Wednesday 25 December 2013

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Happy Christmas to all my valued supporters who helped to grow my blog, and to my new blogger friends! Hoping you have a joyful day and fabulous new year! May the new year bring many new creative outfits and ideas, and may we continue to inspire each other to great new heights!


Monday 16 December 2013

SO THIS IS CHRISTMAS.....

DEAR SANTA.....


If there was any truth in the story about Santa, I'd write him a note with the request to leave this beside the chimney........ and perhaps leave him a generous portion of home made cookies and ginger beer. These pieces are likely to become tomorrow's vintage items, the type of bag and shoes that the young Ms Hepburn may just as well sported. I have always liked MCM for it's timeless beauty and classic designs, and this bag is exactly the right size, and the shoes the perfect height, what more can a girl ask for? The shoes are by Michael Kors and available at neimanmarcus.com, dear Santa........I've really been a good girl this year......

Anything else girls?

Tuesday 10 December 2013

FULL CIRCLE

There can be no doubt that the charm of bygone days are revived with full skirts, hence the welcome reception of this beautiful phenomenon! I remember my mother wearing skirts as big as a satellite dish, making her look as if she was spinning around the dance floor like a whirling dervish. The volume and fullness of a full flared skirt also invokes a feeling of childhood memory bringing a sense of freedom and femininity. Some fabrics are better suited for this type of skirt as the weight of a voluminous style just gives it much more body, allowing the cloth to fall to the floor  like concert drapes. It's  also well suited to rounded hips as it draws the attention away from pear shapes and leads the eye  to the legs and the waste, with mid length skirts adding some height. It's an easy trend to style, as the simple addition of a button up shirt gives it a feeling of formality without  detracting from the playfulness of the skirt. All you need to finish it off, is to slip into the Cinderella like rock studs to make you feel like a princess. Otherwise, a pair of strappy heels or T-bar Mary Janes are just as chic, giving the look it's final edge.
 
I love these skirts for the sheer luxury of metres of fabric being wrapped around you and making me want to take to the dance floor......
 
Voile Blouse - Thrifted
Skirt - Belle Epoque
Shoes - Valentino
Neck piece and bracelet - Sass Diva
 

Sunday 8 December 2013

TURBAN TUTORIAL

I was particularly fascinated by the amount of turbans being sported at Fashion Week during September this year, and with Milan being the birthplace of style and fashion, there can be no doubt that the trend is set to spill over into the next season. It's a marvellous way of adding instant flamboyancy to any look and rather convenient to keep your hair at bay around the pool, which is exactly why I am packing a number of scarves for my summer vacation in the tropics, where the temperatures still remain around 34 degrees celcius notwithstanding the fact that it is supposed to be winter. The charming Rhoda demonstrated how to tie a turban at the Style Society event in Cape Town last week, drawing many enthusiastic crowds. The Red Chamber displayed a stunningly beautiful collection of scarves in the most luxurious silks, from bright and luminous colours to soft hues of pastels and animal prints. 
The finished look:
Position the scarf in the middle of the back of your head, now tie the scarf around your head bringing the ends to the front, giving it a firm knot:
Then take the one end and turn it in the opposite side, towards the back and tuck the end;
Turn the other end straight across your head towards the back, and neatly tuck the ends, and voila!


Wednesday 4 December 2013

SHARING SECRETS

"A fool and his money is soon parted", my beloved late father often quoted. But it's not until later in life that it makes sense, and after having made a few silly purchases that one realises that value has to meet price. I'm acutely aware of the expression when I stumble onto things in my closet that still has labels on long after it's purchase.......I still get caught in the trap of sales talk when it comes to promotions  like "Black Friday" and "Cyber Monday", both being catchwords leading us to stray from our own limits or budgets and causing us to buy things on the spur of the  moment.  I now approach it with much more caution, always considering the value that I could extract from a sale item in terms of the amount of outfits that could be styled with it.  So I imposed a little rule, whenever I buy something on sale, it has to be something that I really like and that allows me to style it in a multitude of outfits. This little jacket fell smack into the category of my self imposed rules, as a result of which I immediately snapped it up on sale, knowing that I would get considerable value out of it, allowing me to style it in numerous different ways. How else do we restrain ourselves from buying things that don't really fit our body shapes, or that we don't particularly fancy after it's found itself into your closet? Let's hear from you girls, come on, share a little secret........

 Jacket- Daniel Hechter
Pants - H & M
Shoes - Zara
Neon Peplum - Woolworths
Handbag - Thai Craft

Monday 2 December 2013

STYLE SOCIETY'S POP UP BOUTIQUE EVENT

The weekend's pop up event proved to be a great success with the delivery of Kumari Govender's 3rd instalment of her pop up boutique  during which local talent was promoted exhibiting their garments and accessories.
The event was held at the charming Victoria & Alfred Hotel at the waterfront in Cape Town. Ladies meandered through the many isles of rails filled with beautiful and stylish garments, mostly manufactured locally making considerable contribution towards the quality of lives of families in the capital of the textile industry by creating numerous employment opportunities. 

The exhibition included bespoke jewellery from Rawjoy, swimming costumes by Banana Moon, exotic scarves from  The Red Chamber and beauty products by Estee Lauder. Guests were offered a mini makeover with a touch up of make up done by professional make up artists, giving us all an instant lift with the age reducing agents of the house's famous regenerating cosmetics. The two designers that caught my attention was Anneen Henze, a graduate from my fellow university, and the charming and beautiful Mushra Hartley, both displaying a keen sense of style and feeling for modern trends yet each with her own particular identity.

Above, the beautiful Ms Kumari Govender, right, with her charming sister.
The talented Aneeqah from Phi Casa, right, and her statuesque model presenting some of her collection of garments.
The talented scarf ladies, from The Red Chamber, who taught us how to do a turban, to be featured in another post soon.... 
All in a day's work from the House of Miracles..... by Estee Lauder
The creative mind behind Mushi designs, Mushra Hartley 
available at www.bymushi.com 
The well trained eye of a make up artist, Nono at work for Estee Lauder

Friday 29 November 2013

HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF

The revival of over sized coats and vintage styles is a gladsome sight as winter coats are normally made of higher quality fabric lasting you into a number of years. The only disadvantage being that I never had the strength of mind to see into the future when I was younger, and never considered keeping beautiful old style coats or storing them with care. One such piece was a Camel coloured coat with a fur collar that my late maternal grandmother wore with great elegance. After her demise, I wore it for a while, until moths manifested itself in my storage space, requiring the coat  to be discarded. With a lifetime of experience of making poor fashion decisions and purchases, I now think twice before I store things away for another season, and carefully pack woollen coats with the most environmentally friendly deterrent, being Sunlight soap, keeping the little creatures devouring your wool, at bay. I have selected a number of coats resembling a vintage style from my favourite on line store, Asos, all of them reminiscent of glory days when coats were over sized and made with fabric to last a lifetime. These few gems could become pieces that could last you a few seasons, making them worth their weight in Gold.
 
 
all coats by www.asos.com
 

Wednesday 27 November 2013

POP UP STORES

If you haven't been invited, or if you haven't booked your tickets yet, you had better log in  and reserve your place for this exciting event on Saturday the 30th November 2013, hosted by Style Society. Cape Town is no stranger to the latest phenomenon of pop up stores, and the innovative stylist and blogger, Kumari Govender, the creative editor behind this blog of note, hosts the third event representing numerous  local designers and international beauty products including Estee Lauder. So slip into something spectacular, slap on some make up, and remember, in case of emergency, apply mascara to yourself before you help others, and come and join the stylish  crowd rubbing shoulders with local designers and stylists at the uber chic Victoria and Alfred Hotel on the waterfront, see you there fellow stylistas!

 

Thursday 21 November 2013

SALUTING THE SUN

Our beautiful province has been showered with innumerate amounts of water, to such  extent that our roads are flooded, requiring a detour of 260 km to get to the sought after resort town of Hermanus, the whale capital of the world.  Finally, the sun stuck it's neck out this morning and with the faintest hint of summer, I immediately turned to some colour. Considering the fact that temperatures are still on the rise, it continues to allow long sleeves, hence my almost luminous blazer today.
 
The best style advice for anybody travelling to this part of the world in the following month, it to suggest that you pack your walking shoes, a raincoat and umbrella, a parka for balmy evenings and of course, your swimsuit. On average, the temperature normally rises to  well into the 30's after such a flood of rain, and may we just as well start unpacking the spaghetti strap tops and thongs for the sweltering heat of the festive holiday! Don't  forget the sunblock and a huge hat!
 
 Blazer - Reserved Clothing
Pants  - H & M
Tunic - Zara
Shoes - Asos
Handbag - Louis Vuitton
Sunglasses - Prada Baroque
 

Wednesday 20 November 2013

YANG LI, A FORCE TO RECKON WITH

Visiting Fashion Week in Milan wasn't all about Made in Italy, as some other designers were taking the opportunity to market themselves in pop up stores or galleries with displays of single ensembles representing some of their best.

One whose work was on display in a cubicle set up as a temporary showcase on the Red carpet running across the city during the event, was Yang Li, a man to reckon with in the fashion industry. His designs seem to be dominated with the maxi, with minimalistic trimmings and somewhat of a ethereal feel about his dreamy looking garments. The fabric had a feeling of luxury, draping heavily to the floor, worn by girls as beautiful as those seen on chocolate box covers. I took a few pictures of one such ensemble which I wouldn't have minded finding it's way to my closet...... and then I discovered his website with more of his regal looking designs.

I think this designer is a legend in the making.....
 
 
 

From the website: www.yangli.eu
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Friday 15 November 2013

BOARDROOM AND BEYOND

If deciding what to wear was my biggest stress, I'd be very cool, calm and collected. Compared to the effort required to perform my daily task at the office, the effort of dressing appropriately pales in comparison. However, deciding what to wear if you are required to attend a formal meeting at 8h00, a field inspection at 11h00 and a board meeting at 14h00, and then closing the day with another visit to rough terrain, you  have to do a little improvisation, especially having regard to the fact that you are required to move onto the next appointment virtually immediately after the other, leaving no time to slip into a change of clothes. I started off by slipping into a neat pair  of jeans with high heels, a crisp cotton shirt to balance the formality, jazzed up with a string of pearls, and a floral printed jacket which should give me enough confidence to assert myself during my first meeting where I am  required to address an audience. Wearing jeans and plain shoes with an informal top would not exactly have been appropriate, but considering the fact that the same group will be out and about doing a field inspection with me, it shouldn't take them by surprise that I am in jeans. As soon as we arrive at the location where we will be out in the open doing some navigation of rather rough terrain, I will remove the jacket, slap on a cotton hat with sunglasses, and put on a change of shoes where comfort takes preference. After that, I will put on a double breasted blazer in Navy Blue to match my heels turning the look into something  more formal for the next meeting which takes place indoors.
 
I will ruffle my tail feathers, put my hair up in a bun, all in a day's work.
 
How do you dress for a day requiring multi functional style?
 
 
 
 
 Jacket - Queenspark (Old)
Jeans - Belle Epoque
Shoes - Next
Sunglasses - Prada
Belt - Hermes
 
 

Thursday 14 November 2013

INTO THE BLUE

Finally, a glimpse of summer sun, and with temperatures slowly rising, I suppose the outfits will gradually become lighter, and perhaps a little brighter! I much prefer winter clothes, allowing you  to take shelter  in thick fabrics, with the royalty of capes and coats, snug scarves and gloves. However, the little hint of summer this morning spurred me on to find something more colourful and vibrant. Print is so versatile, and having  bought these pants a few months ago already, I welcomed the opportunity to finally slip into them, even if I still had to hold my breath doing so..... It was an instant love affair between the print and the colour block tunic which hasn't been worn yet since I never had inspiration to style it. Now, lets see if I can do something about my writer's block....... hence the short description.
 
Do ever you buy things that you forget about and then suddenly find something to pair it with?
 
 




 Pants - H & M
Tunic - Trenery
Sunglasses- Prada Baroque
Handag - Louis Vuitton
Shoes - Woolworths
Earrings and bracelet - Beijing Silver Market