Fashion – Page 48 – L'ensemble du jour

November 15, 2017 – Notre Rain (OOTD #160)

Published on November 20, 2017November 20, 2017 by lensembledujour2 Comments

You know, my photographer made a very valid point as she was taking these photos – this is a very discordant outfit.

I’ve got the rainbow raincoat and yellow rain boots, but also a plaid scarf, and sunglasses. What am I dressed for? The rain, the cold, or the sun?

The rain and the cold are actually completely accurate answers – it was very rainy and drizzly that day. But in late November in South Bend, IN, what day isn’t rainy and drizzly? Who can escape the permacloud of the Northern Midwest?

In fairness, the sunglasses are only there to conceal the fact that I’m not wearing any eye makeup here. Let’s just say it’s quite obvious without sunglasses how much of a sleep-deprived college student I am.

Not to mention, I’ve got my short grey hair, which I’ve already discussed looks kind of strange with preppier pieces, like rainbow raincoats and plaid blanket scarf. I also wore my black gauge-like earrings, just to confuse people even more.

I like to keep people guessing with my outfit, but I don’t necessarily want them to be scratching their heads either. I personally feel like this outfit’s a little closer to that “head-scratching” territory than I would’ve liked, but you know – you win some, and you lose some. I do really like the colors going on here, regardless.

Just because the sky and the weather is going to be dreary and grey, that doesn’t mean my outfit has to be as well. I mean, part of it, sure – my hair, my earrings, and my personality will always be there to bring the melancholy – but some part of me gets to be cheery. Or at the very least, look that way.

Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my life here at Notre Dame. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Coat: Target

Pants: The LOFT

Scarf: Chinatown

Sweater: Kohl’s

November 14, 2017 – Cherry Blossoms (OOTD #159)

Published on November 20, 2017 by lensembledujour3 Comments

Happy 8PM on a Sunday night, I’m presently standing in the basement of a building I didn’t know existed, typing this blog on my phone because I forgot to do it earlier, and waiting in line for food.

It’s pretty nice, actually – my residence hall has a “Friendsgiving” event, where all the residents, freshmen through seniors, come together with dishes they’ve prepared to celebrate Thanksgiving.

What’s not as nice is that, as a freshman, I get last pick of the food.

I mean, I can’t really complain, because I know I’ll eventually be a senior and get first pick, but I’m pretty hungry and lines are not the friend of a hungry Meilin. I hope there’s still plenty of food left by the time I make it up there – there’s a shrimp dish that looks particularly good, and I’d be a little more than hurt if I didn’t at least get to taste some of it.

Since coming to college, I’ve gotten really spoiled with being able to eat pretty much whenever I want to without waiting, assuming I go to the dining hall at a decent time (there are certain periods that are busy where’s you do have to wait in lines). The whole “waiting for food to cook” notion isn’t something I’ve come across for a while.

Regardless of how long into the afternoon I’ll have to wait before dinner is served, I’m still very excited for Thanksgiving! The food they’ve got for us for Howard Friendsgiving looks good, but it’s nothing compared to my mother’s cooking.

For that matter, it’s nothing compared to my or my grandmother’s cooking, as we both contribute pretty fairly to the Thanksgiving meal. My dad on the other hand…he does a nice job setting the table and turning on the grill.

November 13, 2017 – Citrusy (OOTD #158)

Published on November 17, 2017February 14, 2018 by lensembledujour6 Comments

Sorry for the late blog today; I’ve been kind of distracted watching an animal documentary about robotic animals that were used to film wildlife social interactions up close.

It’s really fascinating, actually – both for the sake of the technology that must have had to go into these robots to make them realistic enough to blend in in wildlife, and for the sake of the relationships that they’re able to film. I’d highly recommend you check it out, at least the first episode – it’s just the right amount of cute and informative to be wholesome without being sappy.

I remember as a kid, when the first Planet Earth films came out. My dad asked for the box set for Christmas, and I distinctly remember, because of how novel the concept of Internet shopping was to me back then, that my mother had to order it online for him. We sat down that Christmas night to watch the first episode – one that I got to select actually, “Caves,” – and we were all pretty impressed with what we saw. I was a kid and didn’t really care about or understand the years of filming and editing that had to have gone into the making of that series, but I remember enjoying it anyway. The music was a bit loud though.

And I still do. I haven’t gotten around to watching the sequel yet, Planet Earth 2, but I really want to. Maybe I should order the boxed DVD set on the brand new and completely novel concept of the Internet.

Admittedly, nature documentaries have little to do with today’s outfit blog, unless you’d like to think of this blog as something of a nature documentary – it is, after all, a bunch of photographs of a human going about her daily life and engaging in social interactions. Now that would be a clever transition from discussing Planet Earth to discussing fashion, wouldn’t it?

Actually, there’s not a lot to say about Monday’s outfit, other than that I thought the colors were tropical and citrusy, like that of a mango. Not that the weather in South Bend is anything tropical right now – it’s already getting down into the 30s and feelings like winter.

There is some nice color in the trees though. If you forget the cold and look at a tree while squinting your eyes, you can pretend you’re on a tropical island looking at the sunset.

Coat: Vintage (thrifted)

Sweater: Forever21 (thrifted)

November 10, 2017 – Oops, I Did It Again (OOTD #157)

Published on November 16, 2017 by lensembledujour5 Comments

No, that blog title does not have anything to do with the fact that I’m wearing denim on denim, like something out of a music video with 90s Britney Spears in it.

(Besides, if I were ever to title a blog “Oops, I did it again” with the purpose of referencing 90s Britney Spears fashion, I’d have to be wearing all red or something)

No, my reference has to do more with the concept of making a mistake, rather than anything fashion-related! You see, I posted the outfit from Sunday, November 12, in which I looked like a dementor yesterday, not realizing that I had neglected to post about November 10!

So once more, my blog’s continuity is interrupted in a brief blip in the chronological timeline – this time, though, without me even realizing it until after the fact. In my defense, I usually decide which blog to post based on the photos I have stored on my phone, as, even with the photos I take on my camera, I can just upload them to my computer and then Airdrop them to my phone. So, yesterday, when I sat down to write my blog and I checked my photo albums on my phone, my Sunday November 12 photos popped up, as I had taken them with my camera phone, while my Friday November 10 photos did not, as they were still stored on my camera.

That’s not really a good excuse, but are there any of those?

Anyway, I haven’t really got a lot to say about this outfit at all: just that I really wish I had rolled up my pant legs one more time so that my boyfriend jeans didn’t just swallow up my boots and make it look like I have tree trunks for legs. Also kinda wish the exposure wasn’t so bad in some of these photos, that I hadn’t messed up the order of my blogs, and that I had started working on my history paper earlier this week, but such is the nature of mistakes.

For example, the Meilin of November 10 made the mistake of believing that Notre Dame was going to the playoffs, and she turned out to be proved horrifically wrong just the next day.

Top: Target

Jeans: American Eagle

November 12, 2017 – Dementor Style (OOTD #156)

Published on November 14, 2017 by lensembledujour4 Comments

Alternative title: fashion for mourning Notre Dame’s playoff hopes and dreams.

You know how I wrote a blog yesterday about enjoying switching up my style from day to day, going from goth teenager to preppy Cher Horowitz wannabe – yeah, I went back to the goth teenager phase.

I’ve always wanted to look like an impending vaporous phantom of dark soul-sucking depression, and on Sunday, I did!

For real though, that Saturday game against Miami was an unfortunate display. I made it to the third quarter before I gave up and curled into a ball sobbing – I didn’t even do any homework that night, just fell asleep feeling sorry I ever hoped we could win another National Championship.

Granted, I often neglect to do my homework, regardless of Notre Dame’s winning-losing history. Like right now, when I’m watching YouTube videos and writing a blog instead of writing my history paper or memorizing the work of Arius or Athanasius.

It’s a hard life, getting distracted so easily and then leaving all of your work to the last second, but I make do. It’s nearly Thanksgiving break, meaning if I can manage to wing it for another week, I can reward myself by eating copious amounts of turkey and mashed potatoes.

Shawl: Unknown (thrifted)

Turtleneck: The LOFT (thrifted)

November 9, 2017 – Cher Horowitz Wannabe (OOTD #155)

Published on November 13, 2017January 15, 2018 by lensembledujour11 Comments

I actually haven’t seen Clueless since I was 11, so I can’t exactly discuss that movie in this blog, but I felt like this outfit was definitely a Cher Horowitz aesthetic anyway…so I hope you enjoy the title, at the very least.

I love to be unexpected with my fashion choices, and that includes going with vastly different styles on different days. So, if you have a look at November 8’s blog, you’ll notice that I dressed in a completely different manner than I did on November 9 – notably, yesterday, I looked like a emo teenager, and today, I look like a preppy 90s it girl.

This is actually one of my favorite outfits I’ve done for a while – I dunno, I’m just a sucker for long coats and short skirts. Plus, the color palette is just nice and pastel…it makes me look much more put-together and chipper than I actually am, which is great when you’re a tired college student who wants to look friendly and approachable so people will talk to her.

Actually, this “coat” isn’t really a coat at all – it’s a wrap dress that I left unbuttoned. So basically, you should put me on the unconventional materials challenge of Project Runway right now; I’m too creative and innovative for this world.

The one bad thing about my short grey hair is that it doesn’t really work so well anymore with my preppier outfits, like this one. It looks spectacular with anything hipster-like, but it just looks a little off with things like mauve tweed skirts. My grey hair is like a constant, conspicuous mark of my self-proclaimed alternativeness – unlike my long blonde hair, which pretty much went with everything. I do rather miss it, but sadly, it was just too hard to maintain and it was really looking awful there at the end. Maybe I’ll go back to it one day.

Dress/coat: NastyGal

Top: Free People

Skirt: Forever21

November 8, 2017 – Edgy Teen Aesthetic (OOTD #154)

Published on November 12, 2017November 12, 2017 by lensembledujour8 Comments

Get you a photographer you points out that one of your socks isn’t pulled up all the way before she starts taking photos.

Seriously, I owe so much to the spectacular people who have agreed to take my photos after lunch every day. I don’t know if they really do it because they want to…but they never complain and don’t look too judgmental when I inevitably ask “Hey, so uh…could you do my pictures today?” so for that, I’m eternally grateful.

You know what else I’m eternally grateful for? Finally being over with my edgy teen years.

What…you mean to say that my outfit still looks I’m a 16 year-old with a My Chemical Romance obsession?

Though my days of exclusively listening to the Emo Trinity and obsessively waiting for new tweets from Gerard Way are over, I’ve kept some of the stylistic influences from the era. That includes my grey hair, which is totally not at all hearkening back to 2006 Gerard Way.

That also includes a taste for black clothes and anything that looks vaguely punk! While I can hardly claim to be a true punk – have you seen the effort that icons like Vivienne Westwood put into their looks? – I like to wear things that have a punk influence.

After all, I am only 19, meaning that I only have one year left during which I can blame my pessimism on teen angst – might as well dress like it.

Sweater: Forever21 (thrift)

Skirt: Target

November 7, 2017 – RIP My Theology Grade (#153)

Published on November 11, 2017November 11, 2017 by lensembledujourLeave a comment

Alright, so context: at Notre Dame, there’s this superstition that if you walk on the grass of God Quad, you’ll fail your freshman theology class.

What’s God Quad? It’s this area of grass in the middle of campus, right in front of the Golden Dome and the Basilica. It’s a bit sketchy about what the exact boundaries are, some people (but not all) posit that the rule doesn’t apply on game Saturdays, and no one really knows if the rule still applies to theology grades beyond your freshman year. Still, though the rules regarding the rule are kind of hazy, the fact still stands that there is a rule that no one – not students, not professors, not even visitors – step on the God Quad grass.

So naturally, I just had to go romping all around God Quad for this set of photos.

In my defense, I never really intended to step on the grass; my photographer actually did it first. I felt sort of badly about what happened – so I was standing there on the sidewalk, posing stupidly as I do, and, in order to get a better shot, she stepped back onto the forbidden God Quad grass.

I believe I actually shouted a bit in shock when her foot landed upon the ground, I was that shaken that she was willing to break social convention for me. And so, I figured that if she was going to break the God Quad rule, I ought to do it with her – a sort of solidarity in rebellion, you know?

Ah yes, the rebellion of being a college kid at a prestigious Catholic university walking on the grass…put me up there with Che Guevara and George Washington. I’m headed for the history books, guys. Remember my name.

Sweater: H&M

Scarf: Coach

Pants: The LOFT

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November 6, 2017 – Hug A Tree (OOTD #152)

Published on November 9, 2017 by lensembledujour9 Comments

Recently, I’ve taken to doing my pictures next to trees – what do you think?

I feel like it gives a little more color than what I get with my typical “doorway” photo, so I’m giving it a shot.

(Get it? Giving it a shot? Since it’s like…a photograph….and you shoot photos…)

Also, fun fact – this was not the blog I was originally going to be posting today. Rather, this should have been a post for November 4, the day of the ND v Wake Forest game. So what kind of stupid mistake did I make this time to prevent my plans from turning out as they should?

I’m not certain that it was wholly my fault, actually. Okay, so the photos were taken by my friend, so she had to Airdrop them to me – no problem, right? It shouldn’t have been. But for some reason, after the photos were delivered to my computer, they were unable to be imported into my iPhoto library. And, by the time I realized this fact, my friend had already deleted the photos from her phone, and thus, their lines of code were lost forever.

It’s too bad really, because that would’ve been a good blog. In fact, I even had a “super clever” blog title in mind – Notre Rain, in reference to how it rained the whole time during that game, and it was actually just kind of cold and miserable.

If I somehow come across the photos in some deeply hidden folder in the corner of my computer’s hard drive, maybe I’ll post them, our for now, here’s my outfit from Monday.

Turtleneck: Forever21

Dress: American Eagle

November 3, 2017 – In Which Dental Hygiene Is My Aesthetic: Bianco Smile Whitening Powder Review (and OOTD #151)

Published on November 9, 2017November 9, 2017 by lensembledujour2 Comments

Today’s post will be a little different than usual – in addition to my typical OOTD discussion and sarcastic humor, I’ve got a review for you too!

The lovely folks at Bianco Smile were kind enough to send me a package with their Activated Charcoal Whitening Powder to try and review, and I was just so excited about the fact that someone on the Internet noticed me, that I couldn’t say no. Admittedly, I’m no teeth expert – in fact, the last time I went to the dentist, I got rather passionately criticized for not flossing. But I suppose that’s why there’s a several billion dollar dental hygiene industry out there – because idiots like me don’t care for their teeth like they ought to, and then need to buy things to try to fix them.

The product came packaged in a cute little black box with the instructions labeled on all four sides – 1)Dip ya brush, 2) Scrub ’em, 3) (Smile). I rather a fan of the simple, all-black look; it was very fashionable, like something I wouldn’t mind having sat out on my bathroom counter.

As the instructions suggest, powder itself is actually rather simple to use – simply dip your wet brush into the powder, and then scrub your teeth just as you would with toothpaste. And indeed, the experience was rather like just brushing my teeth as I would any regular day, the primary difference being the texture of the powder (for lack of a better word – powdery), and how I looked when using the product.

To be honest, you’re probably not going to look pretty while brushing your teeth – in fact, you’ll probably look like you’ve just eaten a bunch of blueberries and now their guts have coated your teeth – but that’s alright, because you’ll look pretty afterwards.

I’ve compiled here some photos of my teeth over the last few days using the product:

Day 1:

Day 2:

Day 3:

The verdict: I rather liked this product! I really don’t know anything about charcoal whitening powders, so I can’t compare it to any other similar products, but for my first experience using a whitening charcoal powder, it was overall quite positive.

Perhaps I’m just seeing things, and perhaps it’s simply the result of wearing red lipstick in the final photo (which does tend to make your teeth look whiter), but I do believe my teeth looked a touch whiter after a few days of using the product. I definitely think I will continue to use it – maybe not every day, but perhaps in rotation with my regular toothpaste.

My only complaint is that it’s not exactly the cleanest product ever – there was definitely some black powder left over on the sink after I was done brushing, but it was super easy to wipe up and left no stain.

You can check out the product over on Bianco Smile’s website here, if it looks like something you might be interested in purchasing. Use code MEILIN20 for 20% off at checkout!

Jacket: Vintage (thrifted)

Dress: Pitaya