them. The girl next to me also wanted a pair, but I managed to grab them before her!!

Headgear

I had the pleasure of being invited to a traditional Nigerian tribal union one Sunday. We had to wear the traditional dress of our country. Being British, I don't know what traditional dress is, so if I go back a generation to my parents- they are both Mauritian, so the traditional dress of Mauritius is this:

'Sega' dancers wearing Mauritian traditional dress

Somehow I don't think that they are appropriate for a wedding ceremony- especially as as I don't own a costume and my belly is not as flat as I would have liked! So, if I go back another generation (aka my grandparents), I come to the traditional Chinese dress... the qi pao or cheong sam depending on which dialect you use!
Unfortunately I don't own such a lovely dress. Mine actually looks like a Chinese waitress' uniform- long and red with a side split, which is one of the reasons why I don't wear it at all! So, I looked through my wardrobe and luckily enough I have two other traditional outfits that I could wear- my Yukata (which is Japanese traditional dress) and my 'Ao Dai' (which is Vietnamese traditional dress)

I decided to go with the 'Ao Dai' as I thought that it looked a more more formal and appropriate for a wedding! Although, I do own the hat (as seen below) I didn't wear it!!When we were there, I was actually amazed by the intricacies of the hat/ turbans that constituted the Nigerian women's traditional dress. Here are some images:

Some were very elaborate with lots of pleats and bows and fabric sticking out at all kinds of angles, whereas some were just simple turban types- just covering the head! It reminded me of Prada's take on the turban:
However, I'm more in awe of the ones that I saw- almost made of paper and very colourful, they were much more interesting!

My origami/ flower dress...

And here it is! From just a plain white halterneck dress from Zara:
To an origami flower unique dress!

Hat party!

My friend is having a hat party next weekend and despite all the hats that I have already, I'm looking for something different!

I think I have my outfit planned... I was thinking as I have been buying a lot of black recently and I have been watching a lot of death note I could dress in a gothic/ bondage style! Sounds very kinky hehehe.... but here are some images of my outfit without the hat... which I still have to buy.

This is my 'I have never' outfit:
I have never worn a top to toe all black outfit
I have never worn any of these items out before.
I have never worn a belt as a necklace before

Top: Mango (bought a few years ago, but never had the chance to wear it!)
Necklace/ belt: Alexander McQueen Sample sale
Skirt: Future Classics bondage skirt (my buy from Browns!)
Boots: Work sample sale that was on this week and cost me NOTHING! (they are a size too big for me, as sample sizes usually come in a 4 and a 7 and I'm a size 6!!! grrrr...but still can wear them with thick socks)

Ideally I'm looking for a hat like these to complete my outfit:

Spats

I love anything that can update a wardrobe and this mostly means accessories- jewellery, scarves, belts etc! But rarely do you find something that can update your footwear... but introducing spats to your shoes and they have an instant update!


The image comes from a US website Satine Boutique. Where you can buy them online. The image below comes from the brand website Posso the Spat
I've dabbled in different kinds of socks- from thigh high socks to socks that tie up! But I think spats are just that little more interesting... I want, I want, I want!!

Exahusted,,, but happy!

THE TOPSHOP CHARITY SALE!

Well.... the day came and went in the blink of an eye! I can't believe how time went so quickly today! My Dad generously drove us up to Hanover Square this morning with the car packed to the brim full of clothes to sell!!! We got there early- around 8:45 so we were waiting around for the Topshop people to finish setting up the stalls. It wasn't at all what I expected- I thought it was going to be like some car boot sale or something in the open air, but it wasn't- it was all self contained and undercover, so even if there was rain (which there was!) we would all be protected.

Radha waiting to set up the stall with all the bags and bags and suitcases of clothes!!!!

I don't think I realised how many things people had donated until I started taking them all out and stuck price tags on them all! I wanted to take a picture of the stall after we had done it up etc, but due to the amount of things we had, we were pricing throughout the whole day, so we didn't actually have out perfectly laid out stall that we wanted! Also, as we had soooooooooooo many items, topshop were generous and let us spread ourselves over 2 stalls!

Me doing the pricing

We sold most of the items I featured on the blog and one of my highlights of the day was when this funky guy bought this faux fur jacket from us it looked good on him, so I asked if I could take his pic:



Another highlight was when a pretty girl bought one of our dresses and said she was going to a wedding and that the dress would be ideal. I gave her a 'wings' card that I made for the stall and told her to take a picture of herself and to e-mail me and her picture would be on my blog. She looked at the website address and told me that she'd heard of me! That's so great!!! Whoever you are... please continue to visit the site and don't forget to e-mail me a pic!

After the hectic day we found out how much we raised- overall, the whole event raised over £6000 but out stall raised the most out of all the stalls- with a massive £736!!! My Thanks to the organisers- Topshop, the people who donated the clothes and of course those who showed up and bought something!!!

If you bought something from the sale- it doesn't even have to be from my stall, send me a pic (my e-mail is on the top left hand side) and you can feature on my blog!!! My stall was number 13 so if you see a 13 on your price tag- don't forget, you can feature on my blog!!!

Preparing for the Sale...

It's hard work preparing for this sale tomorrow... I think I've got most of it packed and in the car- ready to go tomorrow morning. But there are still some items that are just sitting there waiting for me to get off my backside and put them in bags!!!

I have a few more items for you to try and tempt people to my stall:

Loads and loads of belts, ties and scarves... all at £1 each!!!

This vintage dress was donated by a work colleague- so nautical and really cute too!

I love this beige crochet dress- in fact if it doesn't sell- I'm going to buy it myself!

Cute little brown shorts- great for summer!

Adorable little crop velour jacket- ideal cover up for nights out.

Gorgeous Indian embroidered belt.

FIRST SALE

Our first happy customer! She saw this retro 'ninja turtles' t-shirt online and bought it from us as she is not able to make it on Saturday! As the new film is coming out soon- she is really setting that turtles trend!

If you do buy anything from our stall... it would be nice if you could take a picture with your purchases and send them to me so that you can be featured on this site! If you don't want your face to be shown, let me know and I can hide it!!!

My e-mail is on the left hand side of the blog... please e-mail me with any comments and images or leave any comments below and I'll try to reply everyone!

Topshop Charity Sale....CHIC Wings

I'm really excited about the Topshop Charity sale on Saturday. I am getting a lot of clothes from my colleagues which is great as I know the stall will be packed full of goodies for you guys to buy.

Unfortunately due to Topshop rules, we aren't allowed to put up our own banners or posters advertising our site directly so I can't put up posters of wings as I would have liked to- just to distinguish us from the competition but I have posted on the site: News and I have been making our very own price tags in the shape of wings! They will have the size of the garment and the price and of course my blog address for those of you who want to be sure that its me selling!!



We may even sneak in a few wings posters around the stall discreetly so come and visit! Majority of items are NEW but we do have some vintage clothes donated and also loads of accessories!

Our stall will be called CHIC... so don't forget!!! hehehe

London Expo

Went to the Anime Expo yesterday with Chloe who was the only other person who came with me yesterday. As I got off the DLR at Custom House for the Excel centre, I saw a lot of people, but not many that were dressed up or come in cosplay, but as I got closer, I saw loads more and I was relaxed- I wasn't the only person to have come wearing an outfit!

The expo wasn't as big as I was expecting it would be and there were a lot of people. I saw a lot of groups dressed up- Final Fantasy,Rave, Azumanga Daioh, Naruto, Death note, Dragon Ball... and loads more others.
I saw this girl dressed up as Princess from Super Mario and had to take a picture of her- she was just so cute!Christopher Lee was also there as he celebrated his 85th birthday and 60 years of being in show-business by releasing an album called 'Revelation' where he sang various different styles of songs.
I managed to get a photograph with 3 storm troopers from 'Star Wars':
In the end, I wore my yukata with a large stretchy black belt from Spitalfields market, sleeveless purple polo neck from H&M, leggings from Uniqlo and lace up boots from Morgan

Yukata Ideas

Was tinkering with ideas for modernising my yukata last night and I came up with a few ideas: Yukata bought from a shop in Tokyo, Japan. It comes like this:

All neatly wrapped with an obi and a bow that you can slot into the obi once done up! It even came with some flat black get shoes! Unfortunately, they are a bit too small for me and I chipped the wood on them when I wore them out for the first time to the summer festival in Yokohama.

Outfit 1

Vest: H&M, white belt: e-bay.

FRONT Outfit 2:

Dress: Rodarte for Gap designs

BACK

Outfit 3:

Corset: 'Today's Woman' by Freemans, Leggings: Uniqlo

FRONT BACK