Tampax VIP Swishing party, London.

Last night I was one of the handpicked blogging gang invited to London's PUNK in Soho to attend a swishing party on behalf of Tampax and 1000 heads. I along with my lovely friend Maria travelled up to the big smoke from Brighton with our 5 pieces of clothing to swap for 5 pieces of someone elses wardrobe. Upon arrival we were met with a lovely glass of bubbly, showered with the tastiest nibbles, cutest cupcakes and girly cocktails were available throughout the night.

Swishing is fast becoming the new shopping. It is a great way to refresh your wardrobe and it is of course FREE! I have been to a few swishing events now and each one has been different. One was a free for all and you could take what you liked, another event was organised with a points scheme.
At lastnight's Tampax event we simply had to bring five items to swap for five items. It was so much fun, there was a flurry of anticipation and excitement before it started as there were just rails around the room so we all had enough browsing time. The only danger was if whatshername wanted the same piece as you!

We also had access to a fabulous stylist Liane who assists Mademoiselle Robot. Liane was great and was trying to get people to swap for items they might not normally buy. I think it is important to push fashion and I thought this was excellent advice. I am guilty of getting too comfortable with my fashion and style choices. For some reason when a woman hears the word FREE CLOTHES something happens...possibly a chemical reaction. All the what's and but's that usually happen in a store go out the window along with reason. So swishing is a great place to try other fashion choices without investing too much in a style. If it does not work you can just swap those unwanted items at the next swishing bonanza. So if you get the chance to swish you must do it. It is a great way to update your wardrobe, meet new people and have fun. Swishing is a woman's version of a sleepover, but far more spohisticated and with champers!

Check out my swagga!

Bloggers and Drunken Monkeys

So Friday I raced up to London to eat, drink and gossip about Twitter, blogs and fashion with my favourite bloggers and members of the Twitteratti. Shoreditch was the location and The Drunken Monkey was the venue of choice. I love meeting with these ladies and Nik...some I had met a couple of times, some just the once, some I had never seen in the flesh, but stalked on twitter. You get the picture.

We ate Dim Sum, drank cocktails, danced to Snoop Dog and sang along to Vogue whilst striking a pose. "One flew over the cuckoo's nest" was also playing on a TV in the background. (surreal). This was not just any other night out. This was a bloggers night out.

You would not be the only one to think that these nights mainly consist of business card swapping, mass tweeting and text speak. LOL. I am here to tell you otherwise..far from it.

I have met Fi from SaveOurShoes & Frankie from SwellVintage only twice before our Friday gathering, but every time we meet we end up giggling till something hurts and start chatting about small kittens in bags, vintage and life.

The thing that always surprises me the most from these meetings is how refreshingly nice it is to talk to like minded people about what you are doing and trying to achieve, where you want to go, be and how to do it. Everyone is really supportive of one another and surprisingly so. You hear stories all the time about bloggers behaving badly and there is nothing worse than meeting a blogger who you idolise only for them to be rude and disappoint you, but this has not happened to me yet. Fingers crossed it never does.

It was great to see Jenny from TheStylePA...whose blog I read daily and so upon meeting Jenny I waved rather too enthusiastically as if I had known her for years. Luckily for me she waved back...I am pretending that she knew who I was instead of just being polite to a crazy lady. (me).

I finally met Alex from AlexLoves who I follow on Twitter and blog stalk...she is officially awesome. If you are not following or reading all about Alex then I will need 140 characters on why on earth not? Dang the girl can dress to impress too...I was lucky enough to meet her in her very new and colourful My Sugarland dress. (Jealous). Alex also brought a fabulous friend along called Kate who runs FabricOfMyLife and now I don't know how I have lasted so long without Kate's blog in my life. Have a **look **

Other blogger powerhouses included the stunning Reena Rai from FashionDaydreams the best looking blogger you will ever meet. Nik Thakkar from Mediacation who can dance as good as he blogs! Kristabel from IWantYouToKnow, Lira Leirner from ThePortmanteau who was wearing one of her own designs!!! I also got to stroke Lucy of SnippetsOfShinyThoughts new Mulberry bag whilst shaking our tail feathers on the dance floor, but I was gutted I never got around the table to chat with the fabulous Tor of FabFrocks :(. Also spotted was Mariana from Sketchbook who lucked out and had to share my room in the ever so glamorous Shoreditch Travelodge and the lovely Katie Antoniou of LondonPlinth fame.

With planning for the next bloggers night already underway I cannot wait to meet the creative writers, fashion designers, journalists and stylists behind these great blogs again! Who knew meeting strangers could be so good?

A Summer Dress

Anyone would think I had got confused and thought I was a fashion blogger of sorts...especially if you have read my last few posts; Louis Vuitton this and Gossip Girl that. Honestly I will try and get back on the beaten vintage track after just one more fashion post!

Now I don't know if its just summertime or the 70% off sales or the fact that autumn and winter looks are just hitting the high street ready for A/W2010, but the streets have started turning into catwalks. Everyone is looking swellegant at the moment...well not everyone, but the majority are pulling out all the stops and making it look easy.

For example this photograph of Drew Barrymore in NYC. (I had to look twice). I am used to seeing Ms Barrymore looking more rock n roll/scruffy, but here she is sporting a fabulous floral frock teamed with simple accessories and FABULOUS shoes. This is the way to do it.

A dress is great for summer, its lightweight and glamorous. Wear with flat shoes for skipping around town and wear with high heeled peep toes like Drew for cocktail hour.

London Fashion Weeekend and it was on 3!

I was one of a few fashionable blogger types invited to go along to London Fashion Weekend on Saturday the 27th, courtesy of 3mobilebuzz. As you know I held a competition earlier in the week as I was also given a spare golden ticket for a reader. (it was not gold). Lovely Lindsey Roberts WON of @Be_gorgeous fame and we both put on our glad rags and travelled 50 mins to London, the Big Smoke!
Our mission was simple: we were given free phones to tweet on and that is what we did...all day. If you follow me on Twitter you would of had a very noisy but fashionable feed as I tweeted about everything I bought, saw and ate at Somerset House. I was given a HTC Hero phone, which took some getting used to, but if you like gadgets and nifty handheld devices then you will love the (super) Hero phone on 3mobile.

Lindsey @be_gorgeous & I @natashabailie at LFW. This pic is stolen from @swellvintage

When we arrived at Somerset House and met all the other bloggers who by the way are all my new BFFs. We all agreed that the first port of call had to be the Luella stand. When we got to Luella we quickly forgot that it was not even 10am and and soon realised we had the stand to ourselves so as you imagine it became our very own candy shop. Most of the gals bought Luella Handbags for a fraction of the price! It was pure heaven. See the ladies below with their Luella Swagga. They may have saved Luella? No?

Carrie @wishwishwish, Frankie @swellvintage, Lindsey @Be_gorgeous, Sarah from 3mobile, Fi @Saveourshoes and Michelle @3mobilebuzz

After Luella and many other stalls where Fiona tried on every shoe and Frankie bought a Buddha we skipped on over to the main event: The London Fashion Weekend Catwalk!

The whole day was so much fun, but I cannot get over how much fun I had with all the girls that I was lucky to be invited along with. They along with the the lovely broads from 1000 heads and Sarah from 3mobile made my day. We were all so tired but did not want the day to end so finished the day quite rightly in Covent Garden with some crepes. Where we vowed to do it all over again next year. So all limbs crossed this will not be my last blog post.

For more catwalk pics or more LFW pictures please go have a butchers at my Flickr page HERE. 

If you want more gossip from our weekend you should visit all the bloggers blogs to see what they have to say about it:

Swell Vintage

WishWishWish

Wolf Whistle

Save our Shoes

Pretty Much Penniless

Unicorn Katie

Be Gorgeous
Ooh I also took some video which will be coming very soon....walk, walk fashion baby!

BNTMLive2010 for Motorola Flipout: Vintage Geek Chic!

It is hip to be square dear readers...you heard it here! Last weekend I was asked by Motorola Flipout to style a model for the Geek Chic catwalk at the BNTM Live event at Excel in London.

Along with five other fabulous bloggers we dressed, styled and talked on the Kiss Catwalk at the BNTM event all about our look, the clothes,  the accessories and our inspirations behind our model's threads. I had to come up with a vintage geek chic look so naturally I decided to go 1950s (obvious?) I chose the original Sandra Dee as my inspiration mixed with a little Mad Men's Peggy Olsen circa first series.

Frankie from SwellVintage was my vintage partner in crime and dressed her model in 70s vintage clobber, with the latest Chloe catwalk as her inspiration.

So I could go on and on about the models, their perfect skin and lean limbs, but I thought instead that I would just show you lots of the pictures. It was such a great event and far too much fun to call work. Thanks to all the wonderful bloggers, hairstylists, make up artists, stage and technical support, JCPR, models, Motorola and the woman who sung about walking in her stiletto's! It was a weekend I will never forget.

If you want to see more pictures from the weekend, check out my Flickr page and add me as a contact so you can see when I add more. Makes sense!

Keep checking the blog for the video!

 

Do you wanna be on top? BNTM Live 22-24th October!

Created by Juliana Cortes

I will be there! Come see me and the other bloggers listed above on the KISS catwalk every day talk through our styled geek chic looks. It looks set to be a fabulous fashion weekend! Visit BNTMLive for more details and how to purchase tickets.

Geek Chic at BNTMLive...it's Hip to be SQUARE!

Based on the hugely successful reality TV show Britain's Next Top Model, BNTM Live is to be brought to you this weekend by Motorola FLIPOUT. The event held at London, Excel promises to "immerse you into the world of the BNTM lifestyle". It looks set to be a HUGE fashion event!

"Get up close and personal with the BNTM girls, watch one of the stunning 45 minute catwalk shows and enjoy the rest of the day in the wonderful world of our shopping haven.  Bursting with the hottest fashion, beauty ‘MUST haves' and exclusive advice from the experts, it's a gloriously glamorous day out." -BNTMLive

I along with five other fabulous bloggers and stylists have been handpicked to style and present our take on GEEK chic courtesy of the lovely people behind Motorola's Flipout! I will be presenting every day across the weekend with my fellow Vintage queen Frankie Murray from Swell Vintage. We will be showcasing our styling talents and presenting our take on Vintage Geek Chic on the catwalk.

Other bloggers include Jenny from TheStylePA and Reena from FashionDaydreams who will be presenting in the High street category. Super stylish Matthew Zorbas from UnNouveauideal and Alize Morand are styling the high fashion category for their geek chic catwalk. As you can see I am in some fine and very stylish company. So what is geek chic?

Come find us at the Kiss Catwalk area to find out!

As well as all the fabulous fashion shows, the place will be full of models (always great to stare at as they graze), BNTM girls, celebrity hosts and guests, make up stations and lots of shopping.

Buy Tickets to BNTMLive!