Just Add Attitude

August 31, 2011 · 10:03 pm

♥ Swan Song for Summer

Summer is drawing to a close; leaf-shedding autumn looms. In truth the Irish weather is such that the transition between seasons is barely perceptible. I sometimes rail against the lack of sun and a surfeit of rain in these parts but in the wake of hurricane Irene I realize how lucky we are to have a climate not visited by meteorological extremes. Still it would have been nice to have the occasional opportunity to wear some summery clothes.

Signs that what Keats called the season of ‘mist and mellow fruitlessness’ is almost here are many, it’s cooler, the shroud of darkness falls earlier each evening and leaves begin to tumble when the wind whips up. As we glide gently into autumn there are many things I will miss about summery days: eating outdoors in garden cafés, freshly picked local berries, darkly beautiful sunsets, riots of colour in gardens, looking at boats bobbing in the tranquil bay…

Before I started to write this I realized I haven’t had a proper summer holiday this year, so on an impulse I booked a short break. I am heading west in a few weeks, not unfortunately to America just a few days in a rugged part of Ireland that I have never visited before. Who knows we may have an Indian summer and I might get to wear a summer frock when I get there.

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Tagged as Last days of Summer, Summer, The Seasons

August 29, 2011 · 10:39 pm

♥ Atypical Tourist

I happened upon the Happiness Project blog recently (click here), complete with its weekly suggestions for the Happiness Challenge 2011. I haven’t fully digested all that’s on it but one thing that caught my eye was the idea of becoming a tourist in your home area. Thus, I found myself in the centre of Dublin yesterday, an atypical tourist in my native city. My mission was to see the Book of Kells.

I headed to Trinity College, a university founded by Queen Elizabeth 1 in 1592. Once through the main gate, I was in a world far removed from the surrounding urban cacophony; a forty acre plus site filled with cobbled quads, ancient imperious grey-stoned building, grassy squares, centuries old trees and verdant playing fields. I was not alone as there was a long snaking but fortunately swift moving queue, waiting to get access to the library building where the Book of Kells is kept (I was there just after the 12 noon Sunday opening time, it’s apparently much quieter later in the afternoon).

In case you don’t know, the 9th Century Book of Kells is an exquisitely decorated copy of the four gospels in Latin, four pages of which are on display in a dimly lit room in the library building. There is an exhibition area, with displays explaining the background to the book and related manuscripts. The €9 admission charge to see the Book of Kells includes access to the extraordinary sixty-five metre Long Room which is the main chamber of the old library. The room is high ceilinged, with to-the-rafters oak shelves holding a mass of leather-bound first editions. White marble busts of famous philosophers, writers and others who have a connection with Trinity stand sentinel along the length of the room. In the center there are display cases in which some of the Long Room’s 200,000 books lay open (the display changes every few month).

I spoke to the very helpful Ken, one of the library’s staff. In a curious circular twist of fate Ken started his working life as a bookbinder and now many years later he again has a book-centric job (in between he has had various other non-book related employments). He loves his work in the library, especially the opportunity to meet and talk to people from all over the world. He has met the great and the good; Bruce Springsteen and Al Pacino visited separately on the same day, Ken says his fifteen-second claim to fame was asking Al Pacino to leave (nothing Al did, just that the fire alarm went off when he was there). A particular highlight for Ken was watching the Queen visit the Long Room on her recent trip to Ireland.

When I left Trinity’s grounds I headed to have a tourist-y Sunday brunch of a full Irish Breakfast before visiting the National Gallery (more about that in another post).

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Filed under Books, Culture, Dublin

Tagged as Book of Kells, Dublin, Happiness Project, Long Room, Travel, Trinity College

August 27, 2011 · 5:34 pm

♥ A Bear and a Spreadsheet

I have looked at my unnamed teddy bear (I never got around to christening him) a great deal more than usual this week; I suspect as a reaction to watching Brideshead Revisited (the movie) last weekend and seeing Sebastian Flyte with his bear Aloysius. Yes, I know it’s been out for an age but I am only just getting around to catching up with a raft of films I missed when they were first released.

Now on to something completed different but trust me there is a tenuous connection. It may be a sign of incipient insanity but from late 2009 I have kept a clothes spreadsheet, diligently entering the cost and details of everything I bought since then and daily updating the spread sheet on the basis of what I am wearing that day (clothes purchased pre the end of 2009 are not included as it would have been impossible to remember when I purchased them and their exact cost) to arrive at a cost per wear figure. It’s not time-consuming, it takes about 15 seconds to enter each new purchase and a similar amount of time daily to update the sheet. It ‘s extremely satisfying to see the cost per were reduce the more I wear something but also very sobering when I look at the per wear cost of items worn infrequently. I think that the only sane conclusion from studying the spreadsheet is that I have too many clothes; I have in mind as a project for next year to buy less and to properly sift through my closet and remove the bulk of rarely/never worn items.

Now back to the nameless teddy and the tenuous connection. I bought his blue-striped shirt in Camden Passage in Islington when I lived in London, if I were to work out the cost of the shirt per sq cm it could well be the most expensive separate I ever bought. However unnamed teddy has worn it every day (except for sporadic-shirt-washing-days) since 1990, so on a cost per wear basis it’s almost certainly my best buy. Sadly nothing on my clothes spreadsheet comes anywhere close.

Is there anyone else out there who keeps a cost per wear spreadsheet?

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Tagged as Clothing, Shopping, Spreadsheet, Teddy bear

August 24, 2011 · 8:53 pm

♥ Favourite Things//Three

Vase d’Avril: The vase is a series of glass test tubes which slot into connected zinc covered steel holders. It comes in two sizes small and large, mine’s the small one and what you see in the picture is just a portion of it, as the whole thing is more than double that length with twenty-one glass cylinders. You can use it whole, in pieces, or even just one tube. Empty it’s not especially pretty but it’s totally transformed by adding a few flowers and bits of greenery. It cheers up a corner of a room, without the need to indulge in bank-balance-busting-buying of bunches of flowers. The Vase d’Avril is by Tsé & Tsé Associées, a small French design company.

Update 12th November 2011: I was in Paris earlier this week and noticed that there are now three sizes of Vase d’Avril: small, medium and large.

Paris Tokyo Cushions: I knew when I saw these cushions, a few years ago, in the Conran Shop in London that they were just right for my sitting room, which has duck egg coloured walls and a black floor on which I have place a bright red sofa. Perhaps the décor is somewhat eclectic but it works (well at least for me). I had seen other variants of the cushion, with pictures of dogs, Picasso paintings and Russian dolls, so I didn’t automatically assume they were French but when I looked at the label today I discovered that are indeed made in France by a textile company called Iosis. Looking at them closely reminds me I need to revisit the City of Light soon.

Goat’s Cheese: I am, in the main, dairy phobic, taking my coffee with soya milk, forgoing regular tea with milk for herbal varieties and eschewing cheeses made from cow’s milk. I miss eating the huge variety of cheeses made from cow’s milk (I confess I occasionally indulge) so I thank the food deities for goat’s cheese. It’s a very versatile ingredient and a staple I usually have in my fridge, I find it useful for adding depth and flavour to a variety of dishes, tonight’s mushroom and goat’s cheese omelette being a case in point. By a neat but entirely accidental coincidence the goat’s cheese in the picture is also from France.

♥ My Rules//Clothes Buying

It has taken me a couple of decades to formulate a loose set of rules through which I try to filter and regulate my clothes buying habits. I don’t mean to be prescriptive or to offer them as a universal panacea for closets stuffed with inappropriate, unsuitable or unworn clothes; they are just a personal set of guidelines that have helped me avoid mindless random purchases. I am sure you have your own clothes-buying rules; here are mine.

At the beginning of the year I make a list of gaps that need to be filled in my closet, if I am exceedingly honest when writing this list, it is minuscule.

I resist the temptation to buy on impulse. If I feel I am about to utter that oh so dangerous familiar phrase ‘I’ll take it’, I walk away, even if it is just to have a coffee, I find that space for reflection is often enough to dissuade me from purchasing. I can always go back in a few days to have another look if it’s something that has really caught my imagination.

I don’t buy a piece without being able to answer yes to the following questions: does the item suit me, suit my lifestyle and have I got at least three other items that I can pair it with?

The next question is; is it worth it? A very subjective judgment but I bear in mind that a blouse costing €15o could turn out to better value than a dress costing €100 depending on the amount of times it’s worn.

On the subject of an item’s worth, I never buy designer items at full prices, as I feel that they are mostly priced at a level that the market will bear and not at a level closer to their intrinsic worth. Most of my clothes are from the High Street with the odd high-end pieces that I acquired in the sales or at an outlet. .

I don’t buy items that don’t fit me. This may seem obvious but it has taken me more years than I care to remember to stop myself from buying, in the sales, things that would only fit if I lost a bit of weight, or that need to be taken in (taken up is ok) before I can wear them.

I buy mostly neutrals with the odd splash of colour, this may sound unremittingly boring but it least it means I have a selection of separates which I can mix and match.

That’s it but I have to confess that I occasionally bend the rules!

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Filed under Fashion, Musings, Shops/Shopping, Style

Tagged as Clothes shopping, Rules to shop by, Sartorial musings, Shopping

August 19, 2011 · 10:25 pm

♥ Feed the World

Sadly we live in unequal communities, within unequal countries, in a grossly unequal world. I don’t know if there is any sane solution to the perpetual conundrum of balancing the have/have not equation but I greatly admire those who give it some sort of shot.

One such person is Lauren Bush (yes, let’s get this out-of-the-way, she is a niece of George W. Bush) she is also the fiancée of David Lauren, son of Ralph Lauren; I don’t know what she will be know as after her marriage but she could of course be Lauren Lauren. All of that is beside the point, as what I wanted to write about is her brainchild the Feed Project, to which she has devoted considerable time and energy.

According to the Feed Project website click here their mission is ‘to create good products that help FEED the world. We do this through the sale of FEED bags, bears, t-shirts, and other accessories by building a set donation into the cost of each product. Thus the impact of each product, signified by a stenciled number, is understandable, tangible, and meaningful.’

Unfortunately when I attempted to order a couple of items, via the website, I discovered that postage (to Ireland) on a $65 order was $61 so I decided not to proceed. Feed bags are available in Harrods in London, which is where I bought my Feed One tote a few years ago (I think it was £38). The large One on the bag indicates that each Feed One bag purchased enables the Feed project, via a donation to The United Nations World Food Programme, to provide school lunch for a child in Africa for one year. Because of my difficulty in ordering Feed products I wondered if I should continue with this post; I decided to go ahead as today is World Humanitarian Day and if you are so minded there are lots of other ways to give.

Below is a video of Lauren talking about her work.

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Tagged as Feed Project, Lauren Bush, World Food Programme, World Humanitarian Day

August 17, 2011 · 10:04 pm

♥ Souvenir

Souvenir is one of only a handful of words in the English language that I don’t have to look up to discover its origin, it comes of course from the French word ‘souvenir’ to remember.

I find that holidays or trips away are quickly forgotten once I return home and re-immerse myself into daily routine. Even so, I am not a great souvenir buyer, particularly of the kind found in emporiums dedicated to flogging a mass of tat to tourists. Occasionally I happen on something that speaks to me and that I know will evoke happy memories of a time spend in a distant or maybe not so distant but different place.

One such thing is the enamel tree that I bought on my recent visit to Bath. It’s by an artist called Janine Partington who lives close to Bath and I found it in a shop/gallery in the Upper Town. I have put it at eye level in front of some books on one of my bookcases so I can see it every time I pass by; come December I plan to move it and use it as part of the Christmas decorations. At £45 it was a tad more expensive than a stick of rock or an ‘I love Bath t-shirt’ but it is a handcrafted piece that will last a lifetime.

What are your favourite holiday souvenirs?

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Filed under Craft, Travel

Tagged as Craft, Enamelling, Janine Partington, Souvenir

August 15, 2011 · 5:00 pm

♥ Bake my Cake

What do you do if you qualified as an architect in Dublin, just as the world economy wobbled spectacularly, the Irish property market imploded and construction in Dublin lurched to a shuddering halt? When Catherine De Groot completed her degree in 2008, she briefly worked in an architectural practice but when her hours were cut, she decided to supplement her income by transforming her childhood passion for baking into a business. For a while she beavered away at the cake making plus the architecture but the fledgling baking business was so successful that she decided to leave architecture and in November 2010 she found a suitable premises and opened Bake My Cake.

The shop is on Booterstown Avenue in South Dublin, it’s long, narrow and the white-painted walls are a perfect foil to the splashes of colour supplied by: the shelves of brightly-hued products, the painted logo created by a graphic designer friend, the colour blocked take away coffee cups and the pretty polka dot cake boxes. The gorgeous baking aroma transfixed me the moment I walked through the door, it comes from the heart of the business,an open plan kitchen, at the back of the shop, overlooking a small garden.

The business has three distinct parts. Firstly there’s the baking side; should you be looking for a bespoke cake for a special occasion (wedding, birthday, christening…) you can sit down and talk to The Bake My Cake team and they will come up with a design that matches your requirements. There is also a list of deserts, cupcakes and other treats available to order. Secondly, if you are a devoted home baker the shop is a place where you can source all manner of cake-centric things such as: fondant icing, cake tins, colouring, cutters, edible food writing pens, cake decoration and cup cake cases. The third part of the Bake my Cake business is the treats section at the front of the shop where there is a daily changing choice of goodies (cup cakes, brownies…) as well as ice cream and coffee for sale (take out only).

A special thank you to Neil, one of Catherine’s team for answering all my question.

Note; Bake My Cake, 45 Booterstown Avenue,Blackrock, Co. Dublin. Website: http://www.bakemycake.ie Phone: 00353 1 2784478. The shop is open, Monday – Friday: 8.00a.m. – 6.00p.m. and Saturday: 10.00a.m. – 4.00p.m.

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Filed under Cake, Celebrations, Dublin, Food/Wine, Shops/Shopping

Tagged as Baking, Cake, Cake decorating, Cupcake, Dublin, Dublin shops

August 12, 2011 · 10:54 pm

♥ Vegetarian Supper

My five-day detox in June (see here) left me feeling so energized that I decided to devote this week to another dose of healthy eating. The ideal was no wheat, dairy, sugar, alcohol, caffeine or meat. I have to confess that I racked up: one coffee, a few cups of tea with *whispers* milk, a delicious square of apricot sponge cooked by a friend and oh two glasses of wine this evening. Oops. I don’t feel too bad about my breakouts as in the main this week eats were über healthy. Tonight I made a dish that I have christened, roasted vegetable, goat’s cheese and chickpea bake. Here’s the recipe, which makes two/three portions.

INGREDIENTS

One small onion finely chopped

400g can of chopped tomatoes

Two cloves of garlic very finely chopped

Handful of basil

Two medium courgettes cut into bite sized chunks

Two red peppers cut into bite sized chunks

70g goat’s cheese diced

Handful of chopped walnuts

Half the contents of a 410g can of chick peas drained and washed

2 handfuls of breadcrumbs (I used spelt bread)

Grated zest of one lemon

Handful of parsley

Salt and pepper

Olive oil

METHOD

First pre heat the oven to 180°C. Saute the onion in a frying pan in some olive oil until translucent, then add the garlic and cook for a further two minutes (don’t be tempted to throw the garlic in at the start, as garlic burns easily). Add the tin of tomatoes with salt and pepper to taste and leave to simmer over a low heat for thirty minutes, towards the end of the thirty minutes throw in the handful of basil leaves. When the thirty minutes are up, take the pan off the hob and allow to cool for a few minutes before whizzing to a smooth sauce in a food processor. Taste and adjust the seasoning as necessary, if the sauce is too acidic you might like to add a teaspoon or so of sugar. While the sauce is simmering on the hob toss the chopped vegetables in olive oil and put them in a roasting tin and pop in the oven until the vegetables are soft (approx 30- 40 minutes). When the vegetables are cooked, mix in the diced goat’s cheese, chickpeas and chopped walnuts and gently fold in the tomatoe sauce. Make the topping by mixing the chopped parsley and lemon zest into the breadcrumbs. Transfer the vegetable, chickpea and goat’s cheese mix into a baking dish, top with the breadcrumb mix and place in the oven until heated through (approx 20 – 25 minutes).

This dish was an experiment and it tasted good but next time I think I will try adding a couple of tablespoons of pesto to the tomatoe sauce.

♥ More about Bath

As a teenager I was much addicted to reading the romantic novels of Georgette Heyer and in early adulthood I fell in love with Jane Austen’s works, so when I was in Bath last week it made perfect sense to make a beeline for the Assembly Rooms in the Upper Town. The rooms were at the heart of fashionable Bath society in bygone centuries; Georgette Heyer’s heroines, Jane Austen (when she lived in Bath) and characters in her Bath novels (Northanger Abbey and Persuasion) visited the rooms to dance, listen to music, play cards or drink tea.

The elegant rooms are on view to the public but as they are empty except for a few pieces of furniture and the splendid chandeliers, it was difficult to imagine what they were like back in the day when, candles flickered after dark, young women were chaperoned in public places and Beau Nash ruled society in Bath.

Bath’s Fashion Museum is housed in the lower ground floor of the Assembly Rooms and when I visited there were two special exhibitions on, the first Dressing the Stars (until 29^th August) which showcases the work of British costume designers who have won Academy awards and the second The Enduring Romance of the Wedding Dress (until the end of the year) in celebration of this year’s Royal Wedding. While the exhibitions at the Fashion Museum in Bath may lack the lustre of the set pieces put on by major museums, I nonetheless spent a good two hours happily viewing them and the museum’s permanent collection. The permanent collection has clothes and accessories dating from the 17^th century to the present day. (The pictures above show costumes from The Duchess and the dresses worn by the actresses who played the young Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret in The King’s Speech)

The outfit I would most liked to have walked away in, came from the contemporary section of the permanent collection, it was a very wearable high-low mix of a vintage Chanel jacket worn with chinos and a white blouse from The Gap, accessorized with a Mulberry bag.

After my visit to the Assembly Rooms I strolled to the magnificent perfectly proportioned Royal Crescent where I stopped to have tea and homemade biscuits in the sunlit garden of the Royal Crescent hotel.

I am sad as I write this, as the television is on in the background and I am listening to news and discussion about the violence, rioting and looting in parts of England over the last three days. It’s very difficult to take in, in total contrast to the serene England I saw a week ago and a shocking reminder of the lurking darkness that can cast gloomy shadows around the heart of any civilized society.