One of my dearest friends (who I met on the internet! All my favorite people are the people I have met through the internet. SURPRISE.) is leaving me tomorrow to study at Central Saint Martins, kinda heartbroken so we decided to commemorate our friendship of the summer with lots of narcissism. You don't recognize him, but I've blogged about him before, he's Scott Park. You can read a short interview I did with him when we first met here. He's probably one of the only people I let borrow clothes from my closet. FYI, None of the clothes in this post are new to the blog, you can see both the blazer he borrowed from me and the dress I'm wearing in this post from March. I'm bet you're sick of the blazer but I DON'T CARE I LOVE IT. ♥_♥
I'm kind of bummed with the way this dress fits now, I think I lost ten or maybe even fifteen pounds since last year without really trying and the way this (my favorite dress!) fits is very different than it did only a few months ago. It used to fit perfectly, but whatever, it's still cute. It's one of those dresses that you wish you had a thousand of.
Scott is such a talented designer and I've seen sneak peeks of his new collection / future collection and I'm SO OBSESSED. I really believe he'll be a success and I do hope you'll watch out for him in the future 'cause I think with enough luck he'll make it big. I certainly think he has enough talent.
I'm really going to miss my bff. Q___Q We shared many memories over spicy ramen and the smog of his cigarettes. And we bonded over Britney Spears and Big Bang, which makes him very close to my heart. Guhhh teary eyed guhhh
I MISS YOU ALREADY, OPPA.
By the time you see this post, he'll be flying and I'll be unreachable at the lake for vacation. I hope you're having a great summer so far and I love you!!! Internet hugs and kisses.
This is probably my most half assed outfit in awhile, I was stumped on what to wear for pride and just ended up not bothering. The rainbow jacket is just serendipitous. When you overthink things too much you sometimes end with the simplest things. I never wear things so form fitting but I was planning on going to a few parties today after Dykewalk / Pridefest etc. None of that panned out (poor!!!!) but I figured it would make most sense to not let the outfit go to waste.
I'm still selling this jacket btw, but I'm probably having second thoughts 'cause I've worn it a few times and I'm diggin it. But, if you want it, go here.
Harness from Angie, vintage silk shirt, and Kova & T lame skirt courtesy of Gilt.
You guys!! This resort season was/is so important and amazing! I have never really been into or been impressed by Resort collections, a lot of the times they seem do be done without true vision or a point, and they're invariably white, beige, short to the point where I seldom bother even looking. But this season I did, and I'm so glad I did! Collection after collection was awesome and I really am in love with so many, so many!!!!! THERE ARE NOT ENOUGH EXCLAMATION POINTS TO PROPERLY DESCRIBE MY ATTRACTION!!!!!
My heart is in my throat I am clutching the screen I am clawing at the screen come to me I want to love you down and sing you Justin Bieber songs!!!! Everything at Peter Pilotto was perfect to me, the length, the simplicity of the silhouettes, the acidic palette. I would die to see this in person, I want to know what fabric they used, I would be a little disappointed if it was just like, cotton or jersey. The prints would look next level in shiny fabric. Basically, I want every single item and I want it yesterday. Peter Pilotto is most definitely one of my favorite designers and I have never been disappointed by his work, ever. Resort was no exception.
I'm just having a moment with the skirts. The shirts are amazing, but I doubt they'd stand the test of time??? I do have collared shirts like them so I'll probably replicate one of these outfits, though it'll take it forever to find a skirt that looks similar to those.
I mean. I MEAN!!!! As a ~fashion writer~ I should be really descriptive and whatever, but really all I can say is: *appreciative animal noises, pawing at computer screen, hearts for eyes*. I really loved how whimsical this was, the floral prints are garish but in a CUTE way, and it's just the best mix of pretty-ugly cool. I love the makeup too, so fresh. Into it.
The red moments at Preen were my favorite. I went through a phase where I wore red like every day. Then I had green and blue phases etc. The way the clothes fall in this collection is truly stunning, I expect the most from Vionnet for draping (check out Vionnet resort it's beautiful) but but Preen had the cool factor and the pink suit. Really the pink suit the most important. Pink. suit. I want a pink suit now. My wardrobe feels lacking without a pink suit.
BABYDOLL COOLCAT AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
And that concludes my highly critical, moving review of the collections. Riveting, I'm sure.
“You Don’t Have to Be Pretty. You don’t owe prettiness to anyone. Not to your boyfriend/spouse/partner, not to your co-workers, especially not to random men on the street. You don’t owe it to your mother, you don’t owe it to your children, you don’t owe it to civilization in general. Prettiness is not a rent you pay for occupying a space marked “female”.”
I caught myself putting on makeup today even though I was running late to a presentation (unfortunately I was too late to enter, because of traffic, and so I ended up siting on the train reading a comic book for three cycles between the first and last stop just to make the trip worth it). Anyway, I was doing my makeup, and doing an incredibly pain in the ass kind of braid because my hair is particularly troubling this week and you know, it wasn't very enjoyable but I felt like I needed to do it because it was expected to me because of what I do for work and play: fashion fashion. Somewhere along the way I decided to make what I love, what I do. Even if I'm going to be poor indefinitely and be unsure of my security for quite awhile and you know, get those looks of both sympathy and pity when parents ask me, "What do I do?"
You know, that look. Sometimes I switch up my major when I'm telling parents of friends what I'm in college for, just to fuck with them. "Philosophy and Cinema Studies." And I see their horror, imagining their children proposing those possibilities to them and I cackle inside, I know it's not nice but well, whatever. I mean, I'm majoring in Gender Studies and Journalism, (so honestly I can just tell the truth and still get that reaction of horror) which are two of the lowest paying majors out of all of them. Fun. Promising. Dirt poor. But, you know, I find the future romantic and I am a dreamer, I like to get lost in my own brain and plan and plan and plan and plan, because the future has every possibility of being better than the past and the present, and I bank everything on those possibilities.
But anyway. Being pretty. Too often it's just a ritual, sometimes I have to yank myself from habit and intentionally dress ugly to make myself comfortable. Because feeling socially acceptable and 'pretty' is different than feeling like yourself, you know? People have to 'put their face on'. People have to 'get ready to face the world' in the morning. There is that old tale, I think it might actually be in the original Alice in Wonderland (or maybe it was a Grimm fairytale? I love those) that the protagonist stumbles upon a princess, who has a collection of faces but no actual face of her own. And I would just stare at the illustrations of the faces for ever, longer than I would even read the story. We're like that sometimes, aren't we? We don't like showing our faces.
I guess I could make the point of this post the fact we sometimes rely on makeup to approach the world, but that's done and stale. I mean, yes, but it's certainly not all we rely on. Everything we present ourselves as is a point of presentation and construct and our assumed reality. What we want people to see as us. That can mean anything, boy or girl or genderqueer or nongendered or what have you. I am lucky enough to identify as a girl, and so I am a girl, and most of the time because I am a girl I make myself 'pretty' even if I hate the stares and catcalling and honks. But I don't want to have to do that. I don't think I owe anyone anything when it comes to being pretty. I want to do it for me, not someone else, you know? What I present myself as isn't for someone else's benefit.
I started playing with my gender when I was visiting someone in an elderly home, I have this hat, my black fedora, and whenever I wear it I want to be a boy and wear Dior Homme suits and slouch even more than I do and not be pretty. I feel like it's an act of rebellion just to wear a dudes hat and ill fitting jeans I stole from a boy I used to know. Everything you wear, everything you chose or chose not to do, can be an important choice. You can be pretty if you want to be, or you can not be, but I think, the important thing is that you make yourself aware of the reasons you are doing so, and hopefully you can also step outside your comfort zone and shake shit up.
Because a dude wearing a skirt shouldn't be sacrilege (!! Andrej!!), a person who doesn't want to be manly but feel beautiful should feel safe to do so, you know, just these small but important things should be allowed to happen. Right? Right. I don't want future children to be beaten or disowned because we're scared of people who aren't like us, or didn't follow the unspoken rules about dudes wearing certain colors or wearing certain clothing or whatever. I hope one day it's just common sense, not abnormal.
I let You Call Me Beautiful by Marty McConnell (my favorite poet)
Did you guys know I wanted to be an interior designer when I was little? Well, actually, I wanted to be an astronaut ninja nurse secretary mix, but mostly I spent my time drawing a bunch of elaborate and over the top apartment buildings down to the initials on the towels. I still have all of my sketchbooks and I still collect a bunch of design clippings. I used to dog sit for a friend who had the most amazing interior design skills (if you stalk my blog, you might have seen me taking outfit photos in her house) and even though I don't do it anymore I still visit her house to drink in the inspiration.
Here are some of my favorite rooms I've amassed in my collection. The majority of these can be find on Lonnymag.com, or Lisa Sherry's Blog. I collected these over time so I'm not sure all the credentials (boo on me), if you know lemme know so I can edit credit in.
Interior Design by Caroline Robert.
Happy rooms make me happy and me happy is a fleeting thing, so I think when I eventually have my own place I'll make it a point to make it reflect creativity and happy things that match my sartorial inclinations.
Lolita day is the first Saturday of every June. I celebrated a bit early mostly 'cause my cat died and I wanted to wear something really cute to make me feel better. I love Lolita but it's pretty much impossible for me to dress up in the style because it's so freaking expensive, like, one knockoff dress is pretty near the price of one of the main lolita brands and both are in the same price range as a CDG dress so obviously I'll choose the CDG. If you're disapproving of knockoffs, when it comes to Lolita, you pretty much have to STFU because buying designer lolita is neigh impossible unless you have $600 to spend on just one designer cutsew or whatever..... everyone buys brand replica Lolita, the original brands are perpetually sold out and too expensive. This isn't even a brand replica, this is just a vintage uber cute dress I got off ebay 'cause it fit Lolita style. I'm too cheap to afford even the knockoffs. >_>; Shuffles feet. I'm not a true lolita by any means, but it's fun to dabble in it when I'm feeling like I need a picker upper.
If you'd like to learn more about Lolita (no, it's not founded of the Nabakov book), you can learn more at Lolita_handbook. I researched and got into all Japanese Street Fashion at around the same time, I learned about BtSSB the same time I learned about CDG. TBH from what I've noticed, Lolita is dying out in Japan (this is what I hear from friends that live there and visit there) and I see less of it in streetstyle websites, but I'm not that surprised. A lot of awesome famous Japanese stores that sell specific (and pretty much necessary) brands have been gradually closing 'cause they don't have any government support. They're getting pushed out. Still, I heard this maybe a year ago so I do hope the situation got better.
There are different 'types' of Loli: sweet, gothic, guro, oriental, etc. I like wearing Princess because I make it a point to be sickly sweet if I'm going to dress like a doll. Go all the way or go home, you know?
