Kingdom Of Style

She's leaving on a jet plane...

Dear LLG is flying back to Manhattan on Tuesday.
Have a safe trip and lots of new adventures when you land.

With much love from the Palace.

Queen Marie and Queen Michelle
xx

Swing high, swing low...

Sorry for the slow start today! I woke up earlier with a splitting sore head, or to be more precise as Withnail would say " a b****rd behind the eyes" so I went back to bed for another snooze...

Even though we are in the depths of winter, my thoughts are turning to the garden...
I had never thought about a swing in the garden but when you see this English oak one by Marnie Moyle, you could imagine any garden being transformed into a 'secret garden'. It instantly makes you think of dozy warm summer days where you could swing and daydream all day long...

But no matter how romantic the image, I wouldn't cough up £295 for it!

I would however happily fork out £149 for these mushrooms by Ben May...

They would tranform any space into a fairy haven.
Everything is available here

Queen Marie

The Sound of Ice...

The hills are alive with the sound...
of poor Philip Scofields wardrobe department pissing themselves laughing!
"He'll never know! let's get him dressed up like Captain Von Trapp in the Sound of Music"

Bless!

Queen Marie

Charmed by 'the charme'

Ahhhh *longing sigh*

There is a new chair in my heart.
Although I think is more of a crush rather than an enduring love...

This the 'charme' chair by Studio Archirivolto

It is that combination of old and new that I love so much. It has an aluminium frame with a leather seat. Of course, looks this good don't come cheap. It is £495 and you can find it here

Queen Marie

boop-boop-a-doo...

Every saturday when I was a small we would go to my wee grans. While the grown ups talked, I would do what I always did, take out the button and bead box and sit behind the couch. That way i could hear what was going on ( yes! I have always been a nosey cow) and play with the 'jewels'. The box was crammed full of buttons too pretty to sew onto anything and broken beads, but I loved it so much.
When I saw the handmade buttons from the lovely people at my vintage charms it took me right back...
Vintage 50's glass buttons on specially designed and printed presentation cards, these are little pieces of heaven. Queen Michelle would of course do the sensible thing, she would buy some of the treasures and use them to transform some jacket or vintage find. Me, being much less practical am just going to keep them somewhere special and look at them.

Lets start with some flapper girls, boop-boop-a-doo...

(boop buttons £4.50 for 6)

Hey dollface! it's buttonushka...

(buttonushka £5 for 6)

Look out Wendy B!, it's bow buttons...

What will you do with yours?

Queen Marie x

Direct debit denouement...

Thank you everyone for all your advice the other week.
Armed with my BAC's information (thank you General Ape x), I headed for the bank to get them to take up the cause (thank you Andrea x)
The reason I hadn't cancelled with the bank before, was both Sky and Tiscali said the debit had to remain open for them to credit me with the money!
The bank were really helpful and said that what they had told me was utter bollocks. They are dealing with it all now and said I should get a refund in about 21 days. Hooray! Being an old hag, I will use the money to pay my dentists bill. Oh joy...

Queen Marie
x

Nine Are Mine!

Hurrah! the Nine West shoes finally arrived!

They are fabulous indeed. They are also slightly too big. I just saw that they have made an appearance in the shoes and bag supplement of UK Elle, which suggests they may very well be stocked here at some point soon. I can either wait and see if I can get them when I'm in London, or I can get busy with some thick white elastic and fashion a strap to keep them from slipping off. Either way, I'm having me these shoes!

Thank you to Princess Shirley for getting these to me.

Queen Michelle

The Paisley Effect

Mmmm well, my first of the two pairs of Celeste Stein tights I ordered got worn today...and I have to say Glasgow just ain't ready for Paisley pattern.

I do have a strange weakness for paisley pattern and I always have. I suppose on some level I just can't shake my (much hidden!) inner hippy. Anyway, the tights received many a confused stare. No outright laughs which was good, but there was a definite sense of "what the hell is that on her legs?". I personally don't see them as being even in the slightest bit outlandish, so I'm not sure what the fuss was about. But there was a fuss.

The other pair, I ordered directly from Celeste Stein, so they are yet to arrive. I actually chose a rather gaudy, granny-like, floral pattern.

Now, I ain't a floral kinda gal. At all. But I reckon I could be missing out on something by dismissing florals entirely, especially since it's inevitable the shops will be filled with flora and fauna come spring. So, by way of baby steps, I am dipping my toe (literally) into fanciful flowers.

I have another reason for being so drawn to this particular print however. When I was little I used to collect scraps. Not sure how many of you will be familiar with scraps, but essentially scraps were invented in the 1800's and people used them to decorate letters, diaries, cakes and so forth. They were die cut images which were later embossed, some even having glitter on them. As a scrap collector you basically had a bunch of scraps which you would keep inside the leafs of books and the idea was to swap them with your friends.

Queen Marie still has some of hers from when she was kid. Mine are tragically long gone, but I still remember how I used to love flicking through my book of scraps. My favourites were the images of cherubs, the glittery ones and the huge ones with roses on, particularly white and yellow roses. They were so ornate and beautiful that I could never part with them. The floral tights reminded of the scraps I adored as a kid.

I fully intend on wearing pretty pale colours, like the colours on the cherubs, to compliment my floral tights. And hopefully every time I look down at my legs I'll be reminded of my childhood spent swapping scraps with my friends.

Queen Michelle

Scraps can be found on eBay by sellers like Liz and Darcy as well as others if you search for vintage scraps.

From Lust To Must-Have...

...in one easy step - a trip to London.

Last year I really wanted a 50's style military hat as worn by US GI's in the 50's, like Elvis here and (possibly) Anouck (image found on The Fashion Spot).

I saw one in Urban Outfitters but it was over £40 and I convinced myself that it would not be money well spent since, as a hat, it served no purpose in cold, blowy Glasgow, therefore I didn't buy it. I couldn't even justify it as a 'going out' hat since I don't go to any suitable places to just sit and look all groovy in my hat.

But of course, as is usually the case with me, it has now spiraled into something akin to raging obsession. I visualise all my outfits as being alright...but with that hat would be perfect. I sit and ponder how I could keep it on when the wind is nearing 70mph and blowing over trees. But, I still refrain. Applauding my own self control. OK, not really. It's actually because the Urban Outfitters hat is long gone and no vintage shops have thrown one up so far.

Then a while back I saw this girl on Facehunter looking fabulous in the same kind of hat!

Oh dear. However, things have taken a turn for the better because as of Saturday 9th Feb, I am taking a little trip to the glorious London! The weather will be infinitely better and I will be able to wear my, yet to be bought, military hat with glowing happiness! No 70mph wind to whip it off my head there. But of course this sparks a whole other issue - how the hell do I get my hands on one before then? Answers on a postcard...

Queen Michelle

Enchanted By Grisgris Cheris

I don't speak French, or any language other than Scottish, but this is a case of a picture speaking more than a thousand words. Well, picture postcards actually.

These absolutely delightful pendants depicting vintage images from old postcards are so joyful! The site itself is beautifully designed to compliment the jewellery.

I can't tell you anything about who designs them, so lots of images instead. But in this case that really isn't a bad thing since these are sure to make you smile.

And my personal favourite - the first ever girl DJ?!

I think I'll wear a pink dress next time I DJ!!

Queen Michelle