la belle dame sans merci

last week i finally bit the bullet & ordered my dress for the leavers' ball! it's a 1960s inspired shift dress from dorothy perkins, and it is a lovely pale/salmony pink which means that i don't have to buy new shoes as i have some in a similar shade (which is awesome as i hate buying new shoes!). here it is in all its loveliness;

part of the reason i loved the look of this dress so much was the amazing pearl beaded peter pan-ish collar (i say ish as it's not quite a peter pan shape). at first i was a little bit worried that the beads wouldn't be totally securely attached to the dress, but in actual fact they are sewn onto netting so, fingers crossed, they should be less likely to fall off. however, it does present a slight problem of what jewellery i can wear with it, as i pretty much feel naked without a necklace, haha.

here is the full length view! i'm a little worried that the cut of the dress will make me look a little shapeless, so i will definitely be wearing heels on the night!

the original price of the dress was £50, which is more than i would normally spend on a dress, but i managed to only pay about £30 as they had a 30% discount offer, and i had a voucher code for free delivery! i'm pretty impressed with that saving, if i do say so myself.

the fabric of the sleeves is wonderfully sheer, in fact the majority of the dress is sheer, so this does raise an issue or two vis-a-vis appropriate underwear.

i am actually in love with sleeves. when i tried the dress on, i felt like i'd just stepped out of the biba changing rooms!

they have the cutest pearl buttons on the cuffs (which admittedly were a total palaver when trying on the dress!), which i couldn't see on the website so they were a nice surprise when it arrived! especially as i was actually contemplating sewing something on the cuffs myself.

love the fluted shoulders. fluted probably isn't the right word, but is the only thing that springs to mind!

the only thing i have to sort out now is what tights to wear, i kind of want to wear some patterned ones as the dress is relatively plain but i think i'll just end up wearing my white ones as that would go with the '60s look. i already have shoes so they aren't a problem, but i do want to change the colour of the ribbon ties on said shoes, at the moment i'm thinking turquoise would be the best choice, what do you think? also, i think i'm going to buy some lilac nail polish for the full pastel experience. (not that i take my clothing inspiration from my art supply cupboard or anything)

*

1. i had my english literature exam today, & i think it went alright. all the extracts we were given were really long though, so it took aaages to read & analyse them! i spent way too much time reading the first two extracts, which were prose (urgh), so only left myself about 5 minutes to plan for the second section, nightmare! i only need 78 out of 120 in this exam to get an A overall, so i'm hoping i've done enough to manage that, fingers crossed!

2. i've just bought tickets for my friend jess & me to go see the kooks in november! i was completely & utterly obsessed with this band from the ages of 14 to about 16, so as you can imagine i am beyond excited to see them! we travelled to go & see them in doncaster about two years ago, but it wasn't an entirely brilliant experience as we both passed out & can barely remember anything from the gig, paha. also, it will be amazing to see them locally, especially as they're playing a pretty small venue. the countdown begins now!

3. the planning for my jewellery shop is still going strong! i stilllll cannot decide on a name, which is so annoying but i think that when i find it, i'll just know, you know? yeah, okay then. well, anyway, i'm starting to gather together some vintage-looking props for a photoshoot in the near future, just of the jewellery, no people at the minute!

4. i recently pre-ordered caitlin moran's new book how to be a woman, two copies, one for me & one for my cousin's birthday present. if you follow me on twitter, you're probably sick of me raving on about it, but i am just so excited to read it! i think she's pretty much my idol, it's so refreshing to find a feminist writer who writes about more than feminism! she's also totally hilarious.

keep calm & imagine peace.

my exams finished today!

i am so so so incredibly pleased they are over, and psychology wasn't nearly as bad as i thought it was going to be this morning!

at first i wasn't quite sure what to do with myself - i haven't had a day when i didn't have work to do in months! tomorrow is going to be a complete skive day; i'm going to watch eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, nowhere boy and gilmore girls while eating loads of kettle chips & sweets. then i'm going to experiment with curling my hair while listening to billie holiday, she & him and belle & sebastian on spotify (which i am now completely addicted to!).

then hopefully on saturday my friends & i will be off shopping in town - which i have not done since march!

i can honestly sign this post off with a smile, and hope if you have exams, they go as well as you would like (:

here are some lovely inspiring pictures that cheered me up while i was (meant to be) revising.

tumblr

i need that bag in my life, so much.

unknown

unknown

i absolutely love this print! i used to be such a huge elvis fan, if anybody knows where this is from pleeease let me know!

tumblr

n'awww. the beatles were the original bromantics.

tumblr

tumblr

my new mantra.

tumblr

maggiesfarm.blogspot.com

i love zooey deschanel, so much. and i need to find myself a pair of those glasses.

tumblr

unknown

it's been a hard day's night.

try a hard day's week ringo! i have two exams out of the way now & only one to go. i just can't wait 'til they're over - and neither can you probably, as you'll be sick to death of hearing me blabber on about them! my english literature paper went quite well today, i managed to make use of the wider reading texts i knew the best, although the poetry section was a bit iffy i'm hoping i've done well. fingers crossed to the max over here.

last weekend my beatles dvds i ordered arrived, which made me so unbelievably ridiculously happy!

even though i accidentally ordered the wrong one because my eyes skipped straight to the low price on amazon, instead of the item description. never making that mistake again!

a hard day's night!

i was actually quite ashamed that i had never since this before saturday, seeing as i'm supposed to this big beatles fan and all. it is now quite firmly in my top ten favourite films of all time list (which is a pretty big deal, let me tell you) not just because it features my boys john paul george & ringo, but because it's so cute, so funny, and so beautiful. people don't tend to know this, but this film actually kind of changed cinema. it was quite revolutionary in its time, as it didn't have much of a storyline, was quite surreal & featured a lot of improvised filming. thanks to richard lester (the director), this kind of thing has become quite normal in our culture. in fact, many of the films i love have this kind of structure.

this is the dvd i ordered incorrectly. i thought it was the beatles' film a magical mystery tour, but it's actually a documentary about the making of their album of the same name. i love beatles documentaries, don't get me wrong, but it was still kind of disappointing as i wanted to see the psychedelic madness of their bus based adventures.

i'm not quite sure what to with this dvd, as it was only £4 i may as well watch it & keep it instead of sending it back. i may sell it/donate it to charity at some point, i'm undecided.

these two are joining my (ever growing, but still quite small) collection of beatles related dvds. so far i have nowhere boy;

a film which i adore, even if it isn't completely accurate. i just love the soundtrack, and the direction. i think i read somewhere that sam taylor-wood had a different colour palette for each of the main characters, which really shows when you watch it back. i love little details like that. also, it makes me so very happy to know that i have been to the places where it was filmed - including lennon's house!

my mother bought nowhere boy for me, and it came with this little photo book! it's so cute, and it has little biographies of the main actors which is pretty cool - even though i think poor thomas brodie sangster (who plays paul mccartney in the film) has been slightly shortchanged as his biography is only 3 lines.

one of my favourite photos in the book; the "nowhere boys" rehearsing their songs for the film. those 3 with the guitars play paul, george & john respectively.

i hope to be getting back to posting more regularly by the end of this week, i'll have more free time (hopefully!) and more things planned.

thank you all for bearing with me! and hello to my new follower (:

i feel free

i had two exams today, eeek! first i had general studies, which kind of doesn't really count, & then i had my spanish listening-reading-writing paper, which was pretty bad frankly. it was just odd, i didn't really know what to make of it, & my essay about musical influence really sucked.

but oh well! there's nothing i can do about it now, so i propose to not worry (:

(this resolution will probably last until, oh i don't know, tomorrow at the latest maybe?)

also, today i, my father & my brother have been packing up our stuff in preparation for moving house on thursday. this is officially my & my brother's last night staying in (what now must be called) our old house, because tomorrow we go to stay with our mother, as per usual. i'm kind of sad to be leaving as i love this house & the garden, but hopefully i will settle into the new place soon enough.

fingers crossed.

i am quite happy though, two exams down, four to go! also, the sun was out today which was lovely, & there are cherry blossom petals everrrrrrrywhere! i was feeling a bit free-spirity so i took my shoes off & ran over the grass in bare feet, which has to be one of the loveliest feelings in the world.

(weheartit.com)

i wrote an epic letter to you

it's twenty two pages front and back, but it's too good to be used,

and i tried to be a girl who likes to be used, i'm too good for that,

there's a mind under this hat.

my friend jess & i went to see laura marling yesterday which was possibly one of the best concerts i have everrrrr been to! the theatre was a really old, really beautiful place so unfortunatley i wasn't allowed to take any photos, because a man shined a torch & shouted at me.

she was supported by an australian band called boy and bear who were a lovely folk group, reminscent of mumford & sons crossed with a bit of nick drake & bob dylan. so yeah, awesome. then there was another girl called alessi's ark which was a good act, but a little twee i think.

laura marling herself was lovely, she had two "act" type of things, first a country-folk set with her more lively numbers, and then an acoustic set which was just beautiful. she was really funny & lovely as well, i love it when artists actually connect with the audience, because really they owe most of their success to us, to be frank.

i thought some of the music was really inventive & original, she played quite a few new songs (for another new album out later this year, eeep!) & her backing band - who seemed to be made up of lots of other different bands, probably given to her "troubles with the fiddle player" who i presume is her ex charlie fink of noah & the whale - seemed to be made up of all the other acts that night. there were double basses, bass guitars played as cellos, maracas & banjos everrrrywhere!

oh, i bought a tshirt as well which hopefully i will post about at the weeeeeekend.