Halloween Inspiration: Birds of Prey

Posing with wild fowl is just another day in a model's life and Toni Garn makes it look so easy. Photographed by Greg Kadel for Numero, leather, lace, fur and feathers never looked so good together.

This Halloween weekend, I made some last minute costumes with what I had in my closet. I rocked a Vampy Goth costume the first night and then dug around in my closet for a puffy underskirt and leggings the next night. I managed to find a sparkly cat mask that I couldn't help but wear all night.

I hope you all had a great Halloween weekend!

via Fashion Gone Rogue

wardrobe: Patti Wilson
model: Toni Garn
makeup: Mariel Barrera
hair: Laurent Philippon

photography: Greg Kadel

The IFB Weekly Roundup: Links À la Mode: Oct 27th

Our post with Laura's closet was selected as one of IFB's link for the week of Oct. 27th! Check out the top 20 links below.

Still Evolving

Edited by: Fajr Muhammad of Stylish Thought

THE IFB WEEKLY ROUNDUP: LINKS À LA MODE: OCTOBER 27TH

I love how multi-faceted fashion blogging has become. In the beginning it was mostly celebrity style driven but has evolved to include everything from personal style, social commentary, fun fashion trends and high fashion! While blogging is becoming a staple of our everyday world, fashion blogging is continuing to push the envelope.
Fashion is converging into lifestyle and we are defining the medium and what it means to be a fashion blogger. Check out the diverse links this week that our pushing our craft to new places.

• Alex Drake Vintage: Vintage Photography Inspiration
• Being Zhenya: Friday DIY
• Beyond Fabric: Urban Menswear Myth #3
• Brunette Blogging: The Blogger and the Brand
• Cadence and Clementine: A Cut Above the Rest
• Consider Me Lovely: Defying Expectations
• Consumerism Killed My Soul: Arguing for Barbie
• Ethical Fashion Blog: Ethical Fashion Conundrums
• Fashion Dynamite: Soft Dressing
• Fashion Tales: Game Art
• Love at First Blush: In Her Closet- Print Designer
• Oranges and Apples: Workwear, Women & Aging
• Practically Spoiled: Closet Challenge- Lace and Lines
• Shrimp Salad Circus: How to Day- Piano Clutch
• Simply Frabulous: Spend or Save- Low Price High Style
• Snapshot Fashion: Fashion Icons We Grew Up with
• Style. Love. Repeat: The Printed Blouse
• Stylish Thought: 33 Tips on Finding your Passion Today
• The Chic Sheet: The New Geometrics
• What 2 Wear Where: Day of the Dead Hulaween

Halloween Giveaway! - Closed-

Love at First Blush has teamed up with The AntiCraft for a Halloween Giveaway! So if you've been lusting after one of our cuffs, here is your chance to win one!

If you haven't heard of The Anticraft, they are a quarterly web zine devoted to crafters with a darker aesthetic or twisted sense of humor. For your daily dose of macabre finds please check out and follow The AntiCraft Facebook page.

We've also started a Love at First Blush Facebook page! Follow us by liking our page. We will be announcing more giveaways in the future and you will gain instant access to behind the scenes.
Good luck to everyone!

Rules
1. This giveaway is open to US, Canada and International residents
2. Giveaway runs from October 24, 2011 to October 28, 2011 at 8:00 pm EST
3. One winner will be selected at random from entries submitted. The winner will be contacted through email.
4. The winner will win ONE item from the Love at First Blush shop.

How to Enter
1. Leave a comment in our entry form and tell us which item from our shop you would like to win and wear for Halloween. Make sure you enter your email address so we can contact you if you win!

For additional entries:
2. Follow our blog via Google Friend Connect located on our side bar.
3. Join our Newsletter located on our side bar.
3. Tweet about this giveaway on your twitter and include our tag @Loveatfrstblush with our url link.
    Example: I just entered the @Loveatfrstblush and #TheAntiCraft Halloween Giveaway! http://loveatfirstblush.blogspot.com/


***update: The winner for our giveaway is Jena. Thank you to everyone who participated! ***

In her Closet: A Print Designer's Pad

Laura is like the girl that everyone wants to know. She works as a print designer, moonlights as an aspiring rapper on weekends, and writes on her blog, noeud noir. If you're lucky, you can catch her performing live at bars on St. Laurent.

We first met at "The Corporation" while working closely on print repeats, embroidery placements and re-colorations of patterns. I visited her desk a lot as we worked on about 8-12 prints each season.

Her apartment is filled with purple, gold and black accents, very much the same palette as everything in her wardrobe. She has a treasured collection of vintage cameras passed on from her father who was a tailor and a professional photographer. He has left her with some incredible heirlooms, a vintage Rolleiflex and Rapid Omega that appear to be still functional. And sometimes her camera bag functions as her purse.

We took her bike out for a spin, but it was pretty windy outside and her brightly colored Marimekko print dress didn't exactly keep her warm. It did look good though.

For more fashion closet stories, please click here.

Patterned Metallic print nails

Every girl needs a Singer sewing machine

Marc Jacobs Zipper necklace/ Marimekko dress

Sushi Addict

There are a few things that I can't live without and one of them is sushi. It may be because I grew up in Vancouver and sushi shops were as abundant as convenient stores, but here in Montreal, good sushi is hard to find.

Visiting the Tsukiji Fish markets in Japan is hardly fashionable, but you definitely won't find fish that is fresher. Eating sushi-on-a-stick is unheard of in North America and seeing a guy hack up a chunk of Bluefin Tuna is as authentic as it gets.

I miss this stuff. Bad.


Tokyo, Japan, photos taken by my bf


Tsukiji fish market, Japan

Vintage Lingerie and Corsets

Inspiration can come from anywhere, but most of the time, it comes from my lingerie drawer (most I have never worn). Too pretty or delicate to wear, I collect them for sources of inspiration. I'm like that with shoes too.

I have yet to add Vintage Corsets and Support braces from the 1920's to my collection, but they fascinate me in a completely different way. They are loaded with such history, I am curious as to who has worn them and under what types of dress.

They seem to tell a story of their own.

 veramode / bubblepipe

Highlights from Spring Fashion Week 2012

Spring 2012 has returned with embellishment and exquisite detailing that create new textural patterns and forms of fabrication. And no, studs and neon do not seem to be leaving us any time soon.

Though I left my design job last year, normally this time we would be collecting images from the Spring shows, creating boards, and figuring out which trends were the strongest for our department.

I guess it's out of habit I am still doing this, but I also love saving the images to my sketchbook.

This is my kind of Spring. Is it yours?

Source via Vogue.fr

Alexander McQueen

Balmain

Versace

Valentino

Hand me a Clothesline

While walking through the lesser known pathways in Venice, we stumbled along canals filled with colorful laundry, airing out to dry on clothesline. These photos were taken from my backpacking trip in Italy from 2005, but they are still an inspiration to look at now.

Murano, Italy, reminds me of Haji Lane in Singapore. Is it just me, or does every city have a block full of colorful painted houses?

Murano, Italy

Behind the Scenes: The 'Love at First Blush' Photoshoot

Last week I was prepping for my photoshoot for the new Love at First Blush collection. I was running around in the rain, picking up some high heels and last minute supplies for my styling kit. I always bring a package of double-sided garment tape, clips and pins to cinch in waists, style the clothes on the model and prep for any wardrobe malfunctions. 

Even though it's not my first photoshoot, I always get anxious the day before. It was a great team and an amazing photoshoot. Here are a few behind the scene shots from Friday's shoot.

Items in my styling kit