Je t’ai aimé et je t’assure que c’est la fin

I loved you and I assure you it's the end


I just downloaded Cœur de pirate's second album Blonde and it is just fantastic. Even though I do no speak a word of French, I cannot resist singing along is a series of bluh blah dahs that sound vaguely like Joey when he attempts to learn the language. 

http://fyeahfriendsgifs.tumblr.com/

I discovered the lovely Béatrice Martin through Tumblr and as soon as I heard her croon those first few notes, I knew I had found something beautiful. Not only does she have a magnificent voice and a way of dragging me into a song - even though I haven't the faintest idea what it is about - but she is also quite a beauty with two sleeves of colourful tattoos and a sixties flick of black eyeliner. It's like The Like, of whom I am also a great fan, but in French.
Below if the video to her song Adieu to which I am listening right now.

Make sure you have a good listen to her. She is quite fantastic!

Cheers for reading,

Now go forth and French it up, dude. 

Jane

photo diary

- mask for Italian Soc Ball -

- bedroom wall hanging -

- blue nails -

- screen shot of my first article on Studenty.me - 

On a side note, I've started getting my vaccinations and shots for Zambia this summer. I have a whole ton of them to get - it's going to be fun fun fun!

masquerade

So I am going to the NUIG Italian Society's Masquerade Ball next Wednesday, even though I am in absolutely no way, nor have I ever been in any way or even known anyone in any way, involved in the Italian Soc. But hey (!) I wasn't part of the Physics Soc when I went to Munich with them in 1st Year and that was positively fantastic. So next Wednesday, a troop of us will arrive out to the Salthill Hotel all masked up and looking magnificent.

Firstly, though, masks had to be bought. I managed to find one today in a shop called Mez's Masquerade on Middle Street in Galway City. The mask as you can see below was just a simple black butterfly type of affair but with the help of some sparkly gold Essence nail polish from Penneys, I  managed to make it a little bit more interesting. 

 

So below is the finished effect. I probably should have taken a picture of how it originally looked though but if you just imagine all of the sparkly gold stuff not being there then that's pretty much it. Please excuse the goofy expression on my face. I realise that I look like a bit of a goon. I may add some thing else to it too, but I'm not quite sure what yet. 

Expect a post about the ball itself, which will hopefully be great!

Cheers for reading,

Jane

model moment

Kelly Mittendorf has quite possibly the most unusual face to be sent down the runway in some time. Apparently first scouted at the age of 11 at a swimming competition, this Arizonian is about to become one of the most sought-after models around thanks to those feline eyes and bee-stung lips.

image via forums.thefashionspot.com

She is not conventionally beautiful but god help you if you try and break her gaze. Top that 5'10" frame off with a mop of long chestnut locks and gazelle limbs and she has a other-worldly beauty similar to that of Lily Cole or Masha Tyelna.

image via google.images.com

image via google.images.com

What Mittendorf definitely is not, is an expected choice, but then again isn't that what fashion is constantly trying to be? There is something almost primordial about that brow, something that reminds me of the Germanic tribes that were often mentioned in my Early Greece lectures last year. Whatever it is though the likes of Miuccia Prada seem to be soaking it up. After placing her in Steven Meisel's Fall 2012 campaign, Mittendorf was signed to Marilyn and as Miuccia has had the magic touch in the past with models like Sasha Pivovarova and Lindsay Wixson, it's safe to assume that we will be seeing a lot more of Kelly in seasons to come.

Whatever can be said about that unusual face of hers, there is absolutely no denying that she has the body of a model, with MARILYN recording her measurements as 32-24.5-35. That is a perfect seven on the waist-to-hip ratio which, according to research, is the absolute ideal and ultimate indicator of attractiveness. Don't believe me? HERE, have some Harvard. That perfect waist-to-hip ratio was shown off in the December 2011 issue of Vogue Nippon (Japan) as you can see in the picture below. Styled by Aurora Sansone and photographed by Paola Kudaki, there is no denying that she makes an impact on the viewer evoking memories of the Indonesian model Tracy Trinita. 

image via google.images.com

Considering the Autumn/Winter 2012 shows are fast approaching, I'd say - and I hope - that we will be seeing a lot more of her. 

Cheers for reading,

Jane

cosmetic consumer

Some recent make up purchases...
The lipstick is 17 Lasting Fix in Poncho Pink and when they say lasting they mean lasting. It is quite possibly the best lipstick that I have ever owned. It does not budge all day long. I wore it out one night last week and when I woke up the next morning you could still see the pink gleam of it on my lips. And all for something like a fiver in Boots! 10/10
I have been meaning to get more concealor for a while now. I wear MAC ProLongwear in NW20 but since I have such horrible dark circles under my eyes I want something a little more heavy duty so off with me to BT's where I picked up the Studio Finish Concealor in NW20. It is much much better at covering dark circles than the ProLongwear but not quite as good for other blemishes, of which I unfortunately have many. 9/10


Excuse the shoddy photography. Although it is a fairly basic Canon (Powershot SX130 IS) I still have yet to figure out how to actually use it properly in inside lighting so alas I am back to the good old reliable iPhone.

Cheers for reading,

Jane

dior since galliano

I recently said some harsh things about Dior in a post HERE regarding Raf Simons leaving Jil Sander to take the position that John Galliano had held until the hypothetical shit hit the fan during the summer.
So now I am going to do a bit of a retrospective on Christian Dior since Galliano left, and his former position as Creative Director became the most debated métier in fashion.
So after Galliano was fired for being caught making anti-Semitic remarks on video, the question of who would take his place was rife amongst novice fashion blogger such as myself right up to the top of the commentary hierarchy.
Bill Gaytten, who had worked at the hand of Galliano for more than twenty years, finally got his chance in the limelight with the Fall Couture collection in July 2011. In my humble opinion the collection was a major flop. All the elegance of Dior and the history of brand seemed to have been flung out the window and replaced by a mishmash of clown makeup, schizophrenic patterns and hats that looked like they had been collected from the bottom of a three year old's toy box.

Fall Couture 2011

Fall Couture 2011

It then appeared that after that disastrous collection, someone took Mr. Gaytten aside, had a quiet word with him and then Bill began to rethink the the position he was in and the power that was, quite overnight, thrown into his lap. And indeed he did seem to understand. A little. The collection that followed, Spring ready-to-wear 2012, did seem to attempt to tap into the elegance and glamour that Dior had become famous for since it's creation in the 1940s and back to that era Gaytten did go.

Now as you can see from the pictures below, it seemed like he was truly going back to the roots of Dior and the New Look that caused such a commotion after the austerity of the war. 

Spring RTW 2012

Spring RTW 2012

images via style.com

If you look at the overall collection though, you'll see that romanticism was well and truly dead on that runway. While Galliano injected cheekiness into his shows through the flash of the inside thigh or the slit in a too-tight pencil skirt, Gaytten went a step too far by simply showing cheek. While girls were paraded down the runway in sheer skirts and knickers, something expected from the flirty Italians at D&G or Cavalli not a house renowned for French elegance, Karlie Kloss ended the show with her derrière. No doubt Karlie has a fantastic bum sitting atop those fantastic legs but is that really the last thought that should be left in the minds of the buyers, editors and even celebrities who came to see Gaytten's second attempt at salvaging the brand whose name was already up to its ear in controversy?

yes that is the bum of Karlie Kloss

image via jezebel.com

So with Dior holding the 2.30pm slot next Monday for Couture week, all eyes will be expecting Gaytten to really up his game because, with all drew respect, his was never a permanent position and whoever will be taking the reigns next won't want to have to dig a house with so much history out of the proverbial hole. 

 Cheers for reading,

Jane

A little New Year's Resolution update...

So today I took a wild fling at using my new Walk-to-Run app. It turns out though that the free app was in fact kind of crap as when you have music playing it doesn't do the whole Now You Can Run, Now You Can Walk thing that I downloaded the bloody thing for. So now I will have to download another one. Ah my life is abounding with First World problems.

These are my hideous runners.

Are they or are they not the most rank pair of shoes that were ever created?
It's not helped by the fact that I have enormous feet and therefore must wear equally enormous ugly runners. They are actually basketball boots but I wear them for every kind of exercise because they are immensely comfortable.

In other news, the not-nail-biting resolution is going spectacularly!

(taken with Instragram)

Cheers for reading, 

Jane

shock.sadness.gratitude.acceptance.relief.delight

So apparently Raf Simons in tipped to be the next man to take the currently shaky helm of Dior.

Thoughts? 

How about 7 stages of emotion...

First: shock.

What about Jil Sander? What about cotton t-shirts paired with couture peplum skirts in jewel colours? What about men in shorts? What about boxy and oversized being desirable? What about elegance in white, navy and brown?

Second: sadness.

Will Simons be given the same freedom in Dior. Sander herself was a minimalistic designer, which was perfect for Simons. Simplicity in unflustered calm. Womanly clothes devoid of ruffles and frills and elegance in white, brown and navy. Will this be the end? 

Third: gratitude.

Look who made cotton t-shirts paired with couture peplum skirts in jewel colours the most divine combination on the planet back in September. Look who paraded men in shorts and eel-skin coats during the summer. Ah Jane, look who made you lust after oversized, boxy cashmere coats back at the tender age of 17! 

Fourth: acceptance.

Well, Dior could use the help. Particularly after those things that were sent down the runway back in July by Bill Gaytten. Perhaps I'm being harsh but if I had a niece, who was six years old, watched My Little Pony and Strawberry Shortcake and happened to come across a crate of Red Bull and an endless supply of rainbow dust, then I wouldn't be surprised if she styled these dresses out of various items of clothing already in her wardrobe. 

Yes. On second thought this is probably a good idea.

Fifth: relief.

No doubt Raf will bring a calm and clear Grace Kelly-esque vision of style and elegance back to Dior. Galliano brought a kind of femininity that made woman squeal in delight and wish for longer legs, Simons will bring a kind of femininity to Dior that will make women long for swimmer's shoulders and a healthy complexion. 

Sixth: sheer delight.

Oh my! This is going to be fantastic!

Seventh: extreme sadness.

Now who will buy me all these clothes!?

Jil Sander S/S 2012

Jil Sander S/S 2011 - possibly a lesson in how to open a show

Jil Sander A/W 2009

all images via style.com

So if the rumors are true then, this next collection from Jil Sander could be the last we see from Raf Simons. Milan Fashion Week is from the 22nd to the 28th February. 

Yall gone be watchin' right?

Cheers for reading,

Jane

napping

Sandwiched nicely between a Flirtationship and Trees for Cities in the What's Hot section of the Sunday Times Style magazine.

Wow.
I am so on trend.

Go forth and nap,

Jane

anjelica

"Oh, all kinds of lunacy happens in Ireland, all kinds of lunacy.”
This is one of my favourite things said by one of my favourite actors.

Anjelica Huston, I do adore you!

Being an enormous fan of Wes Anderson also helps as she has starred in three of his six feature length films, perhaps most famously as Etheline Tenenbaum in 2001. I believe that she is undoubtedly one of the most talented actresses of the late 20th century and 21st century. Most recently I saw her in Jonathon Levine's (who I have had a teensy weensy crush on since The Wackness) 50/50 with Seth Rogen and Joseph Gordon Levitt. She played JGL's mother and, I think anyway, that she got the perpetually worried mother of a too-young cancer victim down to an absolute tee! On top of everything else, she also has ties with not only Galway but also NUIG. Back in 2003, NUIG established a Digital and Media School called, no less, The Huston School named after John Huston, the Oscar winning director/father of Anjelica. John Huston's personal archives also found a home in the NUIG library. Anjelica is the third generation of Oscar winners in her family. Walter Huston, her grandfather, won an Oscar in 1949 and was nominated for three others. Aside from the the NUIG connection, the Huston family also have a history with Galway. Apparently as a child, Huston grew up in St Clerans House, Craughwell, outside Galway city.
I took a seminar in Cinema and Media Studies in the Huston School - which unless you are given instructions as to where it is, you're pretty much guaranteed that you'll never find it - and despite being aware of the whole Huston family connection for some reach, and a little embarrassingly I kept calling it Hudson. But maybe after this post I will have it so drilled it my head that I could not possibly call it the incorrect name again.
Huston. Huston. Huston. Hudson. Huston Huston.

While doing some Google searches for images of Anjelica in NUI, I came across these positively amazing editorial shots of Anjelica Huston modeling Valentino in the early seventies.

all images via www.iamlexaco.com

It was photographed by the late Bob Richardson and co-stars a slightly androgynous male model who reminds me a little of the currently exorbitantly-en-vogue Andrej Pejic. 

Cheers for reading,

Jane

17/1/2012 EDIT:

Anjelica Huston will also be starring in Smash, Steven Spielberg's take on the current obsession with all things musical theatre. She will be playing Eileen Rand the producer of the musical that the show is based around. On top of everything else the musical that she is producing is about the life of my ultimate icon, Miss Marilyn Monroe. The show will also star Debra Messing, Katharine McPhee and Uma Thurman. HERE is the trailer is you'd like to check it out. It's due to air at the beginning of February. 

tipping the velvet

I picked these velvet-look pumps up in Dunnes Stores the other day. I couldn't decide between the black or the blue but at €6 a pair neither could be left behind.

Cheers for reading,

Jane

wardrobe rules

This is just in response to an ask that I got about my tumblr. This is my wardrobe in my house in Galway. As you can see it's pretty wedged because I like to hang pretty much everything up.

Cheers for reading,

Jane

epic fantasy

I have spent the first four days of the New Year watching Game of Thrones. I don't think I am physically able to wait until April for the second series. I may try and get my hands on A Song Of Fire And Ice (that's the book series by George R. R. Martin from which the show was adapted). Also I simply cannot let this go unsaid. Martin created a very detailed world which one would be forgiven for thinking was medieval England. J. R. R. Tolkien, before him, did exactly the same. Martin was even hailed the American Tolkien. This leads me to...
J. R. R. Tolkien. George R. R. Martin.
I know that that is an extremely juvenile thing to sieze upon, but my theory is that when Martin first began writing in the seventies, he may well have wanted something to show that fantasy was his genre of choice. And what better way to do that then have a name that would remind any reader of one of the most famous fantasy trilogies of all time? Now this is of course just speculation. I am simply making an assumption.

Now to Game of Thrones itself...

It really is very good.

They all curse like mo-fos and have names that were hard to remember in the beginning and it also seems like every cast member signed a bum-related nudity clause before filming because they are just mad for showing derrière. Aside from all the butts though (see what I did there?), as far as IMDB ratings go, a 9.4 is undoubtedly impressive. It is undoubtedly the best thing on TV recently despite all the great pilots that came out in September, having discovered GOT has definitely been the highlight (of my life. Literally).
HBO shot the series between Belfast, Malta, Dubrovnik and Reykjavik and although they appear to have wrapped filming in Belfast, I would love to travel up North to get a look at where they shoot. The landscapes and sets in the movies are just spectacular. As are the costumes which are created by Michele Clapton. She was nominated for an Emmy for her work with the show but unfortunately lost out to The Borgias which is such a shame because the costumes really are something else. Next Year Michele. Next Year. It goes without saying, for anyone who has even just seen the trailer, that the acting in this show is unreal. Everyone from Jack Gleeson to Jason Momoa to Peter Dinklage (who won an Emmy for his portrayal as Tyrion Lannister) is just excellent. Even the embarrassingly well cast Alfie Allen is great.
Plus there are some fine looking men in it too if you need any extra convincing. See Kit Harington.

Cheers for reading,

Jane

15/1/12 EDIT:

Saw it in Easons and I could not help myself. Am starting from the beginning. 

Delighted!

make up and tea

- honey bronze bronzing gel for face from the body shop and urban decay loose pigment -

- urban decay loose pigment brush -

- copco reusable 16oz coffee cup -

This bronzing gel from the Body Shop really is quite fantastic. I have never been a fake tan person and probably never will be but this is handy for rubbing on your neck and décolletage if your going out makeup is darker than your everyday makeup. When you first apply it it looks a bit blotchy but it dries really well and certainly does not look like fake tan. Also if you're not really in a make up mood, slapping it on like a tinted moisturizer followed by some light powder works pretty well. I bought it after reading about it HERE. At €18, it is a fairly decent price when it comes to finding a decent tinited moisturizer or bronzing gel light enough for the face. 9/10

I picked this Urban Decay eyeshadow up in Cara Pharmacy in Sligo and although the brush is pretty much unusable as it flickered pigment all over your face the eyeshadow itself is very good. Highly pigmented and a nice colour (smog) considering its meek price tag. 7/10

I picked this reusable coffee cup in Home Store and More in Sligo yesterday when I was buying a weighing scales (along with six other people in the queue - 'tis January after all). I couldn't resist it  even though I don't actually drink coffee but it's nice a big and perfect for holding lots of tea!

Cheers for reading,

Jane

New Year's Resolutions

1. Stop Biting Nails. 
    I am, and always have been, a nail-biter. I have stopped many times - Lent, previous New Years, for special occasions - but I have always given up within a few months. So this year, like several years before this, I will let them grow again and more than likely be off the bandwagon by March.

2. Make My Bed Every Morning
    Yes I am secretly a six year old girl who is not very good at keeping her room clean.

3. Stop Buying 12 and 18 Can Packs Of Diet Coke
    This absolutely needs to be done. If it's not sitting beside my study desk while I sitting there feeling sorry for myself, then I won't drink it.

4. Start Properly Saving and Fundraising
    I have seriously fallen behind in my fundraising for my trip to Zambia in June with Habitat for Humanity. Also saving for travelling with Caitlin is not going well either. At this stage I have enough funds to met her at the airport when she returns.

5. Lose A Few Pounds
    It couldn't hurt.

Cheers for reading,

Jane

sales

I, like many, cannot turn down a good bargain, so unsurprisingly and despite being somewhat under the weather, a post-Christmas trip to the sales was in order after the long annual feeding-frenzy of Christmas Day. I purchased in River Island a black and grey wool tunic, a black sheer pussy bow blouse, denim skinny jeans and a big woolly jumper from the men's section, an top in a|wear and a top in Next that I think I may return because I'm not entirely sure about it. I am waiting to until I'll be back in Galway before I do any more sales shopping. I desperately want to hit up Topshop particularly the jewellery section.

Also the newest addition to my collection of electronic gizmos is a Canon Powershot SX130. I had intended on getting an SLR but considering I'm not the most technically minded of people, I thought that I should probably start small. Going from a quite basic Fujifilm Finepix Z30 straight to a snazzy grown-up camera would have been too much of a leap for me.

So now dear readers - of whom I'm sure are numerous in number - prepare yourselves for a higher standard of photographs accompanying the same bog-standard quality of content. 

Cheers for reading,

Jane

new header

I decided to go mad for the new year and create a new header for myself.

This is the original photograph which was taken during Una's and my mini-adventure on the Corrib Princess at the beginning of the summer.

Cheers for reading,

Jane

gifting

Here is just a quick post about some presents that a few other people received this Christmas. 

First up this beautiful snow globe. 

My friend Caitlin got this beautiful Nightmare Before Christmas snow globe from her mum for Christmas. I have been trying to find some more information about it online but unfortunately I cannot. It is beautiful is it not?

After going to see Hugo which I strongly recommend by the way, Caitlin and I went to see her sister in her new apartment. While there I spotted this. 

Now I am not a fan of One Direction so I was not even aware of the fact that there were dolls of them floating about but when I saw it, I had to take a picture. Imagine all the hoards of screaming pre-pubescent girls whose barbies can now send their barbies on dates with boys who have just recently emerged from the side of puberty.

My uncle, of whom I am now quite jealous, treated himself to an iPad and although I previously had no desire to get one, I now sort of do. I have absolutely no use for one but after spending a while fiddling around with one, I can't help looking upon any iPad with a hint of envy.

I hope that you all got what you wanted this Christmas and that you all gave some good gifts too.

Cheers for reading,

Jane