Wallet & Rucksack – Coach Mount Plaid Collection. Nail polish – Dolce & Gabbana. Lipstick – Bobbi Brown. Watch – Larsson & Jennings. Bracelets – X Jewellery.

Denim jumpsuit – ASOS. Rucksack – Coach Mount Plaid Collection. Boots – Sam Edelman

Jacket – Zara. Jeans – Marques Almeida. Shoes – Coach. Rucksack – Coach Mount Plaid Collection.

It’s back to school time: golden afternoons that last a minute and a half, crazy/confusing few weeks when you crave homework, and a new backpack that go with your new haircut. Coach’s Mount Plaid collection takes me into the season with its nod back to the 90’s – back when ‘homework’ did not mean 10 hours of pixel-shifting while seasons of muffled South Park stream in the background. The quintessential academia silhouette comes in red-and-black workwear plaid – a la Kristen Stewart in American Ultra, with similar attitude and gusto. Best of all, UK.Coach.com is now a fully transactional e-commerce site, which means I can now completely eliminate human interaction over the gift-buying period (win).

In collaboration with Coach as part of season’s ambassadorship.

Marc Jacobs Wellington

Cashmere sweater, Muriee. Boyfriend Jeans, ASOS. Booties, Sam Edelman Rowin. Specs, YesStyle, Bag, Marc Jacobs Wellington

Just a quickie before I go tip a huge bowl of rice crackers from the lounge snack-bar into my boyfriend jeans for the 8am flight back home. I’m wearing the exact pair now and by happenchance caught a glimpse of my reflection at Tokyo Narita airport and honestly thought it looked like I pooped me pants. In a good way, like, you-ain’t-gonna-pat-me-down-there-surely type of convenience. Anyhow, this is probably not the outfit to be posting while on a layover in 35ºC+ (95ºF) Dubai, but I’m quickly learning that it’s not summer in London if there isn’t at least one piece of cashmere in a July outfit, so to heck with it. This Muriee piece is another one of those that fly on and off the couch with an indecent wash vs. wear count ratio, with a shape so boxy that so effectively conceals all stages of le food baby. My favourite bit is the fact that the cashmere is dyed with berries and leaves, brownie points for eco-friendliness!

Shot in London before leaving for Japan; Thank you Kit for helping with the snaps.

[Rings shot] Toolsis Cocktail Ring via Boticca; True Birds Leaf Ring, Courtney Kaye Cocktail Ring,  Michelle Oh Twig Solitaire Ring via Boticca; [Outfit on stairs] Zara Coat; Uniqlo Top & Trousers, Sam Edelman Booties; Kurt Geiger Clutch;  [Outfit ‘red Jeans’] Goldsign Jeans, Coach Bag, Zara Hat, Topshop Boots;

Taking into account that my social skills resemble that of a blind hamster… oh that reminds me, my neighbour now purposefully avoids me after the few occasions I couldn’t grow a pair (of melons, what are you thinking) to say ‘hi’ in the narrow corridor so each time I pretended to be temporarily blind and deaf before shuffling past. Ah, there’s also that time I was giving a uni presentation and thanks to my scrambled nerves (or deadly toxins from the product design studios, not certain) I was known to speak in tongues. (and thus helped the overly abstract project to be even more convincing! (not really)) Anyhow, taking ALL THAT into account and looking back, an event like Firenze4Ever seems sadly not my cup of tea. Granted, I had fun with the girls and a blast trekking Florence with the hubby, but when you put too many world-famous bloggers in one room it’s inevitable that those lesser known (and socially awkward) will eventually end up benchwarming in the sidelines. It reminded me a bit of highschool with all the cliques and gossips, so the hubby and I did what we did best back then, slipped away unnoticed and made out in the bike shed…

Thank you Luisa Via Roma for the invitation & hubby for the photos

Blue coat – Anywho x Brics, Cream coat – Mum’s, Boots – Sam Edelman, Clutch – C/O Kurt Geiger, Watch – Casio, Bracelets – C/O Boticca, Dress- ASOS Salon

Oh how I love Christmas! Mariah (and lately Justin Bieber, the horror) constantly wanting only me from speakers of the randomest of places (butcher’s down the road, WHY); the smart-ass, seemingly-omniscient gift guides of the interwebs; twelve days of Christmas and one very bankrupt and exhausted true love; the visible struggle for the shops to make a watered down version of the season’s products (i.e very well-dressed snowmen decorations and elaborate snowflakes) that hopefully appeal to those that don’t necessarily, by religion or whatnot, celebrate the day but would still like to participate in the buzz…. But most of all, the ‘christ’-lessness of ‘Christ’mas, and a whole month of cringing at the fact that it’s less and less that and more and more ‘x’ of Xmas, probably x = the unknown? To be very frank, I always find myself distressed by the noise around Christmas – this of course will serve as the primary reason to the fact that my children will be the scoundrels who will break the Santa secret to all his classmates on the eve, making the night truly sleepless but for entirely different reasons. And I will die of chronic cynicism, on Christmas day, surely.

Babbling aside, this year I was most drawn to Malachi chapter 4, the final book and chapter of the Old Testament which dates 300 years before the birth of Christ, but in all its might leaves a big arrow towards the coming of Jesus. (Yes Christmas is defacto a pagan tradition and Jesus was really born closer to March but if we’re plastering babies & mangers over our cards and we’ve allocated ONE time during the year to remember His birth then might as well do it properly)