Ahoy ye landlubbers… there be a mermaid on our tail…

I'm taking this as a good omen for this wonderful brand new year: my favorite designer is drawing inspiration from one of my favorite movies, and from two of my favorite fantasies: Mermaids and Pirates. 

While the pirate inspiration will take some arguments, the mermaid inspiration is pretty in your face. Specifically speaking the mermaid Madison from the 1984 "Splash".  If you haven't seen it, Splash is a movie about a mermaid named Madison (Daryl Hannah) who saves Allen (Tom Hanks) from drowning as a child. Twenty something years later, Madison goes on land where she is reunited with Allen (who has no idea she's a mermaid). 

There is a lot more to the movie, but "Tom Hanks" and "Mermaid" in the same sentence should have already sold it. 

Anyways, for their white label look book, Wildfox has found a Madison look-alike: Pro-surfer Hanalei Reponty. Hanalei is a self proclaimed "Mermaid from the beautiful island of Tahiti" (follow her on instagram @hanaleireponty ).  I've included a few of my favorite images below with scenes from "Splash" placed in-between. 

 "Nude Beach Bound"

 

I personally enjoy the less "cartoony" items that Wildfox designs, but there were plenty of loud ice cream patterns and neon fruit sweaters etc. Many of the items have a heavy hawaiian influence, such as the shorts above. While staying over in Hawaii last summer, I found a company called Wonderland Honolulu. Wonderland makes the most amazing pom-pom shorts, and while I'm sure they aren't the only ones doing it, theres are just simply perfection. Billabong has already taken up the trend and it looks like Wildfox is as well (I'm still rooting for wonderland's!)

I also picked up a heavy pirate vibe in this look book. It might not have been as in your face as the "Splash" influence, but the pictures below screamed Keira Knightley stranded on an Island with Jack to me. 

  So? Do you agree? Not agree? Is everyone as excited for Spring time as I am?? I'm going to go light my soy-pineapple candle and count down the days until Spring time…. Leave your thoughts and comments below

Ciao Ciao,
Kk

Inspired by Hawaii and Hawaiians

Whenever I travel, I try to be inspired by things I see. The landscape, art, local trends, foods etc. I've been in Hawaii for 12 days now, so I wanted to make a post about things I have been inspired by right off the bat. Most of the things that I have been inspired by are from the Hawaiian country side in Waimanalo (where I have been living), Kailua,  or North Shore. I'm not the biggest fan of Honolulu...

The sea life in the area is made up of all the colors of the rainbow, with black, white, and grey serving as accent colors. Butterflies in the area also come in a variety of colors so I was first inspired to purchase the multi-colored butterfly crop top I posted yesterday.

 Getting back to the sea life, when your underwater many of the fish/sea life seem to change colors depending on how the light is hitting them at that exact moment. Locals seem to have embraced the concept of "rainbow fish" as shown by the octopus in my last post (printed onto canvas bags at whole foods) and this squid I saw today. 

This guy inspired me to invest in the Wildfox vintage rainbow crop top bathing suit: 

Now I can feel like I'm apart of the underwater rainbow show! The dream of being a mermaid never dies!

Another thing that has really inspired me is the way the wildlife seems to live here (and the locals for that matter). There arn't that many predators. At all. Sharks? Shure but mainly hammer heads and they are not aggressive at all. On land you have wild boars that you respect and get out of the way if they charge you (IF that ever happens), but besides that everything else living here is just... well, super chill. There are no snakes. No big cats. No aggressive animals. 

What do you have? Chickens... local cats... lizards... pet dogs... chi chi birds... and these guys: 

The Wino loving Gecko. 

This afternoon this little guy crawled right up to my daily "I'm going to drink this as the oven pre-heats and continue to drink it as I ignore the buzzer" glass of wine, and just hung out. Even when I moved the wine glass to take a sip, he stayed on the table and just chilled there. 

My thought is that it's so hot and humid, all you really can do is try your best to chill. Animals and people alike. Geckos and Lizards may scurry away from some birds, but the birds also have evolved to eat crumbs out of trash cans and polo fields (not to mention 4th of July left overs on the beach).  So really, what's the rush? The same seems to go for the locals. You're on an Island and it takes a fortune to get off of it and days to get anywhere with the low speed limits and constant waiting for the next shipment of fruit from the mainland... so really, what's the rush? There will always be more tourists to entertain, more waves to surf, more fish to discover, but what's the rush?

I took that mindset and some inspiration from some trippy art work I've seen here (I took my own "trippy" picture of my new friend below) and found this gem: 

These shorts are by Wonderland Honolulu and are available at Edith hart in two different colors. 

OoooooOOoOoOoo Trippppay

The shorts were also inspired by the HEAT. It is so hot and humid here I feel like I'm always in the ocean or a shower and barely wearing any clothes in between the two (and still sweating a storm). If I'm not wearing a bathing suit here I'm running around in loose shorts, skirts, dresses, and bralettes. Seriously, who wants to deal with a real bra when it's this humid? NO ONE. My favorite bralette is from Brandy Melville  and is the Chiyo Top or I've been wearing the hawaiian print bralettes from VS Pink along with a few of their Lace Bralettes. 

I've also been inspired to draw a few sketches, but I'll post the finished products after I've gone home and worked on them a bit with all my supplies.

Ta Ta For Now everyone, early morning run tomorrow.
Kk