Arsenic on the Rocks

So it has been a fair while since I last posted and this has been due to a myriad of things including end of semester exams, moving out of college, stress and just generally not having any spare time till now. So, sorry about that :P

Today I just wanna to show you all my new shoes. So I've been wearing a pair of plastic $25 oxfords from big w for a few months now and more then once I thought they'd met their end, but people handy with the superglue have fixed 'em up for me. However, last week they kind'a became beyond repair and seeing as My grandmother told me she'd buy me a good pair of shoes for my 21st (in August) I decided it'd be nice to have them now as I have no shoes to wear that aren't sneakers.


So here's a coupl'a pics I took this afternoon.
They're patent leather oxford sort'a style with a simulated snake skin finish, and I love 'em! They're really comfortable but just recently they started rubbing my heels as new shoes tend to do sometimes. Hopefully that'll disappear soon. I got them from Easy Living Footwear Orange and I also think there's a store in Bathurst. They're could be more, I'm not sure.

Anyway, I don't really have much else to say, so I'll just post some other pictures that I took this afternoon. I've described most pieces of this outfit previously, except perhaps the green scarf shown below. I don't know exactly where it's from, though I think it's from Venice; it was a gift from my friend Kat when she returned from Europe.



Hat fell off :P




I also thought I'd add this little fill out thingy I stole from Grace

Hello, my name is Steph but you can call me The Green Fairy. Today, I am wearing black skinny legs, my new black patent leather oxfords, 3/4 length black spotty shirt, victorian waistcoat, black jabot, green ventian scarf, velvet bolero and victorian frock coat (breath). I am looking forward to feeling happy and well again and maybe finding a new boy to fawn over. I am feeling down but I'm being pragmatic and assertive about the situation; doing all that I can to change this. I miss Phil, mein Bruder but I'm still angry with him for not saying goodbye to me. I wish I had money and that my new industrial bar and hair ye would arrive.


Over and out guys,

-Steffles

xx

I've got you under my skin

So I decided, although it's not specifically goth or alternative or anything, to talk about Gelaskins in this post. Reason being is that I finally got around to putting my laptop skin on after receiving it over 8 months ago. This is probably because I was an idiot and bought the wrong size and I was too lazy to get it out, and cut it to size before applying it.

So I got my first gelaskin several years ago for my ipod show here:

And the back...

The design is by an Australian artist living in Ballarat by the name of Colin Thompson. The original artwork is shown here:



Anyway, after finding this design, I searched for some more and found this little beauty; a nice treat for all you little steampunk lovers out there.



So here's a lil' pic of my new improved laptop! All steam-pimped!



So anyway I thought I'd share some of the other designs I found on their websites today, seeing as I haven't been there for months. I love these ones:




(Especially this one because I'm obsessed with octopi at the moment :P )





Yeah that's about all, check it out if you're interested. I leave you now with a picture of my home made goon sunrise I made last weekend. I was so proud of it! Tsk, tsk, us students and out goon :P
Steffles
xx

All itch, no scratch but I won't fuck the fashion

So at a request put to me by my good friend Michael, I've put together a list of producers of which I do, or would like to purchase clothes from.

Fanplusfriend : A gothic-lolita online store that dabbles in both men and women's fashions, ranging from traditional victorian gothic, lolita, punk, steampunk, baroque and pretty much whatever your little laternative heart desires. I purchase quite a large number of things from this site for a few reasons;

Firstly because they're rediculously CHEAP. The don;t know how they get away with those prices, especially when pretty much all items on there are available for custom sizes for sometimes no extra cost, but generally a very little fee (I think the most I've seen them ask extra is $10!). For all those ladies and gents like me out there who couldn't fit into asian sizing if they're life depended on it, it's a great option.

Secondly, their quality is FANTASTIC. I've had my gothic lolita black mourning dress now for 3 years, and it stills looks as new as the day I brought it home from the post office. My grandmother even said to me at the time that a lot of it's intricacies were hand-sewn. HAND-SEWN, can you believe it? I admit, I was sceptical when I first saw their clothing online for the prices they were asking, but I would never bad-mouth their quality. EVER.

Gallery Serpentine : Gallery Serpentine was probably my first real life exposure to truely beautiful gothic victorian clothing. I still remember the day I first walked into their shop. I'm fairly sure the year was 2007 (or possibly 2006) and I bought myself on layby my first corset; a bottle green victorian overbust with black lace trim. It's still probably the prettiest one I own, however I like to wear corsets often and I'm just not as comfortable in overbusts as I am in underbusts.

Despite that their clothes are gorgeous and if I could I would own everything they sell, that's just the problem; there's no way in hell anyone could ever do that because they're brutally over-priced. They're corsets aren't really the problem, because I expect to pay $200+ for a good one, but the reat of their clothes on the other hand, ca-ching!

Not only that but I have a small beef with Gallery Serpentine because of a small issue with a corset I bought last year. Late last year, as some may know, Gallery Serpentine released their range of LIMITED EDITION steampunk corsets, as you would with the popularity of steampunk rising like the cost of petrol. Anyway, I purchased myself this beauty with Kruddy Ruddy's economic stimulus package we all recieved last year as a budding attempt to win back everyone's praise after his lovely display of incompetence some would called his term in parliment.




Anyway, all politics aside, the crux of the matter was that this corset was supposed to be LIMITED EDITION, hem...With some emphasis on LIMITED. So for those of you who don't know what that means exactly, Gallery Serpentine introduced a new line of corsets every 2 months or so and would only be made to order for those months. So after the Steampunk month came and went, suddenly, these LIMITED EDITION corsets were back for sale in their own nice little 'steampunk' category on the Gallery Serpentine website. As you can imagine, I was PISSED OFF. So the greedy little mongrels started producing them again, obviously because they were popular, all so that they could make some more money, of which they CERTAINLY won't making enough of already on their other overpriced items.

And so ends my rant about how Gallery Serpentine give me the shits. However, all grudges aside, it doesn't impact on my love of their products.

Next up is..

Clockwork Couture : So when I first came across clockwork couture, you can imagine I was smitten. Their clothes and accessories are broad ranging and awesome and I was heartbroken to discover one day that none of their clothes from what I can gather are actually made by them. Yes, in fact Clockwork Couture is just a redistributer (and an expensive one too from what I can gather). Although, if you like the stuff on the website and you're too lazy to go searching around for the original place it's from and probably get it at a better price, then Clockwork Couture is for you. I on the other hand relish in searching the interwebz as finding things is a specialty of mine of which I get great satisfcation from succeeding at.

Steampunk Couture : So I actually mentioned this site only a few days ago, and I'm quite obsessed with it's stuff at the moment so don't be surprised that if and when I get myself a job that doesn't mind the grass-green hair, I will be posting pics here, there and everywhere about the new clothes I just got from Steampunk Couture.

Retroscope Fashions : So I've never actually bought anything from Retroscope Fashions, however the forever saucy, who I'd like to consider to be the Frontman of the Steampunk subculture, Mr G.D Falksen has;



Falksen is what us fans of this style like to call the ultimate Victorian Gentlemen Hottie. And as it happens, this sexy history major has great influence over my opinion of clothing brands.

Baroque and Roll : I probably won't ever be able to justifying spending $120 of this awesome facinator from Baroque and Roll;



However it's unfortunate that all their clothes for the same profile as this lime green squid hair accessory: they're gorgeous and ridiculously expensive. However if you've got the cash to burn, I suggest you buy some of their stuff, I have a feeling having something so unique would pay off in you being the best looking proverbial bell at the gothic ball.

That's about all I have for today, because unfortunatly I lost my links earlier in the year due to a computer failure. But hopefully there'll be lots of new ones for me to run across in the future.

Signing off,

Steffles xx

Feature: Steampunk Couture

So I was going to talk about my outfit a couple of days ago but the photo uploader hates me at the moment, so I'm going to talk about something else instead.

So this evening's blog post is a little tribute to Steampunk Couture. Kato, the lovely lady who owns the company has both a website and an etsy account from which she sells from. I discovered Steampunk couture quite a while ago, but obviously I wasn't paying proper attention, because although I ADORED their clothes and accessories immediately, I was a little strapped for cash at the time (and still am :P story of my life). Anyway, so my insatiable reaffirmation of my obsession with Steampunk Couture began at the beginning of this year when I came across this little beauty:




Talk about love at first sight, one glance at this baby and I had to have it. So I pretty much starved for a week to get it :P

I've only worn it out twice, but both times I've gotten so many comments about it both times! I really think it's the best accessory I own and was def. worth the price.

Speaking of price, I find that the prices generally on this site are quite reasonable com paired to a lot of other gothic clothing websites with similar quality. Plus, I find that their designs seem to be quite original. I mean have you seen any giant golden octopus facinators anywhere else? And furthermore, Kato seems quite open to design suggestions and custom orders from what I can gather.

So I think the next thing I'll get from there, when I money will be this broach
Or maybe one of their many styles of coats. Like this glorious little red riding hood number:

I have great images flooding my head about the pine forests out near lake Canobolas here, that coat and a picnic basket with a checkered tea towel cover.



Anyway that's about all I have to say for Steampunk Couture.

Signing off.

Quintessentially Gothic

So last week my friends and I paid a little visit to the opening of a new photography exhibition in Orange, named Quintessentially Orange. The reason being that it was featuring photographers from Orange and seeing as one of my longstanding best friends, Gracie is a photo journalist for a local paper, she too was to have her work displayed. In fact, one of her pictures was of me!

This photo was on display at the Orange Regional Art gallery as well as on the front cover of the paper Gracie works for, Photonews.

Anyway, Grace suggested I dress up for the event, so...I did :) I would have posted my outfit earlier but I was waiting for some photos to be uploaded to facebook taken by one of the photographers present on the night; Rodney Shrimpton.



These three were taken by Rodney on the night.Rosemary and I


Susan Shrimpton, myself and Gracie


Myself, Gracie and Rosemary with some of Grace's photos.




So my outfit for the event consisted of:

TUK Green Gunstripe Pumps from Redpath in Canberra: $130

Black damask Underbust Victorian Corset from Gallery Serpentine: $200

Gothic Lolita Jacket Dress from FanPlusFriend: $135

Black satin jabot from FanPlusFriend: $10

Silver pocket watch from Diva: $30

Black satin bow from Diva: $10

Green and Black leather headband (sorry I don't know where it's from or how much it cost, as I got it for Christmas.)

I'd post more pictures, but for some reason every one of my photo-related accounts won't let me upload photos.

Over and out.

Ground control to Major Tom

So, I know this isn't exactly gothic fashion, but I wanted to spend a Blog post discussing one of the greats; David Bowie.

I've been thinking about him a lot lately, probably because I went as Ziggy Stardust to my College Ball. Here's a couple of photos of me, and note that firstly they're not very good quality and secondly I was quite inebriated in all of these photos :P


This was the look I was trying to reproduce:




But seriously, how awesome is David Bowie?


And I pretty much came when I saw him portraying Tesla is the Prestige :P



Yeah I haven't got much else to say, this has been just a pretty much picture dominated post :P

21st century slave, don't forget to obey

Hello the world of the interwebz! Here's me on a Sunday afternoon having just got home from Grace's house after having a night out on the town.


Yes that's me having no showered having slept in a deathhawk and mass amounts of black eyeshadow. Reason being, that I'm sure anyone who has rocked a deathhawk look will know, that washing it out takes FOREVER. This is because in order to get height and volume without using a whole can of hairspray you need to BACKCOMB. Backcombing technique is very important I realised after going to buy a new comb at Price Attack, or whatever that hair care store is called and having a 15 minute discussion with the saleslady about the width of the teeth, those inbetween little spike things and the wonders of backcombing compaired to teasing. I was quite joyous to know that someone else in the world understood the complexities of the backcombing world. No wonder if takes me 4 hours to get goth'd up. :P

Anyway I think I just wanted an excuse to blog today so I decided to show you all my new nail polish that I coaxed my dad into buying me whilst we were in the reject shop


Unfortunatly, it doesn't come out looking as awesomely green as it looks here in the bottle, which is always the case and is something I probably should just stop being in denial about.



Furthermore, I wanted to discuss this new foundation I bought a little while ago (speaking about denial, where the hell did I get the money to buy new foundation?). Anyway, I'm a rather obsessive user of foundation, well, I mean I don't wear makeup everyday, in face I only where it when I go out/ think that somebody good looking is going to be looking at me, but when I do don it, I am very specific about the roles I want it to play.

So normally I use Loreal Paris infallible 18 hour makeup, and I don't know why I thought I'd try something else when I think that it's he best makeup I've ever encountered. It's got great coverage, the perfect shade and feels great on.

Anyway this new Maybelliene 24 hour superstay is just generally crap in every way. I watched plenty of youtube reviews on it before I bought it that all praised it, and I don't know how they could all be so wrong. It's coverage is terrible, I can't even tell that I've got makeup on in the way that it does nothing to even out skin tone or redness. It feels gross on my face, so much that I was afraid to touch my skin, it smelt..odd, the packaging is very unhygienic, in that it's just an open bottle, no pump or anything to prevent mass amounts flowing out. Also, their lightest colour was not pale enough for my skin and so made me look...well gross, as if I didn't already feel that because of all of it's other disappointing attributes.



So yeah, don't buy it :P


In other news, here are the books I plan on reading over the next month, though it might take me a little bit longer with exams and stuff coming up in the next few weeks. I am of the opinion that many aspects go into style, not just appearence. I'm obsessed with appearing well-read and intelligent. It's kind'a ridiculous.


<3 Jules Verne so much

Creative endeavours

So a while ago my university college, Bruce (which I won't be at for very much longer) had a joint bar night with Burton and Garran, the college next door that was themed "Down the Rabbit Hole". Anyway, the point I'm getting at is that my friends Kathryn and Bec bought and decorated hats for it in order to go as mad hatters.



Kat and Bec




Kat, myself and Bec





And there's a closeup of Kathryn with her hat.

Anyway, so it got me thinking about making my own hat to decorate. I have a mini top hat that I bought from a shop in Newtown, Sydney at the 2008 Under the Blue Moon Festival (the one I'm wearing above) and I decided that I was quite smitten with them after the acquisition of my first. So I'm hoping to make a green and back, sort'a absinthe themed one.

I've got myself a hat


Black mini top hat from The Funny Shop in Civic, Canberra: $12


And some materials to decorate it with,


Some bottle green ribbon


Black lace



This little key charm/button thing




And this cute little fairy, which I adore!



Hopefully it'll turn out grand! I'll upload pics when it's finished.

Also, I wanted to add, in order to add a little more of an interactive appeal to my blog, I thought people might wanna suggest some things I could talk about in my next one; other than outfits. And believe it or not, I do have interests outside the fashion world. So yeah comment away, if there's anyone out there reading this.

Over and out,

-Steffles.

Oh yeah - I am a goth

So I know it's probably some blogging taboo that I'm not aware of as a first time blogger, but I was actually going to make my first post a reblog of my friend Grace's blog, seeing as her latest entry was basically all about me (just the way I like it :p) Wow, this post is really blog heavy, blog blog blog blog blog. Okay, so it's out of my system now. Hem.

...


Blog.

Okay, down to business now. So Grace is a serial blogger and suggested that as a rather stylish individual I should create my own fashion blog. So it's going to be Gothic fashion heavy, so I guess if you're not really interested in that stuff then go look elsewhere!

These pictures were taken by Grace Johns 2 days ago when I came into town to do the groceries for my mum :P

So this was my outfit:




Heart-shaped Earmuffs from Top Bargain: $2.50




Ridiculously large ego from a combination of genetics and my intellectual superiority complex: Free


Goat Leather Satchel Bag by Billy Goat Designs: Approx: $50




Black patent plastic oxford knockoffs from Big W: $25




Can't really see it but I'm also wearing a velvet bolero from Gallery Serpentine: $75




Not quite ouroborus snake bracelet from Tree of Life: $30



Victorian frock coat from FanPlusFriend: Approx. $250
Victorian waistcoat from FanPlusFriend: Approx. $50



Pocket watch from Diva: $30




Black satin cravat from FanPlusFriend: $10



Sonic screwdriver: Priceless