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Hello from festive Seoul!!!
Been meaning to share this picture for a while now of super talented UK stylist and designer, Twinks Burnett wearing my embellished leotard from my 'Hives of Lepi Spomini' collection. The piece was designed as part of my wearable art series produced whilst based in Slovenia working as part of the 'GuestRoom Maribor' artist residency project.
I absolutely love Twinks' vision as it's so colourful and magical... so I was SUPER happy when she called in my pieces for an awesome shoot!!!
The fruits of this rainbow fandango are still under wraps....but I look forward to unleashing these beauties as the shoot was totalllllly dreamy and of course as gloriously colourful as you can imagine it would be!!!
So keep those eyes peeled and in the meantime check out her wonderful work: www.twinksburnett.com
Love and Sparkles!
Emma xxx
oHHhh Hiya from CHILLY Seoul~( Winter finally arrived! Minus 2 some mornings this past week....to think just a couple of months ago it was hitting the horrendous humidity of 38 degrees!!!)
Thought I would share some rainbow photos from a recent adventure~ so last month I took advantage of a long weekend and hotfooted it over to magical Hong Kong for a whistlestop jaunt! This is one of the things I love so much about living in Seoul~ it's perfectly located for hopping around other cities in Asia with it being a mere stones throw away from Japan and only a short flight away from soooo many other glorious dreamlands... so any hint of a long weekend and I'm taking the chance to grab my little suitcase and see more of beautiful East Asia!!!
Hong Kong has long been one of my favourite places on Earth and a place I have found myself a few times over the years for both work and holiday~ it had been a long time since I last had the joy of visiting this rainbow land of dim sum and neon so I felt it was a way overdue trip! And also to visit my dear, old chum Gloria who I hadn't seen since a glitter filled night at 'Circus' during the Soho Revue days when she trotted over to London!!! She was as ever the perfect host as she knows THE BEST places in town so it was veggie gourmet feasts ahoy... you can follow her global adventures as she writes and tracks down the most awesome food all over the world, so check out her instagram: foodandtravelhk !!!
So I actually landed in HK amidst the peak of the 'Occupy Central' protests in October... I was staying in Causeway Way which was also one of the protests sites so it was really poignant to see the 'Umbrella Revolution' as it unfolded on my doorstep and really incredible to see so many passionate people, peacefully standing up for what they believe. Also somewhat strange because only hours before I'd seen the scenes on the news and then suddenly found myself standing in those very same scenes.
These protests are such a key moment in HK's future so it was really incredible to see people voicing their thoughts and hopes in a way that was so dignified and calm~ There were little gazebos set up offering food and drinks to the all-nighters and and overall nice sense of comradery.
When I first arrived it was straight out for dinner where we went to the most incredible veggie place in Causeway~ AWESOME crispy taro rolls, bean curd stew, lemon and ginger, tofu, dumplings....more and more dishes kept arriving on our table!! I'd been DESPERATE for some Chinese food for months as the last I'd had was a Kung Po extravaganza of a takeaway before I left the UK!! And HK does vegetarian feasts to absolute perfection!!!
250,00000000 dishes and a million gallons of jasmine tea later and it was onto dessert which was dreamy matcha ice cream topped with shiratama rice balls and piles of azuki from a glorious Japanese dessert cafe called 'Via Tokyo' .... this place was amazing...I wanted everything on the menu!!!
So I will save you from the blow by blow account of what I did every minute of every waking day on my trip.... but all in all it was a really lovely break and so lovely to both catch up with friends and see some magical sights.
One of my absolute favourite places in HK is Lantau Island~ it's breathtakingly beautiful and a total contrast to the mayhem of Kowloon with endless green mountains and teeny fishing villages~ so I was straight on the tiny, local bus winding my way up Ngong Ping to take in the giant Tian Tan Buddha and enjoy a deluxe veggie lunch from the cantine at Po Lin Monastery!!!
I LOVE LANTAU SO MUCH~ the monastery and it's temples are incredible and the smell of incense lingers around the whole area... the misty mountains seem to go on forever... I also saw a horrible spider bigger than my hand hanging around outside the toilets...wahhh NATURE!!!eeep!
During my jaunt I also paid a visit to Sik Sik Yuen Wong Tai Sin temple and the nearby fortune teller alley... the ambience was kind of quashed when a TV crew and some random boyband/ actors/ celeb situation showed up ( I've yet to establish who these guys actually are so answers on a postcard please!!!)... the crowds were going wild so I decided to scoot out of there and onto calmer pastures! Well....as calm as things can be in raucous Hong Kong!!!
Aside from a spot of sightseeing my trip mainly consisted of...glorious food, riding the Star Ferry, gossip times, shopping, walking for miles, night markets, drinking lots of tea, towers of deluxe neon, dim sum, more shopping.... and believe it or not MARKS & SPENCER!!!!!!! So my trip to Honkers pretty much marked the 6 month point of my foray into Asia....I can't believe how fast time has gone and that I've been living as an official Seoulite for more than half a year!! Needless to say it was getting to the point where one or two cravings were starting to kick in...namely mint sauce, veggie gravy and of course CHUTNEY!!! The first time the chutney craving ever kicked in was back when I was living in Taiwan...until then I didn't really like chutters....but now I'm obsessed.... so 6 months without and I was more that ready for a nice cheddar and chutney sarnie....!!!
So whilst I was in HK I used the opportunity to fill my suitcase to the brim with lots of British products ready to haul back to Seoul.....honestly the absolute joy of going into a M&S and stocking up on jam rings, salt and vinegar crisps, veggie Percy Pigs, spiced chutney, cranberry sauce ready for Christmas, shortbread, fudge.....GLORIOUS!!!!...then imagine my delight when I found another shop selling an abundance of Dairy Milk, Maltesers, MARY BERRY FRUIT CHUTNEY (?!?!?!!? I've never even found this in the UK!!!) Lemsips, Strepsils.....and all number of treats!!! As you can imagine my little Korean kitchen is now full of all number of treasures!!! Don't even get me started on prepacked sandwiches either....I was beyond ecstatic to also stumble across Pret A Manger so was straight in there... I'd actually forgotten about it's existence !!!!!!!!!
Ok... so all in all such a magically wonderful trip of dreams....I won't be leaving it so long next time as there's still soooo much I still want to see in HK and plenty more gossip to be had!!!! So I shall leave you with a few snaps....
I'm off to crochet some Granny Squares and brew up some chai~ weird to think that only last month I was tropically hot in HK and now I'm freezing and wrapped up in Winter coats and scarves in Korea... so nice to finally see some lovely autumnal weather though and have an excuse to crack out some fluffy knitwear?!!!!!!!! Seoul has been looking SUPER exquisite as we now near the end of this short but beautiful Autumn...so next time I'll share some snaps of how pretty this city looks with all it's red maple leaves and twinkling, golden ginkgo trees~ sad that they've mainly all fallen already!!!
Love from Seoul,
Emma
xxxxx
Good Morning from rainy Seoul!!
So just a quick one as it's been a while since I last blogged and wanted to share these photos that I've been meaning to post for ages!
'Splashing Around' was a one off garment that I designed exclusively for the LLL+ boutique over in Kuala Lumpur! The Lah'Lah'Land crew kindly sent me over these snaps of Xiao Lin Zi at their Sungei Plaza store!
The piece itself is made from printed, super shiny vinyl complete with quilted PVC collar and cotton trimmings~loved creating this piece so I'm glad that it found a good home!!!
So here are a couple of snaps for you to have a peep at!!
Lots to update on so I will get around to will post some more snaps of recent adventures and some rainbow snaps of a recent shoot very soon~!!!!! Don't forget, if you are in KL you can check out my stuff at LLL+!!!
Laters!!!
Emma
xxx
KONNICHIWA!!!! So last week I arrived back in Seoul from a little trip over the water to Japan!! (yes, AGAIN!) That weekend saw the celebration of Chuseok in Korea so I decided to zip away from the crazy National holiday mayhem and take the opportunity to see a bit more of Japan!
So from one extreme to another~ last month in Sapporo was as far north as I've ever been in Japan and this month, the furthest south of Japan I've ever been!!! I've wanted to visit Hiroshima for many years so it was amazing to eventually go and learn more about the place~as you can imagine it's a pretty sombre place but, at the same time it's a beautiful city.
When I arrived into Hiroshima I had scored a room with the most incredible view right across the Peace Park and set on the banks of the river was the A-Bomb Dome building surrounded by endless green mountains. It felt a bit strange to be able to see such a prominent and symbolic sight from my actual bed...but, it felt more powerful opposed to depressing.
When I was over there I split my time between Hiroshima and Miyajima- an island around an hour away. Hiroshima was massively interesting and really intense....I checked out the Peace Memorial Museum and Park, Genbaku Dome as well as Hiroshima Castle... the Museum was incredible...I learned so much that I didn't know about the city, not only about it's destruction but, also it's story about how it was rebuilt to how it is today. The Peace Park is equally as moving with it's Children's Memorial Monument and endless strings of colourful, paper, peace cranes dotted around.
During my time there I also did some shopping and lots of sampling of awesome veggie food around downtown Hodori!!!!
My first quest upon arrival was to pick up a box of daigaku imo~ This is one of my all time favorite Japanese snacks... Back when I was living with the Takahashi family in Mino during my artist residency in Japan a few years ago, I would live in hope when I opened my dinner bento that there would be a couple of 'College Potatoes' as they are also known...!!! They are basically fried sweet potatoes coated in sticky, sweet, sugary~honey and black sesame seeds....they are the ultimate snack of dreams!!!
I also wanted to do some serious craft shopping whilst I was there as the stuff you can pick up in Japan is phenomenal and I had a few necessities I wanted to get for some new pieces that I'm currently working on! Luckily I took a virtually empty case so I could haul back an abundance of pastel pom poms, rainbow yarn galore and various delightful treasures and trimmings...also picked up some Japanese bamboo knitting needles which I'm super excited to use!!! Of course I also made sure I left adequate space to bring half of Daiso back with me as well as an outrageous amount of cute cosmetics, whopper supply of Matcha, couple of juicy new outfits....ooooppps and a few more little ceramic cups which I definitely do not need!
So then it was on to Magical Mijajima~ a National Park set on an island about an hour away from Hiroshima city! I opted to take one of the cute, little green trams that you see trundling around opposed to the train which was really fun!!
The journey was awesome as the trams wind through endless little, old school neighborhoods and villages full of traditional charm before rolling past some hills and the shoreline so it was a really lovely ride to get to the port!
OoooOOO AHOY THERE~ Next mode of transport was a ferry which takes you across the Seto Inland Sea over to Itsukushima AKA Miyajima~ the name basically means 'Shrine Island' and the place is dotted with shrines, pagodas and temples galore!
The scenery was BEYOND breathtaking....one of the most beautiful places I've even been in my entire life and I was lucky that the blue skies were out if full force making it all look even more glorious!!!
Once I got over there I checked out the famous torii gate which sits on the sand meaning that when the tide is in it appears to be floating on the water!!! Then it was onto a bit of temple hopping in the sunshine!!!!
Also there are loads of tame deer roaming around...they are quite brazen and cheeky...my tropical print skirt went down a storm and was chewed to max!! I also had a delicious sweet potato ice cream whisked from my grasp and as I was writing a postcard it was snatched from my hands!!! Super cute though....Bambi central!!!
Right...well I could easily talk all day about this adventure but, this post seems to be turning into an essay when all I was planning on doing what giving a quick speile followed by a bunch of holiday snaps!!! So I'll pipe down and leave you with some photos!!!
Happpyyy Weekend!!!!!!!!!!!!
Love Emma xxxxxxxxxxx
