Black, White and Matching

Hello Everyone,

It feels like I was changing my plans every hour this Saturday. First I was supposed to go to London with a friend, but then I remembered that my husband had contact lenses appointment and he needed me there for moral support lol. Then his work changed his schedule two times in two days, so he ended up having to stay up for a whole night to get back into night shift and asked me to cancel his appointment. By the time he told me that, my friend was already gone so I've decided to go to Cambridge instead.

I confess that I've been neglecting my modern kimono lately in favor of vintage sha pieces. This black and white ro komon was a lucky win on eBay a while back, but I just couldn't get around to wearing it. I paired it up with my pain-in-a-butt ro hikinuki obi after watching a video on youtube that finally showed me clearly one of the steps that I was missing. This gave me a perfect reason to wear my straw cloche. I thought it would be cute to wear one black and one white belts as two obijime and kept the obiage also white (not that I have much choice lol). Haneri is faint pink with black flowers to match the pink of my bag and the pink in the obi design.

Finally, for the matchy part. I see Yumi Yamamoto doing it pretty often, and I've always wanted to try matching kimono and tabi. I could actually do it this time because I just so happen to own some black and white striped tabi! I like the effect quite a lot, if only I didn't tie my kimono too short. What can I say, old habits die hard :)

Unfortunately this obi has a yellow fold line which can't be hidden. It's not visible very much in the photos, but it's pretty visible in real life. I am not sure that there is even a way to clean it either, since it's a silk obi.

And yes, I did wear tabi! I think it's maybe the third time this year..? :)

~ Lyuba

Just Arrived #14

Couple of days ago I got another package in the mail and I was blown away by the sheer awesomeness of this kimono. The picture is fairly accurate, except it makes a much bigger impact in person. I've always wanted a striped kimono with faint designs on it, and a while back I was watching one on Shinei's website, but it got sold. Then this one came along and I snapped it up within seconds! I can't wait to wear it, but unfortunately it's awase so it will have to wait.

I'm also trying to expand my haori collection. I only have very few of them as of right now because I don't particularly like haori to begin with, but I've always wanted one of the longer vintage ones. Now I got one!

Have you gotten any goodies in the mail this week? 

~ Lyuba

Poppies and Asanoha

Hello Everyone,

On Saturday my husband and I went to go see a movie, which I took as a perfect opportunity to wear kimono.

I choose my poppies sha komon with orange and white asanoha patterned ro nagoya obi. I had some trouble with accessories because I only have 3 ro obiage, and none of them were the shade I would have ideally liked, so I settled on a white one with multicolored shibori patter. The obijime was a last minute addition. I actually had a different one on, but then I saw the one in the picture and knew it was THE one.

It was a market day, so there were a lot of people around. I was hurrying to the cash machine when I heard someone behind me loudly ask if I was wearing the right geisha shoes with my geisha outfit. I was in a hurry, so I didn't even bother turning around and just said Sure do! Inside I was fuming and wanted to say something not-so-nice along the lines of considering I'm NOT wearing a geisha outfit, I'm damn sure I'm wearing the right shoes for it! But really, people will be ignorant regardless of what I wear or say, I just wish they wouldn't argue so much to prove their point (like insisting that I'm wearing a geisha outfit). It made a fun status update for FB though.

Have you been called geisha lately?

~ Lyuba

What I Wore for Travelling Kimono - London

Hello Everyone, 

While I didn't wear the Travelling Kimono this time, I was there in the role of a photographer. The weather was uncharacteristically nice (for the first half of the day) so of course I had to wear kimono.

I didn't wear my usual stripes, but instead went with one of my newest kimono, a summer weight purple hitoe kimono. I paired it up with my handmade reversible tsuke obi because the roses on the obi match kimono exactly. The blue and white obiage play off my haneri quite nicely, and the white belt as obijime seems to bring the whole look together. I actually  had a little trouble picking out the accessories, and I even posted about it the evening before, but I guess I always knew that I will go with my favorite white belt. On the morning of, the rest of the accessories sort of fell in place too.    

You can't see the shoes very well, but they have a plaid pattern too, similar to the obi. 

Hong and I went to the Westfield Stratford Centre to watch Magic Mike, and while waiting for our showing time, we also took cable cars over the river. I'm not going to post a lot of photos of her because I want to give her a chance to write up about the day, but here is a teaser photos. You can also see more photos here and here.

Overall, it was a great day. We watched the movie, we had fresh pretzels, we had lunch at Yo Sushi and took the cable cars for the first time ever. It did start raining right after our movie, and I had to get an emergency outfit to wear so I can hide my kimono in my bag, but Hong let me borrow her umbrella so I didn't get too wet during my 15min walk to my car. 

I'm hoping there will be more non-rainy days from now on, so I can wear kimono more often! 

~ Lyuba

Just Arrived #13

Yay for my happy mailbox! This kimono was actually my first order from Shinei after they got booted off Ebay, and all I can say is that their website is EVIIIIIL! I can't stay away! Thankfully they haven't had anything I like in about a week, so let's hope it continues to be that way. 

When I saw this kimono, I KNEW I had to have it because it's sha, and because I think the flowers on there are poppies. I'm not sure if I mentioned it before, but poppies are my favorite flowers and I'm in Lyuba heaven anytime I drive by whole fields of poppies in bloom. I sure will miss that when we leave UK. 

I am not actually entirely sure that the flowers are poppies because of how stylized they are, but I will maintain that they are since it's hot enough to wear this kimono right now, and the poppies are blooming left and right. See? Totally in season! In typical Shinei fashion, they said that it was unwearable. It has few pin sized holes in it, but other than that, it's perfect. I doubt anyone will notice those holes to begin with, even when I mend them. 

I'm glad I took a chance with this kimono because it paid off. Unfortunately I wasn't so lucky with the ro lily chuya obi I got in last week. I mentioned that it has a pretty big stain that wasn't mentioned anywhere in the description or photos, and here are some pictures of it. I took the photos because I'm actually contacting Shinei about it. I wasn't going to contact them about it at all at first, but then I spend couple of hours trying to figure out how to tie the damn obi (it's hikinuki, so pattern is upside down), figured out how to hide the stain, figured out some other damages might not get hidden (but I knew about them from the photos, so it's ok), remembered that I spent more than "usual" on this obi, still didn't figure out how to tie it and got really angry at the world. Hence an email to Shinei saying that I'm really upset about them not mentioning this big stain.. I did get a reply this morning asking for photos, so who knows? Something might come out of my righteous anger after all. 

Just Arrived #12

Hello Everyone, 

Well IT has arrived! By IT I mean my very first ro AND lily pattern chuya obi. It's actually the last item I got from Shinei's Ebay before they got booted off, so for a moment there I was worried that I wouldn't be able to get it. Unfortunately this obi also has a pretty big stain that Shinei just conveniently forgot to mention. I think it's still wearable without the stain showing, but this one of those hikinuki obi (the ones with pattern upside down) so I don't know. I'm not really upset about it, I mean it IS Shinei we're talking about, and I always take their listings with a grain of salt and understanding that I might get a "surprise" any time I buy from them. They are also off Ebay, so I don't really see the point of contacting them there. 

I'll just have to practice tying it to hide the stain :) It is GORGEOUS in person, and the color is a warmer green, like green tea in a white cup. 

Can't decide