Alice in Wonderland

It's not a real inspiration by the heroin of Lewis Carroll's books, but this red colour looks as if it came from them, not to mention the fabulous shop at the right of the triptych.

This is one of my most comfortable outfits, the one I wear on a rainy Saturday when it's not very warm and I need to walk for a lunch in a nice restaurant, then a bookshop, then a museum... Hence no high heels but comfortable plimsoles, of which the only vice is that they get dirty pretty soon. White plimsoles are really versatile, you can wear them to a summery flowery frock, to practically any type and colour of trousers, to a long dress etc. The number of combinations is endless.
A bag has to be big to fit in all possible purchases and it has also be light so that my arms don't get too tired. Longchamp is a brand, which I wasn't a fan of for a long time as everyone seems to have at least one bag made by them. I got this one from my boyfriend's mum and now I love it (I even got a second one, a smaller one in khaki). They are the most comfortable bags you can imagine and also a very good quality (I only wish they had some compartments inside because looking for door keys in an inevitable mess can take some time).

The painting on the left is by one of my favourite artists, Egon Schiele ("Selbstbildnis mit Judenkirschen") and the picture on the right presents Alice's shop, one of charming little shops with antiques on the Portobello Market.

Shirt - Benetton

Cardigan - Zara

Jeans - Lee

Plimsoles - Topshop

Bag - Longchamp

Earrings - a gift from my mum, she used to wear them when she was in her 20s

American Fictionary

As I'm going to the US this summer the inspiration for this outfit has been the American pop art. I don't like really obvious borrowings, so I'm playing with blue and yellow a bit (not even red as the American flag would suggest). Actually some could say I'm playing more with the Swedish IKEA logo and they would be right too (although none of my clothes in here were manufactured in Sweden) :)

Pop art is a great art movement, especially as an introduction to art for children as it's playful, colourful and can be admired without prior knowledge of art of any kind. It can remind children of comic books and cartoons, can be transported into children's creative subconscience by means of colouring books and thus provide education and fun.

Ok, let's move to clothes :) I bought the top I'm having here last summer in Topshop because I fell in love with the tiny pleats. It was a second piece of clothing in yellow in my wardrobe and to be honest, I just began to like this colour on myself. I also have the same top in grey, which looks great mixed with green and orange. The trousers are also from Topshop (I guess it's my favourite high street shop, there are way too many treasures in so many different styles on the flagship store's four floors), they are three years old and I can't be bored with them. These shoes are quite a new purchase (from my last trip there about a month ago) from Absolute Vintage, I wore them just once and have to get used to them, to adjust them to my feet.

The painting on the left is "M-Maybe" by Roy Lichtenstein and the picture on the right was taken by myself close to Kings Cross Station in London - I like the shop's sigh and a picture of Mao Ze Dong painted on the wall above it.


Top - Topshop
Trousers - Topshop
Shoes - Absolute Vintage
Belt - Ebay
Beads - Primark
Sunglasses - My boyfriend's Ray Ban Wayfarers
Bangles - a gift from my sister

Out of Africa

Inspired by the film "Moolaadé" by the Senegalese director Ousmane Sembene I suddenly craved clothes in African prints. Safari style is too obvious and it shows rather a white man's yearning for Africa - the romantic, melancholic longing for the colonial times. That was not what I wanted. In London everyday I see women dressed in real African fabrics that can be bought by metre (a fabric, not a woman). The fabrics are later given to tailors or sewn by these women themselves to create a fantastic frock or a top. As I lack sewing skills and don't know any good tailors and also don't have any friends who could bring me original beautiful pieces straight from their homeland, I decided to visit some markets and look for ready to wear African clothes.

I went to the Petticoat Lane Market, where African clothes and fabrics are sold but as I loved the textiles I found clothes way too loose and baggy for my silhouette. I finally found this lovely dress at Spitalfields Market, at a stall run by an Afro-English lady, who just buys fabrics and sews dresses to her own designs. This dress is a 'pregnancy' type of dress, or rather - as my boyfriend calls it - 'when-is-it-due-dress'. I don't care that I look pregnant in it, it's just so comfortable and pretty that I'll probably spend the whole summer in it. The violet crochet jacket is a bit Indian in style and everyone usually assumes I've bought it in India (actually it's from Zara). Ecclectism appeals to me so I was happy to mix and match clothes from different continents for this outfit.

This time there is no work of art as such and no particular place to show you here. There is, however, a book, which I got from my boyfriend for my birthday a few months ago but which I still haven't finished reading. It's by Uwe Ommer, a German photographer, who embarked on a great journey around the world to take pictures of 1000 families for his project. It took him and his assistents 1424 days to travel to most countries of the world and two books were created as a result - one showing photographs of 1000 families and another one, the one I have, describing and illustrating this enourmous undertaking. The book itself is such a wonderful source of inspiration that I'm sure it will serve me for years.

Dress - Spitalfields Market

Jacket - Zara

Wedges - New Look

Bag - a museum shop in Martin Gropius Bau in Berlin

Beads - Primark

Sunglasses - Miss Selfridge

Book - "Transit. Around the world in 1424 days" by Uwe Ommer; Taschen 2006