style crush: lana del rey

Musically speaking, my taste caters toward Pop (K-Pop particularly), R&B and Dance, however, I admire Lana Del Rey’s sense of style, fashion wise. It is perhaps a mixture of the glamorous 1960s and a touch of the eccentric 1980s. As quoted by Lana herself, “gangster Nancy Sinatra” defines her style perfectly. Last but not the least, her perfectly groomed hair tells me that having high maintenance hair is worth it after all; i-just-got-out-of-bed-hair is getting really old.

DIY: sleeve cutout blouse

And so I decided to customize an old blouse that I purchased about nearly a year ago when I was in Perth. Been seeing these cut outs on blouses lately or rather since mid last year but, I've never actually own any in this style. Since this blouse is quite loose for my size, although it is supposedly a size 'S', a cut out design on each sleeve would lend a subtle edge to its shapeless silhouette. Excited to add a 'new' blouse to my wardrobe, I took a pair of scissors and cut out the desired length according to a pattern that I drafted and added a bias binding using the machine stitch along the edges to neaten it up. Voila! New top for free. 

geisha

Ink on paper

Had fashion illustration class this morning and ended up doodling a close up portrait of my very own imaginary fashion model. After a few observations, it somehow resembles the advertisement poster for the Memoirs of a Geisha movie that was released a few years back. Apart from that, my Easter break starts next week! And yes, more blog posts to come, now that I finally have a little more free time. For now, my nails are being beautifully pampered with nail lacquer.

chen man

Chen Man, one of China's most celebrated fashion photographers to date and undeniably one of my favourites as well. Her play with colours is amazing. Not forgetting her talented ability to make an ordinary model look almost out-of-this-world-kind-of-beauty through her skilled digital manipulations. In short, her work projects beautiful, dreamy surrealistic-like images. By co-incidence, my latest project involves the usage of experimenting with colours and her work fits in perfectly as a part of my source of inspiration.

"In the past, there were set stereotypes of what a Chinese woman should be like, but Chen Man has really mixed it up. There's not a blueprint woman anymore. Asia is embracing strength and individuality, and Chen Man is creating the modern face of Asia."

Terry Barber, Director of Artistry M.A.C. Cosmetics 

To know that she collaborated with my favourite makeup brand, M.A.C Cosmetics, I am beyond excited to purchase some of these beautiful colours out of this makeup collection! Aquatic and ethereal are the first two words that came into my mind upon seeing this collection. In fact, it is based on the concept of Yin and Yang, water and love specifically. Regarding Chen Man and her love of post-production:

"Everyone in the world has different perceptions of beauty. It's a social phenomenon that everything has to be retouched and appear flawless. If celebrities wanted to show their true selves, it would be easy; they could just take a picture and do nothing to it. But it's not up to the stars, it's up to the masses, they think what's flawless is beautiful. I'm good at finding the beautiful side of people."

Chen Man