Hi Everyone!
I just wanted to let you know that over the past week (of being away & then being sick) I’ve missed you guys and I have missed posting on the blog regularly. I promised I’d take lots of photos while I was in California, so here are a few “postcards” from my trip.
We were in LA for 5 days and had an amazing time. We stayed at a little 1950’s style kitschy motel in Santa Monica. I love mid-century kitsch! (Check out the Kenny G-slash-porno music on the website. Oh yeahhhh.) Our hotel was right by the beach & a short walk to the Santa Monica Pier. It was perfect. Here are a few shots of me on the “patio” outside of our room. I ended up sticking to what I planned on packing and wore a variation of this outfit for most of the trip { Loose T-shirt: Community, Jeggings: Paige Denim, Sunnies: Marc by Marc Jacobs, Flat Sandals: Payless (?)}. The hat I picked up at a little boutique on Main St in Santa Monica!
We spent a lot of time walking around Santa Monica (below) and Venice Beach (2nd & 3rd photos below). Venice Beach kind of reminded me of my neighborhood back home (Fernwood) on steroids: tons of dreadlocked hippies, bong stores, skateboarders, pizza parlours & hippies vans. Yeah, that sounds like BC. Walking down the boardwalk you can smell weed in the air and hear the BUZZ of all the tattoo parlors.
The sunsets in California are really pretty. I also totally fell in love with the massive palm trees and the warm sunny weather (sandals and no jacket in March!)
I can’t remember if I mentioned this but, BF is a shoe designer. The purpose of the trip was actually to shop for shoe samples, check out vendors and research inspiration & trends for his Spring/Summer 2011 line. I just came along for the ride. Needless to say, we spent most of the trip shopping. On our last day in LA, we spent the day wandering around Hollywood & Beverly Hills, shopping on Melrose. Here I am in front of the iconic Fred Segal store. According to design insiders & buyers, this store is a main source for a lot of the casual wear trends that you see worn by celebrities which then get knocked off (thanks to lots of candid in-store photographs taken by designers & buyers alike) by mainstream retailers like Urban Outfitters. I had a good time wandering around the store and looking at all the pretty things.
After we finished shopping on Melrose we wandered over to The Grove, a beautiful outdoor shopping mall where we had lunch before heading over to Barney’s and Nordstrom’s (where I had a total American-Department-Store-gasm.)
When we weren’t checking out every shoe store in LA, we headed down to Santa Monica beach to chill out. I’m pretty sure this is where they filmed Baywatch. Unfortunately, The Hoff was nowhere to be found. Maybe that’s a good thing. His chest hair kind of scares me. Plus, if we’d found him he might have started singing. SHUDDER.
I also met the fantastic Vibrations of a Vixen, on my first night in LA. I don’t have any pictures to prove it though because she is anonymous and mysterious like that 😉 I will say that I had tons of fun going for drinks with her. Within the first few seconds/minutes of meeting we were already deep in conversation about everything from careers & room-mates to…threesomes & spermicidal lubricant allergies. She’s my kind of girl.
PS. Did I mention I ate the equivalent of my body weight in Mexican Food while I was in California? It got so bad, that on day three of the trip BF nicknamed me “The Taco Eating Monster”. Me & La Salsa are good friends now.
