Miaow

Best boots in the world ever.  By Miu Miu, of course.

I also quite want to wallpaper my entire house with the S/S cat print.  Crazy cat lady, moi?

Miu Miu S/S '14

Whilst the rest of the world is in meltdown over fashion month (oh yeah, and the potential outbreak of another Crimean war, to keep this in perspective), I've been losing interest in the whole circus.  Nothing I've seen on the catwalk for the upcoming autumn/winter season has really caught my eye, and even the street style I've seen has been fairly "meh".  I've liked a few looks from the usual suspects- Simone Rocha, Chloe, Dries Van Noten- but nothing wowed me, so instead, I've turned my attention to the current collections (to be fair, spring is always about a million times more exciting than the promise of cold, dark, rainy nights that come part and parcel with autumn).  I'm particularly enamoured of the S/S Miu Miu campaign, and the colourful crochet tights and lace-up knee high boots featured with every look.  They're the perfect solution to my end of winter wardrobe fatigue. 

I must admit, I haven't been paying all that much attention to Miu Miu the past couple of years, and I can't even remember if I bothered looking at this last fashion week.  Seeing the Elle Fanning ad in this month's Vogue awakened my curiosity though, and I'm thoroughly smitten.  I think generally, it's difficult to get a proper feel for a collection just by seeing it on the catwalk, and there have been a lot of times I've failed to notice something until I see it in print, both in ad campaigns and in editorials.  I'm all for the democratisation of fashion, and whilst things like live streaming/instragramming/tweeting have brought the once rarified experience of seeing a fashion show to the masses, I think it's also taken away our ability to properly digest what we see.  Everyone is so hungry for the newest (and therefore best) designer offering, that we forget what's in front of us.  At the moment all I want is to focus on the upcoming season, not to wish it away thinking about what I may or may not like in six months' time.  So I'm all about slow fashion- taking the time to flip through a physical magazine, and noting what makes me stop and stare, wanting to absorb a certain image, or piece of writing.  Somehow this all gets lost whilst scrolling through endless photos on a screen.  So this spring, I'm mainly planning to revive my old habit of scrapbooking, cutting and pasting my favourite magazine photos, saving them for a rainy, inspiration-less day.  Meanwhile,  I'll spending every free moment scouring ebay for vintage lace-up boots...

Portamento

One thing I find sorely lacking in UK/European fashion is mid-range independent designers.  Even fledgling designers just starting out seem to be completely out of my budget, and the gap between the high street and proper designer is increasingly being filled by brands like Whistles and Cos, which isn't terribly inspiring if you want something that can't be found on every single high street. I'm a bit rubbish about actually visiting many of the independent boutiques I admire, especially the ones based in deepest East London, which would appear to be most of them.  So I'm always happy to stumble upon websites that introduce me to brands and designers I wouldn't have otherwise known about.  A while back, I posted a pair of Chelsea boots by Portamento, available at Swanfield Boutique, which in itself is probably worthy of a separate post.  My hunt for the perfect Chelsea boots is still very much on, after an ebay disappointment, so I was contemplating whether I shouldn't give that particular pair a try after all and I ended up searching out the brand's website.  And I fell a tiny bit in love.  

Prices range from £29, for the espadrilles I wish I had been aware of this past summer, to £189 for the black Chelsea boots.  They do a wide range of styles, including a lot that are far more girly than any of the ones I've posted, but at the moment all I want is classic, men's styles.  According to their website, Portamento is run by a couple based in Hackney, and is "a gallery of art, contemporary fashion and unusual objects in an eclectic mix resembling the world of the owners."  They don't seem to have a physical shop, which is a shame, but I'm incredibly tempted to order at least one pair...

Chelsea Boots

As I get older, I've realised that my seasonal searches tend to be less for something new and exciting and more for the perfect version of a long-standing obsession.  I mentioned in my previous post how I had let the perfect pair of Chelsea boots slip through my fingers a few years back.  Obviously, I've been searching for a similar pair ever since, to no avail.  Every autumn, the high street is awash with every possible variety of Chelsea boot, but none have been quite right.  I did find the perfect pair in Massimo Dutti, of all places, last summer, but resisted buying something so wintry in the midst of a heatwave and, of course, by the time I was ready to buy them they had long since sold out.  I ended up buying an oxblood pair, also from Massimo Dutti, and whilst I love them, I'm still hunting for the holy grail pair I want to believe is out there.  This year I'm starting early(ish) and compiling a list of possible contenders.

I instantly fell in love with this pair when I stumbled upon them in my search for something entirely unrelated.  But they're white, which I suspect would leave me still craving the perfect black pair.

Portamento boots

These are, without a doubt, pretty near perfect.  They also cost £500 and are sold out in my size.  *sniff*  I'll just gaze on this photograph adoringly and try not to imagine how I would happily wear them every. single. day.  and how much better they'd get the more battered they became.

Balenciaga boots

I'm intrigued by these Dr. Martens ones, but, pleasingly stompy though they are, I'm not sure I wouldn't prefer lace-up boots in this cut.

Flora boots

These Acne boots are probably my dream boots- they've got the perfect heel height, and look like they would fall at the perfect just-above-the-ankle spot.  If I had had £500 going spare last autumn, I would have bought them the second I laid eyes on them.  As I didn't, I've now resigned myself to searching for them on ebay for all eternity.  There's currently a pair in a size 3 starting at 99p here.