Celestial Maps

(via Hubble Photo Prints)

I'd like to take these star charts, blow them up, print them out, and nail them onto my wall. Bring the celestial sky inside.

The Wild Unknown Revisited

I stumbled across The Wild Unknown last year when searching around the web for Christmas gifts and did a lil post about them. Hello one year later, and I find myself back at their online shop, still enamored with their calendars and prisms and delighted to see they've added new products to their range. And so another post to proclaim my love for the company. They have a new calendar for 2011 with lyrics instead of images, but my favorite product is the collaboration with artist Barbara Reiser, transfering one of her prints onto a candle. I am a candle gal, and this one is about as cosy and warm as a candle can be. I want. But really, I should gift and let others discover the wild unknown.

Fine Words

Words that say something. Neat typography. Speak to me during this postgraduate malaise. Good words.

All by Paper Jam Press ... Words to live by.

Never mine

I'm always thinking about the wrong things at the wrong time. Like these A.R. Trapp Quadra sunglasses which are on my mind even though the sky is one big blanket of gray and will be for months. They are $450, so wouldn't be a reality if the sun were shining anyway. Forever a fantasy, no matter the season.

Cat-Eyed Vixen

Baaaaaaaaah. I'm dying a little bit inside with every exam... #3 out of 4 tomorrow, phew. But enough about that. May I present to you my current internet obsessions:

(1) Kinga Burza's photoblog, which I've been following for awhile now. Infrequently updated but inspiring much wanderlust when it is. Her photos of sunny LA are a ray of light in bleak exam times.

(2) Her amazing Graz x Ellery cat-eye sunglasses. They make me so envious, that I am almost glad they are sold out otherwise I might've blown all my birthday money on them. Eep!

And now back to the books, folks. Thanks for stopping by...

A quickie

Exam #2 tomorrow, so this isn't going to be very eloquent. Rather a hurried note to say: Opening Ceremony, your fall collection is wonderful, but your coats are particularly spectacular... somuchso that I am almost okay with coveting a fall collection in the middle of spring (which kind of feels like fall in this weather-schizophrenic country anyway).

See more wonderful clothes, including nubby sweaters, maxi skirts and velvet velvet velvet here.

Print Perfect

(All via Steven Alan)

Steven Alan has a remarkable ability to make the most covetable spring dresses. They are the right shape, cut and most importantly in the most pitch-perfect prints. These are the dresses that define effortless. They exist to be worn on a perfect sunny day (which this lovely city has been having a fair few of recently), to frolic barefoot through the park or to wander through one of London's food markets, carrying home a sac of fresh ingredients to end the day on the balcony with a big glass of lemonade and a barbecue. Yep, the perfect spring day in a perfect printed spring dress. Mr. Alan, you make me dream the impossible dream. Now if you could only lower your prices a tad, the impossible would be much more possible...

Birthday Wishes and Ramblings

Hello there.

It's been quite a while, hasn't it? The longest I've ever gone without posting on this thing. Life has gone back to before this whole shabang got started - spending my days waking up early, sitting at the computer, but instead of working through my Google Reader, thinking up posts or wandering around various fashion sites, I've been devastatingly single-minded. Study study study. Write write write. But the end is semi-nigh, another month until exams are over but then they are over forever, and that will be amazing.

Anyway, this shall be a somewhat indulgent post (as all are, really) that is serving more as a list for a few interested parties (hi mom!). Hmm, so yes, my birthday is somewhat around the corner. Last year it was spent eating cake and studying and this year will be much of the same - but the cake is so good, I don't mind. I've been nagged as to what I want, and while normally I am pretty good at producing lists for those who want them, this year, I find I don't really want anything. But apparently that isn't very helpful, so I had to think up afew things I wouldn't mind receiving and here they be:

Marais Espadrille Wedge
I've been in love with these bad boys for a while now. I struggle when it comes to summer because I feel I have less shoe options. My hallway overflows with boots and all sort of winter shoes, but summer? Not so much. I fancy these, but perhaps in red...

Aurel Schmidt for Opening Ceremony Donut Tee
This is mostly because I love donuts and have been craving an American Donut for a while now. I didn't realize there was such a thing, until I tasted donuts in this fair country and realized that no, they are not the same. And while that may be good for my waistline, it saddens me a little bit when I am dying for a Boston Cream.

Ray-Ban Aviators
These were the first sunglasses I ever spent more than $10 on. I had them, loved them, cared for them for about 5 years and now they have mysteriously vanish. Another precious thing that somehow disappeared from life and is probably lying in a London gutter. Tear.

American Apparel Nail Polish in Peacock (l) and Coney Island (r)
Dusty blue and almost-saccharine-pink. Yum. It really bums me out that they don't sell these in the stores in London. They do ship them though, but the shipping is the same cost as the polish, and my little brain just cannot justify it.

Books: The Selby by Todd Selby or Appetite by Nigel Slater
Books! I love receiving books, adding to the precarious piles in my room. Interior eye candy from Mr Selby and a cookbook by Nigel Slater. I love to cook, but haven't been doing any new experimenting recently for lack of time. With my degree ending, I'd like to get back to the things I love...which leads me to my last possible prezzie request:

Mom, you know your old Canon? I still want it. I'd like to get myself back on the photographing wagon this summer as well.

And that's that.

Sorry guys, that's all I could muster after a month of absence, a me-me-me list! I still doubt there will be much regularity in posting until the end of May, but who knows...I can't study all the time, right?

Not Quite There

Though I've been hearing reports of glorious weather on the other side of the ocean, it's still not-quite-spring here...It's that annoying transitional weather, where one false move, one layer too many, could lead to uncomfortable sweatiness but layer removed and the chill sets in. Very annoying. Doesn't make too much of a difference to me anyhow as I am holed up inside writing. Supposedly academically, though clearly currently not the case ... rather been playing, dreaming up an imaginary world where I could afford everything from Weekday. It's a world of simple transitional outfits for awkward weather: lighter sweaters, shorter skirts, pastel pants or scrunched up socks while risking the bare leg...simplicity for studying. (Apparently in this imaginary world, I still study).

Though to be honest, my fantasy world would actually involve no studying and no need for transition: summer would be Now. Straight to minimal dressing: throw on dresses, shorts and slinky blouses, and the same shoes and an iced coffee every damn day. Ah summer, you are so far away. Come back soon.

Eye Candy

A stack of fairisle is all that's needed to make my heart skip a beat. Or two.

That is all. Have a lovely (rest of the) weekend!

ps. Those pretty babies are stacked high at the Vintage Showroom in Covent Garden. Discovered via for me, for you

Dirt

Some wall art that requires a little purchaser participation before it can be fully realized...bit genius, I think.



(roland tiangco via all the pretty mountains)

Wanted.

I'm currently on a spending embargo after having a particularly frightening discussion with my mother about post-graduation realities. But that doesn't mean I can't covet, right? So it's a little unhealthy to be constantly eyeing and wanting, and yes, I am perfectly happy with all I have. As mumsy always says,"Want what you have, and you will always have what you want."

Bah. I say sometimes it's fun to want what you can't have...

Something like these:Or those...
If you too have the want or the need but unlike me can procure, then please do so right here at one of my favorite independent online boutiques.

Inside & Out

I suppose I should be less of a curmudgeon and embrace the cold, both inside my flat and out. For lounging, I imagine cozy long knits, sweater upon sweater, and a Pendleton blanket to snuggle up in with a good book. For venturing out, it's best to wear appropriate shoes to ward off the cold and the slush, sheer blouses insulated by thick knits and a proper shearling coat (I was this close to convincing my mom to give me hers while home, guys - this close!). I hate gloves (they make me feel criminal) so fingerless will have to do, but with a good cuppa coffee to keep the tips warm. I can feel the flush of warmth in my cheeks as I type...

happiness is a warm gun

In six months, as I've mentioned, I finish my law degree. It has been a grueling, trying, ridiculous experience -- especially because halfway through my first semester of my first year, I knew that law wasn't for me. Why did I stay? I don't know. Dropping out seemed so ridiculous. And I actually like learning about the law, I find (some) of it academically and intellectually interesting, but it's not what I want to be. So now I find myself in the position of almost having an LLB, but with no interest in putting it to good use. I puzzle my parents and relatives with my choice, and I question why I didn't quit sooner, but it's too late for that now. Going to law school meant I got to move to London, live in an incredible place and have incredible experiences. I got to postpone 'being grown-up' for three more years.

But what's next?

I don't know, but I do know that upon graduation, the above Digby and Iona locket is the perfect commemoration of a strange three years.

D is for Dree

A little 'D' in the hollow (crook?) of the neck. One of the prettiest parts of the body adorned with the most delicate initial charm. Just another thing Dree Hemingway has that I kinda want. Dammit.

(photo via jak&jil)

Makes me feel all fuzzy inside

(via jak & jil)

The right shape, the right knit, the right colour. Dries Van Noten may have made the perfect fuzzy sweater.