Autumn has arrived

Although the weather might not seem to notice it. It's tremendously sunny here in Barcelona. But the fact that autumn is here, my favorite season, is the arrival of American Vogue's September Issue. Yes, the big book with this year 902 pages (14 less than last year) of new seasons fashion (mostly adds). I tend to buy it at the end of September as I am lazy to walk until the middle of Las Ramblas to the International Magazines Kiosk so I only do it when there's the fear it might be already too late to buy it.

After, it's pleasant to start the day glimpsing this image overload magazine. Usually during summer I hardly buy any fashion magazines as the summer selection; bikinis etc. tiny clothes is not so tempting, but when autumn arrives I am more than willing  to study the seasons chunky knits and warm coats. Time to cover up our bodies girls!

This year the cover is really fresh portraying the wonderful actress Jennifer Lawrence; beautiful and natural. The magazine itself is nothing really special; adds, adds and more adds and some maybe interesting article, but it's more the routine for "the starting of the autumn" that makes me to buy this issue. As I no longer study anything "back to school" doesn't exist to me, so I have to find some other things to get inspired. This September Issue is one of those.

Beutiful vintage

A new e-shop for vintage clothes and accessories was opened last week; Stiina's. Stiina Huhtanen is a Finnish stylist living in Berlin and the items she sells are mostly Finnish with some treasuries found in Berlin. The web page of Stiina's is really beautiful, stylish and really easy to use. You can find the items and the description of them easily and prices also seem to be fair enough, affordable.

In the past years vintage and retro have been really a trending topic and widely used describing and especially when selling things. An old item sounds so much better when you say its a "vintage" piece. I was glad when in Olivia's August issue they had a description of these "old" terms, to have some clearance what is what. Following is from Olivia's August 2013 issue:

Antique: more than 100 years old

Vintage: from the 1920's to 1980's

Retro: from the 1960's to 1970's

Second hand: from 1990's

Old/Recycled: all garments produced after 1990's

I have never been a fan of retro; the brownish color palette and more or less psychedelic prints have never attracted me, but vintage has always appealed to me. Old, well done and sewn pieces  evoques great respect in me. My dream job would have been one of a seamestress, but as we live in the prosperous era my parents didn’t let me to study in profesional school, instead I had to go to high school in order to then graduate from university…and at that time I didn’t have my own will to choose against them. Well, old things. Now I have my sewing machine at home and the possibility to create things always when I want to, or have time for it.

Following pics are from the Stiina's web pages.

One outfit from the Stiina's. The shirt has funny ruffle sleeves.

Good add

Today driving in the center I saw a good add on the back of a buss. It was about Vichy Catalan's Tonic Water. Vichy Catalan's product is sparkling water, but lately it has expanded its products to lemon taste sparkling water and now apparently to this tonic water.
The publicity is really stylish black and white image and it did gave me an impulse to buy it. Unfortunately  the supermarket we visited didn't have it, so I have to wait still to taste it. The sparkling water of Vichy Catalan is always a must to have at home, I like it.

R-collection

R-collection is a Finnish clothing company. Its style is simple, honest clothing for leisure and all the clothes are really practical. The wonderful thing about this company is that they weave some of the fabrics they use in Finland, Orivesi. The fabric is thick cotton jersey and it is really long lasting, good quality fabric. They have the headquarters in Kajaani and that is where they also do patterns and cut the fabrics. Sewing is done in Estonia.

R-collection clothes are perfect to my boyfriend who is not metrosexual at all and likes simple, long lasting, classical clothes. I always buy something to him when visiting Finland; T-shirts, college trousers or hoodie. This time I wanted to buy him a jacket, but as he was not with me maybe better not; when back in Spain changing a product wouldn't be so simple. A pity they do not have international e-commerce; they only send goodies within Finland.

From sales I bought 2 dresses for me; a black autumn dress and a blue linen dress for summer. The linen dress had funny pockets in front and the fabric was really pretty as the weft and warp where different color, the other one black and the other blue, creating a beautiful color texture. The black dress was just a simple jersey dress with no fuss, easy going. Maybe if I add blue lace stockings I might get the outfit to rock a bit more.

To be honest the R-collection clothing is not fashion or fancy at all; it looks really "Finnish" so to say. The clothes are perfect for home and outdoors. They also have really loose cuts, so you can't find anything really tight there or figure hugging. Loose and practical.

The linen pocket dress.

Above the typical R-collection logo, and then the one that was in my dress, more fancy one. I don't really follow/understand the different logo in the etiquette of my jersey dress as it is not fancy at all and therefor the basic logo would be more suitable for it. 

Styling from the Olivia's August issue. I love those blue stockings, it would give a twist to my practical but boring black jersey dress.

Yarns and ribbons

Impossible not to have an eye to yarns in Finland. Almost always when I set my foot in Helsinki I visit a yarn shop  Menita near the Design Museum. Usually I don't have anything special in mind, I just like to enjoy the atmosphere and colors of the exquisite selection of mostly natural fiber yarns. This time I had no time to go to the shop, but luckily in the biggest supermarkets in Finland there is also a great selection of Novita yarns.

Other fantastic shop is Luhti in Rovaniemi. From there I always go and buy some carpet rags. The difficulty is to buy a correct amount of something that you actually have only thought of doing, because if you then need more material it is almost impossible to get the same material here in Spain. Of course you could order via internet etc., but it always gets tricky when you are just lacking some color and for sure you wouldn't get yarn from the same dying set.

Here are the materials I bought this time and later, hopefully soon, I can share what I finally have done with these things.

Ribbons & yarns

Finnish magazines

When traveling adequate entertaining on the airplanes is a must. One of the best ways is to buy magazines, fashion, decoration etc. at the airport and read them through the flight. Magazines are that kind of short entertainment that you don't need to be too focused or concentrated as when reading a book/watching a movie and short breaks are more than welcome when the coffee trolleys reaches your seat line.

Visiting Finland I always like to buy Finnish magazines to have a look what is going on on clothing sector. Nowadays I don't know whether there's lot of going on, but at least there are many fashion magazines for such a small country. In summer you also have those 2in1 treats, so this time I bought various different ones just to have a glimpse of all. They were so cheap...

Gloria is for wealthy adults, career ladies so to say, focused magazine, classical one. Although I don't fit de description, not wealthy, nor classic, I always like to read it; usually it has interesting articles and it is not only about the latest in fashion. It also skips the selection of H&M etc. cheap brands. Though this time the summer issue was quite boring.

Costume, Olivia and Trendi they are all for younger lectors; young adults, that are still going out a lot and participating to summer festivals etc. trendy people, hipsters. Trendi is the oldest publication of these 3 papers and that is my favorite. I didn't like the layout or style of Costume (name is nice and the cover of 2/2013 issue) and the same for Olivia as they both were too messy, too blog kind a likes with short stories and reports of products. Well Olivia had an interesting Vintage-story and when entering Costume's web page you could print a pattern for a wide sleeved dress. I just printed all the instructions, so let's see whether this autumn I will be able to make a dress for me.

I still can't believe there are market for all these magazines in Finland. In the future I will just stick to my old favorites Gloria and Trendi; I feel I already start to be too old for Costume and Olivia.

Summer reading

More creams

I recall having seen this bright yellow cream in supermarkets in Finland, but I never would have guessed it is a Finnish product with the Key Flag Symbol on it. But it is.

It was launched in 1952 a prosperous time in Finland's history when Armi Kuusela was crowned to Miss Universum and the Olympic games where held in Helsinki. At that time cosmetic products were luxury items that only wealthy people could afford. Lemon Juice & Glycerine was designed to fill this gap and it surely did succeed as it became the favorite cream "for everyone". The name comes from the prime materials of the product; pampering lemon juice and moisturizing glycerine. The curiosity of the name is that it is in English, because at the time of its creation all the imported products were considered to be better quality so the manufacturer Transmeri wanted to give it an international air. The product has been always produced in Finland and the recipe has stayed almost the same for the past 60 years.

I was surprised about this history and decided to try out this nostalgic hand cream, the price is something like 3 euros so its not a catastrophe if it turns out to be bad. But it was great. The thing I was scared the most was its scent; I had an idea it might have strong lemon smell that I couldn't stand for it. I don't even use daily eau de toilettes as it might give me a headache. With this cream you hardly can smell the lemon, so that is great and it leaves your hands smooth and dries quickly.

The hand cream is the original product, but now within the years Transmeri has created a product family around it so you can find soaps and creams for feet as well.

Lemon Juice&Glycerine; I surely do recommend this product!