Vintage Fair!

Yesterday was Lou Lou's Vintage Fair in Oxford, which I went to with my friend Anjali. It took place in the Town Hall, and I wish I'd thought to take photos because Oxford Town Hall is seriously impressive. Like most old buildings in Oxford, it does not believe that there's such a thing as too many turrets, domes, and adornments. As we entered, we went up the enormous marble staircase, got our hands stamped, and went into the main hall, which is painted a fetching robin-egg blue and is huge. Thankfully, there was a space set aside for changing rooms so I didn't have to gamble with regards to the sizes of the clothes. Anjali and I got there fairly early, and when we left it was noticeably fuller than it had been earlier and it was much harder to move around. I definitely wouldn't have gone later in the day; it would have been an exercise in frustration.

Anyway, I took out £50 on my way to spend and managed to spend pretty much all of it (convenient!). Here's what I got; apologies for the poor-quality photos, but I left my camera lead at home (I'm at uni right now) so I could only take pictures with my phone.

Dress (£20)

I really thought this would be too small for me when I tried it on, but the waist is very elasticated so it actually fits OK. That being said, I'm not sure I'm going to wear this until I've lost a bit of weight. It also creates a keyhole effect over the chest because my boobs stretch it out, but I can fix that by saying on another button or something. I really like the subtle polka dot pattern, which you can see more clearly in the second photo. The cloth is very silky, so it makes for a nice texture.

Ring (£15)

First things first: my skin is not actually as corpse-white as it appears in this picture. I took these photos in not-so-great lighting when it had begun to get dark, hence why I hung my hand out of the window to take photos of the rings. My phone camera don't cope with weird lighting at the best of times, so the colours are a bit messed up. The centre stone in thus ring is significantly more orange in real life. I think you can still get a good idea of the design though. I really love this ring, even though it's more than I've ever paid for a single ring. (I buy rings at market stalls. What can I say?)

Ring (£3)

This and the necklace came from the same stall, and they're not actually vintage, just made by a company that also sells vintage clothing. They're pretty and cheap though. I love, love, love cameos, so I had to get this ring. Unfortunately it ends up at a bit of a weird angle on my ring fingers and is a little too tight for my middle and index fingers. It's adjustable, though, so I can play around with it and see how to wear it.

Necklace (£6)

Steampunk! There were bigger ones available but I liked the slightly more subtle look of this one. I mostly wear silver jewellery so it'll be interesting to see how this works with other things I have. I was going to buy a cameo necklace (see above; cameos are love) but the ones the stall sold seemed very light and insubstantial, compared not only to the other items of jewellery but also to the cameo necklace I was wearing myself at the time. So I got this one instead.

Scarves (£5)

 WHOO SCARVES! I don't think anyone who knows me in real life is following this blog, but if you were you would know that I love scarves. I am always happy to get more scarves. And I don't have many silk square ones although they're ten a penny at vintage stores, so I was very happy to acquire these ones. The top one is a fairly typical design; I was stuck between this and another one but in the end the nautical feel of this one triumphed. The bottom one is the one that stood out to me in the box - it has a really pretty colour scheme and design, and I can't wait to wear it. These were a bit more difficult to photograph without getting other crap in the shot, which is why you can see the edge of my carpet in both and part of my Latin notebook in the top one. Also, I had to turn the light on to photograph the bottom scarf, which I didn't want to do because the lights in this room are really, really yellow, which has come through a bit in the photo but you can still get a reasonable idea of the colours.

Anyway, having acquired cool things at the vintage fair, we went to the Queen's Lane Deli on the High and I got reacquainted with their chicken curry wrap, which is quite possibly my favourite wrap of all time, although it fell apart in my hands a lot and I ended up having to buy hand gel at Boots just to cleanse my hands from the sauce. Yeuch.