Raffaele Ascione

All I can say is this guy is amazing. A few weeks ago in college we had the pleasure of meeting him. He gave us some very inspiring and inspirational talks. He is a London based designer and he started his fashion journey when he moved from Germany to Ireland to study Fashion, Design and Textiles in Limerick Senior, the college which I am currently studying in. After this two years he went on to do a BA in wemonswear design at UCA Rochester.It was during these three years he interned with London designers and gained even more experience. It wasn't until after completion of his BA that things really took off for him, he got picked up by the Italian fashion house Max Mara. After working one year full time with them he decided to do a MA at the prestigious Central Saint Martins college in London and after a lot of hard work it paid off because he now has his own label. You can check out some of his collections on his website here http://raffaeleascione.com/.  He also has a celebrity following with singers such as Lady Gaga and Jessie J wearing his designs.

His latest S/S 13 Collection was showcased at London Fashion week with a debuting powerful Runway Show. He approached new elements to push his aesthetic into new directions. Raffaele Ascione reinvents luxe fabrics with neon and sequin detailing. The Central Saint Martin's graduate takes inspiration from Fruit of the Loom sweatshirts developing his graduate work for this Spring/Summer 2013 collection. Here I have posted a clip of his runway show at London Fashion week.

Shutterbug Vintage Clothing Kilo Sale

Finally I'm blogging about the Shutterbug vintage clothing kilo sale which took place in the ballroom in Langtons Hotel in Kilkenny. It was amazing & I am so happy I decided to go. I found out about the event through there Facebook page. On their page you can view their beautiful vintage clothing that they have in store. Basically what happened at this kilo vintage sale was for every kilo of vintage clothing it only cost €20......such a bargain as vintage clothing can be quite expensive in Ireland. They had a Folkster vintage pop up shop on the day as well.

 I wasn't looking for anything in particular so I ended up getting a few kilos of clothing(I wont say exactly how many kilos). My friend Celine kindly agreed to come along with me & I’m sure she is not regretting it now.

We set off on our little journey to Kilkenny early on Saturday morning. We wanted to get there early so we could Que up and get first pick of the clothes. We joined the Que at 10.30 and waited anxiously for 11.00 to come. At 11 on the dot, they opened the doors, the second I walked into the room and saw all the sequins, the adrenalin kicked in. After frantically running around in circles for a good 5 mins, I had to take myself aside and devise a plan. Wasn't a great plan, I told myself “ just grab everything”. Overall It was such a cool experience and I got heaps of vintage clothes and accessories. When people ask me what was it like, I keep referring to the episode of Friends where Monica went wedding dress shopping, for those of you who don't remember that episode, I posted the clip below.

Anyway it was A-maz-ing & the good news is they are having another sale in December, in Dublin. Not sure of the date yet but if ye like there Facebook page, they will post it there. These are some pics of the day and a few of the things I bought, I'll try do a few outfit posts using the rest of the clothes.

This is a pic I found online, before the chaos

My cringy X-mas waistcaot.

It was the perfect day to be in Kilkenny as the Savour Kilkenny food festival was also taking place. We got to do two of my favourite things, shop & eat. These are just a few snaps of the food festival.

Celine wearing a cozy vintage jumper she got in the kilo sale

Hope ye enjoyed reading about it.

Katie x

Comic Book Girl

So last night was Halloween.....yipeee, & also to celebrate my birthday I went out with some friends. In the spirit of things we decided to go fancy dress. I chose to go as a comic book character, I had seen images of this on the internet and it looked pretty cool. So with some good face paints, eyeliner and the help of a few Youtube videos I set off to try recreate one of the looks & to be honest I was very happy with the end result. This costume ended up being very inexpensive as I had all the clothes and accessories already. I bought the wig, some face paints and used a liquid eyeliner that I already had and here are some pictures of the end result. Also the dress I wore, I picked up at the Shutterbug kilo vintage sale which I went to last Saturday in Kilkenny. It was such an amazing vintage sale so I will post another blog about that, hopefully I will get that up tonight or tomorrow.

In the process

The finished look.

My friend Celine & I.

My friend Fiona as the exorcist.

Fiona & Jesus.

Some face painting that I really liked.

My friend Celine.

My friends Corinna & Lorraine.

Hope ye liked my Halloween costume & I'll do a post about the Shutterbug vintage sale as soon as possible.

Katie x

Tough Decisions.

Here are a few items I need/want.... I'm having a very tough time trying to decide.

Leather or Glitter?

Both from missguided.co.uk and both £45.99

Zara or Office?

Zara boot on the left €149 & Office on the right €100

Cons or Vans?

Both Schuh, cons €55 & vans €49

Oasis or Zara?

On the left is Oasis at €110 & on the right is Zara at €125

Aran or Mango?

On the left is an Aran Sweater at €57 & on the right is Mango at €63

In Love with October

Okay, so its pretty obvious from the title I love October, one of reasons has to be the wonderful array of colours, such as brown, gold, burnt orange and copper. Also, it is the perfect month for being able to wear woolly knits without having to hide them underneath a huge coat. Finally, my other reason I love October so much is because my birthday is the end of this month and as a birthday present to myself, I am treating myself to a new outfit to celebrate the occasion....any excuse to go shopping.

Taking inspiration from October I put together this outfit. I was so excited when I found this jacket on sale in River Island last week and I just had to post an outfit using it.

Blazer & Pants: River Island

Top: Thrifted

Boots: New Look (sale)

Jewellery: Topshop

Safety Pins

A while back I noticed in a magazine this really cool t-shirt with a cross made out of safety pins. I Googled this and stumbled upon Pelayo Diaz and apparently he created some of his own safety pin t-shirts in the last few years and started a craze. These t-shits really fit in with the Gothic/Grunge trend we are seeing a lot of this season.

So taking inspiration from Pelayo, I decided to try create my own. I purchased a T-shirt from Penney’s for a mere €13 and a large box of safety pins…And this is the result.

As soon as I can I will put together an outfit using this t-shirt and I will post it on my blog. Here are a few more images of items of clothing decorated with safety pins. If I have time and a bit of patience, I might try and recreate one of these.

Even the celebs are going a bit safety pin crazy. Here Lady Gaga steps out in Milan in the iconic Versace safety pin dress that catapulted Liz Hurley to fame in 1994. Unfortunately for Gaga I think Liz wore it better. Anyone with me on this?