The Vintage Hour, New Monthly Fashion Talks

I recently attended a ladies' evening to speak about my passion for vintage fashion. I arrived composed and prepared with my pages of thoughts and immediately knew I wanted to speak from the heart and not the paper. Together the audience and I entered the fashion portal and it was an honour to travel back in time with those that had walked through the era's that mean so much to me. I found myself connecting emotionally with the audience as I touched upon the relationship between fashion and politics. Vintage fashion is intrinsically connected to the politics of its time, particularly with the influence of WW11. To share my knowledge with those that had lived through such different era's was extremely humbling and insightful. 

During the course of the evening there was a real sense of community and solidarity and this inspired me to replicate a similar feel in my shop. Conquering my fear of public speaking I now feel inspired to host my very own fashion talk event. 'The Vintage Hour' will take place once month starting from October. There will be a different speaker discussing their own expertise from vintage to modern fashion. This will be a ticketed event, so to avoid disappointment sign up to our mailing list to be the first in line to purchase your seat via the website. We are so looking forward to having you as our most welcomed guest.

Following the tradition of Halloween our first talk will be on the topic of Victorian Mourning Jewellery and the 'Fashion in Death'. This talk will be held by Rachel Snowdon, a collector and curator of Antique and Victorian mourning pieces.

Before "death photography" was introduced, family members would use jewellery to remember a loved one. Queen Victoria also popularised mourning jewellery, grieving her husband for over forty years. Her grief seeped into social convention, politics and fashion and subsequently her reign was labelled the "Cult of Mourning". This was not only felt in Britain, in the US the civil war reached its peak and men and women were heavily imbedded in an atmosphere of mourning. It was unlikely that any other jewellery was to be worn with mourning jewellery during the first two to three years of "deep mourning". This was a time bridging an older world of European tradition and a new world of innovation and technology. Travel back with us as we talk about an era before the latter was imbedded in our society. Enjoy our secret recipe of mocktails and most importantly, an atmosphere of camaraderie. 

Love as always, Willow.