Ooh, Ooh, Ooh: Christopher Kane for Topshop

Look! The new Christopher Kane line has landed at Topshop! And I think I want them all - so it's probably a really good job I don't have any money right now, huh? And also that you can only buy 5 items from the collection.

Mesh, gems, eyelets and big crocodile teeth feature highly. Damn that Topshop website, they've disabled the copy function and I don't know how to get around that (and it's probably illegal, anyways), so I shall just link to my faves:

Crocodile teeth T-Shirt, £45.
Navy gem bust cup dress, £125.
Embellished leggings, £75. (Love!)
Pink embellished body, £75. (Also comes in black, but was getting bored of black by this point)
Mesh boots, £150.

Where would I wear them? Does it matter?

Fancy Pants

I have been procrastinating all morning instead of working, although I fully hope that the situation will change this afternoon. My time wasting brought me to the Urban Outfitters website (I really wish I lived near a store, why did they open one in my last city of occupation just as I was leaving? Not fair.).



Cheap as ever, my perusals took me to the sale pages rather than the full price ones. Now I want these flowery shorts - I just love the fact that they describe them as 'fancy pants'! Such appropriate and amusing nomenclature.



If I had any money - a situation that will not be remedied until the end of October, alas and alack - I would also be putting this drapey dress in my virtual basket. I like the casual cut and the racer back, but especially the print of the fabric; they describe it as "plaid graph", a kind of pixelated (sp?) plaid, but I think it also looks like a map! Or is that just me...?

But, since I am poor, I shall just have to console myself with the jeggings I got for £9.99 in the Leeds store.

Murderous Medea: A Recipe for Wedding Disaster?

Who on earth would name a wedding dress after Medea?!



Elizabeth Fillmore, apparently. The above dress is cccccrrrraaaaazy in an eccentrically beautiful kind of way, but even if I had the necessary funds ($19,580, apparently - which is, what, the best part of £12,000?) I don't think I could bring myself to wear a dress worn by such an ill-starred mythological figure.

Let's remind ourselves of her story, shall we? (I'm sticking mostly with Euripides here, I think) Medea is minding her own business on Colchis when along comes the handsome Jason - who doesn't so much sweep her off her feet, as convince her to help him nick the rather valuable and certainly unique golden fleece by murdering and dismembering her own brother. Nice. Then, they get back home to Corinth, and after knocking her up a couple of times Jason announces he's leaving her for a princess (the daughter of the king, not just a spoilt blonde); as if that weren't bad enough, he pretty much tells her it's all her own fault for being different and that, not to worry, she can be an ex-wife with 'benefits', if she wants. In retaliation, Medea is emotionally torn, but decides to punish him by killing the two children she has borne him in cold blood (but off-stage). She doesn't even leave their little lifeless bodies behind for the now-bereft Jason to bury with the proper rites.

Even the myth seems to blame Jason, because Medea doesn't get her comeupance but is carried off on the sun-god's chariot. Ovid has a rather nice line in Medea's point of view, too, in his Heroides (note too that Jason has not one but two letters from scorned special lady friends in the Heroides, the cad!).

So all in all, not the best name for a wedding dress.

People Tree Madeline Jacket

People Tree is one of those brands that I've tended to admire from afar, but have avoided perusing too deeply because I've always been scared of their prices. But the other week their catalogue fell into my mail box and I've been seriously considering parting with some of my well-earned cash ever since (or at least, parting with some of said cash when I finally start earning it again - Oct 31st, here I come!)



Ok, so they've got their fair share of quite grown-up fashion and of shapeless, fair trade bits and pieces, but, like many ethical companies, they are particularly good at tailored outerwear, I think. This Madeline coat is no more expensive than a decent coat from the high street at £90 - which really isn't very much to pay when you consider that the fabric is handwoven - in fact, I've begun to feel that once you start reading up on why the prices are high (hand weaving, hand embroidering, fair wages in very deprived areas offering independence and a lifeline to exploited women workers etc) they start to seem a lot more reasonable.



I also love this Bora Aksu cotton jacket (£75, and the t-shirt beneath, £42!). These are quirky but wearable pieces, and I fully intend to purchase a wide black patent belt to solve the problem that there are no fastenings on the Madeline coat - two looks in one, I feel!

Plus, I've just discovered that you can also collect nectar points online from People Tree, which you can save up and use to buy books - so, I can also further my research by buying fair-trade fashion! I think I'm onto a winner here...

Sequin Leggings

I think it would be fair to say that we love our leggings, yes? Each year, we both pale when various fashion pages say that leggings are finally going out of fashion, because what other fashion item is as flexible as a pair of leggings? We've done plain black and we've done coloured, we've done wet-look (you laughed at me at first, but now you're on side) and I believe we've even done leopard-print (I've got a pair of flowery footless tights, too, but I've not worn them yet...).

So how do we feel about sequined?



Each year, I look at sequined leggings in the sales and I don't like the extreme symmetry of the sequins - too neat, too tidy. But these H&M ones look so cute in the autumn ad campaign! And, even better, they're only £12.99! Love, love, love!

Time for some sparkle, do you think? But how do wear them during the day?