Fashion

Red White and Blue

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Dress: Joy | Necklace: Joy | Shoes: Dorothy Perkins | Bag: TK Maxx

Yay for Summer. And hurray for Summer Sales. I bought this dress from Joy for a bargain price (and it’s still available online here). I love the scooped back, (scroll down for a pic) it’s the perfect dress to keep me cool, yet covered.

Stripes always say ‘summer’ and ‘seaside’ to me… so of course I had to buy an anchor necklace to complete the look (also from Joy and available here). I’ve just booked my summer hols – to Corsica! I can’t wait to get back out to the med and enjoy a week by the sea. I’ve never been before so I’d love to hear any tips you guys have…

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Happy sales shopping! x

Longer Length

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Jacket: Zara | Scarf: Purchased at a craft fair | Dress: ASOS
Tights: tightsplease.co.uk | Boots: Debenhams
Unimpressed Cat: Not for Sale

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The tall blogging community recently got very excited when ASOS launched its tall range. A lot of brands associated with ASOS followed suit and there’s now a great range to choose from. Just before the range launched ASOS drip-fed some items into it’s stock and I spotted this longer-length dress – it really is the perfect length for me. Usually I have trouble finding waisted items that sit right with my body proportions – but no such issues with this dress. If you’re 5’10” or over I’d definitely check it out. My cat might not have been too impressed but I was.

 

Red Is The Cure

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“Red is the ultimate cure for sadness” – Bill Blass

I don’t know much about Bill Blass but that quote seems kinda sums up this week. Whenever I’m having a trying time of it at work I like to compensate for my lack of confidence in myself with an outfit that says otherwise. This one works a treat.

I bought this Mango shirt in the January sales and it’s one of those rare purchases – the kind where you wish you’d bought two just in case you wear the original out.

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Shirt: Mango | Jeggings: Marks and Spencer (longer length) | Boots: Debenhams

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Butterflies

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When I turned 24, I spent my birthday visiting a castle in Wales, and in the garden they had a butterfly house. It was honestly one of the most magical places I’ve ever stepped inside, the butterflies floated around lazily on soft currents of warm, tropical air and everywhere you looked there was colour, grace and beauty. The image of a butterfly just spells out spring/summer to me – so here are my picks of the best butterfly prints out there.

(Clockwise from bottom left)
Butterfly print dress – Yumi £22.50
Butterfly print top – Oasis £18
Body wash – Anna Sui (via ASOS) £16
Watch – Olivia Burton (via Topshop) £95
Butterfly print scarf – Oasis (via ASOS) £16
Butterfly print cardigan – Warehouse £40
Butterfly mesh top – Anthropologie £68
Scent – Anna Sui (via ASOS) £31

Swift

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It’s no secret that I am a bit of a swiftie. A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to see her live in London. I’d been mooching round the city in the daytime, and had worn the dress below. It being the ‘Red’ tour though, everyone else at the concert was dressed to match the description (and accessorising with fairy lights!) … Anyways I was bemoaning my lack of Taylor-appropriate attire to my sister, when she quite rightly pointed out that I hadn’t missed the boat at all – I was wearing swifts.

So now I love this dress even more. Here’s how I dressed it up recently for a family meal out.

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Dress: Warehouse (Via ASOS) similar here
Tights: tightsplease.co.uk
Shoes: Next
Clutch: Textile Federation via ASOS

And the concert? It was pretty incredible.
Here’s short clip I filmed of Emeli Sande performing ‘Next to Me’ with Taylor Swift.

 

Sixties Shift

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I’ve refined my shopping habits in recent years and most of the things I buy these days tend to fall under the labels ‘classic’ and ‘timeless’. And this fits the bill – in fact when I looked at this photograph I thought ‘if it was in black and white, you might wonder if it had been taken in the sixties’.

The dress is a favourite, it’s heavy fabric – so perfect for winter – but it’s not overly warm for office-wear. And I’ve been enthusing about Charnos tights for ages – as I have quite long legs and these are the only brand I can find that fit me perfectly and don’t slip throughout the day.

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Dress: GAP | Bag: Accessorize
Tights: Tightsplease.co.uk (exact ones here)
Boots: Marta Jonsson at Debenhams

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Bouclé

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Before I sat down to do this post, I didn’t actually know what Bouclé meant. I knew what a Bouclé jacket looked like of course – but not what specifically made it that. Turns out it’s not the cut or the style, but the yarn (or, as Wikipedia called it the ‘novelty yarn’). Anyway the point is, that yarn is a lot warmer than you might expect, I was pretty toasty when taking these photos.

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Jacket: Miss Selfridge (similar here)
Top: F&F (buy it here)
Longer-length Jeggings: Marks and Spencer (indigo)
Boots: Primark
Statement Necklace: via Luan Matthews

Winter Rocks

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This has got to be one of my favourite places in the world, and only a few minutes drive from where I live. Though strangely, I don’t visit it that much. It’s such a spectacular view that I think if I went too often, I’d stop appreciating it as much.

But every now and again I’ll just jump in the car and go. Luckily, this time around I had my sister with me who very kindly took these photos – it was so windy I think the tripod would have blown over if I’d tried to self-shoot!

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Coat: George at Asda | Jeggings: Marks and Spencer | Boots: Debenhams

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Quilted Jumper: ASOS

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Bag: Aldo

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Mango Remembered

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So as it’s the season of office parties – I mean Christmas – I’ve been digging through the archives for things to wear, and I remembered taking pictures of this little gem of a dress, which I bought at the end of the summer. I love the unusual shape at the front of this dress, though I’ll probably take it a step further and dress it up with a bit of festive sparkle or a long slinky gold necklace when I next wear it.

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Dress: Mango | Sunglasses: Accessorize

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Last of the Summer Florals

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I meant to post this in August but, with one thing and another, I’m only just getting around to it. I love a good playsuit in Summer and this one fits perfectly. Sadly I had to cancel my summer hols when I fell ill earlier this month, so I’ve not been able to wear it this year… I tried making it work for winter by paring it with tights but the design and texture of the fabric didn’t really work for winter layering. It’s definitely a summer staple for next year.

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Playsuit: Glamorous
Ring: ASOS