Backstage at the Underwear Show, 1940s

So we’re fresh off Valentine’s Day, and I’m feeling a little bombarded by the underwear industry at present, trying to convince me that I need a five-piece lingerie set for this one night of the year, garter belt and all. Can’t I just be left in peace to pick up my 3-for-2 cotton briefs from…

Tokyo Is Having Way More Fun Than Us at Fashion

In Tokyo, there are no rules when it comes to street fashion. Current trends have little or no influence and you certainly don’t have to work in the fashion industry to throw down some serious looks. I stumbled upon the Tokyo Fashion Tumblr today, which has been faithfully documenting Japanese street style since 2010. From Lolita…

Here are the 1960s Fashion Trends we’d like to Nominate for a Comeback

At MessyNessyChic, we spend a lot of time in the 1960s, revisiting rock & roll communes, getting to know forgotten muses and venturing out on hippie trail, but we thought it was about time we did a retrospective of style from our favourite decade. The good, the bad and the interesting… The Paper Dress The sixties played around…

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The Soviet Propaganda Fabrics We Probably Shouldn’t be Lusting After

On one hand, they’re undeniably beautiful and intricate patterns that could make a very attractive scarf collection were a fashion designer willing to give them a style comeback. On the other hand, if anyone were to take a second look at your scarf, they would find the image of a communist regime… These are the communist…

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Pinterest Trend du Jour: Hair Braiding No Average Woman could Possibly Achieve

We’ve got fishtails, french crowns, greek style, cage buns, cross plaits and five strands– who knew there were so many impossibly intricate ways to braid hair. Are there braiding schools I missed out on? Pinterest ofcourse, is the place to find your hair braiding inspiration. [Follow Shelly McOwen] [Follow Emily Sanborn]…

The Beatle that Got Fired

If you’re not a mega Beatles fan, or particularly well-versed in early Beatles history, that handsome chap on the drums there in a line up of teenage Greasers, might not look so familiar. That’s Pete Best, the original drummer for the iconic band, who was sacked under the direction of Lennon, McCartney and Harrison in 1962…

The Bohemian King of 1920s Paris You’ve Never Heard Of

The life of Tsuguharu Foujita reads like a long lost Wes Anderson movie — and looks like one, too. The expat artist arrived in Paris from Japan in the 1920s, and with his prim bowl cut, button-ups, tiny spectacles (and curious passion for cats), his eccentricity made him the crème de la crème of the Montparnasse bohemians. Let us retrace…

How to Outdo Every Halloween Costume at the Party

You don’t want to be that person at the costume party. You know, the one who’s scrawled some whiskers across their cheek to be a last minute black cat, or just turned up with a sheet over their head and declared it a costume. But we also aren’t ones for perusing overpriced, polyester outfits in a crowded…

One Last Shopping Spree at a New York Icon of Fashion

For 123 years, Camelot was on 5th Avenue, otherwise known as the Henri Bendel department store, the place to be for any fashionable woman worth her salt in 20th century America. So when the timeless Manhattan mainstay announced its imminent, forever closure this month, we kind of lost it. Needed a hat that looked like a…

Mods vs Rockers in Brighton’s Battle of the Beach Chairs, 1964

One of my favourite things to come across when I’m researching is a snapshot from history that I’m completely unfamiliar with. A forgotten story to re-discover, another clue to the bigger picture or just a bizarre anecdote from the past; these are my little treasures hiding under rocks. And today, I found these baffling and beautiful photographs of what I can only…