Saturday 13 February 2010

Pretty dresses

I want this dress:

Ditsy corset lace dress, Topshop, 40 quid.

Ditsy Corset Lace Dress - View All - Dresses - Topshop

Going into town tomorrow to try it on!

Oooooh, just been checking their site and they also have this dark pink lace up sundress for 35 quid:

Lace Up Sundress - View All - Dresses - Topshop

Stay tuned for the verdict!

On an incredibly exciting note, Anthropologie (my soul's clothes live there) have a shop on Regent Street in London! Have to stop by when I'm going to uni open days.

I'd say more, except I'm full from eating a rather wonderful dinner (pasta with spinach, oyster mushrooms and spring onions cooked in butter and salt) and will either watch a few more episodes of How I Met Your Mother, or haul my ass into the cold and watch some Inglorius Basters. We all know which one I'm gonna pick ;)

Toodles xx

Friday 12 February 2010

The Ballad of Czolgosz - Assassins

Incredibly, insanely, insufferably obsessed with this song at the moment: 'The Ballad of Czolgosz', from Stephen Sondheim's musical 'Assassins', as sung by the one and only Neil Patrick Harris. Fell in love with it the second I heard it, and just can't stop listening to it!! last.fm says I've exceeded my limit and won't let me play it anymore....today. Hah. Have no fear, I shall return!

And it's not just the song, it's NPH's voice as well! He sounds amazing. It's just such a catchy, upbeat tempo with simple and rhythmic storytelling lyrics, and so much fun to sing.

Meanwhile, a lovely person has uploaded the NPH version up on youtube:



Stephen Sondheim in a freakin' genius. Have a listen - I guarantee it'll get stuck in your head :)
Damn, I wish I was a Broadway musical star.

"Some men have everything
And some have none,
That's by design..."

Thursday 11 February 2010

Today's ensemble

The most deceptive weather of all time: sunny with clear skies...but bitterly cold with an icy breeze every few seconds. It's so deceiving and confusing. It's cold, so you want to bundle up, but it's sunny, so you feel stupid wearing too many layers as your brains tells you that the sun is out and you should be wearing a dress!
Grr.

Solution? Compromise. The two-fold weather means that you can experiment with the sweater dress craze. So while you're craving summer and keep eyeing those flimsy sun dresses, replace that need to wear a dress with warm, thick, woolly, knitted dresses - they'll keep you warm and the knitted fabric will give you a casual but sophisticated 60s look for the modern day.
Grey's been my choice of colour lately, it's not as severe or standard as black, and adds a subtle elegance to a casual look.
Swap the stiff and restricting skinny jeans for soft, black wool tights that'll keep your legs warm and feeling slinky as well. With a knit dress that's monochrome and quite plain, I'd jazz it up with a pair of sexy, lace-up, long black boots.


As for a coat, either a black or grey coat would work, but I'm sticking with my grey mac - it's simple, classy, with a touch of Bogart, but with a feminine finishing.

Sidenote: I live in Brighton. I shop in Brighton. More specifically, I shop in the North Laines, which is a Bohemian haven for independent stores and funky little shops that sell one of a kind outfits. Therefore, I have to resort to finding online versions of my clothes (which drives me up the wall; also, my camera is shit, so taking pics of clothes is currently a no-no). But luckily, the items I've put up today are pretty awesome faithful representations of the clothes I am actually wearing right now! :)

So there you go: my outfit for today. xx

Wednesday 10 February 2010

Clothes dilemma

Yes, I know I promised a whole series of clothes revamp extravaganza, but I've been so stressed out with uni stuff that I haven't been able to just chill out and do some sewing and photoshopping. After next week, I'll be done with MA uni apps, and then...well, then I have 2 essays to hand in, but we all know I'll procrastinate by putting up those dress ideas I had oh so many weeks ago.

To make up for my laziness, I will instead coax you into forgiving me by posting stuff from my early days on Polyvore. Before I realised I could create crazy artsy stuff, I used Polyvore for its primary function: putting together outfits. My sister has managed to recreate her entire wardrobe on Polyvore sets, creating a 'Cher from Clueless' style online wardrobe.

I, on the other hand, found that tedious (half my clothes are from the North Laines. they don't have online sites to clip pics from), and opted to create outfits that I'd love to have.

Exhibit A:
For the last few days, the weather was being quite lovely and I was able to go about campus wearing this ensemble:



Skinny jeans with comfy shoes, long and soft cotton tank top that's jazzed up with a few accessories, a hat and a compulsory scarf to keep the chill out and my trusty Mac. A perfect, casual student look, right?
(Note: I own variations of all those items. Except the belt. I don't do belts).

But then came yesterday, and it started SNOWING. Again. Therefore Exhibit B came into place:



Cold weather means I can get more creative: laced-up high boots to keep the ankles warm, skirt with pleated tiers (volume=warmth)and a black n white striped long sleeved top to add a touch of Tim Burton-ness to a freezing, drab, wintery afternoon.
(Note: More layers were involved. And I don't own a leather jacket).

I can't decide whether I want it to get summer-hot right now, or let it snow just a few more inches so I can play in the snow. To honest, I wouldn't mind if the snow settled. Just for a while. A short while.

For now, I'm gonna slip under the comfiest thing in the world: my duvet.
xx

Tuesday 9 February 2010

Mothgirls & Candledust

I did once say that I was going to explain Mothgirls. The time is now. Although, to warn you: I don't really have a concrete definition. I can tell you how it came about. I was thinking about stuff like Dust (from Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials) and Stardust (Neil Gaiman) and how I wanted to create another element close to that to go into my own stories.
So stardust, cosmic dust, angel dust, (there's Dustfinger from Inkheart), magic dust, shiny sparkly shimmery things...but they were all too obvious, too...shiny. I wanted something subtle.

I've always loved the imagery of a moth to a flame. That juxtaposition of attraction and danger; something so delicate and beautiful like a moth dancing around a fiery fatal flame, rebellious and frantic and hypnotic.

And there it was: candledust. The world itself rolls off your tongue softly. The subtle hard 'c', the tumbling 'ndle', ending with the barely substantial 'st'. The word itself conjuring up images that are as fleeting and wispy as, well, as candledust.

And then there were mothgirls - exotic yet subtle, mysterious and strange, they weren't pretty flashy butterfly girls...they were darker, more sublime, made you suppress a shiver creeping down your spine.

Mothgirls and candledust go hand in hand. They're born of it, they live with it, play with it, make love with it, and eventually, die into it.


Monday 8 February 2010

For Aseema

So when I was in 8th grade, I used to take the bus to school. I had my own clique of friends and we used to sit together, usually at the front (the rowdy boys sat at the back). There was this one girl, who would always usually sit at the front as well, next to the window. She was small like me, quite quiet like me as well, but she seemed more aloof than just shy. She always looked impeccable and tidy, with her hair tied into a pony tail and she had really clear skin that looked super smooth (her hands are smoother. Seriously, they're like silk).

We never talked (she thought I was a snob, I thought she was a quiet loner), until one fateful day. Now, I only vaguely remember this. I always thought that we first bonded over Roswell, and how we seemed to be the only two people who liked Michael Guerin over Max Evans. But she claims that we first talked about Harry Potter...something about Ron and Hermione. I can't remember, I'll have to ask her again.

Then we found out that we both loved Buffy the Vampire Slayer. And that, ladies and gents, is when we both abandoned our own set of friends and ran off together into the sunset.

Okay, well, it wasn't sunset. And we didn't run, cuz, please, we had a bus. But we did forsake our other friends to be with each other...all the time, unfailingly, devotedly, emotionally, spiritually, physica- okay this is getting out of hand. What I wanted to say was, simply, that I found my best friend that day.

We'd spend the entire day sitting next to each other in class, on the bus, and then when both went home we picked up the phone and called each other right again. There never seemed to be an end to all the things that we could talk about. I remember one time, during summer vacation (we became complete hermits then), I called her up in the morning while watching TV, and turns out we were watching the exact same movie: Reality Bites. (Oh yeah, Troy Dyer). I think we had the phone to our ears for nearly an hour, both watching the film silently, til we realised our phone bill was probably going to hit the roof.

And then there was the time when I fell asleep in her lap during PE. And she fell asleep through one English class and one Physics class, where luckily, both teachers noticed but didn't say anything :)

One of my best memories is of her French braiding my hair on the bus every morning. I used to have really really long hair, and she'd love braiding it. Although it would get quite tetchy cuz she'd hit my head and pull my hair whenever I moved (we were on a bus, of course I wouldn't be able to stay still!!), but damn, those French braids were awesome.



We were with each other for only 3 years, which sounds insane cuz it feels like I've known her for years and years. Like we grew up together and knew all the little nuances and mannerisms of each other. I could hear her smile over the phone.

The last time I saw her was on June 9th, 2005. She was leaving for Canada the next day. I was leaving for England exactly the next week, on the 17th. We were both happy, in a way, because we both wanted to leave Dhaka and move on with our lives, but we were also glad that neither of us were left alone in Dhaka. Even if that meant living on two different continents. Across the damn Atlantic.

So that was 5 years ago. Man, that's just crazy. I nearly saw her again earlier on this year. I was visiting my sister in Boston, and she was with relatives in New York. We were in the same country, dammit! At one point, we were even in the same state! I was even on the way to see her! But a fucking snowstorm raged and I couldn't get pass the Massachusetts turnpike.

I love hearing her voice over the phone. That slow 'Heyy..' followed by her smile, trying to suppress a squeal. (Yeah, you know you do :P) You know, we don't talk as often as we used to, but it doesn't matter, cuz every time we do talk, it's like coming home. There's a few hundred miles between me and her right now (3255 miles to be exact), but it's like we never left each other's side.

I've written about her before for an English assignment, and man it's so easy to witter on and on about her. I wish uni essays were this easy. She just told me yesterday that she reads this blog daily. Okay, yes I don't post stuff daily, but I will now. Even if there's one reader. Even if it's just her.

So this is for you.
Happy reading.

I love you.
Twaa :) xx