P(retty)H(ot)A(nd)T(empting) files

FACT - Fashion is not fair to plus sized women, fashion does not even acknowledge them. Plus size women often have to shop from average catalogues unless you are Beth Ditto. Lead singer of The Gossip, Ditto was voted the the coolest person in rock in 2006 by NME magazine.

She is a pioneer, rebel, musician, feminist and style iconoclast. She does not shave her armpits and is currently dating a transsexual. Beth Ditto is a true punk, naturally she is not the first punk nor will she be the last but what is particularly striking about her (apart from her style) is her personality. Ditto is from a small rural town in Arkansas, her family used to hunt for their food, eat squirrels and she has certainly come a long way from that. Ditto has an amazing voice and gossip's first single was a hit.

I love her choice of clothes, I feel fashion makes plus size girls go for over 'sensible' options e.g. empire line clothes. Beth Ditto evidently does not adhere to these safer Iwanttohidemybodyoptions

You may look at some of her outfits and think okay this is a little over the top but she is a punk, it is almost a crime to look normal and to be honest I would hate to see her in a t-shirt and jeans - it defeats the purpose.

I particularly love her combination of colour, when she goes for colour she really goes for it, you will probably find every colour under the sun on just one outfit. Most designers love her and she often gets sent custom-made pieces from Karl Lagerfeld to Christopher Kane.

In regards to beauty, I do declare Miss Ditto is mighty fine in my eyes, perhaps I am exaggerating a little but she is definitely cute and very striking. I love her jet black hair which contrasts well with her porcelain skin. Her hair cut is always short, never longer than her shoulders. She keeps things pretty simple, her make-up is never too heavy, just black eye-liner and red lipstick.

Apart from the clothes, I adore her attitude, she is not always this wild crazy, edgy chick she also knows how to tone it down. Punks can be classy too, not often but it happens.

Apart from her immense, talent, attitude and style, I think her plus size makes her unique. She is a high-fashion alternative style icon, Period

R - Pattio

Unless you have been living under a rock somewhere you must be familiar with name Robert Pattinson, if you have he is the star of teen romance film twilight. Dubbed as the future of Hollywood, perhaps the press may be going over-board as per usual. To put it in perspective he is just a good looking boy who is fortunate enough to have been in a popular film. He was also Cedric Diggory in Harry Potter but I did not really think anything of him till I saw the trailers of Twilight. I must admit I have not seen the film yet but I am not here to analyze his acting skills. I am here to share the beauty that is R - Pattio. He used to be the face of Hackett.

He is now on the front page of the US edition of GQ. Woop woop. Off duty his style is quite scruffy, he wears a lot of plaid, beanies and Dr Marten boots - I wouldn't call him a style icon but his look is not half bad.

I love the GQ photos it is so reminiscent of early Johnny Depp, mixed with a dash of British classicism and you get R - Pattio. Kudos to the photographer and stylist because he looks great in the photos. There is a real maturity and fierceness about them.

Apart from the Twilight shiz, homeboy will be playing Salvador Dali in Little Ashes. He sings, he acts, he writes. I wish him luck only because I want to see more of him.

Happy Birthday Barb!

Barbie is 50 this month and looks about 16. She also teamed up with MAC for a special edition make up collection. She has starred in several films, need I say more?

Okay, she may not be going grey anytime soon but she is facing tremendous woe. She has been accused of promoting anorexia and her sales plunged 21 percent in the last quarter of 2008, and for seven years she has had to deal with Bratz, her nemesis that is hot on her heels. Most devastatingly she divorced Ken or Ken divorced her! Who cares, they were meant to be together forever.

In all seriousness, I think it is accurate to say that she was every little girl's first style icon. I hate generalizing, she was my first style and beauty icon. For 50 years Barbie has managed to evolve with the times. She may be looking at a bleak future but she has had a good enough run. Happy Birthday, may you continue to give little girls unrealistic standards of beauty to live up to. Only joking, well not really. ;-)

Hey Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

It is good to be back to civilisation, I am sure iheart told you that an evil monster called the Nigerian government banished me to the wilderness for 3 weeks but I am back. Yes, indeed HALSTON IS WELL AND TRULY BACK

So not too long ago I gave you a bit of a rundown from GQ's best dressed list and I thought it wise to expand on it a little bit. Particularly Andre 3000, I wanted to show you some pieces from Andre 3000's clothing line - Benjamin Bixby.

I am not always a fan of celebrity clothing lines but I love his entire collection, it really is an extension of him. It is bright, colourful, cheerful, dapper, smart and fun. I also like the fact that it does not have big fat 'benjamin bixby' logos printed all over his pieces.

It has strong 70's and 80's influences, it is edgy and preppy all at the same time which may strike one as a contradiction but yet again this is Andre 3000. He is a hip-hopping/rapper/singing vegan. You will find polo shirts, khaki trousers, tweed suits, college sweaters and leather riding boots.

Sadly word on the catwalks is that his line is in trouble because of the recession. Mr 3000 is heavily involved in sourcing his fabrics which are rather pricey. It is great that he strives for high quality pieces but I think celebrity clothing lines should start small and affordable and then if they have a big following then they can start subtly increase the prices. You can find some of his stuff at Barney's the prices range from $95 - $695. If you can afford it why not?

In fact I am going to tell my mythical boyfriend to buy it right this second

jonesing for jeans..

forgive me readers, for i have sinned. it's been one week since my last update...

in the time between, i have embarked on a quest for the perfect pair(s) of jeans. 

my jeans never fit!!! and i do not know why. the size tens get up to my thighs and get stuck going upward, and the size twelves go past the thighs comfortably but are way too big around the bum area.

so i googled designer jeans:

:7 for all mankind

:sass&bide

but the saggy bum area was not encouraging. i like my jeans to mold, dangit!

and then there were these:

:by nudie,

and these:

:by Deola Sagoe

which looked about perfect but the question still remained, how do i get them to look like that on me??

help, people?

ps: for the 7 for all mankind, Sass&Bide and Nudie pairs, go here

      for the (award winning) Deola Sagoe ones, visit her website

try this on for size

Online shopping - the most torturous of excercises - fueled my craving for clothing, as usual.

first up, i happened upon this transparent neck/shoulder dress by Marc Jacobs:

i love the loose fit, and i especially love the transparency... so much fun to play around with!

[even tho i must add that i do not like this model in the dress for some reason, and i think it has something to do with her hair...]

and then i came across a picture of the recently battered Riri in a pair of the hottest knee-length cut out Margiella boots:

*swooooooon!!*

well, i immediately found a pair of Peacock boots similar in style and on offer for only 18pounds here (you can thank me with a size 7 pair - sold out, of course.)

view the mini-magnificence on the right of the original Margielas...

and then i thought, how cuuuuuute is this sequined purse!!

Also by Marc Jacobs.

...And, what if, we paired the cute transparent dress with this gorgeous pendant and necklace:

Heart shaped pendant by Loewe; Pearl drop necklace by  Links of London.

and these gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous pieces of jewellry:
  

Ring by Gurhan; Bracelet by Armita Singh.

And then i saw this wrist watch... swoooooooooon!!!

i love large, manly wrist watches, and so there's nothing better than a large, manly-looking wrist watch designed for the feminine hand... and while this might look much smaller in reality i like to imagine it as a huge, chunky, diamond encrusted wrist watch by Technomarine....

And after Seventy days minutes of surfing and styling, i looked upon my work and i was pleased ;)

*for most of these items, hurry over to Gilt Groupe before they're gone!!

corperal duty; and i love that bootie!

i've been a one-man blogging-band on this page for a while now, due to halston's absence at boot camp in mandatory service to her country.

in the same vein, Vicky Becks gave her loyal fashion and gossip bloggers a view of what men in uniform should really look like, in what has since been deemed a fashion faux pas:

The hat and jacket are both by Loewe, and i personally loved the look. she played dress up and looked fabulous in it. some call it OTT, i call it Vicky-B!

she wore the same hat on the cover of russian vogue earlier this year and looked smoking hot while at under it!

Maybe it's all the talk of boot camp around me lately, but i have since fallen in love anew with booties - and no, not booties of the back side variety.

first up, these gorgeous booties by this upcoming designer i only recently stumbled upon, lost not lonely. 

i love the dusty brown and the olive green, and the orange, gold and pewter... i love how the colours clash and almost appear not to fit together - but they do! and the shoes look fab.

now, i generally prefer the open-toed booties but these Phillip Lim ones i find so hot! the lace detail is what really does it for me; it almost looks like someone wearing basic black stilleto platforms with lacy tights. 

i really like the way it's presented here with the model actually wearing lacy tights with the shoes. so creative. love!

so i was looking through the Tory Burch collection on sale at Gilt Groupe and while i could appreciate the preppy influence in the shoe designs, it was the most unpreppy ones - above - that really caught my eye. what do you think?

these Gold Report ones are a tad too cutesie and gold for my personal tastes, but i think with dark blue/black skinny jeans and minimal accessorising they'd easily make an amazing complement to a simple outfit.

Donna Karen.

the snakeskin is beautiful, the colour i love, and the cutout detail adds that little extra something that makes this such a cool bootie.

this one not everybody will be crazy about, but i love the colours and the bejewelled detail, which also runs along the heel... 

Before you turn up your nostrils at my eccentric fabulous choice of boot wear, i give you this:

by david kroell.

people, are clogs really back????? oh say it isn't so!!!

i'm scared of the 'body con' dress

Fashion designers constantly come up with clothing items that drive women to not drink - or eat, for that matter. But with the return of the eighties i celebrated a liberation from all things form-fitting, what with the assymetric, loose-fitting, funky, retro styles that had been unearthed and deemed cool again. 

And then colours became cool again, and who doesn't love a splash of yellow or red, or electric blue here and there to brighten up a boring skirt or an old oversized t-shirt? And then plaid (aka check/lumberjack/ghana-must-go pattern/burberry pattern in different colours), which i was admittedly sceptical about at first but now adore... ...

Alas, my excitement was short-sighted, as i had allowed myself to forget about the other half of this flashback fashion fest, the one where skinny was normal, when disco was a genre of music and women attempted to choke themselves with their own clothes to celebrate it.

The era of the body-hugging mini dress.

I don't know what they called it then, but the noughties interpretation involves bandage-like strips of cloth wrapped mummy-like tightly around the subject until it looks like they'd need a pipe to breathe - Not to mention layers and layers of spanx!! I present to you, the Body-Con.

When i see this dress, i think muffin tops, handle bars, and Oversize. Sexy never was this difficult!

first up, a model for Emilio Pucci. Looks effortless eh? well look closer - now do you see that her entire body spans approximately 10 inches in circumference??

here, teen sensation Amanda Bynes in a Herve Leger bandage dress and Vicky Becks the Great in Barbella.

i wonder how many meals you need to skip to look like this...

left, a model in a gorgeous blue Ali Ro one

right, a pretty pink one from Wolford.

Hayden Panettiere, the cheerleader herself, rocking the trend.

Maybe if i suck in my tummy and wrap actual bandages around myself before attempting to i might just fit... 

both fabulous dresses are by Jane Norman.

(the mummy is courtesy google images.)

I guess until i'm willing to make a home for myself beside a treadmill it's look but don't touch for me on this trend...