Les Parisiennes des Mamansnet: "You gotta have style. It helps you get down the stairs." - Diana Vreeland

[botemp]

Lovers of Parisian style and fashion with a conscious mindset and lots of chatter in between.

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Favoured Parisian addresses:

Second Hand Shops

Outlets

Favoured London addresses:

Charity Shops, Dress Agencies, and Outlets

Favoured NYC addresses:

Consignment shops, Vintage, and Restaurants

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or, have you watched Self Made?

Self Made, urgh that was an awful rendition of an amazing story and person. The whole pitting women against each other for dramatic effect was awful when they were both inspirational business women in their own right who didn't lower themselves to such weird behaviour. Really disappointing. We're on the last episodes of Lupin and it being French I actually have to pay attention to that, so no good for sewing. The Other Boleyn Girl seems to be trending but I thought that was an old movie, like a decade old so if it isn't something new it might be long enough ago that I don't remember much of it...

The Dig is a lovely and fairly brainless film based on an Anglo Saxon archaeological discovery set in Sussex in the run-up to WWII

A relative oldie (in hyperfast Netflix terms) is Russian Doll, if you missed it new. There’s so much deja vu in it that you could definitely watch it with one eye and still get the gist.

If you want something totally off the wall, Blood Of Zeus is a brilliant grown up anime series set in ancient Greece, like the anti-Disney Hercules

Personally I watch something I don’t have to focus on when I have to focus on something else and that helps me focus so usually Star Trek (have seen it all and the pace is just right not the new discovery shite obv).

We’re having lovely sunny winter weather here and I know my teenager is dying to go skiing (downhill), the only winter sport he does. Apart from going outside in unsuitable clothing of course, he’s a firm believer in tradition.

I know these new fangled chalk paints are supposed to mimic something but I’m not sure if it’s what in Swedish is called “linseed paint” or “egg tempera”. It annoys me that they don’t just say? That little piedestal should be an ideal project for the real thing but drying tomes are so long and I don’t have facilities but that’s my dream of course they are so beautiful those colours.

Thanks for the suggestions, oh likes the sound of anti Disney anime Hercules and it's just background noise to me so does the job. Although the snow does look magical so we might venture out but the feel temps are below -10 due to high winds so I doubt we'll last long.

Totally inappropriate commentary, I had seen the promo for The Dig, is Carey Mulligan supposed to look old, last I remembered she was younger than me

Can you ski uphill or is langlaufen considered skiing too?

I think it's imitating lime based paint but that was never really used on wood, but that's the finish. I think traditional Swedish linseed based paint is probably different, it's not as powdery of a finish IIRC which makes the pigment less punchy.

Yes I believe the 35 year-old Carey Mulligan was hired to play a 56 year-old woman.

@Floisme

Yes I believe the 35 year-old Carey Mulligan was hired to play a 56 year-old woman.

This is so weird, is it at least a back and forth in time piece, at least then it would make sense?

From what I've read, it covers the last 3 years of Edith Pretty's life, so age 56-59. I don't know if there are flashbacks but, if there are, they could easily have brought in a younger actor to play them.

To be fair - not that they deserve it - I think they originally cast Nicole Kidman.

Eh, Nicole Kidman wouldn't have looked 56 either 🙊

Ha ha no, but at least she's around that age.

True but I've done some press digging, there's no redeeming them really, the (male) archeologist got aged up from 29 to 51 and his wife's age remained the same when in reality they were only two years apart

So they aged the male characters but took 20-odd years off the leading woman? Well I'm shocked, shocked I tell you.

That's a lovely dress by the way. And Red the silk shirt looks great too - such a flattering fabric.

Bo The green joggers I have from New look are available for £10 in a size 6 in limited stock. I just bought a pair for a friend. Last time we talked about them there was no 6 available. Now its the only size left.

I like podcasts for mindless tasks. I crochet quite a lot and listen to mostly murder mystery. The LA times do a lot of good ones.

bani I like the navy dress, not as keen on the mushroom one. Could it be worn in spring/summer too or is it too heavy?

I've used Annie sloan before. Easy to work with. It's the wax that I found difficult to get the hang off. But a soft cloth and small circles of buffing in and don't do too big an area at a time and it works well.
Though an eggshell gloss probably gives a better finish and isn't as faffy in my experience. Would lavender or coral contrast with the green marble? (My home interiors are a bit....eclectic)

I bought the last pair in a size 12, and returned them 70sduvet, but they were large! Nice colour, and felt comfortable but not for me.

Thanks, duvet, but without meaning to (but probably will anyhow) sound like an utter sniffy judgemental snob, I'm kind of trying to cut back on the fast fashion purchases and if I do then try not to buy things that are difficult to recycle. I totally appreciate the whole trying things out at a low price point before committing at a higher price point but it just doesn't work with my current good intentions (not helped by my new sewing hobby where it's not always easy to figure out where things come from too).

I like a podcast too, or an audiobook, my Scribd subscription is really paying off in the lockdowns. I'm no good with true crime though, I can see the appeal, I totally got sucked in by that Netflix documentary series but the lack of resolution irked me, but I guess that is the appeal for others. I'm going through the whole Dressed, history of fashion podcast archive, it's really enjoyable.

I totally understand that point of view.

The Dressed podcast sounds interesting

I listened to a lot of Dressed before but got a little tired of it because a) that format a lot of "amateur" (not journalists/professional media people) fall into where they stage dialogues with questions and answers but they obviously know what they're going to say because manuscript and b) they seemed a little too keen to be inoffensively PC sometimes to actually get into some subjects in depth. Perhaps I expected too much. But it is a great podcast for covering a variety of subjects and for learning some new things, definitely!

Langlaufen is surely skiing but I forget the English word -- cross-country isn't it? so cumbersome. Anyway, he doesn't do that. His father's son he is, wants to go downhill fast.

Am angry and sad about the Uyghur scandal and the relative silence on the subject by media and authorities. H&M:s statement wasn't bad but fundamentally the global clothes industry can't have a clue what's going on in all parts of the chain. Even in the 19th century cotton was picked by forced labour. I have no idea how to solve this. I was looking at a Swedish webshop the other day that sells Indian blockprinted cotton by the metre (useful among historical sewers apparently, I'm still watching those videos) -- their child labour statement is basically "look, we've been to visit, it looks ok, we can't promise anything but frankly you have to be an adult to reach across the work tables so we'd say they don't use child labour". Refreshingly honest in a way.

Still dithering on the Arket dresses, but such kind words are spoken about the navy I'm almost near keeping it. In answer to Duvet it is ok for Spring, not summer. I'd say up to 15 degrees is a good guess. Maybe up to 20 if there's a good breeze going.

Yeah, don't binge listen to Dressed, I can only take one or two at a time. The scripted nature doesn't bother me so much because if you're doing something else it's a good format to listen to, on its own I can definitely see that getting grating.

The inoffensive PC stuff has me rolling eyes too but I think that's more representative of the state of social sciences in the US than them individually. Several times I've scratched my head with them and their academic titles, for example I'm all for a historian pointing out that certain attitudes that are considered reprehensible (slavery, misogeny, take your pick) today were common then but I find the judgement of the past for the sake of virtue signalling in the present a very strange thing for historians to do.

Yes, it affects my respect for them as academics I'm afraid.

Yes cross-country skiing
I wish I could had skies myself I think I could have just about done it here this week!
I always rent the sky equipment (downhill) but always fancied cross country ...
bani do you need lessons to pick up cross country or could it be done by practice? In Italy they told me there were no instructors for that as ir was ‘easy’ to do on your own .. I was wary and never took the plunge.

And thanks for the the compliments on the shirt.
Today is more thermals and cashmere jumpers . Bloody freezing

I haven't cross-country skiied since I was a child ... The skis are much longer so turning and going uphill requires a bit of technique, sure -- I'm surprised they didn't offer a course where you were, I'm fairly sure Swedish Alpine centers do. But I'd say most people here just shuffle along to enjoy nature, they're not doing the big sweeping moves to get somewhere fast. You need a bit of upper body strength to push yourself along, so being able to "sweep" with your legs (like getting to the lift when going downhill) is very useful of course in any case. When we're over this rubbish you can take a skiing holiday in Sweden instead and do a wholesome cross-country course ;)

Just checking in and trying to catch up. We've had a couple of tricky weeks with dd2 not sleeping very well, a flooded toilet and a broken radiator. The latter two are fixed, the first is a work in progress.

I like the navy dress, bani. But if I was being picky, I would say the waist is a bit high. I'm short waisted and it's an issue I often have. It is lovely, though.

Very snowy here, today, though not exactly cold by Swedish standards. Not sure our old, victorian house would withstand a proper winter. It's draughty enough as it is, next project might be the back windows .

It's so cold here too in the South West UK, no snow, but bracing beautiful weather. I'm sitting at my desk in layers of wool and cashmere (am Googling cashmere vests and bodysuits, I think this is what's missing from my life). I was going to start on a summer dress project later today, but can't bring myself to take off the layers to try on the toile (and my house is not even that cold).