After much deliberation we have a winner of the Golden Ticket to come to The Stylist Says Workshop at Melbourne Spring Fashion Week with me.

Brand New Armour for this comment:

Dear SKM,
I’d love to come, mainly because I want to justify all of the hours spent looking up wonderful vintage blogs at work, and to revamp the daily outfits I wear to try and brighten up all of the dreary days as a glorified secretary!
I’d like to think that an afternoon spent in the presence of the ‘Oscar Wilde of our time’ (dapper, alluring, witty and damned charismatic), would be a present not just for me, but for our whole work place, as dressing well surely rubs off on those around us!
Thanks too for your great blog, which has sparked many a vintage-secretary inspired fashion moment.

Congratulations and let the dress ups begin!

*P.S: I am currently flat out preparing all sorts of Fashion Week treats and events, so bare with me on the slow posting. Fun in store!*

Keeping with the theme of Relaxation August, I’ve been trying to spend more time at home kicking back and taking it easy.  This is no easy task for me as I’m not particularly good at just chilling out, I always feel like I should be doing something more productive.

Today’s outfit is for those days when you just want to be super comfortable, hang out and possibly nap on the couch.  This is my tracksuit alternative.

Outfit Details

Pink Leopard Print Cardigan – Tempt

Navy & Pink Polka dot Scarf – The Tie Shop

Jeans with Vintage Button Closures – Designed and Made by Me

Black & White Spectators – Kumfs

Star Earrings – SIXX

Lipstick – Amethyst in Colour Rich by AVON

BIG NEWS!

Yep, that big! This time next week, Melbourne Spring Fashion Week will be getting it’s first dose of serious vintage glamour!  As part of the lunch time series at City Square, I’ve been asked to present a couple of workshops on The Vintage Glamour Look.

It is going to be some fun in the afternoon, that’s for sure. We’ve made this a free event so as many of you as are able to come can – all inclusive! Bring your mother, bring your daughter, bring your friends and even bring your man. There’ll be tips, tricks, models and beautiful clothes. You can find out more about the MSFW lunch series here.  I’ll be presenting as part of the Slumber in the City and Beauty and the Beach theme days, so just click on through to find all the details and see what else is on stage that day.

Remember, I’ll also be appearing as a special guest for Celebrity Stylist Philip Boon at The Stylist Says Workshop on Saturday 4th September. You can book tickets for that one here or you have one more day to leave me a comment on this post to WIN one!

So bring out your vintage best this MSFW and work the week in style!

It is that time of year again. The weather is still miserable, the wind still bites, but I’ll be darned if I’ll give in to it. I’m already yearning for the sun on my (sunscreen protected) skin and a scotch in hand, while the days get longer and the parties start to arrive. This is the same time of year I get restless with my wardrobe and start to listen to that little internal voice of inspiration that tells me what I want to be wearing in the coming months.  This time I’ve come over far more casual than I usually do and that can only be a good thing as I need a little more ‘relax’ in my current wardrobe.

Of course, because I always seem to be so far ahead of the curve, it isn’t likely you’ll see looks like this in store for a while yet, but when you do, you’ll know where it came from!

This time, for something different, I’m giving you more of a window to my world and adding the music I’m listening to as well! Just click to listen, and as usual, just click each image to see the details of the what and where’s of each outfit.

These Boots Were Made For Dancing

This isn’t your usual nightclub attire, but then it isn’t for your usual nightclub girl. It is for springtime evenings, house parties, kicking up your heels with friends, closing your eyes and jamming in your mind.

I’m currently dancing to Ezra Lee - Mean What I Say – Ezra Lee From his album “Can’t Stop a Freight Train” available on Prestone Records. I highly recommend you check out Ezra’s Myspace and get yourself a copy of this album!!

.

Cocktails at the Saloon Bar

Tell me any eligible eye candy could miss you in this number! Loads of swank, licks of sexy and lots of lucky! Stretch those pins and start smouldering.

Propping up the bar in style to Reconsider Baby – Lowell Fulson.

.

Fancy a Drink Cowboy?

I never thought a cowboy hat and I would ever see eye to eye, but after my photo shoot with Helen McLean I may just be having a little secret love affair. This is how you do Country style with an eye for City Chic. There’s nothing dusty about this!

Tipping my hat to That’s Alright Mama

.

Country Princess

The perfect Day to Night party transition outfit. Just change up the top, swap your flower for a bejewelled bow, crimson lips and you’re good to go. You’ll already know that denim is huge for this season, and while double denim remains on the no go list for me, this is about the only way I’ll work anything close to it into my look. With a beautiful satin and denim bra top with vintage style.  Yes, it could be a little racy, but paired with a sequined cardigan its all lady out the outside but the business underneath!

Kicking back to Jackson – by Johnny Cash & June Carter a personal favourite!

You just never know where you’ll find fashion inspiration that captures you’re mood of the moment, but one thing is for sure; whatever you wear make sure it captures YOUR mood, not just the prevailing trends.  This is where you’ll find the best answers to your wardrobe dilemmas!

*This post is sponsored by Nuffnang and Panasonic*

Sometimes my life is a little crazy; well actually it is a little crazy all the time! But the other week I was given a great opportunity to capture it all for you.

Thanks to Nuffnang and Panasonic, I was sent the brand spanking new Panasonic Lumix G2 12.1 mega pixel camera.  It is half way between a point and shoot and a DSLR.  I’ve had the old point and shoot camera here for quite some time and never find I can get the result I wanted, so I switched to a big DSLR. I haven’t had any spare time to really learn how to use this yet, and find I always have to mess around quite a bit. And while those shots are lovely, carrying around a whole camera bag full of equipment does rather cramp my style.  The sorts of events I get around to aren’t really the type of things where I want to be schelping around extra bags.  So I’ve been trying to figure out the perfect solution for something that would fit into my handbag, but still do a cracking job at capturing my moments no matter what the conditions.

When it comes to taking photos I may have an eye for composition, but I certainly don’t have any technical knowledge. In fact when someone asked me the other day what aperture speed I’d used to capture an image (after seeing it on the LCD camera screen), I blushed and said, “A good one?”. Yep, no technical knowledge whatsoever. I went home and told Mr.SKM this while he had a very good giggle at my expense.

Funnily enough, while we were watching TV the other night, a commercial came on with a guy showing an exhibition of his photography, being asked similar questions and giving similar answers to mine.  Mr.SKM and I were both laughing going, “hey that’s you!” The extra funny bit was when at the end of the commercial, we saw it was for the Panasonic Lumix G2 – the exact camera they had just sent me to assist my novice ways! This is the ad here.

Okay, so this new camera arrives looking like a baby SLR, all black, fancy and miniaturised. Of course the first thing I did was to experiment with which handbag was the best fit for it before even taking a shot.  But I’m not going to bore you with technical details I don’t understand, instead I’m going to take you with me on my weekend and show you how the Panasonic Lumix G2 captured it along the way.

*(None of these photos have been altered in any way – they are RAW, straight from the camera)*

On Thursday I had a bunch of errands to run including a little ‘research’ at Chapel Street Bazzar.  The chaps there were kind enough to let me photograph some of my favourite things as I went along. I hadn’t had the time to experiment much with the camera, so this was a great opportunity to check out how it would handle close ups, things behind glass and to mess around with all the auto artistic photo settings.

Then it was on to a quick cup of tea with Violet Le Beaux before dress fittings for Friday night’s big event.

Come Friday it was time to hit the town for Miss Burlesque Australia. I was privileged to be a part of the judging panel for the Victorian heat, watching the girls get their spangles on.. and off… for the title. Given that it was held in a nightclub it was quite dark, so it was time to see if the Panasonic Lumix G2 could capture the ambience without any flash or me having to worry about ISO stuff. I just set it on auto and shot. Did I mention the camera has an articulated LCD touch screen? This fantastic feature meant I could angle the screen to make sure I could get my friends and myself into those arm length shots! I can just touch the screen to move the focus area and make sure it is all working, even while still in front of the lens.

Saturday morning I was up early for another big day, heading out for a radio interview first up. I had about two seconds to get an outfit shot before heading out the door, so I handed the camera to Mr SKM to snap my favourite new vintage dress.

Of course, I couldn’t photograph myself while I was on air, so again I passed the camera across to the studio assistant and asked her just to press the GO button. Easy peasy!

I raced off from the interview to the shops where I had to pick up food and a very special cake as Saturday was also Miss Three’s big birthday!  Time to capture some colour, action and festivities. Because the Panasonic Lumix G2 has Intelligent Auto Mode, which means automatic light, shutter speed, focus blah blah blah.. I only needed to worry about playing with Miss Three and not spending all the time playing with the camera settings. Oh and because it also captures HD movies I didn’t need to go and find my video camera as well. It was all there, at my fingertips, ready for those classic birthday moments.

After all that there was still Sunday to go. I’d been asked to come and perform in a friends Tableau Vivant gallery evening – A Doll House. Time to break out the super huge hair, massive lashes and work it as Dolly Varden! Again, I had little time to take photos and so the twisty LCD touch screen came in handy to snap away and get some shots of the wild hair and makeup creation.  I often find that taking photos indoor of an evening can create really harsh shadows and be difficult to light. So I wanted to see how the Panasonic Lumix G2 would handle these conditions under pressure. Once again, I set it to Intelligent Auto Mode and tis is what happened. Not bad hey?

The best thing about all this playing around is that I managed to get all these great pictures while on the run, without extra bags, without lots of messing around and with very little knowledge. (I have to admit I didn’t read the whole manual) So what this means is that I know I can get fantastic results with little effort, but that because the Panasonic Lumix G2 has so much of the functionality of a DSLR too, I can spend the time to play around and learn at my leisure.

So, how would you like one of these all for yourself? You would? Well, thanks to Nuffnang and Panasonic you have the chance to WIN one for yourself!

All you have to do is leave me a comment telling me how the Panasonic Lumix G2 would make you a better photographer! Make sure that your comment is linked to your blog, twitter, email or some other contact method.

Worth $1200.00 RRP this is one Fantastic prize!!

The Panasonic G2 retails for $1299 with a 14-42mm  (which is what I was using) or the Twin Lens Kit $1599 with both a 14-42mm & 45-200mm Zoom Lens.

The competition is open to Australian residents only, (sorry guys, I have something else great coming up for my international readers before the end of the month) and there is one camera to give away between the nine blogs hosting the contest.

All the T’s & C’s can be found here.