Cereal Magazine

This one’s for you lucky folk with exciting summer plans that involve unblemished blue skies and a mass body of water of some sort. First of all, I am not one of you (we don’t even own a bath tub), so I HOPE YOU STEP ON A LEGO. My own summer plans involve watching Sherlock on repeat (Cumberbitch4ever) and inhaling peanut butter sandwiches in this dinky cave we call home. Makeup is wasted on me, especially one as effective as this new gizmo by Benefit I’m about to introduce you to.

Before I go further, this indeed is a collaborative post with Benefit, but my opinions are absolutely my own, as always. Everything is always tested before collaboration, and in this case I’d applied the new ‘they’re real!’ gel push-up liner and later in the day managed to drop a peanut-butter sandwich (why does toast always insist on landing on the buttered side) on the kitchen floor. I wept, but revelled later at the fact that the eyeliner had not transformed me into a hot mess/raccoon. I kid, really, but as one who cannot go without eyeliner (desert island item), and naturally someone who’s tested every stick/pot out there – this one definitely cuts the mustard. Jet black, to begin with (I like to think it matches the colour of my heart), opaque, effortless to apply, and waterproof* with appropriate application**.

* Naturally what with anything being waterproof, it’s incredibly difficult to wipe off, but I find that a drop of olive oil/coconut oil does the trick, or simply, the ‘they’re real!’ eye-makeup remover from the same line.
** I found that applying primer and a layer of base eyeshadow ensures longer wear.

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Also, I’ve shared a couple style tips and DIY tutorials on Instagram to accompany the partnership with Benefit, so do give them a click as well. A small warning though, there’s a fair bit of ‘sexy-back’ in one of the the videos and at one point I resemble the Michelin tyre mascot. It’s pretty sexy if you like rolls of phat and stuff.

Click on the arrows to activate the slideshow, and click through to see the full tips and clips.

Wellington Boots – Hunter

Look 1: Look 1: Crochet dress – ASOS. Wellington Boots – Hunter. Hat – Hoss Intropia (Similar). Sunnies – Karen Walker. Bag – Simone Camille

Look 2: Look 2: Tank top – DAY by Malene Birger (simliar) . Shorts – DIY Mango denim. Wellington Boots – Hunter

Burgers for breakfast, nests for heads, drop-in concerts and wild dancing under the stars… yep, the festival season is upon us. Also, lest we forget, the painful reminder of the elementary science behind soil + water, with your brand new canvas plimsoles as collateral to this re-education. Except of course in England one wet sneeze can turn the whole field into cake batter, and however much you try to convince yourself mud-caked shoes are the next paint-crackled converse, it just doesn’t fly. (Stop trying to make mud happen, it’s not going to happen). You’ve never wished for anything rubbery and water-resistant in your whole life, or at least since the invention of squishies at age three. I don’t know what floats your (rubber) boat (ducky), but for me it’s Hunter boots, no question – and here’s two ways I’d style my Shoreditch pair with. And speaking of extremities, now I need to find a clever festival-friendly solution for my hair without looking like I dumped flour (aka dry shampoo) in my hair… All part of the cake-batter setting I guess.

BTW – Hunter are hosting a wee giveaway of the Shoreditch model over on Instagram, simply upload an image of your festival style inspiration and tag @Hunterboots #BeAHeadliner for a chance to win. Dates: 12th – 19th June (5pm GMT). Winners will be contacted on the week of 23rd! (T&C available on request from Hunter)

Photos with the help from ze lovely Miss May.

#MangoDIY, Barcelona

Photos with watermark + video – courtesy of Mango (shot by Cup of Couple). The rest by Park & Cube

I know, POTATO – I’ll explain later. About two weeks back I plastered up a couple white-charged outfits with little explanation for the more-than-usual palm trees and less-than-usual clouds in the backdrop, for which I do apologize. Not that it was much of a mystery – it was clearly Barcelona, in its sexy entirety, where I was called back to lead the second #MangoDIY sessions. Seriously, sometimes I wish these events were public attractions that I can recommend to anyone visiting – I’d pipe on about this DIY class held in a gazebo in the middle of Parc de la Ciutadella where you get to customize dungarees from Mango while listening to mambo records…the teacher is a total hippie and mostly seen making a mountain of pom-poms in the corner or chasing giant bubbles around the park with a toothpick from the lunch spread. But alas, it was a special occasion that brought together sweet bloggers (Anouska, Adenorah, Doina, Izortze) and one each of their lucky readers, around a table where everything related to DIY had blown up on. Including, yes – potatoes. Because 1) this teacher is a hobbit and always needs taters around for emergency fry-ups, and 2) potatoes were the best shape-stamps back in kindergarten, remember? All you need is a simple knife and paint.

What was probably the most interesting was seeing some of the girls try to interpret customization with the trending ‘minimalist’ flair, most of which just ended up in variations of marble-painting on white denim shorts…

Many thanks to our rockstar host Mango again for the great fun! Check out the first session here, and watch some of the mini tutorials filmed during the day.

Necklace – Amulette de Cartier

Dress – Dagmar. Necklace – Amulette de Cartier. Hat – Chanel. Heels – Gianvito Rossi.

Other than waking up one morning and finding this picture in my phone and thinking DID I JUST SUCCESSFULLY INSTAGRAM WHILST SLEEPING, I’ve been revisiting the same dream lately – nothing specific – Ryan Gosling/Jennifer Lawrence’s face here and there, but roughly always a dream of a journey to an exotic, faraway world (burgerland included). As with everything I blame the weather in London, which to be clear, has been downright abominable (not to be confused with the word adorable), but I fear the Disney movie-marathon from a few weekends back, one spanning multiple cultures and backdrops, deserve most of the blame…* It got me digging out photos from the various journeys from the past six months and re-living them, and desperately day-dreaming for more.

As established before, the Amulette de Cartier is a trinket that collects dreams & wishes (ehem pokeball ehem), and being bitten by the travel bug and all I decided to unlock just one wish: shooting at the St Pancras Renaissance Hotel, which was as exotic and faraway-fairytale as I could get in London without hiring a mariachi band from Brixton. Although, tell me that staircase wasn’t decorated by a million tinkerbells and blessed by Fairy Godmother? Perfect location for my second story with Cartier, you’ll agree – shot with Kris, my own fairy godsister when it comes to photography. And as always, don’t forget to check out Cartier’s new Tumblr for the full scope of the Amulette universe.

In Collaboration with Cartier; photography by KrisAtomic; Location: Renaissance Hotel.

*Just like it’s been making me burst out in Let it Go (cue the husband: ‘oh hell, here we go again’).