suite 200 on forest hill

So what have I been doing the last week or so that prevented me from blogging? Well, frankly, extremely glamorous things like mopping around the house avoiding the heat, eating unimaginable amounts of carbs and sleeping in late causing permanent bedhead.

But between my obviously busy schedule, I've managed to make a couple of treks downtown and to my local mall to rummage through some vintage clothing stores (bought nothing), get some back to school clothes and wax my bushy brows (hurt like a b***ch!).

Did I mention that I've spent so much time working at the pool that my hair has been bleached a different colour? Old friends that I havn't seen in awhile have asked me whether I've dyed it or not. Gr, will have to dye it pitch black before school, which is quite ridiculous as I would only be dying it back to its original colour!

I'm also thinking of cutting my hair short. Like, BOY short. Think Agyness Deyn. I know I know, but I've painfully bored with long hair and maintaining it just takes up too much time. I've been with this short hair idea for a long time now, should I get it cut? Leave comments below!

Gonna go now before anyone realises that I'm only posting a crazy long post to hide the fact that I don't have any new pics to post.

-jess

night after ten hours of guarding....

So a quick update on the previous post, of the DIY braided shirt. This is just simply how it looks like when worn. Sorry, I will return with a longer and much better post soon, but as the post title says: I've been working for basically the whole day. So, extremely tired right now. See you guys soon!

-jess

DIY Braided Shirt

Just the other day I came across a youtube video (here) that taught you how to make a ripped braiding effect on your t-shirts. Now, I have an abundance of musty old t-shirts murking around the back of my closet and stuff into the bottomless depths of my drawers. So I thought I might as well try and revamp some of them with this braiding technique, and was very pleasantly surprised at how it turned out. You gotta go to read to the very end to see the results! Here goes:

You will need: Tshirt, sharp kitchen knife, scissors, pen, string&needle and a ruler.

Find any old t-shirt that you wouldn't mind screwing up, place it flat on a flat surface. Front or back depends on where you want the braid to be on. Lay a ruler horizontally/diagonally/vertically, whatever you like, on the tshirt and draw out a line.

Draw out inch increments along the line.

This is what it should look like after you're done.

Now draw out two-three inch increments in between the on inch increments.

This is what it should look like when you're done

Like so.

If you have really sharp scissors, then go ahead and use those to poke holes on the top of the lines. I didn't so I used a sharp kitchen knife instead to poke holes on the top of the increments. I poked the holes because it is so much easier to slip scissors into the holes and begin cutting.

Cut along the lines! (Reminds you of kindergarten doesn't it? Happier times....ahaha)

The shirt should look like this after you've cut them up. Rather skeletal isn't it?

Close up!

Now to begin braiding: loop the second increment into and out of the first increment.

Then loop the third increment into and out of the second increment.

So on and so forth.... This part of the braiding process is extremely hard to explain and I'm afraid I've explained it in vain. So I strongly suggest you go see the video to be sure.

This is what the braids should look like. Resembles more of a ladder at this point though....

I love close ups!

Now, using a string that is close to the colour of your shirt (or something compatible), string it into the eye of the needle and tie the ends together.

Loop the last increment onto the end of the braid. Hold it in place with two fingers like so ^.

Sew together! I think I did a cross stitch on this, but you don't have to do any fancy needlework. As long as it keeps the braid in place, it's good enough. Anyways, nobody's gonna go that close and inspect your craftsmanship.

Finished product!

I absolutely love the way it looks and the way it resembles a winding, diagonal spine running down my shirt! And the rips along the braided "spine" shows tons of skin, so that doesn't hurt either ;)

That's it, you're done! Simple right? You guys should definitely try this out, especially since it's so much more creative than just slashing your tshirts to make it looked ripped.

I will be wearing this shirt out, very soon, so I'll update and show you guys how it looks when it's worn!

-jess

P.S- Sorry for the darkness of the photos, I literally made this in the dark before midnight, with only a dying lamp and the flash on my camera to help me see.

In the Heatwave Behind Chinatown

Spent all of yesterday downtown, where I first hauled my ass down to pick up my passport and visa (will explain in a later post)in the morning. Then popped down to Queens street, after which I had gone completely bankrupt)

So shown here are some of my/our favourites shopping hunts in dt Toronto, excluding all the departmentalized stores. There's Kensington Market for all your accesorizing desires and need for silkscreened tees, all stamped with the likes of The Beatles to Agness Deyn. Unfortunately, I got there towards the end of the day, so much of the more interesting stalls were closed (ahem! Courage My Love)

Then, fighting against sweltering heat and hunger, we trudged to Ossington and Queens where Jonathan + Olivia and I Miss You are located. Now you may or may not know but Jonathan+Olivia carries the only TopShop line available in Toronto, so you can imagine my ecstasy when they announced their opening a couple of months ago. Sady, the three times I've been there, I've been disappointed. To begin with, the lack of variety and quantity of clothes is one thing, but also the rotation of it. The salesclerk keeps on promising that new and better things will come every two weeks, but I have yet to see anything that really made my eyes pop.

I Miss You on the otherhand, is definitely one of my favourites in DT Toronto. Even though I haven't bought anything there yet, the selection of vintage brand names there is very impressive and at an even more impressive price. The hold things ranging from Stella McCartney to Dior! I had seen a vintage Coach clasp bag, the classic ones without of the horrible C's slapped all over, but was rather indecisive as to whether I should buy it. I am flat broke, you see. Regretably, it was gone by the time I decided to go back and buy it yesterday. Ok, Lesson Learnt!

Beloved readers, you will be seeing and hearing more from me now that it's summer and I'm free from the clutches of school and other such obligations!

-jess

P.S- update on the website banner situation; I have a friend working on it so hopefully it'll be ready in another week. Can't wait to have a proper one, instead of the mundane typewriting uptop right now.

Casablanca Haus

I went to a Julian Casablancas concert this friday, at the Guvernment (Kool Haus). He's headlining his solo tour for his new album, Phrazes For The Young. He's of The Strokes fame, their vocalist and main songwriter. Indie rock and garage-rock revival based and extremely talented.

Had to venture all the way to Harbourfront.

I'm assuming The Guvernment is the major holding, and Kool Haus is the club/ concert venue part of it? I'm still confused as to whether Kool Haus is part of the Guvernment or just ajointed to it. Whatever it was, it took us forever to find it because the main building was all painted pitch black and I, being the idiot, completely missed the huge sign on top.

I don't know if I should laugh at the tackiness of the name or not...

First thing we noticed when we walked in was the sparsely decorated floor, with the pumbing and tubes still visible in the ceiling. After we became more comfortable to our surroundings, we tuned into the music that was playing. To be honest, I had absolutely no idea who or what band was playing over the speakers, but f**k me, they were good! My friend, M who went with me, and I were sorely tempted to ask staff for the songlist, but could barely see our hands infront of us through the darkness and occasional flash of strobe lights. But mostly because we were shy ;)

 

Maryam outside of the concert & me upon entry of said concert.

I wish I could say I knew the name of the band that opened for him, but I don't. Their music was along the same lines of The Strokes, the band that Julian Casablancas fronted, but just a tad too screamo for my tastes. Would've enjoyed the opening act a bit more if the five drunk college guys behind us hadn't yelled obscenities into the crowd and tried to boo them off the stage. They honestly weren't that bad, but the drunk dudes were probably too wasted to tell whats good and not.

                   

 Halfway through the opening act, i felt a disturbance behind me and when I looked around there was this girl on the floor, completely blacked out. She got up pretty quickly afterwards so I'm guessing she downed too much alcohol too fast and took a fall. It wasn't even 10 yet.

You probably can't tell because of the crappy lighting, but the guitarist was amazing, and it didn't hurt that he was cute.

They were on for about half an hour and then after they left, we waited another half hour for Casablancas' crew to set up. But, HOLY, when he did come out, the people went wild! Out of the blue dozens of lighters were whipped out of jeans pockets and lit into the air. From our vantage point, we could see a couple of girls jump out of the way of the lighters, probably because they were afiraid it would set their hair-spray laden hair on fire.

I of course, screamed my head off when he got on stage. He looks exactly like he does in interviews/music videos/ tv. Only difference was his stage persona was much less softspoken and swore like a criminal. But he was funny and friendly, teasing the crowd and cracking jokes.

Song: River of Brakelights

Song: Out of the Blue

11th Dimension, one of his New Wave-esque and first solo single, was the one song that really got the crowd started.

Hard to Explain, one of The Strokes song got everybody there to sing along; sounded so awesome live!

Him singing a much slower, mostly instrumental version of "You Only Live Once", my favourite song by The Strokes. Totally disappointed by this number, the bass and beat of the original song was all that was great about it; he butchered it by taking those out.

By the time we pushed past the crowd and stumbled our way out, I was euphorically high on the music and also partially deaf.  Got home late and realised that I had to be at work at 8am the next morning.  You wouldn't believe the amount of people fist-pumping the air; they just ended up lowering them down really awkwardly.

But whatever, seeing Julian Casablancas in person and listening to the Strokes songs live is totally worth the eyebags I woke up with. 

-jess