Sweet Streets Vol. 03 co-curated by Spank!
My first hand account, behind the scenes from my perspective, of Sweet Streets November 19th, 2011! So way back in April, Tavuchi came to L.A. as a guest judge for a magical girls costume contest, and that's where I met her for the first time! I wore a dress that I designed to look like a mix of pre-cure and chibiusa's sailor costume and ended up winning the costume contest! I was surprised and unbelievably happy. I was literally speechless due to losing my voice the night prior too! In my prize pack I won two pairs of spank! tights, a hair bow, two hair clips, a necklace, and a badge in addition to the $100 gift card to meltdown comics!
So when I applied to be a model for the fashion show, I really wanted to do my very best in support for both Michele and Tavuchi who have already done so much for me. I am petite but curvy girl and I was afraid that I wouldn't be chosen due to not being able to fit into the clothes! ;v; In the end I was chosen! At that point I had been on a crash diet for six weeks and I was feeling pretty good! The next few weeks, I'm not exaggerating when I say I really couldn't think of anything besides sweet streets! It felt like forever!
So my friend itskelp let me stay over at her place for the weekend! I was pretty happy to be able to see her and alanna-lioness again! They go to school up north so it was pretty great they were able to come down for the event! Alanna-lioness made Tavuchi a mix CD of all her favorite twee songs that she plays on her radio show at KDVS! Oh yeah, and she also brought me a ton of fluffy socks and bloomers from Daiso (✿ ♥‿♥)
The next day I woke up early and did some stretches and took a bath to mentally prepare for the day ahead! (•⊙ω⊙•) It was weird leaving the house with no makeup!
I left OBSCENELY early and it's a good thing I did! Not only did I get lost, but there was also traffic on the way up! I ended up leaving an hour early and getting there about on time! The area the gallery was in is a really nice area, almost like a park. Everything was really close together and pretty! The gallery itself was super small, I nearly walked past it! It had a windowed front and a small door to the side. I called Michele and she let me in and I started to bond with the models right away ♥ I met Selina! I had admired her craftiness from tumblr! I was so happy to discover that some of the models had tumblrs.
It was sort of weird to see Tavuchi and Eri together working hard and bustling around! It was sort of unreal! Right away we went downstairs for some more room and started working on our routine, which was totally simple and fun! I loved the music they had playing, it was by Hazel Nuts Chocolate! All ten of us models were paired up into themes. Sydney and I were the pop idols! There were also cheerleaders, candy girls, bubble girls, and unicorn girls!
We spent most of the day not practicing the routine but actually coordinating hair, makeup and fitting. We had a lot of spare time to get to know one another and browse the gallery. I took pictures of all of my favorite pieces! If you want to view photographs taken by Sweet Streets check out their facebook here
I'm trying to take a candid picture but Tavuchi has camera senses! (o´ω｀o)
Getting my hair done by the legendary hair team, [a]narchy!!
Me right after hair and makeup, but before fitting! In complete shock!
My outfit for the fashion show!! You should have seen Tavuchi's eyes light up when she saw my reeboks, she hadn't seen them before! I asked her if she collects reeboks and she giggled and said yes!
I was ready before most of the other girls so this is when I had the time to wander around. I asked if I could take pictures of the shop and poke around and they said OK! I was able to see the prices of everything and formulate my shopping strategy ufufufu. If you want to see the photos of the shop you can see them here!
Downtime! Waiting to have a final dress rehearsal and shopping!
We had a little thank you ceremony to get us pumped up, all of the models received a special bag with a tote bag, a pair of tights, a couple of badges, and a chubby bunny bow! For freeeeeee! ノ◕ヮ◕ ノ ・゚✧
The make up and hair artists also received goodies! IDK what they go though. After that it was SHOPPING! The shop was too tiny for all ten of us girls, but we crammed in anyway! I was a girl on a mission and got exactly what I wanted! You can see the post I made with all my purchases here
An FYI, a lot of the clothing was pretty reasonable! I had been looking at the yen amounts on the webshop and certain items that should have gone for $160 went for $75, I got the ice cream dress for $40. Certain items were more than others due to their hand made, one of a kind nature. I didn't know this, but the store is still open at the gallery until December 25th! Also you can buy certain chubby bunny accessories at her webstore at http://iamchubbybunny.com/
I was one of the first people to make a purchase and in my euphoria I struck up a conversation with Tavuchi, who was so grateful to me for buying a lot! I asked her if she would ship internationally and she said no (╯︵╰,) I was also asking her about the hand painted shirts, and she said Maga paints them! I then mentioned how cute I thought the bear baby suit for her baby girl was and Tavuchi was like, "you read our blogs? Thank you so much!!" Aw man I read all the blogs!
So after everyone was done shopping we had one more dress rehearsal and some of my friends were already lining up outside looking in through the glass! They got a little preshow! (I'm looking at you Claudia!) After that we had to rush upstairs and wait for a whole hour! We all got pretty nervous!
Group Photo!!
We ended up doing the fashion show a little after 8 pm. When it was my turn to come out, I saw so many friendly faces smiling at me that I totally lost count! I still did a good job though, even if I was nervous! Unfortunately, MOST of the attendees had to wait outside and it was RAINING! So during our "bow" we marched outside, single file to go take pictures with everyone.
Taken by LA Weekly
We went back inside, had sort of a de-briefing session and some drinks and went to the party! There were so many of my friends who came to support me, I was so happy! ;~; The line for the shop was pretty crazy, but they were only letting a few in at a time. The night just flew by! Before I knew it the party was over and I had to go put on my street clothes!
I went looking for a bottle of water and managed to corner Shojono Tomo and took a picture with her! She seriously has the most beautiful mind and the most vivid imagination, which you can see in her artwork! She said she liked my nails because purple is her “lucky color” she was so sweet!
After this point I was pretty beat! After running around for twelve hours straight I wanted to sleep! The party was winding down and a lot of us went to a bar. It only had beer and wine though, I'm sure I would have just fallen asleep if I had drank anything! I sat across from Shojono Tomo and she was so cute! She was playing with alanna-lioness's popples bag and inventing stories for him
After that I drove back to itskelp's and fell asleep!! (After brushing out my hair and washing my face of course!)
The next day I just hung out with her and her family ♥ Her mom made me bacon, toast and eggs (YAY I'm off the diet!) Itskelp also gave me the entire Sailor Moon manga series because she now has the re-released version in Japanese! And a Kamikaze Girls poster, which I now display proudly in my room! Thank you so much!!
Click to viewThe video of the fashion show, courtesy of Twinkie-Chan!
If you read all that... I am amazed! I need to get to bed, I spent too long writing all this out!
