Blogger love, actually

On Friday I had the distinct pleasure and joy of meeting up with roughly 20 of my closest blogger friends at The Drunken Monkey in Shoreditch. I know it may sound a little strange to have blogger friends to some people, but I believe we have to accept that in this day and age the online world is fast becoming the key place to connect with others. Twitter in particular has introduced me to so many wonderful people that I am extremely proud to now call my friends, and I hope it continues to.

Dim sum was nommed, cocktails were drunk and good chats were in abundance. In short, it was an awesomely fun night. Here's the proof:

My one true love, Natasha Bailie, and I


The lovely Katie of London Plinth, Fiona of Save Our Shoes and Natasha


Alex of Alex Loves, Kate of The Fabric of my Life and Lira Leirner of The Portmanteau


Fiona and the beautiful brain behind Style East


The gorgeous Reena of Fashion Daydreams and I


Maria of mediacation, Mariana of Sketchbook Magazine, Kb of I Want You to Know and the dashing Nik of mediacation

It was geniunely a pleasure to spend the evening in the company of so many brilliant people, and I can't wait for the next opportunity to eat, drink and be merry with them all again. See you there?

In other news, the Motorola shoot went well! I've got behind-the-scenes photos, but I think it'll be better to wait for the final shots...tune in next week if you fancy a look!

Until next time...

Much love,

Frankie
Swell Vintage

Phone-a-face

Apologies for the quickie nature of this post. I hope you don't feel cheap or used at all.

I just wanted to say a HUGE "thank you" to everyone who voted for my face in the Motorola #hip2bsquare competition. Turns out I am one of the five lucky winners, and my photoshoot is taking place this very weekend - eeekk! Between you and I, because you're a good friend of mine, I'm absolutely terrified! I'm not a model by ANY stretch of the imagination, but I think the whole experience will be a lot of fun. Please cross your pretty fingers for me?! I'll need all the luck I can get!

Here's the sexy new Motorola phone that my face will soon be associated with:

Photo courtesy of Motorola

If you're nosey or bored on Saturday, you can see how the shoot is going by following me on Twitter (@swellvintage). While you're there, you should also follow the fabulous brains and stylists behind the whole shoot - Nik Thakkar (@nikthakkar), Matthew Zorpas (@prwonderland) and Alize Morand (@alizemorand).

In other news, I'm also very excited to be attending a brilliant blogger meet up on Friday, kindly organised by my dear friend Fiona of Save Our Shoes. I will be taking lots of pictures for your viewing pleasure. Hopefully I shall see you there, lovely ladies and gents!

Much love,

Frankie
Swell Vintage

x

Swell exhibitionist

Good news, everyone - the Swell Vintage window display is now up at the wonderful Oxfam in Dalston!

Drum roll, please...






That's the window view. And now for the details...let me break it down:

Trench coat - Christian Dior
Suit - Yves Saint Laurent
Tie - Zara
Shirt - Reiss
(All sourced from Oxfam Dalston)

Dress - Natasha Bailie Vintage
Necklace - Swell Vintage
Hat - Oxfam Dalston


Fur hat - Oxfam Dalston
Necklace - Swell Vintage
Dress - Retro Chick
Cape - Oxfam Dalston
Bracelet - Swell Vintage

Hat - Natasha Bailie Vintage
Dress - Vintage, donated by me!
Handbag - Oxfam Dalston
Beads - Oxfam Dalston

What do you think? I've never done a window display before, but it was a lot of fun and hard work in equal measures! I'd really like your feedback, so please let me know.

All I really know for sure is that I couldn't have done it without the help of my dear friend and blogger extraordinaire, Fiona of Save Our Shoes. Thank you so much, Fiona. You are my ROCK. I'd also like to thank the amazing people of Oxfam Dalston, especially Kevin and Steve, for letting me into their window and for being so supportive! They work insanely hard for a brilliant cause, so you should probably follow them on Twitter.


So if you happen to be in the area and you like what you see, why not pop into Oxfam in Dalston from Monday 5th July and see if you can bag a bargain? I'll fight you for the Dior!

Much love,

Frankie
Swell Vintage

x

Jewellery loving

As a "jewellery maker", it's always nice to observe the work of other people who are far more talented than myself! Earlier this week I was lucky enough to attend an event at EC One, a gorgeous jewellery boutique on Exmouth Market, to celebrate the fine work of Nicholas King and Fiona Paxton.


Apologies for my terrible photos! In my defence, I don't think I could capture the true beauty of their pieces on film anyway...and yes, I'm a terrible suck up. Both Nicholas King and Fiona Paxton have such bold styles, but each brings a totally different flavour to their work.

King's chunky cuffs have been published all over the place, and it's easy to see why! This Diamante Knot Cuff is absolutely huge, and is totally worth the extra weight.

Image courtesy of ECOne.co.uk

My dear friend Fiona of Save Our Shoes even treated herself to these rave-tastic bangles. The lovely lady from EC One assured us they also glow under black light - what more could you want for your wrists?


Fiona Paxton's jewellery evoke a strong glamazon-warrior feel that would make any outfit a show-stopper. Needless to say I was ever so jealous of Dolly, the shop's mannequin for getting to wear one!


Not only was the jewellery gorgeous, but I also had the pleasure to meet long-time Twitter buddy Alex of Alex Loves in the three-dimensional flesh! Meeting Twitter friends can be somewhat daunting at times, but Alex is just as charming and lovely in real life as she is online. If you haven't read her brilliant blog yet, I highly recommend that you do. You will fall in love with the things she loves!

The lovely Alex

In other news, my dear friends at Motorola are currently running a fantastic competition to find the new face for their super cool new phone, the Motorola FLIPOUT™ with MOTOBLUR™ technology! The theme is "Hip to be Square", so if you think you've got the perfect geek-chic style to front their campain, head over to www.motorolasquare.com and upload your photo right now! The public will judge the hippest, squarest and best photographs, and the selected winners will become one of the faces of the very hip and square Motorola FLIPOUT. The photoshoot will be styled by some pretty amazing bloggers (names to be revealed soooon), so it should be a lot of fun.

That's all for now, folks! I have something VERY exciting to tell you soon, so watch this space.

Much love,

Frankie
Swell Vintage

x

Swell weekend

...and what a weekend it's been!

Yesterday Fiona of Save Our Shoes (my winner) and I went to London Fashion Weekend, courtesy of 3mobilebuzz, to take in some fashion and tweet with some other blogging ladies. If you were on Twitter yesterday, you were probably bombarded by our tweets throughout the day from our 3 mobile phones! I was given a HTC Hero, which took a little getting used to, but over all it's a very fancy phone. If you love a gadget, you'll love this phone.

(Fiona and I)

Fiona, Siobhan of 1000heads, Carrie of Wish Wish Wish, Katie of Unicorn Katie and Michelle of 1000heads.

Natasha of Natasha Bailie and Lindsey of Be Gorgeous

Armed with our special 3 mobile phones, we were ready to take on the day! The first thing we did when we all arrived was head straight to Luella:

I literally couldn't believe my eyes when we got in there - so many beautiful things for ridiculously low sale prices! It is incredibly sad that Luella is no more, so we decided to do our bit for this worthy cause...

(Part of) Carrie, Lindsey, Sarah from 3mobile, Fiona, Michelle and I

I'm head-over-heels in love with my new bag, and Fiona also managed to score a bargain


Natasha Bailie (who owns an awesome vintage shop, by the way) bought the most amazing vintage Christian Dior sunglasses!



After a bit of mooching around some incredible stands, we headed into the tent to watch some catwalk action.


I can't even express in words how much fun this (well, the whole day actually) was. All of these girls are absolutely amazing, and without gushing too much, I'm basically in love with all of them. The catwalk show was brilliant, but I have no doubt that it wouldn't have been as great if these ladies weren't with me.

Here are a couple of my favourite catwalk looks:

(It's Mecia, winner of Britain's Next Top Model!)

I really enjoyed Betty Jackson's pieces (bum ruffles are NOT just for children, FYI...) and all of the romance and floatiness that poured from the catwalk. Dreamy.

Basically I had the best Saturday ever! I got to spend the day looking at beautiful fashion with the loveliest people - what more could a girl want?! I want to say a huge giant THANK YOU to the lovely ladies at 1000heads and 3mobilebuzz for making our day so fantastic, and to all of my new gorgeous blogging friends - same time next year, ladies??

I think I'm rambled on and gushed quite enough for one day! Next week I'll be posting some photos of new designs (promise).

Much love,

Frankie
Swell Vintage

x

Swell winning

...and the winner of the 3mobilebuzz competition is...

FIONA OF SAVE OUR SHOES!!!

I had such a hard time picking a winner, so in the end I had to use an online random name picker! A HUGE thank you to everyone who entered - the photos were all genius and amazing. The theme was 'the best things in life are free'. Three of my favourites include...

Receiving parcels makes life sweet and amazing by Artichoke Zine

Emails that make you smile by Sarah Drinkwater

Fun things you find in a skip by Lauren Cooke

Fiona and I will be tweeting from London Fashion Weekend this very Saturday, so keep your eye on Twitter if you fancy hearing about our day. We've been given a HTC Hero to tweet from. Needless to say, I'm terrified that I'm going to break it.

In other news, LoveMyDress.net have featured a lovely piece about Swell Vintage. It's such a gorgeous website, and they said some very kind words! If you fancy reading it, head on over there.

That's all for now, folks. See you Saturday!

Much love,

Frankie
Swell Vintage

x