Great writers' footsteeps: looking for J. Joyce - Nicola in Dublin

Nicola is supposed to be a writer, but he's been afflicted by  a writer's cramp lately.  Furthermore he was somehow engaged with Edda and now that she left the house he's  been looming around idly flirting with all the girls.
Trying to revive his inspiration he has decided to take a trip to Dublin, on the tracks of J. Joyce's Ulysses.
Anyway he's going to enjoy a tour of the pubs.

Cecilia, who should know better, seized the moment and volunteered to accompany him, as a secretary. She's been eyeing Nicola since her arrival.

She thinks he's got the "tall dark stranger" looks. So she borrowed Ofelia tartan outfit an off they are!

Day One

First of all they pose for a picture with J. Joyce statue.

Then they head for the Writer's museum.

Then a visit to the Martello tower. Cecilia is  bored already.

And Ormond Quay.

Nicola has been blabbering for hours, he's in a stream of consciousness mood and Cecilia wants to die.....

Day two

Nicola is stunned when they meet Giorgia in Grafton Street, he completely forgets about the stream of consciusness and dragging Cecilia with him invites Giorgia to join in.

Giorgia loves Joyce, so she enthusiastically agrees.

They visit the Phoenix Park

Sandy Mouth Strand

And the Castle. Nicola and Giorgia are getting along wonderfully!

Day three

Nicola has completely forgot to focus upon his inspiration and proposes a  tour of the pubs!

The Market

The Stag's Head

The Temple

The Quai

Nicola and Giorgia are definitely an item. Cecilia is very angry at me, but I don't believe she had any chance with Nicola, would she ever find Mr Right Guy?

Summer Fashion Collection: the Girls in Japan!

Last spring Sasha went to Japan, I couldn't go with him this time, so he gracefully agreed to share his pictures for the Blog.

As you know I've been working on a new summer collection for the girls for a while. I saw these pictures from Etro's 2015 summer collection, and I thought I could pick some ideas for a sort of ethnic collection for the girls!

The girls are thrilled, as they haven't got much attention lately, but only on the blog, as I've been playing around and photographing them for a while. Until I think I came up with the right poses (as usual I ended up watching at Avedon's pictures of Twiggy and Verushka). I think Sasha this time outdid himself....

These Japanese Temples and Sanctuaries, with their elegance, make a perfect setting to display this collection.

For the dresses I used mostly viscosa, jeans, silk (I will not try again until I'm better with viscosa) and an acrilyc fabric in a Missoni fantasy. The final result is very different from the Etro designs, apart from Camilla's and Giada's outfits, but I just needed an theme to start with (I had "girl's fashions cramp" after spending so much time on the guys' suits!)

Let me know which is your favourite, I'm still looking for the "perfect look" for these girls

Agata: Temple of the Golden Pavillon - Detail of the Garden

Camilla: Temple of the Golden Pavillon

Caterina: Miyajima island -  Floating Gate to the shinto temple of the God of Seas

Cecilia: Kyoto -  Kiyomizu Buddhist Temple

Giada - Kyoto:  Kodaiji Temple's garden

Veronica: Kyoto:  Kodaiji Temple's garden

Vittoria: Kyoto:  Kodaiji Temple's garden

A kaftan for Cecilia

I've bought this lovely scarf some time ago in my favourite fabric shop, it was on a sale, I immediately thought its pattern had a summer/safari feel and I grabbed it. I've been thinking about what to make of it when our friend Pabboo at the Dollobserver forum came up with this contest about making a dress out of a scarf, and "BANG", I knew that the first dress I should have made shall be a Kaftan for Cecilia!!!

Here's Cecilia wrapped in the scarf just to show you what beautiful colours and patterns it has:

and here's the pattern of the Kaftan I used to design mine:

Cecilia looks almost happy with it (I said almost).....

I also made her a necklace and a matching handbag, she looks ready for a stroll along the seaside. Luckily enough "Roman Holiday" Barbie's sandals fits (more or less) FR2 feet, so she also has the right shoes!

Thanks again Pabboo for this great idea!

See you soon
Billa

A new girl: Cecilia

I thought a lot about it, finally I made up my mind, I decided to buy two more dolls from 2013 IT Collection: before I wanted to be shure they were the most beautiful around (according to my taste of course).
So here she is, the first one was Nightfall Agnes.
I love the fact that she's a brunette with brown eyes, her colouring and her ponytail. It looks like we're going to have a lot of ponytails from IT in the near future! Anyway, I also loved the fact that she was tanned and came with a simple  makeup, I feel Agnes is often "overtoned".

She's really beautiful and with fuller red lips she doesn't even look so unhappy. Whit her socks on she could hardly wear her shoes, so after a couple of snapshots I took them off.

She felt better, and stood a lot better!

Dolls face sculpts seldom have nice profiles, but this one is an exception, she's stunning!

From now on she will be Cecilia, I haven't redressed her yet. Her minimalist little black dress is simply beautiful!!! But don't worry, she'll have her new wardrobe too!