Outfit: My New Favourite Dress

It's September now, so it's technically autumn and it's therefore acceptable to start wearing wooly tights, right?!

Unfortunately the colour didn't come out very well in these pictures, but the tights are a gorgeous deep forest green and I think they go really well with my new cream lace skater dress from Warehouse. I love this dress and I think it's probably actually the cheapest thing I've ever bought from Warehouse! It was in the sale plus I got 15% student discount so it ended up only being about £16.

I usually go for blacks, navy blues and deep reds and purples in the autumn, but this year I'm trying to embrace creams, khakis and browns. I love the colours in this outfit, makes me want to go for a long walk in a forest!

This necklace from Accessorize was another new purchase. It's a tiny little globe that spins and everything, so cute!

The boots are from New Look and the belt is from H&M. I usually go for big waist cinching belts, but I love the skinny belt with this outfit. It's pretty cloudy today so I think this is the perfect outfit to wear to go for dinner and then to the pub. I hate being over or under-dressed for the pub, but I think this dress is just about right.

Gillian x

Hello New Shoes, Bye Bye Blues

Love this song. :)

Well, technically these aren't new shoes as I bought them some time in July but I have only worn them once and they haven't made an appearance on the blog yet! I put myself on a self-imposed shopping ban for August and so far I haven't bought anything. This means I'll have plenty of pennies to buy myself some new things for my autumn/winter wardrobe.

I'm not usually a fan of wedges or big clunky shoes, but I fell in love with these ones from New Look. I'm loving the autumn fashions this year - lots of gothic lace, crushed velvet, rich burgandy colours - and these shoes will look perfect with some of the things I'm planning to buy!

As these are wedges, they're pretty comfortable so would be perfect for a night of dancing. However, so far I've only worn them out to dinner as I'm scared I'll ruin them on a night out. They're suede so will mark easily and I will either a) step in a huge puddle on the way out, b) spill sticky drinks all over them, c) scuff them on the pavement on the walk home, or d) all of the above! I would love to save up for a pair of designer shoes but I'm so bad at destroying shoes, I think it's safer just to shop in Primark and New Look for the moment!

I'm so excited to go shopping next week! Hopefully I'll manage to find lots of lovely things and have time for a few more outfit posts before university starts again in mid-September.

Gillian x

Nautical Necklaces

Summer in Britain wouldn't be complete without a trip to the seaside for walks on the beach, collecting seashells in plastic buckets and ice cream cones by the pier. Unfortunately it doesn't look like summer's going to last much longer, but these nautical themed necklaces will help it seem like the sun is still shining. Here are some of my favourites.

Little Oyster Locket, Submerged & Sailing Ship, all from This Charming Girl.

Sailor Girl from Cutie Pie Jewellery, Whale Loop Necklace, Pirate's Treasure & Octopus Necklace, all from Etsy.

Boat Trip & Wooden Anchor, both from Junkie Lovers & A Fish Called Willy from Chelsea Doll.

Down By the Sea & Steampunk Cosmic Seahorse, both from Etsy.

Which one is your favourite? Do you like nautical jewellery?

Gillian x

Outfit: Studs, Studs, Studs

I bought this top ages ago from the Mela Loves London concession in New Look thinking it was a dress, but it most certainly is not! To get away with the indecent shortness, I wore it with some wetlook leggings from Dorothy Perkins. I love the soft peachy pink colour of the tunic, and the tiny silver studs all over it help to toughen it up a bit. They also had the same top in black which I almost bought instead. The black one would have probably been a bit more versatile, but I decided to buy this one anyway because I loved the colour.

I seem to have a bit of a thing for puff-sleeves at the moment. I also have a bit of a thing for animal themed jewellery!

These earring are from River Island and are shaped like little pink honey bees! So cute! I've been stocking up on lots of animal jewellery lately - including seahorse and frog earrings and a snake ring - which I'm sure will be making an appearance on the blog soon.

Unfortunately my shoes are looking a bit scuffed and worse for wear, probably because I wear them almost every time I go on a night out! They are ridiculously comfortable! I had a look in the New Look sale to see if they had any left so I could replace these ones, but sadly they only had size 8's. That's one thing I hate about being a size 5 - it's a really common size so always sells out the quickest!

I was hoping to have done a couple more posts this week but I have been feeling a bit ill so have spent most of the time snuggled up on the sofa with a hot water bottle and some DVDs. I've only been to see one show at the Edinburgh Festival so far, but am hoping to get out and about lots this weekend and next week so stay tuned for a post in the near future about what I've been to see!

Gillian x

Eau de Parfum

Hello everyone, sorry about the lack of activity on the blog lately! I've spent the last week or so catching up with friends and tidying and unpacking after getting back to my flat, but I should have plenty of time to update now. The Edinburgh Festival starts this weekend so hopefully I should have lots of interesting things to blog about over the next few weeks!

Anyway, on to today's topic - perfume.

I love having a wander round the perfume department in Debenhams, looking at the pretty bottles and spritzing myself in wonderful scents. When I win the lottery I'm determined to have a huge vanity table covered in perfumes for every occasion and a collection of gorgeous vintage perfume bottles and atomizers. Due to my student budget though, I tend to stick to these two favourite fragrances.

This is Bvlgari's Pour Femme, a classic perfume that has been around since the early 1990s. I love the idea of having a 'signature scent', and this is definitely mine. In my 1st year of university, the first time I saw my friend - who I always sat next to in class - outside of our lecture she said to me "I always thought our lecture hall smelled really nice, but I've just realised it's actually your perfume!".

Cheap Smells (which is a great website btw, I always test perfumes out in Debenhams but buy them from here because they're much cheaper!) describes this fragrance as "a serene, sensual fragrace":

Its' refined bouquet opens with top notes of mimosa, violet, iris, and orange blossom, symbolic of naturality and purity. Heart notes of bulgarian rose and jasmine tea, followed by base notes of florentine iris, vetiver, and madagascar musk, reveal a modern sense of clarity, serenity and sensuality.

To me, it smells like parma violets (not to everyone's taste, but I love them!) and a bouquet of roses. It is both delicate and heady at the same time, light enough for daytime but strong enough to wear on a night out too.

This is my other favourite perfume, J Lo's Glow After Dark. I've been using this perfume since I was about 16, and I don't think I'll ever get sick of it! On our first date, the guy I'm seeing told me he liked my perfume and asked what it was - sadly I had to admit it was J Lo not something classy and fancy like Chanel haha!

Cheap Smells says:

Glow After Dark was inspired by the feeling you get when you're out at a nightclub with your friends, celebrating and enjoying the nightlife. It's all about the fun times with your girlfriends, going out, feeling good, looking good and having fun.
With juicy notes of passion fruit and ice lychee, sexy notes of pink peony and orange flower, and warm notes of blonde woods and soft pink musk, Glow After Dark evokes feelings of warmth and sensuality from the outside in.

I think this perfume is really hard to describe - it's fruity but not fresh. It's strong but not overpowering. In a way, it reminds me of mulled wine even though it smells nothing like that! Glow After Dark is the perfect perfume for a night out, but if used sparingly I like to wear it during the day too.

Do you have a 'signature scent' or do you have lots of different perfumes for different occasions? What are your favourite fragrances?

Outfit: Snakeskin & Velvet

Sounds like a horrible combination, doesn't it?! But I really like this metallic snake print mesh and black velvet (which always reminds me of the Alannah Myles song!) dress from New Look. I bought it a few weeks ago when New Look were doing their 20% off all dresses promotion, so along with added student discount it ended up being quite cheap!



I'm not entirely sure if it is actually supposed to be a snakeskin print, but it's definitely some sort of reptile. I quite like how it isn't an obvious pattern, but just gives a little bit of metallic sparkle.



My earrings are cute little keys from Miss Selfridge. I hardly ever wear 'dangly' earrings as I tend to stick to studs or hoops, so it's nice to wear something different for a change.



I love these sequinned peep-toe heels. I got these from a shop called Famous Footwear (I think!) in an outlet shopping centre for something ridiculously cheap like £5. I used to have an almost identical pair from New Look but sadly they got worn to death and I had to chuck them in the bin, so when I spotted these I had to buy them as a replacement!





Gillian x

Wishlist: Tara Starlet

Like most bloggers, I love all things inspired by vintage fashions and styles. So when I recently came across the clothing line Tara Starlet I instantly fell in love.

Vamp Prom Dress & Flower Button Dress

Tara Starlet is an independent fashion line run by a mother and daughter who share a passion for vintage style. Their pieces are inspired by everything from '40s screen sirens to '50s housewives and everything inbetween.

Gingham Prom Dress & Fifties Capri Pants

Tara Starlet also believes in the 'waste not want not' ethic of the post-war years, using end of roll fabrics and recycling buttons and trimmings wherever possible. Although not quite as unique as original vintage clothes, this does mean that the chances of someone having exactly the same dress as you are much slimmer than if you had been shopping in Topshop!

Belted Vixen Dress & Home Front Dancing Dress

With everything from cute playsuits perfect for picnics to pretty gingham dresses for frolicking in the sunshine, Tara Starlet has everything you need for a vintage inspired summer. If only I wasn't on a student budget, all these gorgeous clothes would be mine!

Side Button Skirt with Blitz Bodice & Polka Dot Playsuit

Gillian x

Outfit: The Pink Skirt

Some of you may remember this pink skirt from New Look that I posted about a few weeks ago. Thanks for all your suggestions for what to wear with it! Lots of you seemed to agree that it would look good with a simple black colour scheme.

I wore it with a black top from Primark, spotty tights from H&M and a pearl multi-chain necklace from River Island.

My ring is from Asos and is shaped like a wolf's head, I love it! I think rings are probably my favourite type of jewellery. Most of mine are cheap though, so they tend to turn my finger green after wearing them for a while!

My shoes are from New Look, and are just as uncomfortable as they look! I think I could have done with getting a size bigger as they squish my little toes so much!

Gillian x

Supermarket Sweep

When I was younger I used to get lots of my clothes from George at Asda, probably because my mum hates shopping so spending an extra 15 minutes in the supermarket was much easier than spending an entire Saturday trailing around town with a 7 year old girl! Once I became a teenager, however, I stopped accompanying my mum on the 'big weekly shop', and now that I live in the centre of town there aren't even any large supermarkets near me. Having a look through the clothing sections on the websites of Asda and Tesco, two of the UK's biggest supermarkets, I think I might have to go on a mission to a store that stocks clothing as they have some great stuff for very reasonable prices.

F+F Linen blend shift dress, £16 & F+F Studded Grecian Dress, £22.

In the past, supermarket clothing departments tended to be made up of lots of childrens clothes and mumsy blouses and knee length skirts. Now, they seem to cater much more for the teenage and twenty-something market, and many of the pieces wouldn't be out of place in Primark or New Look.

G21 Lace Drape Dress, £20 & G21 Spot Print Playsuit, £12 & Tummy Tamer Dress, £12.50.

Perhaps it's a good thing my local supermarket doesn't have a clothing department, otherwise I would end up buying a new dress and a pair of shoes every time I went in to get a loaf of bread!

F+F Signature Gladiator Sandals, £10 & F+F Trend animal print tube skirt, £12.

Do you ever buy clothes and accessories at supermarkets like Asda, Tesco or Sainsburys? Do you think supermarkets could become rivals to highstreet stores like Primark?

Gillian x

(p.s. this is my first attempt at a scheduled post - if all goes to plan this should be posted while I am staying at my friend's house, sleeping off all the vodka from the night before!)

Outfit: I Hear the Train a Comin'

Go listen to this song!

I'm catching a train this afternoon to go home and stay with my parents for a couple of weeks, so today's outfit is a comfy and casual one. Regular readers will probably recognise a few of the items in this outfit!

I'm wearing my Warehouse striped skater dress, last seen in this post, with some New Look black leggings and a brown woven belt from Primark. I'm also wearing my cowboy boots, which made their first appearance on the blog last week. I always try and wear bulky things like boots and my coat (which I forgot to take a picture of!) while travelling so they don't take up lots of room in my suitcase.

I love gold hoop earrings and this is my latest pair, from H&M. The necklace is from Primark and is supposed to be worn as a single long chain, but I wound it around twice to make it shorter. I couldn't get a very clear picture of it, but it's a lovely thin gold chain with various wooden beads and little gold discs. I'm also wearing lots of assorted wooden and gold bangles.

As I mentioned, I'm going home for a few weeks, probably until the start of August. It's not exactly a proper holiday, so I will have my laptop and plenty of spare time to blog. I'm not sure if I'll get the chance to take many photos, but I've got a few outfits saved up and some ideas for other posts, so there will definitely be something for you to read! If you want to keep updated with new posts, remember to follow elevatormusik either through Google Friend Connect or Bloglovin. Hope you all have a great weekend!

Gillian x

What's In My Bag...

I love being nosey and seeing what other people carry around in their bags, so I thought it was time I did a post like this too.

First of all, the bag itself. This is the bag I usually use during the day. It's big enough to fit several notebooks and my laptop in for uni, but it's not too massive so I can use it when going shopping etc as well. It was quite hard to photograph, but it does look nice in real life. I got it from Accessorize last year; it's this bag but in black.

My purse always stays in this bag, and it contains all the usual - money, ID, student card, Visa, loyalty cards etc. It's by Saddler and is a gorgeous turquoise/green colour. I also always carry my Snapfax with me, it has lots of great student discounts on everything from restaurants to hairdressers. My bag seems to accumulate cinema tickets, receipts, bus tickets, flyers and various bits and pieces of paper. Doing this post was a good chance to clear most of these out and chuck them in the bin! Finally in this photo, my umbrella. It's always a sensible idea to carry an umbrella with you in Scotland! I did have a cute leopard print one but I left it in one of my lecture halls one day and never got it back, so right now I'm using this boring black one from Boots.

I never leave the house without taking some form of makeup with me. This is what I would take with me on a normal day - Lily Lolo mineral foundation and kabuki brush, Urban Decay black pencil eyeliner, and some Chapstick or Vaseline. I also like to keep a hairbrush in my bag for bad hair days, and a wee mirror for sneaky check-ups!

I take my phone with me everywhere, not because I'm obsessed with social networking on-the-go or phoning people all the time, but because I don't wear a watch so always use my phone to check the time. My current phone is a Samsung Tocco Ultra. My MP3 player is pretty ancient by now (I think I got it in 2006) but it still works and I don't actually use it as often as I used to so I don't see the point in buying something new and expensive. It's a purple Sony Walkman and I love it because it looks rather space-age. The black case is for my camera, which I always try and take with me in case there's anything nice to photograph while I'm out and about. My camera is a Samsung ST45, but obviously it's not pictured here as it was taking the photo!

During the summer I like to shove a pair of sunglasses in my bag. As the weather here can change so quickly, it's always good to have some spare glasses in case the sun comes out. I also always keep some emergency plasters and kirby grips in my bag, you never know when you might need some!

My Moleskine planner always comes with me too, so I can note down deadlines and appointments and keep track of things I need to do.

My bag is full of lots of pens, there's nothing I hate more than needing to write something but not having anything to write with. All my pens are black as I hate hate hate writing in blue pen, I think it looks untidy and horrible! Black biros 4eva! And finally these are my keys. I once left home without them and got locked out of my flat which was extremely annoying and stressful, so I have never gone out without them since! The green thing is a "Monkey" but its face has rubbed off so it doesn't have quite the same cute effect anymore. I also have a little glittery frog keyring, as they are one of my favourite animals.

Other things that are often found in my bag, but weren't pictured here are - a bottle of juice or water, Hall's Soothers, chewing gum, an A4 notebook (sometimes 2 or 3 if I have several different uni classes to attend), a sampler-size bottle of perfume, whichever novel I'm currently reading, and assorted pieces of jewellery.

I've had a really busy weekend, so I was hoping to have a quiet night in tonight with some home-made enchiladas, a film or two, and having time to catch up on all your blogs. However, I've just been invited out for dinner so I better go have a shower and find something to wear, I promise I will get back to reading your lovely blogs soon!

Gillian x

Outfit: Little Blue Dress

I realised the other day that the vast majority of my 'going out' dresses are black. This is good because black is slimming, easy to accessorise with and generally quite classy. However, it's also a bit boring. So when I saw this blue bodycon dress in the H&M sale I thought I would buy it in an attempt to become more colourful.

I love the combination of cobalt blue and coral, so I have paired it here with some wedges from Primark. The belt is from Dorothy Perkins. The necklace I'm wearing is from River Island and is also a recent sales aquisition. I always try and do my jewellery shopping during the sales as things usually always get reduced to half price (or less!) and you don't have to worry about finding what you want in your size.

I'm still not entirely convinced that blue is the new black, but I think I like this dress enough to keep it. It seems to like creating unflattering arrangements of fabric around my tummy area, but on the other hand it does make my boobs look awesome haha!

I've got a busy weekend planned which includes watching Role Models, making and icing lots of cupcakes, helping a friend move out of her flat, going out for Mexican food and margaritas, going clubbing and taking a trip to IKEA. Hopefully somewhere inbetween all that I'll have time to catch up on reading all your blogs!

Gillian x

Outfit: The Owl Necklace

How gorgeous is this necklace? I bought it recently in H&M and I wore it today to brighten up a casual outfit I wore to go shopping.

This is one of my favourite dresses as it's so versatile and easy to dress down for day-time and up for night-time. It's a black jersey skater dress from New Look, and today I wore it with Dorothy Perkins leggings, an Oasis cardigan and a black belt also from New Look.

These are my favourite daytime shoes of all time. ALL TIME! I got them a couple of years ago from Dune and unfortunately now they're a bit worse for wear. The outside is still in pretty good condition, but the lining inside is all ripped which makes them kinda uncomfortable to wear. I'm constantly on the lookout for a lovely new pair of cowboy boots to replace them with!

I'm loving owl-themed things at the moment, and picked up an owl ring today which I'm sure will be making an appearance on the blog very soon! I went out looking for some good sale bargains but unfortunately didn't find very much. Have you had any luck in the sales this year?

Gillian x