Polka Dots & Cherries

On our way back to the apartment after the trip to Tarpon Springs I wrote about in my last post, we stopped in at the little town of Dunedin*, purely so I could pay a visit to Kina Kouture, which is basically my idea of heaven, selling dresses by Stop Staring, Bettie Page, Trashy Diva – all my favourite brands, in other words.

Unfortunately, when we arrived at the store we discovered it was actually closed for refurbishment, but the lovely owner must have seen the look of anguish on my face, because he very kindly allowed me to come in anyway, and not only to look around, but also to try on this dress in the bathroom (which was like a boudoir, and totally awesome), seeing as the changing rooms were closed at the time. The dress in question is by Stop Staring, and I’d seen it in the window as we drove up, and immediately known it would be coming home with me. Sure enough, ten minutes later I was in possession of the Prechus, which I wore to dinner the very next night, thus continuing my “a-polka-dot-dress-a-day” streak. GOD.

Of course, pin-up style polka dots call for cherry accessories of some kind, so I wore this with my Vivienne Westwood/Melissa Cherries shoes, which just might be my most favourite shoes ever. Shh, don’t tell the others!

(*Fun fact: the summer I graduated from university, I applied for, and was offered, an internship with the local newspaper in Dunedin. Because of the extreme level of stupidity I was operating under at the time, though – and still am, actually – I’d completely failed to realise that an internship wasn’t, you know, paid, and that I’d be working for nothing, but would still have to support myself, the whole time I was there. (I think I’d imagined I’d just be hanging out at the beach all the time, maybe hitting up the Magic Kingdom on the weekends?) Well, I couldn’t even afford the airfare, let alone several months worth of food and accommodation in the US, so I had to turn it down. It was a shame, because I’d already concocted an elaborate fantasy around this job, in which I was such a success as an intern (you know, whatever that was) that after a couple of weeks I was promoted to editor: a job which came with a huge salary, a penthouse appartment, and a clothing allowance. Instead, I spent the summer working in a call centre in Scotland. Oh, the humanity…)