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Classic sustainability : Everlane

Classic sustainability : Everlane

As I follow a bunch of American based bloggers, the brand Evelane hasn’t been a stranger to me.  I always loved their clothes, as they are quality made with a classic cut. So you can probably wear them for almost a lifetime if you take care. But somehow the idea got stuck in my head that, as an American company, they didn’t ship to Belgium. As I realised that my shoe stock was below zero and I…

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In love with a beige hue

In love with a beige hue

I thrifted this beige seventies coat a few weeks ago.  I’m not too fond of the real fur on the colar but since it’s vintage I thought I might give the dead animal that died for this jacket some love by wearing it with pride.

I wore it in a more casual way as I went out for a walk in nature with my Kings of Indigo dress. The boots are also vintage ( I bought them from the grandma of one of my…

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How Kim Wilcox, stylist of Netflix show stranger things, saved us from expensive Halloween costumes

How Kim Wilcox, stylist of Netflix show stranger things, saved us from expensive Halloween costumes

I think I have always loved 70’s style, and it filled my heart with joy when fashion designers revisited the style and the high street shops followed the trend. It just made it so much more fun to shop for me. Although I am a sucker for the real vintage deal. Nothing beats that one of a kind item, it’s like the oyster in the pearl (  I know it’s the other way around ).  But I couldn’t have been…

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Beauty : summer capsule

Beauty : summer capsule

Our bathroom cabinets can become a place where clutter just grows and grows. We hold on to products we never use, bottles that are one use from being empty. It leaves us in front of a non organised stack of products. Each morning before getting to work, we just take whats in front of us and make it work somehow.

I often wonder why we all get so hung up on capsules, but yet we don’t do the same…

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Fair trade, how to read the label.

Fair trade, how to read the label.

Because it’s more complex than you might think, I’ve listed the most important fashion labels when it comes to fair trade clothing.

WFTO

Becoming a member of the World Trade Organization is only possible if a company provides evidence that it correctly applies their ten fair trade principles. The company must:

1) Create opportunities for those who are less fortunate. 2) Be transparent when it…

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How to shop sustainable fashion

How to shop sustainable fashion

It all comes down to this,  I guess. First of all, what I have been preaching here on this website, over and over. And I will continue to do so,  is to write about buying less. It’s certainly not easy. It requires will power and mindfulness. It requires being rooted, knowing yourself,  and being able to withstand external persuasions.

Second of all, it’s crucial to recycle what you’ve got.  Go…

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How to transition your summer capsule wardrobe pieces in to fall

How to transition your summer capsule wardrobe pieces in to fall

In a couple of weeks, summer will be officially over, but that doesn’t mean that you have to change up your summer pieces for fall ones all that abruptly.

Here is a list of key tricks that will make the transition from summer to fall easy breezy.

Tone down brights with black. I’ve always been a fan of the darker shades. Create some depth to those joyful summer dresses by pairing them dark blue…

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Preparing for fall, 10 items that you should consider adding to your autumn capsule wardrobe + essential accessories.

Preparing for fall, 10 items that you should consider adding to your autumn capsule wardrobe + essential accessories.

These items can easily make the transition from fall to winter to spring. They work as a fundament for your wardrobe.

*Disclaimer: this post is written from Brussels ( well at the moment im in France, but let’s forget about that fact for a bit) and for people who live near the Brussels area, or have the same, rather moody weather going on. Our temperatures vary from cool, windy / rain in fall,…

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The fabrics ABC

You can’t know until you know the fabrics and materials you like in your clothes, therefore I made a list, so you can choose.

Raw materials

Natural cotton fibers

Cotton agriculture mainly takes place in Asia and Latin America. Cotton has a high environmental impact due to high water and pesticide use during cultivation. Exploitation, slave labor and child labor are major problems on the cotton…

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How to travel easy: packing tips & lists

How to travel easy: packing tips & lists

I usually travel with a carry on, so I try to layer up on what I’m wearing on the plane. Next to that I try to organise my carry on the best I can.

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How to upgrade your style while you're travelling

How to upgrade your style while you’re travelling

We’re getting to the end of august, but for some of us lucky ones,  travelling for work or pleasure is a constant in life.

I travel 3 times a year to see my parents that live in the countryside of the Nouvelle Aquitaine region in France. They are retired and have chosen to live there, completely aligned with  and surrounded by nature, which is just beautiful. I try to visit them as much as I can.…

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How to dress well on a budget. Preparing for autumn...

How to dress well on a budget. Preparing for autumn…

Since there are much nicer things to do than buy clothes that don’t last, or are way to expensive and that you won’t use anyway. I made a list that you can use as a guide when you are adding those autumn pieces to your all- year- round wardrobe. I added some tips to cut down on expenses too. Little things that you may not have thought of but are of great importance. Lett’s dive in!

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How to shop vintage, the most important things to remember.

How to shop vintage, the most important things to remember.

When I first shopped vintage, I bought literally everything, because I liked everything in the shop, it was just as simple as that. This behaviour left me with a huge pile of clothes that I didn’t wear and most of all, had nothing to do with who I was and my style.

These days, I try to dress by the capsule principle, and I try to buy things that go with all the other stuff that I own. So that I…

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How to care for your clothes

How to care for your clothes

This is a huge step towards sustainability too. We all want to know how to get ‘ the right pieces’ that will last and make our style stand the test of time. But what is equally important is to care for those pieces we have put so much thought, energy, money and time into.

Here are my tips to make your clothes last:

Check the fabric before you buy. Try to focus on clothes that need less care like…

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Stella 9

Born and raised Jess Bercovici came to Guatemala for the first time in 2007 as an archaeologist working on a Pre-Classic Mayan site on the Pacific Coast of Guatemala near the Mexican border. Then and there she fell in love with the vibrant textiles throughout the country, but also with the people. After working on the project for three consecutive summers,  she committed to starting a brand with…

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Last Thursday night I  re-watched Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy,  and as expected it moved me as if I was watching it for the first time around. Chasing Amy is listed as a romantic comedy but it fits a few more boxes than just that. It’s drama, it’s romantic,  and it’s seriously funny…

  “Smith knows that at some level there’s nothing funny about being in love: It’s a dead serious business, in which your entire being is at risk.” aka movie critic Robert Ebert.

Or also : “Love is the province of the brave.” aka rockband  TV on the radio.

The movie is abundant with sharp, ironic and sexual dialogue. Kevin Smiths dialogues are the best in the field as the main characters explore their feelings and point of view on topics such as romance,  sex and friendship.

Holden (Ben Affleck) and Banky (Jason Lee) are two comic book artists living in New Jersey who are signing their cult novel “Bluntman and Chonic” ( featuring the adventures of Smiths characters Jay and Silent Bob). There Holden meets Alyssa ( Joey Lauren Adams), also a writer, and is immediately smitten by her. She invites him to a party. By this Holden offcourse assumes that she has mutual feelings for him. When Alysa sings a song at the party in a rather erotic way and kisses the girl she was singing it to Holdens world is chattered. Nevertheless, he likes her so much that he decides to give the whole friendship thing a try.

As his feelings grow deeper for her he can’t keep quit any longer :

“Why are we stopping? Because I can’t take this. Can’t take what? I love you. You love me? I love you. And not, not in a friendly way, although I think we’re great friends. And not in a misplaced affection, puppy-dog way, although I’m sure that’s what you’ll call it. I love you. Very, very simple, very truly. You are the epitome of everything I have ever looked for in another human being. And I know that you think of me as just a friend, and crossing that line is the furthest thing from an option you would ever consider. But I had to say it. I just, I can’t take this anymore. I can’t stand next to you without wanting to hold you. I can’t, I can’t look into your eyes without feeling that, that longing you only read about in trashy romance novels. I can’t talk to you without wanting to express my love for everything you are. And I know this will probably queer our friendship – no pun intended – but I had to say it, because I’ve never felt this way before, and I don’t care. I like who I am because of it. And if bringing this to light means we can’t hang out anymore, then that hurts me. But God, I just, I couldn’t allow another day to go by without just getting it out there, regardless of the outcome, which by the look on your face is to be the inevitable shoot-down. And, you know, I’ll accept that. But I know…I know that some part of you is hesitating for a moment, and if there is a moment of hesitation, then that means you feel something too. All I ask, please, is that you just, you just not dismiss that – and try to dwell in it for just ten seconds. Alyssa, there isn’t another soul on this fucking planet who has ever made me half the person I am when I’m with you, and I would risk this friendship for the chance to take it to the next plateau. Because it is there between you and me. You can’t deny that. Even if, you know, even if we never talk again after tonight, please know that I’m forever changed because of who you are and what you’ve meant to me, which – while I do appreciate it – I’d never need a painting of birds bought at a diner to remind me of.”

And, like it ought to be in EVERY ( ha ha)  romantic movie, she runs out of the car in the rain. He follows her. She decides that saying that he loves her is about the most selfish thing he did. He walks up to the car, she runs after him and guess what-  they kiss in a very, may I even say, smokingly hot, way. Alyssa explains how she felt when she made the decision to love people in a certain way, and the way she loves Holden…

Alyssa: You know, I didn’t just heed what I was taught, men and women should be together, it’s the natural way, that kind of thing. I’m not with you because of what family, society, life tried to instill in me from day one. The way the world is, how seldom it is that you meet that one person who just *gets* you – it’s so rare. My parents didn’t really have it. There were no examples set for me in the world of male-female relationships. And to cut oneself off from finding that person, to immediately halve your options by eliminating the possibility of finding that one person within your own gender, that just seemed stupid to me. So I didn’t. But then you came along. You, the one least likely. I mean, you were a guy.

Holden: Still am.

Alyssa: And while I was falling for you I put a ceiling on that, because you *were* a guy. Until I remembered why I opened the door to women in the first place: to not limit the likelihood of finding that one person who’d complement me so completely. So here we are. I was thorough when I looked for you. And I feel justified lying in your arms, ’cause I got here on my own terms, and I have no question there was some place I didn’t look. And for me that makes all the difference.

Holden: [pause] Well, can I at least tell people all you needed was some serious deep dicking?

  So they are now a couple, but then Banky, Holden’s best friend and roommate, might be secretly in love with Holden ( still following?)  He tells Holden how they called Allysa “finger cuffs” in high school and how a friend of him told him she had sex with two guys at the same time. Holden, who until then believed he was the only guy she had sex with ( according to his definition of it) begins to doubt himself. He confronts Allysa and they break up.

Then Silent Bob breaks his silence in the diner:

Silent Bob: So there’s me and Amy, and we’re all inseparable, right? Just big time in love. And then four months down the road, the idiot gear kicks in, and I ask about the ex-boyfriend. Which, as we all know, is a really dumb move. But you know how it is: you don’t wanna know, but you just have to, right? Stupid guy bullshit. So, anyway, she starts telling me about him… how they fell in love, and how they went out for a couple of years, and how they lived together, her mother likes me better, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah… and I’m okay. But then she drops the bomb on me, and the bomb is this: it seems that a couple of times, while they were going out, he brought some people to bed with them. Ménage à trois, I believe it’s called. Now this just blows my mind, right? I mean, I am not used to this sort of thing. I mean, I was raised Catholic, for God’s sake.

Jay: Saint Shithead.

[Silent Bob elbows him; Jay motions as if to start a fight]

Silent Bob: Do something.

[to Holden]

Silent Bob: So I’m totally weirded out by this, right? And then I just start blasting her. Like… I don’t know how to deal with what I’m feeling, so I figure the best way is by calling her a slut, right? And tell her she was used. I’m… I’m out for blood. I really wanna hurt this girl. I’m like, “What the fuck is your problem?”, right? And she’s just all calmly trying to tell me, like, it was that time and it was that place and she doesn’t think she should apologize because she doesn’t feel that she’s done anything wrong. I’m like, “Oh, really?” That’s when I look her straight in the eye, I tell her it’s over. I walk.

Jay: Fuckin’ A!

Silent Bob: No, idiot. It was a mistake. I didn’t hate her. I wasn’t disgusted with her. I was afraid. At that moment, I felt small, like… like I’d lacked experience, like I’d never be on her level, like I’d never be enough for her or something like that, you know what I’m saying? But, what I did not get, she didn’t care. She wasn’t looking for that guy anymore. She was… she was looking for me, for the Bob. But, uh, by the time I figure this all out, it was too late, man. She moved on, and all I had to show for it was some foolish pride, which then gave way to regret. She was the girl, I know that now. But I pushed her away. So, I’ve spent every day since then chasing Amy… so to speak.

[after a long silent pause]

Jay: Oh, enough of this fuckin’ melodrama!

[to Holden]

Jay: My advice, forget her, dude. There’s one bitch in the world, one with many faces.

[to Silent Bob]

Jay: Get up tons of fun.

[back to Holden]

Jay: We gotta book. We’re catching a bus to Chi-town.

Holden realises he was wrong all along.  Will it be too late, or not?

  And In the fashion department….Alyssa wears mostly see through tops, wide legged jeans, wide t-shirts with a print, big jeans jackets and flanel shirts. This style defined the nineties, it has made it’s comeback and is till relevant in 2018.

If you want to adapt Alyssa’s nineties style, I think it’s crucial to blend the key elements of that style with contemporary pieces. This style, my dear friends, can also to be found in the Netflix show LOVE, where the character Mickey blends nineties with ease. Or it could also just mean that you’ll have to re-watch Dawsons creek.

But first let me give you a quick reminder of what nineties fashion looks like:

Flared jeans

Chokers

Hoop earrings

Crop tops

Overalls

Scrunchies

90-ties shoes like Birckenstocks and Doc-Martens

If you were in to hiphop, this was generally marked by oversized saggy trousers and sweaters, combined with lots of ‘ fake’ gold and Kangol hats. Oh and Timberlands.

If you were in to grunge, you generally wore cut of shorts with ripped black panties underneath a crop top and a flannel shirt. And doc Martens. Or you could go for the classic ripped jeans or the slip dress.

I bet you know what I mean. Because, if you are here, you are somewhat into fashion. But just incase. I’ll show you the pretty pictures anyway 🙂

  Some cool facts about Chasing Amy:

In Japan, the screenplay of Chasing Amy was adapted into a novel by Kenichi Eguchi and published by Aoyama Publishing. The unique concept of the book is that it is roughly half-novel, half-manga, with Moyoko Anno providing the art for the comic book pages.[25] In an episode of SModcast, Smith revealed that while he was thrilled to have a manga based on his film, he was shocked when he read the novelization, as the characters’ sexual histories, which are just mentioned in conversation in the film, are depicted in the novel’s manga illustrations as very sexually graphic flashbacks. (Source Wikipedia) When Kevin Smith wrote the script he was dating Joey Lauren Adams and was inspired by her.

Chasing Amy is part of Kevins Askewniverse series. Each movie in this series crosses over with other films of the universe. Alyssa is name dropped in Smith’s Clerks and also appears in Mallrats. The key figures of this universe are the characters Jay and Silent Bob two drugdealers are extremely talented in not minding their own business.

Other funny quotes:

Holden: So, uh, what do you wanna do tonight?

Banky Edwards: I dunno. Get a pizza, watch “Degrassi Jr. High”.

Holden: You got a weird thing for Canadian melodrama.

Banky Edwards: I got a weird thing for girls who say, “Aboot.”

Banky Edwards: [to Alyssa] Since you like chicks, right, do you just look at yourself naked in the mirror all the time?

Jay: So why the long face, Horse? Banky on the rag?

Holden: I’m just, ahh, I’m just havin’ a little girl trouble.

Jay: Bitch pressin’ charges? I get that a lot.

    Love, Maureen

  Filmstyle ” Chasing Amy”- nineties revisited Last Thursday night I  re-watched Kevin Smith’s Chasing Amy,  and as expected it moved me as if I was watching it for the first time around.

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Dedicated

Me and my favourite shorts from Dedicated in France. My dad is a bird spotter and aficionado. Their house is filled with books on birds. So there is no better place to wear these beautiful shorts than here in France, surrounded by the love of family and nature.

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