Only A Sunny Smile

 

Photography - Beci McDonald

Model - Ljiljana Pajovic

Styling - Isabel Knowles

It is official, I am launching my SS13 collection and I'm so pleased to share it with you. You can check it out in my Etsy, and I have also redone my online store too. It has been quite different the way I have developed this collection, I started with a theme, a mood and idea and went from there, whereas normally I fall in love with the fabrics and then work around them. To me it feels more of a consistent collection and I love the way it all looks together like this.

I really wanted to name this collection, as I feel it gives more of an insight into the feeling behind it rather than just, SS13, or Spring Summer. I ummed and ahhed about it for ages, settled on a Gershwin lyric, but then it didn't feel right. After trawling the internet (and bookshelves) for quotes and songs and poems I found this beautiful F. Scott Fitzgerald quote that seemed just too perfect;

“It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light it scattered the night and made the day worth living.”

I wanted this collection to conjure up images of long summer evenings, Gatsby's garden parties, cocktails, swimming in lakes, dancing all night, and staying up to watch the sun rise. Playful and fun, but with a hint of darkness to it, uncertainty or mystery. The quiet time when most people have gone to bed and you sit around planning the future and reminiscing on the past until the sun comes up on a new day.

Each piece is named after a female character from P. G. Wodehouse's 'Jeeves and Wooster' stories. These have been some of my favourate stories ever since I was little (I still can't sleep without a story tape - I miss tapes!). The world that Bertie Wooster lives in is a ridiculous one and I think it is lovely, and full of silliness. Also, when I'm working long into the night and nothing is on the radio but dance music, spooky stories, or the shipping forecast (which actually I like to listen to) I always seem to go back to the 'Jeeves and Wooster' audio books to help me through til morning, they are read by Richard Briers who sadly died a few weeks ago, I think he was a jolly good chap!

Anyway, I'm sure you get the gist, go and have a look! Now I must start on my AW13 collection...