cheese twist & shout

so, on thursday night i had a 1960s themed party for my birthday, & it went pretty well! 60s clothes were worn, beatles songs were danced to & psychedelic jelly was eaten. mother & i made some jelly for the occasion, as well as putting out other snacks with place cards saying "cheese twist and shout", "rock-a-hula-hoop baby" & "mustang salsa" among others!

this is what i wore for the party, the outfit has been put on here a few times so i won't show a full length version again, but i did want to display my twiggy inspired eye make-up (:

dress - ebay, necklace - gift.

forgive the daft pose & the vapid facial expression, but i was pressed for time.

photographs from el noche!

my friend joanna brought her fish eye camera for the night, so here is my bizarre face all distorted for your viewing enjoyment.

laughing, as ever.

the cakes that one of my good friends made for me - 60s themed of course! oh, and waz is my nickname. don't ask why, it's not a name i favour.

grooving away to george harrison, as that night was his birthday!

kate & i

so there you have it, my 18th birthday celebrations in a nutshell.

i had a really good night, thanks to some great friends & acquaintances who were more than happy to forgo alcohol for my sake; what lovely people they are!

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edit: oh yes, & i have changed the name of my blog from thoughts from another kook to simply kook. i've been wanting a change for a while, and this seemed more than fitting.

portobello road

lo! i have returned from landaaan, i would have posted earlier but my laptop has been at computer hospital. i took loads of pictures of london & that which i will get on here eventually, but i just wanted to put up what i bought while i was there. i actually didn't buy much at all, partly because i didn't see that many things i liked & partly because we spent a woefully small amount of time in portobello market.

postcards of john lennon & a 60s shift dress. i honestly have far too many postcards of john now, i dare not even count them!

in the tate britain shop there were some amazing lazy oaf "i like to arty hard" shirts which i was very tempted by, but at £28 they were a little over what i was willing to pay, so instead i went for the very reaosnably priced £1.50 "i heart drawing" badge.

feminist postcards from the tate modern. feminism appears to be a bit of a dirty word in today's media, but i am proud to proclaim i am a feminist. also, i think the role of women in society & feminism is something i will be looking at in my work (as my title is political and/or social events & issues)

the advantages of being a woman artist.

and finally, my sunglasses from portobello market! i love them, & they were only £10 which i believe is pretty good.

just a quick update for now i'm afraid (and yes, i'm aware that almost every update is a quick update, sorry), but tomorrow i'm having a (belated) birthday party, which is 1960s themed, so you can look forward to joyous photographs from that occasion!

for now, adieu my dears.

concrete jungle

- scheduled post -

i am away until 20th february

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as you read this, i will be in london on the school art trip! yay! excitement, fun, art etcetera etcetera.

i haven't really had time to think about scheduling posts this week, what with coursework & interview preparation (which went well, & they gave me an unconditional offer!), but i decided i would post about the outfits i packed in case i don't have time to take any outfit photos while i'm there.

outfits 1 & 2

jumper - lazy oaf, blouse - car boot sale, cardigan - vintage, skirt - topshop, tights - topshop & river island, bow - free.

necklace - gift, bracelet - accessorize, earrings - gift.

rings - gifts.

outfit 3

shirt - stella mccartney for tk maxx, cardigan - vintage, patterned shorts - new look, lace shorts - ebay, tights - primark

necklace - car boot sale, earrings - sugar and vice, bracelet - gift, brooch - tynemouth market

outfit 4

shirt - ebay, cardigan - vintage, skirt - diy, tights - dorothy perkins

necklace - dolls & molls, earrings - h&m kids, brooch - gift

flower - h&m.

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i'm trying to pack light by taking pieces that i can double up, & i'm also taking a minimal amount of jewellery & hair things. i'm taking three pairs of shoes, all comfortable for lots of walking! i shall post pictures of the trip when i return, & perhaps some of my purchases (if there are any!) from portobello market.

in the mean time, feel free to enjoy my london playlist;

taxman - the beatles

you & your heart - jack johnson

train in vain (stand by me) - the clash

sheila - jamie t

london calling - the clash

the wind cries mary - jimi hendrix

waterloo sunset - the kinks

travel light - laura marling & johnny flynn

hey porter - johnny cash

cornerstone - arctic monkeys

ghost town - the specials

travelling like the light - vv brown

spider and the fly

this weekend, in between copious amounts of editing coursework i had a small break to rest my brain and, while fixing a pair of broken earrings, i decided to make another pair. i have had these small trinket things (i honestly have no idea what else to call them) for over a year now, they were given to me by a friend at our hallowe'en picnic to make some jewellery with, & it has taken me rather a while to work out what to do with them. i did, however, make some jewellery from some other pieces she gave me, which you can have a look at here if you wish.

fly & spider stud earrings.

(photographed on a picture of vivienne westwood's other half wearing one of her designs for red nose day, i own the blackadder shirt)

despite not being a fan of either creature, i am quite pleased with these, although they were beyond simple to make.

this is a scheduled post because i really am stupidly busy at the moment, & i also have an interview for the foundation art course i want to do on wednesday, which i am pretty nervous about.

destroyed by madness

today i went to see black swan with a couple of friends. i was pretty impressed by it, the costumes were beautiful, natalie portman was excellent & the whole mood was wonderfully angst-ridden and atmospheric. i would say however that i feel if they had made it slightly longer, it might have been more in depth and, well, dare i say it slightly less pretentious. having said that, i do think it was a brilliant film

while waiting for black swan, i saw a preview for a film called howl - an experimental film about beat poetry in the 1950s, as well as the obscenity trial of allen ginsberg's poem of the same name.

i think it looks so good! a film about what is essentially the rock & roll of literature is clearly up my street. from what i could grasp from the trailer, it seems to be told in non-chronological order, possibly with narration from ginsberg (played by james franco). excellent.

james franco has been one of my favourite actors ever since i saw freaks and geeks - which is an amazing show that not enough people have seen. not to mention he is rather easy on the eye.

the cinematographyness (can you sense my ineptitude at describing films?) looks pretty lovely, & the costumes look amazing.

Peyote solidities of halls, backyard green tree cemetery dawns, wine drunkenness over the rooftops, storefront boroughs of teahead joyride neon blinking traffic light, sun and moon and tree vibrations in the roaring winter dusks of Brooklyn, ashcan rantings and kind king light of mind,
who chained themselves to subways for the endless ride from Battery to holy Bronx on benzedrine until the noise of wheels and children brought them down shuddering mouth-wracked and battered bleak of brain all drained of brilliance in the drear light of Zoo,
who sank all night in submarine light of Bickford's floated out and sat through the stale beer afternoon in desolate Fugazzi's, listening to the crack of doom on the hydrogen jukebox,
who talked continuously seventy hours from park to pad to bar to Bellevue to museum to the Brooklyn Bridge,
a lost batallion of platonic conversationalists jumping down the stoops off fire escapes off windowsills off Empire State out of the moon

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posts for the next week may be a bit sparse, if i have time i shall schedule some posts for when i go away on the london trip, but until then i have some english coursework to finish (finally!) & an interview to prepare for.

adieu.

biba fever

 i am dreadfully sorry for the pun in my post title, but i feel it had to be done.

as one of my birthday presents, my mum gave me a gallery booklet from the exhibition she was working on when she was pregnant with yours truly. the exhibition was biba: the label, the lifestyle, the look.

the photographs from the book are lovely, some original adverts & some were photoshoots carried out by my mother & the gallery crew with donations from the general public.

my mother also wrote an article for the booklet about barbara hulanicki's designs, the rise & fall of biba and the clothing line's impact on 1960s-70s street fashion.

i think i am going to search ebay & etsy to find a shirt like the one above!

sorry for the short posts lately, but i've been busy lately & a little ill, so blogging services have taken a back seat i am afraid.

please mister postman

today, the fourth of february, is my 18th birthday. well, gosh. i'm not quite sure what to think about this, in a way it is nice to be considered an adult, but at the same time i'd quite like to do a peter pan & not grow up. having said that, i've had a rather lovely day & been given some wonderful presents!

i was given a cute ring by my cousin & a treasure chest necklace by my sister (with a happy birthday message inside!)

my mother gave me some very sweet jewellery pieces (a strawberry themed charm bracelet & a bluebird necklace), and my aunt & uncle gave me a silver-coloured branch to hang them on.

i've been on the search for a vintage-style satchel for quite some time now, so it was pretty amazing that two came along at once! the first one is technically from my grandad, but i chose it from urban outfitters, & the second is from a group of my friends who clubbed together to buy it (:

my friends also bought me a vintage belt from beyond retro, which is so cute! it's quite unusual, it has a little screw thing (i have no other way to describe it) to move onto a different notch. quite spooky really as i've been sort of on the lookout for a tan waistbelt.

not a present, but this is the paper my mother wrapped my presents in, it is adorable! my mum chose it because it features a winking meringue, & meringues are my favourite things ever!

today has been pretty lovely, i got my haircut back to all its layered glory (or something like that). although i kept being pretty socially awkward throughout the day, for example when two of my friends said happy birthday to me i replied with "thanks, happy birthday to you too!", nice one charlotte.

shyness is nice

on saturday, my friend joanna had a small gathering at her house to celebrate her 18th birthday (which was on the 25th). i look completely & utterly horrendous in all of the pictures taken that night, for some inexplicable reason whenever a flash is used i look like a cross between a meerkat & a potato, so it goes without saying none of those will be posted on here!

i decided to wear the dress my sister bought me for christmas, which i believe is from topshop. it's not something i would necessarily have picked out myself because i don't normally wear this colour, but i actually love it (:

i was a bit unsure of what to pair it with as i generally don't do neutrals or pale colours, so i put it with a few of my turquoise accessories (turquoise, of course, being a favourite colour of mine).

this photo is awkward, and i'm doing an odd pose. but all of that is futile, as i quite like the way the cape looks here.

dress - gift (topshop), tights - topshop, hair flower - h&m, necklace - dolls & molls

this dress reminds me slightly of the pale gold lace dresses the lisbon sisters wore to the homecoming dance in sofia coppola's the virgin suicides. although of course i did not have the name "trip" emblazoned across my underwear (yes, i realise this reference only works if you have read the book/seen the film, but i'm moving past it). something about lace evokes the feeling of innocence, femininity & something ethereal.

with the light turquoise flower in my hair, i felt slightly like a water nymph. the effect of this was sadly somewhat diminished by my bright tights i feel, but i still feel the flowing fabric of the cape evoked an impression of the movement in water.

for some reason, the little cape (capelet, if you will) made me feel like wonder woman for the whole night! to this effect, most of my dance moves involved twisting dramatically from side to side in order to make the cape fly out. i had to search high & low to find a picture of wonder woman actually wearing a cape, so i suspect i am a little misguided in thinking this.

evidence of my super-womanesque qualities;

i hope you don't mind me writing about my imaginings/thoughts about an outfit, it's something i've been mulling over doing for a while now as occasionally i feel a little bland or superficial in just posting what i've worn. this of course is my own personal feelings on the matter, as opposed to dig at people who post their outfits without commentary. ugh, i should stop overanalysing things, shouldn't i?

thanks for all your feedback on my last post! it's always great to hear a bit of reassurance when you're feeling listless & downhearted about something, thank you (: