Parisian Chic- Bonjour de nouveau!

Currently the UK high street are selling a lot of 'parisian' style, but hasn't it all been done before? I know, I know, so has everything else, but It seems that this trend re surfaces overly often. Striped t-shirts, eiffel tour prints, red white and blue...don't get me wrong, I think it's a style that can look great, but it so easily decends into cliché that make me cringe. Miss Selfridge in particular made me wince when coming across their 'parisian' section in their glasgow store with their take on this particular trend, (miss Selfridge t-shirt featured right, £20) but new look takes a close second.

Topshop have a few wrong looking paris chic items on offer, including this "spotty paris vest" at £20 and "bonjour body" at £18.

But amist the tat are some real gems, so if you're looking for a bit of 80's inspired paris apparel, you may be in luck this season.

Emily

COS It Could Be Coming

Rumor has it that a certain sister brand of our (well my) High Street favorite H & M, is joining the cold, grey streets of Glasgow. COS (Collection of Style).
There is not much that needs to be said about this brand. It can be on mute and still speaks volumes.

COS has a great understanding of attention to detail, with their strong, subtle and minimalist approach to design. It is consistently evident in both there men’s and womenswear collections which contend with ready-to-wear but have more of an affordable price tag.

COS incorporates fashion essentials, reinvented classics, clean-cut tailoring and simplistic colour palette, which adds to their highly sophisticated, yet quirky and fresh look. You can see this in past and present collections.
COS products are designed by Rebekka Bay (women's) and Michael Kristensen (men's). I find it inspiring what these designers do, in that difficult "mid-market" place on the high street. They do not compromising on design or fabric, but they manage to make their designs affordable.

In their flagship store on Regents Street in London, new items appear in-store almost everyday. Customers will always find something new to wear, so there is a lesser chance of bumping into someone with the same outfit on. Let’s hope that Glasgow has the same system of “new items in almost everyday”. That is an excuse to be in the City Centre on a daily basis.
I am pretty certain, that a store will be opening up. Stay posted and I’ll keep you updated.

Images from a/w 09 lookbook

http://www.cosstores.com/

Coco

Photo Taking and its hazards

When settling down to take photos for my etsy shop today, cameron my nephew thought he'd help. Here he is holding the hands of Felicity, my mannequin. He was quite disturbed that she doesn't have a head.

When i turned the camera on him, he hid behind her in a sudden attack of camera shys! Bless.

The dress itself should be on etsy soon. It's part of the clothing I got from the Fran & Anna estate, and there is actually two matching ones! Stay tuned.

Emily

It's all about the Cardigan

I've been searching on and off for the perfect vintage 50's beaded cardigan for five years.

I had certain criteria in mind when seeking it out. It can't be yellow, cream, white or black. Has to be 100% natural fibers. Must button down the front, no hooks and eyes. Not too many sequins, if any. Had to be in reasonable, wearable condition (not too many moth holes!) and if possible, had to be under £60. And of course, it had to fit me.

I didn't think it was going to be a hard search. But I was wrong.

There was a few nearlys along the way. A beautiful pringle cardigan i was outbid on on ebay, an amazing cardigan in a London vintage shop that was over a £100.

And then there was all the cardigans that weren't

my size. Too big, too small.

But today, my search finally ended. Behold the chosen sweater:

It's nearly perfect. I think I'll always been on the look out for the absolute perfect cardigan (the ones with heavily beaded vines and grapes are among my favourite) but this one comes pretty damn close. It's cashmere too, which is a bonus. Included in the listing was the original advert for the cardigan, which is fantastic:

The original price was $39.95, I purchased mine for $60. I think thats pretty good going!

If your looking for your own perfect 50's beaded cardigan, there are plenty on etsy:

RageoftheAge, $62

gimmeNICOLE, $81

greygardensvintage, $65

weareshy, $40

Maybe they'll fit in to your criteria of the perfect 50's cardigan!

Emily

Gala Is So Backwards Its Still Christmas There.

Em: We meant to post this before Christmas, but it doesn't loose much of it's pointlessness now that Christmas is over. At the flat we tried to add a bit of Christmas cheer by adding and decorating a Christmas tree. The Christmas tree was left by the previous tenants, in all it's black un-christmas like glory. The Christmas baubles were left over too, making our Christmas tree a mish mash of previous Christmas' past. The only thing missing was lights. So after purchasing £4 coloured lights from Tesco, (and after one of our flat-mates procured a star) we believed our Christmas tree to be complete.

It was not to be. Half a day later, the lights stopped working. It seems that one of the wires was loose. Our Christmas tree stayed un-illuminated for quite a while. Don't worry, Tesco supplied the replacements.

Coco: Here is a picture of our epic Christmas tree, we think it has been tastefully decorated. The time and effort which was taken to skillfully place each bauble and arranging the lights. It took four of us to make this vision of our tree come to life. I would like to take this time to thank everyone who was involved in it's creation.




Let Me Explain.
Please do not judge us on our curtains. There is a short story about them. One day the Lord of the Land came to fix somethings that didn't open (the windows, no joke). He made a comment that we took the curtains down. The only reason why we did this was because I'd washed them and they where hanging on the door drying. He told us that his sister designed the print for them, when she was at... dum dum dum, The Scottish School of Textile & Design. We kind of had to put them back up.

But there is a big but, I think I shrunk them by like half a metre, but we cant remember the original length of them. I think they were floor length, others think they were just a few inches longer. I'm still pretty certain that they were floor length, which makes it even funnier. Also one other thing, this was all written in a whisper, so don't say to anyone.


Here is a pic of the curtains so you can get the full intensity of the swooshy, spirally print. Enjoy.

The Naming of a Blog

Em: Welcome to Borders Without Fashion, a blog brought to you by a couple of fashion students, who think they have something to add to the millions of fashion blogs out there. The aim is to make it a mix of style, life at the Scottish school of textiles, and anything else we want to add really. Hopefully our wonderful flat mates, the 'top flaters' will contribute when they want to, adding to the tapestry of our blog.

Borders Without Fashion's name came about after a lot of debate, but upon seeing a poster displayed outside the clothing workshops at uni, it pretty much clinched it. Here it is:

Coco: So one beautiful Gala day Emily and I were working hard as usual in the workshops. We had both individually came across the Lez-Bean poster, that’s what it’s been nicknamed. When we seen each other later that day, we both said to one another have you seen the lesbian poster. We thought it would be funny to name our imaginary blog this, after a few attempts of coming up with names. A few days had past, we giggled some and joked some about the poster. Then Emily dared me to steal (we do not condemn stealing normally, but in this instance it was necessary)
How I managed to acquire the poster from the walls of the workshops.
Naturally took on the dare silently, meaning I didn’t agree to the dare, but in my head I was like hell yeah.
A few days pass, I was walking towards the poster with a friend. I looked at the poster, then looked at my bag, seeing if it was big enough to accommodate the poster, which would be folded. I looked at my friend, who I was in mid-convo with and said one sec, just need to grab something. I checked if the coast was clear, walking closer and closer to it, then NAB, as quick as that, it was in my bag, and then I apologized for my action to my friend and went on my way to knit.
Later that evening I went back to the flat and presented it to Emily. We laughed together for about 3 and half minutes, and we knew this was the beginning of our blog.

Em: One of the reasons the name is so appealing is because we study at the Scottish School of Textiles, in the Scottish Borders, and it is sometimes very much without fashion. Welcome to our blog!