A day on Portobello Road...

One of the great things about living in Notting Hill is having Portobello Road right on my doorstep! I love browsing the vintage shops and markets to get inspiration for fashion and home design ideas. A few weeks back I went on a little explore with the fabulous Faye from Fashion Found to see what treasures we could find and we got a little snap happy with our cameras...

This is one of my favourite antique dealer shops called 'last place on earth'

It's filled with gorgeous mirrors, antique tea sets and shabby chic furniture. 

305-307 Portobello Road 

Great jewellery, bags and old magazines in the pop-up market stalls

This is the lovely Faye! She has her own amazing fashion blog; Fashion Hound. She is a huge fan of vintage and charity shopping, is all about sustainable style and is full of brilliant fashion DIY ideas. 

This beautiful coloured tiled wall underneath the Westway just screamed for a mini photo-shoot ;)

Faye loved these cat eyed pink sunnies and we were both very tempted to buy that cute Micky jumper!

Goldsmith Vintage

253 Portobello Road

I love Faye's cool and often bohemian fashion sense. She's great at mixing designer pieces with high street or vintage clothes to show off her individual style.

Jacket by Willow (Australian designer)

Leopard print knit from Oxfam shop (only £3) 

Cargoes from an RSPCA charity store in London (She paid only £1, what a bargain!)

Ring by YSL

Black leather converse (which she customised with her favourite quotes - what a great idea)

Lovely Morocan tea cups, funky colourful sneakers and printed tee's!

Even though we were mainly browsing the vintage shops we couldn't resist a visit to a shoe paradise....

Kurt Geiger

www.kurtgeiger.com 

156 Portobello Road

More shoe fabulousness at 202: Nicole Farhi where we stopped for a coffee to rest our feet and to admire shoes, designer clothes and the ever trendy crowd. This restaurant is one of my favourite weekend brunch stops in Notting Hill. I mean how can you not love a place that combines fashion and yummy food? 

www.202london.com

202 Westbourne Grove

Thanks Miss Faye for a lovely day of exploring and fashion fun :)

SNAP! xoxo 

50 Shades of Grey....(blush)

Like just about every other woman in the world, I admit that I am currently hooked on the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy books! The novels which originally began as "Twilight" fan fiction have now become one of the best selling books of the year with over 10 million copies sold so far. The first book in the series; 50 Shades of Grey has actually made E.L. James the first author to sell more than one million copies via Kindle! After hearing so much about these books; the curious side of me just had to know what they were all about....

The plot of “50 Shades of Grey” revolves around a young and naïve college student named Anastasia Steele who is seduced by a hot, rich and powerful billionaire businessman named Christian Grey. Grey persuades Steele to sign a contract that allows him complete control over her life, in and out of the bedroom. And let's just say their relationship is rather steamy! The books have received a lot of criticism calling the erotic novels 'mommy porn' with the overall reception being very mixed; people seem to either love it or hate it. I am now half way through the second book 'Fifty Shades Darker' and I am definitely a little addicted. I do admit that it has caused me to blush (fifty shades of pink!) occasionally when reading the book in public and I may have actually missed my tube stop one morning because I was so...well... caught up (hehe) in reading the book! Fifty Shades of Grey is definitely my guilty pleasure at the moment ;)

Following the huge success of the books you can imagine that this caused a fierce bidding war between leading film studios to secure the movie rights to the trilogy. Universal and Focus Features won the battle and this has now left many fans of the sexy books wondering who will be bringing the sexiness of the main characters to life on the silver screen! Rumours are all over the internet about who will or should play the smoldering leading man, Mr Christian Grey.  

My inner goddess just couldn't resist getting in on the action looking for gorgeous men who I think should play the sexiest, richest, hottest guy on the planet ;)

Let's have a look at my candidates shall we?

♥ Ryan Gosling. I think it is fair to say that I love me some Ryan Gosling any day! Ryan oozes sexyness, cheekiness and has got the smoldering eyes thing pat down. Just think a mix of his characters from Crazy, Stupid Love & Drive to channel Mr Grey plus we all know this guy can rock a suit!

♥ Alexander Skarsgard. If you've ever watched True Blood (or have a pair of eyes for that matter) then enough said. But yes he is tall, athletic and totally has the dominating, intense thing down! I can see him being sensitive yet protective. I can see him being dominating and loving. I think character wise Alexander would be a pretty perfect fit for the role.♥ Ian Somerhalder. Known for his leading role in the Vampire Diaries. Apparently Ian has expressed interest in being cast in the 50 Shades movie. I think he could pull of the sexy and sweet act and let's admit that mischievous grin is quite the asset as well.♥ Armie Hammer. At first glance Armie might look a little vanilla. BUT if you’ve read the book Christian Grey decides he’s into vanilla…soooo…he would fit the nice guy/bad guy mold pretty well.

♥...and last but not least my final pick would be Matt Bomer. Matt is not (YET) that well known as an actor but after seeing photos online of him as suggestions for the Fifty Shades of Grey movie I am completely SOLD on him playing the sexy Mr Grey! Gorgeous eyes, hair you can run your fingers through, and a body that would make any girl weak in the knees...yup, Matt Bomer has got it all looks-wise. I can go on for days just talking about this man's good looks but I'll let the pictures on this page do all that for you. To me Matt looks the ultimate Christian and think he could pull off the dominating but sweet and sexy billionaire CEO personality very well. So he gets my top vote!

All together now....PHWOAR!!!

So there you have it. My 5 suggestions for Christian Grey! 

Have you read the books - if so who would YOU choose to play Christian?

Happy Hump Day everyone! Instead of providing you with my weekly (deep and meaningful) quotes on hump day I thought today I'd just provide you all with some eye candy! Just as satisfying don't you agree? ;)

Laters baby!
(swooooooon) x

Lady in coral: a night out in Paris $

Here a recent outfit of the night while I was in the beautiful city that is Paris. After a day of being out and about in the city, we got back to my friend's apartment, put on some sounds and poured ourselves a nice cold glass of champagne to get ready for a summery Parisian night out! I love getting ready with girlfriends...it's almost one of my favourite parts of going out :) Once we were all ready I asked my friend if she could take some quick pictures of me....welcome to the life of a blogger...

She suggested we go down to the street to take the photos outside her place. Well doing that we definitely put on a good show for everyone! Here I am standing 'posing' outside a busy restaurant with all the dining guests looking at me the whole time thinking, what on earth are those girls doing (cringe...)!!

But we decided who cares and just had fun with it! 

So as you can see the life of a blogger is full of good times ;)

Bright coral silk dress by Maje (one of my favourite French fashion brands!)

Shoes by Isabella Anselmi

I love the padded shoulders and cut of this dress! I remember picking it up from a sales rack at Selfridges and immediately falling in love the colour (to be expected with coral being my favourite colour and all). However, I wasn't convinced it would look any good on because on the hanger it looked shapeless and thought it might look a bit like a 'sack' on me but I ended up pleasantly surprised when I tried it on and realised it actually was a lovely fit! Short and sexy but not too revealing or tight :)

Love this photo...just wish it wasn't blurry! But still put it up because reflects a real happy moment :)

We decided to continue the fashion shoot on the balcony for some more fun photos...

 After a few glasses of champagne it was definitely time for dinner. Luckily, we had a booking for the amazing Brasserie Thoumieux which is by top French chef Jean-François Piège.

Everything on the menu looked so delicious it was hard to chose!

But in the end I decided on a beautiful piece of entrecôte with pommes!

It was the perfect accompany to my champagne ;)

The lovely couple with their delicious meals

This perfect evening just HAD to be finished off with dessert...

Chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate! YUM :)

Again a big thank you to my dear friend for having me for this AMAZING weekend in Paris ♥

Chanel Les 4 Ombes in Mystic Eyes

Last year for my birthday two of my lovely friends got me some Chanel makeup as a present (see my birthday presents post here). All my friends know me well enough to know that with a gift like beautiful makeup they pretty much can't go wrong ;)

The Chanel eye palette they got me was the Les 4 Ombres Palette in Mystic Eyes and it's been one of my favourite quads ever since! I never got round to reviewing it on the blog so only about a year late (woops) here is a recent face of the day using this versatile and gorgeous eyeshadow palette!

Now let's look at the palette a little more up close shall we?

As to be expected from the luxury brand Chanel; the packaging is gorgeous, compact and easy to use.

The palette comes with four eyeshadow shades in a smudge-proof formula, that can be applied dry for subtle shading, or dampened for more intense colour. 

Colours clockwise from L-R:

♥ Neutral deep chocolate brown with tiny gold flecks

♥ Light shimmery vanilla pink 

♥ Silvery shimmery grey taupe

♥ Warm shimmery light gold brown 

The pink and silver shades are a bit more sheer but the light brown and dark brown shades are both very pigmented. The whole quad is quite shimmery with the pink and silver being the most shimmery of the bunch. And as with all Chanel eyeshadows (I also have their Les Ombes Enigma Quad) the staying power is superb, and the colour payoff is excellent.

I love how you can play with these seemingly neutral colours to create a natural or dramatic smokey look. The shimmer in this quad just seems to make my eyes sparkle that little bit more! Here a slightly closer look at my neutral 'Mystic eyes' face of the day:

Products used:

Bourjois 123 Perfect Foundation (review here)

Stilla brighten and correct concealer (link)

Bourjois Delice de Poudre Bronzing Powder (review here)

Estee Lauder Goddess Sea Star Bronzing Blush (as seen here)

Chanel 14 Mystic Eyes - Silver shade applied to tearduct and inner 1/3 of eyelid

Chanel 14 Mystic Eyes - Light brown shade applied to outer 2/3 of lid and in the crease

Chanel 14 Mystic Eyes - Pink shade applied to the brow bone as a highlight

Chanel 14 Mystic Eyes - Dark brown applied along lower lashline

Blink + Go Mascara (as seen here)

On my lips I am wearing the other Chanel present the girls got me last year...

Chanel Rouge Allure Extrait de Gloss in Imaginaire (56) 

Imaginaire is a semi-sheer, milky medium pink colour with a hint of coral and some tiny tiny gold sparkles. This is one of my favourite lip glosses. The colour pay off is very pigmented and rich on my lips whilst still showing a hint of my natural lip tone. And the formula is smooth and glossy, without being tacky or sticky - just how I like it! When I wear this gloss I always feel girly and sophisticated :)

I absolutely love both these Chanel items so am very grateful to my friends for buying these for me! What do you think of the Mystic Eyes palette or the Imaginaire lip gloss? xoxo