OOTW - Revolution and Revival?

Firstly I must apologise big time for my lack of posting! Well over a week since my last!! Blogging kind of tok a backseat for a while as I had my dissertation synopsis due in, which meant catching up on a lot of reading, and well you know, uni work has to come first. I found the whole thing pretty stressful to be honest, no one said 3rd year would be easy! Speaking of my diss, it's on second-hand/vintage fashion and I have some primary research to conduct, so in the coming weeks I'd very much appreciate your help and feedback. I'll be formulating a quick qestionnaire to email out, so hopefully you could fill it out and pass it on to people etc, I'm sure you all have some great insight considering the subject area!

So, not only did I think you deserved a post, but some pictures were obviously in order to make up for my bad blogger behaviour! Ok so the title is a bit misleading, as denim cut-offs are hardly revolutionary are they? And neither are these rather plain photos against a brick wall! But maybe that’s the point? It’s been getting dark sooo early here, so I seized the moment today when I got in from my 9am lecture, grabbed The Boyf, told him to wrap up warm and marched him outside to make use of the natural light. Never mind what I was wearing, how my hair was sitting today, or the fact that I filled my brows in a bit wonky (not to mention the lurking spot on my chin), you guys were getting some shots!

Jumper - Topman, Scarf - H&M mens (stolen off The Boyf), Levi Cut-offs - Vintage, Belt - Vintage, Brogues - Urban Outfitters, Earings - made by me!! In later photos, Trench - Zara, Gloves - Tu at Sainsburys

I think I must have been the only vintage fashion lover around who didn’t own a pair of denim cut-offs!! I bought this pair of Levi 501’s yesterday for a tenner and am in love. I’m hardly surprised, I had lusted over girlies wondering around in tiny little hand-cut 501s for over a year now, and there really was no excuse for not buying a pair. Although... I have to say maybe a few gals did cause apprehension – larger ladies in a style that really is more knicker than short, not so good. Perhaps I was worried I would look exposed, flabby or larger than life, my thighs are hardly me favourite feature after-all! So in this respect I am however pleasantly surprised, at how comfy and casual they are, yet they make me feel, well, pretty damn sexy. You American girls have been avid lovers of the daisy dukes for years now, why did it take me so long to catch on? Also, I'm so addicted to the fab high-waisted 90’s cut that I’m left gagging for a full length pair!

So why did I bite the bullet and finally nab a pair when its so chilly outside? Well as some of you may have read my parents and little bro recently moved to Australia and I’m going out to visit them for Christmas, I can’t believe I’ll be seeing them in 29 days time! They were visiting family in Sydney (my mum’s Australian) and just arrived in Perth today where they’re hoping to settle down. Earlier I enjoyed a crazy little virtual skype tour around the house they’re renting which is massive and gorgeous and has a swimming pool! It was 39°C there today, and might get hotter by the time I get there, so obviously I needed some super cool summer clothes! To be honest though I don’t think you’re going to see any pictures of me from Oz in much more than my strapless bikini, these cut-offs and the odd vest! I’m not sure if I can be bothered to look fashionable at forty degrees, we’ll see!

And the final 3 pictures? No your eyes are not deceiving you, some of you may recognise these as old brownie culottes! I bought them on ebay last week for 2 quid! Why is it that the Girl Guides were the only ones that could make a good culotte? I mean get it right, you should have seen some of the things people were passing off as the traditional shorts/skirt combo! I myself was a Brownie, and I’m not so sure I fully appreciated the uniform at the time, but I’m fortunate enough to be able to fit into this pair 26” waist, so call it a revival! They arrived in the post this morning and seemed ok with my jumper, so made a quick costume change just to give you a quick peek, I’ll style them differently next week sometime I think! Comfy is not the word for these babies, nice little elasticated waist and oh so roomy, plus the colour is perfect for autumn!

Culottes - Girl Guides Association by way of Ebay!

Anyway I’ll stop jabbering now, turns out when you don’t post for nearly two weeks you have a lot to say! And it is rather nice to finally be able to write something for me rather than uni work!

Hope you’re all ok, in all my procrastination I did manage to keep up with reading a few of your bits and bobs... there’s always time to discover a great new fashion blog and check in on your faves ay?!

Ciao for now, VW x

NB: I tried to post this yesterday when I actually took the photos and wrote the post, but evidently blogger was mad at me for neglecting it and was in a proper mood, haha, sorryyyy, better late than never?!

OOTW - An Autumnal All-Round Experiment

Hi guys, I still can’t believe there’s a whole 5 of you following me that I don’t know in real life (9 total)! Thanks for reading my lovers, sorry for the HUGE post.

Today’s OOTW is what I’d call an experiment, all in the name of self improvement I might add, so please comment on what you like and don’t like etc! In an effort to improve my blog I’ve been scouring your fashion blogs (yes you!) and sussing out what I like and don’t like, and well there’s not much I don’t like and a whole lot I do! So taking ‘inspiration’ from you lovely ladies I present my very autumnal OOTW.

Scarf - Vintage, Coat - Zara, Shirt - Vintage, Jumper - Topman, Necklace - DIY (see Eagerly Awaiting the Postman), Shorts - New Look?, Socks - Marks and Spencer?, Brogues -Urban Outfitters.

1. You will notice this post is very picture heavy compared with my previous endeavours, this is mainly because I couldn’t choose which pictures to show you from my ‘shoot’ and after spending hours ‘researching’ I decided it’s nice to have a lot to look at to go along with my constant ramblings!



2. Yes you clever little thing, it’s outside. You’re all doing it, and the out doorsy pictures look so much prettier than my dreary blank wall/door backdrops, so I gathered up the courage to venture into the ‘garden’ of our flat block on the way home from lunch yesterday and tried not to think about all the residents looking out their kitchen windows with puzzled/bemused looks.

3. This coat was screaming to be pictured amongst the autumn foliage don’t you think? That was a bit of an experiment too, wearing the coat itself, it’s from the Zara sale in January 2006. I bought it way back in the day because I was obsessed with orange (ok so I still do love it as a colour, just not generally to wear), my room was orange, my mobile was orange, any present anyone ever bought me was a little orange, I think for a while there my hair was even orange, ok you get the picture?! So when I saw it for £40 I begged my mother, ‘but its ORANGE mum, pleeeaasse, it’ll be really warm tooooo!!’ I lovingly wore this coat almost every blustery day that year (I even wore it on my very first date with The Boyf), well until October that is, when I traded it in for a blue one from Next, hey every girl gets a new winter coat for school don’t they? And they’ve been vying for attention ever since...

Actually that’s a lie because this year I’ve lived in my trench and last year I wore my oversized hounds-tooth blazer almost day in day out, so I probably haven’t worn this coat for 2 years! So why did it get relegated to the back of my closet if I loved it so much? Boredom I guess, and maybe for a while there I was quite afraid to wear winter brights, thought I might stand out like a lit up Christmas tree; but you know what...? This A/W if there’s one thing I love more than the neutrals, camel, brown, grey, black: it’s bright, bright, bright! What better way to clear up a tad of ‘Seasonal Affected Depression’ than by injecting a splash of summer colour into your snugly warm wardrobe! Dear Orange Coat, Welcome back old friend.



4. Outfit experiment in general. More than just rediscovering the coat, I put the whole look together yesterday morning as a bit of a trial run. The blouse/shirt is new to me, I picked it up last week for £6 and this is the first time I’ve had a chance to wear it, but it was so chilly looking outside that I layered the jumper for extra warmth, which was great as it allowed me to still show off the funky collar. Then I’ve noticed everyone’s been rocking the winter shorts recently and thought they’d look great with my long grey socks, but I hadn’t worn these yet this year because I kind of hate my legs/knees and realised the socks might emphasise and further my body-part hatred. After seeing these photo though I’m quite happy; I’m usually looking down on my legs you see, and have over analysed the bowing of my calves and swell of my knee on many occasions, but you guys never see me from that rather strange angle so I don’t know why I worried?

The whole outfit pulled together quite well in the end didn’t it?

5. A’la naturelle. I didn’t edit any of these photos. The Mr took them as always, and we are only working with a ‘point and shoot’ digital camera (Casio Exilim to be exact), so normally a few tweaks are a must but I don’t have photoshop etc on my laptop so the quality isn’t great anyway. This week shooting outside was fab, the natural light really worked it’s magic and for the pictures with a greater colour intensity we actually let the camera do all the work and put it on ‘Autumn leaves’ mode, quite apt don’t you think? Anyway, I’m a bit of a technophobe at heart and can’t get to grips with all the free photo editing software I’ve seen recommended, so from now on I’ll stick to a bit of natural light and the camera’s built in genius, and if all else fails hello Windows Photo Gallery ‘Fix’ to hoik up the brightness and contrast! I suppose I could drag my lazy ass off to uni and use Corel Photopaint etc... one day, maybe.

Anyway, let me know what you think!

Loves VW x



Art Deco Devine & Cocktails at Sunset

So I had a very pleasurable Saturday night this week, as we had a little soiree for my boyfriend’s brothers 18^th and dads 50^th. As you can imagine this was a fairly big occasion for celebration and his mum thought it would be different if we hosted a sort of posh sit down dinner for their rather large family.

Anyway, once we realised this brilliant idea involved cooking a 3 course meal for 20 people, weeks of planning and preparation ensued. The idea was to make it quite formal, as father-in-law has a penchant for all things art deco and had received a beautiful period cocktail cabinet for his birthday; this would be the theme of the evening. We devised a menu, decorated the dining room, made a slideshow of suitably embarrassing baby photos and spent a few Friday nights doing ‘research’ for the cocktail reception, yum yum! After much taste testing I shall share with you our favourite cocktails which were very simple to make and went down a treat with the guests!

Tequila Sunrise - 1 shot of tequila, fill with orange juice and a splash of grenadine (serve in a tall glass)
Pina Colada - 2 shots of coconut rum (malibu etc), pinapple juice, and a spash of single cream and milk
& we just made this one up - 1 shot of southern comfort, half cranberry juice, half lemonade, a spash of fresh lime juice.

But down to fashion business - when it came to what to wear I was initially stumped, but after deciding that old school glamour was most definitely the way to go I came up with this..

Another fab vintage find from a few years back in a local charity shop for only £7.99! I think it looks very reminiscent of Dior’s New Look, which inspired the A/W10 Louis Vuitton collection. My boy is wearing a gorgeous black suit with velvet brocade pattern, from H&M, the shirt is from Topman.

Loves, VW x x x