LIFE LESSON #1: PHONES AREN'T YOUR FRIEND

Hello world. 

So it's the summer holidays and like all university students I'm realising that university is an amazing experience, but it has its faults. You make friends from all over the country and internationally, you have a great year of fun and constantly being at each other beck and call, and then suddenly June comes, and you realise everyone has a life outside of uni. For me, living in somewhere rural on the opposite end of the country, this is not the sweetest of things to find out. Another relatable factor is that all uni students, no matter what you say, are broke in their own way, and everyone is in the same boat, so when you plan to see each other over the summer during your freshers year, it doesn't dawn on you that train tickets cost major shmoney. 

And so some uni students come home to their friends from high school and forget that that year of barely keeping in contact has occurred, and take comfort in the fact that at least they've got someone who they can socialise with. Me? not so much. Losing contact with people from school is hard but you move on and make new friends in university. We build a completely separate life away in university so when we come home and have to live under our parents roof like our awkward sixteen year old selves it gets weird. Eating potato waffles at 4am is frowned upon, you can't get pissed everytime you're bored/sad/in love. So readjusting to home life can get tough, and it can certainly get boring despite the love you have for your parents and maybe your dog (Spencer I love you). 

Summer for me lasts from late May to mid September, and when you have one friend back home it can get pretty tedious. There then comes the issue of getting a job. Luckily, I bloody love my job and everyone who works there, in fact I'm making new friends there as we speak but it isn't so bad. So then, we get to the issue of boredom. As many millennials will know and many older people will preach, when we 'kids' are ever in a position of boredom or discomfort, we seek solace in our technology. Here's the thing that I've struggled with. 

On the one hand, phones connect us to our friends all over the country. Even with the new update of Snapchat, you can literally see where your friend is and what they're doing whenever they are logged in. You can look at their pictures, have a little stalk of their profiles, and maybe even check if that couple are still together, or if those friends have made up yet. 

The sad truth? Phones suck for anxiety. Phones and social media constantly remind us that we are in isolation, and aren't with the people we are missing. You have the constant temptation to check up on certain people who you know are having an amazing time without you, and no matter where you are, you feel discomfort that you can't be part of that. For me, I have really struggled with my mobile phone recently. We have struggled to have wifi in the house for months, so I don't even have the option to keep in contact with my friends. I also live incredibly rural and haven't passed my driving test yet, so I can't go anywhere or do anything. With the anxiety of loneliness, I then overspend on data and that leads to anxiety of dealing with money to pay for a house next year. Also, I've been through pain recently with some people in my life so knowing that they are out there and probably enjoying themselves hurts me, and that's a feeling I don't like.

Phones aren't your friend, they make us envious and obsessive people who are unable to live in the moment as we are constantly wondering who's going to message us, why someone isn't messaging us, why that person is having a nice time when they haven't been nice to you in the past. This is where my anxiety stems from, and I proved this yesterday with a little experiment. I simply put my phone down and went to read for two hours. Knowing that I don't have my phone at my fingertips made me feel revitalised, less anxious, and helped me focus more on spending time with people, or reading my books.

Therefore, if you're a fellow lonely student during the summer months of university, I urge you to put your phone down for a couple hours a day, turn it off and put it away. See how this effects your moods and your loneliness. Even though you're not with anyone, there's a chance that you'll find more comfort in yourself and a book than a device which constantly tempts you to think otherwise. 

A NEW DIRECTION

Oh hi, I don't think we've met, let me introduce myself. 

So all my followers have always known me when I used to blog as a fashion blogger. My posts were always discussing the newest trends, interviewing people in the industry and so on. But now *surprise* I'm legally an adult, who'd have thought we could get there. I've wanted to get back into blogging for a while now but I never quite knew what I would write about, or whether people would actually want to hear my voice at all. Then I realised, why don't I just write about life. I'm a university student now so the copious amount of life lessons I'm learning turn into spiralling stories of how I've changed so much in just under a year. 

University has been amazing but it has been a rollercoaster and the start of the craziness of adult life. So I hope on here I can entertain you all with my tales of 3am chats with potato waffles, life lessons and whatever I come across that I feel is worth writing about. I no longer feel the need to write to an audience and seek success from this blog, I am merely writing from the hurt and if that entertains someone out there in the world, then so be it. 

Bye for now, and I hope you enjoy my new chapter. 

Anna. x

Spotlight on: New York Fashion Week

Hi Everyone!
So New York Fashion Week has ended *cries*, but no worries, we still have more left, but that does not mean that New York's fashion week was not something to gasp at. This year, I kept quite a close eye on the fashion shows, making sure I wrote down which collections I really loved. One of the ways I was kept in the know was with the Snapchat story, where I could look at live pictures coming in from different shows, it was really cool and there were a lot of familiar faces included like Kendall Jenner, and Gigi Hadid. Don't worry I'm not being payed to mention Snapchat, but it is quite good with things like this, and I hope they make a story like they did for NYFW with LFW.  I was really sad because I was actually invited to quite a lot of shows during the week for the second year in a row, but since I've had to deal with school work as usual *rolls eyes* and family stuff my schedule was just packed with everything except fashion events, but I will make sure I keep close eyes on the shows this week through livestreams and social media!

So today I'd just love to show you some of my fave collections that were featured at New York Fashion Week. Not all of my faves are because of the actual fashion bizarrely, with some of the collections I really loved the make up looks, but wasn't really keen on the clothes. 

So the first show I want to talk about is Jeremy Scott's. I discovered this show whilst on instagram and I saw the MAC team post a photo of these insane eyeshadow looks with their makeup, where it was just matte neon colours on the models eyelids. That really intrigued me so I looked it up and it was Jeremy Scott's show. I think I definitely have mixed feelings about this collection since I am insanely in love with Scott's use of block colours in the makeup looks, and tights, since I think it represents the child like vibes of his entire collection, since he also used nursery style fabrics and little silvery white dolly shoes with all looks. 

I was also obsessed with the black wigs and paint splats on top of them. To me, I thought it was a simple yet genius look to compliment his already very unique styles. Would I wear this out on the street? I think I actually probably would, I really love what he's done and although it is a marmite kind of collection, I really liked it and thought it stood out for me, from all the others as the most unique and colourful collection from what I've seen. 

I felt like he also had some similarities with one of my other favourite designers who always uses bizarre patterns and powerful colours, and that is Henry Holland. Holland, like Scott loves to incorporate childhood styled looks but still makes it look cool, and I think that's why I liked Scott's collection that much.

The second collection I really fell in love with was Marchesa's. When I saw this I immediately thought that they were channeling Daisy from The Great Gatsby. Not a lot of you know this about me, but one of my fave style era's was the '20's, and whenever I see anything that has used similar styles to that era, you can guarantee I will judge it. I really liked Marchesa's mix of warm and cool tones with the outfits, and I also loved how they kept with the same black strappy heels, red lips, and a lot of them had statement earrings. The collection also reminded me of Downton Abbey, since there was also a very regal kind of vibe being given off with some of the outfits. I also loved how the classic styles were given a more modern twist by using fringing in a lot of it's clothes (for example, top right) 

I dont think I can really find a flaw with this collection, every single look was flawless, and my two favourite pictured above, weren't even the most glamorous looking of them all. I really liked this pale blue dress and the look overall, as it reminded me of Cinderella (which is coming out soon in cinemas, so excited!) I don't know it's just so girly, almost dream like. As for the second look, you all know by now that my favourite colour is purple, and this dress sums up why. This plum look is gorgeous, and even though it isn't flowy, it still has a regal vibe with it's darker tones, and the should pads with flared make it even more edgier, I might have pictured it with a leather jacket, thinking that would be perfect for me (if I was rich, cries).

My final favourite was a bit of a hit and miss, it wasn't the best show but it wasn't the worst. Anna Sui's show was apparently influenced by Scandinavia, Vikings, and folky prints. I definitely feel like she kept to that well, and the boots that were used in a lot of the looks represented a very folky, autumnal look. The makeup was simple but I really liked how they made sure to define the cheekbones with bronzer, and used nude lips for a lot of it. These were by far my favourite looks (pictured above) and I really love how none of it is really fitted, it gives it a much more bohemian look.

Sui also used a lot of mixing and matching different patterns, and with some looks it may have been a little out there, but with a lot of it the patterns clashed in a good way. Sui also used a lot of paisley/flowery prints, and as I'm a huge fan of that kind of stuff, I think it made the collection stand out and appeal to me a lot more than it may have to others who may have thought it was just a bit too quirky for their liking. 

So what did you guys think of New York Fashion Week? I'd love to hear about your favourite looks and shows, or maybe the ones you just thought were awful! Let me know in the comments and thanks so much for reading, 

'Flaws' in Fashion

Hello Everyone!

It's been a while. I could give you a list of excuses on how and why I managed to not blog for three months, but I think the best thing to do is reintroduce myself. During the last couple of exams I've been thinking towards the future, and it's definitely scary. You wake up one day, and suddenly your high school years are almost over and you actually have to plan for the future. When I was younger I would always love to do that, think of where I'd live, which celebrity I'd marry, all these ridiculous thing that a little girl thinks. But the truth is I think, to every teenager who's at the same time of their life as me, it's scary. My teachers try and make me not think about it but they're slowly preparing us all for the future, and I think that's why I'm scared a little bit. I'm scared of that final day when I don't have the protection of my teachers, and I actually have to go out into the world and make new decisions. Everyone who's older than me reading this will surely understand how I feel, but it's also quite exciting, and the other half of me can't wait to see what my future is going to be like. 

But anyway, let's end that dramatic talk before we all grab tissues and watch romantic comedies all day. I'm back! I'm genuinely so happy, when I'm not blogging I feel like a piece of me isn't there, but recently I was inspired to write about something in the fashion industry that has really caught my eye, and those are actually two seperate stories. The main topic of my article today will be the usual things we don't see in the fashion industry, which are 'flaws'. Flaws can be defined in different ways, seen by different people, but first, to understand flaws, we need to actually know what the word means. 

FLAW

A feature that mars the perfection of something. A crack, a break or a breach. Imperfection.

So basically. It's something that fractures someone's beauty, and makes them imperfect. Back to the stories I will be talking about. The first topic I will discuss is the first ever woman with down syndrome to walk a catwalk at New York Fashion Week. That woman was 30 year old actress Jamie Brewer, and she walked the catwalk because of the 'Role models not Runway Models' campaign.

Photo courtesy of www,stuff.co.nz

When I saw this had actually happened I was so overwhelmed with happiness. During last July, I had the opportunity to work with people who had physical disabilities in their work enviroments, and it made me realise that even though they may be disabled in something, people with disabilities are capable to live a normal life, and do things such as have a job, relationship, and aspirations. Sometimes I feel that people don't find people who have down syndrome beautiful, when in fact everyone is beautiful!

Jamie truly rocked that runway, and I think many people were shocked that a person with a disability in fact was walking, which brings me back to 'Flaws' in fashion. Flaws are a taboo subject in fashion, and people believe that models always look like they do in magazine advertisements, when in actual fact, they all are airbrushed, and everyone has 'Flaws'. The point of this article is to say that everyone has flaws, and my attitude isn't that 'no one has flaws and everyone is beautiful', but actually, everyone has flaws, and everyone is beautiful! Flaws are the foundation of our beings, and it's what makes us different, so everyone should rock it!

The second person I want to talk about today is Cindy Crawford. Cindy Crawford is a mother of two, and is 48 years old. She is an infamous model, and that led to her having a successful career in television an film, and also as a spokesperson. Crawford is a fashion icon, and she is such a huge superstar, that everyone recognises her face.

Recently, this photo of her was leaked online, showing her with cellulite and stretch marks, unairbrushed. The photo went viral, and everyone who was anyone was commenting on it. But seeing this didn't make me grossed out or uncomfortable, it made me happy! Crawford is approaching fifty, and having had two children she was bound to have stretch marks and cellulite, as all real women do! She is happy with her figure, and I think that's what we need to focus on. If Crawford looks beautiful with flaws, then I'm sure that all mothers look beautiful with their flaws.

So to end this article I just want to say that these two stories that have appeared within weeks of each other have definitely had an effect on the fashion industry for the better, as it shows that people are changing their perception of beauty, as they see that real women are just as beautiful as models.

Thanks for reading, and what do you think of these leaked images and Jamie Brewer?