Summer Sales

I hope you're enjoying the start of Summer and have got a good holiday or few days off booked soon. I'm still job hunting, probably because I'm far too fussy with jobs, so I'm avoiding the shops as much as possible. Which makes the fact that the Summer sales are almost here quite unbearable.

Since January I've managed to replace many of the clothes which were now too big for me (I lost a tonne of weight in the last year :]) and I'm nearing completing my wardrobe switchover, so I wouldn't have been looking for anything in particular either. I can safely stick to internet window shopping, and post up here the best of the bargains and the cheapest of the chips.

Artigiano jersey dress, £25 - It's a good day when one is in the position to be in the realm of spending money at Artigiano, it's seriously expensive. This dress has lovely detailing in the back, there's something a little bit 1930s about it that I rather like.

Artigiano pleated georgette skirt, £9 - Ignore the frumpy styling: these midi-skirts are quite trendy at the moment, and £9 for an expensive Italian version is rather good. Dry clean only though, but these types of skirts should all be.

Gap contrast collar shirt, £19.99 - maybe a touch more than you want to spend in a sale, but I love this fifties-style blouse, it reminds me of Frenchie in Grease.

Gap dot sweater, £9.99 - and this reminds me of something Grace Kelly would wear, thanks to that elegant drape neckline. 

Pepperberry wrap dress, £27.00 - What a pretty colour! I'm really into wrapover styles at the moment, I'm not sure they're strictly 'on trend' but they're classic and suit just about every shape. 

Florence & Fred (Tesco) scallop edge skirt, £7.50 - cheap cute with a capital C :)

C x

High Street Clothes in Charity Shops

When is it okay to buy high street in charity shops/thrift stores?

In my rules of charity shop rummaging, I wrote that in general, you want to go for vintage/designer and avoid high street clothes. But there are plenty of exceptions.

You can change colour, size, even decoration, but the one thing you can't change about clothes is the material. Clothes from the high street are often made as quickly as possible so that they reach the high street while the 'microtrend' is still in. To achieve fast turnaround, materials need to be easy to sew/print/size, so tend to be made from thinner, cheaper material, like thin cotton, polycotton and polyesters. By the time they reach charity shops/thrift stores, cheap material will be well worn, so if it doesn't look tired and worn yet, it may not be far away from it.

But sometimes, there are some real gems. High-end high street shops like Whistles, Hobbs, Jaeger, Cos, Banana Republic and LK Bennett produce high quality clothes, and charity shops in affluent areas frequently receive these types of donations.

Hence my love of the charity shops in Stockbridge, one of the most affluent areas in Edinburgh. Recently, I found this gorgeous Whistles top, featuring a crochet Peter-Pan collar, in Barnardo's. Whistles is a great, high quality company, so I didn't mind the £10 price tag, more than I usually think to spend on a top.

I'm currently job hunting, and I think this would be perfect for office-wear with a smart pencil skirt and cute Mary-Janes. Very Emma Pillsbury from Glee.

(source: What Would Emma Pillsbury Wear)

Franca at Oranges and Apples recently wrote an excellent guide to Edinburgh Vintage and Charity Shops, outlining the best places to find good quality pieces. One shop I'd additionally recommend is the Shelter shop on Teviot Place (Bristo Sq). Its vicinity to the university means there's a great mixture of clothes. I picked up this Banana Republic wrap cardigan for a bargain £5 (the buttons on the sleeves, ohmyIlovethem):

And that's the plaid skirt I got in the Lands End sale a couple of months ago - I LOVE burgundy :)

But I don't want you to think I don't appreciate low and mid high street brands! They regularly make good quality clothes, but finding them in the jumble of charity shops might just require an extra bit of rummaging.. Charity shops have become more savvy in recent years to only stock good quality clothes, and send worn, overused clothes to fabric recycling companies. These can be made into blankets for the homeless and for the Red Cross. This is why you shouldn't bin clothes, even if they're ripped or stained - still donate them!

C x

Tulle Time ~ Cardigan Love

It was only a matter of time.

(image via fairycandles)

If I was a lady in the 1950s, I would wear cropped cardigans and tulle tea skirts all the time, for dinner dances or just sipping a Martini on the porch.

Charity Shop Finds May

Bad blogger, I've had a week off to finish all my uni work (I finished my degree, woo!) and then some time for catching up on sleep. As soon as I let my body relax a bit, I pick up a throat infection. Not fair :(

I've only had the briefest of brief looks so far this month, I took two pals to the Royal Mile shops, and although they didn't find anything special, I was lucky and found a cute flared skirt by Limited Collection at M&S (£7).

(styled with navy, apologies for the rubbish photo, the reluctant photographer is busy)

It's the oddest material, a bit like a waterproof jacket, but I just loved the detail on the button-up front. 

I'm not entirely sure what to wear with it, I was thinking just a plain white tee as a distant homage to Jil Sander SS'11:

But it would be nice to do something more adventurous. Black seems a little easy, so I'm thinking of other colours which would pop off the pink, rather than having a single accent colour:

C x

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