Frida Friday

 JOY!

Today's outfit revolves around one of my most prized possessions; my Frida Kahlo swing dress.

I love a pinup style swing dress at the best of times, but a plus size stretch dress with a Frida Kahlo print is just so exciting!

 The Print is delicious!

I've had this Queen of Holloway dress for a couple of years and I will never ever part with it.... EVER! I hope you'll be happy to know that you can still get this dress (I'm wearing a size 24 here btw, but would probably have fitted the 22 in this particular dress if your wondering about the sizing!) and the best thing is it's only £29.99 via ebay.... for a dress this lovely, with so much fabric that is a fantastic bargain!

Frida Dress - Queen of Holloway

Cardi - Primark

Necklace - Primark

Sandals - Ipanema

 Primark necklace from my last post, and a lipstain from Gosh to finish the outfit! I'm also wearing my new favourite blusher from MUA, but I'll tell you about that in another post 'cause I've got loads of lush new makeup recently!

So that was Fridays outfit. Below are some snaps from the rest of the week!

Thursday

Top - H&M Mama

Trousers - Dorothy Perkins

Sandals - Ipanema

Necklace - Holiday gift from a friend YEARS ago. Coins on it. Love it!

Wednesday

Dress - Vintage (another favourite of mine!)

Tuesday

Dress - Anna Scholz (black and red version here)

Neon Earrings - H&M

Sandals - Primark

Monday

Dress - Asos

Leggings - H&M

Shoes - Crocs 

Lip balm (exactly the same colour as this dress!) - MUA 'crazy in love' power pout.

A quick one!

You've already seen this Queen of Holloway dress but it was my OTTD for work today. It's so comfy. I felt amazing in it!

 Can't believe I chopped my feet of in these pics when I was actually wearing heels!

 

I did attempt to take a daylight picture but it's so piggin' grey again so it's super dark!

 I had my little Clarks Originals on today.....

Here's my work selfie so you can see them with the outfit.... they're so cute, I love them.... I also have them in neon pink!

So then, some little red accents to match the buttons on the dress; My favourite old Eyeko lip crayon - from the days when they had the manga/anime theme, I don't think their new incarnation does them sadly :(. Also a pair of Primarni earrings with red apples on.

It's been a good day, and now it's time for Have I got News for You in my fluffy dressing gown (bbbbbrrrrrrrrrrrrr!).

OMG OMG OMG!

My 2 new dresses from Queen of Holloway arrived today, and I am so bloody excited!

As you can see this first dress is super tight on my waist (well, the bit above my belly, which I call my waist!). It's supposed to be a size 24 (4XL) but it's much smaller than normal QOH dresses - still generous on the bust though....

The thing is I feel like a little sex siren in this dress, and as it's a good length so I'm considering folding and sewing it under the bust to raise the wider section of the skirt up to my waist - I need to shorten the halter strap too, or I'd be in danger of showing my boobs to everyone! What do you think ladies? I's it worth me customising or should I just sell it?! Returns aren't really an option as they come from China!

Now on to something a little more classy!

HOW FUCKING AMAZING IS THIS DRESS?!

 Oh my god I was excited when this arrived on the site, but I was in RAPTURES when I tried it on!

It's such a good fit - size 24 / 4XL and is quite generous and more stretchy than anything I've had from QOH before. I am so in love!

I have nothing else to say, I'm just going to sit and stare at it for a while!

Queen of Holloway website is a bitch to navigate so the red polka dot dress is here, the black striped dress is here xx

Easter Sunday

Pah to the cold grey weather! The boyf' and I didn't get dressed until after 6pm, which is outrageous, but felt so so good today!

Today is a day for music, comedy and good food (which means I'm cooking!) so I fancied getting a bit girly!

The chicken is in the oven, and I'm about to get peeling. Nothing better than a roast on a Sunday!

This is one of my Queen of Holloway dresses. It has Parisian scenes all over it! The shoes and cardi are both from Primark.

So cute right?!

I had to do quite a lot of customisation on this particular dress (I've not had that problem with any of the other QOH dresses I have btw), as I couldn't do it up over my norks when it arrived, and I really couldn't part with it because I love the print so much! Basically I turned it back to front and expanded the bust using the lining. It was a very untidy job but it seems to have worked. It's now extremely low-cut but I don't mind!

I'm wearing my old lancom juicy crayon today - I'd forgotten how delicious they are! Don't often wear pale pink lippy but this one is so sheer that I love it.

Rock Diva

'Tis Dress like a Diva Friday again. Frankly the weather has been playing havoc with my diva days. I'm so sick of having to wear boots, big coats and hoods. I have so many spring coats and lovely shoes but I keep having to dress according to what I have to put on my feet! It's annoying frankly.

Having said that I do so love this ASOS curve swing dress (available here) which I have taken to calling my 'Matrix' Dress.

I figured that if I had to wear man boots that I had better go for a bit of a grungy look, so I decided on smoky green eyes. This is a Mac shadow from a delicious pallet I bought years ago. I hardly ever wear eye shadow nowadays, but I used to so I have every colour you could ever think of. Should use them more, especially the mac pots that were £15 each!

I also scrunched my hair up a bit to make it wavy (and scruffy!).

Anyway, fingers crossed next week I'll get good enough weather to forgo big clumpy boots!

The matrix

I don't get on very well with white dresses, so as much as I love the baroque print ASOS curve swing dress I bought a last month I just didn't feel very comfortable in it. I wore it to work, and for lunch with my (not officially) in-laws, but I wasn't really sure about it. When I saw the green and black angle print swing dress I was like DAMN! that one is way more me... so I decided to sell my baroque print dress and buy the angle one.

I noticed that the print placement was different on the regular version for this dress, so I ordered and 18 in asos, and a 20 in asos curve to compare. It's too damn cold to get fully changed so the leggings I was wearing today look a bit odd. Please ignore them!

Curve first...

So the Curve dress is the perfect fit. I'm quite tall so it comes to just above my knee, which is my perfect length for a swing dress. The arms are comfy and it's generally very nice. The only problem is that there is a seem down the back which doesn't match up the print properly. It's a bit of a shame, but I knew from the pictures that this might be the case.

The print placement on the regular asos dress is much better I think, but this size 18 is a bit small for me - it's tight on the bust and arms, and so the fabric becomes a little see through so it doesn't swing as much as like it should!. The length is also too short for me. Shame becuase I think the dress looks better with the print like this.

I've decided to go for the curve version because it don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing.... it's more comfortable too and I feel a bit rock chick-ish in it!

Faux Christmas!

 

My boyfriend and I have been having a lovely fake Christmas before we go to opposite sides of the country for real Christmas. This pic is from Faux Christmas Eve. These earrings are from the V&A's 'Hollywood Costume' exhibition btw, which is friggin' awesome - anyone who is London should check it out!

Just had on the swan print tea dress from Simply be and a primark cardi. Takin' it easy!

It's all about food for us at Christmas. Presents okay yeah, but can any gift compare to duck & grand mariner pate on toasted Brioche, or ginger glazed ham with butternut squash, piccante Gorgonzola, creamed leeks and a snowball?! I think not!

 Ahhhhhh faux Christmas day! The fascinator is actually part of a Mr Claus outfit I have for Tonight.

On with an old fave, my polka dot Queen of Holloway swing dress. I'm wearing an old floral cardi from Primark with it for a bit of clash (and warmth!) and of course my primani Rudolph slippers. I've got some of these for my sister too, because I really love mine!

My boyfriends mum has got my number, check out the cute hat and mitten set she got me from Next!

 As Always I've gone massively over the top with the Christmas dinner (sprouts, gravy & bread sauce are all on the stove behind me in this pic!) and there is probably enough for 6 massive dinners. I blame the supermarkets selling everything in bags.... always too many potatoes etc but never mind, we are both very greedy and will be having leftovers on Sunday before we go to catch our separate trains. I'll need a full belly tor travel on as I'm going to be trying to get to the West Country and the trains are bolloxed!

I'll probably do some real Christmas blogging from my family's place via my phone. I'm planning to get my mum & sister involved (and maybe my super stylish little nephew!

Happy Faux Christmas to you all!  xx

Queen of Holloway wish list

My love for dresses knows no bounds. Although I am not a woman who has one look (I'm too fickle to stick to one style of dressing!) I do have a bit of a thing for vintage / reproduction vintage dresses. I LOVE polka dots and crazy patterns. I'd always wanted to be able to buy clothes from Get Cutie but their vintage sizing means that a size 24 is more like a 20, so too small for my size 22 body. Plus they're very expensive. I also like Collectif for retro dresses, but I have never been on the site and found a dress in a size 22 - they always seem to be out of stock.  I discovered Queen of Holloway via ebay and fell head over heals. I could finally buy some delicious pinup style dresses for decent prices. I now have 5 QOH dresses, but there are so many more that I want! Above is my wish list. Under no circumstances am I allowed to buy all of these, but the leopard print swing dress and the turquoise sailor dress have been on my list for ages so maybe I will have to order them soon!

This was my first Queen of Holloway purchase - Lovely pinup dress with cherries on, from ebay for about £18 (might be a bit more expensive from the real site, but still super cheap). It's a size 24 (a size bigger than I normally wear) and it fits really well. Love it. because it's a pencil dress I think the 22 would have been a little too snug on my belly / boobs, but having said that the fabric has a bit of stretch to it and is really skimming and comfy. QOH standard sizing goes up to a 24, but for a few quid extra you can ask for a custom size. I love this dress, and so I got some more....

The polka dot dress is a fab party dress with a full on swing skirt. The green dress is bloody awesome - It's a Frida Kahlo print, the same as Get Cutie use to do but it cost me about £35 rather than £100! I probably could have got away with a 22 in this one because it's quite generous on the bust. The fabric is amazing - thick and firm, but also soft and stretchy. the Paris print dress wasn't so good, because oddly the stretch goes from top to bottom rather than side to side (surely a mistake?!), so I couldn't get it over my boobs. I ended up cutting the lining out and recreating the body of the dress. Super scruffy work, but the dress is now wearable (albeit SUPER lowcut!), and the pattern was to good not to keep! The pin-up cowgirls dress was the one that really stopped my heart. This is the (Alexander Henry) fabric that I nearly spent loads of money on in order to try & make my own dress. Thank goodness I didn't because this dress looks amazing on - I need a belt to position the waist properly as the skirt is so full, but for £35 I was one happy bunny when this arrived.

A few words of advice - these dresses are normally shipped from China and they can take a while to arrive so make sure you order well in advance of any events you might want them for. The website is a bit of a pain to use, many of the categories don't have any dresses in, but they're on the site if you search. I advise you to click on 'All products' and take the time to look at what they have. Also, they often have almost identical dresses with just a slight difference (like one has a bow and the other doesn't) so look carefully, because sometimes you can get the same basic dress at a cheaper price. They have a range of @Audry Hepburn inspired dresses which are super elegant, and they also make copies of dresses from the series 'Mad Men', so they're good for fancy dress (or if like me you'd very much like to look like Joan!). They make 50's style wedding dresses and coats which look gorgeous, and for under £100 you couldn't go wrong. Once you own a QOH item, if you snap yourself wearing it and send it to the site you'll get a 10% discount on your next purchase (you'll see me in the customer gallery, as I love a good discount code!). I think that any plus size beauties looking for some pinup / swing dresses should take a look at this site - the quality isn't bad considering the cheap prices, and some of the dresses are identical to more expensive versions sold on American sites like 'Pinup Girl'.