We always like to get our sunday fashion fix from the Sunday Times Style, but this particular week we were very pleased to have not one, but two pieces of Tatty Devine on the FRONT COVER!
The beaded flower is now in the sale, and our Bunny-Tastic Tatty Devine for Peter Jensen Glasses are available at uber cool Dover Street Market. Just add a floral maxi-dress, silk flowers in your hair and plenty of sunshine!
For the second year running, we made some special jewellery just for Indietracks. If you missed the festival, you can still buy it online…
Here is Carys from The Give It Ups co-ordinating her necklace with a red dress and heart-shaped sunglasses:
We loved Carys’s look so much that we immortalised her in plasticine during the animation workshop. A friend even made a miniature microphone stand out of a cotton wool bud!
It was a fantastic festival, with lots of indiepop bands playing. We particularly enjoyed Betty and the Werewolves (who we made some jewellery for last year – now all sold out!); Shrag, who have a really good song called ‘Tights in August’ available for free download during August from wiaiwya.com; The Pains of Being Pure At Heart, who played lots of new songs; and Veronica Falls, who play really dark garage girl rock.
We also loved this game of Indie Guess Who made by Club Baby Honey – so cute!
We’ve teamed up with one of the most glamorous females in London fashion, Mrs Jones, on a collection inspired by Inca, Aztec and Navaho textiles. These are some of the biggest and most colourful pieces we’ve ever made!
The collection features showpieces typical of Mrs Jones’ style, but with a Tatty Devine twist, and bridges the gap between clothes and jewellery. There are lustrous feathers, tropical birds, streamers, and abstract Aztec shapes mixed with mirrored rainbow brights. Four special pieces from the collection are available to buy, and the extended collection of stunning one-off statement pieces are showcased at Mrs Jones, available by appointment.
Fee Doran, the lady behind the Mrs Jones label, is a notorious fashion designer and stylist. She’s worked with Madonna, Scissor Sisters, Florence and the Machine and Paloma Faith, and is famous for flamboyant pop star creations like Goldfrapp’s Pony outfits and Kylie’s Can’t Get You Out Of My Head white hooded catsuit:
Like Tatty Devine, Fee first started out at Portobello market! She’s since become legendary in the fashion and music worlds for her unconventional approach to design. Her EC1 studio has just been transformed into a new show space catering to stylists, artists and performers. It’s a creative mecca, with unique Mrs Jones pieces and one-off products from her favourite designers.
Here we are at the grand opening of the show space a few weeks ago!
And here we are with Mrs Jones, hard at work in the Tatty Devine studio creating the collection!
Here’s a sneak peek from our photoshoot by John William of some of the more exclusive pieces that you’ll only find at Mrs Jones…
The Mrs Jones looks is hedonistic, experimental and colourful, so we were wowed when Fee approached us to work together. She inspired us with a vintage book about the Mapuche people. Their traditional jewellery is made by hammering silver flat, and transforming these ideas into modern jewellery using the flat sheets of acrylic in our studio was really exciting. Mrs Jones’ flamboyant, extravagant approach allowed us to make huge accessories that lie somewhere between costume, clothing and jewellery. Put on one of these pieces and you instantly become a superstar.
Here’s a behind-the-scenes glimpse into the story of each piece, starting with the ‘Lizzie Redbone’ Necklace…
For this piece, Mrs Jones brought us an illustration of a tropical Aztec bird, full of colour and pattern. It was a real challenge to translate the image into jewellery, bringing in all the different colours and shapes. We used our special techniques to give the jewellery all the delicacy and movement of a feathered bird. This piece is named after Lizzie, a lynchpin of Mrs Jones’ studio team. You might meet her if you ever pay a visit!
Crazy Girl herself is a real person, Tiff McGinnis. She’s a kind of modern day renaissance woman. To give you an idea: she once grew three beanplants on a constantly spinning turntable, which grew into a braid. Mrs Jones brought us a model of this design in cardboard, then we took lots of coloured mirror and layered it into wings. The tassels are a Mrs Jones trademark look. The colours we used turned out to be a perfect match for Crazy Girl’s amazing animated music videos, like this one, The Rebel:
‘Chaguaitu’ means ‘earrings’ in the language of the Mapuche people of Chile, and these pieces are based on a traditional Mapuche earring design, featuring a crescent shape hung with drop shapes to create movement and sound. We took the design from ancient to modern by modelling it in our trademark acrylic, in delicious matt gold.
For the photoshoot, John William styled the jewellery with unique clothing by Mrs Jones. The shoot was done on the same day as Fee’s son George’s Lady Gaga-themed 11th birthday party! The party and the shoot became fabulously intertwined, with the kids dressing up in Mrs Jones and Tatty Devine for a special birthday photocall. You can see the FABULOUS pictures and read about the party on Mrs Jones’ blog. How Gaga is this?
George’s amazing sunglasses are actually John’s, and Mrs Jones liked them so much that they’re now available from her show space! Make an appointment to visit for more goodies including all the exclusive Tatty Devine pieces at www.mrsj.co.uk, or take a closer look at the four pieces available at Tatty Devine.
Photoshoot by John William
Photography by Gabriela Antunes
Hair and make-up by Bea Sweet
Last night I was on the door for the launch of the new issue of Eel zine. In a warehouse somewhere near London Fields everyone piled in to see what was going on. Dalston Oxfam came down and set up shop in the corner. A friend got a Biba jacket – I was a bit jealous I didn’t get there first (one drawback of being on the door).
Today in our Brick Lane shop we are listening to Julian Casablancas, which reminded us we really should post a snap of him from Glastonbury! Julian wore the Five Tier Frogging Necklace in gold mirror for his performance, and he looked great!
Last night we had a Super Summer Party with Supermarket Sarah to celebrate her new shop wall installation in our Brick Lane boutique. It’s an exhibition with a difference: everything is available to buy from a photo of the wall which will appear today on Sarah’s website (www.supermarketsarah.com). There are lots of goodies on there, from vintage and one-off Tatty Devine jewellery and display pieces to vintage clothing and objects sourced by Sarah. We’ve already bagsied a vintage YSL jacket!
Here’s a sneak peek of the wall! You can come and see it in the shop, and buy stuff straight from it on Supermarket Sarah’s website from later today!
Our windows got a supermarket makeover – come and check them out!
These huge cardboard letters made by Linnea Apelqvist spelt out SUPERMARKET SARAH all along the wall opposite the shop!
Here are Rosie and Harriet with Sarah and the wall! We made a special gold mirror Supermarket Sarah necklace for Sarah, which is on the wall, too, so it’s available to buy – very limited edition!
Here’s Rosie trying on a giant bow made out of milk bottle tops from the wall! If you’re quick you might be able to get your hands (or head) on it…
Prop stylist extraordinaire Fred Butler and Anna of Patternity (she made those great tights she’s wearing) did the DJing. They brought loads of ace 90s dance records with them, which we all enjoyed dancing around to. Their top track of the evening was this special 12″ club version of ‘Pass The Dutchie’ by Musical Youth.
Fifi and Lola made rainbow cupcakes with the cutest little umbrellas in them. We love it that they have name necklaces and also name aprons!
Thanks to Vitamin Water for the soft drinks. Not sure if we were supposed to mix them with vodka, but we did and it tasted good!
At the end of the night all the big cardboard letters had to be brought in, before we went off to one of our favourite local pubs, the Royal Oak. It was a great party – thanks to everyone who came along, to Sarah and her lovely assistant Annette, to Fred and Anna, and Fifi and Lola.
Our friend Philip sent us this photo from Topman Oxford Circus. He thought these necklaces looked suspiciously like our 3-D Glasses Necklace (which is one of our popular Best Of Tatty Devine collection, and was designed back in 2007)…
We went along to Topman ourselves to get proof. And yes, it’s a bit smaller, and it doesn’t say Tatty Devine on it, but otherwise this necklace is very, very, very similiar to our original design. Here’s a pic of the two necklaces side by side:
This actually happens to us quite often. We’ve blogged before about how often our designs are copied. In February, the Guardian included us in their ‘How to catch the copycat designers’ piece. We don’t like to moan every time we are copied (it would get very boring!), but a lot of work goes into our designs to keep them original, fresh and exciting. It’s a real let-down to us and our loyal customers when our design work is treated as a resource by other companies.
Shame on you, Topman and Arcadia.
What do you think, readers?
P.S. Thanks to Philip Normal of the Happy Shack in Camden, which stocks genuine Tatty Devine, for alerting us to this.
You Me Bum Bum train. I can’t disclose much for a couple of reasons. The first is that Harriet is going this week so I don’t want to spoil it for her and secondly I wouldn’t want to spoil it for anyone else either.
For what felt like a feature length period of time, but was probably only about 20 minutes I was wheeled into a dreamscape I haven’t even visited in my sleep. Interactive theatre taken to a new level, Bum Bum Train is surreal, challenging, exciting and basically defies description without giving everything away. Just like a rollercoaster I wanted another go the minute it had finished.
It has sold out but a reliable source told me you can still get tickets through the Barbican.
