Zippered twill moto jacket: CRYX
Faux fur and hematite necklace: handmade by me
Ribbed Tank: Forever 21
Square cube ring: Karmaloop (from last year)
Pleated chiffon maxi-skirt: Wink
Balenciaga-style Cut-Out Boots: DIY (tutorial coming soon!)
They’re finally finished!!
I know many of you have been waiting patiently for me to get those DIY Balenciaga cut-out boots done…and it’s taken me awhile since I’ve been sidetracked with school, family, and other stuff. But at last they’re finally complete…and I’ll be posting the DIY soon!
Cutting, belts, silvertone accessories, hand-stictching, machine-stitching, glue, and moleskin…a lot went into these boots. I’m not sure how well they’ll hold up to a great deal of wear, but I’m pretty pleased with them!
This is probably my favorite jacket in the whole wide world; bought at the CRYX store Shibuya-109 in Japan a few years ago. It has so many zippers and snaps and removable pockets and openable vents and convertible parts I can’t even begin to explain it…or even the myriad configurations of wearing that are possible. Hub calls it my “Michael Jackson jacket.” (He’s a huge fan of MJ, so I suppose it’s a compliment.)
The bottom half zips off so it can be converted into a cropped bolero too. It even has stiff wire inside the collar so you can pop it or bend it and it stays in the shape you set it!! I don’t wear it nearly enough – partly out of a fear that I’ll mess it up. Also, partly because the dyeing process used in making the jacket is not…erm, the best…since even after being washed it still leaches black dye onto my clothes. Which comes out in the wash, though. Ah, the price of amazing design details!! [shoddy/nonexistant dyefast-testing]
I’ve been listening to a ton of books on CD while I’ve been in the car on my 3-hour daily treks to take Lil Tot back and forth to school, and recently finished listening to Jean M. Auel’s The Clan of the Cave Bear [a very engrossing epic, incidentally written by the author and researched in the library the next town over from where I borrowed the CDs!!] If you’ve read it, you may remember that the people of the Clan [the Neanderthals] are all given an amulet at birth to wear around their necks: a small pouch which holds items sacred to them or to their totem spirits. I’d been thinking a lot about amulets lately, and so used some of the faux fur I use for the fox tails I sell on Etsy for a little amulet of my own. It’s a small pouch with a snap that I can put small objects into (though I haven’t put anything inside yet). I added some hematite arrows and gold beads on either side of the chain. I like the rough primitiveness to the piece, though I may re-design the fur part since it’s a little bulky. What do all of you think? It reads a little bohemian to me, which may be perfect for the trends this Fall!
I paired the edgy jacket and boots with a soft chiffon skirt from Wink; a recent Ideeli purchase. I think it’s the only thing I own that is mint green!
Hope everyone’s having a great week so far! Check back tomorrow for the Balenciaga boots tutorial!
xoxox
Carly
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Great DIY. They look like the real thing. You really have some of the best DIYs out there.
Also your hair is getting so long. The length suits you very well and the color looks gorgeous.
I’ve read the book a while ago but it took me ages to get through it. It’s a series I believe but I guess it’s just not a time in human history I’m especially interested in, so I won’t continue reading it. Did you like it?
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Thank you so much, Katarina! (I recently got my hair “glossed” and so the color is a bit darker than my natural color;-)
The great thing about books on CD is that if you have the CD player on they keep going and you don’t have to struggle to get through a boring chapter-you’re either listening or not!!;-) Yes, you are right, The Clan of the Cave Bear is first in a long series of novels about a young Cro-Magnon girl living in prehistoric times. I’ve only listened to this one in the series; I found the writing a bit plodding and ordinary at times and the prose a bit boring, like a textbook; the story definitely lags in places – but the window it shone onto ancient times was really fascinating. I really know nothing about this time period, so it was very educational (though for some of it the author took a lot of artistic license, I did have to remind myself). I’m excited to find out what happens in the rest of the series!
Also, as a feminist I found much of the treatment and abuse of the women in the story difficult to deal with, historically accurate or no.
So worth the wait. Great job!
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Your hair looks AMAZING! and those boots <3
😉 Awwww, thanks Milie!!
seriously, the boots, adorable. so good!
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Favorite! Diggin’ your hair too.
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