Stud it to me! Festival Fashion SS12 Update

Having been in search for a functional, yet obviously unbelievably bang-on trend and AHHHmazing festival outfit since I booked my V Festival tickets way back when, I am happy to say I’m sticking to my previous declaration of scouting out the best festival finds so you don’t have to; and here is a quick update people.

Having obviously popped in to Topshop for something completely unrelated (always the way isn’t it, you wily Topshop Visual Merchandisers!) my eyes scanned a table of rainbow-dyed shorts (of which I am insanely jel of anyone who can pull these hot pants off without flashing their arses) and locked my retinas on this incredible studded bag casually placed alongside (and a bargain at £38).

Now, if you are a fan of black, suede, studs and slightly watered down for main stream Goth-inspired accessories, such as those Steve Madden slip-ons I reported on a few weeks back, I’m sure you will agree on how sick this bag is.  With a long detachable strap, it’s perfect for everything from after-work drinks (as a clutch, obs) and, more to the point, due to its zip lock, will make an absolutely awesome festival bag!  Big enough for essentials (phone, money, make up, toilet paper) yet small enough that you can forget about your shiz and carry a beer in both hands.

So there you go gals and boys, and I will be road testing this beast at Field Day on 2^nd June, come rain, mud or shine.  Now just to piece together the rest of my outfit…

A Rather Gothic (Press) Engagement

Last week S&TS was kind enough to send me to The Vinyl Factory to take a look at Eskimo PR’s press day. Here are my favourite finds:

First off was BlackDressHQ. As the name of the brand may reveal, this seven-month old Australian company puts its entire focus onto the legendary ‘Little Black Dress’. The idea is to bring the timeless elegance of black into one place by creating unique evening pieces, also by collaborating with designers such as Hunter Dixon and Rebecca Taylor. I don’t know about you, but I think it’s a rad idea!

Chinese Laundry’s Autumn/Winter 12 collection was all about edginess. Check out these glitter brogues with silk laces (below).  I guess the only person capable of wearing these would be a very drunk Louis XIV. Still, they look pretty cool.

One of my favourite finds was D.L. & Co. Launched in 2003 by  perfume-expert Douglas Little, this brand offers extravagant homewear pieces characterized by a decadent Ewardian feel: perfumed candles in hand-crafted containers, all decorated with diamante crosses and skulls. This particular candle (picture below) was designed so that, once lit, the melted wax would come out from the eyes. How awesome is that?

Also on my A-list is FALLOW, a Brighton based brand that believes in ‘made in Britain’ more than anyone else. Their denim is handcrafted with original Stonehenge linen and their deerskin patches are branded from a local Sussex Blacksmith. The results are these stunning denim waxed raincoats with leather inserts and unique deerskin gilets with a 70’s feel.

A small area of the venue was dedicated to technology and gadgets. My favourite was this mini-camcorder designed by Fabien Nauroy, an amazing substitute of the common post-it.  Say you wanted to remind your roommate to buy milk or wash the dishes, instead of writing it down you could actually record a 3 minute video. It has a magnetic back so it can be attached to the fridge and it costs just under 50 quid.

Prepare to wave goodbye to trousers forever with LaDress.com

No, no, calm down, I’m not advocating a return to pre-21st century inequality, where women who wear trousers are deemed a disgrace to the female sex. But when you see the myriad different styles of dress for sale on LaDress.com you might suddenly find you’re a born again frock fanatic too.

I almost didn’t make it to the LaDress launch last Wednesday evening. I had a harrowing journey by bike from my office which involved getting caught in a hailstorm, sheltering outside the ICA and half falling off my bike, resulting in a big fat bruise on my shin. When I struggled to find the St Martins Lane Hotel (what is up with that, when they make posh hotels almost invisible with no clear signage – are they trying to dissuade the hoi polloi from dropping by unannounced?) I almost gave up and went home. But I’m glad I didn’t.

After an impromptu full-body blow dry using the hand dryer in the toilets to try and get rid of the residual evidence of rain and hail I made my way to the event room, which was beautifully decked out with vases of roses, and grabbed a passion fruit cocktail – well-deserved by that point, I think you’ll agree.

So what’s LaDress all about it? LaDress by Simone, to use it’s full title, is an e-commerce site that specialises in, you guessed it, dresses. Minidresses, maxidresses, shirt dresses, wrap dresses, formal dresses, casual dresses – you name it, they’ve probably got it. Fabrics, mostly silk, jersey, cotton and wool, are premium so price points are too, starting at £125. Simone van Trojen, the brains behind the business, is a former corporate high-flyer and mum of two who noticed a gap in the market for a one stop online shop for that most versatile of garments.

Dutch-born Simone (the sort of lady who inevitably gets described as ‘impossibly glamorous’ a lot) launched the site in the Netherlands in 2006 before expanding to Germany and it’s now available in the UK for the first time, hence the launch party last week. Stylist Aradia Crockett (how cool is her name?) was on hand to talk through a rail full of LaDress pieces that work the upcoming autumn/winter trends. I was eyeing up some very cool pastel shirt dresses, but I have to admit we got slightly off topic when Aradia told me she’d recently got married. Obviously I had to ask about the dress as research for bride-to-be Sophie Caldecott – it was Alberta Ferretti and sounded divine.

There was also a huge rack of dresses on show at the event for guests to basically play dress up in. There was lots of oohing and ahing as the assembled press and bloggers twirled and posed in front of the mirror in their chosen frocks. I like to think I was channelling Michelle Williams in this ladylike red number I tried on (what do you mean, ‘as if’?).

Before I left I got a real treat: I was able to choose a gorgeous LaDress of my very own to take home. You might think bloggers get this kind of freebie all the time but let me tell you we don’t! I chose the chic three-quarter sleeved Gabrielle style, as seen in the photo below, in a demure dark grey. I’ve already worn it for work twice when I’ve had important meetings and it made me feel super grown up (yes, I know I’m technically already a grown-up but you know what I mean). As a firm fan of androgynous style I won’t be giving up my trousers just yet, but Gabrielle could well lead to a resurgence of the dress as a workwear staple.

Check out the huge selection of dresses, now available to order in the UK, over at LaDress.com.

GUESS who is celebrating their 30th birthday?

This year, iconic denim brand Guess is celebrating a commendable thirty years in the fashion business.

OK, I’m not going to lie. When I first heard I was being sent to an event hosted by Guess I was rather dubious. The company’s often overtly sexual ad campaigns are just a little bit too wild for my taste. As a result I had previously – and rather foolishly – dismissed the label altogether without really giving it a chance. So you can imagine my surprise when I and fellow S&TSer Naomi were spoilt for choice as we waded our way through the latest Guess Marciano range (more on that from Naomi soon).

We found their watch selection equally impressive with even more variety. In amongst the traditional gold and silver designs was their new, younger, fresher – and cheaper, all under £100 – Guess Micro Mini collection, which provided an unexpected  and very bright colour pop from mint green to fuchsia pink.

Other funky watches on show were their rose gold and leopard printed aluminium designs – an exciting and cutting edge patented technology exclusive to the Guess brand. I was lucky enough to take home this fabulous electric blue version with the subtle bit of bling around the clock face.

I also found out at the press day about a competition Guess have launched to coincide with their 30^th birthday, aimed at aspiring bloggers around the globe. Entitled ‘One to Watch: A Global Blogger Search,’ the aim is to find the next contributor to the Guess Access Blog – a great platform considering the fact their Facebook page alone has around 1.2 million fans. Starting this month, hopefuls are expected to create a profile based on their personal style and fashion preferences, promoting it through various social networking sites in a bid to gain as many style points as possible over a period of 90 days until September 2012 when the finalists will be revealed. It’s refreshing to see such a well-established label take a keen interest in young, talented writers by potentially giving them that much needed stepping stone in the vital early stages of their careers. If this sounds right up your street check out the Guess One to Watch Facebook app for more details.

Coming soon | On The Road and The Great Gatsby

I’ve got got goosebumps from watching this magnificent trailer for On The Road, Walter Salles’ adaptation of Kerouac’s classic novel, and I can’t wait to see the trailer for Baz Luhrmann’s version of The Great Gatsby, set to be released in cinemas in December.

I recently wrote a piece about literature and fashion for the Alliance of Literary Societies‘ annual members’ journal. You can read the full piece here, but here’s an extract:

The fact that the 20s and 50s were post-war eras of economic boom in the US (in salient contrast with our own time), where decadence, along with a certain frenetic energy and nostalgia for the past marked the fashion trends of the day, makes the two heroes of these classic novels doubly attractive to the fashion world today. Imitating the style of those decades is a kind of wish fulfillment, escapism, precisely because of the financial depression we now find ourselves in. Luhrmann’s new film of The Great Gatsby will be in 3-D. However you feel about 3-D cinema, it just goes to show the extent to which the director wants to push the aesthetic world of Fitzgerald, bringing the textures and colours alive. The visual element of Fitzgerald’s work has always been important, and this year sees his aesthetic influence reaching from the page to the screen and onto the catwalks and viewers – or readers – themselves. Fashion is, in many ways, the physical embodiment of ideas, of an ethos.

Fitzgerald’s descriptions of Gatsby’s parties evoke images that are incredibly familiar to the fashion world: ‘the air is alive with the chatter and laughter, and casual innuendo and introductions forgotten on the spot, and enthusiastic meetings between women who never knew each other’s names.’ It could, after all, be a scene from any London Fashion Week party. The Jazz Age and the Beat Generation portrayed in The Great Gatsby and On The Road may be solid enough visual cues to draw the fashion industry into imitation, but their philosophy and their heroes remain tantalisingly out of reach; the ultimate fashion icons, in fact. They are awful in their moments of degradation: when John Galliano was exposed for making anti-Semitic remarks last year, no one in the fashion world knew how to react. We never actually want to see through our heroes, because in them we see what we might wish to be – they represent precious ideals.

High fashion, then, is the communal stamp of approval upon something that must go on to become a very personal quest. Fashion is simultaneously something that is, and is not, learnt. Gatsby’s gypsy butterfly girls flitting from group to group in their ‘gas blue’ silks and pearls are on this personal quest, chasing something elusive on the spray of champagne. Sal and Dean are on this quest, catching a glimpse of America as they wind down the windows and make love to the night as it pours in over the dashboard, lifting their sweaty palms in an ecstasy of rhythm as the trumpet player blows his heart out in a grimy club. It is something you can’t ever quite put your finger on, but you know it when you see it. The worlds of fashion and literature have this great Aesthetic Mystery in common.

Don’t step on my blue (spiked) shoes

 We all know the drill.  We read the same recycled, rehashed advice dished out by every fashion editor every time girly, dainty trends hit the runway. ‘Toughen up your feminine look with a masculine bag…warrior style shoes…armour-type jewellery’.  Ladies, and gents for that matter (we are never the type to discriminate) we know you know this.  And we aint idiots are we.   But sometimes, these ‘tough accessories’ cant be taken to extremes.  The ongoing jewellery trend which has bombarded the UK high street over the last few seasons sees disturbingly larger and larger knuckle duster-style rings adorning the daintiest of hands.  And I’m sure must have done some serious damage in late night cat fights up and down the country.  However, the current trend that seems to have infiltrated the market and trickled down from the upper echelons of luxury (Louboutin, I am referring to you, good sir) seems to be based on medieval torture tactics.  I am of course referring to the super spiked shoe trend which is fast taking over.  And I’m not talking stiletto here.  Everything from loafers to  ballet pumps, Mary-Janes to skyscrapers, now come adorned with a full-on smattering of spikiness.  It was Christian Louboutin’s Rollerballs back in 2009 which kicked this off (which are still available for a cool £765), and now the likes of everyone from Steve Madden to Jeffery Campbell have taken it upon themselves as self-proclaimed ambassadors of the Chokey style trend (remember the Chokey, from Matilda?).

Despite personally loving the trend and seriously contemplating blowing a week’s budget on a pair of the Steve Madden gold STUDLYY’s, I cant help wonder if anyone has been seriously injured by stepping on someone’s toes yet.  If you are also keen on this look to ‘toughen up that dainty summer dress’ or do as I would and rock your inner Kate Lanpher (grown-up grunge babe alert) good old Topshop are also jumping on the bandwagon (in a range of colours and for the bargain price of £28), albeit watering the style down slightly for those of us scared of impalement…

Five Signs You’re Getting Too Old for Heels

1. You keep your Jimmy Choos/ Kurt Geigers in the box.
If all your purchases end up in a shoe shrine, never to see the light of day, you know you’re too old for heels. Any self-respecting teenager buying their first statement shoe would scuff those bad boys within hours of handing over the money.

2. You’d rather eat the latest issue of Vogue than trade shoe collections with Daphne Guinness
Heels can turn you into a power woman but flats are the best way to play it cool – dress down trend-heavy outfits with flats and you’ll feel a lot less self-conscious making your big entrance.

And you get to tsk tsk at Daphne Guinness for clinging to banisters as she teeters around in ever more ridiculous shoes. Just think what that poor woman’s feet must look like.

3. Your toes are a wreck from wearing “simple” black Havianas to parties when everyone else is in stilettos
Summer’s a great time to give up heels – or maybe just vow to stick to wedges wherever possible. I’m also a big fan of wearing black raffia sandals on nights out.

OK, they’re basically little better than flip flops but you can wear them with everything. Good for: the beach, the park and running across cobbles looking smug.

4. Those Sunday morning knee grazes are starting to annoy you
It used to be funny wobbling into gutters and twisting ankles on the stairs. But according to some (no doubt) pretty unscientific research quoted in Avril Mair’s latest Beauty Extremist in Elle magazine, 40% of women admit to having had accidents because of their heels.

What does the ordinary fashion ed do then? Simple, wear heels when you know you’re getting a cab to and from wherever you’re going and sit down a lot when you’re in them.

Blue brocade pool flats, Christopher Kane SS12

5. You like ‘haute casual’ footwear like these Christopher Kane abominations
If a talented British designer combines comfort with well, flowers it must be fashionable right? Wrong – but do use this kind of design to your advantage when you’re championing the merits of flats to the Amazon in the 5 inchers towering above you. Acceptably stylish flat shoes include ballet pumps, brogues, leather sandals and even plastic jelly shoes when combined with high fashion underwater-themed outfits. But not these.

Main image: Faraz Pourreza-Jorshari

Emma Yeo and Corrie Nielsen’s millinery precision

At the Forward PR press day a couple of weeks ago, Katy Spry discovered that a pair of designers, both tipped as definite ones to watch, have produced a collaboration that’s doubly desirable.

It all started just over one year ago (cue ghoulish background music). First, there was a Royal wedding. Then came the wedding guests, which led to the inevitable crazy hat parade. More often than not they turned out to be horrendously ill-advised head sculptures – most certainly not fit for a queen – as opposed to actual hats. However, some ladies, such as the ever stylish Mrs Beckham, got it spot on. Her classy attempt, a simple yet inventive little black number, temporarily redeemed the reputation of the hat on the day, so all was not lost.

My point is, ever since the Royal Wedding served to thrust the art of millinery back into the spotlight, hats have been big news on planet fashion. So much so that Grazia magazine created a competition to find Britain’s next generation of avant-garde hat designers called, ‘Grazia’s Hat Factor’. Out of almost 100 hopefuls, the panel of judges – which included the two main Brits synonymous with innovative headgear design, Stephen Jones and Philip Treacy – managed to whittle down the number to six runners-up and the winner, Sophie Beale. I was lucky enough to meet Emma Yeo, a Central Saint Martins graduate and one of the runners up at the Forward PR autumn/winter press day, where she was more than happy to chat and show me her impressive creations. They were formed from laser cut styled wood or plastic where the skeleton structure was then encased in duchess silk.

Yeo created her collection in collaboration with up and coming London based designer Corrie Nielsen. Corrie has received a lot of attention due to her recent London Fashion Week autumn/winter 2012 show (which Katie attended in February). That collection was also showcased at the Forward event and I was able to grab a few minutes talking to the talented lady. Despite winning the coveted ‘Fashion Fringe’ award back in 2010 this is fast becoming her break out collection. Entitled ‘Vestarium Scotium’, it came about as a result of Nielsen drawing inspiration from her roots which after doing some investigating, she discovered were Scottish. The tartan and traditional Scots dress influence is plain to see; here are two of my favourite pieces.

The Florida-born designer told me how she was thrilled about the positive reaction she had received from Scotland. It was recently announced that she has been nominated for an award by the prestigious Scottish Fashion Awards for ‘Best Use of Scottish Fabric by an international Designer’, up against the likes of Mulberry. Due to take place next month, the winner will be determined by a group of judges including the extremely influential fashion writer Sarah Mower. As the British Fashion Council’s Ambassador for Emerging Talent, if you want to get anywhere in the industry then, to put it simply, you need this lady on your side. Here’s wishing Corrie all the best.

You can buy Emma Yeo hats on LoveHats.com. Visit Corrie Nielsen’s website.

Temperley London | Renaissance robes and bridal gowns

While doing the rounds at the autumn/winter press days recently, Naomi got up close and personal with Temperley London‘s winter and bridal collections.

Having already reviewed her recent collaboration with Barbour (read about it here) as well as  being a fan of her work, I was quite excited to see what this young designer – her label was born in 2000, which is no time at all in fashion years – had in store. When designing her next collection, Alice Temperley reopened her old Royal College of Art sketch books, taking inspiration from the religious paintings and tapestries of the Renaissance Movement. Embroidered satin, velvet, taffeta and floral prints are mixed with heavy gold brocades, giving the whole collection an opulent and multi-textural feel.

ALICE by Temperley, the designer’s more casual and affordable diffusion line, pays homage to a host of French style icons. 1950’s necklines à la Brigitte Bardot, oversized knitwear and beautifully finished leather jackets worthy of Vanessa Paradis’s wardrobe, are brought together by a simple monochromatic color palette, with black, white and smokey grey taking the lead.

Also, take a look at these lovely cashmere scarves, specially designed for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee.

As you all may know by now, one of team S&TS, Sophie Caldecott, recently got engaged  Ever since then, the rest of the team have been snapping up invitations for bridal press events and keeping their ears to the ground for anything wedding-related that could inspire our very own bride-to-be. I decided to lend a hand by snapping my two favourite wedding gowns from the Temperley bridal collection. What do you think Sophie?

Fun and frolics at the Batiste Dry Shampoo launch

Last Wednesday me, Katie and our good friend Olivia (from tellusfashion.com) were lucky enough to attend a very plush affair hosted by Batiste Dry Shampoo.  To celebrate the launch of ‘Lace’, the latest edition to the ever-growing dry shampoo range, we were treated to a variety of girly treatments; think grown-up slumber party style, with mandatory champagne!

Already being a dry shampoo fanatic (I carry an emergency can of Batiste’s ‘a hint of colour’ at all times darling) this was an event I wasn’t going to pass up on.  With the venue being decked out with manicure stations, a photo shoot area, a make-up room AND a mini hair salon, it was every girl’s dream. Oh and did I mention the insane cakes on offer topped off with edible mini Batiste cans?!  Katie made a bee line to get her hair ‘did’ (and no, she didn’t choose this look for herself!) while myself and Olivia received incredible manicures.  And don’t you just love Olivia’s nail polish colour?  An unusual mix between grey and purple…grurple perhaps?

We were even lucky enough to receive amazing goodie bags, obviously with a courtesy can of ‘Lace’!  Being dubbed as the ‘grown-up’ of the range, ‘Lace’ takes inspiration from vintage embroidery and romantic elegance (two massive recurrent trends at the moment, for which we are still thanking Kate Middleton’s wedding dress a year on!).  Oh and yes before you ask, it smells DIVINE.  Lace, and the rest of the Batiste collection, is available from Superdrug and Boots stores nationwide for £2.99.  With a price tag that appealing, no wonder they have been going strong for the last 30 years.  So whether you need a refresh in-between washes, or do what I do and use it volume too, why not give ‘Lace’ a test run?