A modern Laura Ashley dress

From some of my previous posts, you might have figured out that I am a fan of Laura Ashley, especially the vintage style numbers from the late 1980s, however this time I've been wearing a floral dress that is a little more recent.

This dress is fairly recent Laura Ashley, although I'm not sure when exactly it is from as I bought it from eBay (as always). I originally saw it about 5 years ago and have been watching out for it ever since. I thought the shape looked pretty flattering with a fitted waist and a slightly flared skirt. The shoulders and arms are a little big for me, but I  so regularly have this problem I've learned where to sew to fix it.

Since it is cold lately however I added a long sleeve shirt underneath the dress but I think it works okay.

I really love the colours of this dress, the shades of pink and yellow remind me of the psychadellic 60s, but with a more subtle style floral version...

I decided to wear one of my favourite beret with this outfit. The colour doesn't quite match, but I think I just about get away with it. I'm not sure I like my hair in this straight way, I think it looks better a bit curlier, but hey, we have to experiment with these things.

Finally I had to do the swish test, although the skirt is a little bit slim to get a good swirl with...

80s Laura Ashley vs. now, what do you think?

My first pair of glasses...

Now I must confess that in my time I have worn a fake pair of glasses. Not those wayfarer style hipster glasses but a pair of lovely vintage-style frames I found in a flea market... well I wore them once.But in a cruel twist of payback it turns out I have slightly weird eyesight, and I now have glasses. Real glasses. With a prescription and everything. Well, in one eye. Yeah I have freaky eyes and one is more short sighted that the other that is 20/20, I've managed to get by for quite a long time with a bit of a 'weird feeling' in one eye but the whole things was exacerbated when I started working at school and well, I need the glasses to look at the board and not get a headache. Yeah, seriously. I'm sure many long term glasses wearers are familiar with this story. I also need them for cycling and the suchlike.Anywho, I used a voucher for a free eye test from the back of an Argos receipt to go and get my eyes checked and once my prescription was handed to me, I have to decide what to do about buying glasses.Fortunately for me, I remember seeing a post on the Agoraphobic Fashionista about some glasses she got from Specspost  a super bargainistic website with tonnes of glasses in loads of different styles.I was super nervous about buying glasses since I've never done it before, but I thought somewhat naively that I know what shape sunglasses suit me, glasses must be the same right? Well I think I got lucky this time and picked up a pair of 'Geek Fashion Glasses' which I think suit me, although I will admit that the £23 price tag including lenses may have had something to do with it.Here I am wearing my new goggles:There are a few other pairs I'd like to try from Specspost, but I wasn't as confident they'd suit me so I went with a more generic shape, but I am definitely intrigues by the shuffle and the Mrs O.Do you where glasses? If so, where do you get them from?

I got my hair chopped off!!!! At Rockalily Cuts.

A little while ago I won a competition held by Rockalily Cuts, the retro specialist salon run by ReeRee Rockette. I was completely thrilled to have won this competition since I have been dying to go to this salon for ages.

I did mean I had to have a very serious think about what I wanted doing with my hair. I wanted something I could set over night and then keep out the way for the day, something I wouldn't have to worry about tying up in the lab, and something a bit 50s inspired.

I found the perfect solution in Virginia's haircut in the Channel 4 show Masters of Sex. Just the right sort of length. Here are a couple of pictures just in case you haven't seen it.

Images are property of Showtime

So I decided to go for it, get the chop. But with head stylist Lucie doing my hair it couldn't possibly go wrong (unlike almost everything else I did that day!)

I hat a wonderful experience at the salon, I would highly recommend it to anyone as all the staff were very accommodating despite me being very late and they really know their stuff when it comes to retro cuts. One day I'll go back and get a fancy up-do too I think.

Getting styled:

The in the mirror shot of the finished cut (look how straight that fringe is!):

The back:

Here is my first attempt at styling it at home:

 I'm still getting used to is, but I am having fun trying different types of rollers to set it, and researching different patterns of pin curls. If you know any good resources for this type of thing I would love to know about them!

Casual Cosplay: Clara from Doctor Who

Well, did anyone watch the Doctor Who 50th anniversary special last weekend? I know I did. I watched Doctor Who on a pretty regular basis but I stopper watching around the time the show became more about River Song than the Doctor and his assistants for reasons eloquently put into an article by my husband here. However I was reinvigorated with the arrival of new assistant Clara. But I don't really want to get into the plot of Doctor Who too much on here,  I want to talk about her wardrobe.

Image from Radiotimes.com

I think Clara's central wardrobe items are dresses, jackets, tights and boots. She seems to have a slightly vintage vibe too, maybe a little 60s with the button up blouses, peter pan collars and her parker or biker jacket. She seems to be dressed in a way that is fairly in fashion now, and I think that says a lot about how retro inspired current fashion has become... dare I say she dresses a little bit hipster (I don't mean that in a derogatory way I don't think hipster fashion is as dire as some people suggest)?

Image credit: Adrian Rogers/BBC Worldwide

So I decided to have a go. Now since I've recently had my hair lopped off I needed to wear a wig so that my hair would roughly be in a similar style. Out comes the Kerry again from Wonderland Wigs, the same one I wore for my Princess Daisy costume, I used a short vintage dress with a jumper for the below look. The dress is from the 1950s and is a lovely fine crepe fabric, it seemed a shame to cover up the rest of it with a jumper, but I don't own a biker jacket so this was as close as I could get.

I do have a black jacket similar to a parker, but it is really just a rain coat and it is very light. I thought it served for the picture but I am on the look out for a proper snuggly fur/fleece lined parker to wear while I cycle to work.

This look I liked the dark blue dresses and the shoulder satchel, I was really intrigued by the whole blazer jacket style effect. To try this out, I actually borrowed my husbands suit jacket, but I have seen some reasonably priced similar to the jacket below in Primark this season.

 Last but not least is Clara's most iconic look, the plaid dress. Tartan/plaid is so in vogue now (I do love tartan as seen here and here) in fact, I believe that Primark (yes, again) produced a very similar dress that is sold out in many stores, but they also made the dress in a few other colours, and a slightly different style with softer lines and a more chiffonny feel (see below). The check is more subtle, but I do like this alternative 'Clara' dress too.

Anywho, that's it for my Clara inspired looks. All in all they're not too different from my usual looks. But it was kinda fun messing around in the wig too. Its just a shame I don't have legs like JLC!

Which Doctor Who assistant is your favourite?

A Pearl Lowe dress, and a pre-haircut photo

Just a quick post today. A little while ago I won a competition to have my hair cut at vintage specialists; Rockalily Cuts in London. I've wanted to have my hair cut there for a while now so this is really an exciting prize for me. I have had a long hard think about what I want doing with my hair and I think I have a rough plan, but I will have a chat with the stylists so that I can get the most out of this opportunity!

Anywho, since the big day is tomorrow I thought I'd post a simple Daily Dresscapade showing the current state of my hair. In all its drab glory. I did this post on a particularly uninspired day and at about 7pm after riging my bike to and from work and just generally getting a bit dishevelled :S

Don't judge me to harshly :(

My outfit isn't too bad though. It is a standard tea dress and chunky vintage cardigan combo that I am so fond of. The dress is by Pearl Lowe for Peacocks, and I got it off ebay before the prices went a bit mental after Peacocks closed most of their shops. I really love their dresses, but it is quite hard to get hold of one for under £20 these days. My advise if you ever see one in a second hand shop would be to get it even if you're not too sure as their resale value is crazy! 

I think the bright roses on the dark background are a lovely contrast and give a very English rose feel despite being wintery.

Here it is without the cardigan:

Oh, and the hair... My fringe is in this rubbish in/out stage and the back needs some serious work to get rid of the drab. You have your work cut out for you Rockalily.

This is very much a 'before picture' hopefully I'll be able to post the after shot this weekend and be able to be proud of my hair.

Wish me luck everyone!

Casual Cosplay: An outfit inspired by Emmy Altava from the Professor Layton games

To celebrate the recent release of the final Professor Layton game I though I would do a Screen Dresscapade based on one of my favourite characters in the game Emmy Altava.

If you've never played a Professor Layton game, I would highly recommend it, they keep your brain active and are great fun in a way that Brain Training never was. The general gist revolves around solving a mystery that usually has more twists and turns than a Christmas special of Jonathan Creek and along the way you solve lots of puzzles. More importantly however, the games are incredibly stylish looking with a distinct retro vibe that takes inspiration from the 1890s-now. And lets be honest any game that features a perfect gentleman in a top hat HAS to be a winner!

Out sleuths on the case...

In case you hadn't guessed, Emmy is the one in the yellow coat. This isn't a cosplay post, so I havent' gone to town on the look, but I went for an 'inspired by' look instead. 

Instead of a yellow coat, I have a vintage yellow dress that was told was from the late 1950s when I bought it. Judging by the quality of the fabric and the cut, not to mention a beautiful lace detail on the back I am inclined to believe that its a fairly accurate date. I did however wear white tights under the dress and I wore a pair of riding style boots from Clarks. I wore a little blouse under the dress and I meant to add a pink ribbon to the neck line but didn't manage to find one in time :(

Anywho, here's the look:

This is one of my favourite dresses at the moment, it is a lovely yellow to help brighten up the cold weather and it fits like a dream! Here is a picture of me admiring the dress while wearing it... you get a pretty good view of the top of my head, which clearly is why you're all here.

Mind you, it would not be Layton without a bit of pointing. Everyone points in Professor Layton. All the time.

I've got it Professor! 

I wore a black coat with this outfit. I sometimes worry that the combination of black and yellow makes one look a bit like a bee, but I think as long as you don't wear stripes its probably okay.

I wore this whole outfit for a trip out to Battle Abbey. It was a beautifully clear day although very cold, but I had to snap a picture of the Abbey. Just look at that sky!

I also stopped off for a cup of tea at M&S. That isn't really an event in itself, but I wanted to share the tiny, tiny christmas tree biscuit! Its so cute!

Thats it for today then.

Have you played any stylish video games?

Cosplay: Luigi and Princess Daisy from the Super Mario Franchise

Aw, finally I'm getting around to posting this! I think this costume is my finest cosplay moment so far. Just in case you are unfamiliar with who princess daisy is I popped a picture below. Daisy is to Luigi as Princess Peach is to Mario, a sort of love interest for the sidekick. She has been around for a while, but it is only with the multi character Mario games like Mario Party and Mario Kart that she has started to come into her own as a character.

Her iconic costume is her yellow dress that is almost exactly the same as Peach's dress but with a few tweaks in design. I previously posted quite a bit of detail about how I manages to make the dress so I wont bore you with the details in this post.

Instead here are some pictures of the finished costume that I wore to MCM Expo: London Comic Con in October 2013:

The earrings and jewels on the crown were made using clear cabochons that I backed with white foam backing that I coloured in myself to make sure I got the colour just right. The crown was made with a double layer of craft foam that was kept in place with a hair band and copious amounts of hair grips.

The hair was the Kerry wig that was kindly provided by Wonderland Wigs that was already cut perfectly and just needed a little bit of styling to get the perfect shape and those flick side bits. I styled the wig using shockwaves hair wax and found that it was really easy to brush out so the wig lives for another day! I was super pleased with it - I will be wearing it again.

The make-up was most of my wedding make-up (from Mac) with the additions of some silly and super thick faux lashes that I got from Primark of all places (they're the same ones I wore as Gwen Stacy).

Of course being a princess, I had to give a bit of a curtsey. 

Even princesses like to play video games! (Pokemon X and Y looks amazing!)

My husband decided to compliment my outfit by dressing as Luigi! He was always the taller slimmer one when compared to the Mario Bros.

Here's his outfit, he did have a pair of white gloves too but they seem to be missing in this picture.

I made the 'tache with the same type of foam as I made my crown with and used a hi-tech Sharpie marker to colour it black.

Of course, eating with a faux 'tache isn't exactly easy...

Here is a picture of the pair of us together. I must say it was a lot of fun being a cosplay couple, were were asked if we would post for photos quite a lot :D I felt like a celebrity.

I also had my picture taken with Saffy who was organising a Nintendo meet, and dressed as a lady Mario.