Until Then...

CONC will be taking a break until February 2010.



Please join us then.

Audiere Bullies

What are your thoughts on minaudieres? You know, the hard jewelled clutches. The ones that Judith Leiber makes.

Like this:



I think they are utterly hideous. Particularly because it is an incredibly expensive way to appear kooky. Whereas I think they just make you look as though you have more money than sense and absolutely no taste:



A case in point.

Or here:



Honestly, Marc Anthony's face says it all. Hid. E. Ous. No?

And yet, and yet... While scanning about vaguely for a cute clutch I found this from Reiss.



And I adore it. It is so delightfully useless.

Or there is a slightly more reasonably priced one from Accessorize (which is obviously not as nice).



Would you avoid me at a party if I had one of these in my paw?

Guiness Is Good For You

Via Style.com

Is she wearing those bonkers contact lenses again in your picture?  Is she taking style tips from that dude from the Prodigy now or what?

I want the armour loving ice queen back, please!

Via Style.com

Fools Rush in Where Angels Fear to Tread

(Image via Haneli.com)

Geez! Now Daphers is in on the act. This collection is clearly the go to for all those fearless fashionistas out there.

Can you imagine going to a party and finding someone dressed like that? I think I would choke on a god-damned canapé. She looks A-LARM-ING.

So Bad It's Good

Well, I think you should go as a villain, because that is always going to be more fun. And if you are really down on being the designated sexy cat for the evening (even though I think you might well be delicious at it) then my first choice of a bad girl would have to be Faye Dunaway as Bonnie Parker.

Just One Coat

Via Olsen Anonymous

How ruuuuude of me!  I didn't respond to your leopard coat post.  I did mentally.  As I read it I was like, 'Aha, yeah I reckon it's a go-er.  Ooh yes, that one is nice akshully' etc etc but I saw this picture and I realised that I hadn't passed that thought process on via the gift of the C.O.N.C.  So yes!  I think you would look great in one!  Do it!

I love a leopard coat.  I try them on all the time but they don't look right.  I think it's because of my hair and the full-eye-at-all-times approach I take to life.  You see, you posted Ashley looking lovely in that coat and now MK has nabbed it, (which Ashley looks a bit pised about if I'm not wrong?) and she's not working it quite so well is she?  I think it's because she also appears to have borrowed one of Shaun Ryder's hats for the occasion.

Hey ho, either way it just goes to prove that they work for some and not for others.  Even if you are like, almost the same person.  Hmmm.  I'm going to move on, but yeah get one, cute!

One more thing: I very much like Ashely's jewelled slippers.  Sinderella eat your heart out.

Cat Got Your Tongue?

 (Via Sodahead.com)

I almost forgot, our Christmas Party is fancy dress and we've just got the theme. Heroes and Villains. Any ideas for a low budget outfit gratefully received.

There's always that jumpsuit I had for the wedding, but then I'll be the obligatory sexy cat won't I? Groan.

I'll be the covered up original version though not one of your Halles or your Michelles. But...oh...GOD! I can't do it. I just can't. Please help.

(Isn't Julie Newmar the best of all the Catwomen? I mean, SERIOUSLY! And she even has time to accessorize before leaving the house to do her dastardly deeds.  Aces!)

Trail Blazer

(Via Marie Claire*)

NO! You're still waiting for that? That's just too much! Yowza.

Yes! Get that bad boy out again. I love that dress! And yes to the boot, how I love that boot. Bravo bravo, j'adore!

Now I know what you mean about the boyfriend. Here is Billie Piper wearing a successful one and looking marvelous. (Talking of Billie, have you seen that Belle du Jour reveeeealed herself this week? The papers are full of it! Does anyone even care? Larks! Leave it people. Katie Price is back in the jungle, THAT'S where our attention needs to be focused! I don't have time for ex high end call girl authors right now. I'm busy trying to work out of it's the cheek fillers, the lips or the eyebrows that are the problem.)

All too often a boyfriend can go wrong though. I mean....such is life, you know? I am a fan of pincering at the back to nip in a bit, but as you HAVE an actual waist I'm not sure that you would really need to do that. I think keep looking. But if you don't find anything will it matter? I know that you'll be lovely and warm from doing the running man on the dance floor after your first sniff of shandy...no?

* I love this bag. It makes me feel sick akshully. I'm sure my life would be better, my hair more bouncy and full of volume and my skin more dewy if I were able to run around town with this slung over my shoulder. It's a 'price on application' Cavalli. Sob!

My Morning Jacket

Well, you know the thing with the sequin skirt, yeah? And how you told me I must buy it, yeah? You know, the one from La Redoute, yeah? This one?

Yeah?

Well, it was a fiasco. What with the irrepressible influence of Grazia and La Redoute's unpreparedness the skirt that I ordered a few weeks ago has not even been dispatched yet.

And of course in the meantime I have gone off the idea of it somewhat.

So I need a plan B for the old fiesta del crimble.

And in these times of crunch I thought, what the Dickens! Why not wear something I already own. Yes! Quaint, I know.

And if there is one item of clothing in my groaning wardrobe that cries out for another outing it is my silk one shouldered leopard print Studio 54 dancing dress.



Remember?

I thought I could rock it out with these:



And some sort of blazer.

Such as this one:



Or this one:


(Images via Whistles)

But you know boyfriend blazers? Yeah? Do you know why they are called boyfriend blazers? Because they don't know how to deal with curves. Not that I'm suggesting that boyfriends don't (although I have encountered some who don't but their experience as boyfriends was probably fairly limited), but clothes made for boyfriends certainly don't. Sorry, am I rambling...? Basically I tried one on recently and it was terribly shapeless, which if you also have no shape probably hangs delightfully, but for me it looked, from behind, rather like two energetic puppies wriggling about in a black sack.

So I am not entirely sure, but I think a fitted or short jacket would be all wrong. Can you shed any light on my quandary? Too kind!

Romancing The Stone

I have and I L O V E  I T.  The woman is a bloody genius, I tell you!

And she looks so...PRETTY!

(Via GagaDaily.com)

I mean I wouldn't like to be a house guest of whoever thought up the premise for the video but that's beside the point.

Labour of Love

Have you seen the Lady GaGa Bad Romance video yet? Needless to say it is awesome. Plus she is wearing the Alexander McQueen antediluvian sea monster shoes in it.

What's not to love?

Coo Coo Ka Choo

I was in Hennes yesterday (buying a tuxedo babygro for the nephew, obviously) and saw the Jimmy Choo stuff. I can't say I was that impressed.

The whole thing was summed up by a girl in front of me who was chastising her friend by saying "I don't know why you would want to spend so much money on something so gross." I couldn't agree more.

If loving Chloe is wrong... I don't wanna be right!

(Images via Go Fug Yourself)

Origa, Me?

(Image via Daily Mail)

I think she wore that to try and hide the fact that she was reading her speech off some concertina'd paper.

I don't like it at ALL.

Hot Spot

(Image via Go Fug Yourself)

Doesn't Ashley look the very most in her coat?


(Image via Oasis)

Do you think I could carry off a leopard print coat? If I accessorised it with lots of black cat's eye liner, leather gloves and a touch of class?

A La Mode

(Image via Go Fug Yourself)


Rihanna looks like an edgy baked Alaska.

Antediluvian Sea Monster

In the context of the catwalk I don't hate these boots so much.





Partly because I think this collection is so weird and beautiful.







And partly because I am utterly in love with the lovely Sarah Mower from Style.com's description of it:

Then the models came out, dressed in short, reptile-patterned, digitally printed dresses, their gangly legs sunk in grotesque shoes that looked like the armored heads of a fantastical breed of antediluvian sea monster. McQueen, according to an internal logic detailed in a press release, was casting an apocalyptic forecast of the future ecological meltdown of the world: Humankind is made up of creatures that evolved from the sea, and we may be heading back to an underwater future as the ice cap dissolves.




(Images via Style.com)

Motley Kruger

(Image via Handbag.com)

I think this dress is dreamy. I wonder if she is blessed with a very perky bosom or if there are some kind of reinforcements under there. Beautiful colour, print and shape.

Miss Kruger really has entered her own sphere of fabulousness this year, wouldn't you agree? Congratulations, say I!

Boot Camp

(Image via Pied a Terre)

Since seeing that picture of Julianne Moore looking splendid in a pair of ankle boots I have become obsessed with finding a similar pair. But apparently wanting is not enough, the damn things have to already exist and you have to hunt them down.

This is easier said than done. A flat ankle boot that is fitted at the ankle and comes up a reasonable distance is a rare beast. The slouchy ankle boot? The flat shoe boot? The heeled fitted ankle boot? All frightfully common, I'm afraid. But the thing I want? Non-existant, supposedly.

This is as close as I have come to what I want, but I am not entirely convinced. Does it look too much like something a spivvy boy might wear? Is it too shiny? Have I used up my quota of questions? Are you bored with me yet? Yes? Oh.

Ugliest Items of 2009

(Image via Vogue.co.uk)

Holy mackerel! I love Alexander McQueen, but there are limits. These shoes are the most heinous, barbaric injustice in the cause of fashion that I have ever had the grave misfortune to cast my eyes upon.

How Unforgivably Rude

Darflinf, fi fant fafologif fenouf... pleugh! Sorry, excuse me while I take my foot out of my mouth.

I cannot apologise enough dearest heart.It was an utter, utter attack of amnesia. And now that you remind me of course I recall your delicious waistcoats and how much you rocked them. Can I retract? Will you ever speak to me again...?

Belt Up!

(Image via Figleaves)

I love a suspender belt and stockings. I think they are incredibly feminine and old fashioned and somehow prim while also being awfully sexy. There is something so unspeakably delightful about a flash of soft milky flesh exposed in that way. And thighs really are secretly one of the sexiest parts of a woman's body, in my mind. Much more subtle than a flaunted, jutting bosom. The thought that hidden beneath a demure little dress is something naughty and slightly titillating is enough to make most people blush, I'm sure. However, the key word is hidden.

The whole effect is rather ruined and laboured when it's all on show like that. So, ladies, please put it away, won't you?



On another note did you ever see those pictures of Maggie Gyllenhaal for Agent Provocateur? Yowza! She looks amazing!

Derring-Do

(Image via benfogle.com)

I love Ben Fogle too! In fact I adore him! He is the proof that sincere niceness doesn't always go in hand with dullness, and that makes me happy.

Although having spent some time on his lovely website I am also terribly, terribly jealous. Man, he has done some stuff! You know? He has been some places and seen some things.

But if I carry on at the rate that I am currently going then I might just catch him up in ten to twenty years... I'll certainly give it a damn good go. Maybe I should try and get on tv too, to fund my adventures. I'm charming, right? Right?!

Anyway, this is really just an excuse to post another picture of the delightful boy on a rocky outcrop. And to say I honestly couldn't be more flattered to be put (even in the vaguest way) in the same group as Mr. Fogle, as people who, like, do stuff!

So in honour of that I will shamelessly, if not brazenly, buy some Oakleys and wear them with pride. So there!

Burning The Midnight Oil

(Image via Mahalo Fashion)

Look! It's Erin Wasson! Poster girl for ladies who don't fancy brushing their hair and like leather and very thin t-shirts tucked haphazardly in to denim etc.

She looks like as sort of oil slicked mermaid doesn't she? And when I say that I mean it in a good way.