Behind the Curtain

His Girl Friday, A Serial of Ritzy Coverings

So here is the second installment of my vintage inspired outfit series. This one is all about 1940s glamor, but taken down a few notches so you can wear it everyday or to a semi-formal affair. By the way, if you haven't seen the film His Girl Friday yet, you should. It's a cute, fast paced black and white.

• Monsieur Reinaert Scarf - a cute alternative to the fox stole, and a great light covering for the breezy Spring season.

• Pleated pencil skirt in chocolate - Will make your bum look stunning.

• Kendra peep-toe shoe from Clark's or the Ada Binding pump from Frye.

• Feather fascinator, like from the last scene of the movie Brick. I made a post on my old blog how to make this, but I can't find it now. Basically, you buy a feather pad of your choosing and hot glue a french clip, barrette or hair comb to the back of it and you have yourself a neat little feather fascinator! If you want to recreate the one from Brick, get the pheasant pad. It is such a simple way to doll-up any look. I always get compliments when I wear mine.

Coming up next week...Golddiggers of 1933.
(If you are interested in stockings and make-up to complete your look, check out my Vintage Style Series posts.)

Noir Lady, A Serial of Ritzy Coverings

With warmer weather and the wedding/party/graduation season nearing, I thought I'd put together a series of posts revolving around vintage inspired outfits. I myself have several fancy functions to attend in the following months and I'm sure the ladies who read this blog don't mind checking out some clothing treats!

First up is a Noir/Pulp mystery look!

Let's go from head to toe, shall we?

• Fleur Fatale fascinator from Pulp Tart
• Pleats Dress from Stop Staring. I own this dress and absolutely love it - the purple color is amazing. Another alternative for a stunning purple dress is their Alexa Dress.
• Baby Doll pumps from Remix Vintage Shoes, in black, of course!

Hope you will enjoy this short series of posts. I'll be making them on a weekly basis. Coming up next week...His Girl Friday.
(If you are interested in stockings and make-up to complete your look, check out my Vintage Style Series posts.)

Burlesque Festival

For those in Chicago, there are still a few performances left in Angela Eve's Twisted Tassel Fest. There are two ongoing shows running: the Star Glow Ball at the Admiral Theater and at the Glitter Glamor Party at Debonair Social Club. Apparently the Admiral is going to have more classic and vintage performances while the Social Club is going to have more rock n' roll/cheesecake theme.

For those in Boston, The Great Boston Burlesque Exposition and Vintage Fashion Fair will be upon you in a week or so. Check out the website for more info.

For those who are in neither location or can't make it to these events for other reasons, here are two videos of my favorite burlesque performances at the moment (I don't think I need to say that these are NSFW). Chicago's own Michelle L'amour with her twist on the classic balloon routine in Les Balloons and Immodesty Blaize at Miss Exotic World 2007.

Vintage Hair Tricks & Cheesecake

New to me blog, The Sophisticate's Diary, has a great collection of vintage hair styling tips and sets, along with their other lovely posts. There are some great scans with diagrams showing how to do things that I never knew you could do, like the horizontal half wave, to create that perfect vintage look. There are so many illustrations that I looked at and thought "Oh, That's how you achieve that style!" Quite an eye opener for me.

Also manned by one of the people behind The Sophisticate's Diary is Vintage Scans (NSFW), which is a collection of pages from vintage magazines. These range from Esquire to cheesecake to pulp. While not all of the posts require the NSFW tag, because there are occasional photos of *gasp* showing some boob, I thought I'd play it safe.

While we are on the vintage theme, I should mention that Dita Von Teese has been announced as the new spokeswoman for Wonderbra and will be releasing her own line under the company that will be 1940s inspired. This may or may not be old news to you, but I'm excited to see what Dita comes up with. I haven't heard any dates yet for when the line will be released though.

Bums & Stockings

Oh am just so in love with these knickers from SophistiKitten. Right now they have an offering of both cotton and silk side button French knickers as well as side tie silk knickers. I'm going to be placing my order soon!

Also, I found a new source for fully fashioned stockings, Christel. They are one of the few shops I know that carry my very favorite style of the Manhattan heel. Oh, how I love thee. Christel also offers "Imperfects," which are stockings that don't quite pass their quality control, for a reduced price. Great for getting FF or RHT stockings without breaking the bank.

Spry Shortening Cookbook

I found this little vintage gem online (can't remember where) and fell in love with the silly speech bubbles. The bubbles are not a modern addition, but part of the original booklet. Land snakes, enjoy the domestic saccharine!

                 

(Click to view larger images)

Recording Music with Duke Ellington

Here's a great news reel showing how music was recorded and made into vinyl records. Pretty cool little clip and it's neat to see the behind the scenes of a Duke Ellington studio session.

Mom's World

A wonderful flickr set from Joey Harris combines photos taken by his mother during the 40s and 50s along with his mother's memories. Absolutely great shots with great tales that not only reveal her personal life but history. I am amazed at her memory. Take a look.

Via Soule Mamma

(An image from the set: mother and father doing taxes - photo set-up by his mother and taken with a time release.)

The Library of Congress

What a wonderful thing when the Library of Congress utilizes flickr! That's right, The Library of Congress is on flickr sharing some amazing archived photos. They have two sets up right now: 1930s-1940s, color photography & News in the 1910s. The 30s/40s set has some great photos of homesteaders in daily life. The LOC also has a blog, in case you wanted to keep up with their happenings.

Via Wil Wheaton.

Two-thousand-eight

I hope everyone had a lovely new year's eve and enjoying the first day of 2008.