On Wednesdays we wear pink

Tackling life's big questions today, though not coming to any definitive conclusions. As per, I am being painfully indecisive and wasting time questioning pointless things. Do I like fashion? Could my outfit (above) be deemed as fashionable? What's the difference between style and fashion? And is it possible to like fashion without actually liking fashion? Am I going through some sort of fashion-existential crisis?

It began the other day when I offered one of my friends a copy of ELLE magazine and she politely declined. My friend studied fashion and I would say she's a fashionable person. Yet when I asked her why she didn't want it, she said it was because she didn't like fashion in terms of trends and designers. Yet by definition that's what fashion is. So how was it possible for my fashionable friend to dislike fashion?

I began applying these questions to myself. Would I say that I was someone who liked fashion? On the surface - yes. I'm obsessed with fashion magazines, have a fashion blog, enjoy styling outfits and love fashion photographers and style icons. Yet if you were to ask me about designers, I wouldn't be able to answer confidently. I love shopping but I hate brands or rather people who buy something just for the name. I could name you the seasons trends, but I wouldn't necessarily say that I follow them. I hate the fickleness and pollution that the industry causes, yet it's an industry that I've chosen a career in.

The more I thought about it, the more I would say this is the general consensus for a lot of girls. Maybe the blog title would be better reworded as 'can you like fashion without liking the fashion industry?' Initially my conclusion was going to be that you can enjoy style without liking fashion. Quite often those who do have good style have one that's their own, regardless of trends. But then there's still the niggling at the back of my mind that reminds me how closely linked style and fashion are. How can you like one without the other? Fashion produces style. The closest analogy I can think of so far is by comparing it to a fashion brand - let's take Primark for example. Primark produces clothes. You may hate the brand of Primark, it's value and the way it works, however you may like some of Primark's clothes. The two are definitely linked but it is possible to like one without the other. Maybe it's the same with style and fashion. Or maybe I should just stop this random rambling and get on with some more important things.

Don't forget to follow me on Bloglovin!

I needn't have worried. It was beyond my expectations. The sourdough was perfectly soft, the cheese was perfectly stringy and the sauce perfectly delicious. In fact at the time I declared it to be the best pizza I ever had, though it's been so long now that I can't remember if this is true or if I was just very hungry (as one often gets when on a long pilgrimage). The ingredients are all sourced from Naples and slow cooked in a stone oven - according to the owners electricity kills pizza - so there really is no hope of recreating this at home.

I recently decided to torture myself even further and see what I missed out on from the restaurant menu. Aside from a large variety of other pizza toppings, I also missed out on mini deep fried calzones, tomato risotto balls filled with smoked mozzarella and most upsettingly, deep-fried Italian mac n cheese. Most intriguingly though was a recent addition to their Exmouth Market stall - pizza soup and a dipping calzone to go with it. Genius. I believe another pizza pilgrimage shall be in order.

SOURCE: dazeddigital.com // PHOTOGRAPHER: Evan Schreiber

If anyone didn't know hair could be so political, they certainly did after the release of Beyonce's Formation. (If you still don't know, you can get an intro here.) The fro is having a mo, and I'm sure I'm not the only one rejoicing. You can say it's just hair but it goes a lot deeper than that. Hair is our identity. It's often the first thing we try to change when we want to change ourselves, evidenced by Emma Watson chopping her locks off after ten years as bushy-haired Hermione, Miley Cyrus ditching her long brunette waves for a peroxide pixie crop and of course, Britney Spears' bald-headed breakdown in 2007. So you could say that after several years of moulding my identity to fit everyone else's, I am ready to start shaping my own. Here's 5 reasons why it's the perfect time to ditch the straighteners.

1. INDIVIDUALITY IS IN
Conforming is out - as discussed in my last post. Nobody worth noting achieved success by trying to be someone else. Being yourself is important but I've been learning that it's not always easy, especially now when we're faced with more influences and opinions than we necessarily want or need. The people I've always admired and quite often those who become icons do so because of what makes them different. Whether it's a tooth gap, a scar or just big curly hair - wear it with confidence.

2. AND SO ARE AFROS
There have never been so many models on the runway wearing their natural hair texture. Model Maria Borges became the first to wear her natural hair on the runway at the Victoria's Secret show last year. It's late but it's still a sign that the industry is slowly changing and coming round to promoting more than one beauty ideal. I never realised the importance of this more so than when I watched these little girls on the Tyra Banks show who believe their own hair is ugly and that people will only like them if they have straight hair. If they saw more women around them enjoying their curls/afro, then they wouldn't grow up feeling bad about their own. Which is why I love Beyonce for Formation.

3. BEYONCE SAYS SO
'I like my baby hair with baby hair and afros.' Just a small line but one that has caused much discussion. Blue Ivy is so young and yet her hair has already come under scrutiny when thousands signed a petition against it's unruliness. Beyonce's letting Blue Ivy and thousands of other girls know their hair is fine as it is. Growing up as a mixed race girl, there weren't many people around me (or celebrities) with my hair type. If I wore it down at school I felt uncomfortable: everyone would want to touch it, boys would make jokes and I was very aware and embarrassed by the fact that it was different. As I got older I would try to hide it as much as I could in buns and ponytails, only to feel ugly in comparison to the girls everyone liked at school, consequently resulting in the damaging years of forcing my hair straight. I'm paying for it now in the long process of trying to get my curls back.

SunKissAlba

4. MORE INFO AND PRODUCTS
Thankfully we are living in the internet age, meaning instant help is only seconds away. There is so much information out there now, bloggers and vloggers and floggers and joggers. Ok I'm getting carried away but you get my point. Youtube is probably the best place to start because you can find everything there, styling tutorials, product reviews, hair mask recipes and overnight techniques. The best person I've found is Sunkissalba who had her own natural-hair-epiphany a few years back and hasn't turned back to heat since. Watching her is enough to make any heat addict put their straightening irons down. And the best products I've found so far are from the Kinky Curly range. The Curling Custard is a life saver.

5. LOVING YOURSELF IS IMPORTANT
Cheesy but it's true. You know what's attractive? Confidence - someone who is happy in their own skin. This is not me saying that you should never straighten your hair or that straight hair is horrible, it's just me saying that it's ok not to when many of us feel pressured to look a certain way. It's about redefining beauty standards and being comfortable with who you are. Love your hair the way Darcy loves Bridget - just the way it is.

Don't forget to follow me on Bloglovin! 

'Something rather magical is happening in fashion: there is a gentle but significant new mood sweeping through design houses...I sense a remarkable era ahead, one that defines a new fashion voice where the brave and remarkable shine.' The editor's letter in the ELLE January issue perfectly summarises my current feelings toward fashion. For the first time in a very long time I feel inspired again, excited to wear the SS16 trends but ready to abandon them at the same time in pursuit of my own personal style. Either one will do, as luckily for me the industry's new mood is the individualist, or as Amelia Diamond puts it - street style has become personal again.

My most recent purchases are an affirmation of that: red co-ords, silky pink bomber jackets, patchwork jeans and strappy orange heels. Granted, they won't look good together but if I wanted to try it then why the hell not? Where fashion was once used to express yourself, a minimal and monochromatic palette bought monotony to the masses, eschewing any glimpse of the wearer's personality and extinguishing any love that I had for it. Until recently I believed that my lack of interest in fashion was down to me. Nothing was inspiring me and I thought I had outgrown it. It only occurred to me the other day when analysing my new purchases that perhaps it wasn't me - it was fashion.

When shopping online or searching Instagram for some inspo, everything looked the same - mainly variations of the Kardashian-clan prototype which consists of black, white and camel layers. I'm not saying it's a bad style but I think it's a safe one, an easy way out when you're not sure what your own style is. Bloggers on Instagram were sharing pictures in jeans and t-shirts and getting thousands of likes and comments on how well they dressed. Normcore was the current trend. Vogue defined it as 'a bland anti-style...The notion of dressing in an utterly conventional, nondescript way.' There's just two problems with that statement. Bland and conventional.

It is worth noting that average isn't inspiring. We are inspired by the extra-ordinary, something remarkable that motivates us to act a certain way. I couldn't be inspired by normcore as it was the antithesis of what fashion is about and what I love about it. The SS16 shows saw designers being the most experimental that they have been for a while and the repercussions show. Street style has character again. I remembered that fashion is meant to be fun and am relishing in the idea of dressing up and going all out Carrie Bradshaw style. My current obsession? Leandra Medine aka The Man Repeller. In terms of fashion she is fearless and she most definitely motivates me to act in a certain way - being confident enough to try new styles and slowly but surely introducing colour back into my wardrobe.

You can follow me here on Bloglovin.

Until now, I believed orange was strictly for prison jumpsuits and monks. It is a colour that has never lay in my wardrobe nor have I ever wished it to. It is halloween pumpkin costumes, high-vis traffic cones and ‘you’ve been tangoed’ jokes. It is not fashion-friendly. Or so I believed.

Fashion’s current individualist attitude is rubbing off on me. Maximalism is in, though it’s not something I could pull off. But keeping the style and cut simple and injecting a burst of colour? That’s something I can work with. And it so happens to be that orange is the colour I want to work.

Red may be the colour of the season, but it’s (currently) not a shade that I enjoy. Yes it’s love and lust and passion, but it’s also brash, flamboyant and brazen. It needs suitable colouring to pull it off, and a bold personality to match. It’s not something to be done half-heartedly. If red is danger and piping hot, orange is friendly fire. It’s warm and illuminating; if worn correctly it can make the wearer glow. You just have to find the right shade for you.

IMAGE CREDIT: ANNI PENG

So what is the answer to my ‘what goes with orange?’ question. The top of my tangerine wishlist is a pair of Missguided high-waisted trousers, and blogger Anni Peng (seen above) styles them perfectly, with a simple white cami top and some black platformed plimsols to keep it casual. I wouldn't add the sleeveless blazer myself as though I said above it's friendly fire, it's still fire. Approach with caution.

Forgive me Father for I have sinned. I made a lie on a previous post. It wasn't intentional and at the time it was true. I really did believe that the Shoreditch Grind made the best iced mocha's in the land. But now I have seen the light. The heavens opened and showed me the way. Like the shining star that led the 3 King's to Jesus. Except it was in London, so it was a tiny glimmer of sunshine (at a push). And it led me to Brooklyn Coffee.



See! The signs were literally right in front of me, urging me to my coffee enlightenment. I stepped in, unaware of the coffee blend I was about to taste. They didn't even have iced mocha written on the menu, but when divine intervention is taking place nothing gets in the way. I asked the lovely workers if they do make them, and they briskly whipped me one up using their b-eautiful coffee beans.





Now, I first heard about Brooklyn Coffee as I heard they were best for size. Seriously, when I see this next picture I can't help but imagine that music they play on X Factor as the judges step out on stage. I even hear the X Factor voice man shout ICEEDD MOCHAAAA. Oh perhaps this is part of the Holy Spirit talking to me.


Just me? Who knows. All I know for certain is that this coffee was amazing. It was slightly thicker than other iced coffee's that I've had, and now all others will seem watery and lack substance in comparison.  So forgive me Father for my previous sin, but now you have shown me the way, and I shall follow in your footsteps and show others the way too. It's straight opposite the Urban Outfitters in Shoreditch.

Amen.

This weekends destination was Route, a cafe situated round the corner from Dalston Junction. I first found it on a Saturday morning hunt for a hangover-breakfast. You know the kind. Something that requires minimal effort/moving and arrives quickly. So I was relieved not only when we found Route within a short walking distance from where I was staying, but even more so when I saw 'The Hangover Breakfast' printed upon the menu. If you look to the right side of the menu and go down, you'll also find 'Hair of the Dog' printed on there, but I prefer a different hangover cure thankyou very much. Food. And lots of it.



The cafe describes itself as a deli/bistro that's inspired by the Middle East and the Mediterranean. The theme is more apparent on the lunch and dinner menu, where seasonal salads and sandwiches adorn the counter. On the breakfast menu you can go for the Mediterranean breakfast or the Shakshuka (a Middle Eastern egg dish), however there is nothing I love more than a traditional English breakfast, especially if it's done well. Other tempting offers that almost made the cut were the buttermilk pancakes with clotted cream and pistachios and the scrambled eggs and cheese in a tortilla wrap with chorizo and tomato. Though who was I kidding by even considering any other options? I came here for one thing and one thing only.



The thing I enjoy most about the breakfast at Route is that it's a fry-up that's not greasy. Actually that's a lie - what I enjoyed most was the sauteed potatoes and onions. But knowing I was eating good quality meat (I'm usually funny about sausages) and eggs made my food-conscience feel that little bit better. Plus, they got the fundamental breakfast principles just right. The bacon was done enough that the fat was crispy and the egg yolk was perfect. Joined with artisan bread, grilled Portobello mushrooms, tomatoes, beans, sausage and my beloved potatoes and onions, and you have yourself an excellent start to the day. The breakfast carries on the til 3pm on weekends for the hungover masses.

Tips: A pot of tea between two works out cheaper; we got two mugs each out of it.The service is quick, however I recommend going early if you want to grab a table of your own. It gets quite busy later on and you'll likely be sharing your table with others. Oh and they do have vegetarian options.

...if you have a sweet tooth. As I have found the perfect spot for your inner American policeman: coffee and donuts to go. Actually it may be the perfect spot for your inner American full stop, as they also serve some mighty fine fried chicken and waffles. But let's save that for another day. Today we're giving these doughy, sugary, hoop-shaped pieces of goodness - that if I'm being honest I'm not completely sure how to spell - their time in the spotlight. I shall go with the spelling that was given on the menu, so for the rest of this post I shall go with DOUGHNUTS.


Yes sir that's the place. (Southern American reading voice please). The Doughnut Hatch. Hot and fresh, just how I like em.


The hatch is located on the side of the restaurant Bird, a fried chicken joint in East London. Serving £1 coffees and the daily Glazed Doughnuts, the Hatch often sells out quickly. When researching the menu, I had seen previous flavours of the day had come in glazed chocolate covered with sprinkles, pink icing with cherries in the middle, Oreo, maple syrup, coconut - the list goes on. So I admit I was a bit disappointed when I arrived to see just a plain glaze that day. However I quickly recovered and settled down to tuck in.




The doughnuts were huge - super thick and very soft. Just 1 was enough for me, but if you really do have a sweet tooth then you have to try it's ice cream doughnut sandwich: a scoop of vanilla ice cream sandwiched between the doughnut of the day and then drizzled with chocolate sauce, caramel sauce and fresh whipped cream. If you want a bit of sweet and meat - something I can't ever imagine craving - then they also do a doughnut buttie on the weekends. Like a bacon buttie, expect the bread has been replaced with doughnut. The idea of it both repulses me and intrigues me. Let me know if you've had it! @AFashionSauce

My internship drove me to coffee addiction. Kind of. Iced coffee counts right? Ok, they were iced mocha's. But I won't let the addition of chocolate take away from my new found membership in the coffee club. As a teenager my fantasy of being a writer was imagined within a Brooklyn apartment where I would frantically write all night, fuelled by a constant intake of caffeine. Given my dislike for hot drinks, the taste of coffee and of course my location issues, the dream seemed far from my reach. Until now.

And so we meet again Street Feast. Round 2. Part II. The return of the bap (Smokestak's). Ah yes, this time I visited Smokestak not just once, but twice. In one sitting. That's not all I had either, visiting my other old pal Mother Clucker and making a few new acquaintances on the way. I think it's fair to say that this time I won. I came, I gnawed, I conquered.
If you haven't heard of Street Feast (check out my first visit here), it is a foodies playground, except toys are replaced by London's finest food stalls, hop scotch becomes hopping from vendor to vendor and secret dens come in the form of hidden bars. And did I mention that there's free beer? I walked in and took one look at it all. "Challenge accepted," I smirked to myself, in a way just as creepy as it sounds.

As any child would do unleashed in a playground, I firstly had to do a hasty lap of the area to check out all my options, literally bouncing with excitement deciding where to begin. Mexican? Check? Indian? Check. Asian steamed buns with slow roasted pork belly, cucumber, spring onions and hoisin sauce? Check. So naturally I got them all.

One of the out-of-the-way bars Once again Smokestak was the clear winner for me. After several visits now, it seems to get better each time. I don't normally eat much pork, but for Smokestak I make the exception - the smoked flavour of the slow roasted pulled meat is incredible, hence why we went for seconds. Next would have to be Rola Wala, an Indian food vendor serving spicy fillings of marinaded chicken, herbs and fresh chutney on mini naans. My only complaint was that they weren't big enough. I also tried to go for something new and tried a Mexican dumpling with blackened chicken thigh, beans (the Mexican kind, not Heinz) and a load of other toppings, but it didn't go down too well for me. The dumpling was quite dry and the chicken was too fatty. The same went for my pork from Yum Bun, which was a shame because I had really been looking forward to that. But it was fine in the end, because pudding made up for it. Sugared doughnuts with vanilla ice cream, salted caramel sauce and hazelnuts. Yes I really did eat that much. Yes I felt sick afterwards. Would I do it again. Probably, yes. I advise you all to do the same this summer.

Round one

The Holy Grail Smokestak

Mother Clucker's Cajun fries

From 'You Doughnut!'

Street Feast is running in Dalston Yard and Lewisham in the evenings and has now opened a similar lunchtime event called Dinerama.