Is that a bandwagon I spy...

...because I feel like jumping on it.

I'm mightily interested in those 'what in your bag' posts that are popping up all over the place.  Part of the allure of blogs is the insight you get into other people's lives.  Now we get an insight into their accessories.



This is my bag.  It's a (genuine) vintage Dooney and Bourke bag in tan and black, accessoried with a leopard print Primark scarf.  I love it so.

I'm not a bag person.  I need to be strapped to my bag at all times, otherwise I'll wander off like Ralph from The Simpsons, off to the toilet or dancefloor without it, and never see it again.  Clutches are not my friend.  Backpacks make me look like an ant huffing a gigantic pile of rocks up a hill.  The mid size bag is a, uhm, happy medium.



For a medium bag, it holds a lot of stuff.  This week it's playing house for:

1. Travel itinaries and booking confirmations - going to Dublin for a few days to catch up with family, go to a few meetings, do a bit of work and hopefully buy a nice pair of pink trousers.
2. Wallet - a present from my aunt - it basically has my life in it.  A life with no money (so be warned, potential muggers).
3. Two of twelve billion Cork and Dublin bus tickets.
4. An iPod that has taken for too many knocks.
5. Coin purse - Marc by Marc Jacobs and was a Christmas present.  It holds coins.  And sometime lozenges (I'm such an old lady).
6. Passport - In case Enzo whisks me off to Milan at the last minute.  It is also helpful for getting into pubs.
7. Generic ibuprofen - because I'm too cheap to buy Nurofen.
8. Reporters notebook
9. Whatever book I'm reading at the moment - this one is a biography of Lee Miller.
10. A pencil - because someone took my pen!  My precious Bic!  I'll get you one day, pen thief...
11. A Nokia phone which is similar to a Blackberry, but nowhere near as fiddly.
12. Hand sanitiser - because you'd never know who has cooties.
13. A lolly.  Just 'cos.
14. Two bobby pins to whip back an unruly fringe.
15. Make up.  No. 7 Mascara, Bobbi Brown concealer, Mac eyeshadow in Bronze and Mac matte lipstick in Russian Red.
16. A pair of Ray Ban Clubmasters.  If I lost these, I would go hardcore baloobas.  My sunglasses are basically my ticket into the outside world.  If you've seen photos of me taken during the day, I'll have these on.  It's not because I'm an indie wanker (that's only about 75% of the reason).  I'm mildly photosensitive.  Direct sunlight hurts my eyes, makes them water and if I don't put my sunglasses on, I'll get a migraine after about twenty minutes or so.  Since Ireland is mostly overcast, this hasn't been too much of a problem.  It's just unfortunate that optimum weather conditions for taking photos are also those which make me want to run for the hills (or a darkened room).

What's in your bag?

Licentiate Column 16/03/11: Couples with matching jackets

Normally, I quite like the stories that my parents tell me about their courtin’ days. Bike rides to the beach on the Kerry coast and trips to see Thin Lizzy and Eric Clapton are played in my mind through a fuzzy, hazy sunshine imbued filter not unlike that used in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

In reality, my parents are one part Sundance and Etta and another part Homer and Marge Simpson. For example, my father brought my mother a box of chocolates on the night of their debs ball. Par for the course, except that he ate all of the soft centres. For every instance of cutesy-poo, there’s another one that is mind-bendingly embarassing (but still very sweet).

Once, my parents decided that it would be a good idea to purchase and wear matching jackets. Not just matching jackets, but matching silver puffa jackets. With red and blue stripes. The mind boggles.

My mother now reassures me that it wasn’t a conscious decision. My father was living in Dublin, my mother in Tralee. She bought the jacket, knowing that my father liked it, but reasoning that they would never turn up in the same place, wearing the same jacket. She was very wrong. Apparently, this was one of the most testing periods in their relationship. If anything, it’s proof that my parents have very middle-class problems.

I told myself that this would never happen to me. That lasted about five minutes when I started going out with my first proper boyfriend. The silver puffa jacket was, mercifully, not an option, but we would manage to turn up separately for afternoon dates in battered converse, slim jeans (skinnies had yet to be invented) and leather bomber jackets. We looked like the world’s worst Ramones tribute band. Don’t get me started on the time we both wore sparkly LBDs to a family wedding... This may not have happened.

For better or worse, if you pick a partner with similar tastes to yours, it’s likely that this will extend to your clothing. It could be little things, like wearing the same colours, or it could be a full-on matching fest of the highest, most tasteless order.

On one end of the spectrum, there’s Ralph and Ricky Lauren. Ricky’s effortlessly preppy style was what inspired the designer husband to branch into womenswear and today, both are perfect examples of co-ordinated collegiate cool. On the opposite end, there’s Posh and Becks. Do we remember the leather jumpsuits? The double disaster of cream and purple suits at their wedding? I don’t think I need to go any further.

In other countries, wearing matching outfits is a source of pride. In eastern Asia, where PDAs are frowned upon, it’s normal for unmarried couples to wear identical outfits as a sign of their togetherness. It has become so popular that retailers now sell outfits in pairs. It sounds terrible but it is probably no more visually offensive than the average PDA.

Like it or not, if you’re a part of the world at large, this dilemma is one you will have to face many times. So, look on the bright side; it’ll make a good story to tell your children - just don’t mention puffa jackets.

Waiting for Godot (or the fire brigade, whatevs)

I did have a huge post planned, with pictures and footnotes and reading lists, I really did.  The only trouble is, I left my notes in my notebook, which is on my kitchen table. On top of that, I can't get into my apartment block due to the fire alarm going off and weird, suspiciously burning-ish smells coming from the lift.

I wish I was joking.  If my flat burns down with my copy of Cheap and Chic Update in it, I'm going to be maaaad.

I'll have to post it on Friday - but here's some video candy - take it as an 'I'll make it up to you, I swear!'


HACHIKO ft Kiko Mizuhara for L'UOMO VOGUE from AntoineAsseraf+RenéHabermacher on Vimeo.

Directed by Rene Habermacher, this video plays with a story he heard about a dog who waited for his owner at a train station every day, even after the master stopped taking the train... Maybe he died. I like to think that he decided to take the bus instead and forgot to send his dog the memo.

Maybe that's what happened to this girl.  She's waiting for the fire marshals to let her back in her apartment block, but they forgot to tell her and went home...

EDIT: All clear. Phew.

John Galliano - or is it?

What fashion blogette worth her salt doesn't have Fashion Gone Rogue on her reader?  Everyone has their reason for clicking; their favourite models, labels, stylists and photographers are all there.  I'm not the biggest fan of editorials, but I do love their Morning Beauty feature - chock full of notable picks that you might not have seen the first time around.

Here's part of a shoot from Vogue Paris' Dec/Jan '06/'07 issue - Dans la Peau de John Galliano, photographed by Peter Lindbergh, styled by new Vogue Paris editrix Emmanuelle Alt and starring Sasha Pivovarova as, er, John Galliano.  The resemblance is uncanny.

2010 Roundup - favourites, highlights and everything in between

It's that time again.  Sluggish bloggers, slowed down into a cosy Christmas chrysalis are sloughing off the excess of too many mince pies and slices of blue cheese and evaluating the year in order to burst into 2011 a beautiful blog butterfly.  Like the alliteration?  I wrote it just for you.  Here's my 2010 'best of' blog mixtape.

Blog Highlights:  I started this blog in March with the aim of sharing what I liked and meeting a few like-minded people.  In the space of a few short months, I've racked up readers from around the world, landed a fashion column, learned a hell of a lot about the fashion industry, joined the Vice Blogging Network, went to London Fashion Week, networked like a mad thing, was mentioned as one of Ireland's most influential bloggers and made some truly exceptional, hilarous and supportive friends.  All of this due to blogging aspersions.  So, to my readers, I'd like to say a massive THANK YOU!  You guys are the best.  Seeing all your comments really brightens up my day.

(source)

Click 'Read More' to, ehm, read more, look at nice pictures and watch some fashion films...

Get the Lichtenstein Look

It's another Hallowe'en inspiration post this time.  Oh, the joys of having nothing to write about, then having a lightbulb moment that says '!!!HALLOWEEN!!!  In short, if there's any reason to write about a night in which you can look totally ridiculous without major repercussions, then I'll grab it with both hands.

You may think that I'm being horribly pre-emptive because I'm a whole month early for Hallowe'en, but if you think about it another way, I'm really eleven months late as this make-up look from MAC is actually from 2009.  Whoops.

I've had make-up on the brain since I found out that I won an amazing prize courtesy of Think What You Like and Sarah Hope Make Up *.  This post is for you.  Big up my sistaz (sorry, in real life I never say anything that obnoxious... I hope).

For once, I'll let the pictures do the talking...

Roy Lichtenstein, In The Car, 1963

Roy Lichtenstein, Girl, 1961(ish)

Nifty, eh?

*Speaking of which, I have a wee giveaway of my own that I can't wait to unveil once I get fifty google followers.  A secret door doesn't unlock when I get 50 followers by the way - it's just a personal target.

Longest week ever (with added Peg Bundy)

I've been staring at a blank screen for ages with no idea how to start this post.  Maybe a bullet point list would be best.

• In London, I suffered a mysterious allergic reaction which left me with a severe rash all over my body.  If you think that's gross, then you should stop reading, because this is just the first in a loooong list of ailments.
• On getting back to Ireland, I started to get mysterious chest pains, which is how I ended up in an emergency room at 4am watching Euronews on a loop.  Interesting side note - I learned that I have relatively few opiate receptors, which means that hard drugs (and the painkillers they gave me in the waiting room) have no effect on me.  Go figure.
• Then, the day after all that happened, a filling fell out while I was chewing a piece of gum, which was just heaping insult upon insult to injury.

What next, I ask?  Am I going to get ebola to round the week off?  Typhus maybe?  Necrotising fasciitis?  It is literally one thing after the other .  I would not be surprised if I was served with a subpoena impregnated with anthrax or something.

This has left me in bed on a truckload of painkillers and anti-inflammatories and all kinds of wonderful drugs that have no effect on my battered opiate receptors.  I don't want to sound all 'poor me' but I have NO IDEA what to post on this week.  The ideas aren't exactly flowing.  The crystal stream of inspiration has been stoppered up.

With one exception.  Hallowe'en costumes.  Yep, I know it's a while off.  Hopefully you'll forgive me for being so pre-emptory, but this is the one cogent idea I have managed to have in between gobbling Difene and jelly worms courtesy of Aisling (the jelly worms that is, not the Difene) and chats with herself and Dawn .

Myself and the boyfriend will be going as Peg and Al Bundy, which is appropriate, because his name is Al and he works in a shoe shop and I sit on my ass all day watching Oprah and scarfing bonbons while engaging in borderline sex-pestery.  It's a hard knock life.

Scroll over to see full pics.  Ooh collage-tastic.

The formula:  A hell of a lot of animal print, shiny tight pants, carrot-red hair dye , Snooki-style Bumpits and a vat of Aquanett (sorry ozone layer, but something's got to give).



Oh Peg.  You complete me.  Why can't we be best friends?

Get The London Look

Our third and final guest post comes from Fiona from Save Our Shoes, who's been living in the capital for a year, so she knows her schtuff about London Looks...

Excuse my quoting of the Rimmel advertising campaign, but after a year of living between Shoreditch and Hackney, I can safely say there is DEFINITELY a "London Look".  To fool people into thinking you are a real Londoner this S/S London Fashion Week do some of the following things...

Invest in shorts; leather hotpants or denim cutoffs (the more holes, the better).



Be permanently attached to your iphone/blackberry/smart phone. A true London member of the fash pack can twitpic a picture from the back of the Bora Aksu show while maintaining a nonchalant air and bbming their friend standing next to them.

Wear some sort of platform shoe at all times. Some sort of black leather wedge boots. A la Acne (but more than likely from Primark). Another option are clogs. Equally clunky and noisy.



Master the penguin shuffle, a common problem associated with wearing long clinging maxi skirts.

Have a constantly grumpy demeanour.

Develop some sort of slash talent. Actress/model, musician/dancer. I like to go by the slash talent of Beyonce Impersonator/Blagger.

When possible, grow a moustache.



There you have it, if you follow these easy steps, you too can act like a you are the bees knees and the cats pyjamas for a week. 'Cause once fashion week is over, it's back to working behind a cash point in Topshop.

"New York is everything" - Marc Jacobs

LAZY POST ALERT!

Ah, V Magazine. Why can't I buy you in Cork? Is there a V embargo in Easons? Don't you like us enough to ship to Ireland? Why, V, why???

'Scuse me. Here's the main editorial from this month's issue, populated by the great and good (of New York, that is. And even then, no Jay-Z? No Naked Cowgirl ?), including Lady G, Marc Jacobs, Jake Shears, DEBBIE HARRY (so good she's in caps) and Lady Bunny, whom I mistook for Jayne County .

Allie Brosh x Fashion = Genius

I might be the only person in the world who hasn't read Hyperbole and a Half, judging by the amount of comments after every post.

I was having one of those lazy Sundays on the internet (because this is where I live; on the internet, clicking intermittently and letting my eyes glaze over), chatting to one of my friends, who forwarded on the link to Allie Brosh's blog.  I went onto the Facebook page and from there to Brosh's MS Paint-y drawings and articles for The Gloss (not to be confused with the Irish Magazine of the same name).  And I laughed.  And laughed some more.  Then I had some dinner.  Then I did some more laughing.  You get the picture.

Pic from 4 Totally Legitimite Uses For Sequins

Total, piss-taking, funniness.  I urge you to check it out.

Wanted: Simpsons Vintage

If you've read this blog before you'll know that I have a deep uncompromising love for The Simpsons, namely the first handful of seasons.  So deep is this love that I'm going to do a post on Simpsons and clothing, so switch off now if you find this boring...

I was just about old enough to remember the 'Ban The Bart' campaigns in 1990.  I also remember my granny was scandalised when she found out that my parents had bought both myself and my sister Simpsons t-shirts.  Mine was blue and had a picture of Bart saying "Don't have a cow, man".  Sigh.  Where did it all go wrong?

Right now I'd give my boyfriend's left nut for an old-school Simpsons sweater or tee (sorry Al) but they must have all been burned on an elementary school principal pyre because finding one of these, in a good condition and in a condition to fit a woman without looking like a tent is as rare as hens teeth (a comparison I never really got.  Do hens have teeth?).

These items are mostly from the early 90's and so are teetering on the edge of vintage.  I think that once the 20 year mark has passed for these items, they'll magically become ironic, then cool, then passé again in the hipster fashion wheel of fortune.

Here are some of my picks.

Available here , here and here .

Weinerdog: Welcome To The Dollhouse

There are some films with iconic style that you want to emulate, and then there are some films where the clothing just makes you want to cry.

One of these films (for me at least) is Todd Solondz's film Welcome To The Dollhouse, which is about nerdy Dawn Wiener and her trials and tribulations as she navigates the perils of being the biggest loser in middle school.

It sounds like a cliche, but this is a Todd Solondz film. There is no happy ending. Dawn doesn't fall down a well, or discover the redemptive power of being herself, or uncover pirate gold in a hidden cavern under the school. It's bleak and black, and like most bleak and black moments in life, is almost too unbearably funny to handle. If you ever, ever had a tough time in school, watch this film, re-evaluate just how shitty it really was and possibly thank your lucky stars that all you got was Ribena poured into your schoolbag and not rape threats.

The clothes in this film really serve to highlight just what a terrible time Dawn has. Her tees, earrings and backpacks are plastered with fluorescent yellow smiley faces and her many jumpsuits are floral-patterned and cloyingly cute.  She wears pink and trainers and ankle socks and all the kids in school hate her because she has no social skills whatsoever and gets good grades (sniff sniff violins etc).

Dawn is backed into a toliet cubicle and told to shit (nice) with the door open.  The ties on her frilled floral dress and her childish figure inside it makes us see that she's just a pre-adolescent, which makes the command even more shocking.  Her aggressor's name is Lolita, nice aside, eh?





















There are no words for this outfit.  This is possibly Dawn's first crack at dressing like an adult, or at least like the kids versions of adults that float around her school.

Poor Dawn's problem is that she's still a little girl being herself in a world of little girls who were becoming sexualised and going into adolescence.  The other girls at her school wear cheerleader outfits, lipstick, shorts, tights and crop tops while Dawn stays staid in her cotton sprigged little-girl-lost suits.  She has a clubhouse while all the other kids in her grade are going to pool parties.

Weirdly enough, some of this stuff is not too far off the faux-naif look that a lot of adult women sport and a million miles away from the frankly disturbing outfits I see on some girls in the city whenever a teenage club night rolls around.

Inspiration 1 - Club Kids

With yesterday's post still firmly stuck in my mind, I can't help but be reminded of the Club Kids.

My obsession started with renting out Party Monster with my sisters.  We watched it once.  Then I watched it again.  And again.  Anyone acquainted with their brief moment at the forefront of cutting edge cool will know the seedy story that overshadows their outfits (in short, movement leader Michael Alig, along with drug dealer Robert 'Freeze' Riggs, killed another drug dealer, Angel Melendez and disposed of his body in an incredibly brutal fashion).  Which makes their appearance on the Joan Rivers Show more than a little bittersweet since the phrase "you're not hurting anyone" pops up all over the place.



Before the clubs became saturated with drugs, however, the Club Kid ethos was a series of Situationist pranks (scatology, mutilation and lactation were common themes for club nights and outfits) and guerrila parties, which took place in McDonalds and Macys departments stores, amongst other places.  To tap into the Club Kid psyche, just listen to your inner freak.  And maybe have a look at these here pictures.

EDIT - Here's a few more pictures of Club Kid trading cards, used as publicity tools for Disco 2000 club nights.

All photos from Collection of All That is Good

This is me. Jumping.

Two days ago, a funny thing happened.  This blog started getting three times the normal amount of hits and I had no idea why.  That is, until I went on Style Bubble and saw that one of my comments had been re-upped on a post about blogger poses .  This is what I said.


"The old 'mid-air jump' pose is another pose not for the light hearted blogger. Tried it once. Never again. Think I'll just stick to the 'Are those MY shoes?' pose in the future."


So, if anyone out there should click on the link and wonder what the one time I tried the mid-air jump and failed miserably looks like, here it is in all it's anticlimactic glory.  It was taken in a dingy smoking room in an even dingier nightclub and this, believe it or not, is the best of what seemed like twelve million attempts but in reality was probably only five or six.  In my mind, I look like an electrocuted sausage roll.  Hence, sticking to the 'staring at the shoes' pose in the future.

Jacket - Lipsy, Cardigan - Agnes b, Top - Ann-Sofie Back for Topshop,
 Borrowed scarf, Brooch - Sonia Rykiel for H&M, Tights, Primark, Vintage roper boots

PS - As you can see, I've a negligible amount of links at the side of my page.  I'm going to get on that very very soon.  I'd love to trade links, if anyone wants to, do let me know!

Ignore everything about these videos.

Ignore the odd stances and awkward porturing of the models.  God, don't you hate watching shows where the models have obviously been told 'look like you're having FUN' and they just end up lolloping awkwardly and shrugging at the end of the runway and then maybe doing a little halfhearted jump... "Er, what do we do now...  I know, I'll jump in the air for no reason and pray it turns out alright".

Ignore the baby doll dresses and strapless sweetheart necklines.
Ignore the candy colours.
Ignore the impromptu burlesque strip in the 2010 video (if you can).

But I DEFY you to ignore the 3D knits. Fam Irvoll is an irreverent genius, the bastard child of Minnie Mouse and JC de Castelbajac, who ran away with the circus and picked up some knitting needles after a food fight turned for the worse, leaving her unable to do any trapezework ever again and with an odd urge to knit her snack choices into jumpers and headbands.* Must... have... the liquorice allsort jumper... immediately.










*That never happened.  I made it up.  It would be pretty cool though, no?

Lady Cops!

Here's a post I really should have put up earlier from this month's Paris Vogue.

Once upon a time I actually had reasonable French but all my parlez-vousisms have dribbled out of my ears and I just buy French Vogue to look at the pretty pictures and to look quizzically at the Antonia Fraser interview her life with Harold Pinter. I really wish I knew what she was saying.

French Vogue reminds me of Playboy. Playboy from the 50's and 60's, not spreadeagled plasticky smooth women. Sometimes you think that Vogue is all editorial, then you get hit with a treatise on the motivations behind working the camouflage print or that Antonia Fraser interview. It's a bit like opening an old copy of Playboy and seeing a short story by Nabokov or an interview with Malcolm X. It's weird and incongruous and totally cool.

Speaking of weird and incongruous and totally cool, there are my favourite pages from the Lady Cops spread starring Brooke Shields and shot by Bruce Weber. Salty goodness.







The scans for the whole shoot can be found here.

EVE, AD 2000!

Does anyone else think that this is oddly prophetic? Marc Jacobs, Alexander Wang, Lady Gaga... you've got a LOT to answer for.



Personally I'd love to have a man of the future who looks like a man off a deck of cards.

If the shoe fits...

This is one of my favourite posts from the old blog...
If you're the kind of person who feels sick at the sight of a person's bare feet (and there's more of them than you'd think) perhaps you shouldn't look any further.


I was promised a new pair of shoes. What I got was this... It took my best friend A more than an hour to painstakingly draw in all the aspects of an Adidas Predator (am I right?) soccer boot on my feet. Next time a pair of Ann D's I think. It's the only way I'll get my hands on a pair.

I love my new boots so much - I might just keep them. Below are some detail shots. Apologies for the poor quality. The photos were taken with my awful camera phone and the lighting was a shaky bedside lamp, resulting in overly-dramatic shadows.





My favourite part is the stud detail (though that was the tickliest to have done).