The age of innocence

Childhood revisited or to put it bluntly, mutton dressed as lamb? Call it as you may, I obviously couldn't resist the temptation (see the grin). 

My worst to date, Mr P endeavored to remark. Apparently I have absolutely outdone myself in choosing the most unflattering shape and going for the "institutionalized child" look, possibly slightly retarded too...Ha ha! Well it certainly isn't one of my more mature choices... Joke aside, I can see where he's coming from ...if by institutionalized he means an early 30's boarding school, that is :).
Because that's where this piece of cloth works its magic for me. The evocative capacity is second to none among the vintage I posses . And while by no means do  I have a comprehensive collection, I still find the fact significant.

"This dress is not as nice as you think" says he. Yet the point is not that, but a different matter altogether. 

...I'm about to chase butterflies, roll in the grass and watch the clouds become fiery dragons reduced to nothing by valiant princes, my eyes dipped into the blue, my heart soaked into the light of this eternal summer... So it's not "nice" I give you, my friend - or rather, I give to myself - but a split second of a paradise forever lost, or perhaps only ever imagined, a glimpse du temps perdu I could almost catch through my tinted glass of nostalgia.

Magenta, sea green and curls under a head scarf (read: 1930's casual chic)

With the sudden resurgence of summer over here I jumped back into what has become for me a warm season staple: wide legged trousers with some blouse or another.Yep, I could do this forever. Lazy, yet happily so.

As for the colour combination, now I know why I needed that bag I left behind at the vintage shop...darn it!

Latest shop additions

 Look at these colours - autumn has come in my etsy store too!

"Colour me beautiful" in ochre, pumpkin, claret and chocolate

I was not particularly taken by this outfit when I put it together, plus I was having one of those days when you don't know what to do with your hair: not freshly washed so not looking its prime, not vintage curled  therefore making it difficult, if not impossible, to work a vintage outfit...

Having said that, things turned out better than I had thought: one of those cases were phrases like "effortless chic", which normally leave me with a sensation of numbness, start to make a dim half a sense, or at the very least I don't feel like my own clothes hate me. Most of time I try very hard with little success, so it is refreshing no to be crippled by the  effort. 

Yet I can't and will never take a perfect picture - something (such a lowered belt showing a missing button) will rearrange things in their natural order where my best will never be any more than a "good try" nor will it fool anybody. Still, with so many things around to bring one down, little matters a button...

Outfit: vintage crocheted gimp hat, as worn here and here; late 40's suit jacket; vintage knitted wine dress; modern shoes, by Carvela, and modern belt, from TK Max; 40's brown cord bag (was probably a purse); vintage Russian cherry amber brooch and vintage horn bead necklace.

Never again?

There is seaside, and there is...seaside. Or, you get there and the sea is nowhere to be seen. For sea-sightseeing, a mile walk in the mud sorts you out. When you finally reach it, you'll waltz in it like my baby did. Or perhaps not.

What is certain is that there can't be many worse ways of spending a wedding anniversary than driving for 3 hours to do this. And whilst doing so, do what married couple do best: bicker for the best part of it. 

Leave too late because you're simply too tired to do otherwise, take the wrong exit on motorways, have horses and an impressive variety of agricultural vehicles interpose themselves between you and this Arcadia of your desire, have your sat-nav lead you to the restaurant with the best reviews only to get lost in the middle of nowhere, and finally arrive at destination hungry and angry and having to face very soon the trip back ('cause there's work tomorrow), while you cannot help but wonder why everything always has to go wrong for you...

Still, not everything has gone wrong. 7 years down the road (excuse the pun) you're here, together, and you take with you the memory of the presents you found for each other on the beach: a little green plastic heart, a black chestnut...That, is good. And that keeps you going. There are paradises that we imagine, we dream of, we work for, we artificially invent, we fight for, we spend our life in the vain attempt to reach...when Arcadia is perhaps up for grabs in the mud.