Spring is getting closer...

With the sun coming out, I feel like wearing something simple but fancy, cheerful but elegant. This lead me to otome. I've never seriously considered this style, but it's such a lovely alternative for lolita now that I long for a simpler silhouette. On schooldays, or while traveling, or when I'm meeting people I don't know too well, I feel very comfortable in this cute, casual style. Of course, for 'normal' people, this style is anything but casual, and I got a lot of compliments on my clothes yesterday. It's within the range of acceptable for the 'normal' public, but still cute and elegant enough for my taste ^^

In short, I think I'll wear this style very often!

  

 Skirt: Shirley Temple

Lace collar: hand-crocheted by my mother

hair/hat clip: Paris Kids

everything else: offbrand

When wearing this, I was compared to a flamenco dancer, a geisha, and an English schoolgirl. And they were all meant as compliments :) People also seemed to excessively like my hat: one guy even said that seeing me walk in with that hat made him 'very happy'. Too bad he's kinda awkward...

Casual for college

Just a quick one for class. We had Classical Japanese which is maybe even harder than Calculus, so I figured I'd wear something cheerful. Plus, it's getting just a little bit warmer here which already put spring in my mind...I think I'm getting my love for lolita back a little, mostly thanks to these two lovely ladies: http://imperialfiddlesticks.tumblr.com/ and http://fannyrosie.tumblr.com/ They made me realize again how beautiful Classic Lolita really is.
Also, I can never not love Mary Magdalene. I still can't believe I actually own a Mary Magdalene dress, and fit it too! <3



Hmm, maybe I shouldn't try cutting my own fringe anymore...
I have a setting on my camera that's called Portrait and makes my skin look super smooth and perfect. See the difference between the two close-up photo's? I think it looks nice, but almost too fake. I don't want to seem like a girl who Photoshops everything...

And I dearly love that lace collar. My mom hand-crocheted it <3 She's teaching me, I can already make my own potholder XD

vintage without vintage

I love the style of the 1950's. It was elegant, modest and playful, but mostly: feminine. What I also like is that women of all sizes were considered beautiful. Audrey Hepburn was very skinny, Marilyn Monroe very curvy, and both were (and still are) seen as incredibly beautiful women.

from ohsophialoren.tumblr.com

from theniftyfifties.tumblr.com

I don't own a lot of vintage clothing (on the top of my head I can only think of one dress), but I do want to imitate the style. And luckily modern clothes can be used for that. It might be because Mad Men is so popular, but a lot of stores have clothing suitable for the vintage-look. The key elements are:
- skirts that sit at the natural waist, and hit below the knees
- heels
- tight-fitting bodices
- gloves and hats
- wavy hair, mostly short or in an updo

So, here's my try (though of course still with my own twist):

 

 

 Turtleneck: Promiss/ Skirt: H&M (with a small handmade petticoat underneath)/ Tights: V&D/ Shoes: Graceland/ Earrings: present from my mother, from Estonia/ Necklace: small shop in Singapore (though you can get them at Six and other jewelry stores as well, nowadays)

What I like about this outfit is that nearly everything was bought second-hand or in sales, or handmade. So, budget-vintage :D
A thing I'm a bit insecure about, is that skirts at the natural waist always sit very high on me, almost as if it were empire-waisted, which is of course a bit weird for a skirt. I have a short upper body and an ample bosom, so I'm often afraid that the skirt begins where my bust ends. Ah well, there's nothing I can do about it anyways.

Cologne

It's been a long time since my last post. I could make an excuse about being busy, or ill, both of which would not completely be a lie, but the truth is that lolita isn't that magical to me anymore. In the last 3 months I only wore lolita two or three times. Maybe it started when my grandfather died. I shortly thought about wearing black lolita to the funeral, but the idea seemed so ridiculous to me. Lolita didn't seem serious and mature enough, as if I was making a joke. I wore pants, and felt comfortable. With Christmas, New Year, and to my concert, occasions which I would otherwise use as an excuse for lolita, or at least a dress, I also wore pants. Doesn't mean I don't like skirts anymore, I definately do. But the lolita skirts and dresses are simply too much. Sure, I still like lolita, but I don't want to dress in it every day anymore. Of course I will not stop wearing it, but I think I will sell some of the dresses I hardly care about anymore, and focus on the few that I really do love. And I want to wear more 'regular' fashion as well. Vintage inspired, with little collars and skirts, lots of hats and gloves and shawls, floral patterns and polka dots, dandy, elegance... Not that different from the lolita aesthetic, but much more practical and less attention-grabbing.
I will keep this blog as my fashion blog, so not only lolita anymore. Expect some pants or not-poofy skirts soon ;)

But, to lessen the shock, here are some pictures of me in lolita, taken when my boyfriend and I went to Cologne for a short holiday. I fell in love with the city (and Germany in general). Definately going there again.

Dress: handmade by me

Blouse, hair flowers, collar: H&M

Tights, jewelry & shoes: offbrand

Spam spam spam, now I'm done :) I'm gonna adjust some of my dresses so they'll fit more sizes, and then try to sell them. Etsy perhaps? I might start a little business...

Oh, just one more picture, to show you how terrible the wind was! I had so much difficulty with keeping my skirt from flying up! Quite Marilyn Monroe-esque.

I'm gonna fly away! Bye bye~

Comfort shopping

I tried comfort shopping. It helped a little. It's especially useful to drive away boredom and endless empty afternoons, when you could have been doing homework. Well, I can't concentrate anyways.

It's very typical that I should end up with 5 books and no clothes, although I did search for clothes. I couldn't find any to my liking, and book stores always keep me entertained. If you don't care for reading, just skip the next part ;)

The top one is a Dutch book which is some sort of adaption of a very famous work of Dutch literature: The Discovery of Heaven. I don't suppose any of my followers have read it, but it's quite brilliant. This is the diary of one of the characters, whose true feelings you don't really get to know in the original book. It's written by another author, and she's really good. She really grasps the style of the original, while still giving the character her own voice. The author of the original book passed away recently, his name was Harry Mulisch. Everyone in Holland always hoped he would get the Nobel prize for literature, but he never did (I'm not surprised, actually.)
The title translates as: "Make yourself ready" and is a quotation from the original. In this case, it could have a double meaning (something which Harry Mulisch would have loved). It can mean either: "prepare yourself", or have a sexual meaning as in: make yourself have an orgasm. In that case it has a really negative sense, because it's said to the main character by her lover. It's like: I don't want to be bothered, just do it yourself. Even in the original book, it was not clear to me what exactly he meant by that, so I hope this book will give me more explanation.

Then there's The Hobbit by Tolkien, which I'm pretty sure everyone knows already. I can't wait to see the film!

And two novels by Jane Austen, naturally. I had not read these ones yet, though I watched the movies last weekend. It's Persuasion and Northanger Abbey. I'm reading Northanger Abbey at the moment, and I really like the main character Catherine. She's much more innocent and cheerful than Austen's usual heroines. I think she reminds me most of Emma in cheerfulness, and most of Jane Bennet in good nature.

Lastly, The Marriage Plot. There are advertisements for this book everywhere at the moment, so I supposed it was good. I think I can identify very much with the main character. Even our names are kind of similair. Feeling out of place in modern times, reading Austen, being very romantic and believing in true love... That could be me. I'm eager to read it!

~book talk over, back to clothes~

I also bought a lovely hat: round, black felt with a bow on the side, and a Hermes-lookalike silk shawl that I've wanted for ages, but found too expensive. It was half price now~! Long live mid-season sale. I will take pictures of those soon, or you will see them appear in my outfits ;)

And... *drumroll*

Sorry, my hair is in dire need of shampoo, I'm going to shower after I've written this.

Of course I also had to buy the adorable fawn fur collar from H&M's children's section. I've seen three other bloggers already who also have it, and I think soon everyone will have one and we will all grow tired of it very quickly. But until then, I will enjoy it. It's very warm  and was only 8 euro!
I removed the pink bow and pompoms because I thought they were a little childish and didn't suit my style. Instead I pinned on a vintage brooch.

And a quick coordination, in which I think I can survive a very cold winter:

A hint of gothic

Something a bit darker than usual, though still not really gothic. I love this blouse/ cutsew/ top, but it's so short! It's from TaoBao, so it's made for short(er than me, at least) Chinese girls. I can only wear it with high-waisted skirts, of which I own the splendid amount of 1- this one. Ah well, they do look good together. I might find a way to combine it with other skirts as well, or underneath JSKs. But one thing I am very happy about, is that the sleeves are long enough :)

Skirt: Baby, the Stars Shine Bright (Alice's Portrait)
Blouse: somewhere on TaoBao (though I'm afraid it might be an IW replica...)
Headbow (that you can hardly see): Alice and the Pirates (Dance of the Black Cat)

everything else, as usual: offbrand

And look, I made a header! I'm so proud of myself ^^ I'm an absolute noob when it comes to designing websites, HTML codes etc, so I was happy just to use the standard design. But I hope this header gives a more personal touch to my blog :)

Dress up to cheer up

Last week has been less than pleasant, so I felt really down. I hoped to cheer myself up with a solo dress-up party, because my dresses never fail to make me happy.
I do feel a bit better now, but I'm afraid there are some problems that even pretty dresses can't solve. I haven't tried comfort shopping yet, though, perhaps that might work ;)

My dear Mary Magdalene always makes me feel like a doll. I combined it with a turtleneck instead of a blouse, because it's gotten a lot colder recently.

I finished this dress last weekend. It's inspired by Mary Magdalene, but also by Christian Dior and the New Look, so I called it Christiane in honor of my idol. (I think Dior is really inspiring. I love his designs and the way he brought feminity and luxury back in fashion after the war.)

I said I would try to coordinate Sugary Carnival in a classic way, right? Well, this is the first try. I wanted to keep the sweet aesthetic, because I think it would be weird to just make a classic coordinate and slap a different skirt on it. That would be out of place and unbalanced. This blouse is actually from my non-lolita wardrobe, but I thought the soft pink matched the lavender of the skirt perfectly. I wish I had pink heels, as well.



My eyes get a completely different color when the sun shines in them.

With the same blouse, I tried a coordinate with Metamorphose's Perfume Bottle. It's a gorgeous skirt, the back especially is lovely, but it's surprisingly hard to coordinate. I don't have any gold or pink shoes, so I'm wearing those same white heels again... I always think I have too many shoes, but never the right ones! Sigh.

I guess that was it. Maybe I'm going to make a daily_lolita post with some of these...

Also! I'm going to a symposium about 'cute' Japanese fashion tomorrow, so of course I'm going to dress to the nines~ I think I'm going to wear the Mary Magdalene dress, but I'm not sure yet. Of course 'cute' calls for an overdose of pink, but I don't want to exaggerate... Any suggestions?