May Coords Roundup

Did I crank things up to very high with coords this month? Yes, absolutely! And it was worth it all.

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Coord 1: People’s History Museum

| Metamorphose Polka Dots Shirring JSK | offbrand blouse, tights, shoes, and necklace | Innocent World Original Lace Millefeuille bolero | Cutie Creator Maiden’s Prayer headbow | handmade earrings | Axes Femme brooch |

I was still rocking some volume in my hair from the Festival of Vintage the weekend immediately before, so it was imperative that I take advantage of that.

Could this be my favourite of the Millefeuille bolero laces? A good mother shouldn't have favourites!
But possibly...

May kicked off with me being off for nearly two weeks and I decided to spend the first week of that museum hopping around the Manchester area. There are so many museums that I still haven’t been to, despite meaning to go, and this was my opportunity. Which warranted dressing up, of course. My main reason for picking this dress over others was that it feels like “a dress for the people”: comfortable, easy to maintain, cute yet inconspicuous. And it paired well with comfortable shoes, since my feet were still recovering from a weekend walking tonnes around the Festival of Vintage and the People’s History Museum is easiest for me to access on foot. It’s one of the most classic coordinates that I’ve done with this dress and I like it, it did everything that I was hoping for. The museum was also great, I learnt some things about events (both locally and nationally) that I didn’t have a clue about before and the exhibits were very much done in a way to make you feel the power that people have when they come together. I also appreciated the curators not shying away from facts that would be “uncomfortable truths” for some (like Manchester’s Industrial Revolution-era wealth growing on the back of cotton harvested by slave labour) and treated them matter-of-factly, which I felt shut the door on people trying to play the devil’s advocate because they only know the history of the British Empire as taught through rose tinted glasses. It’s a museum easily done within around 2 hours, so if you’re ever in the area and have 2 hours to spare, I recommend, two thumbs up from me.

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Coord 2: Manchester Jewish Museum

| Innocent World Georges Rose JSK | New Look blouse | Red Maria tights | Elf Armorie Cupid’s Heart shoes | Baroque Repose of Queen hair clip | Violet Fane La Portrait de la Reine necklace | offbrand earrings | handmade brooch (not by me) |

This may be a bit much, but I was on holiday, a gal's allowed to live her best life on holiday.

Nothing hits the spot quite as well as a gobelin handbag.

Day two was also supposed to include an afternoon tea with a friend, but unfortunately things didn’t line up for them and that had to be cancelled. Still, the floral outfit worked well for the museum alone too and got plenty of compliments from the staff there, as well as some fellow passenger on the tram. I admit, I struggled the night before in trying to put something together, my mind wandered into all kinds of ideas in search of something new and exciting. In the end I went with this because “new and exciting” is incredibly subjective (for example, I haven’t actually worn this JSK with this blouse or these tights) and not exactly necessary. This outfit came out just as lovely and was a reminder that going against the obvious just for the sake of being different is making your life harder for not necessarily a big payoff. Meanwhile, this may be some straightforward coordinate as far as the individual items and the colour palette go, but it’s still really cute and I enjoyed wearing it.

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Coord 3: Museum of Transport

| Chrysanthemum’s Concerto Lost in the Garden of Eden JSK | offbrand blouse, cardigan, and socks | Bodyline shoes | Angelic Pretty Twinkle Sky headbow | Bow and Crossbones bangles | Patisserie Pink Lock and Key brooch |

Sticking to the theme of not overthinking things - my go-to makeup with the simplest hair styling possible.

I really should wear these retro bangles with lolita more. And maybe get a couple more colours.

It would not be an understatement to say that I had a crisis that morning. My original plan for the day absolutely did not work once put together and hand on heart, I went through at least 4 other options before I landed on this one. Of course because I was overthinking everything and stressing that nothing worked the way I wanted it to. And of course, once I stopped overthinking and just went with something, things clicked into place and everything was fine again. So yeah, it’s not a groundbreaking coordinate (again), but I felt really super cute in it and once again got a couple of compliments from the passersby on my way to the museum. This one, whilst also fun, I’d describe as more for the vibes if public transport isn’t something you’re really passionate about. But the vibes were still great, I hopped on a whole bunch of old buses and were it not that a primary school arrived shortly after me, it would’ve been a very quiet visit (though even then they were mostly all in one group following their guide and quite well behaved).

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Coord 4: Pankhurst Centre

| Victorian Maiden Shirring Frill JSK | offbrand blouse and earrings | Metamorphose Swallow Tail Jacquard jacket | Red Maria tights | American Duchess Bernadette shoes | vintage hat | Fantastic Grim Jewelry necklace | Latte Galaxy brooch | Peppermint Fox brooch |

The great thing about hats is that you get away with incredibly basic hairstyles.

Is it just me or has it been a while since Peppermint Fox released some brooches?

The moment when I regretted selling all of my lavender blouses because come on, it’s the Pankhurst Centre, wearing suffragette colours would’ve been perfect! In the absence of that, I went full-on colour theory since blue and pink make purple. The combination of this dress and jacket started out in the 1 Dress 4 Looks post and here it has been updated with pieces that fit the vibe better. I definitely did look historically-inspired enough to pass and when I tried the suffragette sash at the museum, it really completed the whole vibe. The Pankhurst Centre was as great as I expected it to be, focusing not just on Emmeline Pankhurst (though mostly on her), but including her daughters and what suffrage meant to them. Despite being located just behind a very busy area (smack bang in the middle of Manchester Uni campus and right behind the Manchester Royal Infirmary), it was very quiet, which made for a more enjoyable experience since the exhibition spaces are pretty small. I’d absolutely recommend visiting, it’s free though pre-booking is required, and there is also lots of other things in the area to get involved with if you want to.

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Coord 5: Chetham Library

| BtSSB Dreaming Sherbet skirt | A.R.W. blouse | Amavel cardigan | Angelic Pretty Brigitte Regiment OTKs | Sosic Shop shoes | Cutie Creator Maiden’s Prayer headbow | Melty Wish earrings | Latte Galaxy brooch |

Forgive me if I look a tad tired here, this was the first day that week when I had to get up before 10am.

It still amazes me how much wear I get out of this brooch. It's one that I never would've picked out myself and yet I reach for it so often. One of the best raffle prize wins for me.

I must admit, I enjoy coordinating this skirt with academia as the main stylistic inspiration. It’s not the obvious choice for it - but it works so well! The coord and the styling are deliberately simpler because the forecast was saying rain during the time that I’d be outside. I even changed out of these shoes and into more practical boots. And then what? There was no fucking rain! I mean yeah, it was spitting here or there, but that wasn’t the dark clouds and thunderstorms that the Met Office was predicting. It’s Manchester, dammit, how is a forecast of rain not coming true?! Sure, it was nice to be in more comfortable shoes for once this week, especially since after the library I popped into a few other places, but despite the no rain, it was both warm (first outing that week where I didn’t wear a jacket!) and quite humid, so you can imagine what the boots, worn with fluffy socks for some additional protection, did to me. Still got complimented though. And nothing soothes the soul quite like a visit to an old library.

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Coord 6: Coronation

| Baroque Repose of Queen Teatime Dress | Lady Sloth Glitter Mesh overdress | replica socks | offbrand shoes and kokoshnik | Tiny Passerine Creations The Duchess’ Tea earrings | Puvithel Crystal Heart necklace | handmade bracelets | vii ring | Rose of Sharon brooch |

Why don't I wear this headdress more often? Oh yeah, it is very extra.

Since the overdress sleeve hid them, here are my handmade bracelets. They're very fancy.

First things first: do not start counting me amongst the royalists. My reasons for watching the coronation were academic, it’s a historic event that I never had the chance to witness and it could come in useful at one point if my writing ever took me towards similar events. And knowing that the city would probably be awful, as well as needing rest myself, I opted to stay in on the day. The coord is only very loosely inspired by the event, I was mostly after something quick and comfortable that could be taken off fairly easily, since I was also filming a collab video that you can watch here. The emerald accents were a last minute idea that I ended up liking a lot and may reuse in the future one day. You just can’t go wrong with an all white or ivory coord with colourful accents, you know?

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Coord 7: Elizabeth Gaskell’s House and the Postmodern Jukebox

| AatP Rosier Fleur JSK | Lady Sloth crop top | offbrand socks and jewellery | Bodyline shoes | Imperial Fiddlesticks headbow | vintage gloves | Bed Room bracelet | Banned Retro Bella belt |

Full honesty, this hairstyle had me thinking whether I should chop my hair off super short and start going very 1920s with my hairstyles. Part of me is still thinking about that.

I love this bracelet, but damn the jump ring the pendant is on has a knack for wriggling its way out of the elastic.

Since I was meeting a friend in between the museum and the concert, I needed an outfit that would take me through the whole day. So what you see above is a bit of a lie, I changed my shoes to flats after the photos were done - but everything else was unchanged. The Postmodern Jukebox concert was a lot more influential here, as you can probably see, since this is way more mid-twentieth century than mid-Victorian. And despite the mismatched reds and the mismatched tone (some bits are really casual, others are quite formal, some are more sweet, while others are more classic, yadda yadda yadda), the outfit was fun and made me feel great. As was the theme that week, it attracted its own share of compliments, but even without those I would have felt really great about how it all came together. But the shoe change was definitely a good idea! Plus, the concert was great, as was the museum, I’ve never read anything by Elizabeth Gaskell and after learning more about her life, I am inspired to. Or at least to see some adaptations since, you know, Victorians wrote much more lengthy things and I kind of just want to get to the meat of the story.

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Coord 8: Bank Holiday Afternoon Tea

| Angelic Pretty Flower Garden JSK | offbrand blouse and hair clip | vintage haori | Enchantlic Enchantilly The Crown of the Rose Princess tights | Elf Armorie Cupid’s Heart shoes | Axed Femme earrings | Rose Marie Seoir necklace | Innocent World Strawberry Fields wrist cuffs | handmade ring |

Was that the day to experiment with eyeliner? Maybe not, but I did it anyway.

All the arm coverage!

To wrap up the exciting week off that I’ve had, on the Bank Holiday in lieu of coronation I went to Leeds for a chill afternoon tea meet with my comm. Very thankfully I was offered a lift, so I didn’t have to deal with public transport. And since that was the case, I leaned into the idea of wearing something more OTT and wore the outfit that Roli has put together for me as (a bonus) part of the Lolita Fashion Youtubers’ collaboration. Because a) it’s a really great outfit; and b) it meant that I didn’t have to do much thinking of my own, which by that point in the week I was very happy to forego. Granted, I made a few adjustments, mainly adding the obi for silhouette and dropping the fur hat because it’s mid-spring, which is not the time to be dealing with fur hats for the look. The afternoon tea was great, we had it at The Lost and Found Club, which officially has The Fanciest Bathrooms ever (seriously, it’s like a proper historical party powder room!).

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Coord 9: Resuming the Schedule

| Bodyline Sweet Macaron JSK | The Seamstress of Bloomsbury Jive blouse | Banned Retro cardigan | Innocent World OTKs | Sosic Shop shoes | offbrand hair clip | Tiny Passerine Creations necklace | vintage bangles |

Looking back, this kind of hairstyle seems to have been my jam a lot in May.

Hopefully even the snapshot of these beautiful bangles, which in no way shows off their full beauty, will distract you from the slightly awkward harm posing.

After a break of precisely three days I went back on my clothing nonsense, this time in a mostly monochrome attempt at wearing Bodyline’s Sweet Macaron JSK in a more classic way. One of my favourite coords with it to date is that sort of retro sweet-classic vibe, so I tried to do something like this again and I like how it came out. Especially the few bits that I picked up at the Festival of Vintage (two this year and one the year before), which really drove the more classic styling home. Those bangles in particular I’m chuffed with. The seller had these and lavender ones, but they were put as pairs of lavender and blue, not monochrome. When I asked if they’d split them into a pair of just blue, they very kindly did that for me. The picture is not the clearest, but not only are they carved, they have a sort of holographic effect on them, so they shine in beautiful hues of green and purple whenever they catch the light. Truly mesmerising.

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Coord 10: Slavic Representation

| Lady Sloth Slavic Bestiary JSK | offbrand blouse and shawl | BtSSB Polonaise Brillante OTKs | Hush Puppies boots | Kaneko headdress | handmade necklace and bracelets | Hello Crumpet Kukuryku brooch |

I probably won't make it for Eurovision 2024, but I'll learn to carry a tune and vote for me in Eurovision 2025, ok?

Look, I get that kikimoras are kind of malicious as magical beings go. But how could you hate her? She just wants to shoo men away, scare off children, and enjoy her own home that she's cultivated so hard. You can't tell me that this isn't a mood.

Eurovision Song Contest 2023 did not deliver the level of Slavic folk representation that I was looking for, so I took matters into my own hands to rectify. Well, partially because of that, mostly I was already planning to wear this coord since I put it together the day before whilst taking pictures for the 1 Dress 4 Looks post with this dress. I originally had an apron with it, since I was inspired by the kikimora on the print itself, but the apron would’ve covered up that amazing print, so it had to go. Some other time, sure, but not for this dress’ first formal wearing! Look out for this look in one of the future videos that I filmed too.

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Coord 11: Violets and Pansies

| Violet Fane Otome Nostalgia skirt | offbrand cutsew and hair clips | Enchantlic enchantilly The Crown of the Violet Princess tights | Laura Ashley shoes | Jule et Lily Sakura pin | Dentelles brooch | handmade bracelets |

Ok, fine, this bra wasn't the best choice with this top. But I actually kind of dig the vibe?

Proof of the perfect match between the pansy clip and the pansy in the print.

Having skipped Thursday as my typical dress up WFH day, I was determined to wear something frilly, no matter how casual, on Friday. My thoughts gravitated towards this skirt, since it is so easy and comfortable to wear, but I was stuck on coordinating options - so I turned to Whering’s Dress Me randomiser. As soon as it landed on this top, a lightbulb went on over my head and the rest of the coord made itself. Despite some worries that this light, cool-toned lavender might not work with the print, it all came together really well. I was also itching to wear my new pansy bunch clips, so even though I didn’t use all three of them, they still worked so well as a pair. The day started off quite stressfully, so I indulged in procrastinating in the form of doing my makeup, but then improved as time went by, which helped get into the weekend with a much more positive attitude.

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Coord 12: Late May Blues

| Song and Temple Fairytale Library skirt | The Seamstress of Bloomsbury Jive blouse | offbrand socks | Sosic Shop shoes | Haruhi Clover headbow | Metamorphose Rose Letter necklace | handmade bracelets |

Towards the end of May I got into using lipstick as a blush, so my blush game got a bit more intense.

I keep thinking to myself to get more jewellery from Meta whenever I spot any on Mercari etc. and then just... don't.

Blues because damn, the weather is nice and I long to be doing fun things, but this time of the year positively sucks for me work-wise, so I was trying to cheer myself up by looking cute. With it being this warm, skirts are much more comfortable than JSKs, so I started off with that and built on top of that. It’s simple and effective. Though let me tell you, it’s hard to put your head down to work when you have a little fur companion bored and demanding your attention.

Banana for breakfast rather than scale.

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Coord 13: Tea Exchange Meet

| BtSSB Soiree of the Beginning of My Memories JSK | offbrand blouse, shoes, barrette, and jewellery | BtSSB Polonaise Brillante OTKs | Manda Rin Designs hat | Metamorphose wrist cuffs | vintage gloves | Rose of Sharon brooch |

I'm glad I kept makeup very simple if the best selfie I got barely even shows it.

Does the off-centredness of some elements here bother me? Yes. But I already retook the photo because initially I didn't realise those ribbons got twisted.

My Discord server did a  tea and snacks exchange a’la Secret Santa and we agreed to open our packages together during an online meetup. Whilst I had this coord planned out for a bit, Aunt Irma started off my day with pain, so I was worried that I’d have to change it last minute. Fortunately though, taking my time in the morning and taking the day itself slowly worked out, so whilst I got dressed very much just for the meetup at 5pm my time, it meant that I could wear this exact outfit. It’s a shame that I don’t have photos of the green barrette that I clipped to the bow on the hat for some extra colour balance, so trust me that it’s there.

The aesthetic loot picture.

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I am very grateful that I was able to pack May with so many outfits, including wearing almost all of my designated spring/summer pieces in this one month alone. All of that creativity did wonders for my emotional energy levels, recharging my battery so that I could get through the early June when my physical energy levels take a nosedive. And it has been so fun exploring all the museums - I vlogged each of those days, so look out for the vlog on my channel to see more. Now let me stew for a little with some television that doesn’t require any brainpower while I run on bare essentials for two weeks, I’ll be back to my usual cheery self soon enough. Also, I think it’s a little bit funny how you can track the changes in weather here based on my outfits - it did progressively get warmer, which explains a little bit more of why my lolita coords dropped down a bit.