The most important thing to happen to Blogging this year?

Hi guys,
There are two things I look for when I'm reading a blog (and deciding to keep coming back again and again) Interesting content and great pictures. Now having the latter will be infinitely easier, thanks to Getty's announcement today that they are making the full spectrum of their images free to use for bloggers and other non commercial users. This is HUGE! In fact, I'm going to call it the most important thing to happen to blogging this year (Yes, I know it's only March)

All you have to do is visit the Getty website and find the image you want to use, then when you use the new Getty embed tool you can add that image to your site completely free. Because Getty is home to tens and millions of different images, this will be a complete game changer for bloggers: particularly celebrity and fashion bloggers that rely on instant access to relevant imagery to enhance their content! To prove the point, I've illustrated this post with a couple of images of some famous folks arriving on the red carpet for the Oscars on Sunday night.


As an additional note, I'm sure it takes hours to look that effortlessly beautiful, but Naomi Watts is my new beauty icon based solely on how incredible her make up looks in this picture! Embedded images will include photographer attribution and, when clicked, will link back to www.gettyimages.com where the image can be licensed for commercial use.(You can click it and see for yourself if you like!)

Of course, many blogs are using images that originated from Getty on their sites already: it's easy to find the image you're looking for on google, and simply modify it and add it to your site yourself. But such practices are not only illegal (although there is yet to be a case of an unpaid blogger being taken to court for doing so) they are also making it much harder for the average photographer to scratch a living, thanks to the onset of fast and accessible digital images. This new tool is at least an attempt to readdress that balance. To try the tool out for yourself, please visit www.gettyimages.com/embed That's what I did, and I couldn't believe how easy and quick it was to do! Like I said, it's a complete game changer! Will you be using Getty's free images on your blog?

Love Tor x

What's new in TK Maxx this Autumn/Winter?

Hi guys,
Last week I was invited along to TK Maxx's bloggers dinner, where they showcased all the trends and key pieces we'll all be able to find instore for Autumn/Winter this year.

You guys know I have a lot of love for TK Maxx. My inner bargain hunter just can't resist a rummage through their rails, and the Gold Label section is like a designer treasure trove! But I think a lot of people are mistaken and think that TK Maxx is nothing but last season's designer clobber: Actually, they also have a mountain of on-trend new season fashions, and their buyers always cherry pick the best pieces available. Yup. I'm not afraid to admit that I love TK Maxx! Which is why it really wasn't hard to pick out my favourite pieces from their Autumn/Winter collections:

Blue coat with fur collar and cuffs, £69.99. RRP £195
Green tweed coat with fur collar and cuffs, £99. RRP £450.
Glitter heels, £19.99
Tan and leopard print bag, £69.99
Sequin jacket with bow tie, £49.99. RRP £149.99
Sunglasses, £49.99

The key trends TK Maxx are championing for this season are: Folklore, English Heritage, Pastels, Modernist, Bourgeois, Empress, and Military. It's the heritage-style tweed coats that I'm most in love with: my coat obsession is well-documented. And there is a checked Moschino coat on their website that I have my eyes firmly planted on! Looking at all of the gorgeous TK Maxx campaign images (full of wonderful coats) only makes me wish that I could wrap up warm and see my breath when I walk through crisp fresh snow. Bring on the cold and frosty mornings:




By the way - Have you seen the new TK Maxx advert on TV yet? I love it, I think it's great! Apparently TKMaxx didn't cast models for the ad; everyone that appears is a 'real person'. And the super-cool woman in the green coat and turban? (AKA the woman I want to be when I reach my dotage) is 76 years old!

What do you think of TK Maxx? Is it a place you shop? And have you picked up any amazing bargains instore recently?

Love Tor xx

Blog challenge: My yummy new Sarenza shoes!

You guys know how I feel about shoes: I sometimes think addict isn't a strong enough word! So you can imagine how delighted I was when Sarenza approached me and asked if I would like to take part in their bloggers challenge: the winner gets a shopping weekend in Paris and taking part in the challenge meant I would have to choose some shoes for them to send me. How could I say no?!

Well my shoes arrived last week, and I couldn't be more pleased. I couldn't decide whether to opt for sensible flats (I was torn between some lovely gladiators and a crazy pair of cowboy boots) but in the end my head was turned by the slightly less sensible sight of these snake skin wedges.

The shoes are from the Sarenza continental fashion findings collection: over 50 brands from all over Europe gathered together in one place including Paul and Joe sister, Miss Sixty, and Art. My lovely pair are from French brand Cosmo. I'd never heard of them before but I love their mix of colour and texture on both sensible flats and glam heels. When I saw these wedges I immediately thought of 50 outfits in my wardrobe they would look great with.

Ah the joys of the frowny self-taken photograph at 7am, not knowing what to do with my arms, and the pasty-white British winter legs! I am slightly in love with my dress and tulle skirted mac from the Topshop sale though.

And now on to the blogger challenge part of our programme: At the beginning of next month, the pics of me showing off in my new shoes will go onto the Sarenza blog .You'll be able to vote for me (and my excellent taste in shoes) and help me win that trip to Paris: once again, Fabfrocks needs you! (although of course i'll remind you all of that nearer the time!)

Love, Tor xx

Spring Clean and Revamp!

Hey guys,

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Although the blog had a mini revamp at the beginning of June (to make the colour scheme match the YourLondonStylist one) i've decided to revamp it again. And this time get it right!
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Mostly, I want it to look cleaner and tidier, and for the reading pane to be larger, enabling me to upload larger images. I am also toying with adding a second reading pane to highlight key content, but we'll have to take this one step at a time! The work will begin this weekend, so bear with me if it looks off kilter whilst i'm working on it; hopefully it won't be for long, and I will still be posting!
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In preparation for this (and because I haven't done it for almost a year!) I will be tidying up the blogroll, and finally adding all the extra blogs I now read, but haven't gotten round to adding!
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If you haven't posted for the past 10 weeks then your blog link will be removed (unless you get in touch!) And if i'm not linking to you but you'd like me to then just get in touch, either in the comments below, or email me!
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Thanks guys!
Tor x

you know you want to know......

I don't do it very often (chortle!) but today I decided to jump on a bandwagon! All over the bloggosphere lovely fashion bloggers have been doing "ask me anything" Q&A type posts (Susie Bubbles in particular had me in giggles!) hell, you know its a trend when Catwalkqueen give it a go! (God love 'em!)


Never one to miss a trend, the disaster I had with the star print thing surely still being evidence and fresh on everyones minds, I thought this would be a fun thing to do!


So to start this thing off I'll answer 3 questions that I get asked all the time, and then if you leave me questions in the comments box or drop me an email, I promise i'll answer all of them (as long as they aren't perverse or grossly innapropriate, of course!!)

So, big inhalation, and here goes:

1. So, is this blogging malarky a fulltime thing or do you have a proper job as well?
I put this one first because its the kind of question I get asked by parents, friends parents, friends, and almost everybody all the time!
Firstly if this was a fulltime thing, the posts would be more frequent! No, the blog is just a hobby (and love!) but I do have a "proper job" as well. I work as a senior web editor for an engineering charity: not fashiony at all then, but when you finish uni for the second time with double the debt, you have to do something! One day I would love to make fashion writing of some kind a fulltime career move (me and every second girl in the country, I know!) but for now i'm happy writing my little blog.

2. Who is your favourite designer?

I think this is a stupidly hard question because I change my mind so much! Also, i'm not really ever obsessed with one designer for very long, more because I like different trends and so I like different pieces from lots of collections. I love Betsey Johnson (as I know I write all the time and it must get boring) but I find everything she does really young and fresh and quirky; all her collections have a Japanese "fruits" style which was what really started my obsession with fashion in the first place, and whenever I buy something of hers I feel like a happier more grown up version of the teenage me. I also love Vivienne Westwood; the way she cuts and drapes is amazing and her clothes fit to boobs and hips and curves beautifully. Oh, and does Primark count as a designer? (JOKE...or is it....!)

3. If you had to leave the house naked except for one thing, what would it be?
Have you ever heard the phrase "all fur coat and no knickers"? (or is that just something my nan says?) Well anyway, that would be me! I love fur (faux of course!) and hate showing any of my flesh (even when I go on a night out, it's a thing) so the floor length fur jacket would cover everything. And of course, make me look like a movie star!!!


I look forward to answering your questions (which most of the time I find more interesting than the answers!) I hope you can come up with something better than I did!

Lots of love,

Tor

Running fashionable late!

OK, so when I said I would post this weekend I lied. I’m sorry I lied to you dear reader. I didn’t mean to. My weekend was filled with movies, over indulgence and Halloween costumes and I forgot all about you. My bad.

But I’m back now, and I am ready to talk about parties. Oh yes.

Firstly, because I made a ruddy great fuss about the whole thing, here's what I wore:

And without the jacket (plus some rather disheveled hair) with the hilarious Dressed and Pressed:

The dress is from a stall on the east street market (it was only £20!) the lace top is from warehouse, I made the head band myself, and I went with curly hair and leather jacket. As you can see no doubt. Of course, I desparately want to show you Beckys fabulous outfit too, but I think her soul might weep if I ruined the reveal. You'll have to wait, sadly. As did I.

The event was blogger heaven with folks like disneyrollergirl, the recently renamed make do, and the above mentioned dresses and pressed in attendance, and everyone was uber friendly and cool (in a non-intimidating way, thank god!) The combo of free vodka and fabulous vintage dresses, hats, shoes, and anything you wished you had in your dressing up box when you were a kid was intoxicating. It was a feast for the eyes. Never before have I seen so many people dressed so imaginatively all in the same room. But don't take my word for it. Here is the photo evidence (which sprinklings of dressing-up box Tor and Becky to stroke my vanity of course!):

I think I can safely say a good night was had by all.

Much love,

Tor x