Wednesday, October 10, 2012

Bugging Out!

























Last Wednesday, Valerie posted about her fish and lobsters. This week, I'm talking about insects. I'm buggin' out! I scanned my jewelry and immediately saw a theme -- bugs. Lots of them. In all shapes and sizes. Here are a few of my favorites. To spare those readers with arachnid phobias, I omitted any spiders from the round up.

When we went to Brooklyn to the Anna Piaggi Picnic, we stopped in to a vintage store on the way from the subway. I found this terrific little orange and black wasp pin.






















I paired it with my favorite Amy Downs turban.




















These bright red Kenneth Jay Lane earrings are two of my all-time favorites. The color and design are knockouts.















Don't you just love how they bring out the blue in Daniel Craig's eyes? I do think he makes a positively smashing James Bond, but my heart belongs to Sean Connery! Who is YOUR favorite Bond?
























And my vintage cricket clicker. Anyone who went to Catholic school in the fifties may remember how the nuns used the clickers to signal when we were all to genuflect. It's created an almost Pavlovian response in me -- click and I begin to kneel.














I couldn't resist strategically placing my little fly pin on Gwen Stefani's September Bazaar cover shot.
























On my first trip to Paris in 1972, I purchased this carved scarab pin as a memento. Whenever I wear it, it takes me back in time.
























I put it on skirts, jackets and, of course, hats! I found this vintage pleated grey wool turban (a Saks Fifth Avenue Debutante) at the Stella Pier Show a few years ago. I paired it with a Max Azria for BCBG coat I found at the Atlantic City outlet center last year.
























I bought these fabulous black resin earrings at Angela Caputi's store in Milan because they reminded me of beetles.


















They are definitely statement earrings. They look a little bit like the back of the head of The Alien, which of course makes me love them even more. I paired them with the turban, to riff on the striped effect, and my lucite frames.






Valerie adds a little seasonal flavor, above. Jean saw it first at the flea market, but oddly, didn't need a huge aluminum spider. Valerie needed a spider very badly, so it came home with her. Sharp eyed observers might wonder why its two little eyes are drilled into its - ahem - back, and not by its pincers, where (as we saw in Lord of the Rings) they might be more useful. Isn't nature full of surprises?!

Think we've gone buggy? If so, we're in good company. Schiaparelli (below) did it waaaaaay before we were born. (Thank god there are still SOME things that happened waaaaay before we were born. We both find we often say "Oh that happened before you were born", but usually to people who are much younger than us. EVERYthing happened before THEY were born!)
























POST SCRIPT 10/13/12

How did we forget to include these two ???!!!

Jean's fabulous huge bakelite scarab pin.






















Valerie's tiny wasp pin, copied in modern times from an antique Japanese sword fitting.

11 comments:

  1. I had so forgotten the clickers and genuflecting. Thanks for bringing that memory back.

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  2. I love this post with your pairing of bug jewels and ensembles! Schiaparelli is good company to keep!

    Adore the black resin with your pleated turban; wonderful!

    xoxo
    Karena
    Art by Karena

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  3. I see I am not the only one to be in love with plastic bugs:
    http://www.mispapelicos.com/2012/02/rebel-schiaparelli-inspiration.html#.UHgw4FH8bIU
    I adore you both!!!
    have a grand weekend
    Sacramento

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  4. Way too many things to love :-) But if I had to single out something, it would be the scarab from the trip in 1972. Oh yeah, and Sean Connery. Both would be from my era.

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  5. There is too much goodness going on in this post- my brain can't compute! How lovely you all look and it's so cool to see Forest City Fashionista amongst you all!

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  6. The Betsey J top is to scream for! So I'm screaming: aaaaaaghhhhh! Yes.

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  7. What a visual feast! How I wish I could have been there and soaked up some of these wonderful treasures. If money were no object, I dread to think where I would put everything that I'd want to buy!

    Love from England,
    Rosemary from www.foreveronthecatwalkoflife.blogspot.com

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  8. Hello; great blog, I have added it to my list! BTW, that "scarab" pin from Paris is not in fact a "scarab"; it is a CICADA. It's a favourite Chinese theme; I have a couple of Chinese carved cicadas!

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  9. I just stumbled across this blog and it has made my day, what vibrant and creative people. Inspiring.
    Although i have one small question...
    Theo who wears his jumper boldly as a pair of trousers, was this restitched in some way for the purpose?... i never thought a vintage fair would be the place for a crotchless number!

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  10. In response to Anonymous and the question about Theo (in our Metropolitan Vintage Show posting), Theo was a model of propriety. He was kind enough to show us how he transformed the sweater into pants. It was all quite decorous. The problem is in our descriptive powers, not in his dressing. We'll either have to try it ourselves and photograph it, or ask Theo to demonstrate. His sweater had a wonderfully graphic knit, which added to the results.

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