It’s all Nineties Fun and Games Now, But What Happens When it’s the Noughties Turn?

They say fashions make a comeback every twenty years, so for many people (myself included) this is the first time I can honestly say ‘Hey! I had the ORIGINAL Adidas triple stripe sweat pants, and they did not look good.’  As Calvin Harris famously sang, ‘If you were born in the eighties’ or early nineties for that matter, there is no escaping the fact that nineties inspired fashions are currently the ‘in’ thing and you WILL be transported back to your die-hard Spice Girls fan days.  Been down to Shoreditch of late?  That place is nothing short of a buzzing 90s microcosm breeding crop tops, oversized denim jackets and fluoro dip dye jobs.  And while it is fun to reminisce, and appreciate that the powers that be have thankfully selected some of the ‘crème de la crème’ of nineties chic and taken inspiration from much of my beloved childhood films (Seen WildFox Couture’s SS13 look book lately?  Hello Cher Horowitz!), some it of it truly makes me cringe.  Kappa jackets anyone?  Leopard print bras and ten-inch white platforms guys?  Thanks Spicies, but lets leave some of it in the fashion time capsule for another twenty years.

While I can deal with the majority of ‘nineties-chicness’ and subconsciously channeling my inner Romy or Michelle for ‘fashspiration’, I have started to ever so slightly panic about what will happen next.  What happens when the nineties evolves to the Noughties?  After discussing this in panicked voices with a friend recently, we were at a loss as to what could possibly be made fashionable again?  Is it because the 20 year magic cycle isn’t upon us just yet? Can we not see through the mythical trend smog?  Help us Fashion Gods, we pleaded. Surely the peasant skirt with matching metallic disc belt has been banished to Hyades forever?

And then I saw an episode of ‘Date My Mate’, and every conceivable, horrific crime against fashion came flooding back in to my memory.  If you are ever after a good fashion-inspired drinking game, I insist you download the Date my Mate (yes, a low-budget street date style Trouble catastrophe)  back catalogue and shot your drink every time you spot something that used to hang in your wardrobe, which you have since blackened out from memory.  These may include, and not limited to the following:

Scarf belts

Bandanas

Bangles

Punky Fish

Pedal pushers

Baggy combats with the noticeable G String poking out

Backless trainers

Baby G watches

Yes, we have absolutely nothing to look forward to. 

Step back in time for a night | 1940s Blitz Party

We have all been there. You receive news of an upcoming party and in your excitement you begin rocking off a list in your head of all possible outfits fit for the occasion. That is, until you come across that one vital piece of information instructing you to, ‘Come in Fancy Dress’. Panic sets in as you promptly scrap your already compiled mental list in order to make way for that one simple question, “What the hell am I going to wear?”

However, this was not the case for me last weekend after I was asked along to Shoreditch for a 1940s Blitz Party in an old air raid shelter where wartime attire is mandatory. I found I could breathe a sigh of relief with this invite as most of the tools I needed to achieve the vintage look required I already had lying around. Luckily, the Forties style is timeless and you can almost always find an affordable dress resembling those from this particular era on the High Street, or already hanging up in your wardrobe. Throw on some red lippy, a cute cardigan, dig out a trusty pack of kirby grips and a lot of hairspray in order to create a wartime appropriate hairstyle and voilà, instant 1940s costume. Simple and stress free.

The dimly lit air raid shelter included two bars with smartly dressed bartenders complete with Ration Book style cocktail menus which included an array of Blitz themed drinks and fantastic wartime décor such as sandbags and old-fashioned food containers dotted around the venue. Not forgetting a live band, also in fancy dress, playing some classics from the time for you to Jitterbug along to, or at least attempt to.

It was clear all who attended had really made an effort, the men just as much as the women in their military uniforms (insert slightly immature but extremely apt ‘wink’ emoticon here). This contributed to the great atmosphere and a really different kind of night out that I won’t forget for a while so I felt inclined to recommend it to you all if you were yet go.

If you like the idea of celebrating  the New Year in a different style to the norm, 1940s style that is, then the next Shoreditch Blitz Party takes place on New Year’s Eve, Monday 31^st December. Tickets are on sale now, click here to find out more.

The Story of O-food

No, this post isn’t about some kind recipe book sequel to erotic novel The Story of O. It’s about a new sandwich shop in Shoreditch (try saying that three times quickly).

O-food is a pop-up sandwich bar on Rivington Street that originally popped up or ‘soft launched’ in August (that’s marketing newspeak for opened without a grand opening). It was the official launch last week and I went along to sample some sandwiches and find out what it’s all about.

O-food aims to bring sustainable, healthy and tasty fast food to London. How? First of all, they don’t use any meat, because it’s a highly energy intensive food to produce. Secondly, they don’t use any of the ‘big five’ fish, the most popular and over-fished varieties (haddock, prawns, tuna, cod and salmon), while the fish they do use is sourced from low impact fisheries in Kent. Thirdly, all the vegetables used are sourced from British farms, meaning they don’t have a gigantic carbon footprint from their jumbo jet flights into the UK from overseas.

Since fish and vegetables are generally lower in fat than meat, and since you won’t find these sandwiches slathered in butter and mayonnaise, that’s the healthy bit covered. As for deliciousness, having sampled several miniature versions of the O-food speciality sandwiches like the Hastings (a fish patty with romaine lettuce, tomato and gherkin) and the Portobello (mushroom, mature cheddar, tomato, red cabbage and pesto) I can vouch for the tasty factor. And they all come wrapped adorably in white paper packages tied up with string. You can also get salads, coffee and a few breakfast bits.

The shop was set up by Jens Hannibal, Daniel Flosser and Roel Philippart. The trio met while studying in London and discovered they wanted to combine their interests in sustainability and business.

‘We’re not people who think that meat-based fast food is inherently bad,’ Hannibal explains. ‘We just think that someone needs to take the lead to show people delicious, low impact, alternatives to meat and mainstream choices of fish.’

Hannibal and co have been so pleased by the response to O-food that they’ve decided to keep the shop popped up even longer so they can continue to spread the word. So you’ve got until 23^rd September to get down to the ’ditch and experience the future of fast food for yourself.

O-food, 54 Rivington Street, LondonEC2A 3QN, will be open daily from 8am to 4pm until 23^rd September 2012. Visit www.o-food.co.uk.

Drawing me, drawing you: hellohead at CARGO

I can’t think of anything braver for an illustrator than agreeing to do the portrait of another illustrator. But that’s what the hellohead charity exhibition at CARGO, Rivington Street (this Wednesday 22nd August) demands so that’s what these courageous souls have done.

On Wednesday, Rosie Shorter and Lucy Joy’s night of face related fun will run from 6pm till late and include live portrait drawing in two minutes, a pop up shop and an interactive set plus a silent auction of all the prints from the portrait-swap. All the money raised will go to the National Autistic Society and some of the portraits on display will come from NAS artists. And on Thursday, Style & Then Some favourite Zeena Shah will be running a screen printing and art workshop with Bread Collective for children with autism and Asperger’s from 11am to 2pm.

Over 60 illustrators and designers are taking part – you can see the names and work of some of the artists in the above image, from the hellohead site. If you fancy sticking your head into the exhibition (sorry) or noseying around some of the work online (OK, I’ll stop), you can find out more at the hellohead website or the event’s Facebook page. Style & Then Some will be there getting our face painted so we’ll post some snaps up afterwards.

Flight BA2012 | Fasten your seatbelts for British Airways’ new pop up restaurant

Lucky Craig White of the hilarious but now sadly defunct blog I got it at Versayce managed to nab a ticket for Flight BA2012, the latest pop up restaurant to hit East London, and he wrote us this guest post about it.

Flight BA2012 is the new high concept pop-up restaurant launched by British Airways this week in Shoreditch, to bring together and promote several strands of BA’s high-profile, high cost Olympic marketing strategy. Sounds sexy doesn’t it? Well, as flight attendants usher you to your table in the sleek mock-aircraft interior, it certainly is.

The cabin’s clean colours, sharp lines and crisply uniformed staff make you feel at once relaxed and like you’re at the start of a futuristic adventure. It’s quirky. It’s fun. And the glass of chilled champagne as you take your seat makes for a smooth take off. A look at the menu brings you right back down to earth though.

Inspired by BA’s in-flight food from around the last London Olympics in 1948, you can’t help thinking the average episode of Ready Steady Cook! would have turned out a more enlivened set of ingredients: beef, beetroot, cabbage, mashed potato, mackerel, duck egg. The futuristic ambiance of the cabin definitely sagged under the weight of the bucolic dishes on offer.

Where was the great British food of today? Is fish pie or beef topped with piped mashed potato – no matter how beautifully presented (and it was) – any way of trumpeting what puts the Great in GB 2012?

I should add that all the dishes will be served in either Business or Club Class on actual BA flights this summer, so certain technical considerations limit what is achievable. Nevertheless, most M&S pre-packed salads show more inventiveness than the frankly workaday combinations that chef Simon Hulstone offered up. While well executed, these dishes were examples of British food at its most comforting, conforming to a pervasive and persistent stereotype that British food is unadventurous and rather drab.

If British food was meant to be celebrated and championed by this menu, then it’s a British food of a bygone era. It was a trip into the past which left me feeling that our national airline is misrepresenting us. I just hope visitors from abroad manage to leave their expectations of Britain at the airport gate and discover just how adventurous and inventive we really are.

Dining seats on Flight BA2012 have all sold out, but you can still go for drink in the gallery, no booking required. Visit the Flight BA2012 Facebook page for more info.

Boxpark pop up mall, Shoreditch

Boxpark, supposedly the world’s first pop up mall made entirely from shipping containers, has arrived in Shoreditch. I work just around the corner from this new phenomenon, and have been enjoying the strange scent of freshly laundered fabric (don’t ask me why Boxpark smells like Fairy non-bio detergent gone crazy, it just does) wafting through the air as I walk down Bethnal Green Road.

The lower (ground level) section of the mall is mainly devoted to brands such as Calvin Klein, Irregular Choice, Onepiece and Nike, while the upper level has got large seating areas which will be lovely in the summer, and plenty of familiar foodie names like Frae Frozen Yogurt and Crussh. My favourite find by far, however, is the cafe Foxcroft & Ginger at the Shoreditch High Street end of the complex on the upper level, which I first heard about through Emerald Street. Not only do they serve all their hot drinks in an assortment of pretty, vintage cups and saucers, but they also happen to make the most delicious french toast I’ve ever tasted. (It’s got a honey and mustard sauce addition, which really works.) Most definitely worth a visit if you’re in the area.