Oh my! The other day while walking home I spotted that this had happened.....

Yes Covent Garden Market Hall, hang those Christmas baubles with pride!!

And I might have visited Fortnum and Mason Christmas shop ALREADY.....

Makes me ridiculously happy.

(To add to my growing excitement for the upcoming festive season, Jenna gave me a Christmas jumper cookie cutter, so hundreds of photos of festive cookies to follow shortly.)

Ah but away from my slightly ridiculous Christmas procrastination, I have been busy getting back into the swing of things on my Costume Design course!! This term my main bits of work are dissertation - aaaaaaaaaaargh - and my first design project, 'Constructed Costume' where we have all picked an object from Windsor Castle as our starting point which we then need to be inspired from said object to create our own character and costume ready for a show in January, Tired just thinking about it.

For my dissertation I am asking:

'Are clothes Holy?

The significance of style in Beat culture.'

Basically chatting about these cool guys.

And how they have been portrayed in the media and film both during their time in 1950/60s America and today with more recent films, so discussing the nature of sub-culture and how the lives of these now notorious characters such as: Kerouac, Ginsberg and Burroughs have therefore been perceived by the mainstream! Have done a couple of my own sketches from films for the fun.....

'Pull My Daisy.'

'Howl.'

For my design project I am on the research and sketchbook stage. For my object I picked a painting 'The Chinese Convert' 1691 by Sir Godfrey Kneller. It has inspired me to explore the notions of East and West, the idea of personal identity wrapped up in culture, belief and faith and taking on a journey for truth, quests, pilgrimage and questioning the world around us, oooooh. See where it goes!

Went on a day trip to Brighton Pavilion for some West meets East research.

And today I made a trip to the British Museum Enlightenment Gallery, as a time when people started questioning the world around them, it seems to tie in well with the themes I have been looking into so far.

As my dissertation is concerned with the Beat Generation and discussing the significance of style in representations of Beat culture, there is an overlap of interests with my practical work. Although my writing is not as focused on religion, the Beats’ style is underpinned with a strong sense of personal identity which has been purposefully excluded from the mainstream, safe position of western society, therefore again creating links with my studio project which similarly has been inspired by the concept of abandoning a secure majority and venturing into the unknown.

As a time out from thinking about the Beats and philosophy and life I took some time out on Sunday to have a lovely lunch with Ellie and Mollie who is moving to Kazakstan?!?

Lovely Sunday.

Fair to say I have never eaten so much apple crumble.

The coming week has a secret Halloween party in East London, champagne afternoon tea, a Birthday night out and a Sunday Roast! Best get cracking with some more work!!