in the country

 

Spending an unusual week by Lough Derg - eating Lemon Drizzle Cake, observing a lonesome peacock on a rooftop and foraging through antiques. 

my favourite thing about the summer

 

Sunglasses. 

yellow

 

Homage to Square, Josef Albers (If you live around Cork, have a look at the Josef Albers' exhibition at the Glucksman), Elle Fanning for Self-Service Magazine via Discotheque Confusion,  Alice of Hot & Cool/Cool & Beauty via Cheapskate Chic, Christopher Kane s/s '11, Elle Fanning same as before, Yellow lace dress, Topshop.

Warmest day yet. I crave a yellow dress. 

smart summer

 

 

via Blank magazine.

So it's summer. I really like these outfit ideas. Simple shirt and good jean combos are appealingly fuss free. Boyish with runners and cool with sharp sunglasses.

notebook

Front cover. 

Kandinsky postcard. 

JFK postcard and quote - Bob Dylan lyric. 

 

Turner postcard and an extract from Alain de Botton's The Architecture of Happiness.

Eva Hesse Quote with Pipilotti Rist postcard. - Rothko in Britain exhibition information and ticket. 

 

 

Click to enlarge. 

These are some excerpts from my notebook. I love notebooks. There is something so special about them and I am endlessly fascinated with what people scribble or stick in theirs. I got this notebook last summer in the MoMA gift shop in New York and as it was a fancy notebook ('Andy Warhol Idea Book') I really wanted to do something equally special with the content. Since then I have stuck various postcards and other bits and pieces on its pages accompanied with quotes, song lyrics, poems, extracts and other inspiring words.
Without getting super 'deep' and/or cheesy about it...it's doing little creative things like this that give me such peace of mind. Personally, I find it amazing how such small acts can be so extraordinarily fulfilling and it's nice to think I'll hopefully have this for a long time to come. 

pinafore

 

 

 

Dress, shirt - Zara, Shoes - Topshop

This dress originally belonged to my sister. I wore it once and then again and again and again and somehow, it became a staple in my own wardrobe despite my protestations about the 'LBD myth' (I think it was the overuse of the acronym itself that spawned my greatest distaste...).
I wore it yesterday as a pinafore with a polka-dot blouse from Zara and a denim jacket and with my Mother's leather handbag.
A little 60s inspired maybe...possibly due to further Mad Men adoration at the moment (just how good is series five?! Seriously it should be illegal for a TV show to be this good.).

something you should actually read

A few months ago I spent the bulk of a Friday afternoon reading each and every post over on new web mag, The Vagenda.  Yeah. Vag – enda. That’s a play on vagina and agenda.  While not necessarily about vaginas per se (well...), The Vagenda seeks to, in the words of the editor, ‘call the bullshit on the mainstream women’s press’. While many of the posts are infused with a sharp and snarky dose of vitriol, I found myself laughing aloud at the clever, perceptive and downright hilarious accounts of women’s magazines such as Grazia, More! and Cosmo.  The Vagenda highlights the manner in which such women publications attack and demonize female celebrities, poke fun at how these so called ‘women’s magazines’ are largely comprised of articles to ‘please him’ and stress the quite frankly ridiculous expectations such magazines place on women. They are not afraid to cast a wry look on the questionable journalism over at The Daily Mail (or ‘Fail’) either. Something I am sure the majority of us sane folk are onboard with too.

The Vagenda tackles the  problems within the mainstream women’s press superbly well, shining a light on the utter inanity often at work  - er, no More!, I don’t really care that 36% of ‘blokes’ prefer brown bread to white – and their seemingly endless hypocrisy; these maybe ‘women’s mags’ but just have a flick through some of the gossip stories for example, where week after week women are ridiculed due to weight gain, weight loss, constantly trying to ‘win’ back their exes and unable to cope with work and relationship pressures. 

The Vagenda is far from being alone in challenging the mainstream media’s demoralizing approach to female experience.  The Hairpin, Jezebel and the teen-orientated (but completely awesome and still relevant for anyone not in the intended age bracket) Rookie are some well known examples of internet outlets that are committed to approaching women issues and interests with intelligence, good humour and a healthy dollop of realism. Indeed, it would appear that the internet is the key tool at women’s disposal in what could be considered as feminism’s Fourth Wave. And while these are lighter options, to more political blogs such as Feministing.com, they provide an important foil to low-brow fodder, such as More! Cosmo, Look, Grazia etc.  

Maybe not everyone is keen to jump at the notion of Fourth Wave Feminism, but its existence is unquestionable. According to Jennifer Baumgardner, author of the rather creatively titled, F’em, Goo Goo, Gaga and Some Thoughts on Balls, the Fourth Wave emerged roughly in the latter years of the last decade with the onslaught of new media vehicles such as blogs and Twitter. Suddenly, there was a whole new means for women to communicate with each other and places to pen opinionated pieces on what being a woman, being a girl in the twenty first century is really like.

In addition, it is interesting to note the dialogue between fashion and feminism that has been gaining momentum in the past few years also. The Style Rookie, Fashion Pirate, Hipster Musings, The Man Repeller and even Advanced Style are all examples of fashion blogs that celebrate this idea of women dressing for themselves rather than giving into mainstream perceptions of beauty and looking ‘hot’ or sexy in a conventional manner. With physical appearance as a key (if sometimes unfortunate yet undisputable) aspect of female experience, there is a growing appetite among women to use their clothes as a means to question, if not attack societal expectations on what we as woman should look and dress like.

We need such outlets to counteract the derogatory way in which women are pitched to in the mainstream media.  I want to read something smart and real and witty that actually relates to my day to day experience as a woman. In general, I don’t wear ‘cute but sexy’ dresses whilst baking cupcakes and the ‘adorkable’ Zooey Deschanel is certainly no icon of mine. I am sick of being told that ‘real’ women have curves only to turn the page to find some soap star being derided for minor weight gain that is inevitably linked, in the eyes of the publication, to  her being dumped.

Internet sites such as The Vagenda recognize crucially that women want a much more rounded approach to lifestyle matters and wish for the diversity of women’s experience to be recognized (indeed, The Vagenda has been featured on The Guardian website twice with the magazine growing in significant popularity. Great things lie on the horizon. ). While these online women websites differ in the extent to which they may be overtly feminist , they are feminist because they care about how women are being spoken to in mainstream media and they seek to offer something true to what being a woman in the twenty first century is actually about.  It boils down to this: what we see so very often in these magazines does not correlate to women’s actual experience. But the internet is trying to do something about this.

nina leen

 

 

 

 

I discovered the photography of Nina Leen while I was researching for my dissertation recently. Many people will be familiar with her famous portrait of the Abstract Expressionists for LIFE in 1951, titled The Irascibles and her fashion photography is equally compelling. There is a great snapshot quality to her work - capturing little details like a hair bow or those quite frankly radical leopard print heels. Personally, I find a certain humour present in many of her photographs and a desire to capture patterns and repetition which at time lends an almost surreal aesthetic to her imagery. 

may grey

Firstly, forgive the mess in my room..
Second of all, this is like only one of my favourite dresses. I got it months ago and have worn it a lot since then. I like it because it's just the kind of thing that I can get a lot of wear out of  and I find it equally suitable when dressed up or down.
The length is all kinds of right for me too. It is that 'interesting' [code word for granny] length that I happen to find so appealing...
And we all like grey jersey, yeah?

Dress - Topshop

eyewear

Mia Farrow on the set of Rosemary's Baby, 1967.
THE most perfect sunglasses.

metallic

for The Face, Corinne Day 1993 via Dazed or Something

The Face, Juergen Teller via Dazed or Something

see you on a dark night

#1 & #2The ubiquitous Claire Boucher AKA Grimes. I like I like I like. Especially her glittery hoodie, baggy tee, headphones, pink/green/blonde hair and navy blues in the Oblivion video.Watch. Punky and sporty yet still sort of girly...? I dunno...but it works. #3 Princess Diana - Hello, double watches. Pretty rad, I think we can all agree. And neat summer blouse too. #4 Rihanna makes her first apperance on She's in Vogue. Say what? Rodarte jumper, heavy gold jewellery, ankle-grazing grey jersey skirt and Converse. Rihanna actually does have clothes other than hotpants! I kid I kid... #5 Paul Weller...being well Paul Weller... Denim jacket and scarf and scowl. #6 Lee Krasner, Shattered Form, 1947. #7 Freaks and Geeks' Lindsay Weir (Linda Cardellini) via Rookie. I always have room in my heart for khaki and flannel shirts.

seaside

(l-r) Jackson Pollock, unidentified child, Clement Greenberg, Helen Frankenthaler and Lee Krasner. (credit)

Ab Ex beach expedition, July 1952. This made my day.