26. A walk with Henry Rousseau

SIA, Style Imitating Art has a lush painting this week as inspiration, Woman Walking in Exotic Forest by Henry Rousseau.

I wanted to bring in the lushness and exotic mood in with color. And as I don't wear such greens I took something else very exotic.

This background fabric has followed me for 20 years. It is hand embroidered on coarse blue linen. I bought it because it was calling my name very, very loudly. I could not afford it, nor had I any idea what to use it for. A couple of years it lived in my cupboard. I would fondle it from time to time, feel the fabric, delight in the rich embroidery and vivid color.

Then we found a wooden day bed on the sidewalk in Brooklyn, bought a foam mattress and used the fabric for cover. It wore all threadbare in the places where we would sit. It was our tv-couch, and we watched a lot of movies, a lot.

Then we moved again, and now this fabric serves as curtain between the hallway and living room. Threadbare spots mean there is some daylight filtering into the dark hallway. I still love that fabric, and I know I will use it in the next place, too, as it has become part of me.

But this post was about clothing...

I am wearing a printed linen skirt, a simple blue blouse with tie, a polished slab of apatite on a suede cord (by some Brooklyn-based artist) and pomegranate red shoes. I wanted to look exotic, and this skirt with it's exiting complementary contrast (see entry 25) is maybe the most adventurous thing I own, colorwise.

details:
skirt: H&M (2009)
blouse: Promod (2011)
pendant: bought in Brooklyn (2005)
bracelet: made-by-me (2011)
shoes: Vagabond (2008)

The bracelet is made by moi. I took an inner cardboard roll of an adhesive tape, the large kind, and knitted a tube around it. I have several bracelets in fun colors and different widths (scotch tape, packing tape, duck tape...)

linking with:
Style Imitating Art

21. Cherchez la femme

Oh SIA! What a wonderful inspiration this week, a flowery lady by Colette Calascione.



Such luscious florals are hard to come by (and they certainly don't live in my wardrobe), but will you look at this!

Last time I lived in Vienna I purchased a small painting from a wonderful Finnish artist. It has followed me all these years and withstood several moves between countries and continents.

I walked by a store front last week and thought something looked very familiar. And indeed it was. She has turned her art into fabrics and clothing. Fabrics are printed from her artwork and come in silk, rayon and cotton. One word: luscious!

Inside the store looks just as nice. Artwork and clothing everywhere. I won't bore you with interior shots, take a look at her web gallery if you're interested). Needless to say, there was a lot to see. I fell in love with this little number.

A caftan of sorts, made of silk. I already saw myself wearing it as a morning robe.

Hi SIA, here's my interpretation of the lovely Colette Calascione flower lady:

Hard to tell where the lady ends and the flowers start - just like in the original.

The story goes on. The caftan didn't come home with me, but got some printed cotton sateen instead. Which will become a jacket - you'll see.

In case you are in Vienna, why not pay a visit.

Linking with:
Visible Monday
Mix-it
Style Imitating Art

15. My Life as a Woodcut

I love the gentle nudge when it comes to my wardrobe choices.
Well, there are wardrobe choices - and then there are wardrobe choices. Have you ever tried taking your inspiration from a painting, its mood, its colors, its actual message?

Following an artwork takes clothing choices to another level. This week's SIA - Style Imitating Art - inspiration artwork was "Feeding Ducks" by Mary Cassatt.

There was a lot of inspiration: soft colors like blue, celadon, old rose, muddy peach; a feeling of serenity; Japanese woodcut style; faintly Victorian clothing; water, boat and ducks.

So how did I incorporate them in my outfit?
Long sleeves for Victorian, blue and white woodcut printed blouse, a blue skirt, a blue scarf with ducks, an Art Deco style silk scarf with muddy peachy tones and celadon, a duck brooch, and shoes like a boat.

Here ducky ducky ducky...

I put the blue duck scarf at my feet - this is water. I pretend to be feeding the ducks, see?

Other fun stuff I am wearing:

these insane shoes. I found these at the car boot sale. They are going to be refashioned into

shoes for my Medieval wardrobe, but for this little while I enjoyed them with a mundane outfit.

Also starring: a delicate fabric loop necklace. I love these soft mauves and greys and the flash of gold.
And the woodcut shirt again - crinkled tissue cotton, perfect for a hot day.

The outfit once more:

skirt: me-made 2013
blouse: Esprit 2008
scarf and duck pin: passing through my hands
belt: la Femme Mimi 2013
necklace: Lassy Fair 2013

So, in the beginning I wrote how I feel this challenge is beneficial to my wardrobe choices. I am ashamed to say, this combination that looks so "normal"would never have happened had it not been for the challenge.
One tends to keep within a certain comfort zone. For me, perhaps, the comfort zone is a skirt, tee and cardigan. Time to change that!

linking with:
Sunday Style
Visible Monday
Mix.it
Style Imitating Art

12. Dressing Up The Jeff Koonesque Way...

... if that even is a word. I love SIA for their challenges! It really gets your creative juices flowing when you have to dress in a way that would reflect a painting.
Here is this week's inspiration, a giant red and pink and flashy gold bow by Jeff Koons.

What is a girl to do whose favorite color is grey? Answer: she'll dig deep into her closet, she'll get creative and pair together items that were probably never meant to go ... that is the genious behind this challenge!

So, for color's sake, I paired together a silk dress that isn't even a dress but just two giant scarves sewn together, a pair of red gold earrings (very mod!), a red and pink ring

a clutch with golden accents,

and because the outfit already had a flapper feeling to it, I donned on a recently thrifted vintage pair of Clarks.

Want to see the outfit?

 I love it. Thank you SIA! This was fun.

dress: Zara (thrifted 2013)
shoes: Clarks (thrifted 2013)
clutch: Promod (2012)
earrings and necklace: Designer's Market Blickfang (Vienna 2012)

linking with:
Sunday Style
Visible Monday
Style Imitating Art

8. Austrian Pride

Style Imitating Art is a fun challenge, one that I always like to try.
This week there's a wonderfully bizarre picture, but the colors read very "normal" - tan, americana, polkadots. Instead of Americana, I chose Austrian (that's where I live)

It was a true challenge for me, because tan is not part of my wardrobe. But then I remembered a shirt that I had bought for dyeing - hooray.

In going with the bizarre theme of the week, I made equally bizarre choices. These shouldn't go together, but somehow they do. Austrian overload, be aware!

linen skirt, blue, by Mac Scott
knitted merino cardigan, red, made by myself

a long long overshirt with ties to hike the bottom up, tan, tags missing
Austrian dirndl-blouse (covers the breast, just), white, by Bösch
blue tights, by Hue
Austrian Edelweiss shoes, black, by Geier Wally

blue felt cutout necklace, by some wonderful young designers in Tallinn, Estonia. It can be worn as a belt, too.

linking with: Style Imitating Art
Visible Monday

2. Style and Art

For a while now I have been lurking around the blogs I have marked as my read. I have been especially charmed by a novel approach to dressing up - you may have guessed - Style Imitating Art.

This week's picture is a lovely mess of secondary and tertiary contrasts. Blue with yellow, blue with brown, but not any blue and any brown nor indeed any yellow. Pale, muted, dark or distressed, this color concept is spot on!
I love it.

The problem is that I do not own that many clothes and do not wear many colors. Yellow is a no-no for my complexion, so I was unable to complete the assignment.
However, this is what I came up with:

1. pale and muted blues and blue-greys, brown and a pale yellow doily in my hand.

2. Then I decided to try the look with more pale yellow. This shirt was thrifted and is just passing through my hands. A lovely cameo pattern with 70's exaggerated pointy collar and folded cuffs - sweet.

Not my thing, though. Can you tell? Or is it just me?

3. But here is what I actually wear and feel comfortable in: long-sleeve tissue tee topped with a wild caleidoscope floral tee, a smokey blue tights, granny shoes and my trusty grey-and-brown speckled skirt. I bought it in my first weeks in Vienna and have worn it all winter.
No yellow!! Does it still count?

tissue tee: Promod
printed tee and tights: H&M
necklace: blue silk cover wooden beads
skirt: Sandwich
shoes: Clarks (thrifted)

I am also linking up with
 Watch What I'm Wearing
Sunday Style
regards, juli
x x x