Thursday 10 November 2011

Paris

I've just come back from a few days in Paris which is always magical. It was a very relaxing trip, largely spent shopping and eating good food - what more can you ask for! As much as I love London, I always find Paris much more inspiring fashion wise. There is the whole cult around how Parisians dress, and while not everyone looks like Emmanuelle Alt, on the whole everyone just makes more effort in how they present themselves. Most people have well cut and styled hair, simple makeup and clean clothes. Very rarely do you see anyone in sweat pants which is such a common occurrence in England that is become the norm.

The stylish Parisian girls I saw tended to be wearing dark grey or navy jeans, short flat ankle boots, cashmere jumpers and parkas or wool coats with fur hoods. The fur collar or hood is definitely big right now, Maje do amazing coats that are very popular and good quality.

As for what I bought, I got some Make Up for Ever eye cream from Sephora (love), Christophe Robin conditioner, Leonor Greyl shampoo and Jonak boots. I saw many girls wearing beaten up suede taupe boots and these are basically what I bought. They aren't a 'forever' item but should certainly see me through a few winters, after all I'm not going to be able to wear Repettos much longer!

All in all an enjoyable break and has given me lots of ideas for my winter wardrobe.

PS. Thank you for all the sweet comments, its good to be back!

Wednesday 19 October 2011

1. The Perfect Skincare

All my life I have struggled with bad skin. It has such a big impact on how you perceive and project yourself. A good outfit can only give you so much confidence. It is important for the skin and hair to match.

I have a love of products and have tried just about everything on the market. I have sensitive combination skin so I prefer to use all natural products where possible, but there are so many that just don't work! While looking around the beautifully redesigned cosmetics section of Liberty's I spotted the Australian brand Aesop. I am particularly drawn to products with well designed bottles, and Aesop seemed to check all the boxes. I started with the scrub, which I didn't already have, then from there my collection has grown! All the products smell lovely and don't leave my face red or irritated. The oil is great to wear overnight and means you wake up with nicely glowing skin. I have to say that the best product is the deodorant. It has quite a strong scent (nicely so) and I get many compliments on it. Not something you can say about the majority of aerosol deodorants from Boots.
Finally the cleanser - for me, the most important product. I bought this Mario Badescu cleanser prior to getting in to Aesop, and I am almost at the end of it so I think I will switch to Aesop, purely in an effort to use only natural products. This cleanser has been very good though, helping to clear my skin quite a lot and balance the overall tone which makes such a huge difference.

As I said, I love, love, love buying skin and hair products, but I absolutely hate having a whole pile of things that don't work and I won't ever use. Its just so wasteful. And while I get bored and want to try the newest things, what is the point if you have already found a formula that works?

What are you skincare essentials?

Fresh Start

Welcome to my new blog! I have moved over from http://missmollcherie.blogspot.com/ It was going in a direction I wasn't happy with so I wanted to start an entirely new blog with more thought and originality put in to it. It will follow a similar theme though, based around the 4 - 5 piece French wardrobe, but rather than a dispassionate list of things I have bought, it will be a more focused analysis of why these purchases are (hopefully) right. This should  help keep me on the right track. The blog will also have the things that aspire me and photos I take.