what i wore: leaves know they're ending, celebrate their end

ah, the fall! so beautiful, and quickly coming to an end. i must post these pictures before the snow starts to fall! i don't know about where you guys are, but almost all of our leaves have fallen now here in beautiful québec city. early october is always peak season in ontario and quebec, and i had the chance to enjoy the beautiful colours when visiting my family for thanksgiving/indigenous day of resistance weekend at the beginning of the month.






this is my younger sister's wonderful dog, aspen. she is potentially my favourite four-legged creature on the entire planet, not gonna lie. look at my big goofy smile! how can you not love this dog?


and how can you not love the beautiful fall leaves?




if you're interested in that kind of thing...
dress: 1950s cotton day dress, vintage clothing fair in ottawa circa 2007 i believe?
crinoline underskirt: thrifted
necklace: key from the ste. foy flea market, 2$, chain thrifted ages ago
belt: from le vestiaire, free
oxblood heels: gift from my mother, naturalizer
goofy smile: thanks to my awesome sisters and an adorable puppy.

so with that out of the way, we can talk about more interesting things.

the folk festival de québec is in full swing as of tuesday and i am filled with musical love and lust. anne-marie, simon and i went to see ferriswheel and timber timbre, which was so lovely. timber timbre's music is always so perfect around this time of year, and it's always a treat to hear it live. there are so many shows i'd love to have time to check out, but my time and my pocketbook unfortunately will not permit such things. i do think i'll have to go see lisa bozikovic, though.

this beautiful song, no denial, is about the death of her mother, and features some of the most beautiful lyrics.

brilliant gold, crimson red/ the leaves know they're ending/and celebrate their end

i don't think i've ever heard a more beautiful metaphor for death.

self-portraits: characters/decay

a bad habit of mine i've been trying to change is actually sharing some of the thousands of photos i take. i still have ones from last fall i took with the explicit goal of sharing them here and other places online... but here they are, still stagnating and find ways to get lost on my harddrive. but not this time.

on my last day in quebec city before i head to mexico via toronto, i decided to sneak into an apartment in the midst of renovations with some tools of my own: vintage dresses, lingerie, jewelry and of course my trusty pentax. the canon rebel doing the photo taking is courtesy of my wonderful friend ben. here are a handful of the results... i'll upload a few more to flickr later.

also, off-topic: i'm looking for inspiration for a new layout. i still have a lot of love for the one susanna made for me, but i keep thinking back to why i made this blog in the first place... it's time for something more streamlined so you can easily see where else i post online, and an atmosphere that fosters more comments and discussions (i don't know about you guys, but i really dislike the way blogger handles comments and have been seriously considering moving to something more like wordpress). one of my main goals with this blog was to generate discussions and i often end up feeling like we don't get the chance to respond to one another individually.

aside from that aspect, aesthetically i'd really love something vintage inspired and classic, kind of like clevernettle, verhext, celine pinckers or katerina d'autremont. or perhaps i should just go the simple route and go for a nice header, something like cardboard sea has, or the wonderful nikki dekker. last but not least, what do you bloggers use for stat counter? i've been applying for guest blogging positions and things of the sort and the one i've been using for a month is not really cutting it. if anyone has any tips in this html department, suggestions of how to make or adapt your own layouts, your favourite blog layouts, etc, send me an email (juliacaron AT gmail DOT com) or leave a comment! sorry for all the technical boring discussions.

end of may getaway: what i wore

to take a break from the city and the seemingly endless job hunt, i decided to head to la pocatière to visit a good friend of mine, and boy am i glad i did.

this was the house i stayed at. my friend ashlee told me it is the oldest house in the town. all of the other houses that were built around the time the city was founded in the 1670s were destroyed when the english attacked in 1759. this house survived, and dates from around that time. ashlee lives there with four lovely people, a one month old baby, a cat and her four kittens, and a ferret. we listened to lots of 90s nostalgia inducing music while cooking, and watched episodes of malcom in the middle while we weren't enjoying the beautiful weather.

on the last day of my visit, the morning seemed calm and beautiful, another sunny day ahead. but a storm arrived in a flash, the temperature dropped, and then all was wonderful and beautiful again. none of my attempts at capturing the beauty of the storm succeeded, so here are a dozen photos of me enjoying the sun in my new favourite dress.

i think it's supposed to be a slip; i bought it at my favourite thrift store in ste. foy, where they sell things for pennies. literally. this dress was 99 cents.

yeah.

i know.

and the flowers in the backyard matched the colour perfectly! don't take my word for it, here's proof:

this was right before the storm struck

during the storm, i took a few in the greenhouse space of the house. the lighting was really eerie and beautiful, and i found wonderful old wallpaper (my favourite).

and of course, after the storm, we enjoyed a magnificent sunset.

do yourself a favour and watch the sunset tonight.
find a rooftop, a window, a front yard, a park bench.
it'll do you some good, i promise.

vintage bathing suit appreciation post

from the 1890s to the 1950s


beach fashions by nina leen, 1950






i simply refuse to bathe anywhere that does not provide benches to match my bathing suit!








clara bow in my DREAM romper


what's this? oh you know, just louise brooks having a tea party on the beach.


silent film stars love to hang out at the beach, it seems.
here we have agnes franey and myrna loy (of the thin man fame) in 1929


dorothy sebastian and joan crawford


my favourite, ukuleles and the beach!





fair bathers


from lecondevetement's flickr


more inspiration:
flick groups
vintage swimwear
retro beach
vintage bathing beauties/belles

my favourite thrifts: new feature!

today is the first in what i hope will become a regular feature here: my favourite thrifts. i've been posting my finds for years on thriftwhore but here i will highlight one item per post and tell you where i found it, what i paid for it, and why i think it's awesome. pretty straightforward. so here is the innaugural post of my favourite thrifts.



found: march 2010
where: emmaus
how much: 3$

why it's awesome:

i promised myself years ago i would stop thrifting things for other people; i would only purchase things that i could fit into and that i would wear. i wouldn't simply take anything that i thought was beautiful or interesting or cool home with me just to have it, or to give to a friend, or to maybe one day sell. this, of course, has failed miserably, namely since i started my etsy store in november 2008 and when i stumble upon things like... this dress.

this dress. this dress is made for a child, but it is by and large one of the world's most wonderful dresses i have ever found. i'm sure you're looking at said dress, thinking, "why, yes, julia that is a cute dress, but one of the world's most wonderful dresses? that's quite a statement to make about a simple little 1970s children's garment."

sure, there's no fancy embroidery, or embellishment, or designer tags. it, by all accounts, looks like any old dress a young girl in the 1970s would scamper around the yard in, spill ice cream on, get dirty in. but let us look a little bit closer.


upon inspecting the perfectly sweet peter pan collar, the awesomeness of this garment should become apparent. no? need more convincing? look closer still...


look at the print of the sleeves! there are little children holding placards; they are all protesting for women's liberation, a permissive society and worker's rights! how amazing is that! i can't stop using exclamation marks!


and to top it off, they are the most stylish adorable freckled little protestors you've ever seen.


this one, who holds the sign saying "up with permissive society," reminds me of a turn of the century suffragette. think of the mother in mary poppins.

and there you have it. one of the world's most wonderful dresses i have ever seen.

check out my flickr for a few more photos and for higher resolution versions.