April Favorites

Hiya! So, I've been wanting - and attempting - to make a favorites post since February, but I just haven't been able to until now. Monthly favorites are some of my favorite posts to read and videos to watch from the bloggers and vloggers I follow, so I decided it's about time I sit down and make my own.

April was a particularly unique month for me because I was traveling for the majority weeks of it, which is more than I've ever travelled before in my life. On March 31, I left Edinburgh for Paris - from there, I went to Lisbon, Madrid, briefly back to Edinburgh, and then up to the Isle of Skye. Less than a week later I left Edinburgh for Brighton, then Cardiff, then Swansea, and finally Cheshire. Oh, and there was a quick day-trip to Glasgow somewhere in there as well. I returned to Edinburgh for good on April 27th - just shy of a month after I left. 

I'm not going to lie about it - all that traveling honestly drove me a little crazy and took a toll on my sanity. As I'm very much a homebody, I spent quite a bit of this past month feeling overwhelmed and out of place. This was frustrating because I knew how lucky I was to be seeing such incredible places - but I just couldn't get my emotions to agree with my brain. The latter half of the month was better than the first because I was in hotels, not hostels, and with my dad and brother, who I trust to travel with. Doubtless, though, I saw so many incredibly beautiful places this past month and learned so many new things. In addition, all that packing and unpacking (and only having a tiny bag to carry everything in) taught me a lot about what products I really, actually use every day - making April the perfect time for me to start compiling monthly favorites. So, without further ado, let's get into it!

Times 5 (1)

Hi! I feel like it's been so long since I've been here! I've had a really busy few weeks, at my internship and otherwise, and I haven't been home enough to make a good post. It's way past time, though, so here I am with something new!

 I decided to start something new this week, which I'm calling Times 5! It's, essentially, the same outfit five times, accessorized differently. It's a really cool brainstorming process for me and I wanted to share it!

The idea is that you can make the same outfit look drastically different and fit drastically different scenarios depending on how you accessorize it. It definitely highlights the important of accessorizing and how it makes, breaks, and decides an outfit!

The first outfit I'm accessorizing is a really basic outfit, very similar to what I wear pretty regularly - a black shirt, and black jeans. I used a gorgeous pair of Rag & Bone /Jean that I'm obsessed with right now. I love the placement of the rips and I think they look gorgeous in Polyvore sets! The top is a really cute strappy cami that I wish I could wear, though it would be hard without a bra. I love it for these sets though!

I didn't use anything twice, except for the shirt and jeans, of course, which I used five times! At first I thought this was going to be a challenge, but at it actually ended up being a challenge to stop after five! I don't think I'm ready to take it to ten yet, but maybe one day!

Check out the sets below and under the cut for a little breakdown of each outfit. I hope you enjoy, and look out for more of these in the future! 

Times 5 (1) by gwenalmighty on polyvore.com

Accessories Edit

I've recently discovered that my infatuation with fashion is, more than anything, an infatuation with accessories. I love clothes but I'm realizing that what I really love, what I really get excited about, is accessories. Shoes, bags, jewelry (especially rings), hats - these are the things that I'm usually lusting after. An outfit isn't really complete or unique without accessories anyway!

https://instagram.com/gwensday.addams/

When it comes to wearing accessories myself, I'm pretty conservative. I do wear six rings (four on one hand, two on the other) but they're the same six every day. I wear the same necklace that my best friend got me for Christmas every day, along with the same Casio watch (that I love dearly) and the same sunglasses. As I'm working an unpaid internship this summer, I don't really have much money to be spending on accessories (or clothes, or anything, really) at the moment, but I've decided to put together a sort of accessories lust list to get myself thinking about branching out more! 

Here are the things I've been lusting over lately, things I've been adding to my sets, and things I would love to add to my wardrobe! 

A little more commentary under the cut as well!

Untitled #293 by gwenalmighty featuring white leather sneakers

Obsession of the Moment: Calum Hood

Menswear style is a huge inspiration to me. I often wear dresses and skirts because they're so comfortable, but if tight as hell skinny jeans were just as easy to move in, I'd be wearing them every single day. Lately, I've been absolutely loving Calum Hood's (bassist and vocalist in 5 Seconds of Summer) everything - his style, his aesthetic, his life. His color palette is exactly the kind I live for - blacks and greys and whites, sometimes with a little pop of color. While I'm usually a Michael girl when it comes to 5SOS, I haven't been able to get enough of Calum lately, so here I am.

I would say Calum's style can be characterized by his ripped skinny jeans, (black, of course) sneakers, combat boots, beanies, band tshirts, snapbacks, and flannels. His essentials are pretty similar to mine, which might explain why I've been crushing on his look so much lately. Recently, he's also been wearing round frame sunglasses, which are my go-to sunnies at the moment as well! They compliment his face perfectly, and inspired me to buy my own pair.

Calum loves beer and dogs and good music as well, which are just more things I relate to.  I'm loving absolutely everything about him at the moment, and I felt like I had to share it somewhere! I've made a collage of some of my favorite looks that Calum has stepped out in (think cozy oversized tops + super tight jeans + a hat) and a few sets of inspired looks to try to deal with my obsession in a healthy way. I'm also including some of my favorite Calum tweets and looks that didn't make it into the collage because, you know, why not?

Enjoy!! 

xx g

(All the photos I've used in this post came from my favorite 5SOS updates site, hotdamn5sos)

Calum Looks by gwenalmighty on polyvore.com

:))) this is probably my all time favorite picture of Calum

I relate to this 200%

I can't get over the sunnies!

this is a Look with a capital L 

it's funny because it's his own label

me too

Inspiration

            One of my biggest career dreams is to work in the magazine world. I’m completely fascinated by magazines, and I take a lot of my inspiration from the articles and images in my favorites. I’m subscribed to Marie Claire, ELLE, Vogue, and Teen Vogue, and every month I spend countless hours looking through their pages. I’m totally enamored by almost everything I see. I know lots of people make inspiration boards and walls with magazine clippings, but because I don’t have enough wall space, I make an inspiration book.

            After I finish reading my favorite magazines I go through them again to cut out the things that inspire me. Every spread in my book – a big sketchbook that I bought at the bookstore – is like a miniature moodboard.

            My book is one of my favorite ways to pass time, and I love looking at it and thinking about one day being part of the team that creates something so inspirational. I really wanted to share some of my favorite pages in my book in the hopes of sharing some inspiration and excitement! Enjoy!!

xx g

Summer '15 Inspiration

Untitled #185 by gwenalmighty featuring white tops

Even though it’s still mid May, I wrapped up my semester last Friday, meaning summer has been in full swing for me since last week! Summer has always been the season I struggle with most when it comes to style – New York summers are hot and humid and generally very miserable – so I decided that my first post would be a sort of summer style moodboard to help myself get excited about what I’m going to wear this season.

My summer inspiration is coming from all over the place, but I’m really loving white and metallics, which is a sort of 180 from my usual all black everything look. I’ve never been super confident in white, but this summer I’m hoping to overcome that! I’m also loving fringe, destroyed denim, muscle tees, and, as usual, stripes.

I’ve put together a little inspiration set together to get my mind into the right place. I think my obsession with bags, shoes, and sunnies is super evident here. Obviously, it’s not a full list of all the things I’m loving for the summer, but rather an aesthetic look at how I’m envisioning my summer wardrobe.

Here's my small inspiration set for this summer! Enjoy!

xx g