Clothes Show Live 2016 👗✨

This is my 4th year going to the clothes show, but this year was the best one by far (despite my little incident occurred which I’ll explain later 😂).
If you don’t know what the Clothes Show is, it’s basically Britain’s biggest fashion event that’s hosted at the NEC in Birmingham. It’s filled with stores and pop up shops, varying from hair and beauty, to fashion and accessories, including some well known brands such as Barry M and BooTea, and also some really cute vintage shops. On top of all that, there is also a really cool fashion show, which consists of several trends for the upcoming seasons. Many reality TV stars and Youtubers also make an appearance too.
Personally, this year I felt as though the shops were not as good as they have been in previous years, and it did take me ages to actually find something I wanted to purchase. However, I did find a stall which I really like – Nanshy Brushes. Nanshy is a makeup brand that I have actually never heard of before, but their brushes are SOOOOOO soft and they’re cruelty free and 100% vegan which is brill! I only purhcased 1, however this was soley down to the fact that I had never tried the brand so I didn’t know what the quality would be like, however I will definitely be purchasing from them again!! 😋

Moving onto the fashion show – I had such a cool seat, I was facing the middle of the stage at the back so I had a really good view of the fashion show as a whole. I also felt that this year the theme had been very much inspired by the fashion show in the film The Neon Demon; the catwalk was filled with blue lights and was shaped like a triangle.

(Clothes show VS. The Neon Demon)

Overall the show was really really cool – I’ll leave some pictures here. ​

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And now for my incident – whilst I was at one of the coffee stands at the clothes show, I ordered a mint tea. I took the lid off the cup to let it cool, and as I went to test the temperature it slipped out of my hands and spilled all down myself! To make matters worse, I had ripped jeans on so the water went all over my bare legs!! My skin started pealing straight away, so I spent the last hour of the trip in the A&E room! So at the moment, my legs are all wounded and incredibly sore – note to self ~ be more careful around hot liquids 🙃
See you next Tuesday,

Scarlett x

Negative Capability 🌹🍂🌷

I first found out what negative capability was last year in my year 12 English Literature lesson, when we were studying John Keats’ poetry, but I actually only fully understood what it was recently.
I learnt the term in English, and it basically means appreciating something for what it is, rather than looking  too much into the reasoning for it. For example, rather than looking at a tree and thinking ‘why do the leaves change colour in the autumn? How do they change colour?’ etc etc, just looking at it and thinking ‘those autumnal leaves look really lovely”. It basically means that appreciating beauty is something that is pretty fundamental for a foundation of positivity.

I feel like this links to my previous blog post (here) about how this is a stressful time of year, and I feel that it is important to take a step back and actually appreciate the beauty of things around you, rather than just be absorbed in the stress of school and/or work. I believe that this is the reason I have just come to terms with the true meaning of Negative Capability; taking time out to appreciate the beauty of things really helps when trying to de stress. For example, going on a walk somewhere nearby and just appreciating the lovely bits of nature around you will actually help take your mind of things for a while.

Expressing creativity is another way of portraying negative capability, and just showing who you are through what ever you love or see as ‘beautiful’. Two of my lovely friends do this in both very different ways, one of my closest friends Grace has a blog (here), and she writes in such a lovely and down to earth way, which expresses her sense of creativity. And on the other hand, my lovely friend Lois expresses her creativity through what she wears and her makeup with some of the coolest looks; she does tutorials which are linked here. 
I felt like this post was just a little remind to destress and take some time out to appreciate the beauty in things 💞
See you next Tuesday,
Scarlett x

Body Confidence 👙✨💖

Body confidence is something that has been affecting women of all ages for many years, but I feel like at this moment in time its something that keeps popping up on my social media a lot, so I thought maybe I should discuss it.
The image of the ‘perfect woman’ has changed drastically over the past few years, and how men AND women visualise what the perfect body should be changes all the time, putting an increasing amount of pressure on women to look at certain way. The pressure starts from a young age, and I know especially from around the age of 12ish is when girls begin to feel uncomfortable in their own skin, and they begin to understand the aspects of body shaming. 

So what is body shaming? Its making people feel extremely uncomfortable about who they are and what their body looks like, and I personally feel that this is in no circumstances acceptable. Girls are made to feel ‘too fat’ or ‘too thin’, ‘too ugly or ‘too pretty’ etc etc. This message is highly confusing for young girls, as there is no clear middle ground. What is TOO thin? What is TOO fat? What does that even MEAN? 

In todays society with the introduction of social media, it becomes a gold mine for body shaming towards women of all ages, and more and more hate is poured out everyday towards more and more women. Celebrities get hit one of the hardest, and although they have such a glamorous lifestyle, its not all glam when it comes to the fact that they are the forefront of all the hate. A celebrity whom is someone who really represents body confidence and who I find pretty inspirational is Ariel Winter (Modern Family’s Alex Dunphy). I love the fact that she isn’t a size 6 and she isn’t bothered by that either. She has curves and she’s confident about that, and often in today’s society curves on a girl are frowned upon. She’s experienced some pretty extreme hate, even over her breast reduction surgery which was her choice. If you just scroll through one of her Instagram pictures, you will see the crazy amount of hate that she gets; “slut” “slag” “whore” on a daily basis. Despite this, she continues to embrace her curves and posts whatever the hell she wants, and I think the is a true inspiration.

There isn’t such a thing as the ‘perfect body’, every body is beautiful in its own way, shape and form. The attitudes of society are going to be extreme for as long as social media continues to exist; people can become anonymous and hide behind a fake profile to express hatred to others. The most important thing to remember is DO YOU AND BE WHO YOU WANT TO BE!! Body confidence is something that has taken me a while to understand, but now that I finally do, I felt like this was something I wanted to write about.

💃👙👸🏽👣

See you next Tuesday,
Scarlett x

The Development of My Love for Makeup and Fashion💅👗💄👒💋

I have to admit, this was a very spontaneous post as I’m having a bit of writers block this week! This lil post idea was given to me by my very good friend also blogger Grace, and you all should check her blog out because she is an AMAZING writer😛!! 

http://gracyviolet.blogspot.co.uk

This is going to be a short little post about how I developed such a love for make up and fashion, and how it continues to influence me everyday💋👗.

I come from very creative family; my mum is a photographer and she used to be a fashion designer, and my dad is a furniture designer; so from a young age I’ve always had creative influences in my life.

Aside from those fashion stencils and ‘fashion design’ games that pretty much every girl had when I was younger, I think with Fashion, the thing that sparked my love for it was really watching shows like America’s Next Top Model. I always loved seeing the outfits that they wore, and how the pieces were put together, and the reason behind the outfits.
Growing up, I realised that what you wore really expressed who you are, and therefore I began to develop my own style and sort of define how I went about expressing myself, and how I wanted to portray myself to other people.
I love simplistic clothes, things that are block colours (usually white, black or grey..I know, really out there…) and then provide makeup that adds that ‘statement’ to the look. However, I also like to play around with more bold colours and different patterns, yet still keep it pretty simplistic.
I think taking textiles has also allowed me to explore other peoples creative style, and how they combine different colours and patterns to get the look that they desire and expresses them the best. The girls in my textiles class are a brilliant example of this, as we all have our own individual styles and are all very unique.

Moving onto makeup, I think as a child my love for makeup was influenced by media – the magazines that I read, the shows that I watched on TV, the books I read, etc etc. I think my very first makeup product, i was a clear mascara that I got in Shout magazine in the summer holidays just after I finished primary school, which is probably the age that the majority of girls started wearing makeup. And of course, I went through that terrible blue eyeshadow and purple eyeliner phase, and also the black panda eyes with clumpy mascara and chalky foundation until I realised the ‘beauty’ of makeup. 

Now, I’m able to realise that makeup is not only in the beauty industry, but it is also considered as art. The looks that some people are able to create are just outstanding, and I love scrolling through my social media and seeing the most amazing and creative looks, that are so truly original as well. My Inspirations include those such as NikkiTutorials, Carli Bybel, Daisy Marquez, Mikala Walker and many many more; they’re so beyond talented.

This post turned out to be something a bit more than a ‘little’ post, I just got a liiiiitttle bit carried away😬😆!!
See you next Tuesday,
Scarlett x

A little information about me 😝✨💅🦄

After providing you with an introduction, I feel like I should let you know a little bit about me before I start with some blog posts, as some may get personal.
My name is Scarlett Swanston, I’m 17 and I live in the UK, currently in the midst of my A-Levels. I attend a sixth form rather than a college, which has its perks and it’s downfalls, and I feel this way due to the fact that I like to consider myself more of a creative person. I study English Literature, Media Studies, and Textiles and I feel as though these subjects represent me well (if that makes sense?!). Its the time where we are all sending off our applications to University, and I have applied for Marketing Management, however I am still unsure if I want to go. Some people may think that’s mad; but I think I want to do an apprenticeship in marketing. Media studies is something I’ve loved since GCSE, and my love for it has grown over the past year and it is something that I 110% want to pursue as a career in the future, so why should I not just get out there and go for it as soon as I can? I’ve had 2 part time jobs and I’ve just recently started my third job at Costa Coffee. I’ve got braces, and I’ve had them for two and a half years and HOPING to be getting them off very soon🙄!! I love makeup and fashion and I consider those my hobbies, as they are things that I truly do love (and pretty much what I spend all my wages on😂). I really do love social media as well; I use it pretty much everyday. I find it so interesting in a way, like how media has developed so much that you can share anything with anybody so quickly. This also seems like a sad self promo, but feel free to follow me on Instagram – @scarlss1 and Twitter – @scarlss1.

Other important things in my life are my family, friends and my boyfriend.  Know you’re probably thinking “Oh God, how cliché!” but it really is true, they are the most important things in my life and I wouldn’t trade or change any of them for anything.
My family are very very important to me, we are very strong and close knit and I feel so lucky to have such a loving family. We have been through so much together, enough to break some families apart, yet we stick together through thick and thin!! 💪🏼

I have learnt so much about how strong friendships can be over this past year, and especially these past few weeks. Our friendship group is rather big, which obviously means that each one of us is different, but I feel like this is something that we really appriciate and the reason why we are all such good friends. You are all so strong, we have been friends for such a long time now, and the fact that next year we will all be split up is sad and I will miss you all very much💔

(Minus Sophie, Emily and Ella – I couldn’t find a picture with us all in😩)

Being in a relationship for almost a year and a half has honestly been the best thing that has and will ever happen to me. It has taught me many things, and things that I will appreciate for the rest of my life. Josh, thank you for being there for me and making me feel loved everyday, I appreciate and love you so much💖.

I know this post got pretty cringey and deep and all that, I honestly didn’t intend it to😂! Thank you for taking the time to read this – next weeks post will be about my trip that I am taking to New York at the end of this week🗽!!
See you then,

Scarlett x