February 27, 2012

Do it like Diane


You might not know it, but... I'm a Diane Kruger fan! Ok, she's sort of an icequeen when it comes to her acting (hello, emotions?) but GOOOOD, this woman has IT! As in: the looks and the sense of style. My cousine Serafien - I have a big family if you were wondering - who married last October (I showed one picture of it here) will marry again (with the same husband from her marriage in October, to be clear) for church in May. It's the event in our family this year, so everyone (at least the women) is already searching for a dress and shoes and all the other stuff. I found my dress this weekend at Clinic, Antwerp. A very cool store with lovely clothes! The dress is from the brand Traffic People, but I won't say more (I have a few family members who read my blog too). But I l.o.v.e. it. Anyway, I can hear you thinking: "What has Diane Kruger to do with all this?". The answer is: one of these 6 pictures will be the ultimate inspiration for my hairdo on May 19th! What's your favourite? I do have a sort of 'favourite' but I'm still open for your suggestions...

February 23, 2012

Pasta alla puttanesca


It might look a bit unappetizing... but this pasta alla puttanesca I made tonight, was delicious! And: ready in a minute. What do you need? Spaghetti, ansjovis, green olives, capers, garlic, tomato pieces in a can, parmesan, olive oil, pepper, salt and something to make it a bit spicy (I used some paprika flavor). How do you make it? Shred the garlic cloves and bake them in some olive oil. Cut the ansjovis in small pieces and add it to the garlic. Add the tomato pieces and stir well so they 'melt' a bit. Cut the green olives in small pieces and add it to the sauce. Leave it simmering and add some spicy flavor. When your pasta's almost ready (al dente!), you can add the capres to the sauce. Stir some more, add some salt and pepper and serve (with some parmesan flakes). Enjoy your meal!

February 21, 2012

Mother & daughter in London - pt. 3


Excusez-moi for letting you wait so long for the last part of these London-posts (haha, how self-imortant of me, like you are all desperately waiting behind your screens to read my new posts - not) but I had a sort of 'offline-weekend' going on. Anyway, here's the last part of 'Mother & daughter in London'. Enjoy!


My mom loves to go to Boots when she's in England, so we went to a Boots-shop in London, of course! And no, Boots is not a shop where they sell shoes (and boots), it's like the English (and better) version of Kruidvat with a drugstore in the basement. When I saw a 'hair donut' hanging between the hair accessories, I had to take it with me (never saw it in Kruidvat). And when I arrived in our hotel room, I had to try it! Do you like it? I definitely do!


Because we wanted to grab a quick bite before going to the musical (now you know the answer to my question: "Why am I so dressed up?") we entered Pepe, a little Italian takeaway-restaurant. Don't be deceived by the word 'takeaway', 'cause these pizzas were lovely!

57 St. Martin's Lane, London, WC2N 4EA
info@pepe-food.com
www.pepe-food.com


I can hear you thinking "Watching a musical in London? So touristic!". But in fact: it wasn't touristic at all. Okay: Leicester Square, where you can buy the tickets, is very touristic (and so not my thing). But I didn't felt like a tourist when I was sitting in my red seat in the burlesque-like theatre. And when the curtains opened, I watched the musical Chicago for two hours with a smile on my face. The dancers, the music, the whole atmosphere... Did you ever saw the movie Chicago? It was exactly like that, but so much better!


Saturday, also (sadly) known as Departure-day, was all about culture and History with a capital H. On the program: British Museum. It wasn't that far from out hotel, so we walked trough the beautiful streets and found the biggest and oldest museum of the world...

Mama and me!

How impressive it was at the outside, the inside was even more impressive. Unbelievable what you can find there and how old everything is. The oldest objects (stone tools) are more than 1.600.000 years old! But also seeing the Egyptian mummies, Rosette's Stone, Lindow man and a part of the Parthenon... it was all a-ma-zing. If you want to see everything in the British Museum you should visit it every day for a month or so, but we only had a few hours so we had to make choices in 'where to go'. We wanted to see the big things (such as Rosette's Stone), but we also payed a visit to the Mexican and Mayan part of the museum ('cause we've been to Mexico a few years ago).


Thanks to me we were a bit too early at St. Pancras - I said to my mom it was better to leave early so that we wouldn't get into trouble if there were delays with the tube or something and our luggage was heavy (from all the shopping) so that wouldn't be quite handy if we had to hurry. Briefly: we had to wait a while. So we went to Le Pain Quotidien for a Moccha and a hot chocolate before we boarded for Brussels... And that's how my fantastic citytrip ended. See you soon, my lovely London!

February 15, 2012

Mother & daughter in London - pt. 2


Around 5 PM we left alternative Shoreditch for multicultural Brixton. My cousine, her husband and their little daughter Amy live there... Unfortunately Amy was at her grandparents (because she was ill) and my cousine's husband had to play football so we only met up with Sofie. And she showed us a very lovely part of Brixton...


... Brixton Village! You probably never heard of it (neither did I) but apparently it's now mentioned in a lot of magazines (about London) as the new hotspot. It's located in some old indoor market halls and it's divided in tiny 'rooms'. One 'room' can be a restaurant, a shop (vintage clothing, African art, Asian spices - you name it), a bar, an art gallery... Because the rental costs are so low, the fear to fail isn't so big and that's why you can find a lot of restaurants of shops who try out 'a new concept'. We went for an Italian meal and it was delizioso!


When we left the tiny Italian restaurant, we noticed it was snowing! I know it's not a big deal, but snow in my favorite city + good red wine... it just made me a bit astonished and nostalgic. On the picture above you can see my mommy and our cousine Sofie.


After a good night of sleep and a savory English breakfast (at least for my mom, I'm not a big fan of sausages, beans and eggs in the morning) we took the tube to Covent Garden. Covent Garden is a well-known place for tourists, but Neal's Yard isn't. It's a little square, hidden between some buildings. Are there any veggies out there? Neal's Yard is your place! Biological, vegetarian, organic and colourfull are a few keywords for this nice yard of bricks. As you can see on the pictures: it's quite empty. That's because we went there early and Neal's Yard is just more popular during summer...


You all know I'm a big fan of the Isabel Marant Dicker Boots (I did a post about some lookalikes here), so I could barely believe my eyes when I saw these almost exact copies for £75! But no, I didn't bought them. My mom said I already have enough shoes and she's right with that. But then again: a girl can never have too many shoes! You can find them at a shop called Office. But hey, I just found out that they also have an online shop and apparantly they make a lot of lookalikes (such as the studded Chloé booties and the Acne Pistols)... you can find the IM-lookalikes in the 'ankle boots'-section here.


I already mentioned Rokit in the previous post about my new vintage boots (hm, 'new' and 'vintage' is a strange combination) but oh well, they deserve a second mention because I can't thank them enough for one of my best buys ever (and I don't even have them a week, haha). They have several shops in London, make sure you visit at least one! I bought my booties in one of the shops in Brick Lane, the shop in the picture is the one in Covent Garden.

I'm wearing my new coat here! (and a vintage bag, H&M scarf, 7 For All Mankind pants and Sacha booties)

We asked the salesboy in COS if he knew a nice place for a quick lunch and he advised us to go to SUDA, a Siamese rice bar. We were so glad we followed his advice. My mom and dad travelled trough Thailand a long time ago and Pad Thai was the best thing they ate in their life. So when my mom ordered Pad Thai, I did the same! And it was soooo tasty... especially compared with my fresh mixed pineapple and mango juice!

23 Slingsby Place, St Martin's Courtyard, London, WC2E 9AB
info@suda-thai.com
www.suda-thai.com


We didn't knew the brand Eileen Fisher, but now we definitely do! Eileen Fisher stole my mommy's heart with her simple and loose designs, soft fabrics, over-the-knee-(but-without-loosing-feminity-)dresses, the principle of some basic items that are great for layering and the crazy discount of -70%. She also stole a piece of my heart, because I fell in love too... with a super soft, burgundy circle scarf and a black, loose top. It's an American brand but there are three shops in London!


I leave you with a little teaser for the third (and last) part of 'Mother & daughter in London'... Where would I be going to (according to my 'chic' make-up look)... Any ideas?

February 13, 2012

Where have you been all my life?


I've found and bought these amazing shoes in the secondhand shop Rokit in London. I love them to death; they're just so perfect! I wear a lot of skinny jeans and these beauties are made to wear with skinny's. Vintage booties are the best. Hello?! Where have you been all my life?

February 12, 2012

Mother & daughter in London - pt. 1


Stress! Chaos! Panic! That's how you can describe our Thursday morning. Because of some delays from the Belgian railservice (delays at 6:30 AM, can you imagine?), we almost missed the Eurostar to London. Luckily we were still allowed to check in so after 2 hours, we arrived in Europe's biggest metropolis. After approving our hotel room (at Imperial Hotel, near tubestation Russel Square) and drinking a cup of tea, my mom and I left for East London...


We took the tube to Bethnal Green and after some walking and thinking where we were (you couldn't say it was a beautiful neighbourhood) we discovered alternative, hip and cool (East) London: Shoreditch. The perfect place for streetstyle photographers; there were cool dressed people e v e r y w h e r e. And, more imortant: cool shops e v e r y w h e r e. We couldn't believe our luck when we discovered there were still sales going on. So yes: you could say our citytrip to London was rather a shoppingtrip.


Because we hardly had breakfast (one croissant and a fruitjuice in the Eurostar) we were starving by noon... On good luck we entered Full Stop. It seemed a nice place and... it sure was! Not only was the interior totally 'my style', the food was also very good. Altough Full Stop is known for its coffee, we were more into sandwiches and an organic juice. When you're in London, definitely go check it out!


Another nice place to visit: Brick Lane Book Shop. A shop with a very simple name, but with very divergent books. The range is so large I won't tell you what kind of books you can find here, but it's just worth a visit when you're in the neighbourhood!

166 Brick Lane, London, E1 6RU
info@bricklanebookshop.co.uk
www.bricklanebookshop.com


Behold: one of my favourite shops in London! Public Beware, it is. And no, I didn't left with empty hands... I bought (ehm, my mommy payed) a beautiful coat! It's not the one I'm wearing on the picture below (that's my mom's)... it's in the silver bag I'm wearing in my right hand, haha. As you can see: I shopped a lot (for a small price).

91 Brick Lane London E1 6QL
publicbeware@gmail.com
www.publicbeware.co.uk 


At 3 PM or something we entered a nice place where I forgot the name of (edit: my mom looked it up on internet and it's called 'Nude Espresso') and had a hot chocolate, a latte and a strawberry muffin. It was cold outside so we embraced the warmth of this nice coffeebar.


As my mommy loves to cook (especialy Asian food), Taj Stores was like heaven for her! It's an Indian store where you can buy everything what you need for Asian cooking. And you can buy it in very large packs. As I don't know a lot about cooking, I just captured to photogenic shop.


My mom thought it was funny that every streetname in Brick Lane was also written in Indian (or Bengali - I'm not an expert), so I took a picture of it. And so far this first part of Mother and daughter in London!