Just a Little Liberty Fix...

Sunday was my sister's birthday and with an awful hangover from a very late night Halloween party at my house, (more on that in another post) all I felt like on Sunday was a pub lunch and definitely not shopping. However as it was not my birthday and not my choice, I was dragged, grumpy and grouch-like to Liberty of London. 

Now I might make a note here, my mother loves Liberty, something of an interior designer she is inspired by its beautiful surroundings, colours, fabrics and pretty things. I also love Liberty, but I have until recently associated it with an old job I had several years ago, for which I used to work near and sometimes in the store organising events and I remember the stress of running around, while people a lot richer than me bought things that I could never afford. So perhaps, it lost a little of its sparkle to me for a while..

Back to Sunday, I'm ashamed to say I behaved like a complete teenager and stropped and moaned non-stop for the first 15 minutes. It was too hot, too crowded and there was nothing on the menu in the lovely cafe (2nd Floor) that I wanted...  I'm surprised my mother didn't hit me. Or my sister, whose birthday it was for that matter.

Anyway, after I grudgingly ordered a Caesar Salad, things improved. It turned out to be one of the best Caesar salads I had ever had, a bold statement I know, especially since I don't even really like Caesar Salad - not an iceberg fan. It was followed by excellent pistachio ice cream and then I remembered why Liberty was so special.

 

The decor is so inspiring and nostalgic. I wanted everything on the walls. From lovely framed postcards to the pink neon bird lights on the wall - very Emin-esque.

 

Darling, My loving thoughts are for you Sweetheart and hope you find this day with best of luck and happiness. From Ever-loving Sweetheart Tommy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

 

 

 

After lunch we meandered down to the stationary department passing some beautiful Peter Pilotto print dresses; works of art in themselves.

I have loved stationary since I was a young girl; beautiful coloured fine paper, textured card, colouring pencils in tins and gel pens. In Liberty, I coveted all the greeting cards, handmade and ornate, humorous and witty. 

There was novelty notepaper that berated the garrulous, filterless and self-indulgent overshares that are so habitual by some on Facebook, Twitter and their less popular relatives. 

As much as I like to mock the superfluousity of some people's social media habits, it was this journal I fell for.

 

 

Harking back to a bygone era it celebrates nostalgia and vintage traditions, with witty little anecdotes every few pages to spark creativity in the lost art of pen to paper writing.

As a youngster, I kept endless diaries written in rambling prose which is likely to provoke a fit of the cringes in me if read now. However they were full of feeling and not published on the World Wide Web for all the world and therefore raw and full of mad-cap thoughts.

I sort of miss that. So I purchased said diary and have resolved to keep it in my bag, even if just for random thoughts or verses of very bad poetry.

Liberty of London, a true London icon.

 

Liberty of London

Regent Street
London W1B 5AH
 +44 (0)20 7734 1234 
Monday to Saturday: 10am – 8pm
Sunday: 12pm – 6pm
www.liberty.co.uk 

PS: It should be noted that what Liberty is really known for is its beautiful prints. Watch out for these... They're so pretty that you'll want to drape entire rooms in them and spend days swathed in the fabrics.

Fashion on Friday: Channelling Clueless

Back in 1995, Director Amy Heckerling led a young cast in a little American teen film based on the classic Jane Austen novel, Emma. Alicia Silverstone led a young cast of good-looking teens as a very rich, very attractive teenager with a computerised wardrobe, a dead mother and the same problems with cliques and boys that all teenage girls have. The script was funny, the lines very quotable, but it was the lifestyle and wardrobes of these teens which seized the young British imagination.

I was aged nine when it was released and barely interested in boys and fashion, puppies and ponies were my thing at this stage. In fact, I didn't seen the film until two years later, at boarding school with mass of other girls, many older than me who said it was "like" the best film ever.

For an awkward pre-pubescent, spotty and swotty eleven-year old, it was an impossibly glamorous other world. It was America, where teenagers drove Jeeps, the boys looked like movie stars and you actually knew Gay people. At the time I wasn't all too sure about Cher's fashion sense and choice in clothing for both herself and her friends. Partial to a baggy trouser and a combat at the time, I believed that her friend Tai looked before the makeover in her grungy gears. In fact the only outfit I really liked was her red "This is an Alaia" dress, a classic nineties, strappy, clingy number that made her look like no 16-year-old I'd ever seen in real life.

18 years later and 18 years of watching the film and quoting the film over and over, I finally love that nineties, preppy Americana look. As the decade has surreptitiously crawled back into our fashion heads over the last few years from chunky boot to matching accessories and all other forms of fray, we are finally in a full on revival from Vogue to Primark. I am now coveting a full on Cher look and despite age and colouring it may now be the time to wear a matching yellow tartan two-piece... or maybe not.

However, I'm inspired to outline some of the best looks from the film and items that seemingly take inspiration from the look in our stores today.

Cher: It’s like that book I read in the 9th grade that said, “‘Tis a far, far better thing doing stuff for other people.”

 

ASOS, Black Beret £10.00

Primark AW13, Dress £13.00

Cher: So, OK. I don't wanna be a traitor to my generation and all, but I don't get how guys dress today. I mean, c'mon, it looks like they just fell out of bed and put on some baggy pants, and take their greasy hair—ew—and cover it up with a backwards cap and, like, we're expected to swoon? I don't think so!

 

ASOS, Daisy Street Tartan Mini Skirt £19.99

ASOS, Over-the-Knee Socks £5.00

Cher: He does dress better than I do, what would I bring to the relationship?

 

New Look, Burghundy High-Neck Cropped Jumper £17.99

Zara, Striped Shirt £25.99

Accessorize, Woven Chain Alice Band £8.00

Tai: Why should I listen to you, anyway? You’re a virgin who can’t drive. 
Cher: That was way harsh, Tai.

London Loves LA, White Lace Taylor Dress £34.00

Murray: Your man Christian is a cake boy! 
Cher and Dionne: (together) A what? 
Murray: He’s a disco-dancing, Oscar Wilde-reading, Streisand ticket-holding friend of Dorothy, know what I’m saying?

 So I couldn't find anything like this, as much as I tried... but I love this jacket..

ASOS, Barbour Tartan Liddesdale Jacket, £179.00

Thanks for reading.

Champagne and La Plein Soleil

On Friday, I took one of my girls to a screening of the 1960 French film, La Plein Soleil (directed by René Clément) at the Working Title premises near Bond Street. I'd acquired the tickets through an Emerald Street promotion, which I signed up to and promptly forgot about.

 

To be honest, I haven't watched a foreign language film since school aside from the obvious Amelie and the odd few obligatory Alfonso Cuarón titles at Uni when lustful Spaniards and the beauty of Gael Garcia Bernal managed to persuade me to stray - albeit fleetingly- from my diet of chick flicks, Harry Potter and anything with Joaquin Phoenix in it. 

In art, literature and even television I like to think of myself as quite cultural, but for some reason when it comes to films, I seem to sit quite happily in the comfort food sort of arena, period dramas and happy endings. Not particularly used to applying my shaky French, whilst trying to read at the same time.

La Plein Soleil had piqued my interest due to it being the original adaptation of The Talented Mr Ripley - a film which I enjoyed, largely due to the impressive acting skills of the entire cast but specifically Matt Damon who proved his great versatility as an actor. 

I must admit too that there was free champagne on offer and free wine and free nibbles and after weekends of hitting it too hard, a nice Friday with a French film and free champagne seemed quite the pleasant option. Of course what ended up happening was that I was late out of work and my friend went shopping and we managed to miss most of the free stuff, helper-skeltering in at the last moment....

"Aha yes.. You two are the last to arrive" said the lady on the door on hearing our names "you have five minutes to get a glass of something.."

Of course five minutes didn't slow my thirst and I managed to very un-surreptitiously slug my two glasses before they called us in to the screening room.

And the film.. What do I have to say of that? It has taken a significant amount of paragraphs of my languid, self-obsessed scene-setting to reach even a hint of the film. Shock me. Well firstly the actor, Alain Delon, who played the lead role of Tom Ripley is dreadfully good looking, in the way only the French can be - all arrogant blue eyes and pouting. Apparently it was his first major film role, remind me to look at more of his work... 

Secondly, the scenery is absolutely stunning. Set in all the beautiful parts of Italy and swathed in the scratch sixties film roll, it all looks impossibly picturesque and glamorous. The actors playing Marge and Phillippe (Marie Laforêt and Maurice Foret) are just as attractive and beautifully dressed as you would expect them to be and they play the parts well, though one can't see why Marge adores and Tom obsesses over Phillippe so much as we can with Jude Law in the Minghella-directed modern adaptation. 

The plot is much slower and to be honest not as gripping, the defection away from the original book by Patricia Highsmith, which clearly depicts Tom having a homosexual obsession with his friend threw me a little. In Plein Soleil, a non-homosexual Tom seduces Marge after killing Phillippe in order to totally take over Phillippe's life. I just prefer the original story and believe it fits better with Marge and Phillippe's ridicule of Tom.

However, Alain Delon is a wonderful actor, depicting his version of the cold character of Tom Ripley with a casual nuance. He radiates an easy arrogance and a calculated body language that depicts Tom's lack of morality perfectly. He is so unbelievably sexy that you wouldn't question Marge jumping into bed with him so swiftly. 

The ending of the film is deliciously French with a hint that Tom is about to be caught and committed for murder as the police descend on a beachside bar that he lays sunning himself in. However, the audience never knows, as the credits role just prior to this scene, leaving us with the feeling that just maybe he escaped.

Overall, I liked the film and I enormously respect Delon, but I still prefer the Minghella directed Hollywood version. So populist, I know....

Buy the DVD on Amazon: Plein Soleil Special Edition *Digitally Restored [DVD] DVD ~ Alain Delon

Johnny Flynn & The Sussex Wit at Hackney Empire

Johnny Flynn at Hackney Empire

I'm still learning how to get these posts out on time, it is a struggle with work being so busy, hence this post being over a week late. I went to see Johnny Flynn & The Sussex Wit at the Hackney Empire on 10th October 2013.

I have been a fan of Johnny Flynn's deep poetic tones since 2008, when his first full length album, A Larum was released. Since then I have seen him a full five times prior to this, twice on his own (Transgressive Records in Shoreditch and Shakespeare's Globe this year) and three times with his band The Sussex Wit (Union Chapel, Shepherd's Bush and this year's Gentleman of the Road Stopover with Mumford, The Vaccines, Edward Sharpe et al). I've even blogged about him before at The London Word. So it is safe to say I am not a newbie to his gigs or admirable musicality. This time I trekked to Hackney - three tubes from work followed by two night buses home - to hear him perform a set which including many songs from his new album: Country Mile.

Along with the only friend who really indulges my love for the "modern folk rock" and its many relations, we were of course late and arrived mid way through the performance of the second of his support acts, Marika Hackman. A slip of a girl who looked about twelve and had the suitable uncomfortable-on-stage air so much favoured by the folk/singer-songwriter types because "it's about the music" you know. Apparently she's an ex-Burberry model and childhood friend of the rarely pictured Miss Cara Delevingne. Her voice when we listened following a hurried trip to the bar was extremely special, a softer strummier version of the girl from new indie pop sensation London Grammar. Her lyrics were poetic, straying to quite dark... definitely one to watch...

Later, Johnny strolled on stage accompanied by his usual bunch of sartorial misfits The Sussex Wit including his female backing singer/pianist/flautist/accordion player etc, his sister, Lily who I actually went to school with for two years when I was 11. I remember playing opposite her in a adapted musical version of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs - even then she had a hauntingly beautiful voice. Talented family.

As usual as well, Johnny stood in the midst of a circle of various instruments which I knew would be exchanged throughout the set as he showed that genuine musicality that I mentioned before. His band the Sussex Wit include, not only his sister Lillie on vocals, flute and accordion but also David Beauchamp on bass, Adam Beach on drums, Joe Zeitlin on cello and Cosmo Sheldrake (also the first support act that we missed) on keyboard.

The set rambled merrily through old favourites such as Brown Trout Blues,The Box and the The Wrote and the Writ from first album, A Larum and Been Listening, Howl and The Water from Been Listening. He interspersed well-known songs with new ones from Country Mile.

Preffered tracks of mine from the new album included the title track, Country Mile - apparently about walking according to Johnny and a very "country" folk record in the old American sense with a lot of twangy guitar behind the catchy, repetitive chorus. Murmuration (def: an act or instance of murmuring), slower dream-like and more poetic Johnny "I dreamt I flew with the saints last night/I know them all by wing size/And up there it just doesn’t count for naught/Whether you’re clever or wise" - I do appreciate a good poetic lyric. I've heard the sweet sound of Einstein's Idea - Johnny's lullaby for his son - before performed live and always like it. My favourite new track though had to be Fol-de-rol, which as Johnny explained referenced the bands love for South American folk music and Chicha; psychedelic Peruvian music from the 60’s/70’s. It stays true to the band's musicality and Johnny's earthy tones, but builds to rollicking chorus with some great male harmonising that certainly made my friend and I stamp our feet very un-surreptitiously amongst the well-behaved, serene audience.

If you are not a nu-folk/folk rock/ Flynn fan already I would generally advise starting with A Larum as it is probably his most "popular" work, but personally I am a great fan of Country Mile. Whilst Flynn and his band were never going to make an album that was a significantly different sound from the others, I do feel that Country Mile is more upbeat and positive than Been Listening and goes back to the twangy, memorable chorus's found on A Larum, whilst the philosophical lyrics never fail to pique thought.

As a live act, Johny Flynn & the Sussex Wit are a must-see in my book. Rarely is so much musicality seen on stage; Johnny himself plays the banjo, trumpet, mandolin, guitar, fiddle - and I'm sure others that I didn't notice. The band really feel one and other in the way that only comes from years together and constant jamming on the road and whenever they can just because they enjoy it. I would see them again and again. Going to their gigs makes me want to move to North East London marry a guitar player and become a whisky-drinking poet... aaahh if only....

Images (c) (1)Annabel Cameron and (2)Wunmi Onibudo on Flickr

It's Time to Start a New Chapter...

It's time to start a new chapter....

To stop hiding in the box that you're boxed in...

Because of this....

 

And because I want to be this...

Finally, because I don't want to be disappointed in twenty years...

Watch this space 

J