Edinburgh Festivals: week three!

Week three of the Edinburgh Festivals is over, and it's been a surprisingly quiet one for me. I've got LOADS on this week (am out every night this week, ahh), so it was nice to chill and actually eat dinner that required a knife AND fork. Who'd have thought plates were a luxury?

Anyway, I still had fun and saw a few things! Here's what it was like for me (you can catch up on week one and week two here).

THE GOOD

• Hot Dub Time Machine: If you can get yourself a ticket you HAVE to go! I had such ridiculously high hopes for Hot Dub, and it did not disappoint at all! You go on a musical journey from 1954 to the present day, and it's just so much fun! It's also quite surreal dancing in the McEwan Hall - a beautiful and very, very grand building that I did loads of exams and graduated in!  
• Pajama Men: I'm a huge fan of the Pajama Men, and was super excited to see their show (although it was tinged with the pressure of recommending them to 35 workpals, who all came along). They are a bit surreal, a bit daft, and it might take you a minute to work out what is actually happening in the show, but they are SO likeable and very much worth seeing. 
• James Kakalios: Possibly one of my very favourite events I've been to this month! James Kakalios is a very hilarious, super lovely physics professor that uses comic book superheroes to illustrate physics theory. We learned about why lasers are AWESOME, how comic books use real science quite a lot of the time, and that physics professors are all gifted pipes after 25 years of research (ahem, probably true). 
• Sleep: Sometimes during the festival, sleeping is cheating. But other times it's actually AMAZING to be in bed by 11pm. Does this mean I'm turning into a grown up?

THE ALRIGHT

• Beardyman: Without a doubt, Beardyman is very, very talented and incredible at what he does (which is beatboxing and using live looping technology to build up really amazing tracks). It is amazing. It's really impressive. But after about half an hour, I got a bit bored? I also felt very old as I didn't know what trap music was. Still, worth seeing if you fancy something different & are more appreciative than I of awesome sounds!

THE UGLY

• Grump: I've lost that initial festival shine of "Welcome tourists! Enjoy my fine city!", and now feel a bit tired, cross and scowly whenever anyone stops immediately in front of me, walks slowly and takes up the whole pavement, can't obey proper queue etiquette, doesn't immediately understand how buses work. Sorry tourists. I like you really.  

Lion girl painting

Sometimes inspiration strikes from the most unexpected places. I've got another painting on the go at the moment (the next person in my illustrated blogger series), but when I heard - wait for it - the new Katy Perry song, it got me thinking.

I'd fancied doing a follow up to my fox girl painting for a while now, and so when I heard the chorus ("louder than a lion") a super-cool, fierce lion girl appeared in my head and wouldn't go away. 

& here she is! It's the first time that I've illustrated a painting with lyrics too - I have really weird handwriting (I don't join up my letters, so annoyingly I've never learned how to do pretty, swooping writing), so I was a bit apprehensive about writing on it and ruining it. I think it works though!

While I was painting I took photos along the way and posted them on my instagram feed (you can follow me @eversojuliet if you like!). I follow a few arty folk and I really like when they post in-progress photos, I think it's really interesting to see how things come together - so hopefully you all agree, and it's not spammy!

I actually find it really helpful to take photos of things when I paint - it helps you distance yourself from what you're working on, and it makes it easier to spot when things are going wrong!

Overall with this painting I was trying really hard to keep it soft and a bit more natural than my usual style. A very talented pal of mine gave me some very good painting advice (mainly to try and not be so heavy handed!), and so I've really tried to take this on board.

Roooooar!

bebaroque

I think I've finally got to admit defeat and come to terms with the fact I've lost my very favourite, very loved pair of bebaroque tights. I lucked upon them in an Urban Outfitters sale a few years ago, thought that they were perhaps a ridiculous price for one pair of tights, but decided that I liked ridiculous things and bought them anyway.

They looked like this this, I got complimented on them whenever I wore them out (which I did, so frequently that a few people thought I'd actually got my leg tattoed), and they seem to now be out of stock everywhere. Sob.

So maybe it's time to give up the search and buy another pair?

Natalia heart tight | Betty legging | Lexie lux tight

bebaroque was set up in 2007 by two graduates from Glasgow School of Art, Mhairi McNicol and Chloe Patience (what a lovely name!). Combining their skills of hand embroidery and drawing, bebaroque was born, producing beautiful tights, leggings and body wear.

They are beautiful, but they aren't cheap (not a surprise really, considering they are still hand embroidered and printed in Scotland). Tights start at around £40 going up to £150 (eek), and for body wear you could spend well over £600 on a dress (eeeek). But the tights are amazing quality (my tights - RIP - were in brilliant nick, even after many, many, many washes!) and I think they are absolutely worth it.

So. A new pair (I'm thinking the Natalia heart tights above) are going firmly on my wishlist. I want hearts on my knees!

Edinburgh Festivals: week two!

Okay, week two of the Edinburgh Festivals has been and gone. We've reached the point in the month when posters are covered in snippets of reviews, flyerers are getting a slightly glazed, desperate look in their eye, and locals are getting a wee bit fed up of the whole thing, and wondering when it'll end. 

I am still very much in my happy place though (hooray), and despite being on the verge of a summer cold, I've had a really brilliant week, filled with some of my very favourite people.

Here's what week two was like for me! (Week one can be read here). 

THE GOOD

• Seann Walsh: I wasn't sure what to expect from Seann Walsh. I like that he looks like a lion (that's a valid reason for liking someone, yeah?), but I hadn't heard anything about him except that he was popular with students. Is that a good thing? A bit weird? Turns out it's good! He tells very funny stories about being a bit lazy and a bit rubbish at being an adult, and the last ten minutes of his set had everyone in fits of laughter (including him). Fun! 
• Puppet Up!: It's the muppets, but not like you've seen them before. They are a wee bit mucky, the sketches are a bit ridiculous (it's improv, so you can probably imagine the suggestions), but it's really fascinating seeing the puppeteers at work! Tickets are £25 so it's one of the pricier shows on the fringe, but they do pick someone from the audience to be a puppeteer, which is pretty cool. 
• Iain Stirling: I have such a soft spot for Iain Stirling, he is just so very likeable. He didn't have the easiest set... there was a powercut five minutes in, meaning we got kicked out & he had to restart the show (with a sweet offer to give people a heads up before the end so they wouldn't miss later shows), & various phones rang or spontaneously played music, interrupting the set. Despite this, he was lovely and funny, and didn't seem phased at all. 
• Book Festival: My very favourite festival (shh, don't tell the others) has started! I started the first day of edbookfest watching the very wonderful Patrick Ness, who is funny and witty and very inspirational. Twelve hours later I was back in Charlotte Square Gardens for their opening party, where we celebrated books with gin, music and making shadow shapes across the lawn. 
• Late n Live: How many times do I need to say? Buy a ticket, have a disco nap beforehand, and don't be scared if you have to sit in the front row (we did, and survived!).

THE ALRIGHT

• David O'Doherty: I am a big fan of D O'D, nobody can sing slightly awkward songs on a slightly too small keyboard like he can! This was the happiest he's ever looked performing, he was obviously having a great time (and he's been selling out this festival, so you can't blame him), but it felt like it knocked the edge off a little. If you haven't seen him before, definitely go! If you have, it might be a little weaker than previous years...
• Festival food: Oh festival food. Why are you always so unreliable? Gold Star Award goes to Assembly Festival for their amazing food stands in George Square Gardens (loads of veggie-friendly options, huge portions, and quick service) and Total Baddie Prize goes to the Book Festival for charging me three pounds for a bacon roll that contained half a piece of bacon. Sob.

THE UGLY

• Reviews: I'm a sucker for festival politics, and this has been an entertaining week! The Evening News announced that five star review systems (aka what every reviewer in the world uses) were too complicated for readers... and seven stars were the way to go. The List then went one better, with seventeen stars (this made me almost cry with laughter when I saw it). Obviously The List are joking, but weirdly the EN aren't! It's all a bit bonkers. I think star ratings should be taken with a pinch of salt, but if you want to use them to guide you then this top rated page (which compares reviews from loads of publications) is the way to go. 

Hendrick's Carnival of Knowledge

Do you like gin? Curiosities? Peculiar events?

Well, if so, Hendrick's Carnival of Knowledge is for you. Pop-up venues are two a penny in Edinburgh over August, but this is one with a difference. Hendrick's have taken over a very fancy boutique hotel, One Royal Circus, which sits just off the lovely streets of Stockbridge, creating a place to celebrate the unusual and curious.

When you walk in it first feels like you've somehow been given an invitation to a very quirky and exclusive supper party - you are greeted by dapper gents (most with moustaches of course) and invited to "Open your mind and step inside".

Downstairs there's the Parlour Bar, a small space that feels like the very best type of library (one with a bar and very intelligent conversation, obviously). It's free to get into, although I imagine it'll get busy very quickly once the secret gets out!

Upstairs there's a variety of events - many of which have already sold out, but there's still tickets left for A Genteel Tipple Through Gin in Literature, Grim Tales from the Brothers Grimm, and the Menagerie of Creepy Crawlies and Vegetable Animals, which all sound fantastic.

I have to admit that I am a sucker for anything that's a bit quirky and delightful, and makes me feel like I've somehow stumbled into the staff room at Hogwarts. On arrival you are handed a copy of a paper called the "Unusual Times" which is full of stories of magic and science and curiosities, alongside an events guide and cocktail menu. The attention to detail is just SO spot on - it's just so easy to get lost in their wondrous world (and spend a small fortune on cocktails).

I would very much like to live here, and it was pretty easy to get carried away & imagine what my new gin-centric life would be like. Personally I would insist on swanning around like an heiress in a country manor - dressing only in ballgowns and diamonds, or tea dresses layered with vintage-looking knitwear (like perhaps this one from Fat Face), and absolutely no jeans in sight.

Alas, I did eventually have to return to the real world, but I plan to be back. The Hendrick's Carnival of Knowledge is only open until August 11th, so you have THREE DAYS Edinburgh people to get along and get delightfully lost too.

If you can't get to Edinburgh in time, never fear... the wonderful gin celebration of curiosities will be in London in October for London Cocktail Week (watch this space...).

Disclaimer: This post contains a sponsored Fat Face link. I really, really, really fell in love with the venue and would definitely like to live there (um, when can I move in?).