Escaping London with Coppa Club

After a hectic few weeks with work - I say weeks, I had 2 months without a weekend off - and in a moment of madness and stress I booked Ryan and I a weekend away just to spend some proper time together without me running off to the theatre at 7pm on a Saturday night. 

Although I knew we wanted to get away from the city, I also knew that neither of us had the time to actually book time off, and as sods law goes I actually had to squeeze in an industry event on the night we were meant to go, so somewhere we could drive to within 2 hours but also was a bit of a countryside escape, was important.

When I saw a deal come up for The Great House at Sonning, it looked perfect - a cosy hotel alongside a gorgeous river but also partnered with Coppa Club, so I knew it would be a bit of a treat and we could rely on them for the comforts of good cocktails and food from the reputation of the London branches. And even better, only took us 1hr 15 to drive there! 

We got everything we expected and even more, starting with a very kind room upgrade when we arrived from a Cosy Room to a Deluxe Room in The Palace Yard - which was gorgeous. All the rooms have a modern countryside feel to them but luxurious at the same time, and the bathroom was probably bigger than my bedroom at home - so there's that! We had brunch at the Coppa club (which I heard is George Clooney's local - but no sightings so cannot confirm nor deny) and then headed into Windsor for the day as it was a little cloudy and I hadn't been there since I was a little girl. I also slyly wanted to pretend I was Megan Markle walking down that aisle but Ryan was too distracted by the weapons and armour so I got away with it. After wandering around the town for the afternoon, we relaxed back in the room and then headed back down to the Coppa Club for an evening of food and slightly too many of the incredible cocktails. They have a gorgeous outdoor terrace covered in fairylights which we sat underneath for a lot of the evening - very instagrammable and will be making an appearance on there in the near future.

After checking out the next morning we indulged in yet another brunch - the hollandaise sauce was the best I've had so I couldn't resist another Eggs Benedict. The sunshine had made an appearance for our last morning so we made a half hearted effort to burn the calories off by taking a stroll along the river. It was such a beautiful little walk, with all the boats rolling past and Mr Birdwatcher Ryan spotting a kingfisher, a heron and god knows what else, I swear that boy is the next Dr Dolittle. As we came back to the pub, everyone was sitting in the beach chairs in the garden while they had a BBQ getting fired up, the outdoor bar opening, boats mooring up and dogs jumping in and out of the river. It was so lovely and had to drag ourselves away to get ready for a Monday back at work! Will definitely try and come back in the summer and make the most of the pub garden and terrace in the sunshine.

Anyway, haven't written a blog post in a little while so I hope you guys enjoyed and that I have answered a few questions that some of you sent me about our stay. I will pop the hotels website down below for any of you interested - they also have way more venues than I expected so will try to visit a few more. But also worth keeping an eye on Secret Escapes, as that was where I booked ours and it was such a great deal!

https://greathouseatsonning.co.uk/ 

Tara-Jade x

*All views are my own and this was not a gifted trip or collaboration*

Is Instagram culture contributing to climate change?

I'm sure you all saw in the news this week and plastered all over Facebook, Twitter etc - the scary headlines along the lines of "WE HAVE 12 YEARS TO CHANGE EVERYTHING OR THE PLANET WILL BE DAMAGED BEYOND REPAIR". Now this along with the suspiciously high 21 degree temperatures in London this week meant that everyones ears suddenly pricked up and we all started to ask ourselves what we could do to be a tiny part of this change.

Could I become vegetarian for a few days a week and cut down my meat consumption? Probably. Could I also stop buying drinks and plastic packaged foods for lunch, cutting down plastic waste? Also yes. But these are all things that are shovelled down our throats constantly and there is already a big buzz around them. What I became more interested in is the impact that our generation in particular is having on the planet, the habits we are introducing and how we can try and create a buzz around these less talked about factors that actually have more of an effect than we might think.

If you are following or reading my blog, you will more than likely be here for the fashion chit chat, the outfit links and all that jazz. However for this post I am glad to announce that there are absolutely no website links for this ootd, simply because its all old and god forbid HAND ME DOWNS. The skirt is roughly 7 years old from a dress that I had when I was about 14 years old which I have cut up and saved for so long just because I adored the fabric and new that someday I would be able to make something beautiful out of it (helps that mum's a seamstress cough cough). And the jumper was an unwanted hand me down which scratches a little bit but was originally from a lovely high end store so I didn't want to part with. I was inspired to do a set of outfit photos using only recycled/ out of season clothes to try and spark up a conversation between girls that follow me because I think the whole of instagram has started to become so focused on constant consumption of fast fashion, a new outfit for every occassion, constant browsing of the New In sections from our favourite shops, the fear of being an 'outfit repeater', and just wanting to constantly be a part of all the fleeting trends.

I am absolutely a contributer to the problem myself, most Sundays spent browsing instagram, spotting something I love on someone, clicking through to the outfit link and then spending the next few hours lost in the depths of the asos new in section - but I am starting to wake up to the harm it is causing and trying to make a conscious effort to only buy pieces that I know I can style in different ways, create different outfits to wear more than once, resell old pieces that I know I won't wear again, and steer away from any trends that I know will be shoved to the back of my wardrobe in the next month or so - such as a neon green roll neck that looked cool on that one girl but I will definitely try on once, realise I look like a knob and shamefully hide any evidence of my mad 5 minutes at the bottom of a drawer somewhere - you know the ones.

"If one million women bought their next item of clothing secondhand instead of new, we would save 6 million kg of carbon pollution from entering the atmosphere"

Shocking right? So here I am doing my teeny tiny bit and trying to get a few of you to do a double think before you do your weekend shop - in the words of Vivienne Westwood "Buy less, choose well"

If you want to share your own recycled/ old season/ reworked outfits it would be really cool to start up a hashtag so we can use each other for inspiration and make this a thing! Add #oldseasoninspo and I'll share them on my story.

Why I'm happier without abs and without the gym

First of all, let's take a moment to laugh at how ridiculous I look in the photo above, clutching my boobs and laughing like an absolute goofball. There's a funny story behind it -  I went to go take some pics with my sister and halfway through she goes, "Tara one of your boobs looks way smaller than the other" and this was the face I pulled immediately before I said, "It probably is!". Kind of a nothing story I know but I actually kind of love this photo because a year ago there was no way I would have posted it - I would have pointed out my goofy teeth, unsymmetrical boobs, belly overhang and hip dips and deleted it straight out. But this year has given me so much more perspective on what is important to me, who I am becoming and honestly just not caring what other people think.

  I know I have gone on far too many times about how busy this year has been for me but it has and - although the theme of these photos may be a bit misleading - it has been over a year since I have done any proper exercise. In my first and second year of uni I got very caught up in how I looked and this whole 'gym culture' that seems to be expected of you on Instagram nowadays. I was pushed over the edge when one of my old dance teachers said "you are very unfit now, don't turn into one of those fat uni students" although I know she meant nothing by it and said it as a helpful passing comment, it was enough to make me look at myself a little differently and cave into the pressure that I was already feeling. Now I'm not saying that I went unhealthy about it - in fact I was probably the most physically fit I have ever been but it was just excessive pressure on myself that I didn't need. I would be going to the gym 4/5 times a week, every time trying to beat my personal best of the amount of time that I could stay on the treadmill and not letting myself get off until I had. I constantly feeling guilty about what I was eating, how much longer I would need to go to the gym, if I skipped gym one evening I would drag myself to the gym in my halls as late as 11pm as a sort of punishment. As much as my body was healthier for it, my mentality towards it wasn't, and when it came to my third year of university, I just knew that this sort of pressure on top of everything else was going to make me crumble. So I just stopped it and I focused on writing my dissertation as well as working 2 jobs, finishing my degree, staying in the studio until 8pm most nights and working freelance, and I bloody smashed it! Yes I may have lost my abs, my legs and hips are a bit jiggly now and I probably couldn't last 10 minutes on a treadmill, but I gained SO much more. 

It's all about about balance. Now that I have a bit more time to myself I want to concentrate on earning some more money, getting my career started at the same time and probably at some point getting my fitness back but I will do it in a much more healthy and gentle way and hopefully in not so much isolation as I was feeling last time. What I have learnt from this past year is that if you focus on the physical results of how you look to make you feel happy and a sense of achievement, you will never be happy. Even when I was at my slimmest and could run for an hour, I would still want to lose a bit more, run a bit longer. It never ends and you have to focus on what is going to benefit you most at that point in time, and for me that was focusing on getting my career goals focused, getting a first to help me do that and working to be able to afford it as well as building my portfolio and making industry contacts along the way.

Now I am always a bit cautious of using the words 'body confidence' because I am aware that I am a still naturally slim size 8 and a lot of people will scoff at you for even trying to put yourself in that category but I think that everyone will always criticise their own body way more than anyone else does and that everyone can lack confidence in their own skin at some point. For me it was just about realising that honestly NO ONE CARES. None of my family, friends or boyfriend have even noticed a change in my body in the past year, so why the hell was I worrying so much. So for the foreseeable future you will find me under a blanket and with a pack of Haribo, and I am absolutely ok with that!

Tara - Jade x

Outfit details:

Top: Boux Avenue here

Leggings: Boux Avenue here

Use code : TARACTIVE20 for 20% off until 30th September

10 things I wish I knew before starting university

If any of you follow my design Instagram you will have seen this over on my stories but I thought I would dedicate a blog post to it because I'm sure lots of my followers are just about to start 1st year at uni and it can be bloody scary! Some of these points are very art school based but hopefully most of them are relatable to anyone!

Don’t put pressure on it to live up to the expectations of what everyone says uni will be like. 

Especially at a London university, it will be most likely be a different experience for you than the stories you have heard. It may be the best 3 years of your life when you make incredible friends for life and you may party 3 nights a week and spend every night socialising at the SU. But also it may not and thats ok. Don’t feel like you have to push yourself to fit in with this stereotype of the uni experience, keep hold of what you enjoy doing, time to yourself and time for your old friends and family and you will be just fine.

You get out of university what you put in.

No matter how amazing your course is, at the end of the day, the amount of effort that you put into your work will be reflected in how much you gain from those 3 years. Give every project and opportunity your best shot and it will be so much more worth the money!

If you can, DO WORK EXPERIENCE!

If you have spare time to do work experience atall, do it as much as you can too! These are the contacts that will help you get ahead once you have graduated because you have a strong relationship with them and they trust your work and work ethic.

Learn 5 recipes that you can make in 20 minutes or less.

When you are busy with work, staying late at the studio or even just rushing a quick meal before you go on a night out, the last thing you are going to want to do is cook or think of a meal to try and make. I kept a whole stock of curry sauces, pasta sauces etc that you can just stick on the hob with some sort of carbs for 15 minutes and fry up some chicken/ veg etc to put with it and you will save a whole load on ready meals! 

Have a secret stash of cutlery

Sounds silly but I’m sure my flatmates ATE cutlery, it all seemed to go missing. Having a spare set in my room saved me having to eat all my meals with a spoon on many occasions.

Keep your uni room as a nice relaxing space to come home to.

This one will help with homesickness and general stress levels. I started to realise that I felt so much more stressed when my uni room was a mess and my bed wasn’t made and laundry wasn’t done. Try and make your room as homely as possibly with photos/ decoration that makes it feel like your space and somewhere that you look forward to coming home too.

Before you start uni, try and save up a bit of money to use as your freshers fund and overflow money.

From the date you move in in September, there is a while month until you get your first student loan instalment, which I didn’t realise! Your student loan is paid on the first week of your actual university course. So unless you want to go into your shiny new overdraft straight away, have some back up money ready.

Art supplies that you use regularly, buy in bulk online

For me things like sketchbooks, scalpel blades, mountboard and foamboard really started to add up when you buy them all singularly from the art shop and I found that buying them in bulk on ebay made such a difference, even if you buy them and split it between your mates!

Learn to budget very early on!

As soon as I got my first student loan payment, I worked out how many weeks I had until the next one and then divided how much money I had between those weeks. That was my budget for the week and if I went below that I put extra money into the ‘overflow pot’ I spoke about earlier and then took out of that if I needed it. It seems like a lot of faff but trust me you will thank me later when you need extra money for birthday presents or event tickets or christmas!

 However you are feeling, someone else is feeling the exact same way.

It's a big change to begin with, give yourself a bit of slack and be kind to everyone. You are all a bit scared and anxious but just relax and know that - as cliché as it sounds - everyone is in the same boat, everyone is putting on a brave face and everyone is only putting the best bits on social media!

Tara-Jade x

How I get involved with Blogger events

I have been a bit AWOL recently on the blogging scene, mainly due to being a little busy finishing my degree and the craziness that goes with that such as the mad panic to throw yourself into the "real world" as soon as possible - but more of that on another post. 
However, in amongst it all, I have managed to squeeze in a few blogging/ fashion related events and have had a few of you message me about how I go about getting invited to these or hearing about them. I'll be honest a lot of it is luck, as I don't have a very big following so am always SO grateful when a brand wants to invite me to one of these and be part of an exciting event, but I do have a few tips and tricks that I can share with you so I thought I would pop it all in a blog post along with a few photos of the recent events that I have been lucky enough to have been invited to. 

Skinnydip x Foamburst event

So the first way that I get involved in these events is through an app called @theinfluencersdiary run by @rosalindshimmen which you apply to be part of as a blogger and then weekly there are brand events posted on the app which you leave you handle on and apply your interest and via the app and then they will email you if you have been chosen. This is how I got invited to the Skinny Dip x Foamburst event which was a lovely event including a whole range of free candy cocktails, Mac and cheese, a dj for the whole night, plenty of photo ops and candy floss machines.

Boux Avenue Graduation event

The next event that I ABSOLUTELY made time for was of course the Boux Avenue graduation event in which my year as a Boux Ambassador drew to a close. It was such a beautiful event at The Ivy Chelsea Garden in their private room in which we had a free cocktail menu (which I took FULL advantage of if anyone knows the Ivy's cocktail prices usually!), SO many canapés, a mini awards ceremony - in which my hairdresser will be very proud to hear that I won #hairgoals queen, and finished the night off with presenting us with our own personalised satin dressing gowns to send us all off. Boux always have the most wonderful events for heir student ambassadors and I would highly recommend applying it if you are a student. They will shortly be announcing the new year of applications to be open so keep an eye out on their social media channels on how to do this!

21 buttons x The influencer diary event

 Another lovely event through The Influencers Diary but this one actually thrown by Rosalind herself, which took shape as a mystical forest in The Cuckoo Club with girls dressed as butterflies on stilts, ballet dancers, pink cocktails, candy icecream, light up candy floss (can you tell that the food is a vital part of an event for me!) and a pink flower Photo Booth.

Unrelated to recent events for me but another way that I hear about events and collabs is through a lovely Facebook group called Creative Girl Gang (CGG) run by @kelseyinlondon which is a great little tip I can share with you guys and also The Blogger Programme (@tbp_social) which is great for bloggers with a few more followers than me, as most of the events and opportunities start at 5k but I always keep an eye open for them!

 I will say that blogging events are a bit like marmite, you either love or hate them. There are so many 'Pro's' that get plastered all over social media such as the outfit photos at gorgeously decorated venues, goody bag unwrapping stories or glamorous boomerangs of clinking cocktail glasses, but it is rarely mentioned that often these are only the best bits like the trailer for a movie. What fills in the in-between is very often a lot of awkward standing next to someone, knowing that you both follow each other and like each others photos but not knowing how to introduce yourself without either a) looking like an idiot fangirl when you assume that they recognise you too and they have no idea or b) looking like you are ignorant when you try and play it cool and don't say an enthusiastic hello first. As someone who is a mixture of quite shy when you first get to know me, slightly socially awkward including lots of nervous giggling, and also have to WORST resting bitch face in the world when I'm not wearing my glasses, as you can imagine these things are sometimes a nightmare for me. If I have any shred of useful knowledge to pass on it would be, find a group of girls who share your interest for blogging and fashion that will also be invited to these things but that you also feel very comfortable around. I have been very lucky in that I have met some of the most lovely and down to earth girls through blogging, two of which being @robynnelouisex and @evieroselane - who I always know that I could ask to come to one of these things with and I would never be bored or run out of things to chat to them about, and it makes you so much more comfortable. When you go to these things,  in amongst the Clichy circles and resting bitch faces, there will be one smiley face or someone who looks just as uncomfortable as you do and you will gravitate towards them and the event will be all the more enjoyable for it.

Hope this has been half helpful for some of you or at least an interesting read on this rainy Sunday evening!

Tara-Jade x

Mini Festival Lookbook

Although it may not seem like it with our LOVELY grey and drizzly English weather still in full swing, but festival season is actually kicking off this week with all the buzz around Coachella. For my wardrobe this means one thing. All the colour. All the pattern. All the crazy trousers. So with Boux Avenue challenging their Student Ambassadors to come up with some creative festival inspired looks, I put my best crazy trouser-adorned foot forward and pulled together a couple of looks for you. Hope you enjoy!

Tara-Jade x

Outfit details:

Bralet: Boux Avenue

Jacket: In The Style

Trousers: Pretty Little Thing (Last years sorry!)

Trainers: Ego shoes

Outfit details:

Bralet: Boux Avenue

Cropped top: Pretty Little Thing

Trousers: Pretty Little Thing - (I would recommend going a size down in these girls!)

Necklaces: Chained and Able

                 Chained and Able

What I learnt from taking a break from my phone

So before I pretend to get all high and mighty and act as if I took an intentional break from social media, to detox, cleanse my brain or anti oxidise my hair follicles or whatever other myths they sell to you nowadays, I didn't. I dropped my phone in the bloody toilet (for about the 10th time) and had to wait 2 weeks until my insurance got a new one back to me. You would think my now I would have learnt to have NOT PUT IT IN THE BACK POCKET OF MY JEANS. But will I continue to make the same mistakes until the end of time? Also yes. 

However, although unplanned, having 2 weeks without my phone did teach me a few things so I thought I would share a little bit about how things panned out.

1) I do not own another method of telling the time at all. The one thing that struck me the most was how dependant I was on my phone for the smallest things, for example TELLING THE TIME. I even had to go into the nearest post office at one point and ask the guy what the time was and he looked at me as if I had used him for the square root of Pi. I was late for pretty much everything during these couple of weeks because once I had left my house, I was in the abyss. It was slightly liberating though, not having to constantly power walk with the knowledge that I was going to be late, I was just blissfully unaware.

2) I have a crazy amount of spare time every single day. Honestly I am the first person normally to  complain about how I have NO time EVER and am always so busy and blah blah but without my phone I cannot tell you the amount of time that I spent sitting in silence staring out of train windows, bus windows, walking to places or listening into strangers conversations. It even got to the point where I actually had to buy a book from Waterloo station at a ridiculous price because I was going to go crazy if I had to do another journey in absolute silence. It did make me realise though that I usually would waste all of this time just scrolling through whatever was on the screen of my phone, and make me think about how useful this time would be if I spent it being more productive. I mean, I haven't since, but imagine.

3) I have more will power than I thought. Whilst we are on the subject of spare time, I actually found myself going to the gym more this weeks and managed to fit in a solid 4 sessions, which may not sound like much to some of you but its a good effort from me. BUT. But. As you can imagine, without a phone this made gym time very very quiet indeed. Do you actually understand the amount of willpower it took to spend 45 minutes on a treadmill with only the sound of your own footfall ringing in your ears? I'm proud of myself.

4) It's kind of lonely. For someone who lives on their own in London, I am happy to admit that I rely a lot on my phone for keeping in contact with all my family and friends from home, and having that snatched away was actually kind of lonely. Even though I am known for being the worst ever at replying to texts when I'm busy, I actually found myself looking forward to get home just so that I could Facebook call (lol) my boyfriend on my laptop or even email (double lol) my mum back. 

5) EMAILS. SO MANY EMAILS. One thing I didn't look forward to getting home to however was the bombardment of emails. You don't realise how easy and convenient getting emails sent to your phone is, for you to quickly reply back to and sort out in chunks throughout the day. Being a freelancer with about 3 different shows to organise at one time meant that when I got home I was straight on the laptop getting back to everyone, until it got to 9pm one night and I realised I hadn't even taken my shoes off or moved from the same spot since I got through the door 3 hours before. Never again.

6) The social media part wasn't actually that hard. Being a self diagnosed Instagram addict, I thought being without my phone was going to be like a drug addict being sent to rehab, but actually I didn't really struggle that much. Admittedly it did help that you can get most forms of social media up on a laptop, so I got my fix this way, but I found myself mainly using it just for contacting people. Oh and FYI Instagram for desktops SUCKS. There is no DM button either so I missed a collaboration request and so many lovely messages, I'm sorry!

7) I have some very fickle followers. Not you lovely people obviously, because you are taking the time to read my blog (and I love you so much for it!) but being MIA from Instagram and not being able to post or engage in other people's posts for almost 2 weeks meant that I lost almost 50 followers. Now I'm not that upset, seeing as I am not one of these people who takes numbers of followers too seriously - I have only grown by about 500 of you in the last year - but it just made me think how many of those unfollowers had a 'oh she didn't like my posts so I won't like hers' attitude or something similar that meant that when I took a small break, they lost interest. I know the whole deal with Instagram is this instant, constant, consistent flow of images that are expected but that is just way too much pressure for me which is why I don't think I could ever be one of these full time, dedicated bloggers. I admire you guys honestly.

I think that is about it, and I'm sorry for the slightly unrelated blog images this time round, being without my phone meant that I left my loves over at Boux a little unloved for posts so I thought I would kill two birds with one stone and show off some of their new swimwear line as well. All linked below. 

Use code TARAJADE20 for 20% off.

Swimsuit: here

Bikini: here