MONETIZATION, REALLY?

My dear readers,

As many of you already know, I am an accountant. It’s a good job. I have a good salary, good benefits and I mostly like my everyday tasks. I can’t complain - especially in this economy.

The problem is that my passion isn't in accounting - it's in writing. For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to become a writer. When I was a little girl, I used to write short stories about my Barbies. But as I grew up I realized that there was a very slim chance that I would be able to make a living out of writing, so I switched my college major from French Literature/Creative Writing to Management/Accounting. Accounting suited my neurotic personality very well; but something was missing. I missed writing, and this was the reason why I started my blog -- a year ago now. Since then, it has become my pride and joy.

Now what? I want to take it to the next level and take a shot at monetization. I don't think I have the kind of traffic that will generate an income but I want to get more familiar with the financial side of blogging. Do you feel sometimes that monetization is almost a taboo among bloggers? I do, and this is why I wanted to write this letter to you. So if you see ads and new banners you will know why they are there.

I would also like to promise you that monetization will not jeopardize the content of my blog. My blog will never become an advertisement.  I will put as much thought into the products I will choose to advertise as I do to select the subject of my posts. I hope to get your support and blessing in this manner because I know that without my readers this blog wouldn't exist.

Sincerely,
- Marie

VOGUE CHINA - MARCH 2011

Photographer: Willy Vanderperre / Models: Lindsey Wixson & Hailey Clauson

Via Fashion Gone Rogue

I love this look.  The cute socks, the pearl ankle pumps and the girlie dresses.

- Marie

A DREAMY TOUCH - Vogue Italia

VOGUE ITALIA - FEBRUARY 2011

Photographer: Sølve Sundsbø
Model: Melissa Tammerijn

Via Fashion Gone Rogue

VINTAGE CIRCUS



AMAZON.COM
$8.22



Based on the book of Sara Gruen, Water for Elephants is about a veterinary student who abandons his studies after his parents are killed and joins a traveling circus as their vet. (If you want to know more about the story, click here)

After I saw the trailer for the movie Water for Elephants, I was inspired to write a post about vintage circus.  I was able to find some photos on the website of the Wisconsin Historical Society titled "Photographs relating to circus and rodeo performances, ca. 1875-1940. Included are images of costumed performers, behind-the-scenes work, circus tents, animals, crowds, publicity photographs, and images of performances."

Enjoy!

- Marie



Five women drummers with the Ringling Brothers,
Barnum and Bailey Circus pose with striped drums at hand and
wearing band uniforms, including large hats topped by plumes.

Studio portrait of trapeze artist Emily Schadel, posing on a trapeze

SEE ALL THE PHOTOS...

Are Pastels the New Colors for Fall?

Philosophy di Alberta Ferretti - Fall/Winter 2011

Season after season, I complain about the color palette for winter.

It's always the same - black, grey, white and a couple of red dresses.

Alberta Ferretti must have felt the same way because she made a drastic change by choosing lavender, baby blue, yellow, soft pink and mint green for her color palette for fall 2011.

The change is so drastic that it feels like she created clothes for the wrong season. 

There is no doubt that this collection is gorgeous.
But pastels for fall? I don't know.

It looks odd, don't you think?
Am I being old school?  Am I a step away from writing "no white after Labor Day"?

Nonetheless, this collection is absolutely gorgeous.

It is hard to hate a collection in which every outfit has its own matching coat - very mod, very sixties.

There are also the princess coats, the baby dolls, the mohair dresses.

Sooo beautiful...
- Marie



   

Photos via Style.com

Marie Antoinette & Marchesa Casati // BOOKS

I just bought these 2 books on Amazon. 

Two style icons, two muses, two women who changed fashion forever.

Have you read them?

- Marie

- MARIE ANTOINETTE



AMAZON.COM
$11.56

Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution

A Washington Post Book World Best Book of the Year

When her carriage first crossed over from her native Austria into France, fourteen-year-old Marie Antoinette was taken out, stripped naked before an entourage, and dressed in French attire to please the court of her new king. For a short while, the young girl played the part.

But by the time she took the throne, everything had changed. In Queen of Fashion, Caroline Weber tells of the radical restyling that transformed the young queen into an icon and shaped the future of the nation. With her riding gear, her white furs, her pouf hairstyles, and her intricate ballroom disguises, Marie Antoinette came to embody--gloriously and tragically--all the extravagance of the monarchy.

"Queen of Fashion is as richly imagined as the gowns it describes. . . . As sociology, it's nothing short of stunning."--The Washington Post Book World

"Absorbing, fascinating, a wonderful display of grace and expertise."--The New York Review of Books

"A thrilling frock-by-frock account . . . While this book is rigorously researched, Weber's narrative style is energetic and alive with her own feminine pleasure at a beautiful dress or an outrageous pouf."--Entertainment Weekly

"Wickedly enjoyable."--The New York Times Style Magazine

- MARCHESA CASATI

  

AMAZON.COM
$12.89

Infinite Variety: The Life and Legend of the Marchesa Casati

The Marchesa Luisa Casati was Europe's most notorious celebrity, and its most eccentric. For the first three decades of the twentieth century she astounded the continent. Nude servants gilded in gold leaf attended her. Bizarre wax mannequins sat as guests at her dining table. She wore live snakes as jewelry. And she was infamous for her evening strolls, naked beneath her furs, parading cheetahs on diamond-studded leashes. She traveled to Venice, Rome, Capri, and Paris - collecting palaces and a menagerie of exotic animals. Her outlandish homes became the setting for some of the century's most outrageous parties. Artists painted and sculpted her, poets praised her strange beauty, and fashion designers fought for her patronage.

Then the extravagance ended. By 1930, Casati was over twenty-five million dollars in debt. Her wealth gone, she fled to London, where she spent her last years, supported by family and friends and as eccentric as ever. Even today, nearly a half century after her death, Casati still fascinates.

"A beautifully written biography . . . Prepare to be astonished." -- ELLE

"A delicious edition of extremely rare and retro refinement, the biography of the mythical marquise . . . An indispensable book." -- Vogue

"A meticulously researched biography, Infinite Variety is as much art history as chronicle of personal obsession." -- New York Times

"Fascinating . . . with or without her cheetahs, Casati’s circus of the self makes her a natural for the new millennium." -- Vanity Fair

CHINA SYNDROM - Vogue Germany

  

 VOGUE GERMANY - MARCH 2011

Photographer: Alexi Lubomirski

Model: Constance Jablonski

Via Fashion Gone Rogue

A Selection of Dresses from ModCloth

The last time I wrote about ModCloth - click here if you want to check it out - a reader left a comment asking me how much affiliate money I was making promoting ModCloth because their dresses were overpriced.  For the record, I didn't receive money for talking about ModCloth on my blog.  I was not promoting ModCloth but promoting beautiful clothes and the inspiration to dress up every day the same way I do when I post a Dior dress.

And that's all folks!

Can we enjoy the beautiful clothes now? :)

Here are 15 dresses I would be delighted to have in my closet.

Which one is your favorite?

-Marie