fashion blog

Happy Halloween! (Because, even  though it's past midnight here by now there's still some Halloween left somewhere in the world). Last year  I spent my Halloween (with a skeleton) at a pilates trainers camp , but this year I got to celebrate it big time at the horror-themed RubiesKlubit burlesque club I produce with Tinx. It's great when you get to host an event with a spooky voice all night long. Here are a couple of shots from the show, all shot by Bernhard. Miettinen. I did my 50ft woman thing, inspired by the, ehrm,  epic masterpiece from 1958. Pepper Sparkles. Vera de Vil. Tinker in monster mode. Bent van der Bleu. One of the winners of our costume competition and my skeleton hand handing over his price. We run RubiesKlubit about every six to eight weeks at Mascot in Helsinki's Kallio district, always with a different theme. The concept has worked really well and it has developed into a great club night with a super audience each time. The next RubiesKlubit will be...

I have a jack-o-lantern and some lights burning on the front porch. Once the pumpkin is gone I will add a bunch of lanterns and lights in different sizes  more still -we changed to wintertime today and it's almost November now so the darkness really is here (that sounds very gothic doesn't it) and the more the merrier applies here; our world up here needs more lights now! Meanwhile, it's nice and cosy on the inside. Made myself a marinated chick-pea salad for dinner. With some Sunday-evening red. There's so much mess and stuff here, because of moving houses, that one has to really focus on how to crop the photos in order for not to reveal any of how it actually looks over here for the moment. And Uh! I broke that fine orchid of mine when I brought it out here. It was even making new small flower buds and all! Apparently you can't have an orchid branch grow roots to plant again the way you can do with many other plants' branches and leaves, so I'll just have ...

Today the dishes were matching each other.

The darker and more desaturated it gets outside the nicer it is to wrap yourself in colours. Well that, and -a bit contradictory I guess - all black as well (which is still a very common day-to-day choice for me). But today it was deep red för hela slanten as one would say in Swedish. (Well probably not the young folks to be honest, but that's how I'd say it.) This is a damask pattern chiffon dress that I received from  Sugar & Cream vintage store . My bag is vintage (that I haven't apparently used, or emptied properly in some time as I found a concert ticket to Gotan Project from 2010 in it!) and my red lace-up high heel boots are from somewhere on the internet from a few years ago. With the boots the dress gets kind of a folk-y vibe to it. You know I love shirt waist dresses and this one also as an elastic waist (comfy-points!) plus a hidden zipper in the pleats in the front which means you can step into it and don't have to pull it over your head! That gets poin...

Time for some self-promotion! Or not promoting me but my business (which I suppose I really should remember to do more often) - Both my colleague and I (plus our assistant. Yazzz, we have one that actually the employment agency pays for! Phew!) are huge fans of Halloween . So to get the most out of it we are celebrating Halloween weeks at the studio with spooky tunes and choreographies. Plus some discounts - come and try out a new class for just 10€! You can find our studio at Facebook here: Facebook.com/StudioShangriLa And our Burlesque School (which is pretty much the same as the studio page, but focusing more on the burlesque content) here: Facebook.com/ShangriLaSchoolOfShowgirls You can of course find our website here: studioshangrila.fi and us at instagram @studioshangrila For any blogreader of mine who hangs around Southern Finland and wants to take classes with us (a whole season/weekly/once) I've made a discount code to use at the web store or at the studio for 15% off any...

Eddi is in Iran for a month, and I am working on a lot of projects, but I've tried to come up with some bigger and smaller quality-time things for me and Dag to do when possible. We've played some word games and made late night apple pie, and the other day we went to  Linnanmäki with my sisters and their boys. The amusement park normally closes after summer, or is open just a few hours in the afternoon, but throws a light carneval each October with evening opening hours and different programs and light installations. (Light is an often recurring theme -and subject- in  happenings over here , as we tend to go towards darker days, and there is an acute lack of it...) Last time we went to the  Light Carnival was three years ago  when Dag was just a baby. The park really looks pretty with all the lights of the attractions on (in summer it is so light so they don't really show) as well as the trees illuminated, led-light infused cotton candy, and light installations and p...

I went to a Octoberfest-themed party in the weekend and dressed inspired by myself in 1983. (Even though I remembered my tiny dirndl had the colours the other way around, with a red skirt.) I did not have that much time to put together an outfit and also wanted one just inspired by the look of a dirndl, not to create one. But if there's a next time I'll sew myself a pair of high waisted lederhosen-inspired suspender shorts (or skirt) instead! This is a selfmade skirt and the waistcoat/corselette is one I use on stage as part of a very differently themed outfit. This was also a great opportunity to get to use one of my petticoats! I seldom wear them nowadays. I should go to parties more often I guess (not just perform at them).

I have an orchid in my soon-to-be-former home, that keeps in growing and making new branches and new flowers. As soon as the flowers fall off new ones appear. And I don't know how this little fella does it, considering  most orchids just come to wither and die  under my tl-and-c, as I've pondered upon  before . Not sure what I've done differently this time, perhaps watered it with a more constant routine, or then it's the fact that I only sleep in the apartment a couple of night per week and it grows better that way because it's just not fond of humans. Either way, I hope this one will survive the move out to the countryside and can keep making me happy with it's amazing prettiness!

It does not take much longer than a hair wash for your child to decorate himself throughly. And when your own canvas is not enough anymore you will want to continue onto the next one - Dag thus gave me a foot tattoo that he got a little eager with and extended onto my leg. I noticed the kid had managed to "tattoo" himself on the neck as well. Rather impressive, I'd say. So much concentration. So now I have a leg full of ninjas. And Dag has them on his arms and chest as well. Plus in the face. Time to pour up a bath I think.

I've harvested my tomatoes -from the three slices of tomato I planted we got a big bunch of beautiful green tomatoes.   I started my whole tomato-project a little too late in spring in order for them to have the time to ripe properly and turn red, and now the couple of sudden sneaky frost nights that we had managed to kill some of them off already. So I had to harvest those that were left now. It does not matter that they are still green, as they taste pretty awesome when fried in butter and garlic anyway (well, doesn't everything...).

Channeling some 70's lounge vibes with my blackjumpsuit, peeptoes and slinky silk shirt. It's all old stuff from the closet.

One thing about getting older, I've noticed, is that you get more tired doing things that before did not tire you as much. So after a weekend of working for about 30 hours, of which half of those hours in high heels, walking an uncountable amount of time back-and-forth between stage area and back stage at a huge fair center (note to self for next year: bring a pedometer!) it does take some days, not just a , to recover. But because work and moving apartments and such those days have not yet appeared; this is the first time in a week I managed to sit down by the computer and do internet-stuff from a bigger screen than the one in the palm of my hand. Phew! Here are a few shots from the Pin-Up Finland pageant that we were working on last weekend - It's not really a pageant per se, that focuses on looks, but a modelling competition that values over all style and how to embody the modern pin-up, as well as modelling skills live and in front of the camera. The pin-ups this year were ...