Silky Party Dress

One of life's finest joys has to be accidentally finding the occasional genuine op shop. They sadly seem to be a dying breed these days with hoards of people trawling fro quality vintage and then re-selling for a huge profit. Don't get me wrong. I think it is a great business model I just miss having a larger selection of op shops to trawl myself. I found a great little hospice op shop in the back streets of St Kilda while on a bit of an exploratory stroll. It was certainly in the afternoons highlights. Right above the tropical fish store that we spent about 45 minutes in- but that's another story...

I was very restrained in this store. Possibly due to the fact that I remembered anything I purchased would have to be lugged around with me for a week before it got home again. This is a very good thing to remember when starting to get excited about vintage crockery and vases. I left the brick a brack section and headed straight back to the rack of frocks.

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I found this cute little silk number and it made my day. I estimate it as early to mid 70's. A silk party dress with sweetheart neck line. Almost off the shoulder- and  puff sleeves. Slightly flared skirt and all in a great mix of buttery cream background, orange and yellow flowers, the occasional stone fruit (maybe peaches?) and teal squares with a semblance of vertical stripes for good measure. Whoever designed the fabric may have been having some acid flashbacks of some description. It is a pretty odd combo of things to have all happening at once really.

All of this in one frock and for the fantastic price of $10.00. This was still ok even after I mentally calculated the exchange rate. (I was much better at doing that this trip!)

I have chosen to accessorise to pick up the teal squares. This is mainly as it is the easiest way to lift the whole colour scheme to take away the fact that my complexion is possibly too fair to be wearing a colour this pale right next to my face. Also- I feel like I should be carrying an elaborately wrapped present to a birthday party. Now the only thing this dress is missing is a party hat and goody bag to take home for afters.

Blue and Teal Circles

This is the latest in a long line of hidden treasures the Wardroom has thrown out at me in the last month or so. In the name of Frockstar- I have been rummaging to find some new inspiration for outfits and blog posts. This is a dress I have never worn. Not even once. It has been in my possession for more than a year now. It came from a Hospice shop in Melbourne. I pulled the price tag off when I took the pic- so I can tell you that it cost me $10AU.

It is a simple halter neck dress with a flared skirt. It is actually made of silk which feels amazing on the skin. I love the retro vaguely 70's overlapping circles pattern on the fabric and this is made even better buy the colour scheme of turquoise and a deep teal green over white.

Now that I know that I have matching shoes, hair flower and can wear a crinoline petticoat with it- I think it will make it out to the streets as a completely wearable outfit!

NB- while this has absolutely nothing to do with the outfit in this post- something very weird is going on with the spacing here. For some reason I cannot change the gaps between the pics and the words. It is highly annoying...