Retro Fashion is Back!

These days, the fashion magazines seem to be filled with pages of retro fashion. The pictures featured in Louis Vuitton and Chloe all bring to mind the clothes I remember seeing my mom wearing when I was growing up. Especially nostalgic are the bow-tie blouses, like these:

Bow-tie blouse from ASOS

Bow-Tie Top fm Mango

Printed Bow-Tie Top fm Mango

I also recall my mom wearing tops like this ...

Cropped Cap-Sleeve Top fm ASOS

3/4 Sleeve Blouson Top fm Mango

All of which she normally teamed with full circular skirts similar to these (except I remember she liked them in florals ... and longer ... around a midish length .. much like the skirts or dress skirts in the Louis Vuitton ads seen recently) ...

Camel Full Skirt by Mango

Printed Full Skirt by Mango

And just the other day when we were talking about how fashion during my mom's time was coming back in vogue, my mom told me about her precious pleated skirts when she was in her early 20s. Apparently, she'd scrimped and saved to buy one of the pleated skirts that was the height of fashion then. Back then, the skirts were sold according to the size of the pleats! Eg. 1cm pleats, or 2cm pleats, or 3 cm pleats! Fascinating!

And here's the clincher (at least for me!): They were all packed in long boxes, with the skirt beautifully and immaculately folded along the pleat lines! Oh wow! Can you imagine receiving a skirt nowadays in a box?! Much less folded along the pleats?! Sometimes, I think that certain things were really done much better in the ol' days...

Sadly, my mom had given all her skirts away, but I'm guessing the skirts looked somewhat like this ...

(except prob minus the silver and definitely looking more vintagey ...)

Pleated Skirt fm Modcloth

Pics of the Survivors (IF they flower!)

In case you were wondering, here are some pics of what the plants I'm growing will look like if I manage to keep them alive and healthy!

Cosmos Bipinnatus

Viola

Marigold

Mealy Sage

The Fittest Survivors ... So Far ...

I just snapped these pics today ... the seedlings are now about one month old ...

Here's the Black Cherry Tomato plant ...

The Marigold and Viola (they are the tiny ones emerging ... these seem pretty delicate and hard to grow) ...

Cosmos Bipinnatus ... looks really like a scraggly garden of bean sprouts now ...

A close-up of the Cosmos Bipinnatus ...

Another pot of Marigold ...

These Mealy Sage took a pretty long time to appear, and their growth seems very slow ... I was beginning to despair that they'd not even take seed!

Survival of the Fittest ...

Ok .... so anyone who knows me knows I'm completely lost when it comes to plants. All plants that arrive in my apartment with their lush green foliage soon turn brown or go bald under my care. So, it was indeed lofty aspirations that possessed me to attempt growing tomato plants from seeds. I had salvaged the seeds from some black cherry tomatoes that my aunt in London gave me to try ... and once I munched on one, I was sold! Black cherry tomatoes taste like balsamic vinegar - with their vinegar sweetness!

This was my cherry tomato plant a few weeks ago ... I'll post some more recent pics later ....

Given that I'd not had any hopes of any tomato seeds taking root, when I saw the little seedlings appear, I was absolutely thrilled! And that motivated me to finally take out the seeds for "cosmos bipinnatus" which a friend had given to me last Christmas (yes ... it took me a whole year to get round to planting them), and look what happened in less than a week after sowing the seeds ...

I took all the above growth as encouragement to sow more seeds, so during the Floral Expo in Taipei (to which we had managed to get a special invitation to preview), I bought some seeds for Marigold ...

Some more marigold and viola. which at this point - a couple of weeks ago - had not grown much ...

I also planted some Mealy sage as I have always admired the beautiful purplish hues of the flowers ... but these took the longest to grow...

French Labels

Given that not all of us can afford the major international fashion labels on Rue du Faubourg St Honore, I thought I'd list some more affordable names that the Parisian women seem to love ... these have well-made and well-designed clothes that carry a good mix of classic and trendy without going over-the-top. While the prices aren't exactly cheap, neither are they sky high. They reflect the price I'd pay for a special more unique garment.

1) Sandro

While at the La Vallee Outlet Mall in Paris, I was sorely tempted to get a simple yet beautifully cut dress, but passed as I had shopped too much already.

2) Maje

3) Comptoir des Cotonniers

4) Kookai

5) Gerard Darel

The bags look very popular especially the "24 Heures" one, but I personally preferred the Moon Bag (below), which somewhat resembles the Hermes Massai bag ...

6) Lancel

(Pic taken from here.)