Fashion

Guernsey goes global

They say that if you wait long enough, then anything from the past will eventually come back into fashion. And true enough; over the decades we’ve seen all sorts of unlikely fashions from yesteryear experience a new lease of life on the high street Disco pants, eighties neon and double denim… I’m looking at you.

However, I’m sure that I’m not the only one who was slightly amused and bemused to see our very own Guernsey jumper (which is over 400 years old) hit the headlines recently. At first, it may seem quite hard to imagine how a fisherman’s jumper, with humble seafaring origins, could make it into a glossy spread in Vogue – and be sported by none other than world renowned supermodel Kate Moss. Recently the Guernsey was promoted on ITV news by intrepid explorer Ben Fogle – It seems official; the Guernsey is in the media glare, it’s being worn by the fashion set. Celebrity endorsement has elevated our much loved Guernsey jumper into the upper echelons of glamorous knitwear. Forget cashmere and forget angora… it’s all about the Guernsey. It’s never been cooler to be seen in vintage look clothes, brogues and chunky knits that could have been worn by your grandparents.

The Guernsey or ‘Gansey’ is a garment that was originally valued for its practicality. Knitted using oily lanolin wool, it serves as a great insulator against the elements. It’s important to remember that not so long ago, the main stays of the Island’s economy were the tomato trade and the fishing industry – the latter job requiring the fisherman to be outdoors in all weathers and temperatures. The Guernsey was therefore seen as a vital item of clothing. Traditionally, a wife would knit a Guernsey for her husband – once completed, she could sleep safe at night, secure in the knowledge that her fisherman would be snug in his woollens, mostly protected from harsh winds and relentless sea spray.

The Guernsey has a simple yet unusual shape. For example, if you look closely at a Guernsey, then you’ll notice that the sleeves are much lower on the arm than on your standard jumper. The sleeves are stitched on below the armpit, (knitted on by hand to the main body of the jumper as a finishing touch) allowing for unrestricted movement – something that is a priority when you’re controlling a boat in unpredictable weather. The tightly woven stitching on the sleeves denotes different maritime symbols, such as rigging, ropes and waves breaking upon the shore. Occasionally, certain patterns on a Guernsey could be used as an identifier for men from different families or parishes. So you’d be able to tell your Queripel from Torteval from your Le Page from Castel just by his clothes. Looking back now, this creativity may have seemed like a cute personal touch, however this decision to customise the Guernsey was not fashion based. The grisly truth, was that the unique pattern meant that if a man had been lost at sea and his body eventually washed ashore, the pattern of his Guernsey – the lanolin wool not being damaged by the sea – would lead quickly to his identification. The high symmetrical neckline meant that the Guernsey could be worn back to front – if you got one side dirty or it started to show a bit of wear and tear then you could just flip it round. It was seen as an enduringly loyal item of clothing – iconic Guernsey.

Guernsey jumpers and stockings are historic objects with a rich heritage – and date back as far as the 1600s when English wool was first imported to the island. According to the BBC and The British Museum’s ‘A History of the World’ project, Guernsey knitting even had royal connections – Mary Queen of Scots is said to have been executed in her favourite pair of Guernsey stockings.

If you go down to the Fermain Tavern today, there’s a fair chance that you will see one or two middle aged professionals (and maybe even a sixth form student) wearing their Guernseys with nonchalance. However, if you ask these finance types why they wear their fisherman’s Guernsey, you’ll notice that they’ll tell you their sentimental reasons for doing so with a typical Guernsey donkey sense of pride. My sixteen-year-old brother even asked for a Guernsey for Christmas – and when I questioned him why, he replied that not only was it an ideal garment for outdoor pursuits (you’ll often find him down the shooting range on a Sunday) but also that he liked to support local industry. Furthermore, it reminded him of his roots and heritage. “If I’m looking for a quality jumper, then why wouldn’t I go for the best?” The Guernsey is not disposable fashion – for many it’s an heirloom.

So what do we make of the Guernsey becoming ‘on trend’? Well, we won’t settle for anything less than the very best, will we? It’s only natural for it to be modelled in one of the world’s leading fashion bibles and by top models. Because what does a publication such as Vogue, Kate Moss and the Guernsey have in common? They’re timeless.

This article was written by Louise Le Pelley (of http://www.lavalisedelouise.com) and appeared in the Fashion section of Gallery Magazine Guernsey’s 2014 Passion Issue

The Bells of Notre Dame and the Glitz of Printemps

Are you ready for another story from Paris? Well then, I won’t keep you waiting a moment longer!

The day started off slightly overcast – after having been reunited with my suitcase, I spent a while deciding what shoes to wear on my day in the city before eventually settling for sensible flats. Heels are all very well but when you’re dashing all over the city and having to anticipate the thought of climbing lots of stairs at BREAKNECK SPEEDS (slight exaggeration) then flats are the best option… Satchel packed with a change of clothes, I headed to Maison Blanche (which is not a glamorous presidential house or home to Blanche Neige but a relatively small and quiet metro station) where I took line 7 to Châtelet. Emerging from the underground, I was greeted by the stunning architecture in Place du Châtelet.

I soon found myself crossing the Pont au Change (a bridge which features as an iconic location in two of my favourite books Victor Hugo’s ‘Les Misérables‘ and Patrick Süskind’s ‘Das Parfum’. The latter tells the story of a sensual yet gory quest for the perfect scent through 18th Century France and a large portion of the book takes place at a fictional parfumerie on the Pont au Change).

From the bridge, I got a great view of the Palais de Justice complex, which is a really impressive sight to behold. Whilst the gothic towers and spires look as if they belong in the illustrated pages of a fairytale book, it’s important to remember that Paris has more than its fair share of dark secrets. This building has a particularly bloodthirsty past, for it was in the Conciergerie, an ancient prison within the complex, that numerous prisoners (including Marie Antoinette) were imprisoned before they were guillotined during the Reign of Terror.

Just around the corner from the Conciergerie is the Palais de Justice – this is the most exciting part of the building because this is where all the action takes place and where justice is carried out to this day! This was a very busy area, with a heavy police presence. The national tripartite motto of ‘Liberté, égalité, fraternité’ is featured on the façade of the Palais, with one word chiselled above each of the three main doors.

When you cross over the Pont au Change, you leave the right bank of the Seine and find yourself on the île de la cité – a natural island on the River Seine, which is dominated by the iconic gothic cathedral Notre Dame de Paris.

The Cathedral of Notre Dame is one of my favourite sights in Paris – measuring over 70m high, construction began in 1163 and today the Cathedral is considered to be one of the most beautiful religious landmarks in the world, showcasing a perfect example of French gothic architecture from the Middle Ages. Notre Dame was also one of the first buildings to feature flying buttresses as a form of architectural support. I’ve already mentioned my love of gothic novels and admiration for the author Victor Hugo elsewhere on my blog, so the fact that I love the novel ‘Notre Dame de Paris’ (in English ‘The Hunchback of Notre Dame’) will probably come as no big surprise to the reader. Everyone knows the Disney version of the story – where deformed hunchback Quasimodo falls in love with the beautiful gypsy girl Esméralda and spends a lot of time singing and chatting with his anthropomorphic gargoyle friends and swinging on bells. The novel has much darker themes – as well as playing with juxtapositions of the grotesque and the sublime in the form of the different characters in the novel for effect, Victor Hugo was extremely passionate about the importance of preserving Notre Dame’s beautiful architecture from destruction and corruption. The character of Esméralda in particular serves as an important metaphor for the potential fate of the Cathedral…

Arriving at Notre Dame, I wasn’t too impressed with the massive eyesore ie. blue walkway that has been built in the Place Jean Paul II to mark the 850th birthday of the Cathedral. This pretty hideous looking construction (what was that about heeding the important warning about the corruption of the beautiful Cathedral by modern architecture?) leads to an elevated grey viewing platform which is covered with the names of French Saints (I was mildly appeased by the fact that the name Louise was included. Mildly. I remember visiting the Cathedral when I was much younger and being able to have a Mary Poppins ‘Feed the Birds’ moment, however now all the sparrows have been scared off by the terrifying sight of that walkway)

I do have to admit, however, that even though the view of the plaza was compromised by the big blue monstrosity, the view from the platform was spectacular, giving the viewer a closer look at the ‘Gallery of the Kings’, a line of statues on the Cathedral façade. The air was cold and even though I wasn’t that high up the ground, it felt as if I was at quite a high altitude. I stayed for a while gazing at gargoyles – and I ended up being approached by a seemingly never-ending chain of couples wanting to have their photographs taken with the impressive backdrop of the Cathedral. This went on for a good twenty minutes, (I started to feel as if I was a teacher on a school trip in charge of everyone’s cameras) but it was actually quite a lovely feeling helping others get a good memory to take home.

Moving swiftly onwards, I left Notre Dame to have a look at the ‘Bouquinistes of the Seine’. Along the river, you will find green stalls which have a large variety of second hand and antiquarian books – as well as the obligatory postcards of the Eiffel Tower, cats and Brigitte Bardot.

In the two lower pictures, you can see some examples of Parisian graffiti. On the left hand side, brightly coloured Chopin and Gospel concert posters have been stuck to the side of a green box covered with tags and scribbles, whilst on the right hand side there is evidence of some of the more tongue in cheek graffiti artwork that you can see around Paris. Just above the street sign ‘Rue des trois portes’ there is a red horned octopus – Octopuses seem to be a popular image to use as graffiti in Paris. According to this interview with Underground Paris (http://undergroundparis.org/gzup-interview) street artist Gz’Up has managed to place over 214 plywood octopuses in locations hidden around the city. (I’ll interject here with a vaguely fun and random fact about Guernsey and the octopus. The French word for octopus, ‘pieuvre‘, originally came from the Guernsey French language of Patois. When Victor Hugo came to live on the island of Guernsey for 15 years whilst he was exiled from France, he wrote a book dedicated to the island called ‘The Toilers of the Sea’. One of the villains of the novel is an angry giant octopus. Victor Hugo quite liked the sound of the Guernsey word ‘pieuvre‘ and so decided to ‘borrow’ it in order to give his aquatic beast a name, and after the book was published, the word ‘pieuvre’ came into common usage in the French language)

Pieuvres aside, I continued on my travels and eventually stumbled across a weekly market. Taking a break to buy a drink, I was amused momentarily by the commotion caused by a small flock of pigeons flying out from behind the counter of a bakery before I looked at the time and realised that I had to meet a friend in the west of Paris and that I had no idea where I was supposed to go, which metro line to take… or indeed where the nearest Metro station was. Although I was cutting it very fine, I made it just in time and promptly found myself in a Japanese restaurant with ‘G’ struggling to make a dent into a large platter of avocado sushi, rice, mushroom skewers AND miso soup whilst trying to appear elegant and demure using a pair of chopsticks. A sushi massacre ensued.

Seeing as I had moved onto the west side of Paris, I was relatively close to the big department stores Printemps and Galeries Lafayette on Boulevard Haussmann. Outside, the grey clouds were dispersing, leaving the skies over Paris a glorious shade of bright blue, so I decided to go for a walk along the boulevard. The blue skies were contrasting beautifully with the golden art nouveau domes of Printemps’ Flagship store. The shop windows were beautifully decorated for the festive season.

Just across the street from Printemps is the rear façade of the Palais Garnier, l’Opéra National de Paris. This structure was planned by Napoleon III and designed by Charles Garnier – the project completed construction in 1875. It’s an opulent, beautiful building – and was the scene and inspiration for Gaston Le Roux’s 1910 novel ‘Le Fantôme de l’Opéra’. Having recently been bowled over by Gerónimo Rauch’s performance as Erik the Phantom in London, I had been particularly looking forward to getting a closer look at the building. Florence had told me that if you turn up an hour before certain performance then it is possible to get cheap tickets, however I didn’t have time to try this out. The Opéra interiors are gorgeously decadent and can be toured for a small fee of around five euros.

I allowed myself to get lost in the glitzy decorations of both Printemps and Galeries Lafayette (which was built 30 years after Printemps) for a few hours. The Christmas tree in Galeries Lafayette was the most beautiful tree that I’ve ever seen. It was lit up with electric blue lights and studded with large pink flowers with mechanical petals which opened and closed at regular intervals. A big snowy owl perched at the top of the tree whilst animatronic puppets of mice, cats, rabbits and monkeys danced above the heads of shoppers making extravagant purchases at the make up counters on the ground floor. Galeries Lafayette has ten stories and so there are escalators on each floor in order to make the ascent to the heavenly glass domed ceiling – ‘la coupole‘ – much easier on your legs. I decided to make my way up to the top in order to get a closer look at the big fluffy owl.

For many families, it’s a time honoured tradition to go and see festive displays in the big Parisian department stores. The 2013 window displays at Printemps were designed by Fashion House PRADA. Grown ups and children alike were peering into the colourful vitrines whilst upbeat retro music played from speakers – I especially enjoyed hearing the goose walk from ‘The Aristocats’.

I would return later to Boulevard Haussman later in the week with my mum to bask some more in the bright lights and beautiful shop displays. As dusk began to fall, however, the time came for me to head to Chatou, a town in the suburbs famous for being popular with impressionist painters, to spend an evening with my uncle, aunt and cousin.

We would be leaving for Disneyland Paris in the morning…

Lounging around the Louvre

Want to know why my satchel is so big? That’s because “it’s FULL OF SECRETS” (i.e. many clothes and an iPad)

I left the planning of the first day in Paris down to the resident Parisian – Florence is a classy miss with a passion for culture and beautiful things so I knew that I was in good hands. We bid farewell to Claire, who had a lot of essays to work on, and were off on the metro to the Palais du Louvre to spend a leisurely Sunday morning sauntering around the shops in the Carrousel du Louvre. We started off with a coffee break in Starbucks ( The irony of going on a cultural trip and ending up at Starbucks within the first five minutes has been pointed out to me. There is both a Starbucks AND a McDonalds under the Louvre which is frankly a bit surreal. We were hoping to use their wifi. There was none. I clearly hadn’t adjusted to the parisian cold yet and thought that a frappucino would be a wise idea… wrong). Starbucks was followed by a taste test of the herbal teas on offer in L’Occitane en Provence, and scent smelling in Fragonard before we were suddenly inspired by the great masters and decided to give some of the art themed products from the Carrousel shops a test drive – there were quite a few cool gadgets, such as this ‘Bhudda slate’ that allows you to draw a design with water before slowly absorbing and erasing your ~~scribbles~~ masterpiece.

After purchasing a few postcards, it was time to get down to business – we headed up the escalators to visit the famous Musée du Louvre, which is one of Paris’ top tourist attractions. The Louvre is one of the largest museums in the world, famous for its stunning architecture, art collections, glass pyramids and for paying host to Leonardo di Vincis’ famous ‘Mona Lisa’ (‘La Joconde’ in French), the mysterious portrait of a woman with a winsome smile… or smirk, depending on how you view it. Whenever I’ve walked past the Louvre in the past, it has been absolutely heaving with people, however we were lucky enough to visit on a relatively calm day. If you want to visit the Louvre at peak holiday times, then in order to make the most of your day I would advise arriving early to avoid queues and planning the sections that you want to visit well in advance. An audio guide in English (and many other languages) can be downloaded as an app for android phone and nintendo 3DS XL (I found the nintendo 3DS XL partnership quite intriguing) using the Louvre’s wifi network.

To our delight, we were able to get in for free, as free entry is offered to any citizen of the EU (with a valid id card) under the age of 26. This excellent initiative is also available in other Parisian museums and I really believe that it is a great way to promote the preservation of art and culture to young people. We picked up some plans of the museum, flashed our identity cards and started our visit on the lower floor. Here we were greeted by formidible giant busts (including the bronze bust of Emperor Napoleon below on the left… and this gentleman with rather impressive sideburns on the right) and the medieval foundations (and moats) of the palace building. The ground floor foundations are all that remains of the Louvre’s first incarnation as a medieval fortress.

Leaving medieval France behind us, we climbed up some stairs and embarked on a journey through Ancient Egypt. After viewing tools, trades and jewellery (Florence was particularly taken with the scarab amulets), we arrived at the section devoted to Egyptian mummies and burial customs. The devotion to respecting the dead through ornate handiwork, elaborate coffins and the practice of complicated preservation techniques such as individual embalming and burial of organs is both fascinating and bewildering to contemplate.

I found the collection of mummified cats particularly intriguing – in Ancient Egypt cats were worshipped and the death of a cat would be treated with great reverence and ceremony. Upon death, cats often received the same mummifying treatment as pharaohs – as you can see below.

At first glance this motley crew of cats looked like a collection of long lost bedraggled stuffed toys – it was only on closer inspection that we realised that the seemingly cute painted gauze or plaster faces were in actual fact concealing some rather grisly remains underneath. The bodies are tightly bound with intricately patterned bandages brushed with resin. The organs would originally have been removed for individual embalming – in order to retain their shape, the bodies would have been stuffed with sand or earth before bandaging. Embalming the remains of a dead body ensured that the spirit that once resided in the body would be able to progress on into the afterlife. Occasionally pets were even sacrificed and mummified upon the death of their owner, so that their remains would be able to be placed side by side in the tomb, ensuring that the owner would have a companion with which to cross over into the next life with. Cheerful thoughts!

After a substantial amount of time contemplating Mummies, we headed onwards through the Louvre… gazing upwards in awe at the palatial gold lacquered ceilings.

One of the most interesting aspects of museums is of course learning the stories behind artefacts on display. The Louvre has an astonishing number of artefacts, which are all of an extremely high value…. but if you forget the value of the objects just for a second, I’d like you to imagine yourself going back in time. You are a noble at a birthday party, and you receive a charming gift of home-ware…

A jug with your own face and fancy dragons sculpted onto it …”Oh thanks darling, you shouldn’t have…”

ANYWAY, we were gazing up at golden ceilings and heading onwards through the Louvre towards the most valued painting in the world – the ‘Mona Lisa’. As we followed the numerous arrows pointing the way to her, we noticed that the number of people in our vicinity increasing at a fast rate. By the time we actually entered the room where the painting was displayed, we were faced with a real hullabaloo. The ‘Mona Lisa’ is actually surprisingly underwhelming – compared to other works in the room, it’s quite a small painting, cased under thick bulletproof glass (to protect the grand dame of the museum from attack) and surrounded by a cord barrier. It’s not the kind of painting that you can stand in front of and gaze at for ages as to get a glimpse up close you have to weave through the crowd (the ideal manoeuvre to get to the front is kind of a cross between a slithery eel and a slalom skier) whilst avoiding elbows and camera phones to the face. The real challenge is trying to get a photo of the ‘Mona Lisa’ without any other tourists in the frame….

Florence accepted the photography challenge. As you can imagine from my eel/slalom skier description before, this feat required some quite skilled choreography – however she managed to get a couple of photos of me that almost look as if we had the room all to ourselves for a private view (LIES).

We soon escaped the throng to have a look at other paintings in the room – our favourite was the immense and colourful crowd scene ‘The Wedding Feast at Cana’ painted by Veronese in 1563. This is the largest painting in the Louvre’s collection and it covers the entire wall opposite the Mona Lisa. It’s quite interesting to observe how such a vast theatrical painting remains largely ignored, living in the shadow of ‘Mona Lisa’ and her many admirers. The fact that the painting is a crowd scene ironically reflects la foule in front of the ‘Mona Lisa’. After having earlier spent quite a bit of time with the cats of Ancient Egypt, we especially enjoyed spotting the cat that appears in the bottom of ‘The Wedding Feast at Cana’. If you make a trip to the Louvre, see if you can spot it!

We viewed a few more paintings (including ‘The Coronation of Napoleon’ by Jacques Louis David which was breathtaking) before deciding to replenish our oxygen levels by going outside to admire the architecture of the Louvre alfresco. En route, I took a few photos of portraits that particularly caught my eye – ‘The Empress Josephine’ by Pierre Paul Prud’hon (1805) and “The Young Martyr” by Paul Delaroche (1855). Josephine de Beauharnais was the first wife of Napoleon – her former residence the Château de Malmaison is considered a Napoleonic national museum and is located in Reuil-Malmaison, just a few RER stops outside Paris.

Below you can see one of the iconic glass pyramids situated in the courtyard of the Louvre. Although they were quite a controversial concept when first installed, they have since become beloved Parisian landmarks. The large pyramid was completed in 1989, it’s just that little bit older than me!

The Louvre has its own ‘Arc de Triomphe’ – the ‘Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel’ is a miniature version of the larger ‘Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile’ (situated on the Avenue des Champs-Élysées). The baby arch is made out of rose marble and although both structures were planned at the same time, the miniature was actually completed 28 years before its larger counterpart. After going around in circles for a while, admiring the ins and outs of the courtyard, we decided to head head back inside to the first floor of the Richelieu wing to see the state apartments of Napoleon III.

Victor Hugo famously referred to Napoleon III as “Napoleon le petit” (Napoleon the little), implying that Napoleon III was diminutive in both stature and grandeur. The grandeur that Napoleon III was lacking in character (according to Hugo) was clearly hiding in the interior décor of his state apartments.If you’re planning a visit to the Louvre, this section is not to be missed – the sheer opulence and decadence has to be seen to be believed.

The tiara that you can see above was originally part of the French Crown Jewels collection – after having been sold many years ago (1887 to be precise) to a private collector in DURHAM it was acquired by the Louvre in 2002 (I was excited by this connection, as you can tell by my apparent need to take a photograph of a sign… all that pomp and sparkle and I thought it imperative to take a photograph of a sign… honestly)

After perusing the apartments and indulging in one last photo opportunity (I just loved the joyous stag, it reminded me our Collingwood stag statue back in Durham), it was back down to the carrousel in an attempt to source food and an internet connection so that I could send off some articles – I ended up leaning against a plinth in the apple store. We then parted ways as Florence had a busy evening of studying ahead of her, whilst I was off to meet my mum, who coincidentally had just arrived in Paris for a course on French tax, in Villiers.

Food was to be found at Casa Belucci, a cute Italian restaurant in Avenue de Villiers (http://www.lacasabelucci.com) We were enticed in by the chic red lip sofas (reminiscent of the italian siren of the silver screen Sophia Loren and Paris’ classic ‘Crazy Horse’ cabaret show). We were presented with free shots of mushroom soup, before sharing the’Romana’ pizza and ‘La Riviera’ salad. Dessert was a raspberry sorbet and pistachio icecream coupe topped with cherries and pistachioscalled ‘L’Amarena en Folie’. All in all, it was an excellent way to conclude the day! Many thanks to Flo for joining me in being a culture vulture tourist for the day!

Covent Garden Cuisine (with a little bit of cruising around Camden Market)

On the fifth day of my trip, I found myself accompanied through the London streets by some pals from University – three physicists and a mathematician, to be exact. Nick, Tom, Caleb and Daryl (Daryl of Hamleys teddy bear snuggle fame) managed to organise a London meet up day with relatively short notice and it was great to catch up with what they’d all been up to over the summer. We met in the morning at London Victoria – Nick, who was busy with his fancy jet-set number-crunching job (or so he’d have us believe…), joined us later in the evening. With so many scientists in the entourage, you’d think that the day would have gone ahead with logical precision, however apart from a request from Daryl to visit Chin Chin Labs in Camden, it was a relaxed freestyle day – which was more than ok with me, as you can tell from my previous posts, “magical mystery tours” of random discovery are just the way I like it.

We had a mosey around several different areas of London throughout the day – As the only girl, I found myself outnumbered by the boys, however used this newfound manly troupe as the perfect excuse to finally try out Five Guys burger restaurant. I had finally worked out where the building was and had a hunch that it would be a crowd-pleaser – from experience, messy burgers tend to be a hit with men. Of course, I have a secret weak spot for a good barbecue bacon cheeseburger (but shush, no-one must know!) and was really intrigued to see if Five Guys lived up to the hype.

I had decided to take my new shoes from Forever 21 for a test drive – they would come to be referred to throughout the day as the “disco shoes” by Caleb and Tom, who both seemed to have an affinity for their apparent 70s look (or more likely, the 70s in general). It took a while for everyone to get used to my new height, as at first glance it seemed as if I had grown about seven inches over the summer. It was a lie. Fashion can be deceiving, folks.

After traipsing around London Victoria for a while, looking for an “edgy café” for Caleb to get a coffee from, we decided to do a bit of sightseeing, starting with Buckingham Palace. We zipped from Victoria to Green Park on the tube and caught some action at the Palace gates. We were actually lucky enough to see some ornate carriages leaving the palace, which was quite exciting. I think one of the things that I love most about cities, is that even if you visit a landmark several times, you never have the same experience twice as there is always something different to observe or take part in. It was interesting to see the ceremonial dress of different dignitaries – I believe that the blue national costume pictured below is the attire worn by the Mongolian ambassador to the UK.

After witnessing some artistic Instagram photography attempts at the Canada gates by a certain member of the gang (who is in denial of his passion for Canada and subsequent status as aficionado of all things canadian), we headed to Covent Garden to catch a bit of street magic and busking. Whilst we were en route to Five Guys – we had decided that we were pretty ravenous by this point – we spotted the official Tintin Shop, which can be found at 34 Floral Street. The street name indicates Covent Garden’s early origins and roots as a flower market (the pun is unintentional this time, I swear). “Les Aventures de Tintin” is a comic book series which was created by Belgian cartoonist Hergé in 1929 and the shop on Floral Street was established in the early eighties. The Tintin comic series has since been adapted into a major feature film and still enjoys popularity today. I remember walking past Le Grand Rex in Paris whilst visiting a friend on my year abroad in 2011 and being awestruck that the façade of the cinema had been magically transformed into the exterior of the fantastical boat La Licorne.

Tintin is a classic character known all over the world – on one of my first ever trips to Germany, I stayed in a host family and instantly felt at ease when I spotted a Snowy poster on the wall of the lounge*- Tintin ended up forming the basis of one of my first German conversations. The comic books have in fact been published in over seventy languages, which just goes to show how international a character Tintin has become over the years. I have good memories of spending the christmas holidays (in particular the night of ‘Reveillon’ – Christmas Eve) as a little girl watching the animated Tintin series (from the early nineties) with my dad, uncle and grandfather – the series was often broadcast on French TV!

Once the boys spotted the Tintin Shop, we all thought that it would be rude to walk right past without taking a glimpse inside… just for the sake of nostalgia of course… 😉

These tourists walked into my photo with lightning speed – however I do like how these London ladies coincidentally match the colour scheme of the shop! Inside, Daryl and I got sidetracked by the fluffy Snowy toys, whilst Tom and Caleb checked out some of the books – I think that’s what they were up to at any rate, I was too busy being entranced by fluff.

*Snowy’s name in German is Struppi, in case you were wondering – his French name is Milou.

Once we had torn ourselves away from the fluffy Snowys, we were back on track on the hunt for food. Five Guys turned out to be not far from Floral Street and surprisingly there was no queue outside – there wasn’t even much time to enjoy the heaps of free monkey nuts that line the restaurant before we were served with our burgers and fries. Of course, I can’t complain because if we had indulged on the peanuts then we would not have had enough space for the main event! The menu at Five Guys is quite simplistic, however there are several different combinations that you can create from the ingredients on offer. I decided to go for a ‘little’ burger – which was a wise choice, as the portion sizes are massive! I would not have been able to cope with a normal sized burger and I hadn’t even eaten breakfast! Look at the cheesy barbecue bacon deliciousness below, pictured on the bottom right – if I could choose any adjective in the world to describe this burger, I would not go for little! Decadent, perhaps?

I naively ordered a “regular” diet coke, but soon discovered the novelty of the Five Guys refill ‘coke freestyle’ system – where you can choose from hundreds of different drinks options including combos such as Grape Sprite, Strawberry Fanta, and Raspberry Coke. It was mind-blowing for the first five minutes… until I found myself craving the normalcy of a plain diet coke! When it comes to being served your food, you have to present yourself to the counter to receive your order when the number on your receipt is called. The food is then handed over to you in a plain brown paper bag. The burger is wrapped tightly in foil; as soon as you unwrap it, the squishy bun expands (a bit like a slinky or a sponge) to reveal itself piled high with your chosen fillings.

I decided to try the cajun fries as well as getting a burger (naughty, naughty). Now, I have a confession to make – I am the kind of girl who likes to slather tabasco and jalopeños over everything. When I was living in halls of residence I even had a little spice selection that I would take to meals to douse my plate with – one of my friends ended up calling me Tabasco girl – not my finest moment. Although my taste buds must be slightly numb from all these years of chilli pepper abuse I actually found that the cajun fries tasted very spicy, so be warned! Again, a ‘little’ sized fries was a crazily generous serving – the cup you can see above was only half the portion, most of the fries were to be found at the bottom of the glorious brown paper bag. So many fries, so little space in my stomach – one portion ended up feeding three of us! We stayed in Five Guys for a while, tucked into an old fashioned 1950s style booth in the downstairs underbelly of the restaurant. The walls are plastered by endorsements from newspapers, bloggers and food critics – not really my taste of decor but the food was satisfying and great value for money. I guess the posters provide you with a bit of light reading if you find yourself on a solitary lunch break!

After leaving Five Guys, we had a look around Leicester Square and ended up venturing into M&Ms World. It was pointed out that it was a great marketing strategy to have such a large pick and mix of chocolates available next to one of London’s top cinema venues – the M&Ms building is vast – just about every kind of kitsch M&Ms memorabilia that you can imagine is spread out over four enormous floors. As you cross the doorway under a maquette of a London double-decker bus (given an M&Ms twist, of course) you are hit straight away with the cloying smell of chocolate. I think it’s probably a marmite experience, in that you either love the shop or hate it… maybe you even love to hate it, as evidenced by point number 3 on the buzzfeed link below …

http://www.buzzfeed.com/robinedds/things-youre-only-scared-of-if-you-live-in-london

I have to admit that I enjoyed looking around the shop – I definitely didn’t cave into temptation a few days later and return to buy a handful or three of peanut M&Ms….

It was definitely turning into a “foodie” day by this point in our reunion – our next stop was Camden Market to visit the place where dessert meets science – the mysterious Chin Chin Labs. Place your order at the small counter, and you can watch as ‘test-tube ice cream’ is created before your very eyes using liquid nitrogen, being frozen into a delicious triangular slab just for you. This was definitely up the boys street – I, however, have not been near a pipette or beaker for years and tend to be scared that scientific equipment will break if I touch it, so it was a slightly surreal experience. There was a choice of four flavours – Tom and I went for Pondicherry Vanilla whilst Caleb went for a slightly more adventurous “limited edition seasonal” flavour, Szechuan Peppered Pineapple (which was actually the nicest in my opinion and turned out to be dairy free). Daryl chose a dark chocolate flavour which was around 80% cocoa and tasted extremely bittersweet. You can choose one sauce or topping from the pyrex beakers displayed on the lab shelves – I was a little bit greedy and went for grilled white chocolate bits AND salted caramel sauce. Caramel pretzels looked like an intriguing topping, but will have to wait for another visit. The tasting was an unusual experience – I find it hard to describe its exact consistency but it definitely felt a lot smoother than ‘normal’ ice cream.

We walked off all our ice cream on the Camden cobbles – it was an interesting experience to navigate around over the said cobbles wearing the “disco shoes”, but I managed it, just about. Thanks for the patience, guys… the sun was setting over the Lock and the view was breathtakingly beautiful, so we stopped for a while to soak up the scenery. Camden is a very quirky open air market and residential area, which serves as a haven for all sorts of alternative fashion shops, one off street stalls, tattoo parlours, piercing studios and bars. It’s a good place to look for cds, a vintage look dress or if you’re feeling particularly daring, a steampunk-esque corset!

It was here Daryl left us, as he had to be up early the next day to drive up to Durham to visit the Lumière light festival. And so, the remaining trio retreated to The Lockside Lounge to wait for Nick, who had text us to confirm that he was finally deigning to join us.

The Lockside Lounge is a cool haunt – and definitely has a boathouse vibe with its nautical beams. As you may have guessed from previous posts, I love buildings with character and this bar was no exception. I ordered a glass of Burlesque rosé and was informed by the bartender that the label of the wine was chosen because the lounge often pays host to burlesque evenings. Camden nightlife seemed to be pretty vibrant, and I reckon that The Lockside Lounge would be a great place to spend an evening as it had an awesome atmosphere. It also endorses up and coming indie, funk, blues and jazz performers.

The peace was shattered when Nick arrived – he was enthused after a day at work and obviously hadn’t had to go through the tiresome trials of tasting various foodstuffs all day… We stayed in the bar for a little longer, being updated on his recent exploits in Lithuania and Latvia, before we found ourselves being frogmarched out of the bar and taken to Fire and Stone, a pizzeria on Maiden Lane near Covent Garden. I can’t personally vouch for the pizzas as I was still feeling pretty full from Five Guys and Chin Chin Labs so picked at a salad, but the boys seemed satisfied with their meal choices. Nick claims that it was “better than Nando’s” – high praise indeed.

I took the opportunity to take a few snaps of the guys looking relatively refined, taking on the role of slightly overenthusiastic paparazzi photographer/a grandmother. Nick helped me accessorise my Mai Tai with aplomb.

We ended the night sat in a Canadian sports bar called The Maple Leaf just a few paces away from Fire and Stone. We stepped off the street and found ourselves in a forest green canadian log cabin themed interior. Canadian flags and maple leaves were draped all over the bar and I felt as if we’d somehow managed to warp into The Hoser Hut from the popular TV series How I met your Mother. Caleb was in his element. It wasn’t long before he discovered the tempting array of Canadian beers on offer behind the bar…

I guess you can say that we all had quite a diverse day of café, bar and restaurant hopping! After returning to Victoria via Covent Garden tube station (with its surreal lifts that transport you from the street into the bowels of the underground) it was time for me to head back to Croydon, reunite with Ellie and to begin planning another day indulging in pleasures of a different nature – the theatre! Thanks go to Caleb, Daryl, Nick and Tom for an unusual culinary themed day of sightseeing in the capital.

P.S. Forget the riddle “Why is a raven like a writing desk?”. We had an incident on the tube where Caleb tried to persuade us all that lemon strepsils are as effective at cleansing the palate as chewing gum, much to the amusement of our fellow tube passengers. “Why is chewing gum like a lemon flavoured strepsil?” – the new riddle of our time.

Scintillating Summer Nights

Happy August to one and all! Oh how I love the summer… and this year’s summer festivities in particular are shaping up to be rather glorious. Admittedly in the last couple of days there have been a few rainy moments – including the one day where I faced an unexpected cycle ride in a thunderstorm, but on the whole I have had the chance to bask in sunshine reading good books and I even appear to have a tan! It only seems like yesterday that I was bidding farewell to my student days living on the Bodensee, enjoying the last summer parties with my Konstanz friends before returning to Durham to knuckle down and get my degree… what a whirlwind of a year it has been. This year I’ve had the pleasure of graduating, I just received some good news regarding a job, and will be hitting up the South of France later this week! I am ridiculously excited. I haven’t written a decent blog entry in a while because I’ve been concentrating on soaking up the sunshine (wearing my sun screen of course) but I am breaking my silence to share a few of my July/August favourite things!

Let’s start with beauty products, SHALL WE. I bought a new perfume to celebrate the summer (perhaps a lame excuse to splash some cash, but I think every girl needs a signature summer scent… or three). I chose Elixir des Merveilles by Hermés to be the scent that embodies my summer 2013. The fragrance actually came out in 2006, so it is not technically a new perfume, but it’s fresh to me! I fell in love with the warm orange aromas and the beautiful glittery bottle – it looks like Hermés managed to bottle a sunset – excuse the poetics, but just look at the sunshine glow in the picture above! 😉 I also decided to buy a light coverage Chanel foundation to accompany Mr. Elixir on my summer travels and received some great travel size skincare samples with my purchase. I have a ‘sophisticated summer lipstick’ in the form of Chanel Rouge Allure Velvet 33, La Distinguée – however my brother presented me today with a funny little present in the form of ice-cream flavoured lipbalm, which will probably be a lot more convenient down on the beach! I have included a photo below – growing up the Twister ice lolly was my summer corner shop standard!

So many flavours!

Entertainment wise, I have quite a bit of summer reading to get through in preparation for my new projects. However I’m also looking forward to reading “Tender is the Night” by Scott F. Fitzgerald (which coincidentally takes place on the French Riviera) and “The Little Book of Chanel” which was a chic and unexpected present from my friend Flo. The most recent film I watched was “Le Camping”, a hilarious French comedy that takes place on a campsite – I definitely recommend watching this film for an insight into French campsite culture! If you are more of a discerning film critic (i.e. inflatable lobsters and campsite banter are not your scene) and you’re feeling in the mood for a sophisticated summer film classic then I would recommend Hitchcock’s “To Catch a Thief” for stunning panoramas of Monaco and scenes showcasing timeless elegance from Grace Kelly.

I’ll leave you with a clip of my favourite fashion campaign from this summer – Dior Addict. I have not tried the product, but I love the fun, flirty video campaign that in my opinion captures the essence of a French seaside summer perfectly – it’s just a shame that I can’t find my heart shaped sunglasses – they would pay a perfect homage to Daphne Groeneveld!

Joyeux Anniversaire Miss Audrey

It’s a cliché student poster of a cultural icon, tacked onto the back of a worn door, covering up unsightly notices. The carpet is navy blue with orange specks, and looks like out of place, like it should belong in a conference room rather than the sanctuary of a 20 something student, the blue clashing with the hues of delicate baby pink, magenta and white dotted throughout the room.

I’m sure that I am one of many girls who have such a poster – often bought down at the union or in a university building, in an attempt to add a touch of elegance to a cold and clinical room. This poster is just one of many artworks, books and trinkets featuring Audrey that I have acquired over the years, zig zagging across Europe from room to room, objects given to me by artistic friends and close family.

Audrey would have been 84 today – here is to the memory of a charitable icon, to a talented polyglot and to the pinnacle of poise. In memory of a woman whose presence on screen still brings comfort and joy to many, years after her passing. Happy Birthday Audrey Hepburn!

Fond memories of my room in Konstanz

Porte-Bonheur

(Photo from Pinterest)

It’s the first of May! In many countries this day is known as National Labour Day, however in France, the first of May is also known as La Fête du Muguet. Muguet translates as Lily of the Valley, and it is customary to give sprigs of Muguet to your loved ones in the first week of May to wish them good luck. My french grandmother always sends me a Lily of the Valley card to commemorate this date, and this year was no exception. I received a beautiful scented card in the post, which was a wonderful start to my week. I think that flowers in general are wonderful, as you can see from all the photos of floral arrangements scattered all over this blog! However, in my opinion, Muguet is a very special flower indeed, as it represents the sentiments of love and luck and can travel from afar in the frailest of envelopes!

I leave you with a video of Christian Dior’s 1954 Muguet dress to admire! This floral motif has been used often by Dior in jewellery, clothing and perfume.

P.S. Good Luck!

Les Ongles d’une James Bond Girl!

My favourite manicure of the moment! This is OPI Man with the Golden Gun (18k gold flecked top coat) layered over OPI Bastille my Heart (a glamorous burgundy colour from the OPI French Collection). Maroon, Burgundy and in particular, Oxblood, have been a big trend during this winter period… I’m not entirely sure how to differentiate exactly between the shades in this spectrum of deep reds, but I have noticed that these colours have been everywhere in the past few months! They have also been gradually infiltrating my wardrobe, starting with the purchase of a burgundy peplum coat in September. I can now count leggings, tops, socks, ribbons and oversized hair bows amongst my burgundy cachet, although they are not to be worn all at once, of course! Call the colour what you will, it has clearly been the shade of the season – I reckon it’s been the colour most worn in lecture theatres across the country throughout September-Feburary 2012-13. I don’t think I’ve ever noticed a colour trend being so popular before. Students swanning around nonchalantly in burgundy chinos and artfully draped scarves, have meant that I am greeted each morning by a veritable sea of these rich hues on my walks around the city…

Back to the manicure!

OPI Bastille my Heart is a great way of adding an on trend accent to your outfit without blending into the crowd too much… It also feels luxuriously smooth if you run the fingers of one hand along the nails of the other hand. I know that textured nails are in, and I love glitter polishes (possibly too much), but you can’t beat a smooth and sophisticated finish. I’m glad that it is not a limited edition polish because I will definitely be replacing it when I reach the end of my bottle! If I had to describe this manicure, I would say that it is a perfect blend of two OPI collections – the French collection and James Bond Skyfall collection – culminating in a decadent look, reminiscent of the tones of a rich french wine. When peppered with gold flakes, you are left with a warm look which will brighten up the cold and drab early months of the year!

A taste of Marc Jacobs – An ode to Soda

I have a confession.

Diet Coke is my downfall. If I have a deadline due, I will always need to dash to the shop first to get some of this elixir in order to ensure that I keep my cool (literally – sorry for the bad pun). If I’m in a restaurant and I order a Diet Coke with my meal, I will experience a few seconds of mild outrage if my drink turns out to be Pepsi masquerading as Diet Coke, often to the bafflement of the people I’m with. You know those annoying people who claim to know the difference between brands of Cola, and whether sugars or sweeteners are used? Yeah. I’m one of THEM. (I worked at a music festival once where the sponsor was Pepsi. No Coke products were available, and buying a Pepsi was cheaper than water. It was a sad time)

When I’m at home in Guernsey, Diet Coke is a drink that I keep for special occasions. Tapping into this concept of keeping soft drinks/soda as a treat or experience, Diet Coke have been releasing beautiful artistic cans and bottles across Europe in the past few years. When I lived in France last year, I noticed that the supermarket chain Monoprix was selling eyecatching limited edition bottles of Diet Coke designed by Karl Lagerfeld, the current mastermind behind Chanel… Thus began my collection of unusual Coca Cola vessels.

Since Lagerfeld’s bottles, I have seen numerous other limited editions come and go, including lacy nautical designs by Jean Paul Gaultier, who did a collaboration with Diet Coke last year. Last summer, whilst on the road from Germany to France, I bought a lacy JPG can from a motorway stop in Belgium, pleased by the glamour of the design. Daft Punk, David Guetta and James Bond have all since made an appearance on Coke Zero bottles. As an aside, it is interesting how Coke Zero appears to be marketed towards men, whereas Diet Coke is clearly marketed towards women. I think that the marketing concept for Diet Coke collaborations is genius – with the purchase of a can, women can claim to be drinking something designer – not only making high end designers accessible to the masses, but also tapping into the psyche of women obsessed with fashion. It has paid dividends with regards to their sales growth.

With the arrival of Spring 2013, comes a new creative director for Diet Coke, the designer Marc Jacobs. I have yet to see any designs for bottles, but the latest incarnations of limited edition Diet Coke cans are inspired by the 30 years anniversary of the brand, with three Marc Jacobs designs each referencing a decade (80s, 90s, 00s) from the past thirty years. So far I have only purchased the above design, but I think it looks quite chic. I don’t drink the limited edition bottles, but I do drink the cans, afterwards using them as cheap yet elegant design features/vases for dried flowers in my student bedroom!