A New Look

A 'New Look' for Fanantique

If you've been following along for a while, you'll know that the past year has brought about some massive changes and both my business, 'Fanantique' and my career as an illustrator have been somewhat neglected.

Now that things are slowly starting to get back on track, I have put some time into re-branding everything and am trying to consolidate everything I do into one cohesive identity . It is not easy!

To gather inspiration, I looked over both the current Fanantique and Lizzie Lamb branding; logo design, fonts, colours along with some of my favorite images and promotional graphics created.

 

 Above: The Current Fanantique logo & colours

Below: An advertising image created for a sale

(photography by Rob Luxford of Vivid )

My very favorite Fanantique image is this one below, of the gorgeous Anna Boulic in this fabulous 1950's dress. I am sure you have seen this image around the place on the Fanantique website and facebook page.

While having a think about all this, I spotted an image I had hanging above my desk and drew a quick interpretive sketch of it.

I then scanned the image and had a play with it in Adobe illustrator, adding some color and tweaking the design. (I'm thinking about trying to upload a tutorial soon)

below: The iconic image that inspired me, Dior's 1947 New Look

This rough sketch was scanned and then colour shading and pattern added to create the below drawing.

I was pretty happy with the image, so used it as my starting point to create my new business card (I love polka dots!) I just got the cards back from the printer and they turned out well. I actually went with rounded corners and they turned out great.

French Flowers

Last week we held our Spring Fashion workshop which was co-hosted by the lovely Ms Candice DeVille and milliner extraordinaire, Peter Jago. We were joined by a lovely group of ladies and everyone left looking very glamorous indeed, newly armed with some new tips and techniques to try.

just some of the lovely ladies that attended our event

However, the lead up to the event was not as smooth as I would have liked, with my order of hats not arriving in time. As you know Spring time in Melbourne is all about hats, so this was a cause of great anxiety for me. Never the less, the show had to go on. Luckily, I am a hoarder by nature and have long been hanging onto a collection of fabulous vintage millinery supplies, so I pulled some out of my collection to use for the day. Peter did an 'on the spot' demonstration and created this gorgeous headpiece in minutes using a combination of vintage velvet leaves from my collection and gorgeous fresh roses.

Looking at how gorgeous this is, it has inspired me to go through my collection, sort it out and share it.
I have decided it is a shame to have these things sitting in boxes when the could be made into something gorgeous like this!
I do have my work cut out for me though!

A pile of flowers that need sorting!

Some gorgeous wire edged French ribbon, just wait until you see the rest of the collection!

Now because it is Friday it would be unlike me not to list a cocktail, but today for a change I am drinking a glass of Rose´ . It is often an underrated drink of choice but on a nice sunny day like today, when Spring is really in the air and the sun is shining I think it is the perfect choice (besides I love the colour!) so cheers!

Saint Patrick's Day

As you probably know tomorrow (The 17th March) is St Patrick's Day. 

St Patrick's Day is a time to let the imagination free to enjoy legendary Irish superstitions. (It doesn't really matter whether you are really Irish or not). Like most Australians,  I do have some Irish blood so this gives me a better excuse to celebrate. I have been thinking of some fun decorating that I could do to celebrate and remembered these cute green vintage jars. For the sake of the photo, they have green hydrangea stems, but I am planning to pick bunches of fresh clover to place in them. I think that will look cute!

The image above is from Martha Stewart and shows various types of shamrocks simply planted and growing in pots. This is perfect for a St Patrick's Day decor accent, but I am thinking about introducing this to my front porch all year round. (I think even I could manage to keep these pot plants alive!)

 

These cute green cupcakes pictured above can be found at 'bakerella.com' (there are some fantastic ideas here) last year I found some of these cute candy shamrocks at the supermarket. They make a very easy and fun cake decoration!

This image below is also from Martha Stewart. A four leaf clover is tucked into a grooms chest pocket for luck.

 

Of course, we all would like a little extra good luck to come our way......wearing green on St Patrick's Day is a good way to encourage it. I have this gorgeous green feather collar that I bought on a whim once and have not yet worn......I think it will be perfect for 'St Pats' !

Of course, It would not be much of a 'St Patrick's Day if there weren't drinks. You could have a green guinness, but I think these cocktails are much more elegant!

St Patrick's Day

cocktail glass

22ml Green Creme de Menthe

15ml IrishWhiskey

Dash Angostura bitters

Shake ingredients with ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

Irish Rose

cocktail glass

45ml Irish Whiskey

22ml lemon juice

2 tsp grenadine

Shake ingredients with ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

Vintage Style at the Oscars

I always love to watch the Oscars to look at the fabulous and sometimes, not so fabulous dresses. This year I think overall there were more people that got it right than really wrong. Most of the looks  captured old  Hollywood glamor and thankfully it seemed like it wasn't just all about flaunting clevage!

But also, from what I have seen, it seems many of the looks were quite conservative and there was not one ensemble in particular that was a real stand out.

As co-host, Anne Hathaway had several wardrobe changes. I thought this Vintage red Valentino looked stunning on her. Pictured here with Valentino himself.

Of course I love the look of this 1950's inspired dress by Marchesa, worn by Hailee Steinfeld. Many fashion commentators suggested that this 'ballerina' style was inspired by 'Black Swan' and the whole ballerina theme. (There were on awful lot of feathers on the red carpet this year)

 Marisa Tomei also dressed in vintage couture, this gown by Charles James from Lily et Cie Couture.
(I love the ink colour)

 'Our Nicole' dressed in Dior Haute Couture (what could be more classic than that?)  Not many critics seemed to like this dress, but I quite like it. (I must admit I wasn't a fan of the hair, she had a pony tail at the back!)

I do always love to check out what Helena Bonham Carter wears because she is usually the most interesting and has a particular fondness for Vivienne Westwood. This year, I thought she was quite conservative too, opting for an elegant black velvet piece by Colleen Atwood. Shown below with partner Tim Burton- great to see his Film 'Alice in Wonderland', get an award for best costume!

Not to be disappointed, I did see some Westwood on the red carpet. Worn by Helen Mirren, who I think did a fabulous job presenting with Russel Brand!

Images from style.com

Weddings, Parties, Anything

As you may have known, I recently became engaged and since then have just been loving looking at and discovering some amazing wedding blogs, magazines and other sources of inspiration. Admittedly, I had always looked at this sort of thing anyway, not because I am a tragic 'Muriel' type longing to get married, but because there are so many great ideas for decorating and design, not just suitable for a wedding but wonderful for any occasion or even for no occasion all.
Firstly, I must say that there are also many awful wedding mags and sites out there too .... I even came across a site that was selling replica dresses modeled off the one worn in the movie "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" (seriously)

As my partner and I are opting for a small, simple wedding in a small village in Hungary (yes really),
I will not be able to use very many of my grand ideas , (which is fine I just enjoy the creative process).
Another 'problem' of the small wedding abroad is that not many family friends and relatives will be able to attend. Instead of the big wedding, we have decided to have an engagement party so that the family and friends that can not travel to the wedding can celebrate with us. To keep it casual we are planning a garden party (held in my parent's garden).
The event is coming up soon, and hopefully I will get some nice photos to post. In the meantime, here are some lovely images that inspired the theme of our event and a mention of some great sites, worth a look not just for Wedding stuff...but all sorts of inspiration for any kind of party and everyday life too.

These beautiful images below are from thesweetestoccasion.com. I love the combination of soft pastel colored flowers and vintage bottles. I like the idea of the look being simple with a random feel to it.
(I don't usually like anything to neat or ordered when it comes to flowers)

Pictured below: paper lanterns suspended in trees. I love this idea for an elegant alternative to balloons.
Lanterns are more 'grown up' than balloons and suspended from trees create a fun, whimsical mood. I found these polka dot paper lanterns at pinkfrosting.com.au. I ordered some of these in various colors and used them as a starting point for the theme that will tie the event together. I created invitations to match and there will also be other decorations to compliment along with some color coordinated food!

If you are planning an event, you can't go past Martha Stewart. The magazines are usually brilliant. (I highly recommend the 'Martha Stewart Living' Halloween and Christmas editions ) but most of what  appears in the mags end up on her website anyway, marthastewart.com. Her creative team are amazing
and there are some fantastic ideas on this site. Of course she has a "Martha Stewart Weddings" section too. These invitations shown below are from the site and caught my eye because they match my theme.

This amazing piece below is a gorgeous 'save the date' card that I found on a cute blog called 'Little Winter Bride' there are some gorgeous ideas here. The author has a penchant for vintage style and again many of the ideas shown here do not necessarily have to be employed for a wedding.

Not that I am ready to start thinking about the dress and all that yet, but how gorgeous is this 1950's style wedding shown below??!!!! The bride and all the bridesmaids are wearing original vintage dresses (modified a little to fit). These gorgeous pictures are from a lovely site , called Polka Dot bride. (www.polkadotbride.com)
It is lovely because the weddings featured all have a unique twist, but still hold onto some tradition (ie they still look like weddings)

The image below is from a site that I admit I am now addicted to. "Offbeatbride.com' has some incredible photos of real weddings on it (no white pouffy dresses here!). As the name suggests this is a site for alternative weddings, there are many that are really out there, but there are some that are classic with a unique twist. There are heaps of great ideas here, from decorating to graphic design and food, so many of these ideas would be great for all sorts of occasions.

 

Below is a rough illustration that I did while working on the invitation for our party. I featured the croquet mallet as we are planning on having yard games for our guests. We just need to keep our fingers crossed for some nice weather! Below that is the design that I ended up going with. I ended up going with a simple watercolor printed onto one side of a postcard with the event details on the reverse. Sent in a sunshine yellow envelope, it created a light happy feel.

Lady Bugs and Bees and Happy Champagne Friday!

This week at Fanantique we have had a very strange week indeed. Earlier in the week we had a swarm of bees (...yes bees!) decide to come and sit in front of the shop. They looked like they were waiting for coffee...or maybe they heard about Champagne Friday and wanted a free drink. They were out of luck as it was only Monday.....

As you can imagine, they scared away anyone wanting to visit Fanantique or Angelo at Il Caminetto next door. Thankfully, there is such a thing as an 'emergency bee service' (you learn something everyday) and the lovely Dr Nikolai came and rescued the bees. He was most impressed and said this was quite unusual. 

Amazing! The bees had a strange attraction to this chair, at first I though maybe the pattern. Emma of Fleurage had a much better explanation. She suspected that someone (not naming any names) may have spilled wine or Champagne on the chair causing the bees to be attracted to the sweet fruity aroma. This made much more sense......

 Dr Nikolai as he starts to relocate the bees. He is not even wearing any protective clothing!
(he did put on his special bee keeper hat later). He was such a lovely fellow, he even gave me a jar of honey! (I will make my Champagne Friday cocktail with it).

Inspired by my experience with bees, I thought I would share our insect inspired collection of vintage dresses with you today. These pieces are from the range we titled "Lady Bug"

And now for our Honey Bee Cocktail...

Honey Bee

2 oz dark rum
1/2 oz lemon juice
1/4 oz honey

pour the rum, honey and lemon juice into a cocktail shaker over ice cubes and shake well. Strain into a chilled glass and serve.

Spring Fashion Extravaganza, hosted by Fleurage Perfumery.

Part 1- "Ice Cream Cake"

My apologies for my long absence from the blog, but now I can finally share with you what I have been working on for the last month. Fanantique together with Fleurage presented our first Spring Fashion event, and what an event it was.
There are too many gorgeous images and too much to tell all at once, so over the next few posts I will show you everything. Firstly, I must credit Rob Luxford of Vivid Communications, for all of the professional photography. It's stunning! A big thank you also to our gorgeous models, Adrain of Delilah Hair studio (to find out more about Delilah click here) and to Rebecca of Beyond Andromeda for the beautiful make-up. The stylish hats are all by Ann Shoebridge (excluding a few pieces that are vintage)
To see more gorgeous images and a wonderful overview of the afternoon, please visit the Fleurage blog by clicking here . Emma, sums up the whole event wonderfully.
Set to the romantic sounds of Anna Boulic playing Harp and serenading the audience in French, our show commenced with our 'Ice Cream Cake' collection. Delicious shades of sorbet, the very essence of spring. To compliment this ,  Fleurage coordinated a signature fragrance to each ensemble.....Spring was definitely in the air!
Coming soon, our next collection, 'Hello Sailor'

Here are our gorgeous girls backstage before the show started, what a marvelous job they all did!

Welcome Spring

 Spring has Sprung!

After a really long Winter, Spring is finally here...although it doesn't really feel like it yet. I never thought I'd get sick of my favorite boots but I am. I'm ready for strappy shoes, longer nights, walks on the beach and of course refreshing cocktails.
With the arrival of Spring last week, things have really gotten busier, (hence the recent blog neglect) all of a sudden, so much has happened! Two of my dear friends have just become mothers for the first time. Welcome to the world, little Elle Angelina and little Elliot Joseph! Another dear friend, Emma of Fleurage Perfumery, has celebrated her fortieth birthday..in complete style I might add, with a 'Paris Bohemia' themed party (for more on that, and to visit a fabulous perfume blog click here)
And of course there was fashion week. A highlight of this was the fabulous Chitra's Spring Collection. This image from Style Melbourne, to see the full story click here.

Chitra is my favorite Melbourne Designer and I am lucky enough to have worked with her on several occasions....I am currently working on an illustration for another one of her upcoming shows.

Of course right now I am busily working away on Fanantique's Spring  Event which is coming up very soon, I am busily unpacking crinolines, organizing gloves, flowers shoes and more.
I am very lucky and excited to be working with a great team of creative people, hair stylists, make-up artists, musicians and performers who I look forward to telling you more about soon.

For now, here is a sneek peek at a few of the lovely vintage Spring dresses that will be featured in the show.

If you are in Melbourne and would like to attend our Spring Show please contact me via the contact form on the website www.fanantique.com.au and I will send you an invitation.