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M+S Nice and Easy.

M&S The Big Easy collection, M+S Press Event A/W 2016

The ‘Big Easy’ collection

When Mrs V attended the M&S press event held yesterday Thursday May 12, M&S’s autumn/winter 2016 collection was unveiled  to the fashion press. One segment of it will go on sale online and in 26 stores – six months earlier than it usually would. This means that at selected stores it is actually on sale right now. The “Big Easy” autumn trend, as M&S is calling it, offers us minimalist, transitional items and for that reason you should book at seat for it, front stalls, in your wardrobe. The Big Easy collection will ease that transition period when we say sayonara to summer and need treats to console us because winter is waving at us. The Model Edit has already developed profound feelings for the gorgeous black and white cropped Palazzo pants. Genius. The little black pinafore top that they’re teamed with offers the am/pm options that just makes life easier. And from the rest of the M&S A/W 2016 collection? Get your diaries out ladies, when it arrives in September it’ll be a sprint to the tills.

Watch this space lots more to come on this as my M&S crush develops into a full blown love affair. You didn’t see that coming, right?

A Scintilla of Style

 

The Model Edit is not just about what I’m wearing, but also very importantly to me, it’s about inspiring you to create similar looks from your own wardrobe.

Mango Fashion, metallic sequins, Sequinned jacket, zipped sleeves, silver
Mango Fashion, Mango, sequinned jacket, silver jacket, sequinned jacket, zipped sleeves, white Levis, black lacy bodysuit, lacy underwear H&M, H&M lingerie, white Converse boots, Chuck Norris
Mango, Mango silver sequinned jacket, zipped sleeve jacket, Toyshop silver ankle boots, Zara skinny jeans

Last Wednesday we had summer. It caught me  off guard and left me with the dilemma; Do I waste these rays by carefully spending time coiffing my hair and meticulously applying make up to shoot these new Mango items or, do I simply swipe on some Topshop Rio Rio Matte lipstick  that shouts very loudly and largely deludes people into thinking that I’ve made an effort? Life’s a bit short and quite a lot of it in the shade so I am to be excused the rufty tufty allure of the visuals due to lots of stuff that frankly we all experience yet never sounds interesting. Its the wisdom in my words that matters most here and that is top quality stuff. Here’s the kicker. I have incorporated another facet of themodeledit fashion wizardry by giving you a glimpse of lingerie modelled by me MrsV. Alert Reuters.

Left to right all worn with the Mango sequinned jacket;

Because this little sparkler has the biker element of zipped sleeve cuffs, it’s mixing day with night. My favourite, never get bored of saying ‘most clothes can do two things if you know how, which is where I come in’. First out of the hypothetical starting gate and conjoined with my favourite logo t shirt bought in Hong Kong featuring ‘Mao-Bama’ are my vintage Adidas sweatpants found in a scruffy old charity shop in Shepherds Bush. I can’t help but imagine that a very un-fashionconscious person traded up for a Wayne Rooney Man U shell suit, thereby affording me the opportunity to ‘shine bright like a diamond’ in my look. Chuck Norris Converse coming at you from my ankle regions. Bralet from Urban Outfitters.

 

Urban Outfitters Bralet

Urban Outfitters £20

Selfishly I think it may suit less cleavage rich women, but isn’t it the truth that you are spoilt for choice in the ‘tits out for the lads’  (or the ladies ), ( or yourselves) category. Can we have this?

Teamed with vintage white Levis 501’s bought in the East Village, NYC about 30 years ago.   (No, I do not think that if you haven’t worn something for eighteen months you should sling it!) Again with the Converse All Stars party, venue; my feet . Black lacy racy body  is the most amazingly fabulous, really comfortable, suitably sexy, and versatile body from H&M which although seen in London in the last ten days and purchased in the last outpost of anything very current, Exeter, on Tuesday, seems not to feature currently on the H&M website. You can see if you scrutinise which at this point I don’t really mind you doing, that I have wound the tie bit around my neck and achieved a pussy bow.  I am wearing it with nothing underneath but I could be persuaded to put a singlet, or bra etc. This way girls with bigger boobs can join with us exhibitionists.

Black lacy body, H&M lingerie, black lace, sexy, see through,

H&M £19.99

Lastly,  my bezzies; a Brandy Melville t shirt, Zara jeans and Topshop silver Chelsea boots. This is probably how you’ll see me wearing this jacket the most. A sort of don’t care attitude, but do care ethos.

Encouraged by the deep love that I was experiencing via my jacket, I pressed ‘send’ and doubled my quota of silver sequinned closet friends and gained a skirt, oops.

One skirt duly shoved through my letterbox from Mango, three looks proving my point that a tight pencil skirt is available to all and depending on the length of top that you choose, will reveal or conceal your body secrets.

Silver sequinned skirt, Mango metallics, pencil skirt, side split, white linen pyjama top, White shirt with navy piping, Converse All Stars
Brandy Melville top, white sleeveless blouse,
Whistles, peasant blouse, silver sequinned skirt, Mango metallics

Left to right all worn with the Mango Metallic skirt;

Pyjama top made for me by an admirer. I’ll tell if you guess who. Ever faithful white Converse  well worn so totally loved, hating the thought of updating as I gradually leave tiny pieces of these everywhere I go now. If you haven’t got a pair, just get some  please

.Brandy Melville top, back fastening , current as anything can be, given that I left the shop with this purchase a couple of months ago. Same shoes.

Vintage peasant top from Whistles. I remember the day I bought it twenty years ago. Kings Road Chelsea, baby in pram, screams, tension = I bought one in each colour in case I never got to a shop again. Topshop silver platform sandals, no longer actually available but more of the same everywhere.

Tops that would also work with the skirt;

ME+EM Tie Neck Silk Blouse, pussy bow neckline, silk blouse, silk shirt, silver tie neck shirt
Zara Asymmetric Pleated Top, black short sleeved top

Tie Neck Silk Blouse from ME+EM  £148 and Asymmetric Pleated Top from Zara £19.99

Styles Worth Getting Out Of Bed For

Chanel A/W 2016, wide legged trousers, floral prints, silk trousers, silk blouse
Miu Miu denim, denim jacket, denim skirt,
Chanel, Chanel A/W 2016, white t shirt, long black skirt, off the shoulder

The Model Edit is not above a little inspiration that could ultimately lead to a transformation. Here are three looks that are top trends currently. Blink and they may have wandered off, consigned to the Valhalla of Wardrobes. However, just before they transcend, let’s regenerate, courtesy of the catwalk.

Left to right;

Chanel. Floral flimsies, trousers and shirt. Scrutinise. You’ve already got either-or right now in your wardrobe and if not there are pretenders on your high street. No messing about. H&M, Zara etc,etc have got this covered. It’s very feminine and forgiving. It’s a look that hides and highlights. Work it girlfriends.

2708400620_2_8_1
Zara, Zara floral silky shirt, floral shirt

For example…

Zara outfits. Almost had conniptions trying to choose from their bloody amazing selection in this genre.

Vetements. Denim duo here. Hackneyed debate- to double denim or not? I don’t mind, sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t . Give it a go, you couldn’t be more on the money. Literally denim is the code that we can all decipher. Jeans, jackets, skirts, shirts and hats, yes thank you Zara look at this. I will be the real Slim Shady in this all summer long.

Zara, Denim hat, denim, Mrs V, www.themodeledit.com, Vanessa Voegele-Downing

£15.99, couldn’t be nicer.

Chanel. Off the shoulder anything you’ve got. Genius white t shirt idea. Girls, catch me if you can because I’ve got some bustiers that nearly got their marching orders. Nah, they’ve been called to duty. Put your white t’s under anything at all anyway, but more marvellous even would be that they fill in the shoulder gaps left vacant by another garment also being worn. Lovely, lovely. You have the t shirt world at your feet, but because I think that they’re a bag of treats as a brand, I’m showing you this ‘job done’ t shirt for your online shopping pleasure from ME+EM.

 

ME+EM, ME+EM white t shirt, crew neck t shirt,

£35, sartorial sure thing.

I have thrown back the bedsheets, you know the way to your wardrobe. Components from all these looks may languish in there somewhere and if not, you also know your way to the high street or can click ‘send’ from where you’re reading this right now.

Making an Exhibition of Yourself

 

Show stopping Conscious Exclusive collection on shop floor at H&M right now. They are this year’s sole sponsors of an Exhibition “Fashion Forward – Three Centuries of Fashion”

H&M Conscious Exclusive, Musee Des Arts Decorative, Palais de Louvre, evening dress, troupe l'oeuil, monochrome clothes, woman, women's clothes
Exclusive Conscious H&M - 1

An outfit from this year’s Conscious Exclusive collection.

An outfit from the first designer collaboration with Karl Lagerfeld in 2004.

H+M Karl Lagerfeld collaboration, black lace dress, frills

My very own dress from that very first collaboration. We’ve seen some sights, heard some stuff and still we accept bookings together How great is that?

Materials include organic silk, hemp, recycled linen and Tencel blends, along with beads and rhinestones made from recycled glass and Denimite − a material made out of recycled worn-out denim, which H&M is the first fashion company to use.

Until you decide where your holiday will be this year, and in case you alight elsewhere than Paris, you could stroll down Boulevard Regent Street and promenade into H&M and voila, works of art in frock form. I was, I’m not gonna lie, shocked by this bijou little collection. No offence H&M, I just didn’t know you had it in you. Truly red carpet looks but upping the style situation. Beautifully serene and stylish clothes that will set you apart from the Bodycon brigade and still show your sexy. Cool, calm and chic. Above you can see a favourite dress which is a ‘Trompe L’oeil”  sensation. I photographed the back view which is on the left. How cool is that tassel  ? Totally “trick of the eye”

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Yves Saint Laurent, Hedi Slimane, The Black Hole.

‘A la’ Yves Saint Laurent (www.themodeledit.com personal protest, use of full YSL name ) and reaction to their Instagram shutdown of all posts pertaining to H Slimane’s there, I have no images today. My mental image though, is that of thought control, implemented from the CEO throne room at the court of YSL, by eradicating all traces of Instagram imagery posted during Hedi Slimane’s tenure. Are we lost in the crossfire of some bitch fight? is this the very bitter end of a love affair that was actually only ever based on decimal points? How do we feel about that? Are we ok about being so curated? Will the disappearance of these images help us to totally forget that Hedi was ever there? Will those of us that bought some of his clothes whilst he was Creative Director feel like fools because our purchases are now considered a mistake and an aberration by YSL? Examining the ever so slightly megalomaniac leaning of this action, should we thank our lucky stars that, despite the conveyor belt through put of disposable designers, equalled only by the regularity with which Premier League football managers shuffle off their professional coil, any reference to the Yves Saint Laurent himself, has somehow dodged the cull and still remains? Although the ‘Yves’ part of the Saint Laurent was’t so lucky, was the erasing of the word ‘Yves’ a sort of ring fencing of that era, or acquiescing to a despotic Mr Slimane? How boring that not only do we have to be told the the mental state of each designer prior to them putting pen to drawing paper in order for us to understand why we should like something, thus eradicating any need for frivolous thoughts like ‘I like that colour’ Now we aren’t allowed to remember what people would prefer us to forget, and are becoming collateral damage of an argument that started off as a beautiful relationship… I’m talking about Yves Saint Laurent and his designs.

All That Glitters is Not Gold.

 

Monks metallic top, high necked metallic top, silver top, silver sequinned top, www.themodeledit.com, MrsV, Vanessa Voegele-Downing

The sun’s out, and everything is shiny so themodeledit.com is sharing a style find. Rushing around Carnaby Street on Friday I found this top at Monki  and bought it not in silver as shown, but in black, reduced from £30 to £8 in store, even though it says £15 from Asos. Loads still hanging there ( whats the matter???) It’s slightly tailored and made me get all Audrey Hepburn about myself, freckles and frizzy hair not withstanding… that is me Mrs V. I wore it under my Lee dungarees to the theatre. Nothing cultural, but a Soho venue and a day to evening situation developed. This top elevated an outfit that had pounded the streets with me by day, to ending up walking me down The Mall at 11pm by night.

metallic, Mango, short sleeved top, silver t shirt, round necked, pleated fabric

£9.99

On a roll (neck) and supposing that not everyone wants a tailored top, but still wants their body crossed with silver, I suggest this ever so pretty pleated metallic t shirt from Mango. Mango launched their ‘Metallics’ collection last week and have featured Karlie Kloss modelling it. They’re not silly, she’s just a gorgeous girl, naturally flipping’ fabulous. Best not to dwell there, instead look at the message; shouty silver will do the job, nothing left for you to worry about, lipgloss or ‘stick if you fancy, and Glow from Topshop because I fancy . Now read on for news of your bottoms…

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Big Girl Knickers, (themodeledit.com has it covered)

Dolce and Gabbana

remove
Lyst £525

Dolce and Gabbana, lingerie, designer lingerie, Mrs V, Vanessa Voegele-Downing, www.themodeledit.com, polka dot, sexy underwear, big knickers

 Now that we have that out of our systems, but at the same time have set the waistline quite high, I shall continue.

To quote Dita Von Teese, flamboyant and professional knicker wearer.

”Don’t save your good lingerie for dates, wear it for YOU’.
Shall some of us also interpose ‘husbands’ for ‘dates’?

Shall we wear what tickles our fancy and shake it up a bit, given that styles for S/S 2016 don’t include clothes being superglued to our arses?

There has never been a better time to shop the navel grazing pantie. Truly, when I started researching this post I underestimated the size (just the once, promise) of this phenomenon, and am now knee deep in knickers. This just goes to show me that big girl panties are on the up and up…. Cutting to the chafe, we can swap our our g string days for regulation school uniform undies,and from there to lacy lady knickers. There is nothing or everything, to hide in. We can mete out the sexy. I don’t need to point out every nuance of the sensual slip of your choice, however, in my mind, the bigger the knicker, the longer the reveal… As I mentioned in my recent Fashion post Join The Navy knickers that maintain full cheek contact are stating their case, and this season’s fashion cares not a fig leaf for that bully, VPL. You are literally spoilt for choice and I felt frenzied about what I would wear, what I wanted to recommend for you and the full economic panoply.

stone_white_1176-brief-front_retouched
& other Stories, lingerie, gingham, gingham knickers, gingham briefs, high waisted women underwear, Mrs V, www.themodeledit.com, Vanessa Voegele-Downing
Moschino boxer shorts, women's underwear, briefs

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Join The Navy

removeWhistles Limited Edition Dress, side split dress, navy blue dress, www.themodeledit.com, MrsV, Vanessa Voegele-DowningWhistles Split Dress £180

With navy blue, I feel it’s a ‘get it while you can’ situation. Always when you’re not looking, your hearts desire confronts you. Just as I was contemplating a rethink of my underwear, strings to knickers with hanky pockets in them, I had my resolve confirmed., with good window dressing by Whistles. A school uniform dress whose subversive splits; 1, immediately makes you Head Girl, adding t shirt and trainers ready for P.E. and 2, could really wine and dine crotch to chin knickers. How about a glimpse of a substantial amount of material clinging to your bottom, instead of… bottom? Both dresses can accommodate full frontal and back-al (?) panties. It’s the way to go and my next post will confirm, convince and coersce you in to more is the new sexy, vis a vis knickers. Good, you’re all on board. The other beautiful navy blue dress, also by Whistles, is in fact the high street chaser to my last post concerning stark naked shoulders, Trends, Not Necessarily Spends, and should convince you that I am on it every inch of the catwalk so that you don’t have to be. Get your shoulders ready to be admired but not adorned for that ever so important one day of sunshine that is almost, nearly, perhaps, certain to come our way here in the UK. How short is this post compared to my pet rant of a post Just The Clothes Please ?

Truly, the little schoolgirl split dress stopped me in my trackies in St Christophers Place, W1 yesterday. Happy to do detention in that dress.

Just The Clothes Please.

Firstly, I sort of do want to apologise for ‘picking on’ Rick Owens. Whilst it’s true that I’m  not a fan, I do admire his candour and his earnest and egotistical belief in what he’s doing. Rick Owens is representative of some designers  from this generation, and because of that he serves my purpose well.  As yet, I’m not a front row regular at Press shows, although I should be as  I need to ask; is everyone sitting  tight on  their front seat thrones, scared of losing their footings? Will no one give an honest unbiased opinion. Why is no one pointing and laughing? Truly Mr Owens, whilst your furniture is fabulous ( and I definitely think that’s the way to go), your clothes are patronising, unwearable in their catwalk state ( you do amend these for people that go to the toilet right?) and are body binding. Don’t think Azzedine Alaia or Herve Leger, think more a Gladys Aylward scenario, and therefore tyrannical and not liberating. I am probably a Mastodon in so far that my model mates and I are largely extinct on the catwalks of today, however my memory of Yves Saint Laurent expounding the motivation behind his each and every collection is nil. Yes, that’s because he didn’t have to, his clothes did the talking, not his ego.

Yves Saint Laurent, vintage couture knitted wedding dress, knitwear, mannequin,

Yves Saint Laurent Haute Couture Knitted Wedding Dress 1965

I’m bored of being lectured by designers about their creations. I want their creations to wander freely in my imagination, to interpret them for myself, and to let my imagination ensnare the items that I will be wearing because they speak directly to me. I don’t need an interpreter to tell me why I like something. I also don’t need my conscience pricked by a couturier, I have all my other senses honed to that. Spare us the designer doctrines, editorialised despite any genuine responsibility to us the customer. What happened to clothes shopping being a treat, an escape or just fun? I don’t want to be beaten about the head by a banner waving designer. Please leave my body image and wardrobe aesthetics out of the political forum.  Another thing, where exactly does this fashion fawning stop? I don’t care which model ‘opened’ or ‘closed’ the show. Will we get to the point where the model is questioned about the angst or joy behind her interpretation of the clothes that she’s modelling, why she particularly paused before she snapped round and headed back up the runway, was that her statement on world peace, who cares? Certainly not themodeledit .Tell you what designers, you send out the clothes. Fashion editors, you report on them, honestly and then, given the above information, we your audience/clients, will make an informed choice. Not designers, because you felt the need to validate the existence of your clothes by sewing a metaphorical poem into them. We don’t need your poem, we need you to spread before us your collections, we’ll channel the rest. It goes like this; “does my bum look big in this?”  etc, etc, because if it does, I ain’t buying it. Even if it was inspired by a sonnet written by Shakespeare and dedicated to the travesty of Elizabethan  Plague deaths.

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Trends, Not Necessarily Spends.

Prada, off the shoulder, model, catwalk, press show
Prada, pom poms, earrings, stripes, Model, Press Show, catwalk, Prada bag, handbag, www.themodeledit.com, Vanessa Voegele-Downing, Mrs V
Balenciaga, dungarees, white satin, white satin dungarees,
Stella McCartney, bare shoulders, off the shoulders, long skirt,

Buff up the shoulders right now as they absolutely have it this year, Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter. This is really good news, because, and please tell me that none of us have shoulder issues, we can all be on the same page . We can pay and display, tiny glimpses, or the full on armpit to armpit, off the shoulder look. Ok, it might possibly be reasonably said that we may give some viewers the cold shoulder, but not before we’ve given them a clear shot of a very sexy, feminine piece of our bodies, without it being x rated. We can go pretty or we can go raunchy. There are no holes barred on our shirts, T’s, blouses, dresses, the lot. We are naked…in patches.

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