The National Vintage Awards

We had a vintage ball of at The National Vintage Awards in Birmingham last night. Thanks to all of you, we were finalists for the UKs' Best Vintage Fair! And....we won! Hurrah! The event was awash with gorgeous dresses and fabulous hair dos, it really was "where the vintage elite meet"!

Due to a shoe related nightmare, we sadly missed the champagne reception but we still had plenty of time to browse the offerings at Fazeley Studios. As soon as we heard "free cake" we launched ourselves on them as well as lots of handsomely displayed sweets. A few select stalls were at the event, including Vintage Paradise who regularly trade with us. I bought an awesome 70s gold and black maxi that will definitely be making an outing this weekend! We were all treated to a goody bag with discount flyers, keyrings and nail files which made for a nice surprise.

LeKeux's Vintage Hair Salon were on hand to provide their usual high standard of pinup hair styles (and hairspray top ups!) and various talented vintage style performers were entertaining the room throughout the evening. One of my favourite additions to the evening was the superb Vintage Photobooth. Simon, a handsome well dressed chap, was unimpressed with our first attempt (black and white pouty try hard fail - oops) so insisted we had another go with various props and bits of costume. The results were brilliant and I'll definitely be treasuring them especially as it's been a while since I've held a real photo, I can see this being a massive hit at weddings so definitely go check them out!

Now as you can imagine, I was stressing for a while as to what to wear as the dress code was #VintageGlitz. So in the end we just chucked on these old things...! Sadly LouLou couldn't join us as she is celebrating her wedding anniversary at Glastonbury (congrats LouLou!) so I took my good friend Lucy who, despite not being quite as "into" vintage as myself looks beautiful all dolled up in her 50s style evening dress. Proving that anyone can wear vintage.

Bang Bang Vintage 60s mini dress
ASOS art deco style clutch
Beehive courtesy of Rock n Rollers hair.

Bang Bang Vintage sparkly Paisley dress
60s box bag

Lola Lamour was our host for the evening, providing quick wit as well as few 40s and 50s tunes to keep us sweet, dressed up to the nines might I add. The winners from each category are listed below. Do be sure to do some exploring and check out all of them!

Best Vintage Style Performer: Bexi Owen
Best Online Fashion Shop: Lovely's Vintage Emporium
Best Online Homeware Shop: Your Vintage Life
Best Regional Fashion Shops: Miss Dixiebelle, Urban Village, Oh So Vintage!
Best Repro Fashion Brand: HeyDay!
Best Vintage Wedding Fair: Discover Vintage
Best Vintage Life Pinup 2013: Kristelle O Chocolat

Like I said earlier, there were some seriously stunning outfits sashaying around the venue last night, sadly I didn't manage to capture as many of them as I would have liked, but I did put together a very quick video for you on Instagram to give you an idea of what was on offer.

To finish, have a load of photos. You'll have dress and hair envy (and husband envy - scroll to the bottom to see what I mean!)

Diablo Rose from Lekeux Events

Sweeties for my Sweet

Hurrah!

A very special 1920s flapper dress

My Favourite Things trio

Fabulous outfits

Bexi Owen, Best Vintage Performer!

Urban Village providing some much needed 60s and 70s vibes! Best dressed gent of the evening without a doubt.

ONE MORE MASSIVE THANK YOU!

LOULOU AND GINA

XXX

Get Your Thrift On

If you're into vintage it's also likely that you're pretty thrifty with your dollar and careful with how you spend it. So now the sales are here! Hurrah for us all! I've done some of the hard work for you and put together a guide from the high street and vintage stores based on a few of our favourite things! Paisley, platforms and down right cheap frocks!

The High Street does Paisley for Pennies
A classic vintage inspired print

£22.50 Vero Moda

£20.00Topshop

£25.00 Urban Outfitters



ASOS adds Height for Half
Get a bit of 70s in your wardrobe

£28.50 Holland
£22.50 HELTER SKELTER



Must Have Metallics
Shimmer in your discounted disco gear

£17.00 COW
£5.00 HOLYSMOKES
£15.00 ASOS




Dirt Cheap Vintage Dresses
These are just the beginning - keep searching! There are masses of vintage shops with clearance sections all year round and here are three starting points for you! Good luck and dig deep.

£49.00 Lovely's Vintage Emporium
£7.00 Godiva
£25.00 COW



Gina
xxx

The Invasion of The Crop Top

Anyone else suddenly feeling a little bloated? A bit podgy? Thinking of cutting back on your sweets? Yeah...me too. I reckon it's all down to the rise of the T-shirt hemline from a sensible hip level to dangerous below bosom heights! The crop is here. And I fear it may be here to stay.

Oh I'm just bitter. The crop looks damn good on most of the ladies out there! In fact, they have done for decades, it's a fashion item that just keeps coming back to the catwalks and this time I blame the likes of Balenciaga, Louis Vuitton and Prada.

We've seen this style of top from the 1940s worn with with high waisted palazzo pants as worn by the gorgeous lady below on the left, through to the 1960s and the high necked, sleeveless styles seen on the right styled with monochrome high waisted shorts. A gorgeous 1960s sewing pattern and lastly, Kelly from Saved By The Bell showing us how the 80s and 90s chose to resurrect the crop!

Here are our picks of the best vintage, vintage repro and high street crops out there. 

Gypsy Crop from Vivien of Holloway

50s 2 piece from Hell Bunny

60s inspired crochet Topshop

90s cool Motel

Denim to go with everything Beyond Retro

More retro 2 pieces Hell Bunny

xxx

Reclaim To Wear

How very ethical of them. Toppers have gone all DIY on us with new collection Reclaim To Wear, a new sports luxe, minimal collection made entirely from discarded fabrics. The look may not be vintage or vintage in style but the use of old textiles is something the vintage industry relies upon and we think it's brilliant that a huge high street brand is using the same thrifty yet fashionable method as your local vintage shops. The collection goes live tomorrow and you can find all the information you could ever want here.

We love the styling of the shoot though, blue highlights in the hair keep things fun and a bold red lip is never a mistake in our books. Very Rooney Mara. Plus, hellloooooo platforms! 

The collection launches tomorrow (June 15th) and can be found alongside various DIY tutorials that the team at Tophop have put together including this vest-into-bag one. Not quite our cup of tea but goddamnit we are feeling pretty chuffed at this eco friendly attitude from Topshop! Hurrah!

Jump Right In

We love a trend as much as the next fashion obsessed person in line. But sometimes, I just want to go against the grain and rock something completely different to what the magazines are telling me to. So I'm currently hunting for more 70s jumpsuits. Just LOOK at them! Farrah Fawcett looks incredible on the far right and they are just so easy to wear. The 80s tapered leg doesn't quite pack the same punch as a big flared trouser leg does, you couldn't rock platforms in quite the same way! So. The hunt begins!

 

At the Brighton Vintage Fair on Sunday I found this graphic printed jumpsuit with lovely floaty flared trousers and I do believe some lucky disco junkie walked away with a steal that day as I couldn't find it afterwards. 

Our Newcastle Vintage Fair a few weeks ago was a temporary home to this beauty. How many parties can you imagine this jumpsuit has seen? The psychedelic print really caught my eye, but when I found out it was a jumpsuit and not a maxi dress it became even more special. 

Let's stick to the real deal with a little look at what's on offer online on ASOS Marketplace, eBay and other independent sellers. 

Classic print Underground Girl

Neon 5678Vintage

Contrast legs Etsy

HUGE palazzo trousers Etsy

And no jumpsuit is complete without this Summer's shoe of the season: The Platform!

ASOS

Topshop

Gina

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