MAWI Dynamite SS10 {heart}

I love Mawi's costume jewellery. And I partly like these pieces because they are wicked awesome fierce, but also partly because they remind me of daleks.

I bought some less crazy looking but still awesome looking affordable pieces by Mawi for Asos, and now I can't wait for the post.

ASOS AFRICA!

I may be a bit slow on the uptake of this, but ASOS have released a new range under ASOS AFRICA, featuring some very on-trend pieces in bold tribal prints. Their pieces make me want to go back to Tanzania!





The material (which are usually sold as a piece called a khanga) is sourced and made in Africa (Kenya and Tanzania), and their tailors in Kenya are being paid fairly.

And they'd better be paid fairly considering that my favourite piece of the lot costs £75! While I was in Tanzania I had a tailor made traditional outfit made for me and cost me TSH 21000, which is the equivalent of £10.19. I'm wary that they haven't got the Fairtrade brand on it yet. If they really are being paid fairly, I would definitely recommend you to buy yourself a little piece of Africa :)

It's given me some inspriation though, since I was given a khanga as a gift and I haven't used it for anything yet. I could quite easily whip up something similar of my own now that I have a few ideas (with the help of my mum of course :p).

You can look at the ASOS AFRICA range here.


PS! Me getting fitted in a khanga shop!


And the resulting dress:

Transformer Dresses!

I was reading Shazberri's blog yesterday, and she went to see Hussein Chalayan's exhibition. I'm not usually one for stealing content, but when I saw the video on her blog of his SS07 collection (I'm really slow, I know)...I was bowled over backwards. This is epic on a new scale!

Sexy as hell dresses, that are ROBOTIC! I had never dreamed sexy and awesomeness could be innovated into such a combination.

What made me laugh the most though was when I Googled this further and found someone had posted it on some geeks'r'us website, titled" Transformer Dress Turns Into Naked Lady!, and the guy who posted, who was obviously very impressed by it, finishes it off by confirming his incompetence at winning over the opposite sex. Classic.

Noobtard commenting ensues, which I am ashamed to say, I actually found funny/agreed with. Damn you nerd in me.

But looking at the rest of his work.. I mean wow. His pieces are really beautiful. Some are quite ethereal and different. And so feminine. None of this androgynous business that I keep seeing everywhere else. Yes, androgyny has become very fashionable a la Agyness Deyn, but I do feel it is refreshing to see the beauty of a woman being celebrated by designing clothes that she actually looks beautiful in.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with having strong qualities of a man and a woman. Physically, emotionally, or otherwise. But having a woman dress up in very manly clothes.. The concept almost feels like she needs to outwardly conform to androgyny in hopes to draw out a stronger, manlier personality that she is incapable of summoning whilst in very feminine clothes. It's all a facade. It's unflattering to think we need to fill the shoes of men. I think it's a more powerful image when a woman can project the strength of a man, just by being a woman.