Life Lately: Spring break, wedding celebrations and teaching excitement
Or the highlights of a strangely warm and surprisingly not-too-busy April
Dear fashion friends,
It has been incredibly difficult to sit down and write today. As much as it has quickly become my favourite start-of-the week ritual (as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago), this morning my brain has been wandering around too much perhaps with the excitement of going back to teaching tomorrow and in part because it’s still on weekend mode.
How could it not be after the most magical weekend in the English countryside, celebrating my dear friend Isabella’s wedding to her-love-turned-my-friend, Alex?
I met Izzy (or Isa, as my Spanish-speaking brain calls her) when I was just starting my PhD in William & Mary back in 2018. I was awarded a scholarship to attend Colonial Williamsburg’s Antiques Forum, where she was a fellow. My first memory of her is washing our hands in the bathroom when she very excitedly (as usual) invited me to come for lunch with a group of other young scholars.
Since we bonded over some historical food at one of the taverns on that day, our friendship has grown to be one of my most precious gifts from my time in Williamsburg. In the years to follow that meal, we’ve shared many long walks, first in Virginia and now in London, always filled with personal confessions and historical gossip, podcast and period drama obsessions, love (and some heartbreak) stories, writing tips, exhibition openings, and my favorite: a very fun birthday celebration in the most inaccurate period costume that two textile historians could ever wear 😅
Izzy was also one of the very few people who knew I was interviewing for jobs in the UK before I moved here and has been a sort of fairy godmother to all things London since I moved.
So, as you might guess, to say that this weekend was very special is an understatement.
I cried, I laughed, I danced (we all did) in celebration of a beautiful couple that I am very lucky to have in my life and I hope to continue calling my friends for the rest of my days in this world.
I was thrilled to wear some of my favorite festive pieces for the celebrations because, as you may know by now, not only am I a chronic outfit repeater but I also love to accumulate memories over my clothes by wearing them over and over again to special occasions.
For pizza & gelato evening and pub quiz night on Friday, I wore a hot pink wraparound dress that my aunt gave me for my birthday a few years ago. I had mostly worn it with sneakers and sometimes jeans for a more casual look until now, but this time I dressed it up by pairing it with studded sandals and statement earrings.
For the wedding ceremony and reception, I wore a greyish-blue dress that used to be my mom’s, which felt perfectly appropriate for this time of year: not too hot, not too cold, and filled with blooming flowers and singing birds. The shoes were my go-to lace-up heels from Aquazzura that I’ve been wearing to almost every single dance party since I first got them back in 2016. (They’re just too comfy and perfectly looking to want to wear something else!) And the earrings were a beautiful ceramic pair that I unexpectedly found at Richmond market the other day and only realized were a perfect match for the dress when I was packing for the wedding.
On both days I added a ruana with crocheted inserts made in my beloved Andean highlands by Priah, one of my favorite conscious brands in the entire world. I don’t take the choice of “conscious” as an adjective for fashion lightly and I honestly believe that Priah is doing a fabulous job at fighting the status quo in fashion. But I’ll have to write an entire post about it at some other time.
Beyond giving me the perfect excuse to wear pretty clothes and fun jewelry, the wedding also happened to mark the end of a blissful 3-week spring break from teaching. Early tomorrow I will be taking my weekly train to Leicester for a very intense block of teaching some history and theory of fashion communications and styling. First-year students will be developing a fashion film exploring the connections between fashion, music, and subcultures. Second years will be developing creative statements where they explore their identities, creative practices, and sources of inspiration. The end feels quite distant still but I’m already excited about the outcome!
And, since I reflect a lot about my teaching and how we can use fashion education to actively create a better fashion industry, I might come back to share some of my insights as the term progresses. I’m also finally editing a much delayed podcast episode on Fashion Education: The Systemic Revolution, edited by Ben Barry and Deborah A. Christel (and gifted to me by Intellect), so do expect that in a couple of weeks.
In the meantime, here’s my top 5 things that I’m looking forward to next month:
Going back to teaching and exchanging what I hope will be several thoughtful and insightful discussions with my stellar fashion styling & communications students;
Trying to catch The Great Mughals: Art, Architecture and Opulence before it closes next Monday at the V&A;
Joining my friend Dr Jess Bailey and other stitchers for Gather Around the Frame: A Public Quilting Bee at London College of Fashion;
Witnessing Khémaïs Ben Lakhdar’s viva (or dissertation defence) on cultural appropriation in (French) fashion;
And, of course, continuing to write these weekly updates and creating podcast episodes to release bi-weekly on Redressing Fashion!
(By the way, if you missed last week’s post, it’s because I published over at The FRD Community, pondering: Can we ever dress sustainably?)
If you have any additional suggestions for events that I should attend and report back on or if you’d like to invite me to join your event, please don’t hesitate to get in touch! I’d love to find out more about them 🤩
As always, thank you, thank you for reading and joining the conversation!
Until next time,
—L 🩷