April showers? I’m ready!

An alternate title for this post could be, ‘How I ended up in the children’s section of Marks and Spencer.’

What happened is this: somehow, I tripped across this particular Sies Marjan orange metallic trench coat online, and predictably, I fell in love. My wallet refused to fall in love with the price, so for three months the coat has been gathering virtual dust in my online shopping cart. For a while, I would visit it daily and gaze upon its sparkly wondrous perfection (note the fabulous lapels and the pocket flaps to keep my trinkets safe).  It is my ideal sartorial cocktail– both vintage and modern style in one shiny item.

Retailers eventually put the coat on sale, but the sizes of anything I could fit into sold out quickly. My dream of being the fashion version of a Quality Street orange creme slipped away.

In my sadness and irritation, I googled.  Oh, how I googled! I was certain I would find this sparkling orange cream dream of a coat somewhere on a second hand website. Surely someone with a thicker wallet would buy it and tire of it? No such luck (yet). I did turn up many sparkly shiny jackets, but most were even less wallet friendly than the orange dream. Whilst feverishly googling for metallic and iridescent raincoats (because I was on a mission now, obviously) I found an iridescent SEQUIN RAINCOAT at Marks and Spencer…  maybe a sequin raincoat is even better than a candy wrapper raincoat? The only problem was that it is for children. The largest size was a children’s age 15-16. Never mind that I am going to be 50 in five short months, I ordered it anyway. For £38, I didn’t have a lot to lose. The adorable girl in the photo looks as pleased as punch to be wearing it, and I can’t blame her one bit. I’d be equally pleased if it fit me. It arrived and I actually squealed when I unwrapped it. To the universe, I whispered the mantra, ‘Please let it fit, please let it fit, please let it fit’ as I slipped it on. The universe sometimes delivers because this children’s coat fit… barely. I wanted to photograph it on a drizzly grey day to show a raincoat in its natural habitat, but the universe didn’t deliver that. Instead, we got wall to wall sunshine until about an hour after we finished the photos.

There is even a hood and pockets, see?  Très practical.

Lavender nail polish from the set in this post

Signs of spring in London– cherry blossoms and building works on my street

Here are some colourful, shiny (or both) jackets I found during my googling, in case you would like some inspiration to pimp up your wardrobe for spring. Some are crazy prices, some are affordable, but all educate the eye into seeing something besides a classic taupe trench. On me, taupe is the colour of misery itself, so bright colour is compulsory. One jacket below is part of a pink metallic velvet suit (I know, the decadence).  It is definitely NOT rainwear, but I couldn’t help but include it 🙂

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linking to: stylesplash, notdeadyetstyle, notdressedaslamb