We were late. My sister Sophie and I had to get to Bristol after work, and since I'm about 40 mins away, with traffic I arrived just before six. But Soph had to come from Devon, so she arrived about half an hour after me. The preview started at six, and by the time we'd had a glass of wine and got ready, it was nearly half seven. Also, trying to get an outfit shot proved rather tricky as we couldn't get the lighting right, but here are a couple of our attempts!:
Top: Topshop, Shorts: River Island, Boots: Urban Outfitters
As you can see from my face in the latter picture- I lost patience with trying to get the lighting correct very quickly.
I actually intended on wearing double-leather: leather shorts and leather jacket- but it was only in the taxi on the way there that I realised (to my amazement) that I was actually working quadruple-leather. Leather shorts, leather jacket, leather boots and leather bag. In case you havent picked up- I have a thing for leather, so was secretly smug. But I'm not sure it's necessarily cool to go anywhere dressed as effectively, a human cow.
Anyway, so we were late arriving for to the event, and unfortunately missed the speeches, dancing and cocktails- which, in my book is complete failure. They, no doubt, (secondary only to the exhibition itself) would have been my three favourite things of the evening! But I didn't have time to dwell, as we collected out free drink (Babycham!), snuck in a few canapés (cocktail sausages, fish pâté en croute, cheddar and green olives, and mini lemon meringue pies!), and headed into the exhibition.
I am of firm belief that you will enjoy this way more in picture form than my wordy narrative- so here, enjoy:
Our Aunty Julie, glamorous host of the evening.
Sophie, Me and Sammi no flash
Sophie, Me and Sammi with flash
Sorry MShed
These are obviously just a selection of the photos I took, so if you'd like to see more, feel free to email me and I can send some over for you.
If you'd like more information on the exhibition opening times, how much it costs etc. click here. It's open until the 15th April and I thoroughly recommend you go, if you're in any way interested in that kind of thing. The photography is just fantastic and it's really cool to see some of the trends re-emerging again now. It reminded me of the fashion cycle post I did- click here to read. It was also amazing to see such iconic Vogue covers and have a look at the outfits used. Really cool.
After the exhibition we were invited to attend the after-party- but unfortunately, our hunger got the better of us, so we ventured into Bristol to get some food. Now, this wasn't really what I had in mind- because Sophie had made it clear that we were wearing heels, I didn't assume there would be much walking, as we would get taxis. This wasn't the case, and I became very self-conscious very quickly walking the streets of Bristol in leather hot-pants...
We attempted to get a table at Za Za Bazaar (have you seen this restaurant?! It's just the epitome of gluttony, but I must go. Check it out if you haven't yet heard about it), but they were fully booked! All 700 covers!! So we decided we would go to Zero Degrees, the micro-brewery, which was pretty rad- some what of a cross between a night club and a restaurant. We stopped off to take a couple of bridge photos on the way, so I will now depict the rest of our evening:
Sisters. As you can see, Sammi had some slight wind-in-hair issues. Awkward.
Inside Zero Degrees
Playing about with camera settings
Statue love on the way to Racks
Inside one of Bristol's Secret Cocktail Bars
So, yes, we did end up having a few beverages at different venues after dinner, but we'd got Sophie out of Devon (she doesn't get out much), so we had to make the most of our time together. Sophie and I get a little mischievous when we've had a couple of drinks and we may or may not have searched Rack's hotel levels for the biscuit cupboard, but that's a story that probably shouldn't be told... (Sorry Racks)
If you haven't heard about Bristol's Secret Cocktail Bars, they're pretty cool too. I've only been to two, but know the locations of four. It's basically a kind of 'Speakeasy' venue, where you knock on the back door of a covert non-descript building and someone ushers you in and inside it's a really cool bar that serves lush cocktails! Well worth a trip, but you'll have to find them first...
We were home by one, which was good, and we got up relatively early. Soph and I went to Cribbs Causeway to do a spot of shopping and lunch, which was successful. I got a beautiful sheer white blouse from Mango that I actually wore out in Cheltenham last night, and Sophie got a few things with vouchers that she got for Christmas. I also bought some ear tunnels from TopShop, but I'm going to do a seperate post about them when I have the time- they're pretty cool.
Hope you've all had fun weekends too...
L.
