This weekend is going to be insanely fun for those attending the convention Atomic Lollipop! From July 11-13 we will be taking over the Ontario Science Centre for a weekend of insane games, panels and shows. On Saturday at 9pm Peepshow TO will be taking over the main stage with a Cartoon and Comic themed show. Come out and see my legendary Batwoman act!
As an avid wearer of corsets I was thrilled to have the opportunity to model for the company Love, Poetry Corsets. Their unique designs come in a beautiful array of fabrics and their shapes hug the body and flatter the figure. I got to model this steampunk inspired, overbust corset with a sweetheart neckline and back lacing.
As part of World Pride and because I am a life long Rocky Horror Groupie, I decided to check out Excited Mental State‘s Pride Show!
As usual the cast was spot on with their shadow casting of the film. In case you are not familiar with the tradition of Rocky Horror, typically a cast will act out the film while it is playing and add their own spin on things. There is a lot of audience participation, including callbacks and the use of props at certain cues in the film. In Toronto we are very lucky to have an amazing cast that has been running for over 30 years and always has a hilarious take on this classic cult movie.
Here are some of the photos I took last Friday night for the Rocky Horror Pride Show!
This past weekend I had an absolutely fabulous time celebrating World Pride in Toronto!
As an openly bisexual woman it is so important to me to celebrate Pride and show my support as a member of the LGBT community. I feel empowered being a part of such a humongous group of not just Lesbian, Gay, Bi, and Trans people, but also all the weirdos, freaks, and artistic creative types like myself who were celebrating. It makes me feel like I am part of a much bigger community when I see such vast crowds of like-minded people declaring that they are proud to be who they are. I was so happy that Toronto got to be the host for World Pride 2014 and I feel lucky to live in this great city where I do feel safe to be openly, genuinely ME!
The party started on Thursday evening. I lined up early and got into the Starry Night event at the 519 Green Space where I had the pleasure of seeing Ru Paul’s Drag Race’s top 4 Queens from this season, Darienne Lake, Courtney Act, Adore Delano and Bianca Del Rio, doing their thing on stage. On Friday night I joined my friends at Exicted Mental State (aka EMS), the Toronto Rocky Horror cast, at their pride show. The main event was the parade on Sunday, in which I strutted the parade route in my new self-made mermaid ensemble!
On Sunday I attended a 1920’s Gatsby themed garden party at Spadina House in Toronto with the lovely Leelando Calrissian! We had a fabulous time getting all dolled up in our 1920s attire and lounging on the beautiful lawn behind the historical mansion. There were more amazing outfits than you could imagine, some real 1920s vintage, others simply inspired or reproduction. The women were decked out in lace, pearls, bias-cut frocks, cloche hats, beaded bags, with many gorgeous parasols scattered throughout the crowd. The men adorned themselves with boater hats, suspenders, linen suits, sock garters, spats with many pocket watches on fobs. Live bands roared with jazz on the main stage and small groups played the ukulele at the garage stage. The main event was the fashion parade and costume contest with prizes from Malabar, Aviv restaurant and the Rose Emporium. Leelando and I were very jealous of the grand prize winner who will be receiving 2 dozen fresh cut roses every month for the next year for winning! Please enjoy my photos from the Gatsby Garden Party!
Today I bring you part 2 of Sam’s Style, featuring dresses custom made for my beautiful friend Sam by her personal designer; me! Part 1
Phineas and Ferb
While out fabric shopping together Sam spotted this amazing cartoon printed fabric with characters from the show Phineas and Ferb and instantly fell in love with it. We decided it would be the perfect print for a new summer dress! The colours in this fabric are fantastic and the comic book window style with graphic text and action posed characters bring so much life to it. Because of the loud fabric we kept the design simple on this one. Just a plain black sash with bow at the back and a short t-shirt sleeve. Sam looks stunning in this creation!
Romantic Red
This red dress was the first one I created for Sam. We began with the trim fabric, which is a delectable blackberry print, and then matched the red highlight in the print with a red fabric for the main body of the dress. I love the way the rich red and the purple blackberries balance each other. The cuffs on the sleeves have a little wing with a button that matches the buttons on the bust area. This dress also has some sweet pockets to keep your cell phone and your lipstick in! At the hem of the dress I added a couple of blackberry hearts and matched them on the fascinator that I also made to add to this look.
My super cute, super stylish friend Sam commissioned me to make her a series of dresses over the past year or so that encapsulate her fun, colourful style! Each of these whimsical creations is created from the same base pattern, with slight alterations to each, and the choice of colour, pattern and print in the fabric is what really gives each dress it’s own unique feel. Recently Sam and I adventured to a local park to snap some pinup shots of Sam in her very own line of dresses. Today I will share 2 of the styles I created!
Banana-Rama
The Banana dress might be my favourite of the set. The contrasting banana and blueberry fabrics are so fun, fruity and look good enough to eat! This dress has a peter pan collar and long bow in the back. We did a bit of a longer sleeve on this dress with the lovely blueberry fabric again as a cuff. Sam is a knockout pinup queen in the dress!
Button-Up
The Button dress was commissioned by our friend Rena for Sam’s birthday. She found this amazing button fabric and let me run wild with it. For the design of this dress I kept it a little more simple, no collar or tie, but the fun detail is the real buttons I sewed to the front of the dress. They blend in so well that they are a fun little surprise when you see them up close!
I had a blast this past saturday at the Peepshow TO Late Night Toon Tease Nerdlesque show!! Performers stripped as their favourite adult cartoon characters such as Leela from Futurama, Jane Lane from Daria, Gimpy from Undergrads, Molotov Cocktease from Venture Brothers and so many more. The show was amazing, with so many creative costumes, acts and song choices. The stage, which was set with old school televisions, created such a lovely atmosphere to witness these cartoon characters coming to life. Congrats to Peepshow TO on another wonderful show!
When it comes to curvy burlesque beauties Dirty Martini takes the cake!
Based in NYC, this burlesque performer/pinup model/dance instructor’s style of performance is a combination of classic glamour and raunchy humour. She holds the title of The Reigning Queen of Burlesque – Miss Exotic World 2004, first runner up to Miss Exotic World in 2003 and best fan dance at the Burlesque Hall of Fame in 2002. She was featured in the John Cameron Mitchell film “Shortbus” and the Scissor Sister’s video for the song “FIlthy/Gorgeous”. Dirty Martini is truly a wonderful representation of the curvy girl body-type in burlesque. She has curves for days and proudly shows her figure in the most glamourous burlesque costumes and routines. Dirty Martini is such an inspiration to me as a big girl in burlesque and she really proves it that beauty has no size!
This is the final set from my Bettie Page inspired Striptease photo shoot that I will be posting on this blog. The last few images. which feature a helpless Dolly in bondage, have been deemed too racy to post here but fear not! If You Fall Photography and Classically Curvy are currently working on a gallery show of the full Bettie Page set! Stay tuned for more info and for now please enjoy these final shots!
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Photos by If You Fall Photography
CLASSICALLY CURVY 