June travels

We begin with the red button hole. I hadn't noticed until I took this photo of the denim shirt that has become my summer travel jacket for the month that it has one red accent button hole. I had purchased the shirt last year at this time at a consignment shop on the outskirts of Paris that alas is no longer there. 

I've moving around quite a lot this month, from Paris to Lyon, then to Manchester England to meet up with a friend who is going to have a baby. But one step at a time. 

While waiting to meet a friend at a cafe at the bottom of the rue Lepic in Paris, I caught these American  students standing listening to a guide. Easy target for a photo. I love the oversized look on the left with the tatoo in the middle of the upper back. 

 The boulevard de Clichy and the base of the rue Lepic provide a wonderful vantage point from which to watch all kinds of fashionable attires deambulate.

I was amused by the concept of a *supermarket* at which one could acquire "original" undergarments. 

From chilly Paris, France to ... chilly Manchester, England. My friend Elsa and I love shopping for used clothes. Her dress and shoes cost a grand total of 10 pounds, not bad! I found a nice pair of linen pants for 5. Charity shops as they are called in England are numerous and easy to find as they tend to cluster on the main streets of cities all over the country. It's so much fun to go from shop to shop in search of bargains, and then have a really good meal afterwards. 

                                                                                  One of the many Oxfam shops in Manchester, UK

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I'm now in London, staying in Marylebone. Off I go to get my hair done in the neighborhood, wearing the Eileen Fisher tunic I have layered with the Jean shirt.

First stop: the charity shops on Marylebone High Street. I find this red and white skirt for 16 pounds, a perfect "three season" piece as they say. 

Then, after the haircut,  I walk to  Primrose Hill  where there is a really good charity shop that reflects its well-to-do inhabitants. 

It's Ascot season, and there is the perfect hat to wear to the races. 

I come back down to earth and instead,  choose a cashmere cardigan, in really good condition, for 35 pounds, a really good deal I think. I remind myself that I live in a region where it's winter for six months out of the year. 

The woman who did my hair had inspired me to head across Regent's Park, the canal, across Primrose Hill to the really cute high street where I also stop into a bookshop and pick up a collection of Ishiguro short stories. 

The Regent's Canal

 On my way out of the charity shop, I catch a snapshot of a beautiful Japanese woman sporting a long, flowing belted duster that one can only wear in a place like London where the weather remains iffy even on the loveliest of days.

Heading to Ascot from Waterloo Station, the hats are called "fascinators."

Another fascinating bold move

At the Saatchi Gallery, threads, fashion, collage

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Then off to Bournemouth to a comics conference where I met a fellow charity shopper, Cath from Australia. The day of my presentation, I wore the dress I had picked up in Brattleboro, VT, to show my indigenous colors, trees, the woods, with the necklace I had picked up at a charity shop in Manchester UK. The woman on the left, Gillian from Canada, is a children's book author. 

Off to Brussels now, on the last day of June. 

Spring clothing

Spring has finally sprung as they say. What to wear? It depends, because spring can be cold, and spring can be hot, wintery, summery. 

I found this Eileen Fisher cotton sweater at the Pink Alligator. It's navy and has pockets. 

More pink alligator.  A red cotton shift that I like to wear with black pants. Bathroom shots are a bit weird, but there is a good mirror and the lighting is decent. 

Sweater vest from Housing Works on Chambers Street in NYC. With a black tee-shirt or...

                                          a pink and white Talbot's blouse. Pin from my mother.

 To close: shoes from Revolution in White River Junction,

skirt from Housing Works on Chambers and...

               

 ... sweater vest from I can't remember anymore. It's a grey and black leopard spot style.

                                                                 HAPPY SPRING!

Springtime in Seattle and Tacoma WA

April 1st. April Fool's Day. Spring and winter duking it out. That means coats. I noticed in the uniformity of puffy blackness, some colorful wool coats in Seattle and New York, where I traveled recently. But alas, no photos. Just this coat found in a real vintage store in Tacoma, Washington, a city that itself looks like time stood still, with its 1930s and 40s era buildings left intact, giving visitors a pretty accurate idea of what an American city used to look like well before a Starbucks at every corner (come to think of it, down the highway from its birthplace in Seattle, where they have spawned like rabbits at Easter, there isn't one). I left the coat on its rack, where I thought it looked just fine.










New acquisitions, not including, still, no photo, my newest bad ass black leather coat with a rip in it, acquired at a relatively new thrift store in White River Junction, Vt, around the corner from Revolution. I do, however, have a photo of a (real?) suede coat that I bought at Beacon's Closet on 13th Street in NYC, right after seeing Isabelle Huppert in her latest (mediocre) film at the Quad, in which she looked fantastic in a greenish suede coat.

I could use some lipstick, I know, but even then I can't compete with the captivating face of la Huppert. 

Dress from consignment store in Brattleboro, Vt; linen jacket, from Lyon, France consignment store; waiting for the spring, ready with an outfit

Bourgeois(e) in NYC

 I begin my January visit to NYC with text, first, a book I saw in the MOMA bookstore, with many wonderful archival photos of college women at all women's colleges. Have added that one to the Amazon wish list. On the right, the pretentious -- at least I thought it was pretentious -- explanation accompanying the rather uninteresting -- I found it uninteresting -- exhibit at MOMA asking the question "Is Fashion Modern?" Fashion is difficult to display in a museum. I find that it looks best in dark rooms. The only piece that had me intrigued was

this one. 

I want to make this with different elements. It seems fairly straightforward. Perfect for recycling all kinds of materials. 

 While waiting for my daughter Clara, I observed the crowd from one of the staircases. My eye was drawn to a very nicely dressed woman, tall, elegant, perhaps yes, bourgeoise. It's too easy to make that pun, when the show we were visiting was the Louise Bourgeois retrospective. (I came up with another bad pun joke: she had three sons. What do you call her sons when they were small? "Petits Bourgeois." Haha. )

 I was pleased to see that Clara was wearing the necklace I had given her for Christmas. But it looks really nice on her! (all her clothes are used, by the way. I must ask her the origin of that animal shirt, it's amazing!).

 More bourgeoises at the Bourgeois retrospective.

I was also intrigued by the printer in Hinsdale, New Hampshire. Her prints are enormous, and I wonder why she chose one in New Hampshire. I must look them up to see if they're still around.

 The note taker in front of one of Bourgeois's late enormous prints.

LB recycled old fabric and added her own painting and stitching. 

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And a discovery in Williamsburg to end with: Junk on Driggs Avenue.