currently feeling 21/11

Saw this photo on AnOther. Swooned. This is everything I want currently: everything in various shades of brown (down to the sepia-ish tinge to the picture), heeled knee-high boots, maybe even chandeliers (though probably, in my case, the sort you get at Tesco Extra). Also, I'm amused at how the man at the bottom left looks like his outfit is part of the show and he's just about to jump up onto the catwalk at any second. After all, it's not a fashion photo if there's not at least something ridiculous in the frame.

autumn vibes

As the leaves begin to tumble from the trees in earnest and frost begins to spread a glittering carpet over the pavement, I too fall back into autumn traditions which are far less noble and generally consist of getting overly excited about wearing orange and feeling the urge to consume copious amounts of red wine. 

All black is also a very viable option, and amber (or amber-ish) jewellery is perfect. I don't recommend taking up smoking for autumn in order to look mysterious; swinging around a carpet bag, wearing lots of eyeliner and listening to The National should suffice.  

muliebrity by seraglioe featuring a zip back dress 

These King Kennedy carpet bags are probably the epitome of rich autumnal luxe. And these descriptions of outrageous dinner parties of the 1800s are sort of second-hand satisfying the wine-drinking impulse. See: a pie, which when cut into, reveals a whole dish of jewels, iridescent fountains and 2000 'arrangements' of fish. 

The description of the diamond miners does, however, serve as a slightly sobering reminder of how somebody had to dig up all of those beautiful jewels. I'd be quite happy, instead, to settle for a slightly more innocuous inside autumnal meal like this indoors picnic via Polkadots and Vodka Shots (the former blog of Maja Hattvang). 

When I was about 14, I had the pink-wine-and-pavlova-on-shiny-blanket image saved in a folder of pictures that summed up a life I wanted to live when cool and grown-up. Now grown-up, albeit extremely uncool, I think I could just about manage an impromptu cake and wine picnic. Donning as black turtleneck, of course, and some amber jewellery. In an ideal world, it would take place on a beautiful Turkish carpet, but I'll have to make do with my rather less lavish Ikea version - I'm no Victorian billionaire, after all. And perhaps later, post-copious amounts of red wine, we'll go for a night-time walk through swirling leaves and mist and a delicate coating of sparkling, diamond-like frost...

Back to school

This time three years ago, when I was starting Sixth Form, I was scouring H&M and Zara, trying on suit trousers and dreaming of my fantasy professional wardrobe, which, if I recall correctly, contained satchels, fitted suits, and gratuitous use of brooches. I wanted to transform myself into an 80s businesswoman carrying four phones a la Kate Beaton, or, on other days, a vintage art student. I had plans far grander than my old, boring school uniform.

Naturally, of course, my neat, pretty little skirt suits and my clicky kitten heels and my carefully-chosen jewellery devolved quickly into a uniform of holey tights, the same scruffy, paint-stained velvet blazer, and whichever pull-on dress I could dig, crumpled, out of my drawer. It is not easy to dress stylishly when you get up every morning, without fail, half an hour later than the absolute latest you should have been up.

Of course, now at university I don't have a dress code. I can rock up to lectures in pyjamas for all anyone cares (and indeed, it might come to that - I haven't become an early riser in the past three years). I still, however, love clothes that catch my imagination and make me feel like I have transformed myself. Here are some looks with blouses, pinafores, turtlenecks and brooches, to wear if you want to feel like a cross between a 70s secretary, an eccentric art teacher and the Queen.

Photos are taken in the garden by my mum, of course; it is back to school after all. (Disclaimer: the glasses are genuinely needed. See: middle photo in which I am squinting, blindly, at the camera, like a pinafore'd badger.)

Outfit 1: Shirt: charity shop, brooch: hand-me-down from my mum, skirt: charity shop, shoes: Deichmann

Outfit 2: Shirt: charity shop, pinafore: charity shop, brooch: my mum's, borrowed, shoes: hand-me-downs

Outfit 3: Top: New Look,  skirt: Topshop, cardigan: charity shop, brooch: car boot sale, shoes: Deichmann, as before

Voutsa

Hand painted mural (via)

If I did happen to be choosing wallpaper for the millionaire New York brownstone apartment of my dreams, I'd definitely be giving Voutsa a ring. I didn't think that wallpaper porn was a thing, but Voutsa's multicoloured, water-colourish designs are absolutely gorgeous.

(pictured: Octopussi, Ballet Russes Mini on Flat White, Vagina Tree)

They also do lampshades, screens and clothes, in case you wanted to emerge from your beautiful apartment in an equally beautiful outfit.

While I'm sure my landlord wouldn't appreciate me painting all over the walls, I'm sure I could stretch to a t-shirt. Maybe not vagina tree-print though...

Sunday morning vibes

Above are images from different Sundays, but both nice ones. I feel like there two sides to the Sunday coin. One is getting up early, going on a pretty walk and feeling productive. The other is getting up as late as humanly possible, eating a labour-intensive breakfast and sitting around in the same room listening to music all day. Have a cup of tea, put on a good album, hopefully bask in the sunshine and have a nice Sunday.

Adventures in Adulthood: The Moving House Edition

photo mine. it's truthful.

Moving into halls was far easier than I thought it would be. I was handed over a key, then handed over to somebody else, who walked me to my building and left me to begin the rest of my life. There were directions to the town and people in official hoodies waving signs and paperwork packs and about fifty billion emails, and even when my chair was broken and my internet didn't work, it all got resolved within a day.

A few months of living in halls, and I thought of myself as a Real Live Adult. I tidied my room without my mum forcing me to. I cooked meals for myself, and not all of them involved ketchup. (Although I did once, on a particularly grim day of essay-writing, perilously close to a deadline, buy just a packet of chicken dippers and a bottle of ketchup at Lidl. The cashier's response was 'we all have those days, don't we?'. I then proceeded to eat the entire packet. It was a low point.)

I was so very excited to get out of halls. The house I had paid a deposit for was a promised land, with a dishwasher and a double bed and peaceful nights, un-punctuated by the sound of the flat above singing Happy Birthday and banging on the floor for the fourth time this week. (How many birthdays can a flat of ten people have?!) 

Unfortunately, I didn't quite take into consideration how much students are looked after by halls staff. I live with two other girls, and none of us are stupid, but when we got into the house and saw the fridge and freezer wide open, we naturally assumed that new houses just don't have electricity. We rooted about in the cupboard under the stairs and pressed a switch, and the house alarm went off. We pressed the switch again, panicking, and the fire alarm started bleeping ominously. We decided it needed batteries, and went about unpacking with the equivalent of Chinese water torture as a soundtrack. 

Our landlord then arrived, and kindly told us that the electricity had already been on, and flicked the switch on the plug that was very obviously connected to the fridge. The beeping stopped. Peace was restored. We cleaned the house top to toe, hoovered the patchwork 70s carpets, and wiped the layer of stickiness off the kitchen counters. Thoroughly pleased with ourselves and feeling competent, we broke out the gin and tonics and settled down in front of 24 Hours in A&E (like the wild, crazy students we are). 

Then the bloody slugs arrived. There were two big fat ones slithering across the freshly-cleaned kitchen floor, and a few more tiny ones wriggling across the Artex walls. For some reason, we had anticipated everything going wrong except this. We'd assumed that naturally, the wifi wouldn't work. We'd discounted the possibility of having hot water for at least a week, and that we'd be living in the lap of luxury if the heating worked just once over the course of the year. But nobody walks into their kitchen and expects their foot to meet something plump and slimy. We had had a few gin and tonics, and we were absolutely traumatized. 

There it is: my experience as a student so far in a nutshell. Dodgy carpets, dodgy flats, dodgy food choices and dodgy TV. Oh, and alcohol, of course. 

on being long distance

image via tallulah fontaine @ tumblr

Since previous posts, things have changed. (As they tend to do when you don't update a blog for a year and a half.)

I have now moved away from my teeny tiny town in the middle of nowhere, and currently live in Manchester, which is obviously a bit more exciting. I have emerged from a year's living there so far with high expectations about public transport (there's a bus every thirty seconds rather than once an hour!!!!!), a paranoia about my so-called posh Southern accent, and a new-found appreciation for Greggs (who am I kidding, I've always loved Greggs).

I love Manchester, and how there's always something going on there. I love living away from home, and the freedom to visit people whenever I want and get in at 4 in the morning, and the technical ability to eat chicken dippers for tea without my mum clubbing me to death with the packet for cooking junk food in the house. I love living up north (everyone is friendly, it's cheap, and they call bread rolls barms which is really cool).

The only problem is that my boyfriend has moved away from home too, and now lives in, as far as Manchester is concerned, the arse-end of nowhere. The journey from Manchester to Cambridge, if you're taking the cheap route, is five hours long and involves a train and a coach: almost literally planes, trains and automobiles. It also requires money, and a lot of planning. Spontaneity is supposed to be sexy, isn't it? Sitting on National Rail Enquiries a month in advance is most decidedly unsexy, as is waking up at three in the morning to get the first train with unbrushed hair and dribble on your chin. Even less sexy is watching somebody be sick in a Tesco bag on the X5 bus and lob it out of the window into Milton Keynes Station. The X5 bus is not a place that fosters romance or elegance.

 Being in a long-distance relationship also makes me an extremely boring person. At home I was always confused about people who couldn't spend a day without their partners; being alone can be so lovely! Then I got into a habit of spending every evening on Skype talking about the inanest shit (for example, extreme interest in what the other had for tea), starting to miss my boyfriend after two days of not seeing him, and, worst of all, may or may not have fallen asleep spooning a pillow on more than one occasion.

As difficult and lonely (and expensive) as a long-distance relationship can be, however, there are silver linings. Neither the freezing walk to the train station at three in the morning, nor Milton Keynes Station, nor the X5 bus are particularly romantic. But running into the arms of the person you love the most, bags and all, on a sunny morning on a Cambridge green is rather cinematic. And curling up in somebody's arms after months of not seeing them, laughing in almost disbelief that they're real and you're with them, is probably one of the romantic things around.

Then again, I say this from the perspective of somebody who's home for the summer and is a fifteen minute walk away from the love of my life. So think of me next September as I slump on the 4:30 train with bird's nest hair, feeling as unenthustiastic and unsexy as humanly possible.

Writing experiments

image via tumblr - unknown source

Recently I found this list of writing experiments and am absolutely intrigued. I love the idea of writing about a single thing every day. I have recently rediscovered a list I wrote once of all my favourite things, including:

• the smell of cumin
• the amber colour of tea when the sun shines on it
• orange roses
• how legs look underwater
• recipes written without measurements

I am really tempted to start writing a journal about things I see from the bus, however, which I feel would be far more interesting.