Halloween

I think this is really more of a "look" than a proper costume, but here I am as Snake Plissken. This year's costume was inspired by an article (treatise is perhaps a better word for it) my friend Mr. M. had written about Escape from New York (and yes, I am aware that the above still is from Escape from L.A.). I am one of the few people I know who has been forced to wear an eyepatch for legitimate medical reasons, and I must say they're not as much fun as they should be, but I managed to get by alright for a few hours with severely limited depth perception.

If you are in the Echo Park area this Sunday night come out and see my band Auto Da Fe supporting the always awesome Rats on the last night of their Echo Curio residency. There will also be a local crafts open house featuring Automatic Sweetheart, Poppyabout and the debut of my new accessories line daswunderkammer.

This is a new sweater from Target that my mom bought for me in order to bribe me into grading papers for her textile class (hey, I never put any restrictions on accepting gifts or bribes of new clothing).

I've worn everything here before, but I like the way the combination of these two shirts turned out. It almost looks like a waistcoat.

I find it hard to believe I haven't really worn this Topshop T-shirt yet this year. I mean, I have technically worn it, but looking through the garment thread photo archives, I only ever see it peeking out at the hem of an outfit. Thus far, it has been used as an undershirt and never worn on it's own. So today is it's moment in the sun.

Once again I have proved that if you hold onto something long enough it will eventually come back into fashion. I bought this shirt at a thrift store several years ago and though I've always absolutely loved it, it never seemed to be the right top for the occasion. Well, today I headed out to the Hello Kitty exhibition at Three Apples gallery and if there was ever an excuse to don this shirt, it was this event.

I was feeling inspired by Automatic Sweetheart's forays into her mending pile and decided it might be time to tackle my own. I bought this skirt at a thrift store a couple of years ago even though it was a few sizes too big. Today I finally resized it which (as it is a wrap skirt) basically entailed moving the buttons over an inch. Actually, if you look closely, you can see that I've only moved two buttons (one on the inside and one on the outside) and still have 3 more to go. The shirt is from the Jovovich-Hawk Target line. I keep forgetting how comfortable these shoes are, so I don't always chose to wear them. They are from Office and I could probably spend all day on my feet in them. Later on in the evening I added a pair of blue tights to this outfit which I sadly neglected to document.

My mom bought me this sweater from one of those mall-type department stores (J.C. Penney's I believe it was). It has an unusual trait of being very cozy, yet simultaneously not very warm since its made of cotton. Today I've dressed it up with two of my vintage copper bracelets and a pair of boots from Office.

I was feeling very scruffy in this outfit and didn't even plan on photographing it until I received some very nice compliments from one of the patternmaking students about how great my style is and how I've got a very Euro casual thing going on. Perhaps he thought I have some say over his final grade (I don't). Ulterior motive or not, it boosted my spirits immensely.

Of the two pictures I took of this outfit, I like this top one better. I think the skirt hangs nicer and, more importantly, I think I look better (though this is perhaps debatable). The only problem is the above picture cuts off my feet and todays shoes were an integral part of the look, so I am including my outtake photo so you can get a peek at them. Given that I have had a hard time accessing the unworn bits of my wardrobe lately (and trust me I am nowhere near finished wearing everything), this outfit is something of a triumph as none of it has been previously worn this year. The top is Diesel, I don't really remember where I bought it except to say that I only ever buy things from that brand when I'm in Britain. The dress is from American Apparel, and is intended to be worn as a strapless bubble dress. It looks pretty horrible on me when I've tried to do this. I've had much more success wearing it as a top and today I thought I'd try it out as a skirt. The shoes are from a little shop on Colorado Blvd. in Old Town Pasadena that Mr. C. took me to. I attempted to wear them earlier in the Summer, but found a black widow spider and her young living quite comfortably in them. Sadly, I had to displace the mother and abort her unborn spiderlings by means of the vacuum cleaner. Needless to say, I did not wear the shoes that particular day and it has taken me a few months to get up the nerve to put them on my feet.

I've worn this H&M dress before, but I had a last minute job interview and needed something professional in a pinch. The belt is from Automatic Sweetheart and so, in a sense, are the sun glasses, but only because R. of that particular line gave them to me. The bracelet I bought at the Lotus Festival when we played there last Summer.

I find that I have been wearing entirely too many pairs of jeans lately and came up with this outfit as a much needed antidote. I always refer to this as a bubble skirt, but I don't think that's necessarily an accurate description. I picked it up in Olympia, and though I'm not sure where I got it, I do recall that it figured heavily in a 80's themed outfit I wore once to a party. The green Eddie Bauer sweater is the first and only article of clothing I've ever owned from that company. I plan to add a bit of beading around the neckline, but for the moment I've gone with this bow tie instead. This is actually just a long thin piece of jersey that I found in my fabric pile and tied on. Those with sharp eyes will recognize it as the same fabric I used to make this dress. I guess subconsciously it might be inspired by the fact that American Apparel have been selling bags of their scrap fabric to the public, which I guess is a cool and eco thing to do, but you've got to be a real chump to pay $8 for a sack of jersey scraps.

This shirt received it's share of compliments from my patternmaking students today. It reminds me quite a bit of another shirt I wore earlier in the year, also a hand-me-down from my great aunt. As you can see, the waist-length shirts of the 60's don't quite work with the low rise pants of today, so I had to bridge the gap with a tube top (worn here as a waist cincher) from Hot Topic.

Moments before this picture was snapped, I got heckled by a car of passing teenagers. I guess it is somewhat funny to see someone posing in front of a freeway on ramp. Though you can't see it too well, this coat is from H&M by way of the Oxfam shop on the Ormeau Road. I haven't been to that particular shop in many years, so I'm not sure if this is still the case, but one used to be able to buy all sorts of H&M seconds there. In fact, until a few years ago it was the only place in Belfast to buy H&M clothing (nowadays I question why that would be exciting, but back in 2003 it was a big deal). This coat is a bit of an anomaly, it's long and shaped like heavy Winter wear, but the material is actually quite lightweight. It did not serve me very well in the UK where they have proper seasons, but it has come into it's own in Southern California (where we like to dress up for the Winters, but don't actually need to).

Finally some colder weather!!! This jacket is from the Richard Chai Target collection. I honestly hadn't really heard of Chai before his collaboration with the bulls eyed giant, and I didn't really think I was going to be all that into the offerings. Surprisingly, I ended up buying several pieces. I just love these rain boots! I bought them from Dumpster Values many many years ago.

I was worried this outfit was a bit too monochrome, but thankfully it doesn't seem to read that way in the picture. I have so many of these 70's polyester button up shirts, that I think a massive clear out is due. I'm not even sure where I got this one from. Underneath, you can see an H&M tank top that I bought in Glasgow (though why I bought it is something of a mystery to me). I was thinking of converting it into a dress, but more likely I'll just get rid of it.

I had completely forgotten I owned this top, which is too bad, because I could have really used it during the Summer months. I have a real dearth of light weight yet long sleeved tops suitable for warm weather. This one, I'm pretty sure, comes from my great aunt.

There are several new things going on in this picture (new to this space at least). First is my coat, which was once my mother's coat and if I am to understand correctly, it was the one she used to wear when she was pregnant with yours truly. It's a lovely full 1950's swing coat, but it doesn't have any closures on it, so I spent the majority of the night pulling it tightly around myself. Our next newcomer is my bracelet which I bought on holiday last month. It was £4, and I simply can't resist peacock feathers in whatever form they may take, so it was added to my collection. Lastly we have the sweater, just barely peeking through here. It's from Banana Republic and is short sleeved and very very soft (5% bunny hair).

I have been accused in the past of taking "moody" pictures for this blog and I think this one is perhaps the "moodiest" of them all. Please forgive me for the lack of detail shown here, I was in a bit of a rush and after 5 attempts, I just had to let it go. My blue sweater is from London, and I love it so much that last year I had to put it out of sight for awhile to give my other sweaters a chance to shine. It has only recently come out of exile. The shoes I have worn already this year, but they didn't manage to get photographed the first time around, so let's let them have their moment now. I'm not sure when it happened that I became the sort of girl who buys lots of shoes. I know that all girls are supposed to be crazy about them, but until recently I only ever bought around 2 new pair of shoes a year (okay, that might a low average, but the point is that I just didn't purchase shoes in the same quantity that most others girls I know did). This year I have purchased about 8 new pairs, including these patent leather wedges which are terribly uncomfortable, but awesome looking. I don't think I'm going to tell you where these are from, because if you are a regular reader you will already know that I buy almost all my shoes from one of two shops (Office in the UK and Urban Outfitters in The States).

Here I am hard at work on this blog with a flowered hair band from Anthropologie on my head.

I love these new Free People boots. They are so cozy and comfortable that I think I shall wear them all through the Autumn. The shirt is one I bought at Topshop a few years back. It's a L, which is a size I don't normally wear, but at the time I was heavily influenced by an article I had read in UK Vogue where the author talked about how she always chose clothing several sizes larger than her in order to get a unique look to them. For myself, I usually find that wearing clothing several sizes too big makes me look even skinnier (it took me most of my teenage years to figure this out), but in this case, the shirt probably looks better for being a bit looser.

More job hunting today. I have on an Anthropologie top, a Free People skirt, House of Holland tights and shoes from Miss Sixty.

Okay, so I may have had a few pints before deciding to climb the roof of this fast food establishment. As you can see I am clearly very enthused about being up there. The black sweater (the same one as below) I bought at a vintage clothing store in Buffalo NY when I was 16. I almost lost it my freshman year of college when, in a fit of drunken bravado, I lent it to my friend B. (I should probably explain that it was the middle of Winter in Olympia and neither of us were properly dressed for a night out). She then left it at a stranger's house. To her credit, I eventually got the sweater back several months later. These days it is missing all but two of its original buttons, but otherwise in good condition for the amount of wear it has gotten. It also has an odd old-fashioned shape to it. I think it wants to be worn over some serious 1950's corsetry because it is very tight at the waist and full on top. The brown shirt is another from my great aunt.

This is the sort of thing I wear when I don't leave the house all day.

Today I was job hunting at some of the more fashionable stores in the area, so a bit more effort was put into this outfit. Actually, that's a bit of a lie - this was a pretty effortless combination. I found this See By Chloe dress at T.K. Maxx in Belfast (and can I again state how much better the selection is over there). The colours remind me of a creamsicle. I couldn't seem to properly capture the intensity of these blue tights. Of all the shots I took, this picture gives the best idea of it. This is another pair of tights that I don't actually remember acquiring, they just showed up in my tight drawer one day. I do rather love the idea that my tights might be multiplying while my back is turned.

You can't really tell here, but this sparkly green sweater-shirt has irregular stripes - the kind you get when knitting with variegated yarn (you can sort of get an idea of what I'm talking about if you enlarge the picture). I usually hate that effect, but I really like this shirt. It once belonged to my great aunt and, truth be told, I had forgotten of it's existence, so this is a lovely little bit of buried treasure that I have unearthed here.