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Friday 31 July 2015

Lolita and Doe-eyed Look

Lolita by Concrete Minerals is one the very first loose mineral shadows I ever bought. It's still one of my favourites, the shade is incredibly easy to wear and always seems to look nice on me. For this look I applied Lolita all over the lid and gently added just a little touch of a dark chocolate brown shadow in the crease. The brown is also by Concrete Minerals, but sadly discontinued. You can still find Doe-eyed at some retailers, but I'm surprised that it isn't part of the selection any more, because it's my absolute favourite dark brown. It's a cool toned brown and goes well with my skin tone.

The only new things in this look are the nude liner on the waterline (it's a MAC concealer pencil actually, thanks to Liisa for telling me how awesome it is for inner liner!) and trying to make the brows fade a bit from the inner corners. I usually paint my brows with loose shadow and liner liquid to make them last, but the fading inner edge looks very nice to me.





Thursday 30 July 2015

Black and White

Back home for a little while! I'm going on a business trip on Sunday, so just a short stay at home so I can change all the pvc clothes in my suitcase to jeans and game t-shirts for the upcoming game convention ;D I did a little shopping on my two extra days at Cologne (aside from seeing all the museums I had wanted to see for ages).

These cute little socks were one of the things I got for myself at Primark. Viivi Vanessa at Black Saliva has the cutest socks and sandals look and I wanted something similar, and my sandals are still so new and stiff that they chafe me. And the fact that it's been the coldest summer in Finland in 50 years, so the only way to get to wear sandals is with socks.



Sandals - Depeche from Nilson Shoes
Socks - Primark

Now wish me luck in trying to overcome a cold in just two days! I caught a cold at Cologne and it's poop because this is my last week of vacation. And I have to give a speech next week and be ready to show off the game and all. Right now I'm mainly interested in sleeping and hot beverages, but I'm hoping this will pass very soon.

Monday 27 July 2015

Amphi Festival!

I'm not liking the German internet once again, hence the recent silence. I'm in Cologne for the Amphi Festival and I have to say it has been awesome. Despite some bands being cancelled due to a storm on Saturday, I got to listen to many great ones. And I still have some time to do shopping, as I'm flying home on Wednesday. So expect a lot of make-up posts in the near future!

The last band of the festival was VNV Nation, here's a snap from the gig. All of the little lights are lighters and phones, there are so many!


Thursday 23 July 2015

Pentagram Earrings by Killstar

I think I'm having a Killstar phase in my life ;D I have a few of their dresses, few pairs of leggings, a handbag and now I extended my collection to large pentagram earrings. I have to say that while these babies look gorgeous, they are quite heavy and cumbersome to wear. I solved the heaviness problem by ordering a packed of Lobe Wonder patches. They are small silicone patches with glue that you put on your lobes to cover the earring hole. You then thread the earring through the porous patch. The patch divides the weight of the earring on a much larger area than just the tiny hole, making them way more comfortable to wear. The patch itself you can't really feel, and it's clear so it doesn't grab attention.

Here's about a million pictures of me with the earrings because so many came out nice :> I really like how this look turned out! I'm wearing MAC Cyber lipstick and a simple neutral smoky eye.



If you look close, you can see the Lobe Wonder patches in these pics.
The patches can also be worn on the back of the ear lobe, but I felt they gave
more support on the front side.



Wednesday 22 July 2015

Purple Liner Look

A super simple look with mauve lips, light neutral smoky eye and just a touch of purple liner. I took the pictures after a trip to Ikea, so I'm a bit shiny and the lipstick is worn. I usually wear colourful liner on just the waterline, but now I put it on as upper lid liner too and it seems to work nicely. I think the purple really brings out the green in my eyes :)




I'm wearing Rare Find by Pollen Cosmetics as a smoky eye. It's a light taupe with a hint of pink sheen, very light and easy to wear. Perfect for quick looks!

Pink on Pink on Pink Look

The post person brought my latest make-up order in today. I wanted a tea lipstick, so after consulting my fellow beauty enthusiasts on Facebook, I made an order to My Beauty Addiction to get their "Teal with It" lipstick. It felt silly to get just one item, since the shipping to Finland was a bit expensive, so I got a few other items too. I wanted to try their eyeshadows, so I chose to get a Mineral Eyeshadow Quad with colours that went well together, and a neutral lipstick, because I've been wearing those quite often lately.

My look is done with Lip Paint in Vintage and eyeshadows called Sangria, Illumi, Blossom and Ruby Slipper. The quad doesn't have a name, but here's a link to it. I have to say that Illumi is not very much like the picture in the listing. The shop picture shows a light beige, but Illumi is actually a pale peachy pink. It's a pretty colour, but not alike to the listing, and quite close to Blossom. Having both Blossom and Illumi in the same set seems excess, I'd much rather have one light pink and one matte beige, than a shimmery pink and a matte peachy pink.

I didn't have a lip liner to match Vintage, but it's a very nice mauve and super easy to wear. It's a little bit darker than my lips to give definition and has a satin finish. I also got Color Rich Lipsticks in Teal with Me and Aquatic, but I'll show those to you later! The brows are Aromaleigh Obsession with liner liquid. And that's my too-lazy-to-brush-my-hair bun ;P



Illumi on the brow bone and inner corner, Blossom on lid, Ruby Slipper in the crease and just a touch of Sangria in the deepest crease for definition.


Lip Paint in Vintage.

Tuesday 21 July 2015

Lumous Saturday Outfit

I seem to have forgotten to post this earlier, whoops! On Lumous Saturday I wore the silver Artifice outfit I purchased second hand. It's a lovely set of a top, skirt, corset and sleeves. I wore only one sleeve to show off my tattoo, and chose to go with my purple glitter shoes to compliment the light silver.

The necklace is new, I bought it from Lumissa's Purple Octopus at Dark Market earlier the same day. It goes well with my hair and was perfect with the silver pvc and purple shoes!



Necklace - Lumissa's Purple Octopus
Corset, top, skirt and sleeve - Artifice Clothing
Boots - Second hand (Pennangalan?)

(This pic was taken after the event at home, I'm so proud of how well my make-up lasted and not looking horribly drunk ;D)

My other half wore a striking post-apocalyptic look. He put it all together very last minute, but the outfit is absolutely awesome! I thought he didn't want to wear anything special but he really surprised me. It's not often that he's the more photographed one of us ;P Thanks to Helena for the pictures!




Sunday 19 July 2015

Olivia and Charmy Look

Metallic peach and olive green! I used Sugarpill loose eyeshadows in Olivia and Charmy for this look. Super sparkly is just how I like it!



Friday 17 July 2015

Lavender Nails

I wore this look just before I had the acrylic nails done. The polish is KPS Nostalgia, a thermo polish that's lavender in warm conditions and goes darker purple when it's cold. It's been quite warm so I don't usually get to see the darker shade, but when I wash my hands with cool water the polish creates this lovely gradient when the nails slowly warm up. The polish has a satin finish, but I use a top coat on it so it becomes shiny.



Wednesday 15 July 2015

Shimmery Acrylic Nails

Got my nails done! I've been wanting to try acrylic nails for some time, and now I finally got them. These babies are made of shimmery acrylic powder and look super pretty even when nude. And there's lots of room for decoations once I get my nail polishes out!





Monday 13 July 2015

Outfit of the Day

Behold the cat hair! I don't understand how one tiny Möttönen can leave such a huge amount of hair on my dress ;D Yesterday was my first time wearing these Killstar leggings, and the same tiny cat slipped on my lap, clung on with nails and managed to make a few small holes in the brand new leggings. I tried a fix for the holes today, I hope it works, because I'd like more wear out of my clothes than just one day!


Dress - Queen of Darkness (sponsored)
Leggings - Killstar
Earrings - Rogue x Bones & Lilies
Boots - Unif High Trench


Sunday 12 July 2015

How To Make A Victorian Bustle Skirt - The Easy Way

I'm very proud of my Victorian bustle skirt. It wasn't very hard to sew, so I want to share my self-made pattern and the basic instructions, so others can enjoy this lovely type of skirt!


What you need:

5 meters of fabric of your choosing, preferably something that drapes nicely. I used taffeta.
4 meters of plain cotton ribbon. Can be any color, it won't show!
A short zipper in matching color. Mine is 22 cm long.
A button, hooks and eyes or a snap button for the waistband
Sewing machine
Needle and thread
Chalk to draw on the fabric
A piece of plain white paper
Iron and an ironing board
Plenty of pins
A dressform or a friend to help you

Please note that to get the best silhouette for the skirt, you should have a long tulle petticoat and a bustle cage. Both are easy to make yourself, and can be used with many long skirts for added fullness. Petticoats are not expensive to buy either. I made the bustle cage myself, here's a post with pictures of it and a link to the tutorial I used. Before this, I was using a simple pillow to get the effect and it worked nicely too, so you can take a shortcut here if you want!

If you want to wear the skirt with a corset, you should use the corset as an undergarment so you can get the bustle to sit at your natural waistline. It's basically down to what sort of silhouette you prefer, but having the bustle start at the natural waist accentuates the waist, and makes you look taller than with a lower bustle position. Wearing a corset on top of the skirt also flattens your bustle. The best bodice to wear with this type of skirt is a short one that flares out at the natural waist. My bodice is sewn with a Truly Victorian pattern you can find here. The main thing that makes the bodice work perfectly is the little pleated tail that gives plenty of room for the bustle.

For fabric, the best ones are fabrics that have a shiny surface, like my taffeta, so the millions of little pleats and ruffles show well. The fabric should not be very heavy, because there will be a lot of it.

I drafted the pattern based on a bustle skirt I own, made by Fan + Friend. The pattern is not exactly the same, but the general structure follows that of the Fan + Friend skirt. They had done the bustle a bit differently and had a decorative ruffle on the sides of the bustle, for which I was way too lazy.

The red lines mean the folded side of the fabric. Etu is front and taka is back. Turn. is the bustle part and the unmarked piece is the front side of the upper skirt, the pleated apron. The main thing is to have plenty of fabric, so if you are in doubt, rather cut pieces too large than too small. You can always pleat the excess fabric on some seam or another. In addition to these pieces you need a waistband that is the measure of your waist (or corseted waist if you plan to wear the skirt with a corset) + 3 cm, and fabric for the pleated ruffle at the bottom. My ruffle is 9 meters long and 15 cm high.
Basically the skirt has an underskirt with a pleated ruffle about 12 cm tall and an upper skirt consisting of a pleated apron and a bustle that's gathered on five cotton ribbons hanging from the waistband. There's a side zipper that's sewn on both upper and lower skirt, and a waistband that has a snap closure. For more comfort in crowds, there's a loop of matching satin ribbon sewn on the underside of the train so it can be lifted up by putting the loop on your wrist (thanks to Kerttu for adding this last minute!).

An important thing to note! Make sure you take into account the shoes you plan to wear with your skirt! I wanted to wear heels, but mistakenly measured the hem to sit right on me with no shoes on. This way, the skirt ended up being too short with heels on, so I ended up having to take apart the whole waist to add some fabric to the skirt. Naturally I only noticed this after I had the whole skirt finished.

I did some adjustments and fixes while making the skirt, so my process was not as straightforward as it could be. I don't have pictures of all the steps but I'll do my best to explain each one.

The skirt consists of six pieces: upper skirt front (the apron), upper skirt back (the bustle), underskirt front, underskirt back, underskirt hem ruffle and the waistband. The picture below shows the pieces on a finished skirt.


First, lay your fabric on a flat surface, fold it in the middle and draw the pattern on it using a measuring tape. Cut the skirt pieces and a waistband, but don't cut the pleated ruffle yet.

The Underskirt

1. Sew the side seams of the underskirt but leave room for your zipper on one side seam.

2. Iron the waistband so you can pin it on your dressform. If you don't have a dressform, have a friend help you and use pins to secure the waistband on yourself. If you have certain shoes in mind that you want to wear with the skirt, put them on so you can measure the hem to be the right length.

3. Pleat and pin the underskirt on the waistband. Put most of the pleats on the sides and back, you don't want extra bulk on your stomach area.

4. Check the length of the hem. If you have the skirt on a dressform, double check that the dressform in set to the height you will be with the shoes you want to wear with the skirt. Choose how high you want the pleated ruffle to come and, if needed, cut the hem so that it has an extra 1-2 cm for attaching the ruffle. On the front side, the hem should just touch the ground when the ruffle is on. If it's longer, you will trip on it when walking. And trust me, you don't want to shorten the ruffle, so be careful with the measurements here.

5. Cut the fabric for the ruffle. I made a 15 cm high ruffle and pleated it in alternating sections of 5 cm and 2 cm. Some people prefer box pleats for a symmetrical look, but I took the easier route and did just regular pleats. For my pattern, 9 meters of unpleated fabric was enough for the hem and a little piece was still left over. I suggest ripping the pieces instead of cutting them, that keeps the height exactly the same for the whole piece.

Tip: If your hem is not the same length as mine, but you want to use the same 5 cm pleats with 2 cm of fabric folded under the pleat, you can calculate how much fabric you need when you know that 60% of the length of the unpleated fabric will be the length of the finished ruffle. So 5 meters of fabric is 3 meters of pleated ruffle, 10 meters is 6 meters of finished ruffle and so on.

6. Sew the fabric for the pleats so that you have one continuous piece. Finish one edge, either with zigzag or by folding it. Iron for best results.

7. Iron and pin the pleats. Take your piece of paper and fold it in the pattern you want your pleats to be. For easy ironing, you can use the paper as a guide for the fabric. Just tuck the fabric in the folds of the paper and iron over it all. Pin the pleats into place an iron again without the paper to make sure the fabric gets enough heat to keep the pleat well. Move on to the next section and repeat. Make sure to pin the raw edge that will be attached to the skirt, not the finished edge. This is the most time consuming and boring part of the whole process, so stay strong! When the pleats are done you have done most of the work.

Tuck the fabric into the folds of the paper, iron and pin the pleats in place.

8. Sew the pleated edge of the ruffle to secure the pleats.

9. Pin the ruffle to the hem of your skirt. Try the skirt on or try it on the dressform at this point to make sure the final length of the hem is correct. If it's not, you can shorten the hem by attaching the ruffle higher, or add length by sewing an extra strip of fabric on the waist edge of the underskirt. Once you are happy with the length, sew the ruffle on. I found it easiest to hide the seam in the ruffle by placing it on the side of the skirt but it's not very noticeable anyway, so don't worry if the seam is somewhere else.

10. Carefully take the waistband off the underskirt but pin the pleats you made to the skirt edge so they stay put. Sew to secure the pleats. You underskirt is now done!

The Upper Skirt, or Bustle and Apron

1. Cut six pieces of your cotton ribbon. Pin them on the top side of your underskirt in the following pattern: 1 on the center back, 1 on the side where there's no zipper, 2 side to side to the side that will have the zipper. 1 to each side on the back between the side ribbon and center back ribbon. You will gather the side fronts of the front part of the top skirt, and the bustle on the back of the top skirt on these ribbons. If you have a very full figure, you might want to consider adding a few extra strips of ribbon, if it looks like the ribbons are very far apart. The closer the ribbons on the back side are to each other, the tighter and basically fluffier your bustle will be. See the picture below for how the ribbons should lie on your underskirt.

Cotton ribbons pinned to underskirt, seen from the back.


The length of the ribbons is up to you. On the sides they dictate how low the pleated sides fall and on the back you can gather the bustle as low as the ribbons go. A a general guideline, since cotton ribbon is cheap, leave it long so you can cut it shorter later when you can see how the pleating looks.

2. Pleat the front of the upper skirt. Pin the waistband on the dressform and pin the underskirt on it. If you don't have a dressform, put it on yourself and have a friend do the pleating (or the other way around if you are roughly of the same size). Take the piece of fabric you cut for the front part of the upper skirt. You can finish the edge of the piece now if you feel confident that the length is right. If you are not sure, pleat it first and see how it looks, cut if needed and finish the edge last.

Once you have the underskirt on a person or a dressform, locate the cotton ribbons you pinned on the sides. Pin the top edges of the front piece of the upper skirt to the ribbons so you see how wide you finished apron should be. Sandwich the ribbons between the upper skirt and the underskirt. Pleat and pin the top of the piece, once again concentrating the pleats on the side area rather than on the center where they would make you belly look fluffy. Now you have the width of the front part of the upper skirt (=apron) mapped.

Pleat and pin the sides of the apron to the ribbons on the sides. These pleats should fold upwards for the best look. There's no one best size for the pleats, try what looks best to you, just pleat and pin until you are happy with the look.

Ribbons lay on the back of the underskirt.
The front of the upper skirt is pinned to the
waistband and pleated to the side ribbon.


3. Sew the front piece's pleats. Carefully unpin the ribbons from the underskirt and the upper skirt from the waistband, preserving the pleats. Sew to secure the pleats and make sure to catch the cotton ribbon when sewing the side pleats. The edges will be sewn together with the back side of the upper skirt, so don't worry about finishing them yet.

4. Sides of the bustle. Once again put the skirt on your dressform, yourself or a friend. Pin the pleated front piece of the top skirt on the waistband. Make sure you have the cotton ribbons pinned on the underskirt: you should have one in the center back, one on the side where the zipper will be, and two between the sides and the center back.

Take the piece you cut for the back of the upper skirt. Pleat and pin the top edge so it matches the underskirt. Now you want the pleats to be mainly in the center so you will have plenty of fabric for the bustle. Sew to secure the pleats and pin the piece back on the waistband, sandwiching the ribbons between the upper skirt and the underskirt.

Start work on the bustle by pleating the edges of the back piece to match the sides. These pleats should face downwards, not upwards like on the front part. Pin the pleats to the free cotton ribbon on the side where the zipper will be, and straight to the edge of the front piece on the side where there is no zipper. Try what size of pleats work best for you, the general rule is that there can't be too much fabric!

Front of the upper skirt is pleated and sewn to the side ribbons.
The back of the upper skirt (the bustle) is pleated and pinned to the
side ribbon.

5. Sew the side pleats. Sew the pleats to the cotton ribbon on the zipper side, and sew the back piece of the upper skirt to the front piece of the upper skirt on the side where there is no zipper. Put the upper skirt back on your dressform to continue with the bustle.

6. This is the creative part! You aim is to gather the bustle to the cotton ribbons. Use pins to see how it will drape, and when you are happy, attach the fabric to the ribbon with a few hand sewn stitches. There's no rule to how tightly you should gather or in how many places the fabric should be sewn to the ribbons, just pin and see what you like. I suggest wearing your bustle cage / other padding / pillow, and a petticoat to see what the silhouette will be like with the undergarments you plan to wear with the skirt.

The cotton ribbon lies flat on top of the underskirt.
The back piece of the upper skirt is gathered on the ribbon to
create the bustle. The picture shows only one ribbon, but the
finished skirt will have three ribbons done with the same
technique.

When you have gathered the bustle, finish the edge of the piece. If you have extra energy or are just a little bit off in the head, you can add a ruffle to the bustle edge too.

7. When you are happy with the bustle, move on to the boring part. Take your zipper and sew it on so that it's attached to both the upper skirt and the underskirt. (Google for specific zipper instructions, I suck at them!) Sew the rest of the side seam on the upper skirt.

8. Pin the waistband on to make sure it fits. I prefer a waistband that folds over so I can hide all of the ugly unfinished top edges inside them. All that matters is that you have a sturdy waistband that closes securely with a snap or hooks and eyes or a button. No one will see what's under it anyway. If the waistband doesn't fit, check if the problem is in the band or in the skirt. If the band is too long or short, shorten it or cut a new one. If the skirt is too wide for the band, just add a few pleats somewhere to make the width fit. Make sure to have a 3 cm overlap on the waistband for the closure.

When you are happy with the fit of the waistband, sew it in place, making sure you catch the cotton ribbons so they take the weight of the bustle and the pleats. Add the closure type you want (snaps are easiest if you ask me!) and you are all done.

9. Put your new skirt on and admire yourself in the mirror. You did it!

The instructions are quite long but the process itself is not very complicated. Just two skirts with one side zipper, and the top one is pleated at the side seams and gathered on ribbons in the back. Here's some more picture to help you with the details!

Underskirt with ruffle in place.
This side of the skirt has the zipper, but it blends in nicely.
Me, Jukka and Nina. Jukka took most of the pictures of the outfit, thank you! The pleats on the side of the bustle show well in this picture, and also how they are made in a different direction than the pleats on the sides of the apron.
Here I have the train held up with a loop of satin ribbon.
In this picture the pleats on the apron are going the wrong way.
The bustle gathering shows well.
Detail of the bustle.

Hörppy!

This shot was taken after the engagement photoshoot, when we went to get ice creams at a supermarket. They also carried a black apple juice, which I naturally had to get, because it was goth as f*ck ;D So my face when I suddenly owned a litre of a black sweet drink:


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