the story of my first love

Right, so I had this pair of gorgeous cream, quilted pumps with patent black toes and strip running down the back. I was completely and totally in love with them, they went with everything and never, ever rubbed my feet. It honestly was a match made in heaven (aka. PRIMARK). But as all romances tend to go, through the constant wearing of the shoes, the toes wore out and one awful day, my toes went right through and I had to spend the day walking around looking like a hobo. It was a sad ending, as the shoes were thrown in the dustbin and I was forced to return to my plain black pumps with bows and gems on the front, still nice, but definately not love. I spent months searching for them in the shops, but nothing. Then yesterday as I was just about to leave Primark, I saw something out of the corner of my eye; it was the shoes.
7 months I had been left alone, then there they were. My size, black patent toes shining in the light and with a new small part of gold chain entwined with matching cream material across the front. They don't quite feel the same as the old ones, but I guess nothing ever can really beat your first love.

I also made some other purchases over the past week; the first being a beyond-amazing dress in Topshop. I'd seen someone wearing it and did look to buy it for myself, but it cost £40, which is about a whole months money for me. So I let it go. But as I was looking through the sales rails in Topshop, I saw it. Reduced to an incredible price of, £10. So instantly, I brought it, not caring that it was a size 6; I have other clothes this size, size 6 usually fits, so no problem, right? Anyway, I rushed home to try it on, still smiling from my bargain find, until the zip stuck half-way up. 15 minutes later, it was still stuck. I was contemplating trying to let it out, but it was lined and I think it would have completely ruined the fit of the dress, so I was forced to sadly, return it. Before I did though, I took a couple of quick photos to keep as a memory, the pictures don't do it justice I promise If it wasn't for ribs or boobs, I'd be wearing that dress right now.




Continuing with my new purchases, after returning the dress (RIP), I headed over to H&M and found a simple, black and white stripe oversixed t-shirt, with a rope belt to go around the waist, price = £3.99. It's pretty good value considering I can wear it with the belt over leggings or skinny jeans, to wear it as a dress without the belt. I've been wearing it with enough jewellery to make my neck ache, to make it look abit more exciting. For ages I've been looking for some new boots as my UGGalikes have holes in the bottom of them, so if it ever rains they instantly fill with water and I instantly turn into superbitch. So as it's getting nearer to Autumn/ Winter, I decided it was time to make the purchase. I brought a pair of short, faded tan colour boots with gold buckles down the side. Cost = £12.
My final purchase was a coral coloured cardigan, with angel wings and a bow tie around the waist from PRIMARK (I don't get everything from PRIMARK, honestly). Then when I arrived back home today, a nice little parcel was waiting for me containing a bottle of Purity facial cleanser which signals the beginning of my long-awaited Vogue subscription (woo), no more having to walk around to the shops and search for a copy.

So if you haven't already guessed, I'm back from my "trip". Hello. I won't go into details of the trip but let's just say I now have newfound respect for my Mother and i really should learn from previous mistakes. Welcome back, scratches.
Got some good news yesterday, after a long, long search I finally got a job! And I never even applied for it. Starting next weekend at a little coffee shop out on a hill, as a waitress. Bets are already being made as to how long I will last before dropping something on someone. I'm not known for my hand-eye co-ordination skills or balance, but I'm staying positive. Very generous pay per hour then tips on top of that! More money = more fabric for clothes. So just out of interest; what exactly is a Latte?!

I'm one of those obsessives who know horoscopes are just made up and don't actually mean anything, but yet I still check it quite regulary and get excited when it predicts something good will happen. This week, it says I will begin to change my mind about the path my life is taking, and that things take a good turn. I'm starting to think they might, just might be right... sometimes. I mean, last Thursday I somehow managed to pass all my as-levels and progress onto the final part of a-levels.. and a bottle of wine. Got a job and rediscovered my lost love. Not to mention the 20 something designs I got done and almost a sketchbook full of portraits and sketches of the ridiculously perfect models of VOGUE and ELLE. So maybe things are starting to pick up, who knows..
This is one of my sketches from the past 10 days, a slightly cartoonized-portrait of Audrey Hepburn. I really, really cannot draw hands and it is all slightly lopsided..



Playing with lots of different ideas at the moment, got an idea for a scarf using the old school style of paper chains at Christmas and giant pom-poms. Beginning designs on a dress for a lovely friend who has asked me to make a dress for her to wear to an end of year ball. Just coming up with a series of different designs as she's been open and not giving me any specifications, which is good and bad in some ways. But we'll see how it goes.

Busy yet, very very exciting times ahead :)
Should have some amazing news soon... i hope. Keep watching :)

failure and goodbyes.

This is the outfit I mentioned earlier, except now I added my grey wooly tights and tan box-satchel bag. This is the outfit I'm going to wear to go collect my AS level results. This is the outfit I will find out I failed the last year in.
I think it's appropriate.

In other news, I'm leaving until further notice on Thursday. Shall be back anytime between the following monday and early september. Needing some time away from... well, everything. Taking the time to get a large amount of my portfolio done so I'm ready for glorious UCAS and interviews when I return in September and get everything together in general.

adios amigos X

you're rocking that dress.

This might be long, boring and make no sense, so here's something that may be vaguely entertaining however it is completely unrelated to fashion, but it is good music



So me and my friend went to London yesterday which was tres good. Went to the V&A first and had a look around the fashion exhibition and a temporary exhibition up at the moment called 'Futuristic Fashion' which was all designs made by some students at the Royal college of Art which was amazing. Definately gave me plenty of ideas for future designs and got some good photographs. Out of all the outfits in the Future fashion exhibition, I think this was my favourite:



I really like the shape and just the general style/ colour of it. Some of the designs were abit to weird and OTT for me, but I guess that was part of the concept.
After the V&A, headed off to Oxford Street and the amazing TOPSHOP. I think I got more ideas in Topshop than anywhere else, saw so many gorgeous things that I'd happily let someone buy for me. Most of the dresses I liked were £50+ which exceeded my total of £20 spending money. Not going to copy any of the designs I saw 'cos I think that's cheating abit, but got loads of ideas that I can adapt from what I saw.
Really into winter clothes at the moment, brought a looovely chunky-knit cardi from primark yesterday, £7, bargain! Been wearing it today onto of my floral summer dress I made (picture in previous post), my strechy rose belt around the waist and my usual armful of bangles and pearl bracelets. Also really into more dressy-dresses (as i call them, aka evening dresses) right now. Quite alot of friends/ family's birthdays over the next few months so seems appropiate I start making some. Also currently helping my friend pick a dress for her Winter Ball which is looking more likely by the day that I will be making the dress for her! Which is tres exciting as I will be paid :) Also been repeatedly asked to make a dress for someone else, which I am hoping to get round to before the end of the year, just need for her to choose some fabric! Things are starting to get pretty exciting now, someone even stopped me in the street the other day and asked where my dress was from because she loved it, which was amazing to answer back "i made it" :)

Read this really interesting article the other day from a link I got sent on Twitter (yes, i'm becoming obsessed with it also). However I can't find the link anymore! It was all about what is actually "fashionable" nowadays. I agreed with alot of what was in there. How some people automatically class themselves as "fashionable" because they wear clothing from Topshop or read Vogue. It all seems to be based upon what the media deems as "fashionable", instead of what the person truly likes. Personally, I think "fashionable" is a term that can never fully be used to describe someone in the same way that "normal" can be, because it varies for every person. Everyone is entitled to their opinions and free speach is all cool, but there's a point when it becomes ridiculous that someone bitches about another persons clothes or uses that as a reason to avoid or be cruel to them. Slightly taking lines from my personal statement here but, everyone is a part of the fashion industry. Whatever they wear whether it's Chanel or from Oxfam, it was still designed, made and then marketed/ promoted. Time, effort and imagination goes into every piece of clothing wherever it comes from. So maybe if certain people didn't keep thinking they was better than everyone else simply because of their choice of clothing and accepted that infact, everyone is either "fashionable" or "unfashionable", no in-betweens, no exceptions, everyone is still human, that makes us all equal- then the fashion industry could genuinely make a difference to the issue of low self-esteem and eating disorders because people wouldn't feel ashtough they have to be like the girl on the cover of Vogue.

Anyway, rant over.
I can be an opinionated little bitch when I want to..
XX

Cinderella, changes and camping?

The sunburn's slowly, very slowly, starting to turn brown which is amazing news for me, as i'm always pale. Shame I didn't have a tan for when I was actually at the beach, but nevermind.

I've temporarily misplaced my camera's memory card.. so just going to have to describe things for now..
Anyway, got on with more designs for my uni portfolio today and I found the watercolours! So they're not all plain line drawings anymore. Started on some 'Power dressing' designs. Lots of OTT collars and shoulder pads. Had the image of some really fierce manager type woman who works in london when I was designing them. Gone with a red colour scheme, to represent power and kind of aggressiveness, (is that even a word?!) Tried to make some of them more feminine by adding boys and afew ruffles, which seem to be becoming abit of my trademark now.

The skirt and dress are on abit of a hold at the moment, not to keen on them, so thinking of changing them. Will update soon when I actually decide what to do.
I think that's everything for today, far to tired and I'm desperately craving a frappaccino, it's hard to concentrate..

au revoir X

true love

i think i'm in love.




£3,040.

This dress, or my first years tuition fees at uni?

new things, rest and truth or dare.

hello temporarily abandoned blog.

So it's been awhile since my last post, probably too long actually. Been pretty busy over the last few days and haven't had the chance to write anything of a decent amount. But anyway, I'm back to ramble. Went to Bournemouth for the day yesterday as we heard it was meant to be the nicest day of the summer, and I think my sunburn and horrific tan lines prove that indeed, it was. Woke up this morning with a lovely bruise on my stomach and the scratches down my leg making me look like i've been beaten. So today's my day of rest and recovery. And the fact that I can't put jeans or tights on without lots of pain forced me to stay in pyjamas for the day.

Got 1 dress and a skirt on the go at the moment; one is in the style of a dress I saw in Vogue by Givenchy. It's a white lace dress, which I loved. Decided to take the idea of lace over fabric and make my own version. Givenchy's had long sleeves and was a more cream colour. Mine has short sleeves and is white. Gone for a slash-neckline and a fitted top around the bust, with my usual flowing skirt section. Going to use the same buttons as I used on my waistcoat, (gold, with anchors in the centre surrounded by black). Thinking of getting something else to add to it, as I'm worried it looks abit like a short wedding dress, so might go for some bright coloured ribbon to put around the bottom and sleeves. But still deciding on that. The skirt I'm making has an elasticated waist, so it's easy to get on and off, and I didnt want a zip on it, as it would mess up the design. Gone for plain white fabric underneath, the on top of it I had some Egyptian Hessian fabric that I got really cheap ages ago. I've started to pleat this horizontally, so the pleats are going across instead of downwards, then this will be sewn on top of the plain white. Not to sure how it's going to look, but thought it might be quite interesting with the mix of vertical and horizontal pleats. Plus, I like the white colour as I'm going to be able to wear it with any colour top.

Working on some more designs today for my Portfolio. Moving on from the sea-inspired section, (final pictures will appear soon) and onto darker clothing, in the style of 'Gothic Glamour'. Black and everything else gothic, really isn't my style, but I'm taking parts of it that I like and adapting them into other designs, such as lots of lace being layered. So far I've got a couple of designs for LBD's.
After that, I'm thinking of doing some tailored designs, in honour of one of my all-time favourite designers, Chanel. Still really wanting to go see that Coco before Chanel film...
Got about a quarter of my portfolio done now, many clothing designs and about 5 pieces. That's not including all my A-Level work that some of which I will hopefully be able to include. Also done afew patterns and prints in a mini-sketchbook, that are ideas of what I could print onto fabric. This is 1 of them, still not coloured in, but I'm not sure what colour to do. Was thinking of keeping it a simple black and white, or going for a variety of colours.



Some of the prints are going to be put onto different materials etc. For example, I screwed up some gold tissue paper to give it a nice crumbled look, and sewed it onto paper using black zig-zag stitch. Then I'm going to sew the pattern onto the tissue paper. Also going to do some mono-prints and screen-prints of some onto fabrics.
I think it's all off to a pretty good start, and I still have about 3-4months before interviews will start.

Off to London on Monday with a friend, going to see the V&A, who have a future fashion exhibition up at the moment and then off to Oxford Street for shopping. Should be good :) And she also happens to have a fashion blog to,

XX

dresses, dresses, dresses

In my last post I described the dress I was making, included with a picture aswell. But I decided that look far to much like what a Grandmother would wear, so changed the design. I cut into the top of it to give it a heart shape and then added lace straps. I think it looks abit more modern and can layer it on-top of different things now. Also made the waistcoat today, but it still needs to be pressed, so the pic will be uploaded next week sometime. Was the first attempt at making a waistcoat, so think it came out quite well. Found some super-cute gold buttons with anchors on, which give it abit of a vintage-look. So the dress and waistcoat cost less than £5 and took less than 5 hours to make, not bad.

Was searching through the photos on my camera today and came accross some of the other dresses I've made, here's 2 of them, both finished. Sorry for the awful photographs, it's not my forte..






The top 1 is by far my favourite. It has a plain, navy blue cotton layer underneath, then the chiffon on top which has been sewn into a shape at the front, with ruffles down the side to give it shape. Sadly haven't had a time to wear it yet, seems abit formal to wear on just an average day, so for now, it's hanging up in my wardrobe.

injuries, denim and mcflurry's

So, today turned out to be pretty eventful. Started off be going to my favourite ever fabric shop, Masons. I've had this idea for ages, and did it as 1 of my designs in my portfolio. I've been looking in the shops for ages, but haven't been able to find anything that would do, so decided to make it. I saw a girl wearing this outfit which I thought was really cute, on the street one day, kinda 70's-esque. It was a ditsy-print/ floral patterned dress, with a loose denim waistcoat over the top. I found about 5 metres of dark denim fabric in a cupboard, but I wanted a more stone-washed colour, so using the wrong side of the fabric. I don't usually use patterns to make my dresses, the fabric normally just put straight onto the tailors dummy and cut, but I thought I'd do it the "proper" way for once. So in my true DIY style, I used some bright red tissue paper to make a pattern for the waistcoat. In Masons I found the perfect fabric for the dress and it was in the sale! £2.50 per metre. It's a whole mixture of colours, but has a really nice, vintage style floral print. Brought some cream lace, 12p a metre, to go around the sleeves, for detail near the bottom and on a ruffled section at the front. I pleated a small bit of fabric, then surrounded it with lace, to put on the front just underneath the neckline.

This is it so far.. still with pins in and everything;




Thinking of wearing it with my blue belt, with gold knots on the front, just to break up the pattern as it's quite busy. All together, the outfits costing me under £5, which I think is pretty good for a whole outfit. Beat that Primark.
Was hoping to get alot more done of it today, but had a minor incident in the evening of having a pair of (brand new, purple!) fabric scissors fall and go into my foot. After a rush to A&E, which in my opinion was unneccessary and I had plans to go get McFlurrys. So now, I have a new hot accessosory; steri-strips and a white-bandage. Just what you want in the middle of the summer. Awesome. On the bright side, I was brought a McFlurry after the hospital, so the injury saved me having to spend £1.19.
Mental note: never leave scissors on your bed, on top of your jumper and forget about them. ever.

Third post for today... this is going better than I thought. Maybe it'll work this time, I might actually have things to put.

Having a clear-out today and found my book 'Young Fashion Designers'. Haven't looked at the book in aaaaaages, reminded me of some of the most amazing designers, some of the fave's;

Ailanto




Cecilia Sorensen



Parnasse



ohhh, I want that dress in Goldstone. Was deep blue, with vintage-style floral print on it, with lace on the top around the neck and straps.♥
but me it? :)

Introductions done, going to get on with the purpose of this blog.

Last week I was away on holiday, only Isle of Wight, but gave me quite alot of ideas.. and it is actually quite a beautiful place. Anyway, gave me looooads of ideas for things. Visited lots of art galleries, but I wouldn't class it as "art", all people draw on that island is pictures of landscape. Once you've seen 5 paintings, you've seen them all. It might just be me, but art is something that you interpret something from and actually has some meaning, not just what you see from your window.

Amongst the gallery visits, beach and arguments, i managed to get some sketches down for my portfolio. Gone with a blue colour scheme, inspired by the sea of course. Don't think they're the best ever and got slightly ruined in my suitcase coming home. But nevertheless, you can see the basic design, the models are still faceless and look like ghosts, but I lost my watercolours to can't finish them just yet... so professional. They're abit plain looking aswell, haven't got round to writing the notes on them just yet either..




They're all pretty random designs, but I had "Casual evening" in mind with them all. Ones a more ballerina-esque dress, anothers a kimono bubble dress, then the black design in the centre, is the worst I think, it was meant to be a coat..

Back at home, and back with my lovely sewing machine and Betty, I made a dress with some red stripey fabric I got whilst on holiday, in this amazing little shop.
First attempt at sleeves, think it went quite well :)
Been wearing it constantly since I wore it, so I think it was successful



Nautical stripes + ruffles + short sleeves = win.

(sorry for the awful photography)X

I set up this blog as a way to show the things I make/ design, and as a place to store all my ideas. Afew rants or random stories, from my ever-increasingly random life may be added. The aim is to write in this atleast twice a week, but this is about my 5th attempt at starting one of these, so we'll see how it goes. If i ever make something of myself, then I guess this will show where it began. If not, it might show why I never did.
Basically, I want to study fashion at University next year, Arts University at Bournemouth, to be exact. I mainly make dresses, as I found it amazingly difficult to find nice, day dresses that didn't make you look over-dressed or didn't even fit properly. My first dress, was made at the end of 2008. It had been a.. shit year, to put it nicely, so the dress was a way of trying to make a change and to see if the theory of "start the year, as you wish to carry on" works, which it has actually. It was a cream poly-cotton dress, with a busy floral, pink patterned fabric along the bottom and top, with patterned hearts and zig-zag stitching leading up to the hearts, like balloons i guess. It had thick cream straps and a blue ribbon to tie around the waist. It wasn't the best- but it started a passion. It's never been worn, and probably never will be. I guess it's more of a symbol, a start. I leave it hanging in my room, so whenever I need some kind of reassurance, it's there. Wow, I sound sad..
Anyway, at this point, I've made roughly 20 dresses or tops, in 8 months.

If you're reading this in like 10 years time and I'm not a failure;

hello, and thank you :)♥