Getting Fashionably Hitched

On the most sunniest day of the year, Saturday 18th August, my very good friend Guy got hitched to his gorgeous gal Cristina, and they, quite frankly, couldn’t have done it more perfectly. It was a very stylish affair, both work in fashion and Cristina’s taste and eye for detail is just glorious, a London wedding of pure sophistication! Cristina’s Italian roots meant she opted for the utterly beautiful St Peter’s Italian Church on Clerkenwell Road. I had heard whispers of this church that was simple from the outside and amazing inside…jeepers, I was gobsmacked by it….divine. Cristina looked faultless, arriving in a black cab, her 1950’s style dress was immaculate, with a pink frothy petticoat and hot red patent Jimmy Choo peep-toes. This gal sure has style.

Both the church and the reception, which was held at Chandos House, London, were pure decadence. Stunning. Cristina’s palette of vintage pastels for her flowers, were complimented to perfection by the sugared almond pinks, yellows and blues in the decor of both venues….so classic, feminine and pretty. It was quite possibly THE most gorgeous wedding I have ever been to, city location, utter charm and splendour and with a genuine informal atmosphere. I wore one of my most special dresses, a 1950’s dress, nude rayon with black layered lace, I teamed it with a jumbo 80’s clutch and some killer 80’s heels, and a 1930’s paste and silver bracelet. James wore a 1930’s 3 piece wool suit…he got very hot! The sun shone harder than it had done all summer, we were all very hot but very happy. We chatted, we drank, we met new friends, we ate great food, we danced and we got a cab at the end of the night, a most perfect day.

The whole weekend was pretty superb. We stayed with good friends in east London, met a dog called Archie, and on the sunday we walked and talked through Brick Lane market, Columbia Road flower market, and the streets of Hackney, under the beaming sun. We don’t have many weekends like that, it was damn good.

Congrats Guy and Cristina, may true love be yours forevermore. xx

 

Cristina’s dress from http://www.candyanthony.com

Cristina’s shoes from http://www.jimmychoo.com

Guy’s suit from http://www.paulsmith.co.uk

The Prim Girl’s dress, shoes, bag, bracelet from http://primvintagefashion.com

Most perfect London venue http://www.chandoshouse.co.uk

 

 

Allo Darlin’, I Love You.

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I have gone and fallen hard and fast in love, I’m that kinda girl. The object of my mass affections is the band Allo Darlin’. They rock. I only stumbled across them a few weeks ago and their music has literally not been out of my ears since…..I found their first self titled album from 2010 and adored it from the very first moment, then oh my goodness, they just released their new album; Europe. I didn’t think I could love any album more than the first but, now I have two albums that make me wanna jump up and down ever so high, yay.

Elizabeth Morris has a gorgeous velvet voice and the lyrics are the cutest and most sincere darn words, gee whizz, I wish I could be in their band.

See and hear more at allodarlin.com

Print-cess Mary Katrantzou

Mary Katrantzou walked into the room wearing head to toe black. For a woman whose fashion designs are known for pioneering bright, fussy, intricate and vivid print, I was kinda surprised that she was dressed so plainly. I liked the contrast though between the images her name conjures up and the simple dark silhouette she commands when in front of you. I went to ‘An Evening with Mary Katrantzou’ at the Fashion and Textile Museum, as with the talk by Pat Albeck, this was a small informal group and Mary chatted about her career in fashion design. She spoke of how happy she was that finally print in fashion was shifting and evolving and women were becoming more open to wearing print as well as all black. When questioned why she herself was dressed in all black, Mary replied ‘All year round I wear the same, a black A-line skirt and a black long sleeved top, I’m known for it, I am not known for wearing print. When you are constantly creating and working with colour and print, you need a plain uniform to counterbalance it. My flat is as plain as it gets, all white walls and wooden floors, nothing else.’ I like this, I think it would be pretty crazy if her whole life, every aspect, was about prints and colour, the dissimilarity between her work and home life must keep her sane.

Greek born, Mary studied in the USA at Rhode Island School of Design and then went on to St Martins where she completed her BA and MA. Her original interest was in architecture, then fabric, and then she moved into fashion. ‘Once you start working with the body, a 3D figure- everything changes. You never know how a pattern will look and change on the figure, the way it swings, the way pleats hang..’ she seemed to have been really fascinated by how her print designs could take on a whole new form through shape and movement. Once you work with the female figure ‘you become a fashion designer’.

Mary’s fashion designs are all about print, when she first started, it was stilll early days of digital print, she taught herself Photoshop and still, today, it is the only programme she uses. In her Graduation show, she had 9 dresses, all identical in silhouette but with different intricate and bold prints. Mary confesses that she is not able to pattern cut herself, she works completely on the model. Her interest in architecture comes into play as she adds the fabric to the model, shapes it so that it flatters and hangs as she wants it to, her dresses have a real sculpted, and architectural element.

Mary loves women, she knows women and she designs for women. She chatted about one of her earlier collections where she took items that women coveted but couldn’t physically wear, like perfume bottles or vases and put them in print form on a dress, enabling the woman to wear what she loves in a new form. I love this concept. It has a real tongue in cheek element as well as being utterly beautiful in itself. Some of her dresses are pretty surreal and abstact, quite sci-fi too. But, a woman after my own heart she says, ‘It should be as viable to make a dress a woman can treasure and collect and wear once, as it should be to make a dress a woman can wear 500 times’. Oh yes, dresses aren’t always things to be worn over and over, they can be purely an object to love and adore for it’s form and beauty.

Three of Mary’s dresses were on display for us to look at; the first is a really cute and kinda futuristic sculpted shape, different sections and fabrics with contrasting prints, she told how her inspiration was to take elements of ornamentation from different countries and cultures; tapestries, florals, vases, and put then all in one dress……very gorgeous and pretty wearable too.

This next dress has so many elements, the mixed layers of raffia, silk, canvas and beading mixed with the different prints make it a really stunning piece…

This last dress is my favourite, plush velvet with different prints, the colours are really vivid and Swarovski jewels have been hand-applied to excentuate the colurs…beautiful!

Twas a lovely few hours looking at lovely dresses with some lovely people, Mary said how thrilled she is that her dresses are worn by women from ages 25 to 65, ‘and they all wear them equally well’. 

For more information visit www.marykatrantzou.com