My spider-brooches were the stars of the show. Every single one I did, it sold. I have expanded my colour scheme (you'll be glad to hear) and I am hoping to experiment with more colorful schemes as well as keep improving my techniques, so watch this space... You can find more pictures on my website: http://www.theblackwardrobe.com/category/accessories
I took the chance to film the mini-catwalk of my clothes. The quality is not very good, I am afraid. I think the other video is better, which I-ll post soon.
Because of The Lpool Design show, I haven't had the time to update the blog with my new items, some of them finished just before the show. I will be posting them in the next following days. I hope you like them.
The first item is a over knee-length dress, with puffed long sleeves. Heavily inspired by the 1940s starlets such as Veronica Lake, this figure-hugging little dark number features a draped neckline and a pencil skirt with an interesting drape on the hip. It is made of two different shades of black crepe-like jersey to add more interest to the garment.
The second item is another over knee-length dress, with puffed long sleeves. Very 1950s style, I designed this dress thinking of those funny pics of Marilyn Monroe with her do-I-look-smart? glasses and secretary style dresses. It features a square neckline trimmed in velvet with a bow on the side. The skirt is fitted with a slight godet, giving it a sleek A-line shaped, which I think fits better and looks less ridiculous than those very pronounced fish-tail skirts.
Hello everyone! I am thrilled to announce that my little fashion label will be exhibiting at The Liverpool Design show.
If you would like to have a look to my gothic/vintage inspired pieces (both clothing and jewellery), don't hesitate in coming over to have a look, on Saturday 20th to Sunday 21st November. From 10.00am to 5pm.
The Liverpool Design show will take place in the sumptuous neo-classical surroundings of the grade 1 listed St George's Hall. (Liverpool city centre, in front of the main train station). Alongside established designers, this shows gives the chance to meet young and undiscovered talent in the fields of fashion, accessories, jewellery, decorative art and furnishing. Tickets cost £5 online, £6 at the door. If you would like free tickets, please email me.
If you are into Dark stuff AND Gothic, it is very very likely that you'll be into victoriana. This is my last discovery.
VICTORIAN LONDON This very resourceful site is the creation of writer and victorian afficionado, Lee Jackson. Anything you want to know about victorian London, you'll find it here. History, economics, personal stories, literature, maps...Everything! And if you can't find what you want, you can email the writer. It is a great page for both research and pure nosiness. His blog is worth having a look too. It includes more interesting links. http://www.victorianlondon.org/ http://catsmeatshop.blogspot.com/
Feliz Dia de los Muertos! or Happy Samhain/Halloween (for all those anglosaxon-speakers out there). Either you are in a Gothic Festival, at the cemetery visiting your loved ones or at home, watching whatever who knows, I hope you are having a good nice quiet day. I am in situation C, although the telly is off. It is still too early and Sunday! so there is nothing interesting to watch. If I was in Spain, I would probably had gone for a nice walk to the Cemetery. As you know, this festivity is Catholic, people go to clean the tombs of their beloved ones, or just to leave them some flowers. I don't think they do this here in the UK nor in The States. Anyway, have fun and relax. Because tonight, your door-bell will not stop ringing... "Mwahahahaahhaha" Picture of the famousPère-Lachaise Cemetery, Paris. Copyright of Till Krecht.
Last weekend, my boyfriend and I were invited to a wedding in Morecambe. It took place in a gorgeous Art Deco hotel called "The Midland". As usual, in weddings, I wasn't sure what to wear, as you don't want to out-stage anyone, even the dogs, specially in wedding where you don't know anyone and you are not a relative (the groom was an old friend of my bf).
I just finished a couple of designs that I will soon upload to the website. One of them is the one I am wearing in the pics below. It is a red maxidress in silky vibrant red viscose jersey. I wanted to go for a 1940s inspired look, with a bit of Valentino glamour flair as well, so I teamed this gorgeous red maxi with black satin accents and a crystal silver necklace that I made (coming soon to the website). It turned out to be very appropiate as the wedding was vintage themed (1950s, as you can tell by the ice-cream van and the bride's gorgeous dress, adorned with organza roses. It was made in the USA).
I came across this lady through the House of Harps blog. Her style is amazing, a perfect mix of Vintage and Dark. Her romantic hairdo is a modern reminiscent of the 1900s edwardian style up-dos. Her make-up is subtle, understated but still dramatic (take note of the smokey eye make-up in brown and purple shadows) I had never heard of her before, neither had you (I presume)...
As I promise in my last post (Gothic make-up tips for the summer), I have arranged a post about how to do smokey eyes. It can be done with all the colours you can think of, but still, the most popular option is black and its closest shade, charcoal. You can go for the dry look or the wet one. I tend to go for the wet look in summer. I have found two very interesting tutorials which are very similar in technique but with slight changes.
The main focus is: you apply black paste or paste for eyeliner (picture2, MAC has a wonderful one that I use on its own and as an eyeliner) and powder eyeshadow (to keep it on place and avoid the hideous lines of excess pigment sitting on the wrinkles of your eyelid). The trick with black eyeshadow is to smudge it softly at the end of the eyelid and on the corners. Otherwise, it would look messy and unfinished. You can achieve this by doing it softly with either a brush or your fingers... or in this tutorials, using a second shade wich is closer to your skintone. It could be brown or a lighter shade such as cream or white and it is applied before the black colour. As I had already said, I tend to go for the wet smokey look in the summer. Either I use this black paste on its own (which is quite tricky because is not oily, is dry) or I use the "multi-effect" eyeshadow from Manhattan cosmetics. This eyeshadow gets a bit more intense and shinier when you wet it with a bit of water.
What these tutorials don't tell you and I will, because you MUST know this. Keep a tissue (with make-up cleanser) close to you because when you apply the black eyeshadow some bit of the powder will fall on your cheek and once you rub it, you get your skin all smudged in black. What I use to prevent this, is an special brush that you can find everywhere. It is used to apply powder as well, but the good thing is that will sweep the eyeshadow away without staining the skin. It is usually very wide and has the shape of a flat fan.
Here is the kind of post that my followers love to bits: fashion tips! Everytime I do one, it seems like half of the internet stops by to check it out. The visits go through the roof!
One of the main problems of Gothic fashion is that is a winter fashion. For british goths/goth enthusiasts or people who live in Britain, this is not a big problem; as summer doesn't exist here. However, for the rest of the world, specially in the Mediterranean, this becomes a huge huge problem. So, after so many requests, I am starting my new fashion tips series: Gothic fashion for the summer. This post will cover some make-up tips for olive skin, as this is the tricky one, and no-one seems to have bothered with the subject.
During summer, I don't know if this is your case, I cannot wear full make-up because the sweat will sweep it away. Therefore, the old school trick of applying talc or white powder to make you look paler doesn't work anymore. It is time to confront the golden sun-tan your skin is achieving and embrace it. This means, either leave it plain, naked; or use a blush to accentuate it (pastel or deep 80s style strawberry shades)
I am pretty sure, you must be wondering how you can still achieve that "dark" look, then? You can still dramatise your eyes with deep eyeshadows and/or deep make-up. It is not going to look as edgy as it would on a fair skin person. It would look slightly more harmonious as your skin is already dark and any light shades you apply to it, it would absorbe them.
These are the options I can think of:
SMOKEY EYES (deep make-up on the eyes, and that's it - no dark lips, no shade on cheeks). It doesn't have to be always black or grey. You can still achieve amazing dark results with other deep colours such as gold, turquoise or deep blues (I'll do a post about).
However, with the black or grey colours, you can achieve the exact density of pigment you want on your eyes. You can make it soft so the eyeliner stands more or for a daily look (see picture1) or you can make it properly pitch black (see picture3), however this one is extremely difficult to apply because is incredibly messy. So while I am writing this post I am arranging the next one, which will be about its -several- methods of applying.
DARK FULL MAKE-UP Because your skin is of an olive shade (due to sun tan or genetically), you can get away with a full make-up look, during the sunny day. I have broken down this idea in two further options you could go for: red lips - for a classier look but still looking very vamp (picture2), dark lips - for an edgier and alternative look. These can be black or any other extremely deep shade of red and purple such as aubergine (picture3).
As you can see, both full make-up looks work well with either soft blush or deeper strawberry shade.
Very rarely I find inspiring editorials among the summer issues. Suddenly, everything is just pastels, pinks and bright/neon shades that could easily blind you if you are not careful! Don't get me wrong, I like pastels and some bright but strong colours such as deep red (my favourite!), deep blues and greens but I am still fond of my black, even in the summer. This editorial is very interesting, it has all the elements I like: gothic, a bit of fetishism (but not to the point of being pornographic and therefore, might get the ban from Blogger) and with a vintage twist. It features an unrecognisable Megan Fox as a lady Vamp who is doing dirty tricks to her clone number #2, who is a mannequin. I love the stylism, is quite summery - if we ignore the fur, unless you are living in Scotland or Iceland - the bob is stylish, simple but still keeps the vintage flair. The make-up is beautiful, although I think it would only work if you are extremely pale. Otherwise, forget about achieving that soft gothic flair with a golden sun-tanned skin-tone. It just wouldn't work. But hey, if you think otherwise, comments are welcome. I do like debates...;)
Hello everyone! I am thrilled to announce that my little fashion label will be exhibiting at The Liverpool Design show.
If you are into Dark stuff AND Gothic, it is very very likely that you'll be into victoriana. This is my last discovery. 
Feliz Dia de los Muertos! or Happy Samhain/Halloween (for all those anglosaxon-speakers out there). Either you are in a Gothic Festival, at the cemetery visiting your loved ones or at home, watching whatever who knows, I hope you are having a good nice quiet day.
Last weekend, my boyfriend and I were invited to a wedding in Morecambe. It took place in a gorgeous Art Deco hotel called "The Midland".
inished a couple of designs that I will soon upload to the website.
It turned out to be very appropiate as the wedding was vintage themed (1950s, as you can tell by the ice-cream van and the bride's gorgeous dress, adorned with organza roses. It was made in the USA).
I came across this lady through the House of Harps blog. Her style is amazing, a perfect mix of Vintage and Dark. Her romantic hairdo is a modern reminiscent of the 1900s edwardian style up-dos. 
Her make-up is subtle, understated but still dramatic (take note of the smokey eye make-up in brown and purple shadows)
As I promise in my last post (Gothic make-up tips for the summer), I have arranged a post about how to do smokey eyes.
The main focus is: you apply black paste or paste for eyeliner (picture2, MAC has a wonderful one that I use on its own and as an eyeliner) and powder eyeshadow (to keep it on place and avoid the hideous lines of excess pigment sitting on the wrinkles of your eyelid).
What these tutorials don't tell you and I will, because you MUST know this. Keep a tissue (with make-up cleanser) close to you because when you apply the black eyeshadow some bit of the powder will fall on your cheek and once you rub it, you get your skin all smudged in black. What I use to prevent this, is an special brush that you can find everywhere. It is used to apply powder as well, but the good thing is that will sweep the eyeshadow away without staining the skin. It is usually very wide and has the shape of a flat fan.
One of the main problems of Gothic fashion is that is a winter fashion. For british goths/goth enthusiasts or people who live in Britain, this is not a big problem; as summer doesn't exist here. However, for the rest of the world, specially in the Mediterranean, this becomes a huge huge problem. So, after so many requests, I am starting my new fashion tips series: Gothic fashion for the summer. This post will cover some make-up tips for olive skin, as this is the tricky one, and no-one seems to have bothered with the subject.
These are the options I can think of:
DARK FULL MAKE-UP
Very rarely I find inspiring editorials among the summer issues. Suddenly, everything is just pastels, pinks and bright/neon shades that could easily blind you if you are not careful!
I love the stylism, is quite summery - if we ignore the fur, unless you are living in Scotland or Iceland - the bob is stylish, simple but still keeps the vintage flair.
