Washed up.

Hello! Just a short post this time to show you my new(ish) hair colour & new favourite blouse.

I have been wearing this outfit so much lately! This picture is super washed out (sorry) but the blue in the skirt matches the blue of the blouse almost perfectly, and the whole outfit seemed to fall together when I dyed my hair a shade up.

The blouse has such adorable alphabet embroidery in light blue, aqua and white. I think it might be a children's blouse as it's pretty tight (and kind of unflattering tbh, but that doesn't bother me!) and has a weird sizing label. It only set me back £4 and it's just so cute!

I did really like this colour initially, but I've gone off it a lot now & I'm pretty sure I'll be going back to pink/lilac soon. It was a good experiment though and I'm glad I did it, just so I could see what it was like having sea monster hair for a little while. Also, it matches my glittery blue eyeliner exactly! FYI, I used Bleach London dye (available in Boots) in Washed Up Mermaid mixed with conditioner but it still came out pretty bright. The colour has lasted quite a long time but it's pretty patchy as it develops so quickly on your hair.

Next post is going to be featuring my Meadham Kirchhoff x Topshop pieces, eek! Prepare yourself now for some next level twee-ness.

Predictable.

Hello again! I said I had lots of posts planned and I'm very excited to be sticking to my word. This skirt has to be one of my favourite things I have ever bought. I saw it in Topshop's summer campaign and checked their website pretty much every day until it finally became available.

I was really worried that I had built it up too much in my head & wouldn't like it any more once I could actually close my hands around it, but that was not true at all! I am so in love with this skirt I feel like I need to frame it. The lace is so pretty and has these wonderful pink watercolour splashes across it, as well as tiny gems in blue, pink and green. You can only really see it faintly here, but the underskirt is light green gingham, which is so cute! I try to be really careful about wearing this as it's so nice I really don't want to ruin it, I have paired it with a few things but I always keep coming back to pairing it with this 80s tropical print top as the colours just fit so well.

Top - vintage via ebay, skirt - Topshop, tights - Topshop, brooch/necklace - vintage, cardigan (below) - vintage via Etsy

Very sorry for the absolute state of my room! This corner is just where I bundle everything that just gets in the way. I really want to put a couple of posters up on the wall behind me but I haven't really found any that I like yet, although I have put a few on my Christmas wish list!

When I saw the skirt in person, the little gems instantly reminded me of this vintage brooch. I think it is one of the most fascinating pieces I own but I never really wear it enough as it's pretty heavy and tends to drag my clothes down, I really like threading it onto a necklace chain like this though.

I think this outfit is one of my favourites I have put together in a long time, everything just seemed to come together so effortlessly & looked as if they were made to be worn with each other. Last term in a conversation about Mad Men one of my tutors said that I must watch it (I don't! I probably should!) "because of the way you dress". From the glimpses of the characters' wardrobes I have seen, this outfit does seem like I could have stepped off the set. Very pastel 1950s secretary finds the sequin drawer. Predictable me, basically.

As you may/may not have been able to tell, my hair is slightly different in these photos! I've been trying out setting my hair in rollers & it actually worked quite well this time (although it looked a bit better later in the day)! I still have to work on it a bit, especially at the back, but I really like the way it looks and the way it changes over a few days. Having said that, these photos are from about a month ago & my hair is now blue!

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I'll be back with another post soon, hope you are all well & thank you for reading (:

Herman Munster

Hello! It seems that I accidentally went for two whole months without posting on here, oh dear. I am really disappointed that I haven't been able to write here, when I first moved to Sheffield we didn't have any internet in our house, and even though we have it now the signal is always breaking off. My workload has been pretty heavy too (I currently have three essay deadlines within a week *cries*) so I have been a bit too stressed out to post. I am going to try and make some time from now on though, as I hate giving all these excuses!

I wanted to show you all my new coats! I am very picky when it comes to coats (and clothing in general, really), but I have recently acquired some completely adorable ones. My mum bought this one from a charity shop (for a £1!) for me a few months ago, but I hadn't worn it until recently because it's a little bit big and I wasn't sure if I liked it. On a whim, I decided to wear it for the day at uni & promptly got three compliments, so it's definitely a keeper.

It's slightly too big for me, which along with the shoulder pads makes me feel like a camp Herman Munster. Which I obviously love! You can't really see it here, but it has a lovely glittery thread running through it which makes it extra cutesy.

The second coat I acquired recently has yet to actually be worn out of the house! I've been obsessed with those clear macs you always see very cool Twiggy-type girls wearing in 60s photographs, and I finally found this one (which has such a Louis Vuitton SS14 vibe!) on pretaportobello.com. Maybe I will wear it soon, when we next get a spot of rain.

I really like the idea of being able to see my outfit underneath! Does anyone else get a bit annoyed having to put your coat on top of an excellent outfit? No? Just me then!

Sorry for the bad lighting in these photos! I have yet to really work out the best place to take pictures in my room, it's a slightly odd shape and has sloping ceilings and walls so there's not that many places I can actually stand up properly. I have a few outfit/clothes posts planned (including showing you what I got from the amazing Meadham Kirchhoff for Topshop collection, eek!) but after that I think I'll do a little room tour to show you what it's like!

Hopefully see you soon, and not in another 8 weeks!

All that glitters.

In my last post I said I was going to do a details piece on a dress I bought recently. As you might know about me, I am a huge Meadham Kirchhoff groupie and a few months ago I managed to pick up one of the pieces from their Topshop collection (relatively) cheap on ebay.

Here it is! I love the shape of it, and how it really hasn't got a shape at all. I like that it isn't trying desperately to be flattering, I have such a growing dislike for all the (mainly male, mainly high end) designers who talk about wanting to fit a woman's shape in a flattering way. It just feels so, I don't know, such a boring and restrictive way to look at dressing. It's much more fun to not care about that at all (not to mention it's so male gaze-y for designers to think that way!).

The layered, jagged skirt.

Sleeve detail with beading and sequins.

I love these little glitter discs! They remind me of those white chocolate sweets with sprinkles you get in pick & mix places.

I like the layers here, and how you can see the glitter peeking through the thinner parts of the lace.

I love the really excessive portions of sequins there are, they look almost like fish scales or like, a cool skin disease or something. I like how they're matte instead of shiny, it's a bit more unusual. A wry nod to decadence, to be shiny would be too much, but there's so many of them that it's kind of too much anyway. (A good kind of too much)

A sleeve.

I love all the unfinished edges and how it looks almost ragged. The mix of the opulence and the ripped, jagged edges is really interesting I think.

The back of the bodice. I like how it almost looks like a contour map.

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I'm moving back to Sheffield for my second year on Monday so I'm not sure how often I'll be posting, I will try though. I want to write something about Meadham Kirchoff's SS14 collection because I have a lot of thoughts about it (like, why only white models?) and I want to put them all somewhere.

See you all soon!

Pink lady

*FAVOURITE NEW OUTFIT KLAXON*

I bought this playsuit from Etsy very, very impulsively. I was having a casual browse late one night, saw this and decided an hour later (because that's what I call impulsive!) to buy this for myself as a little "yay for doing your first year of uni and yay for getting a 2:1!" present. Treat yo' self, basically. It's one of the most expensive pieces of vintage I've ever bought (most of that was bloody postage costs though!), and I'm so so happy with it! I was really worried about it not fitting, but it looks amazing on me, let's face it.

I love how unusual it is, I've never seen anything quite like this before. It's kind of 1950s Barbie does space travel air hostessing, you know what I mean?

Pin up pose/outtake, you decide. Also sorry for the mess on my bed! I am the laziest human ever and my tidying regime basically consists of moving things from my floor to the bed and back again when I need to sleep.

The buttons on the back are so adorable!

It has been quite tricky to undo in a rush though, so leaving plenty of time before bathroom breaks is a definite must!

Back view. The shorts have little straps, so the legs can be either rolled up or down! I definitely prefer them shorter for now, but we'll see. It also came with an adorable detachable belt which adds a lovely bit of waist detail.

Me being really happy with how great my wardrobe is right now. I have to say I haven't worn a piece of clothing that makes me feel as confident as this does in a long while. I just love it! It makes me feel powerful but also cute as hell, and I think it's important to own clothes like that.

Speaking of clothes! I'm selling a few pieces on ebay that I've been hoarding, they're really lovely but they just don't fit me and I can't bring myself to alter them! There's some beautiful vintage pieces and some Topshop, River Island & Primark cuties too. Have a look here!

(I know all I post is outfit posts these days but I just have so many pieces I love that I haven't shown you yet! I'm going to do a details post of a very beautiful dress I bought a few months ago, and then I will sort out some posts before I go back to Sheffield. Peace and love, peace and love)

Nostalgia for outfits/versions of myself.

Hello! Time for Part Three of my Alteration Series.

 This skirt used to be part of a dress I loved when I was sixteen, I think there's probably a (very embarrassing) outfit post of me wearing it floating about on here somewhere. On of the straps broke a while back and couldn't really be repaired, but I didn't have the heart to throw it out because A) I am ridiculously sentimental about clothing, and B) I always thought I would change it up into a skirt one of these days - and now I have!
You can't really see it properly here because I was lazy and took these pictures without using my tripod, but it's really cute I promise! Also, I am inadvertently matching the colours of my room perfectly.

Blouse - Dorothy Perkins, skirt - Motel/DIY, necklace - gift.

I have been sitting on these pictures for a long time because I wasn't really sure what I wanted to say about them. The fact that both of these pieces are recycled items from my past has made me do a lot of thinking about how I think about my appearance now. I feel like I'm in the middle of a transformation in the way I dress, moving away from an all pastel aesthetic into a brighter, more varied array of clothing. I do love pastel shades, but I feel like I had been using that colour palette as a means of restriction - a few times I looked at clothes online and found myself thinking "oh that's nice, it's not pastel though" as if that some how diminished how much I should like it. What I guess I'm trying to say is that I think I was forcing a strict identity upon myself, through clothes but also myself as a person. I want to move away from this now and become more adventurous and explore vintage dressing and presentation more (a few of you  might have seen me with my hair in rollers on Instagram, this is part of that exploration and growth). This series of alterations I have been doing has also been a step in that direction, the skirts and dress I have shown you recently are a step towards my hopefully more open approach to dressing. I just want to have fun again, I think. Last week I started looking through my blog archives because I was feeling nostalgic for the enthusiasm I had for blogging last year, and I was also missing the way I looked back then (in this post specifically). I have had this weird notion in the back of my mind that Summer 2012 was my peak and that I will never look better. Obviously, this is a really odd and stupid notion, because growth matters. Change matters. I feel like I am in the halfway stages at the moment, my style and my approach to it are going to continue evolving and this blog is going to be the site of it.
I have been really apathetic about blogging lately and sluggish in showing you all new, pretty things that I have bought because I have been taking the time to think a lot more lately. I have been a bit confused about lots of things, some to do with my style - because I do think that is worth thinking over and deconstructing - but my personal life as well. I am not going to share much about it here (because I'm not sure what I'm thinking myself, but also because I don't really want to), but know that I am a little fragile right now and that, even though I do want to write about things here, I do not really have the energy to post a lot right now.

Plaid on plaid.

Thank you for reading.

Pretty in pink

Hello! I said many moons ago that I was thinking about doing some small reviews of some make up I've bought recently, and today I have finally got around to it! This post is going to be pretty picture heavy, so prepare yourself accordingly.

These are the four lipsticks I own. Up until about four months ago, I only owned one! Pretty shameful to be honest, it's pretty much one of my make up staples.

(They are in the same order here as they are in the pictures below)

Rimmel Kate Lasting Finish Lipstick in 16.

This one is my favourite! It looks a lot more subtle here than it does in real life, but it's a lovely pale pink which feels kind of like a grown up Barbie colour (so basically my aesthetic in general). It has fairly blue undertones which is great because I am so not one for coral/orangey shades. It's also pretty moisturising but does fade a bit during the day.

Rimmel London Moisture Renew Lipstick in 130/Oxford Street Fuchsia (they don't have the shade, but other ones are available here)

I really, really love this colour but the  formulation of this lipstick is not good at all! It takes a lot of applications to get the colour to really build up and get full coverage, and it can look quite patchy if you have dry lips. I would recommend wearing lip balm underneath for definite with this one because it can settle into lines in your mouth pretty easily (which I think you can see a bit here). I do find it quite disappointing because this is the most expensive lipstick I have bought (£6.29 at Boots, but I bought it in a 3 for 2 offer with the other Rimmel lipsticks). Having said that, I do love the colour (which is slightly more purpley than it looks here) and I like that it makes my eyes look really blue.

Topshop Lipstick in Mischief (they don't sell this exact shade any more but there are other similar ones on their website)

My sister bought me this a fair few Christmasses ago (I think when their make up range had just started) and I really love it! Definitely my favourite red shade that I own. Its slightly raspberry red which I really like because I feel like that works with my ghostly pale skin, it kind of makes me feel like a Snow White/Marilyn Monroe hybrid, if that makes any sense at all. The formulation is really creamy & it is pretty long lasting, however it is very bad for bleeding out. I blot it several times when I apply it & I've also started wearing lip liner with it too (but more on that later).

Rimmel Kate London Lasting Finish Lipstick in 22.

I haven't really worn this lipstick much, but that's mainly because I prefer my other red. As you can probably see, there isn't much difference between the two but this one is slightly less pink and a bit darker.

Swatches! Same order as before, natural light.

And flash.

Also, I thought I would show you my lipstick holders! I picked all of these up in charity shops gradually, at one point I owned all three of these but only one lipstick.

I also bought some glitter eyeliners recently! Glitter, yaaay! I bought the turquoise one for my burlesque make up expecting it to be a bit rubbish as it was only cheap, but I was actually really impressed & went back to buy it in some other colours.

Collection 2000 Glam Crystals in 5/Le Freak (other shades available here)

I really love this liner! It's such a pretty colour & it's really easy to apply. It's easier to put on than the other two, I think because the glitter is finer and it glides better over the lid. Very long wearing too considering it was so cheap.

Collection 2000 Glam Crystals in 8/Dancing Queen (other shades here)

Really love the hot pink colour, but it does look a bit odd when my hair is bright pink so I don't wear it very much.

Collection 2000 Glam Crystals in 11/Shake It Up

I kind of regret getting this one because I don't think I'll wear it very much, it looked very purple in the shop but it's more like a dark blue on which is a little bit dull for me. I mean, duller than the other shades! Can glitter even be dull?

Swatches!

Also, just thought I'd do a quick round up of the rest of the make up I'm wearing here. I don't really wear make up around the house, like ever, but when I'm meeting people or going out for the day I put a little bit on.

• I never used to colour in my eyebrows, but I barely go out without doing so now. The Benefit Brow Zings in Light are so good! I find the wax really good for shaping my eyebrows and the powder is great for darkening/filling in gaps, as my eyebrows are pretty light on their own. It comes with two brushes and a set of tweezers, but I just use my own tweezers because I find these ones too small and fiddly.
• I'm kind of on a mascara hunt at the moment. I got this free sample of Benefit They're Real! in Elle magazine & I have heard good things from other people but honestly I'm kind of disappointed. I really don't like the weird spiky brush and I never feel like I get it on thick enough on my lashes, which i like because mine are pretty thin. I like the colour but I find that it's really difficult to actually take it off too.
• I had a discount code for The Body Shop & I'd heard really good things about their Lip Line Fixer so I decided to give it a go. It works just like any ordinary liner, except it's invisible so it can be used with any colour. I really love it and I use it whenever I'm wearing lipstick, especially with the Topshop one above as it really stops it bleeding out onto the skin around my lips.
• More new additions to my beauty routine from The Body Shop are this Eye Definer liner in 5/White and this Baked-To-Last Blush in 1/Petal. I'm not quite sure what I'm doing with the eye liner, but I quite like the way it makes my eyes look a little bit brighter. I love the blush though! It is really shimmery and the pale pink is much better than the coral I was using before (a free sample my mum didn't want, my apathy with make up is so painful). It comes with a highlighter too, which looks great on my cheekbones.

Okay, so amateur hour make up review is over, hope you enjoyed it!