Apologies+A Sighting!

Sorry for the unexplained lack of posts this past week, I've been away in Mallorca and only got back yesterday at midnight or so. Then at midday today we're heading off for a lovely British beach holiday in Suffolk. Yay. Unfortunately I will have no computer there either so you'll have to last another week with no posts. A downside of the summer I'm afraid.

A VERY exciting thing that happened yesterday on my flight back-I was sitting at the deserted gate, having got there early because I had no interest in browsing through duty free for the billionth time, when a tall skinny woman with white blonde hair and a lovely Chanel back walked up and sat down on an adjacent row of seats. I did a subtle double take, and yes, I was in fact sitting three metres away from Claudia Schiffer!! This reduced me and my family to complete star-struck giggling wrecks right through until we cleared customs and she cleared off. Ah well. I never pretended to be sophisticated.

Interestingly, despite her beauty and immense height, with her jeans and sunglasses she managed to look completely anonymous. I've always thought that wearing sunglasses is a stupid way to ward off unwanted attention but I might have to rethink that opinion.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince

I saw the latest instalment in the Harry Potter film franchise today...I was so excited and man was it good! All the actors were actually good for once (except the guy who plays Malfoy, who has been Oscar-winning good the whole way through and showed a range of emotional complexity in this film that actually got me thinking, for once, which is something I never thought I would take away from a Harry Potter film, entertaining as they are) and the balance between all the hilarious romantic antics in the first half (I always thought it was unrealistic that in a co-ed boarding school there was never any kissing going on in the background of shots. I loved the part near the end which showed a group of students in the cloisters all making out in the shadow of the night. Classic.) and the drama in the second half (I even welled up at Dumbledore's death. Again, something I never thought I would get from a H.P. film. Oh, wait, sorry, spoiler alert, attention attention yadda yadda. Like there's a living sould on this planet who doesn't know how the plot turns out. Except from my mum, of course, who came out of the cinema (yes, I did go to the cinema with my mum...and my two siblings...well the cinema's expensive, OK, and I'm constantly poor!) going 'oh isn't that a surprise, I must say I never thought J.K. Rowling would kill off one of the main characters...). The only criticism was that some plot details, like the horcruxes, weren't explained very clearly, but then again everyone seeing the film will have read the books...well almost...

Also, something which caught my eye-HOW ON TREND is Maggie Smith as Professor McGonagall?! Loving the next-season shoulder pads! I almost wanted to whoop and shout 'work it, girl!' in the cinema, but then...I decided...no.

Sminty Fresh

Last month, a particularly bad one for me in money terms, I decided that in order to continue satisfying my insane addiction to mint I would have to buy a sweet that I couldn't finish in one sitting. Smints, although they cost more than your average pack of polos, are much smaller yet stronger, so I rationalised that they would last me longer, therefore costing me less money as well as being better for my teeth.

Sadly, I rationalised wrong. This month, a particularly good one for me in money terms, I have merely fed my mint addiction so now I must either have a Smint every 2 minutes, or failing that a polo every 15 seconds. It's bad. Stoopid attempts to economise. They always end up backfiring.

Poppiholla

I have actually found my number one summer tune ever. I'm not even joking, listening to this makes me want to cry because of all the ideas of perfect summers it evokes. This should be top of my 25 Most Played in approximately 5.3 hours. LISTENN.

Poppiholla (Radio Mix)-Chicane (via YouTube)

Red for Rebellion

Every time the holidays roll around I have a ritual nail-painting ceremony. During the term I only wear clear nail polish (at rare intervals) because my school is fanatically obsessed with everyone having clean nails. Painting them as bright a red as possible is just another way to remind myself that I have freedom from the hellhole for two whole months.

I Love...From Spring 2009

I have a box which I keep all my magazines in, and when it begins to overflow I take out the oldest ones and cut them up. Now that the holidays have come I actually have time to stick them all down somewhere. This is a collage of some personal favourites which I've accumulated over the past month or two.

(I'm still trying to work out how to get bigger pictures-I think you can view a bigger size by clicking on the photo though)

Dreaming of Balmain

My current number one must-have item is a stripy, Parisian-style knit, preferably cashmere, and preferably this Balmain one. I admit to having shamelessly jumped on the Balmain bandwagon in the past year or so, but then so have a whole host of designers (a year ago Balmain was the only one doing ridiculously high shoulder pads, now it's one of the main trends for this season) so I'm in good company. I love how the runway shows pair the glitter and glamour of tops like these (and of course the famous jackets) with casual jeans and flats. It's the kind of style I aspire to but will doubtless never achieve *sigh*.

Couture Fall '09-Jean Paul Gaultier

The theme of this collection was old silver-screen Hollywood sirens, and it worked. OK, so it was one of the more RTW-couture shows rather than blowout-fantasia, but the whole collection just oozed luxury. Some of the dresses were so utterly Oscar-ready it was unreal. All in all, not a collection I fell head over heels in love with at first sight, but rather one that worked its magic gradually.

One question though-why was the model wearing the last look wearing iPod earphones? Very strange. I was watching the video (because seeing stills is completely different to watching how the clothes move-plus I am always fascinated by watching models sashay gracefully down the runway wearing shoes that I can hardly stand in) and for the first half of the runway she was accompanied by 2 techies in black holding her hands-call me old fashioned, but isn't that a slightly strange practice for a couture show? Hm.

Eleanor Hardwick

I stumbled across this photographer in one of those long random internet blogging searches where you jump from blog to blog and then forget how you got there, which is always annoying if you want to return to one of the pages at a later date. Turns out she's only 15, which makes me feel totally jealous and inadequate for not having produced such atmospheric, haunting photos too. You can see more of her pictures here, but below is a selection of some of my favourites. I will definitely be following her in the future-her photos have a strange, ethereal quality a little like Tim Walker's, but there's an ominous, even menacing undertone in lots of them. I felt inspired this afternoon to do some photography of my own, but it totally failed when I realised I was really only interested in shooting people, and had no willing subjects to point the lens at. So I read Vogue instead. Anyway, here are some of Eleanor Hardwick's awesome photos.

Couture Fall '09-Elie Saab

My first reaction to this collection, even before I had clicked open the first thumbnail, was how similar it was to Chanel's last season couture, being solely in white. Hm. Just a tad awkward for Mr Saab in that it made him look like a total wannabe.

However. Once I actually opened that first thumbnail I was enlightened about Elie Saab's complete geniosity. WOW. I LOVE IT. SO MUCH. I admit that the 46-look collection did drag a little towards the end (there's only so many floor-length white dresses you can look at) but the level of detail was spectacular and as for the dresses themselves...well, let me put it this way-if you know anyone who's getting married and who also happens to have rather a lot of spare cash... I'm not even joking, I actually saved every single look from 14 through to the end. I found it tricky to narrow my favourite looks down to 20, and by the time I got to 15 I was having to talk myself into clicking the delete button each time in order to reach my self-imposed limit of 10. I find myself genuinely hating the models who got to wear those fantastic creations. And I'm not one of those people who tends to suffer from irrational hatred.

.

Couture Fall '09-Christian Lacroix

Before I comment on the collection itself, I should just mention that Lacroix is my favourite couture designer of all time. It's like he designs for my imagination personally. All his shows are complete fantasias of amazingness and luxury-no minimalist crap from him, he pulls out all the stops every time. Except, of course, this time. Because, as every remotely fashion-orientated person should know, Lacroix's business has recently been 'put into administration' (I quote from Style.com), i.e. he no longer has the money, the manpower and basically the means to design. This collection was produced with minimal time and money, with only the models being paid due to the French law. And yet-and yet...

It was beautiful. Talent like this cannot be supressed. Even the plainest of his clothes have that magical something-it's like fine art. All the detail and the cut and the material come together to form such wonderful clothes. I can't really articulate further than that how much I love Christian Lacroix, but a picture paints a thousand words, or however that saying goes, so just look and see if you don't fall in love with him too. (This collection was only a little longer than Givenchy, but I sure had no trouble finding 10 looks I loved enough to post).

Couture Fall '09-Givenchy

Well, I've just given up on fantastical couture because it's quite clear that it's totally dated and a stupid notion to hold dear. Ho hum. Well, on with Givenchy. I'll say one thing-it was short. Couture is basically a synonym for exclusive, so a forty-something long collection seems a bit of an oxymoron to me. So five stars to Tisci for that aspect at least.

Clothes-wise, it was a bit kooky, I suppose, and I remain indifferent. Some nice features but definitely not enough to persuade me to put 10 pictures up as I have with the other shows. I liked the long veils and the hoods a lot, they were pretty cool, but weird face-jewellery? Can't see that one catching on anytime soon.