Wednesday 29 February 2012

The Dress - Pac Man

So time for another dress post. Yay! I thought I'd break away slightly from my usual red lips and cheeky grins for this post. You know - just mix things up a bit. I love, love, love this dress. However, it is the biggest pain in the butt to wash, because the trim around the bottom tends to dye the other parts of the dress when it gets wet. Actually, it's kind of a funny story how I discovered this, if you care to hear....

 Dress: Eu
So I bought the dress in Taiwan, when Luke and I were just getting to know each other. It was kind of an impulse buy to be honest. One of those "Oh that's cute" moments, and precisely 5 minutes and 35 seconds later my purse is a lot lighter. Anyway, since I was not much of an expert at washing clothes (in fact, I had zero knowledge in that field), when the dress needed a wash I just threw it in the washing machine with all the other laundry and went off to class, only to come back and discover that the dye had run. 


So I promptly took it to the lovely drycleaners down the road. He gave me a big lecture (in Chinese) about colours and whites and not letting wet clothes sit in the washing machine for hours. But he told me he would see what he could do.


 About 5 days later, I was walking home - no wait, scratch that, I was floating home, as Luke had just proposed to me and we had gotten engaged. When the man in the drycleaners called out to me. He told me he had managed to clean all the blue spots out of the dress. After giving me another lecture about the importance of washing clothes correctly, he turned to me and asked in typically abrupt Chinese fashion: "This dress is very pretty. I think boys would like it. Do you have a boyfriend?"
At this I paused. Damn! I thought. I don't know how to say "fiance"! 
"Yes..." I said. "Well, actually I just got engaged."
"Congratulations!" he said. "When did you get engaged?"
I looked at my watch. "Hmmm... 3 hours ago."

And that's why the second person I told about my engagement to Luke was my drycleaner. :)

Bow! Which awesomely came with the dress. I also love how the shape of the dress is very 1950s-60s but the pattern is so modern - which is why I call this my Pacman dress.
Earrings: Iko Iko
I think these are Luke's favourite earrings, since he is a massive Lego fan. I like how their shape matches the shapes in the dress. I actually wear these earrings quite a bit, as they are rather understated, and it's not until people get close that they realise they are actually pieces of Lego. Plus, if you join them together when you're not wearing them, you'll never lose one!

Until next time :)



Tuesday 28 February 2012

The Holiday - Art Deco Day 3

Here you have it folks: our third and final day at the Art Deco Weekend in Napier. We started off the morning by going to church with Carolyn's aunt and uncle. Then we headed to into town to check out the National Tobacco Company Ltd, which was open to the public for the weekend, although to be honest the outside is much more impressive than the inside.


Carolyn and I inside the building. I'm wearing the cream dress that was given to me by a friend in Taiwan, and actually made use of the handbag and headband I used at our wedding.

Oh yeah, and I found another car... how many is that now?

Time for an icecream on the beach. 


Then we headed off to "The Great Gatsby Picnic", which is the big event for the last day. I feel like they really do need to give this event another name, because it is so much more than a picnic, and the title is really quite deceptive. 
 To give you an idea of how big, grand and spectacular it is, people are not allowed to set up before 6am. Can you imagine setting up before 6am for a picnic that starts at 1pm! There were marquees everywhere, dining tables, gramophones, tea trolleys, china, and cake stands. It was like people relocated their lounge rooms outside for the afternoon! Just look at these photos and you'll see what I mean.



Told you there were tea sets.
This is not what I think of when I hear the word "picnic." Much closer to when they have "tea" in Jane Austen books while the men shoot birds. 

Love the big circus tent. 

And speaking of circus, I heard they were in town... not really, it's just the people from the dance company "Full Swing". Of course, just having the picnic 1930s theme is not enough for them; they had to go one step further and make it 1930s Circus theme! Gotta love their creativity and the way they put a twist on things.

The kids really loved the whole escaped gorilla antics.

Never fear the strong man is here!

Luke and I stopped for a dance (I love this photo).



Making our way back home and back to reality *sigh*. It was such a magical weekend.
Well, I hope you had a nice time travelling vicariously through my blog to the 1930s Art Deco Weekend Napier style.

Until next time :)


Monday 27 February 2012

The Song - Suzy

Have you ever heard music that makes you want to do the Charleston and the robot dance at the same time? No? Well then, you obviously have never heard of the band Caravan Palace, because that is precisely what their music makes you want to do (well at least, it does with ME).

And I have to thank my wonderful French-Canadian friend Claire for introducing them to me. Actually Claire's friendship had a profound impact on my iPod - if it weren't for her I wouldn't have heard of Basia Bulat, Caravan Palace, Kat Flint, or Eli et Papillon, to name just a few. Pretty much as soon as Claire and I did an iPod swap while we were working as temps at the Earthquake Commission, I told her to write down all her favourite artists because I liked so much of her music.

Anyway, so Caravan Palace are a French electroswing and gypsy jazz band based in Paris.  Although generally speaking I like my jazz music more traditional and I'm not big on electro music, I feel in love with how fun this music is. I mean, it seriously puts you in a good mood.

Have a watch of this video clip of their single Suzy. The robot is so cute!

 

Until next time :)
 

Sunday 26 February 2012

The Holiday - Art Deco Day 2

Time for the second entry of our Art Deco Weekend in Napier. Saturday was full of sunshine, wine and lots of dancing, as you'll be able to see from our photos. We had a fairly leisurely start to the morning and made our way to Craggy Range winery for a bit of midday wine tasting. Here we are in all our vintage finest, sipping wine like the sophisticates we are (well, at least trying to be).


To be honest, I think it was the first time I'd ever gone wine tasting! However, I considered it "research" for work, since it's my responsibility to order the wine for 2 of our offices. I also discovered I am quite a fan of Pinot Gris.
Grapes! Just about ready for the picking.

Smiling faces :)

Playing in the vines...

So in case you're wondering where I got my outfit from, I bought the culottes in Melbourne (these will be covered in a later post), and the tie and braces I totally stole off Luke. Such an awesome way to expand your wardrobe for free: just raid your husband's!

Oh by the way, these are the Craggy Ranges - in case you were wondering where the name of the wine came from. Very beautiful and craggy.

A little bit of a "farm girl" look going on, but I think I can pull it off.

Then into town to check out all the vintage cars, and vintage steam rollers too!

These three looked so cute, just sitting back enjoying the view, so I had to snap a photo.

Carolyn and her new wheels (well she wishes anyway)

If dreams are free, Luke and I will take this one please.

Some Art Deco buildings - love the colours and the details.



I honestly don't think I've seen so many parasols in my life. I'm pretty sure they would last about 2 seconds in the Wellington wind, but they looked very pretty in not-so-windy Napier.

This photo really cracks me up. Three ladies in white perched on their stools.

Everyone enjoying a bit of sun on the grass.
Luke and I with our second car (after all, we need one each, right?)

Love the Public Trust Office, and I honestly never thought I'd see a "Supre" shop in such a stylish building (the yellow one to the left - if you squint, you can just make out the sign).

Art Deco wall mural.

Me posing with Art Deco lady, damn I forgot to bring my matching dog.

Our Full Swing friends from our dance classes, lazing around before the group photo

Here is the group photo. Doesn't everyone look great? Such an attractive bunch.

Three beautifully dressed ladies from Full Swing. Some serious fashion inspiration here.

Luke and I snuck off at the end of the day for a quiet dinner before the dancing began. I think Luke really suits the vintage look, so handsome :)

Let the dancing begin! Love the movement in this photo.

Dancing in the street with the lovely Renee.

All the restaurants are full? Oh well, no problem - why not just have dinner in the street instead? Why not indeed.

Looking back at the Sound Shell from the beach.
So this photo deserves a little explanation. The story is that Carolyn and I were doing a bit of Charleston on the footpath to the music we could hear being played at the Sound Shell. At this point, a young Asian girl came up and asked if we could teach her. This very quickly developed into a impromptu dance class with 10 Malaysian tourists, doing the 20s and 40s Charleston. Again, why not? They were really lovely and it was such a nice way to end the evening.

So there you have it folks: day 2 out of 3. One more day of photos to show. 
Until next time! :)