The Mid Century Market and my Birthday!

A few weekends ago, I turned 27 and decided to spend my birthday in London eating lots of good food and looking at pretty vintage clothes.  My birthday also happened to coincide with Bettina Scarlett's 'Mid Century Market' which I blogged about back in March. 

As it was a special day, I just had to wear one of my favourite dresses...

 
This is the Anne Fogarty dress I purchased on the Sunday at Rhythm Riot 2013 and it is such a great little cotton dress.  I'm surprised that this dress lasted until the Sunday of the weekender but I think it was because it was destined to be mine!

Giggling because there were builders doing work on the street opposite and they were somewhat bemused by my "posing"

The dress did actually come with it's own original belt which is in good condition as well.  However, it could do with being an inch smaller (and because the belt is constructed in a particular way, it isn't possible to make it smaller) so I decided to wear this nondescript black belt instead.

OK, so on to the Mid Century Market... I'm so glad I got to go to this event, it was in a great location with lots of lovely traders selling 1950s vintage and vintage inspired items.  Even though it was my birthday and I did have some cash to burn, I managed to be impressively restrained in my spending.

I bought a pair of 1950s cat eye sunglasses that I had been lusting after from Vera Mode Vintage.  It was so good to see her stuff in person and I am surprised that I managed to walk away from her stall with only sunglasses!

I also treated myself to two pairs of vintage inspired earrings from Bow and Crossbones - so many pretty things at this stall! 

Unfortunately, I only took one photo of the market but you can see how it is filled with vintage goodness!

The next fair date has already been set and it is on Saturday 16th August in the same location in Hammersmith, check out the website for more details.  I really hope I can make it to this one too.

Dress: Vintage from trader at Rhythm Riot
Belt: Vintage from eBay
Jacket: Vintage from Ballyhoo Vintage
Shoes: Marks and Spencer
Bag: Vintage from Vintage to Vogue, Bath
Earrings: Vintage from Etsy
Bracelet: Vintage from eBay
Hat: Vintage from The Little Vintage Shop, Lymington

My Mad Men dress

Tonight, UK viewers will get the chance to see the first episode of the last season of Mad Men (if you have Sky Atlantic that is!)  I've loved the show for so long and thought today would be a rather apt time to show you a dress of mine which was featured in a previous season!

 

Please excuse the rather poor image quality!  This dress was worn in the Season 2 episode "Maidenform" which you may remember as the episode where the team get creative over ideas for a new Playtex campaign and suggest that every woman is either a "Jackie or a Marilyn." 

 

 

 

This dress was actually the first item I ever purchased on Etsy back in 2010.  It is a "Doris Fein Original" and at the time I purchased it, I didn't know it had been on the TV show so you can imagine my surprise when re-watching Season 2 on DVD and I see one of the secretaries wearing my dress!  Cue lots of 'rewind and pause' moments.  As this is obviously not the only dress ever made, I am not suggesting that this exact same dress made its way from the show's extensive wardrobe into my wardrobe but it is still pretty exciting to own a dress that has been seen on Mad Men. 

 

And I am not the only one that this has happened to!  A while back I saw this post on the Couture Allure blog and how the blogger had her very own "Mad Men Moment."  Have any of you ever had one of your vintage items featured on Mad Men or another period TV show?  If you have, I would love to see!

 

Dress: Vintage from Etsy

Shoes: Marks and Spencer

Belt: Vintage from Etsy

Bracelet: Vintage from Rhythm Riot

Earrings: Vintage but cannot remember where I bought these as it was so long ago!

The last of the wool dresses...

As mentioned in a previous post, this transition from Winter to Spring has been interesting for my vintage wardrobe.  I bought a few vintage wool dresses over the last few months and this post features the last of them to go on this blog.  I am also showing you my new coat, which is a 1950s 'Kerrybrooke' Teen coat.  As a petite lady, I do buy a lot of 'Junior' items as they fit me better and this coat is no exception.  I find it quite difficult to buy vintage coats so when I saw this on eBay and it was my size, I knew I had to get it (especially as it was from a UK seller so no customs charges!)

It has a lovely fleck in the material and I just love the buttons.

 

 

 

I purchased this dress from Croatia Vintage on Etsy and scored a good discount as it was during the Black Friday sales.  You might not be able to see in the photos but the neckline has rhinestones around it - so cute!

 

 

Dress: Vintage from Croatia Vintage on Etsy

Coat: Vintage from eBay

Shoes: Marks and Spencer

Bag: Vintage from Etsy

Earrings: Forbidden Charm on Etsy

 

Autumnal hues in Spring

After my last outfit post where I welcomed Spring with open arms, it was rather hasty to say that I wouldn't be able to wear my winter coats again... It is safe to say that it is still cold in England and although we had a brief bout of warm Spring weather, I think it will be a little while longer until I can go out without a winter coat!

These photos were taken on a day trip to Brighton a few weekends ago (when it was still cold but very sunny!)

 

The colours in this outfit are perhaps more suited to a day in Autumn rather than the start of Spring.  I do love all those Spring pastel shades but I like to buy vintage that is practical and I find these colours to be more practical (at least in England!) than pastel shades (this doesn't stop me coveting all the pastel shade dresses popping up all over Etsy right now!)

 

 

 

This outfit also presented the opportunity to wear this hat.  I bought this hat in 2012 and have only worn it a couple of times (it has been featured in this post.)  Although I do really like the style, the colour doesn't seem to go with many of my outfits but I think it suits this dress.

 

 

Dress: Vintage from Luxie Vintage on Etsy

Hat: Vintage from Concetta's Closet on Etsy

Coat: Vintage from Lou Lou's Vintage Fair

Shoes: Topshop

Bag: Vintage gift from my guy

Earrings: Vintage from Clerkenwell Fair

Two great upcoming events!

Not an outfits post but an events post...

The first of these two great events is the Mid Century Market...

I was a bit disappointed that I missed the first Mid Century Market which took place a few weeks before Christmas (but I was pretty low on funds in December!)  So I am very much looking forward to going to this one and it just so happens to be on my Birthday - Saturday 12th April! 

What I like about this type of event is that it is era-specific.  I try to go to a lot of local vintage fairs and although I do find some good stuff there, the items on sale usually span a few decades (usually 1920s-1980s) which means that it becomes harder to find the items of the era I really want (i.e. 1950s!)  As the name suggests, the Mid Century Market only has traders selling 1950s era vintage and vintage inspired items, which is pretty good in my opinion!

You can find out more about this event and the other events that Bettina Scarlett does here.

The next event is also something I am super excited about...

If I was to dream up my perfect vintage festival, this would pretty much be it!  Concentrating on my favourite era - 1946-1962 - Atomic Festival really is shaping up to be the UK's vintage event of the year!  It is a two day event on Saturday 3rd May and Sunday 4th May and I have got tickets for the Saturday (unlike weekenders, you can get one day tickets!) 

Early bird tickets have sold out now but you can still get your hands on the Advance tickets at £39 per day but be quick, they are sure to sell out soon too!

Check out the website here.

Not only do both events have a lot on offer, it will be a great opportunity to meet fellow vintage lovers.  If you happen to be going to either event, let me know!

It's Spring!

So Spring is finally here in the UK!  I am very pleased about that because I am a fan of the 'warmer' months, however, having said that, we didn't have a particularly cold winter (I never saw any snow!)  It did rain a lot though so I hope we don't see rain like that for a while. 

As a vintage lover, warmer weather is certainly easier to dress for.  It took me a while to get into "vintage winter wardrobe" mode, which essentially meant that I didn't allow myself to buy any more summery cotton dresses and instead only bought wool/ wool blend dresses.  I did find some really nice wool dresses as well so although I am happy it is getting warmer, I'm going to miss wearing these dresses and my winter coats! 

My favourite winter dress purchase in the last few months is easily this one...

 

I bought this dress from Lucky Dry Goods on Etsy.  I almost always message sellers when I buy online, usually to double check the condition of the item.  When I messaged the seller this time, it happened to be the lovely Sara from Lilies and Remains who replied as she works for this store!  I love her blog as she has the most sensational 1940s style and she was so kind as to answer my queries and even gave me a 10% discount for a tiny flaw that was overlooked in the listing (even though it is so small I can't even see it on the dress!)

 

 

It's pretty easy to see why I love this dress... cute velvet collar, great fit, and the fabric has little yellow 'x' details woven into the fabric... perfect! 

 

 

I was in London for the weekend of Valentine's Day and I wore this outfit to the Clerkenwell Fair.  I managed to only buy two items at the fair - a pair of red flower screw back earrings and a beautiful Rhona Roy dress in the most exquisite celadon colour!  I can't wait to wear that dress but just need to find the right occasion for it. 

 

 

Dress: Vintage from Lucky Dry Goods on Etsy

Coat: Vintage from Lou Lou's Vintage Fair

Hat: Vintage from The Little Vintage Shop, Lymington

Bag: Vintage, gift from my guy

Earrings: Vintage Lucite confetti, Etsy

Gloves: Vintage from Lou Lou's Vintage Fair

Shoes: Marks and Spencer







The novelty print swing dress

A few weeks ago I attended the 'Retro Revival' event in Bournemouth and this is what I decided to wear...

I have to apologise for the quality of these photos, it is so much easier to take photos during the daytime on my phone (another reason why this blog is mostly dedicated to daytime outfits!)  However, this dress was just too amazing not to be featured here.  I first wore it at Rhythm Riot and I had tried to take photos there but they also suffered because of the night time quality of my phone photos.

This dress just fits like a dream!  I bought it from the Clerkenwell Fair (from the amazing stock of Tamara Watts) and knew I had to have it.  It has a rather awkward centre back zipper that does not go up all the way to the top but I can get over that.  It is so perfect for dancing because it has such a full swingy skirt.  ALSO, my guy happened to point out at Rhythm Riot that it is actually a novelty print and I hadn't even realised!  I thought it just had some sort of interesting floral swirly print but there are actually cherubs hidden within that! 

 

 

Dress: Vintage from the Clerkenwell Fair

Shoes: Johnson's

Bracelet: Vintage from Rhythm Riot

Earrings: Vintage from Etsy