Make Your Own Touchscreen Gloves!
Didn’t say I was an expert. [At anything.] But these do the job.
Instructions:
Buy cheap gloves
Cut fingertip off the gloves for whichever fingers you use on your touchscreen.
Put gloves on.
Touch screen.
Gasp in technoshock and awe as your bare fingertip works just like a bare fingertip.
S/S 2012 Fashions I Won’t Be Following…
I was at the shops yesterday & bought a Company magazine – special new redesign, promo price of £1, no idea what’s changed about it other than the crinkly “real feel” paper. Now, I’m not sure if it’s just that I’m deeply untrendy, or whether fashion has crawled back up its own arsehole and died, but there are some trends I simply will not be doing. Ever, if I can help it.
Not Doing: Denim Boilersuits
I last wore one of these in 1987; you can’t make me go back there. I was only 10, I didn’t know what I was doing. I thought [wished] it made me look cool like Ripley in Alien, but I was a kid digging holes in the woods, and a jumpsuit wasn’t going to turn me into a hardcore grown-up heroine. Baggy but not comfortable, inconvenient to change or adjust layers, and there’s no way in hell I’d pay Wrangler or anyone else £135 for making me look like an extra from an archetypal sci-fi engineering room.
Not Doing: 7/8ths Length Jeans
Listen, my legs are long. If I wore jeans that stopped above my ankle bone, I’d have inches of exposed ankle getting hypothermia. Also, it’d look like I’d stolen them from a 12 year old. As it is, I usually wear boots that reach at least mid-calf, so the whole thing would be pointless because nobody would see my on-trend leg length anyway.
Not Doing: Feather Mini Skirts
Because my arse was not built to be a pom-pom. And because if I was going to wear a feather skirt, I’d want bloody great melodramatic peacock feathers rather than that fluffy fringy stuff.
On the upside, leopard print is cool still/again. Boy boots and brogues with big brothel-creeping workwear soles are a thing. And there are ads in there for new extra-big bottles of Aussie Miracle Moist, which is one of the few conditioners my hair will cooperate with.
Related articles
- Style Tip: Wear Rolled Up Denim and Ankle Boots Like Rachel Bilson (ldvfashionfix.com)
- Mischa Barton in Leopard Jeans (denimblog.com)
You Asked For It (You Sick, Sick Puppies): Fetish Fan Photo Requests
OK, I keep getting asked about fetish images and bdsm in particular, so here’s a quick guide to what I’ve got for you:
- Naked ballet and other nude dance: There are still more photos from my “naked ballet in the woods” session with BD-Company.co.uk that I’ll post up sometime soon, but if you really love the nude ballet that much then I can always shoot more. I can tap dance, clog dance, pole dance, hoe-down and do jazz hands “interpretative dance” shit, too, so if you’ve got a “specialist” naked dancing fetish you’ll have to leave me a message about it and I’ll see what I can do. No Charleston though; I never got the hang of that one.
- Pregnancy fetish / various pregnant fetish subgenres like pregnant bdsm, pregnant housework, pregnant in suspenders and so on: Yes, there are lots of photos I didn’t post in the gallery when I was pregnant. I’ll put some more of them up if you like.
- Housework fetish, nude housework, and cleaning fetishes from rubber gloves and washing dishes to scrubbing floors to vacuum cleaning and feather dusters: I have loads of these photos already, and I’ll probably shoot more housework fetish pics in 2012.
- Food fetish / WAM / wearing food: OK, you obviously like this idea a lot. I haven’t posted up many foody photos yet, so I’ll plan a special food fetish photo shoot just for you. Now, what to wear?
- BDSM and other control fetishes: I’ve got quite a few bdsm sets kicking around – I’ll liberate some of the photos from storage and put them up. If you’re into sadomasochism, I’ve got a lovely Wartenberg pinwheel I’ve been meaning to use in a shoot.
- Girly sex: I’m not sure what you’re looking for when you people type this into your Bings and Googles… do you mean like 2 girls together in a faux-lesbian pose? Do you mean girly like all giggly and squeal-y and wearing a pink sweater? Nobody’s directly asked me about it, but I’ve noticed you turning up here looking for it, so if you let me know what it is you want I’ll point you in the right direction.
- What else? Well, that’s mostly up to me but it’s partly up to you, too, – let me know what kind of photos you want to see more of, and I’ll start plotting the next year’s fetish & bdsm photo shoots.
Image of the Week: Infinite Sadness by miskan
A beautiful, emotive expression on a completely inanimate object. Lovely.
You can see more of miskan‘s work on Flickr.
Want to Win Image of the Week?
Send me the URL to your image, or email me the file as an attachment if you prefer. I’m on Facebook and Twitter and my email is mi@machiavelliid.com. Give me whatever info you like about you or your image. That’s it.
[No guarantees that I'll ever publish it, or that I'll repeat what you say about it word-for-word. But if I like your image or your thinking, it's in.]
Beach Holiday Fashions
This is a guest post by James.
Whether you’ve booked flights to Jamaica, the sizzling Spanish coast or the affluent South of France, if you plan on spending a lot of time at the beach then there are a few fashion must-haves that will see you through from beach babe to night owl, as well as being both fashionable and functional. Here are our top tips…
Swimwear
Whatever your figure there is an abundance of swimwear on offer these days that will either hide a multitude of sins or show off a fabulous physique. Choose from a daring two-piece to a full bodied sporty swimsuit or something in between. Whatever you dare to wear be sure that it’s comfortable, fits well and doesn’t go see-through when wet!
Sundress
A definite must-have item this one; the sundress whether long or short, floaty or fitting is the perfect cover up when you need to pop to a local café for a nifty espresso or bite to eat without having to go back to your hotel and change. Choose something small and light that will fit easily into your bag.
Sun Bag
A good bag is indispensable, especially when you plan to transform from beach bunny to evening elegance without the aid of a mirror or the privacy of your hotel. Make sure it’s big enough to hold a good book, water bottle, sunglasses, a simple sundress, some accessories, lip balm, moisturiser, a t-shirt and a sarong.
Shades
When the sun sizzles it’s important to protect your eyes as well as looking cool. You can go as bling as you like with your shades, from designer labels to elegant shapes like Jackie O’s. Black can often look harsh so opt for a softer brown or perhaps a funky colour like red or purple.
Flip-flops
They come is thousands of styles and colours and fit easily into any day bag. Pack a fun rubbery pair for splashing about in the sea and a more elegant pair for when you slip into your evening attire.
T-Shirt and Shorts
A sundress replacement if you prefer shorts to skirts, but it’s always handy to have some spare clothes in case your others are wet from the beach or too covered in sand to be of use. Go for casual denim or perhaps something more formal if you plan on dining out in them later.
Sarong
Whether you’re flying to Jamaica, Australia, Europe or Asia, this is one handy little number you want to make sure you’ve packed. The sarong can be used as a towel, headscarf, wrap, dress or top. If you really can’t fit any additional clothes into your bag, one of these natty pieces of cloth should be able to transform you from beach chic to barfly in one move. Just be sure you’ve perfected the art of tying it up to avoid any embarrassing incidents!
Sun Hat
It will protect your hair, head and eyes from the sun as well as looking super-cool. Choose a straw number for casual chic to a baseball cap if you plan on a little beach volleyball. It’s prefect for hiding hair that’s had a little too much sun!
Bangles and Earrings
Pop some accessories into your bag; they take up little space but a pair of earrings or a bangle or two will transform any outfit into one fit for a glamorous evening do.
*****
Although the temptation may be to pack light, when you’re going on holidays it’s important to make sure that you’ve got all of the fashion essentials. James, a writer from London and full-time fashion freak’s learnt this the hard way, but now cannot go on holidays without making sure he’s packed everything on this simple checklist.
Question: “What’s the oldest piece of clothing you still wear?”
My corduroy jeans. I bought 4 pairs in about 2002 and I still have 2 of them. They’re worn so thin you can see my skin through the fabric in places, and there are holes in the seams, but I love them and I hate almost every pair of trousers I see in the shops right now, so they’ll do for a while longer.
Super Size Me
So I’m now 4-and-a-bit months pregnant, and it doesn’t really show yet. To everyone else. To me, there’s a huge difference already. My waist is about 3 inches bigger than it used to be, my fitted clothes don’t fit, and the handspan gap between the bottom of my tops and the top of my bottoms (read that again if it didn’t make sense the first time) is leaving my belly cold in the lovely British greyness of impending winter.
More importantly, I have unfulfilled sartorial needs. The party season is approaching, and I wanna rock the maternity fashion boat like a colicky infant’s cradle. Tis well known that MI likes the shiny stuff, and there is little or no fetish maternity wear available off-the-peg. My options appear to be limited to the following:
- Create a cocoon-skirt ensemble by wrapping myself in bondage tape. This has the benefit of being relatively cheap, and adjustable in fit as I get bigger, but I have my reservations about using it for a party outfit in case some little grunt finds a loose end and unravels my outfit while I’m rooting through the breadsticks.
- Spend £250 to get a custom latex maternity dress made up for me by a kindly designer (thanks Kaori Matsubara for the offer), which in another 6 months will become obsolete since I don’t intend to get pregnant a second time.
- Learn *very* quickly to make my own latex clothes, which means buying cutters, glues, solvents, patterns, and a whole heap of sheet latex to practise on before I can ever make my dream dress. I did Google up the Making Latex Clothing blog by Latex Kitty, but I’m not convinced I could get up to the necessary standard in just a couple of months.
- Resort to PVC instead of latex. Now I like PVC but really, it has its place and that place is on my ass. It’s great for trousers and miniskirts, but shite for dresses and anything that you want to have a bit of drape or flow. Plus, I haven’t seen any PVC maternity clothes for sale either so I’d still have to engage a designer or hack out my own…
- Wear stuff with DIY belly cut-outs to accommodate my bump. OK, this would work in terms of fit, but did you read the part about the winter and the chill and the greyness? It’d be a nifty look for the summer, but this is a winter pregnancy and it’s not gonna look so hot if my bump is mottled purple with cold.
I am at a hair-pulling, teeth-grinding loss. Do I shell out for the custom latex and hope to recoup the cost by booking a few pregnant fetish fashion shoots? Do I start trying to learn the art of latexery (new word?) only to find that the best I can manage is a wrinkly-seamed mess? Do I give up and wear a duvet from now until the birth (and possibly thereafter until the flab and postnatal depression have subsided)? Grrrrr….
I don’t really expect anyone to have all the answers, but if you have anything helpful to offer then get in touch – my belly needs you!
***Mercenary Postscript:
Make a donation to the Shiny Things For Machiavelli Id fund and earn my undying gratitude :)
How I made my first pasties
Short answer: in a hurry, on the day of my first performance.
Long answer: see below.
Necessary stuff:
- Thin card, whatever colour you fancy for the background of the pasties (I used shiny silver card).
- Ruler or tape measure
- Scissors
- Compass, or something round with a suitable diameter (to draw around).
- Pen or pencil.
- Glue.
- Sticky tape.
- Clothes pegs or paper clips
- Marker pen(s), in a colour that contrasts with the card (I used black).
- Ribbon, in another colour that looks good with the card & pen colours (I used red satin, to match my shoes).
- Needle.
- Thread, the same colour as the ribbon.
- Any other nice things you feel like decorating your pasties with – sequins, crystals, beads, glitter, lace, velvet, satin, braid, UV paint, origami cranes…
Don’t forget you’ll also need some double-sided tape, or eyelash glue, to stick the finished pasties on your nipples!
How to:
- Measure across the centre of your nipples, top to bottom and side to side. Take whichever is the widest measurement & add an extra centimetre (just under half an inch).
- Either set your compasses to that width, or go & find something round that has roughly that width so you can put it on the card and draw around it (I drew around the lid of a coffee jar for mine).
- Draw two circles of that width on the card (use the back of the card if it’s single-sided; mine was silver on the front but plain white on the back).
- Mark the centre of each circle with a dot/cross (either mark where the compass hole is, or halve the size of your circle and measure inwards from the edge a few times to find the central point, then mark it).
Machiavelli Id makes pasties. Bad lighting, sorry.
- Carefully cut out your two circles. Now make a cut straight from the edge into the centre of each circle.
- Overlap the edges of the cut and pull the circle into a flattish cone shape. Hold it up against your nipples to check how pointy or flat you think the cone should be. When you’re happy with the shape of it, stick a pen/pencil inside the point of the cone and draw it alongside the edge of the overlapped card, marking a line on the back of the cone from the centre to the outer edge. Now let go of the card and let it go back to being a flat circle. Do the same with the other circle.
- Get the glue and apply it on the back of one of the circles in the wedge shape from the line you drew to the nearest straight edge, and out to the outer edge of the circle. Overlap the edges again so that the inner edge meets the line you drew, and stick the overlapping part down. Put a couple of clothes pegs or paper clips etc on the cone to hold the shape together while the glue dries. Now do the same with the other circle.
Waiting for pasties to dry.
- Once the glue has dried, stick a little piece of sticky tape over the join on the inside of each cone. Use your fingers to pinch around the edge of each cone and make it as symmetrical a shape as possible. Now they’re ready to decorate!
- Get your marker pen(s) and draw decorative patterns on the outside of the cones – figure out what will look good with the outfit you’re wearing. I just drew thick lines from the centre to the edge of the cones, to make them black & silver striped. It helps if your pattern covers up the line of the join in the card, unless you’re planning to cover the pasties with sequins etc so the join won’t be visible.
Stripy pasty decorating with marker pen
- Stick any fabric, sequins, glitter etc on to the pasties, and let it dry.
- Take your ribbon and cut two equal lengths, long enough to tie in a small bow. Fold each piece of ribbon into a bow shape and sew or glue the overlapping bits together to hold the bow in shape. If you’ve used glue, wait for it to dry.
Ribbon bows. I sewed them myself!
- Hold one of the cones with the point facing you and the join at the bottom. Position the bow just above the point of the cone, and glue or sew it into place. Do the same for the other cone. If you’ve used glue, wait for it to dry again.
- Stick them on and shake it!
Machiavelli Id's first pasties - finished!
PS If you want tassels on your pasties, either buy them or make them and then pierce a small hole at the point of each pastie. Feed the tassel through from the front to the back, and tie it in a knot at the back, right in the point of the cone.
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