Sunday –

I was dreaming about breakfast… croissants with jam, pain au chocolat, crêpes, freshly chopped fruit, fresh juice & hot fragrant coffee! I could almost smell it.

I already started to miss London too, stumbling across some photos on my phone during the night; but there was no time to think:  I was on a mission.

Food thankfully changed my focus.

After breakfast, I sped off to the tradeshow to have a wander around. It was enormous in comparison to any of the events I had been to before.

 

My small shopping list of items that were not sourced yet in the UK:

Fabrics

Stretch Jacquard/Brocade

Trimmings

Elastics

Attachments

Bra hooks/clasps
Metal Pieces
Gold Hoops

I wanted to find high quality items that could be potentially used for my collection; in particular, interesting bra clasps. At the end of this post is a list of the companies I ordered from! There were certainly some interesting new clasp options that I will test out once they arrive and some new gold hoop options that might fit well with my decorative body harnesses.

Thankfully, I had already found many fabrics and trims at the Textile Forum in London in October 2013; something I will most likely post about very soon. I will be contacting some of the fabric suppliers I spoke with in the next few days for possible sponsorship!

Bumping into familiar faces throughout the day was lovely, but I kept my focus on sourcing and ordering samples of any appropriate finds. Of course, no photos are allowed inside the tradeshow unless you are Press, so I haven’t included any within the show!

Trendshow for 2016

I joined with Catherine Fuller, Owner of Outrageous Fortune and a group of contour girls to watch the trend presentation and was pleasantly surprised to see the back of a familiar head! Deborah!

I didn’t expect to bump into Deborah Minshall, Head of Design at Victoria’s Secret at Corsina International Limited who previously taught me in my first year.

I must say I am sickeningly on trend in so many areas. I knew this from reading earlier trend reports like:

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Interfilière A/W 2014-15                                                                                 Interfilière Summer 2014

 

Silence                        Oxidised                     Sumptuous                    Moonstruck

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MarediModa

 

 CANDY BAROQUE                              RELIVE HISTORY

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Now at the show, the amazing Trend Forum Tendances ‘Joyful’ area at Interfilière was telling me the same.

I didn’t plan it, honest! ˆ−ˆ My decisions were based on my research: my chosen consumer, the market level and many other factors which then resulted in my style options, colour palette, my choice of fabrics, trimming and details.

Seeing it on the screen was really lovely~

I guess I should exhibit, huh? =ˆωˆ=

All the beautiful fabrics and little trimmings were making me hungry, so I had a lunch break with my close friend Kayleigh Aitchison, Studio Assistant at Gilda & Pearl and with Diane Houston the lovely Owner of the brand at their stand. It was so good to catch up, it had been too long!

Long, like my humongous baguette! Oui Oui!

It was getting late, so I decided to leave the centre and headed off on the train back to the hotel. Once at Port de Versailles metro station, I met the loveliest New Yorker from Brooklyn named Rebecca who was a little lost and needed to get to the same station as me; so off we went together, chatting away on the train and exchanged numbers. When I travel to New York, I will make sure to give her a call!

We parted ways outside of the station and then I realised… Where am I?! I came out a different exit and was in the huge intersection at Montparnasse. The last time I was there, it was dark and I was eating in a restaurant that was red? Chez Bebert or Au Baroudeur? I have no idea. I do however remember some lovely glamorous French Women recommending us the best food on the menu and having copious amounts of red wine amongst our very large group! I certainly wasn’t paying attention to where I was going.

I had a map in my bag…

There were many red restaurants… and I was alone. Uh oh! I looked down one road as it started to rain and remembered the skyline with the Tour Maine-Montparnasse, it looked vaguely familiar… So instead of walking around like a headless chicken, I thought it made better sense to check with the locals that I was heading in the right direction.

By locals, I mean two gorgeous French Men. Teehee! They helped me with their limited English, walking me part of the way to the hotel to make sure I was on my way. So lovely! My intuition was correct; 2-3 minutes of slight worry over.

“Did she plan that?” Probably.

Evening time –

Time for the Eiffel Tower? No! I was advised not to go that evening as it was raining, cold and getting rather late. I was disappointed, but decided a plan should be made later with Bronte Phelps, a friend on my course, to zoom across Paris at dangerous speed on Monday instead before our train.

The weather would apparently be better… I really hoped so.

In the evening, I went for dinner at Café RUBIS with a large group of Contour girls again and had THE best onion soup with croutons and went back to the sex shop for research and photo evidence!

I find myself dancing at people again…

Too much energy and happiness!

Pharrell William’s song Happy has become somewhat of a theme tune for my trip and life at the moment! It really does feel good to do what you are passionate about. The moments of worry and panic are momentary. It’s good to learn how to keep a level head and keep positive – no heart attacks for me please!

 

Some of the wonderful companies I visited and ordered from at Interfilière:

 

Les Tissages Perrin

 

MODA-PIERRE

 

Satab

 

Art Martin

 

Odea

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I looked at my competitors and I thought that, If they could do it, I could do it. And if, they are popular and doing well, I could compete with them.

Tommy Hilfiger

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Day 3 coming soon!

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