Dark Inspiration- Salem

So here is a little random fact about me- I am a fan of the TV series Charmed. Well, mostly the first few series, as it got incredibly silly towards the end. James and I had only seen up to the end of series 5 previously and earlier this year, we decided to go through the entire 8 series. Sadly, the last few series has ruined it a bit for me, but I will always have a place in my hearts for the first few series. As we were looking for a Charmed replacement to fill our desire for 'witchy' TV shows, we got searching online and came across another series called Salem.

Far from being a cheesy but lovable monster-of-the-week format, Salem is based on the 17th century witch trials and how the witches remain hidden in their small puritan town. I am not going to lie- there are things about Salem which definitely could have been done better and there are times when the script makes me cringe a bit. But after watching the first few episodes, I found enough that I liked about Salem to keep me going. The plot is a lot darker and the scenery is very atmospheric. 

Although the characters are not always that likable, I loved how the series has a lot of strong female characters. In a time when a man's word holds far more power than a female's word ever could, the witches are ruthless and able to get their own way far more than you would expect. Initially the character of Mary Sibley seems weak, and she ends up marrying the head councilor of the selectmen board, after her true love John fails to return when promised. However, it quickly becomes apparent that Mary is well and truly calling the shots, and without giving away any spoilers she soon finds herself in a position of power within the town.

But another thing I love about Salem is the costumes. As Mary takes on the role of head councilor's wife, she is dressed in a way you would not expect somebody from a puritan town to dress. To reflect her new wealth and power, her clothing becomes more extravagant. We start to see her in more luxurious fabrics, such as furs. Although Mary favours dark colours, as do most of the residents, there is a lot of gold and jewels. As a lover of all 3 of the main lolita sub-styles, the gothic and dark classic lolita in me can't help but admire Mary's beautiful outfits. In fact, a lot of the wealthier characters in the show have very inspirational wardrobes. I do know that the costume department for Salem has been receiving a great deal of praise. There are so many ornate and delicate little details. 

With this is mind, and with Halloween fast approaching, I decided to come up with a Salem and Mary inspired lolita mood board. I think Mary would be very enamored with the indie brand VooDoooDolly and would also be a fan of a lot of the darker Alice and the Pirates pieces. Making this collage threw up a lot of interesting thoughts about 'witch lolita' and how they almost always feature a pointy witch hat. But what if you are unable to reveal your witch identity? So I wanted my mood board to focus on a more 'luxurious' dark lolita look rather than a specific witch lolita look. I made sure to include gold details, as well as some fur trim and a hat similar to the one in the screen shot Mary is wearing above. I also wanted to include a corset (as they feature heavily in the show) but unfortunately I could not find one which didn't look cheap or fitted the image I was going for. I settled on a corset style choker instead.

Series 3 of Salem starts early November and I am hoping I will be able to find a way to watch it. I am a bit lover of all these witchy dramas and movies. I love Hocus Pocus and The Craft. It always feels like this is a good time of the year to curl up on the sofa and enjoy these classics and I hope I am able to do so over the Halloween weekend. Do you know of any good witch themed or gothic style shows and movies? Feel free to comment with your favourites. And I hope you all have a Happy Halloween!

I Think I May Be Addicted...

It started off innocently enough... I was planning my outfit for the Oxfordshire Lolita's October Halloween meet and I really wanted some black roses just to finish off my "kuro bride" outfit. I was lucky enough to find some in Claire's for a cheap price. They may not last forever but they were good enough for the job. Then I saw they had the same style of rose clip in ivory and I thought they would be a nice addition to the classic side of my wardrobe. Then I found the navy roses and I thought I could use them in an outfit with my Midsummer dress. Then fast forward to the present and Claire's are bringing in their new stuff for Spring... What do I see? Even more of these rose clips. When I got home I decided to take a photo of all the Claire's rose clips I have obtained so far...

And before I knew it, I had 6 pairs of these roses in 5 different colours. The bad thing is, my obsession is still not satisfied. I spied some yellow, mint and red ones as well and I am itching to add them to my collection! I don't think I will be satisfied until I have these roses in every single colour!

I think the staff in my local Claire's branch must think I am a bit strange. But to find such loli-able items on the high street at a low price is a real bonus for me. There is no fiddling about with fake flowers and pins like I have done with previous outfits. All I do is clip these roses in and go. 

These rose clips are a huge part of my hair accessory arsenal now. I have a few outfit ideas in my head which will include these roses and I am also trying to come up with lots of different ways to wear these clips. I am going to use them in both sweet and classic items. I love their versatility.

I have recently spotted other items in Claire's which are very loli-able without being expensive. Sadly, I can't share some of them though, because it may give away a surprise! I definitely think it is worth having a look in Claire's right now though. Although, hopefully you wont become as addicted to stuff as I have!

Hyper Japan Christmas November 2012

Apologies for the late post. Despite only being able to attend Hyper Japan on the Saturday, I had a very packed weekend in London. I was so tired and when I woke up yesterday, the last thing I felt like doing was sitting on my laptop all day!

So, as the title suggests, I attended Hyper Japan Christmas on Saturday! I would have loved to attended on the Sunday, when the kawaii fashion show was being held, but I wrongly predicted that most of the fashion stuff would be held on the Saturday. Also, it was a friend's birthday as well, so I was too busy eating Thanksgiving Biscuit flavour ice cream with cranberry sauce (I love you, Chin Chin Labs!) and admiring dinosaurs. I am very sorry for the upcoming rant, but I was not impressed by the organisation of the fashion events this time around. I understand that there were some lolitas out there who were doing their best behind the scenes to make sure that we at least had something going on at the event. I am not blaming those people at all and I am grateful for all your hard work. But I felt that one of my favourite parts of the last HJ back in February was the Bring and Buy stall, which wasn't here this time. I heard that there had been some complaints because this stall didn't pay the stall fee. I do feel it was a real shame. I think that with a bit more time to organise, we could have all grouped together to get the stall fee and got people to help run the stall throughout the weekend. UK lolitas, I say that when the next HJ gets announced, we make it our mission to get the Bring and Buy stall back! To make things worse, BABY were not there this time either. I did think that some of the BABY stall items were a bit overpriced last time, but I think they still made a lot of sales. And they had lucky packs there too. Thankfully, about 6 weeks ago, a kawaii fashion show was announced (for the Sunday only). But overall, it did feel that a lot of the fashion stuff got pushed aside. Considering the amount of publicity the lolitas gave HJ back in February (UK lolitas even got featured in Marie Claire!) I think this was a mistake. When I was walking about on Saturday there was a significant drop in the number of lolitas in attendance. A lot of people were trying to sell their Saturday tickets and I felt like there was less excitement about the event. I really hope that Hyper Japan listens to these complaints, as it could affect future attendance. Okay, rant over!

I think I will start with my outfit! I have been more drawn to dark colours lately and I decided to wear Nostalgic Chess by Meta. A lot of my outfit is similar to an outfit I wore earlier in the year, with a few little additions. I was wearing my new Secret Shop crown shoes, I had additional accessories on and I made a chess piece headpiece. Compared to my last HJ outfit, this one is pretty understated. Although, that could be due to the fact that I didn't fully carry out all of my plans. Let's just say I did have something a bit more interesting planned but I was unable to locate some materials. If I am able to get all the stuff I need together, it may be part of a future outfit...

This was the best photo on my camera of my chess headpiece. The original idea was to wear my Lockshop hime wig with this headpiece on top. Unfortunately, the hime bump sits quite close to the front of my head and when I put the headpiece on, the chess pieces all tilted forwards. I couldn't quite get it to work. So I just loosely curled my hair and fluffed it out a little bit. My hair got a little bit messy towards the end of the day so it was a shame I couldn't have worn my wig. As you can see, I picked up a bottle of peach flavoured Ramune soda from the Tofu Cute stand. I had only previously tried the original flavour, but I think I prefer the peach one now.

A jewellery close-up picture. Kyra was very pleased to see me wearing her book ring! I made myself a gold pawn ring to match my headpiece. The rest of the jewellery is from Angelic Pretty and Paris Kids. The bow clip attached to my bolero is off-brand.

There were lots of very interesting stalls this time. I think my favourite has to be the Tofu Cute stall though. Look at those giant alpaca plushies!!! I really wanted to get one but then I would have had to carry it around and I don't think it would have fitted in my luggage. In the end, I got a smaller alpaca instead. I can't get enough of these cute alpacas. The Tofu Cute stall was also stocking lots of other cute things, including loads of Chocomint accessories, more alpacas and even some Loris bags. I already have a Loris shooting star bag, so I know what to expect quality-wise. I was going to buy one, but decided against it. I am currently having storage issues and the last thing I needed was yet another bag! Maybe next time...

My favourite stage performance was the Kamui samurai sword artists. It was a really exciting and fun performance. The group leader had appeared in the first Kill Bill movie. It was an action packed show and there was even a Q&A with the group leader.

I was very pleased to see my favourite macaron makers were back again! I prefer On's macarons to Laduree (and that is a huge deal, because I love Laduree). I loved the 'Valentine' macaron, which was raspberry with a chocolate ganache. My favourite is still the peach champagne flavour, so I was glad they still had that flavour available.

So with the kawaii fashion show being on the Sunday, us Saturday fashion attendees got to see the Marble Collection. Now, if I am being brutally honest, I was not impressed. For a large chunk of the hour, all we got to see was a video. The video basically explained what the collection was about and went behind the scenes of their most recent show. I do feel that a video was not really enough. This is the sort of thing that you could probably find online pretty easily. It lacked the 'wow' factor. After the video, the people who run the collection got to come on stage, along with some familiar faces from the UK J-fashion scene. This part was a bit more interesting as we got an insight in to the ideas behind the Marble Collection. But overall, I think this offering was bland. I did see a few people around me walking off as they lost interest. I think what was wrong with it, was that there wasn't much for the audience to interact with. I didn't feel like I was gaining any inspiration or really 'connecting' with what I was being shown. Perhaps it would have been better if we actually saw some more fashion on the stage instead of watching the video. 

I thought this stall was very cute. They were offering a Christmas present wrapping service. I love the traditional looking Japanese feel the examples had.

The Wii U console was also at Hyper Japan. When we finally got our hands on it, it stopped working! FAIL! And by the time it was working again, a bigger queue had formed. So we didn't get the chance to have a proper play with it. But from what I saw, it does look very exciting. I am not sure I really want to buy another new console though.

So I would say that this is probably the weakest of the 3 Hyper Japan events that I have attended. There were a lot of stalls to keep me occupied. I felt the fashion side of things was disappointing and I ended up enjoying the swords display a whole lot more. I picked up a load of sweets. I finally got my hands on a box of Melty Kiss chocolates and some KitKat flavours I haven't tried yet. And obviously I loved the alpaca plushies and Chocomint stuff. But I really hope that next time, there is some more exciting fashion stuff going on. I think there are still some issues with the organisation that needs tweaking. I also think that the organisers need to give their ticket buyers more of what they want. What I love about Hyper Japan is that it offers something a bit different to a lot of the anime conventions we have here. It is more focused on Japanese culture. But if it carries on like this, it will eventually become an MCM Expo clone. I do enjoy the MCM Expo, but do we really need Hyper Japan to become more like it? I would hate for HJ to lose its identity. Here is hoping that next time, there is much more excitement!

Give brown a chance.

So you are interested in lolita and you are starting out. Or maybe you are a seasoned lolita looking to extend your wardrobe. Lolita items are expensive so you want to get items that would be easy to match up with other items. The most obvious choices are probably black or white. These colours can become a really strong staple in your wardrobe and if you are unsure about an outfit, black or white are easy colours are a safe option to finish off your look.

But just recently, I have really been craving brown items. Sometimes it feels great to refresh your wardrobe by choosing something a bit different. I believe that brown is a lot easier to wear than people think. Pink, mint, blue, red and many other colours can go well with brown. Plus brown looks a little softer than harsh black tones. With Autumn's arrival we are seeing more Autumnal colours coming through and brown suits these perfectly. Brown is usually considered a dull colour but I disagree.

If you are unsure about brown pieces you could start with something small. Like an accessory. This Innocent World bag is very classical and you could easily use it whilst you are not in lolita because it has a grown up fashionable look.

Some shades of brown almost look black so making the leap to brown is not that huge a step. However, other shades of brown can be easy to wear too. I adore these Innocent World boots. I was going to use a picture from Rose Chocolat but they disabled the right click function. The Rose Chocolat boots are called the Classic Heart Boots and the only reason I have not purchased a pair is because they cost $180. Ouch! I would happily get these in every colour if I could. http://www.rosechocolat.com/shop/step1.php?number=355

Classic lolita brands like Innocent World love brown. It can be used very effectively. However, it is not just classic lolita that makes good use of the colour.

Melty Chocolate by Angelic Pretty was a very popular print and it recently got another release with different colour options. Those of you who looked at my Hyper Japan photos will know I bought some brown Melty Chocolate rings. The good thing about this print is that the brown is not too dominant. If you didn't want to wear a dress where brown is the main colour but the brown was still present, prints like these would be perfect.

Sweet lolita pieces that use brown do not necessarily need to feature sweet items like chocolate. One of Bodyline's most popular designs was this Love Nadia dress with the forest scene. And you have the option to go for a full brown version or a more sweet colour. If you were still nervous about trying brown then a dress like this is a good example of how to introduce the colour slowly. It would not be too hard to find shoes and accessories to match Love Nadia.

Yes, black and white are still easier to wear but don't automatically dismiss brown next time you go shopping :)