Sunday Style: Ode to an Old Coat

I received a new coat for Christmas this year, a military-style one, and I like it very much.  It's a great coat- simple, attractive, flattering, and a little bit badass.  That's about all I can ask for in a piece of clothing.  

However, a button fell off of the front a few days ago, so I wore my older coat today.  It's black and white, with buttons down the front.  I love it mostly because, when I look down at the sidewalk beneath me, I silhouette like an Elizabethan courtier.

And that, my friends, is cool.

Anything that makes me feel Renaissance-chic is wonderful.  Anything that went to Europe with me is marvelous.  I wore this coat all around Europe- it traveled through four countries with me, and even though it isn't as new, or as trendy as the military-esque coat, this fact will always give it a place in my heart.  

Stay tuned to see what I was working on today, why I wore the coat... I was acting in a short film directed by my friend Ginny.  I'm so pleased with how the shoot went, I can't wait to see the final result!  Hopefully I'll be able to post it on here once I get a hold of it.

Until then... another reminisce through my European travels with my coat.  

God, I need to get myself back to Europe!

 In a tourist shop in Picadilly Circus, London, England, paired with a Union Jack cowboy hat.

 At the Albert Memorial in London, with a black beret.

 At the Tate Modern in London with Lenny and Jackie!

 At Camden Stables Market, London, with a be-dreaded horse.

 At the Sherlock Holmes Museum in London, with a hunting cap, pipe, and Watson.

 At Canterbury Cathedral, Canterbury, England, with some graves.  

 In Canterbury Castle, Canterbury.

 Trapped in Canterbury Castle, Canterbury, but wearing some cute gloves.

 Outside the Rupert Bear Museum in Canterbury.

 Inside the delightfully awesome Rupert Bear Museum in Canterbury.

 Inside of Cardiff Castle in Cardiff, Wales.

 In Bute Park, Cardiff.

 At Stonehenge, England, with a black scarf.

 In The Rocket pub in London, with Kim!

 On the hostel-boat in Stockholm, Sweden!

 With Laura, Morgan, Alex, and Kelly in Stockholm, on a ferry!

 Gazing into the future in Oxford, England.

 In a college courtyard in Oxford.

Pairing a pink face with a pink scarf in Cambridge, England.

 Gazing into the baths in Bath, England.

Straddling a crevice in Bath.

Inspiration Fridays: I Just Want a Castle...

Who doesn't want to live in a castle?  I do.  Castles are the coolest.

While I was studying in London, I was able to visit many of them, including Canterbury Castle, below.  I wrote a post about it soon after visiting, but the structure was incredible.  By incredible, I mean it was old, historically important, and crumbling to bits.  Though it had been a residence of the monarchy of England, it apparently wasn't important enough to charge money for entry, or even to be guarded.   We walked right in.  I climbed around in it.  I stole a rock from off the ground, which was part of the Roman wall that surrounded it.  This was legal, apparently, because were there cops or Unesco Heritage Site guards or anything?  Nope.  It was a big, open space that, you know, happened to have a castle in the middle of it.  No big deal.  The UK has tons of those.

As an American, this pretty much blows my mind.  Living in a castle, or seeing one, is one of the pinnacles of existence, as far as I'm concerned.  I was in awe of every structure I had the pleasure to view that was built before about 1550AD because we just don't have any of those on our continent.  At some point during the first couple weeks I was living in London, I took a moment and bragged to one of my English friends that I had lived across the street from one of the oldest pubs in New York- it was founded in 1865!  With an utterly straight face she said something along the lines of "Yeah, whatever, my building is fifty years older than that and it's the newest building on my block"...  It's just different.  

But, this post is about castles, not pubs.  Once again, as I have hypothesized during basically every Inspiration Friday post from the past few monthes, I may only be inspired by castles because I read too many fantasy and historical fiction books, watch too many fantasy and historical fiction films, and play too many fantasy video games.  I'd play historical fiction video games if more of them existed.  Or, maybe I do all of those things because I love fantasy and historical fiction with a passion. Honestly, I'm rather certain this is the reason. I almost accidentally acquired a minor in medieval and renaissance history in college.  If I had been paying attention, I would have achieved that, but frankly, I didn't notice I had done it until I was about to graduate.  I just gravitate towards this stuff.  Reminders of times gone by, times in which I did not live, excite me.  Or, maybe I did live there.  Who knows the true nature of our existence?

Yet someday, I want to climb a castle tower in the middle of the forest and gaze out over the land.  I want to feel the wind whip through my hair as I do this; I wish to watch a hawk circle overhead. 

Well, I think I've established that I'm not just a hopeless romantic, but a completely lost one. Sounds fine to me.

Here are some castles and such in the British Isles.

Tintagel Castle

Photos 2 Please U

Windsor Castle

Inel

Restormel Castle

Lusete

Castell Caerdydd

Joan Angelats

 The White Tower, Tower of London

S.M. Tunli

Chepstow Castle

Piers Perrot Gaveston

 Caerphilly Castle

Euro Tours

Caernarfon Castle

Castle Wales

Edinburgh Castle

Beautiful Places to Visit

Castle Stalker

Scotland in May

Threave Castle

Sascha Koehler

Caerlaverock Castle

Tom Langlands

That's How We Keep it Popping

I found an app on my iPhone called Toon Paint, and I went a little bit crazy.  Danny and I like to think that we're total badasses, and though we are simply on our way to ultimate awesomeness, these photos made us feel like we are there.  I had a lot of fun making these cartoon/ pop art style images, and I hope you have fun looking at them too!

Taken all over the place... 

Bronxville, New York, USA

Brooklyn, New York, USA

Austin, Texas, USA

Boston, Massachusetts, USA

London, England, UK

Inspiration Fridays: Back to Britain

Since my parents visited England a few weeks ago, my brain has been dreaming of returning to Great Britain.  I want to see more, desire to do more, and need to learn more.  I want to learn everything about the culture, immerse myself in it.  There is this vision I have, of me wearing a tartan scarf, eating a sausage roll, and reading Shakespeare whilst sitting in the middle of  a stone circle.  Call me stereotypical, but that just sounds fantastic. 

Kind of like this, but with said food, book and scarf... and my face...

 (This creepy effect happened and I just LOVE IT.)

But anyway, check out these other, fabulous, Britain-only things that I just can't wait to get more of!  There are quite a bunch, but I've narrowed it down for the sake of brevity, and not losing readers because I've written an extensive, but contentless bit of drabble.

1.  Highland Cattle

Because, Holy Cow!  These things are awesome!  They are also 100% real.  And, in Scotland.

Animal Wallpaper

Oh my goodness.

 Scotland in May

Oh My Goodness!

Highland Cattle World

They have a world??!??

Red Bubble

OHHH My GOODNESS.

Seriously, though, have you ever seen anything more fluffy and stupidly cute in your life?  Best of all, these animals a freaking huge.  Like taller than I am (5'3") at full height.  That is so much fluff, I can't even take it.

2. Pasties, Sausage Rolls, and Meat Pies

Because what is better than meat?  Meat wrapped in pastry!  Pronounced pah-sty, as opposed to pay-sty... pasties (pay-sties) are things ladies wear on their nipples, especially whilst stripping.  I considered putting some kind of hilarious photograph of that in this post, but, I'm at work, and even though my place of employment is an acting school, there are just some things I feel like I shouldn't have on my screen.  Unlike this meaty, pastry glory...

Savory Bites

Yum.

Tastefully British

Well, yum.

The Cornish Pastry Man

Nom nom nom nom...

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So, there are Pasty STORES like this all throughout Great Britain.  It's wonderful.  Not all of them have meat, some have vegetables, cheeses, eggs- all kinds of delicious stuff.  I'm drooling a bit just thinking about it.  

3. Stone Circles 

Now these are just mind-bogglingly amazing.  Think about how crazy they are.  Obviously, there is Stonehenge, which everyone and their mom has heard of, but there are dozens upon dozens of stone circles and other old stone structures in the UK.  It's so nifty.  People care so little about these things, because they are just, well, standard, that they are in the middle of parks, and even intersections.  A road goes through Stonehenge.  It's mind boggling.  I was able to snap that photo of myself standing on an altar-like structure in the middle of one in Cardiff, and no one stopped me.  No one was even around.  I love this blatant love and simultaneous complete disregard for history.  They have so much old stuff, the insignificant historical locations don't even matter, per se.

Channels

There's the classic.  Stonehenge.  It's pretty epic.

Here's one of the ones I took in Cardiff.  Yes.  This stone circle is smack-dab in the middle of... a traffic circle.

This is the same stone circle from the top of the page, sans moi.  It's in Bute Park in Cardiff.  No fence or anything.  Just, you know, ancient stone circle, chillin' out.

Note:   I know that stone circles exist in places other than the UK, but, the ones in the UK just rock my socks.

4. Tartans

Here, we have another specifically Scottish one for the win!  Tartans!  Part of my family is the Craigs, it was my grandmother's maiden name, and it is my father's middle name.  If my parents had a son, they might have given him the middle name Craig as well.  Though I am actually more English than Scottish (and also more German and Swiss than Scottish...) I feel a strange affinity with this part of my heritage.  Not as much as my uncle Barry, who used to dress in a kilt and go to big Scottish events, but I do feel proud.

This is the Craig tartan. 

Loch Carron

Family pride is kind of awesome sometimes.