Contortionists, comedy horns and cocktails.

This is going to be quite a picture-heavy post as I am rather tired after quite a busy but brilliant weekend.  By force of habit, I tend to take my camera everywhere with me now and this weekend was no exception.

Hayley looking delightful

You may have seen my previous post on the Ric Rac club and how brilliant it is, so I made sure I could be in London for the circus themed bash.  All of my early costume ideas centred around face paint (to which I am allergic) so it wasn't until a couple of days before that I decided to don my best tight-rope walker/Big Top outfit (yes, I went as a tent). 

 

My outfit consisted of a gorgeous '50s sunsuit (label - "Sun fashions exclusive with Best's" - anyone have any information on them?), nude fishnets with a black seam, incredibly uncomfortable ballet pumps (courtesy of Primarché) with added ribbon and a hat I cobbled together the night before.

 

Sunsuit - vintage
Shoes - Primark
Hat - made by moi

 Here are some pictures of my lovely chums in all their circussy glory.



Much joy was had with the comedy horn

The lovely Jeni Yesterday

Sara and Russell looking splendid as always

Fleur, Bethan and Auntie Maureen during the infamous raffle 

 

As well as Auntie Maureen on the decks, there was also a fantastic contortionist by the name of Stephanie Valentine.  In the words of Hayley, "she's so bendy!"

 



My best attempt at being a contortionist!

After a lovely leisurely Sunday morning, Hayley, Katie and myself headed into town for a spot of lunch at the Brasserie Zédel and cocktails in the adjoining Bar Américain - that is, after quaffing some free champagne in Burberry, admiring some of the Great Gatsby costumes in Brooks Brothers and dancing to Trinidadian Calypso in Regent Street.  I'll do another post about Brasserie Zédel later on or this will get too long!

  

Did any of you attend the Ric Rac club?  What would you wear to a circus themed party?  Have any of you been to Brasserie Zédel?

 

A hat is an accent. It can set a mood. It can tell the world you are witty or romantic, timid or daring

Again, sorry for the lack of posting - but I have now moved into my new house and have the internet back (yay!) so I'll be able to post much more often.

Recently, I have become very interested in hats – especially from the ‘40s and ‘50s.  I’m not sure if everyone has found this, but it’s quite difficult to find nice hats in a good condition, that don’t cost the earth.  This Shop Rocks on Brick Lane has possibly one of the best selections of hats I’ve ever seen, but with the majority of my favourites being well over £100, they’re a little out of my price range.  This scarcity of hats that I could afford (and didn’t look like someone had just sat on them) led me to try and create some of my own.

Now, as I didn’t know any of the techniques or have any of the materials necessary to become the next Stephen Jones, I opted for cutting up old hats and making pretty new ones.  Here are a couple of those ‘upcycled’ (if you’ll excuse the phrase) hats and what they originally looked like.

I had to be told how to smoke in the photo of me - I was just worried about my
CC41 gloves catching fire! - taken by Russ Bell for The Chap magazine

After my fairly reckless quitting-my-normal-job-in-a-shop-so-I-can-work-for-the-Vintage-News-properly episode, I had a couple of days a week ‘spare’ as it were.  When I saw a tweet about a millinery internship, I decided that was how I wanted to spend those extra days.  The only trouble was that firstly, I have no millinery training and secondly, the internship was in London!  I didn’t let that deter me and so I headed to Battersea for my first day.

The internship is with Bundle MacLaren (who is absolutely lovely) and it's all very relaxed, just stitching away in her front room, with ladies popping in to pick up their bespoke creations.  Everyday I’ve been given something new to do – I’ve learnt so much!  So far I’ve made silk orchids, covered blocked bases in lace and silk, as well as preparing and mounting peacock swords.  One of the peacock sword hats that I made ended up on the Vogue website in their coverage of Ascot! 

 I’m taking a break for a few weeks what with the Olympics and Bundle being on holiday, but here are a few of the hats I’ve made over the past few sessions.
Oh, and the title of this post is a quote from Lilly Daché, one of my favourite milliners of the first half of the 20th century.