hilkat

Since changing the blog, I’ve decided it’s now fine to be much more personal with my posts, and to write about a whole variation of things, which is why today’s post is about…. our upcoming nuptuals.

I’ve got very definite ideas about what I do and don’t want (DO: a relaxed and fun day, vintage country style decoration and dress, minimal fuss, candles, flowers in jam jars, nothing too matchy-matchy, and above all, cost effective. DON’T: ‘Bridezilla’ moments, bows, frills, anything too ‘done’, one theme colour, anything avant-guarde or modern, anything ridiculously overpriced) and have decided to share some inspiration pictures with you. The idea is to keep expenditure down to an absolute minimum, and while food is one cost that is always going to be fairly large, I’ve got no intention of paying £200 per table for them to be decorated, so I’m intending on doing all that myself (with the help of my Mum and Maid of Honour!). Here’s how!

I decided rather than paying for expensive vases, we would be thrifty (and eco-friendly!) and use jam jars to hold the flowers and candles. I love the effect this has, and although it sounds cheap and tacky, it looks marvelous!

After researching table centre-pieces, and almost fainting at the price of them, we’ve decided to do as much with candles and flowers (probably bought from a supermarket and trimmed accordingly the day before!) as we can. I’m a big candle person anyway, so its not going to be a problem, and once lit they look absolutely gorgeous. Tea lights, church candles, votive candles…. they’ll all be in there!

We’re also considering the idea of using bird cages or lanterns on the tables, either with candles or flowers arranged inside - I just love the vintage country feel they add. Plus, then I’d get to take them home and adorn our house with them!

For the place settings, I’m almost a hundred per cent sure that we’re going to incorporate vintage china (picked up from charity shops between now and then!), simply because it’s so colourful and in keeping with the rest of the look.

Obviously the flowers are pretty important, and the main idea is to keep them looking as relaxed and un-arranged as possible. I love the mix of tea-roses and carnations, in delicate shades of pink, yellow and green, and want the same sort of things in my bouquet. My worst nightmare is anything that looks like it’s been strapped in place with florist wire - let the flowers be free!

As much as I love writing this blog, having a part-time job, full-time son and Other Half, parents, relatives, friends and far too many hobbies for one person, means that I’m going to have to (gasp) do less posts. At 26, living in rural Hampshire and being more of the playground-and-reading set rather than the parties-and-raving group I used to be, means I now have too much to do and not enough time. Sadly, the only thing I can justify spending less time on is Hilkat. So rather than a post a day, it’s going to be more like a few posts a week, on varying subjects rather than just fashion. Expect more crafty-experiments, more photography, more art and a little less outfits, and far less catwalk photos (get thee over to style.com instead!). Look out for different categories in the sidebar, and blog links to things other than fashion. More fun writing, and generally an all-round more entertaining blog. When you put it like that, everyone’s a winner, surely?

Just a little tiny begging-bowl style post really - I feel a bit like Oliver, asking for ‘more’, however it’s not gruel I want, it’s your feedback. I know you people are out there, simply because Google Analytics tells me that a hundred or more of you log on every day - so how about leaving me some comments, words of wisdom, or just stopping by to inform me that if I post a picture of those black wedge boots one more time, then you’ll come and steal them away in the night? (Sorry about that, but they’re top of the shoe-pile at the moment).

I’d love to hear what you think, although I suppose this could be classed as a bit of a cheeky request since I read all of my favourite blogs through Google Reader and hardly ever comment myself. Maybe if I start, then the comment-karma fairy will come a-visiting…

Anyway, if Jean-Michel Basquiat, Andy Warhol and Tina Chow think you should leave comments, you can’t really argue….

As someone who refuses to conform to ‘trends’ and likes to put a bit of a unique twist on things, I’m all for natural beauty. This puts me slightly at odds with half the people in the fashion industry, who like everything to be airbrushed to an impossible, unattainable perfection - but I’m not going to change my opinion simply because I like to immerse myself in beautiful clothes and glossy magazines.

One of the leading fashion bloggers, the renowned Susie Bubble of Style Bubble, recently found herself in a spot of bother over some photographs she posted of her wearing a Pam Hogg catsuit - apparently the PR people considered this “bad publicity”. In her post detailing the event, Susie went on to tell how an individual on another style website deemed her “far too unattractive and unfit to be wearing the graduate pieces for Metro”. Upon reading her post, I was incensed at the audacity of people - who has the right to judge what kind of people are and are not suitable to be wearing a certain style of clothing? Susie has impeccable taste, is never afraid to try anything once, and has been a constant source of sartorial inspiration to me - who better to wear such clothes? Should they all be put on stick-thin models with lengthy blonde hair, and then airbrushed to look like someone else? Frankly, I think it’s a complete load of old guff - my continuous line, on forums and my blog alike, is that fashion should be accessable for all, regardless of age, race, size or “celebrity status”. Nobody should have the power to judge what other people should wear - fashion is an extension of a person and a way to celebrate individuality, be it through architectural detailing, the brightest of colours or the sharpest of tailoring.

Which leads me nicely to the point of this post - a rather wondrous video posted by Dove, in their campaign for real beauty. Perhaps if we all start photoshopping ourselves to death, we’ll finally be ‘allowed’ to wear the clothes we want to. Pffft. Pass the biscuits.

A rather lazy, and purely visual post now - a small gathering of the styles sported by those performing at various festivals throughout the summer. I can’t help but love Gaga’s mirrored mask, despite the fact that I find her immensely irritating…

Ashamedly, I didn’t know about the blog I’m about to write about until I found it shouting “how did you miss me?” from the pages of Grazia magazine a couple of months back, and even worse, it’s taken me this long to sit down and write about it. I do want to do it justice though, as it’s one of the best individual style blogs I’ve ever laid eyes on, so I decided to take my time choosing my favourite images.

What Katie Wore is a year long record of one woman’s outfits, written and photographed by her boyfriend, Joe. Every day, Katie adorns some of the most amazing sartorial combinations I’ve ever seen, and is then captured on camera by Joe, who adds witty and informative little snippets and posts the whole visual treat up on the blog.

I can honestly say, this is the only blog I ever visit daily, without fail, come hell or high water. If there was a comet plummeting towards the earth, I think I’d probably stop and log on to check out what Katie was wearing before heading for cover. She has the most individual style and extensive wardrobe that I’ve ever seen - and what’s even better is that she doesn’t seem to follow the fash-pack religiously. Her outfits are colourful, clashing and completely unique, and would probably make most of us look like a total tit - but she pulls off every single one without a glitch. Katie has the sort of look that I (and most people, I would imagine) would love to imitate if we were a shade braver - in my defence, I live in Portsmouth, aka The Land that Fashion Forgot, and so highly outrageous outfits just aren’t possible. But thanks to this wonderful blog, I’ve certainly been inspired to inject a little colour and print into my wardrobe. I just hope I can carry it off as well as Katie…

For every fashion fan, style-maven and anybody who even knows who Anna Wintour is (is there anybody out there who doesn’t?), September 10th is going to be tantamount to Christmas Eve. Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock for the last couple of months, you’ll already know that September 11th is the official UK release date for The September Issue, the groundbreaking piece of cinema that tells the story of how the most relevant issue of Vogue is produced.

The September issue of Vogue is arguably the most important - it’s the biggest (the 2007 edition of US Vogue weighed over 4lb), and the most anticipated of them all, impacting massively on what luxury and high street brands are bought and bypassed during the coming months. The film goes behind the scenes of the office of Anna Wintour, in an access-all-areas extravaganza to show what really happens during the production of the magazine.

Last year, when I was in the depths of pregnancy, and had lost interest in everything except eating things and moaning, Mary-Kate Olsen was featured as the cover girl for UK Elle magazine, and I recently remembered watching the ‘behind the scenes’ video for the photoshoot. I looked again last night - lo and behold, there it was on youtube, and now here it is on Hilkat. Even if you’ve seen it before, I find anything related to the wonderful Olsens is always massively inspirational. Personally, I love the paparazzi shot at 0:39, where she’s wearing a hoodie, a rock t-shirt and handfuls of rings - I do love a bit of grunge.