Shooting Stars Necklace, from inspiration to the big day

We had some lovely news at Ivaldi Towers a few months ago.  My biggest nephew and his long term partner  were finally tying the knot.  So, obviously an enormous hat has in order, as was a stunning piece of jewellery.

Hat and dress were easily arranged, but as a bespoke jeweller I wanted to create something stunning, I do have a reputation to maintain after all.  My current collection is all about stars so the main focus was an easy choice but where to go from here.  An evening on Pinterest and I had an inspiration board http://pinterest.com/ivaldi/shooting-star-necklace-inspiration/ and a quick trip to my favourite beads hop and I had some yummy new beads to play with.

Many sketches later I had a design I was happy with and I started making stars.  The Lovely Caroline from the Outhouse Studio has loaned me a beautiful antique kiln, and I just love the results it gave.

I then spent about 3 days placing beads, polishing stars and generally faffing about until I get things where and how I wanted.

Here it is about half way through.

So, Saturday morning dawned and we were off into the wilds of Suffolk and here it is in it's finished glory.

Rosemarie of the Lighthouse Network has been helping me focus and reach my goals, and she has been hugely encouraging all through this project, thank you sweetie x  

So the final outcome of this is that the necklace is now up on Folksy, the original you see here but also as a bespoke, whatever stones, colours you want.

I've really enjoyed this project.  It's brought my Stars collection to a conclusion and I've learned a lot doing it.  So what next, what will be my next collection.  Stay tuned and I'll let you know.... as soon as I know myself x

Victorian Cameo Pendants

 I have created a series of beautiful portrait cameos using fashion plates from the University of Washington's archives (you can see these images here) They are taken from fashion journals from the 19th and 20th Century and are a great record of the way we would have been dressing (or aspiring to dress) 150 or so years ago.

 They show closeups of the sketches, mounted and varnished to create a long lasting piece of jewellery.

One of the original images I have used for my cameos.

I'm thinking about doing some boys next.  What do you think?

I can also make these images from your own pictures. I will be blogging about that really soon.  I'm in the process of making a necklace for a lovely friend that I can't wait to share with you all.

BAFTAs 2011 - glam goth lives again

Once again Helena Bonham Carter has stolen the show.  Not only was her dress, Vivienne Westwood of course, absolutely stunning but her speech was a genius of randomness.  For more BAFTA beauties see the Catwalk Queen blog

Dressing up to sit in the dark

My New Year's Resolution was to date my fantastic husband much more this year.  So, at 6.30pm on Saturday I started the delicate dance that is getting the gothlings to bed while getting dressed up.

At 7.15 we left the house, and our two children mostly in bed with a sensible grown up in charge.I was wearing my behaving badly shoes, a pencil skirt, purple lace body stocking and a little military jacket.  Add to this a full face of make up, carefully chosen jewellery and a very cute beaded hair band (my new favourite accessory).  I was Dita Von Teese incarnate.

Where were we going?  The cinema! and I was about to sit in the dark with my husband.  Part of me wondered why I was bothering.  Did I really need to wear stockings and high heels to go out with the man who sees me in my dressing gown every morning, where no one would see me.

ABSOLUTELY!!!!!!!!!  After 6 years of marriage, 2 children and many trials and stresses I want my darling man to know that he is still married to "a woman who cares about herself".  I want to be able to walk down the street with my head held high looking fabulous.

So for 4 hours I looked dead glam with GothDad on my arm, then I came home, took it all off and made a bottle for Bat Boy.  3 hours later I was up for the night feed in the dressing gown, but I still felt glamorous.

Spring wardrobe - GOTH STYLE!!!!!

I've been perusing the high street and my NEXT catalogue for the gothic twist to the new season's fashion.

I'm pleased to say that relaxed knits, tunics and maxi / wide legs are prominent so we can all be stylish and comfortable once again; just don't forget some fantastic shoes and gothic / alternative accessories.

Lace is with us once again, which is great.  That goth staple has been around for almost a year now, and I've just picked up a fab lace tunic from H&M's sale.  Too good for work, but it will work casual with jeans and glam up with leggings and killer heels.

My big problems this season are the return of the jumpsuit!!! It brings back memories of the electric green one I had in 1983.  It's just wrong!!!!!  Also the big trend for nudes.  They do look fab but just not at all Goth.  The goth version of nude is frankly NUDE, so I will not be partaking of it.  Even the beautiful nude platform peep toe sandals.......(*slaps*)

So bring out / top up your florals, lace and relaxed knits and look fabulous this spring.  

In jewellery, we just can't get enough of charm bracelets and big beads. Fantastic

So keep an open eye on this blog for a fantastic new jewellery site (me and GothDad's world domination) for custom and cutting edge jewellery for the gothic fabulousness in you.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness month

I have had the shittiest week.  Nothing has gone right and I'm exhausted.  But all of that paled into insignificance when I got a text message from one of my team saying she couldn't teach her class the next morning as she had found a lump and was going to the doctors.

Now this is a horrible thing for anyone to go through and obviously I'm praying that it is a false alarm and when she sees the specialist in a week or so she will be given the all clear.  Thankfully her doctor referred her immediately.  Unfortunately she is the second member of our quite small department to have found a lump in the last few months and another of my team is currently off sick after having very invasive and exhausting treatment for breast cancer.  I could quite legitimately get paranoid about our workplace and what it is that could be damaging the health of so many otherwise healthy women.

So the moral of this post is coming up. My friend is in her early 40s although she does have a family history (hence the really quick referral) she is healthy as you can be.  ALL OF US LOVELY LADIES NEED TO BE CHECKING OUR BREASTS.  I have collected some links to help us all.

Please check your breasts NOW, it may save your life!

http://www.coppafeel.org/  is a great charity raising awareness of breast cancer in younger women.

Get a text reminder from Breast Health UK with loads of information and help to ensure your breast health.

Raise some money for CoppaFeel by buying this gorgeous bra from Bravissimo

Goth Spring Wardrobe

I read enough about fashion and in an attempt to get my self back from new mumness I have gutted my wardrobe and created a spring capsule wardrobe. It didn't involve buying much, which is good as we are broke. But a quick trip to Primark and New Look has seen me right.

I am going with a lace and military theme in black (surprise surprise) and silver with pink accents ('cos I'm a sucker for shocking pink) and a bit of floral as I had it lurking. I've had to keep a few pieces aside for work wear as I will be going in a bit more now and can't rock up in jeans and a milk stained Tee.

The major principles of GothMum fashion are simple and very effective.

1. You can't spend much money.  Use what you already have and buy from charity shops and discount high street.  I have no pride, school shoes come before handbags!

2. All GothMum outfits should be glamorous and fabulous but also practical enough for a spontanious trip to the park; ie you should be able to pick up a small child without showing your tits or knickers.

3. It must wash or wipe, milk, icecream, chocolate and even vomit are all part of the GothMum world.

4.The Goth is in the details and in subtlety.   These may look quite boring outfits but teamed with a pair of jack skelington ear studs, or a pair of killer boots these take on more of a Goth edge.  I have finally realised I am not 17 any more and have to tone it down a bit.

OK, So here are the pics, this first one is the entirety of my wardrobe now, I'm quite chuffed with it.

This first outfit is my new grey lace dress.  It looks great with jeans, leggings or tights and will be my glam staple.

This is my serious lace outfit, all from bits in my stash. I love Goth, it just keeps coming around. I can pull bits and pieces from my cupboards to fit a seasonal trend and really will only have to buy one or two key pieces each season to remain absolutely fabulous.

This is my guilty pleasure.  Not Goth at all but very pink and girly, for those days when I don't want to kill everyone in the world.

But after all that Ill be the first to admit that a lot of the time I will be mooching around the house wearing jeans, a t-shirt and a drooly baby!

Elasticated trousers

I bought Little Miss a pair of skinny jeans from Next for Christmas and they had an adjustable waistband, she is very skinny and these jeans had a lot of give in the belly region.

I am pear shaped and could really do with trousers that I could just pull in a bit at the waist. Little Miss' trousers don't look like they have an elasticated waist, they just nip in nicely.

Why can't I have them too?????

Home Dye, is it worth it?

I've just dyed my hair at home. It's something I've done for years and I've got quite good at it. My bathroom did resemble the end of Carrie an hour ago but it's all clean now and I have red black hair. It actually looks quite a lot like it does on teh packet, which is encouraging.

i thought I'd have a bit of a change from the blue black that I have been for the last (stone me) nearly 10 years on and off. I did have a brief faray into cyber purple but it faded to auburn very quickly so I didn't try that again.


So I'm hoping that this stays true for a few months as I really can't organise myself to do this kind of thing too often.

I was thinking; as I sat with a plastic bag over my head, was it worth it to save £25. Should I just get my hair done at the salon like normal people. But then i thought that £25 was nearly a half term's worth of Gym classes for little Miss, so I decided that home dying would be here to stay.

By the way, this isn't a blatent Schwartzkopf advert. It's just that I haven't found any other hair dye that stays in my hair.

Miss Naked Beauty 2008 was nearly a GOTH!!!!!

I have been watching Gok Wan's Miss naked Beauty for the last 6 weeks and Goth dad and myself have been cheering on the very lovely Dawn (pictured); 6 ft 2 of Glaswegian Bolshiness. We really couldn't believe it but she kept going through to the next round.

In the end she was beaten by Shona (pictured below) by 7 votes and we didn't mind because Shone is also lovely, but very much smaller and more celtic.

It is great to see Gok doing this series, looking at how women see themselves and how each of us can be beautiful without a whole heap of slap (not that I don't love the slap given the chance), and it has been great to see such a wide range of women being shown to us on prime TV as beautiful, desirable women who are all passionate about the female form.

So to all my lovely lady readers...

YOU ARE BEAUTIFUL, if you believe this and own this the world is your oyster.

goth eye makup

As a Corporate Goth girl I have to say that my eye makeup is a key part of my look and my identity. Obviously when I go to work I don't wear quite as much makeup as some of these lovely ladies but this little smudge (below) is pretty close to what I try to get going at 7am most mornings.



It's fairly normal (if a little biased towards grey and purple) except for the black eyeliner which MUST by heavy and smudged. In a black suit with boots and some simple silver jewellery, all complete with dark eyes and a bit of lip gloss, there really isn't too much doubt that 'Miss' is a bit of a wierdo.

This is the lovely AndromedaX who is this gorgeous at 7am on a Wednesday morning and 1am on a Saturday night.

I would like to point out that she doesn't go to work looking like this (bit of a shame really, but no one would ever get to work on time if we had to slap on all the war paint every morning) but still manages to look very goth without looking like the dolly girl below.

So, I guess the key point to this post is that if you can give a girl black eyeliner she will either hang herself and end up looking like a macabre clown, or she will make it her own and remain a Glam Goth Goddess, no matter how modest or corporately she needs to dress.

Goth Mum gets let loose in London

I had a weekend, on my own, in London this weekend. OMG!!!!!

I was there working, I was on a course (more can be found on my lovely new blog ) but I had to go into the west end to buy a guilt present for Little Miss and I seemed to fall into H&M.

Now, here in Norfolk H&M is shite, with the WORST range of clothes, but I love the London stores, especially Knightsbridge, they have such good collections. In 15 minutres I went from this

to this....and all for £20, £8 for the very cute hat and £12 for the wool dress.

I'm sorry about the pics but they were taken in the changing room mirror.
So, I came home very happy, very tired and only a little bit poorer. I saw BritWitch for wine Dim Sums, Icecream and chats (all a girl really needs on a Saturday night) but unfortunately couldn't sleep in my lovely hotel room; no cat no Goth Dad, no Little Miss to check on before I slept. So 3 tablets and half a book later I guess I must have fallen alseep as I awoke at 6am with the lights and TV still on, go figure!


I am coming to the conclusion that my style revolves around a blck base of classic rock chick chic with appropriately goth accessories. Shoe research me need to happen.

Lovely stuff in Sainsbury's

I had a very un-Goth moment a week or so ago when I saw this outfit in my local Sainsbury's. I actually found myself thinking "oo that's nice, maybe I should buy it" O My Gosh. I can't believe I actually thought about it.

Having said that I did see some lovely bits for little Miss (pics below) and YAY the halloween stuff is in. This year I will be adding a pirate outfit to the dressing up box and have to check that her stipy tights all fit now.

Glamerous Goth Mum is inspired

I have decided to become inspired. My new mission is to search out fantastic fashions for goth girls on the high street.

I'm starting with Dorothy Perkins simply because Gok Wan is linked to them and he is my style icon.




I love this dress. I could wear it with leggings or jeans during the day and with gorgeous tights for a trip out.


According to Gok I should be wearing these jeans.

I'm in the process of putting together my own Goth Mum style guide, it'll be fun.

Now I just need to get into town.....

Go and find some beautiful clothes here.