Hello my friends! Happy December! On Instagram, I asked you guys if you would like to see more of my new office on the blog and the answer was YES. That's why, before publishing my long awaited Los Angeles story, I decided to share these news with you. No, I don't have a new job, I'm still independent:))) but I have moved and am now the proud owner of a new bueautiful home office, completely designed by MEEEE!
Read MoreFood For Your Senses, our open-air music festival in Luxembourg is definitely a Summer highlight for the youth! Good vibes, nice creative corners, yummy food. We left early but didn't miss the golden hour, my favourite moment of the day. Enjoy my impressions x
Read MoreBLOOM. I discovered the place more than a week ago when it was still closed. There was someone inside so I knocked on the door and gave my business card to the guy asking, him to call me when they're opening.
Read MoreChasing music, mood an fashion elements. 🐱🤘
Rock-a-Field is one my favourite events in Luxembourg. I'm always excited to be here and document this Summer party. This year, I couldn't come on Saturday because of a wedding but on Sunday (yesterday), I gave 100%. I didn't know any of the bands that were playing so I was curious to discover new music and I left really satisfied. My favourite bands of the year have been...
Read MoreThis month I made two very cute and fresh discoveries, both in pastel tones and very Spring welcoming.
First, I want to introduce you the new Njörd cafeteria in Luxembourg City, located in the MNHA museum. The Scandinavian looking place offers all kinds of drinks and healthy ready to go lunch menus. The interior is so pretty.. pure, minimal design. I love the clean wooden furniture, the lamps and the big windows that offer great natural light, the plants, everything. And the service is good too. Very gentle and polite guys will serve you. Here some visuals.
Read MoreMy personal TOP 10 must go / wear / have / do's of the month.
Autumn is definitely made for cozy warm clothes and coffee. I added other stuff I fell for during the last days.. Let me inspire you! Any other spot or thing I missed? Let me know below <3. The addresses I mention here are from Brussels, next article will be more Luxembourgish. I currently enjoy my last months of studies in Brussels so I go to my favourite places all the time...
My Be Pop. A new liiiitle concept store on the Rollebeek street in Brussels. I saw it and thought OMG, I need to write a November essentials article. This is exactly the kind of stuff I like to discover. Homemade popcorn served by a lovely madame in a cute cone (or box). I tried the salted caramel butter popcorn... love love love.
Red. I'm in love with everything red this Autmun. I tried my first permanent nail polish (not that happy, anyone has a good address for that shit in Luxembourg or Brussels???) But back to my crush - the Estée Lauder 340 lipstick. Must-have for matte, deep red lips. There was this Sephora private selling day with 25% on the whole shop.. you understand! So here I also finally bought the new Naked palette - Smoky (amazing stuff) and the Too Faced mini beauty kit, the NARS bloody red nailpolish and a eyebrow brush by Urban Decay. Yes, I bought two the Naked palettes because one for me, one for my twin for Christmas, but too late, I couldn't resist and already reached her my November-twin-present.
Jat' Café on the Rue de Namur street close to the Royal Palace of Brussels. A big space for students, business men, lovers, singles... to enjoy great coffee and the BEST cupakes ever. You should take the vanilla one or with peanut butter, they're the best. My combi: ice coffee or chai frappé + cupcake. Then sitting down for hours or after some shopping at the & Other Stories (if you contiunue the street towards the Toison D'Or street where is also located the huge Zara and Apple store).
So after a coffee break at Jat', I continue my happy moment in this area of the Toison d'Or. Here, my favourite shop of the moment - & Other Stories. Precisely in this shop I fell for the wool plaid scarf, their funny packaged cosmetics (lovely little gift for a girl) and the cashmere camel pullover. Above: Pulli // Below: Scarf <3.
Pumpkins. Very Important for me. Eeating soup made of them, craving, exposing, watching. Muhaha I love Halloween so mine lasts for a month or more. :D
Pochette de Janette - November edition. Products to care about your skin on cold days.. Get yours here. It's always a pleasure to unpack a surprise isn't it? Favourite item of this edition: the discret armcandy by Artistic Bracelet.
Yuka Espresso Bar. My must go to enjoy two hobbies: hot chocolate and blog. Basta. And tea. And cake. and coffe. Oh and it's located on the boulevard Anspach in Bxl. The barista is very polite, you feel at home when passing by.
It may get cold outside but for short trips for a house chillax party or girls coffee break - my must wear: The ripped April 77 jeans (with a plectrum hidden in a pocket!!) and the mint Gazelle Adidasies. I love to combine the look with my mint Marc Jacobs bag and the scarf mentioned above.
Restons Zen. A café, lunch room on the boulevard Anspach in Brussels as well. For me a Moroccan hipster place and I love it. I come for lunch, for cake but especially for the traditionally served Moroccan mint tea.
Last but not least - WOODS! Nature, the LAST leaves of the year! I love to collect leaves that in one or another way please me and I often ask myself why I took one leaf and not another.. Enjoy the last colours of 2015 before letting Winter swallow all this prettiness! My must-do.
Dudelange On Wheels is an urban sport event held every Summer in Dudelange, Luxembourg. Several contests are organized (skateboard, streetboard, inlineskates, bmx..) during the whole weekend. Beside the sport - live music, food and drinks bring the youth together to celebrate a sporty, sunny moment. We came on Saturday and had a good time. I used to be an inlineskater for many years, spending every afternoon on the halfpipe with my skater friends. Kinda miss those fearless times. Enjoy the story. Yes, the ginger head is me trying to look like a skatergirl again. Kisses.
The streetboarders I shot: Sergi Nicolas, Bernat Pomerol, Gabriel Arguelles, Max Anderson, Gabi Munoz and Eduard Wojcik.
Rock-A-Field, the biggest open air festival of Luxembourg welcomes every year since 2002 thousands of music and Summer fans during the first weekend of July. It's the second time for me to document the festival as official photographer (here the previous edition). I was super excited and it was again, amazing. The shows were great - my favourite ones: Muse, Bastille, Rise Against, Kontra K, Marmozets, Echosmith and Go Go Berlin, Kate Tempest and Mutiny on the Bounty. A big thank you for the lovely crew for being so kind, cheeky, funny and helpful at the same time. Great organization, management and fun. Thumbs up! Enjoy my impressions made during 3 days of awesomeness.
Went to Chocolate House in Luxembourg City for a drink with my blogger friend Sunzibar. Here I unboxed the lastest Pochette de Janette that I found a few days ago in my mail box. The beauty bag provided by Janette Magazine surprised me with lovely goodies that I can't wait to use during this month. Details of my look that day follow below. Enjoy!
My stylish friend Sun has a good taste for fashion. She should give fashion lessons or someting..
Unpacking time !
This month, the beauty bag includes a lovely packaged Maniderm hands and nails cream, a dry shampoo for lazy mornings, a tea set of two Tea Forté bags from my friend Tea and more. More about this special tea experience at the end of the article!
Also in this edition.. a purple eye-shadow by Maria Galland.. nice colour!
And a Pizza Hut dinner for two! I'm more into fresh and healthy food but I won't say no to an occasional XXL pizza.. Very cute invitation.
Last but not least..My favourite item of the surprise bag - the Apoi ring. It's small and discrete and an eye-catcher at the same time.. The tiny chain with the sparkling stone offers this bohemain spirit to the little piece. It totally goes with my outfit, doesn't it?
Unboxed! The illustration on the Janette bag is as usual very cute. I like the idea to change the print on it for each edition. This one is dedicated to Mother's Day, so you have this cute mummy with her daughter printed on the bag.
Outfit details...
About the outfit: faux suede waistcoat with fringing and combined white crochet tunic + backpack with foldover flap from Zara.
Back home..
At home, I immediately tried the Tea Forté.
The unique characteristic of the tea is the packaging. As you see, it's a pyramid with a little green leaf on the top. It's a lovely present for tea lovers. The other thing is that they have a large collection of teas. The green tea for example exists combined with other flavour such as fruits and herbs. I hope I could inspire you for my little fashion and beauty discoveries...
Yesterday, I baked a gingerbread wonderland with my ladies. The cookies are so tasty. Here's the recipe. The cookie-cutter set is from Maison du Monde, the wooden box from Cinnamon Home. For 6 medium houses and like 50 mini cookies you'll need...
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
6 tablespoons softened butter
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup molasses
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Whisk together flour + baking powder + baking soda + salt + ginger + cinnamon + cloves until well blended.
In an other bowl, beat butter + brown sugar + egg on medium speed until blended, then add molasses + vanilla.
With a mixer on low speed, gradually stir in dry ingredients until blended.
Gather dough with your hands into a ball and divide it in half.
Shape each half into a disk and wrap both halves in plastic. Refrigerate up for 20 minutes. Let dough come to room temperature before using.
Roll the portions but first cover the surface, rolling pin and dough with flour.
Cut out shapes...
Cut out more shapes...
Bake the houses for 7-9 minutes, the mini cookies for 4-5 minutes on parchment paper to 375°. When the cookies are cool, decorate them with food colouring and royal icing.
Readyyyyy. Enoy! Merry Christmas !!
Troc'n'Brol 2014 took place at Carré Rotondes in Luxembourg-City on Thursday the 18th of December. At the end of the year I use to participate to this artistic event. Several local artists expose their latest or oldest work and visitors are invited to barter art for something else than money. It can be an item, a service, a meal, an offered experience... When you're interested in a work, you grab a post-it, write down your offer and stick it on the wall. At the end of the event, the artist chooses the best proposal and the deal is done.
I exposed three big canvas of pictures I took during the Extrabold Circus party. I chose those three ones because they're blurred. This accidental haziness of the clowns makes me think of an illusion, hallucination or a horror movie and that's why I love this trio. It's a form of storytelling, everyone can imagine his own story behind those pictures..
People at the exhibition asked me about the canvas.. Well, I ordered them at Photo Service in Luxembourg-City. The next day they were ready, so super fast work! I need this kind of service as I'm a very last minute person. It may be more expensive than online shops but you have several facilities compared with online systems. If you're not happy with the result, they reprint immediately so you don't need to send it back somewhere and wait a week or more to receive the corrected version. The quality of the canvas is great. It's the first time I print photos on canvas and I love it. The price is about 100€ for a big format.
Here are my DIY (do it yourself) take-away business cards decorated with Christmas stickers and affixed with masking tape! I always enjoy making little souvenirs for visitors.. :)
My twin sister Xenia exposed drawings in a magical, fairytale-like style. It was the first time she participated to this event and she was quiet successful! I love the way she decorated her area!!
The event was very nice. Several friends came over to say hi. I love photographing them while they're exploring art, such serious expressions...xD Many post-its were gone, arrangements settled and lots of meetings and conversations filled the room. The best offer I got for one of my canvas is day in a spa, can't wait for it. More pictures will be published on the Troc'n'Brol facebook page.
Tadaaa! My personal favourites for Christmas 2014. The list starts with a brand-new designer headphone and ends with classic macarons but extra-dressed for this festive period! I love sweets, tea as well as stylish technology newbies. So here we go - Christmas gift ideas 2014 for him and for her, for daddy, auntie or a colleague! I think it's a good mixture of tastes and most of the items are purchasable in Luxembourg-City. Why? Because it's my home town and I want to share with you my favourite corners over here. Each item is linked to its local or online shop! Enjoy and leave me a feedback, I'd love to know if I was helpful to inspire you!
HEADPHONE | Parrot Zik 2.0
This headphone is an innovative designer piece of Philippe Starck. Wireless and ergonomic, it offers several options for a perfect sound, comfort and music control. You can manipulate the volume and tracks through the sensitive panel - demo on the website. It also has a concert hall effect. What I realllllly love is the HD Voice. Instead of letting your smartphone fill your head with dangerous radiance you can enjoy hands-free calls!
ONLINE SHOP | COST: 350€
CANDY BOX | Chocolate House + Cinnamon Home
This set is made of hand-crafted items all available in Luxembourg! It was my own idea to combine them! :D I think the different departments of the box filled with chocolate make the whole thing look like a big surprise full of discoveries! For me it's like holding Christmas in my hands! I'm a big fan of Chocolate House. The place is beautiful and cozy, the staff adorable and the chocolate unique. The home-made spoons are the speciality of the house. You dip them into hot milk and there you are - a perfect hot chocolate in several flavours. I wrote an article about the house some weeks ago, read it here. The other thing that makes this set looking so pretty is the wooden box of Cinnamon home, an online shop based in Luxembourg as well! The box is made by Danish designers and I love its retro look and pleasant smell of wood!
Chocolate House LOCAL SHOP | Cinnamon Home ONLINE SHOP | COST: whole set: 61,65€ (wooden box: 24,90€, normal spoon: 2,70€ & baileys spoon: 3€, the other chocolate bags: about 8€)
HYBRID CAMERA | Olympus Pen EPL-7
This new little elegant mirror-less camera is my personal highlight of the year. It's available in grey and black as well! I wrote a whole review about it that you can read here. I'd say it's a solid present for everyone who loves taking pictures, professionally or not and who is attracted by old-school and retro fashion.
ONLINE SHOP | COST: 500€
TEA BOX | Tee Geschwendner
Tee Geschwendner is a tea shop in Luxembourg-City and when you get in, you hardly go out without tea. I love their big variety of tea! They don't only sell black and green tea, but also several sorts of fruit tea and organic herbal infusions. This Christmas box contains an organic herbal tea, ginger-cinnamon-anise honey, a spoon and a bonbon. The packaging is very festive and the content not only tasty but also healthy for this cold season! There are different boxes in the shop!
LOCAL SHOP or ONLINE SHOP | COST: 13.50€
BEAUTY BAG | Janette
The pochette de Janette - a local newbie in Luxembourg. I love the way the Janette team chooses the ingredients for their subscription bags, you'll always find items out of the mass market so this month be ready for fashion and beauty discoveries like temporary tattoos, Aztec like necklaces and handmade soaps! My personal highlight of the month - the Max Mara scarf!
ONLINE SHOP | COST: 18.50€ for Luxembourg, 23€ for Belgium, France and Germany.
MACARON GIFTBOX | La Durée
I love the exotic Winter design of the macaron boxes by La Durée. It gives variety to the stereotype symbols of Christmas. Explore the shop for more shapes and sizes. The gingerbread macaron is a must in a Christmas box!
LOCAL SHOP or ONLINE SHOP | COST: 18,50€
This is my first review of my new camera family member - the Olympus Pen EPL-7. Let's start with saying that I'm a proud owner of this little thing. Yes, it's the smallest camera I've ever had and I enjoy it. I don't carry my big fat Nikon D800 everywhere I go because it's just too big for my bags and too heavy for my neck. Of course I will never give it up but it's good to enlarge your camera family if you're on the road all the time.
This sexy hybrid (mirror-less camera with interchangeable lenses) is becoming my constant companion. I fell in love with it when I saw it. The glossy white matched to the leathered texture, the lens and historical logo makes it look retro, elegant and feminine. Thumbs up for the design! The body is made of metal, you feel the quality when holding the camera. So even if it's small, it has a solid feel, good!
Focus manually! I really like the screen taping tool - at a push, you can save up time to record the perfect moment instead of working automatically when being in a rush. Wifi-control! I The appropriate app enables to transfer my favourite images on my iphone within seconds. From here I can use them for my several editing, social media and blogging apps. It's selfie time! You can flip down the screen a full 180° to make selfies! Isn't it funny? Ok, why should you take a selfie with a camera when you have a smart phone? Well, I don't like the face-fronting camera of my iphone 5s, the quality seems weak to me... I definitely prefer the Olympus.
Here are some snaps I took in Brussels today. What should I say? The photographs come out very sharp, I'm impressed by the fine detail. My lens on this cam is a 14-42 mm. I'm used to a 50 mm and I've always wished to take pictures with a wide-angle so I can enjoy shooting at close range. You can activate the autofocus or control aperture and shutter speed. Of course the pictures are edited - I'm a dreamer, the cameras today are so perfectly mirroring the reality that I need to destroy this real factor with my Photoshop skills as you've probably noticed already. Oh by the way, the camera offers a cool selection of art filters and I recommend them, but I have already my own editing method. Don't forget: a filter can't save your picture - so only use filters when the shot already looks good and you want to add a little extra to it.
19th Of November. Lady Panoplie - a ladies night at the Vins Fins wine bar in the Grund, Luxembourg City. This small bar is interesting because of their organic and biodynamic wine selection. It's quiet small inside but very cozy at the same time due to the decoration and weak lightening. The bar welcomed us with a drink and finger food. You could sit down and let a hairdresser offer you a creative bun hairstyle or check out a some second hand clothes and accessories.. I'm glad I discovered the place through this event. The goodie bag we received at the end was filled with...advertising. Aaargh! Anyway, looking forward to more of such ladies nights...
Nuit Des Lampions 20/09/14 - a big Chinese lantern party in Wiltz, the north of Luxembourg. We felt like entering the dream of Alice in Wonderland. There were small places to relax hidden behind exposed hedges.. People were enjoying music, wine and loudly declaimed poems in a mysterious atmosphere. During your walk through the lights, you came across a hula hoop performer, dreamers relaxing on beds or big bees covering a passage..
One of my favourite local events - the Butschebuerg medieval festival in Dudelange (Luxembourg). The party takes place a whole weekend in the middle of September and merchants, artists, manufacturers from the neighbour countries come together to celebrate the Middle Ages with it's enthusiasts. What I absolutely appreciate is that so many visitors come appropriately disguised! The place is full of entertainment for kids and adults. There's even a wooden carousel ! You can find beautiful handmade jewellery, wooden toys, knitted slippers as well as handcrafted tableware or drink some honey wine out of old school clay mugs, eat apple rings and listen to live medieval music.. I was glad I was invited to document this yearly party.
My last festival of this Summer was Wacken. I go to Wacken every year since 2009. The biggest heavy metal festival in the world is my personal highlight, it's my second home I'd say. The ambiance is peaceful even if you see thousands of people dressed in black. The music is great - Arch Enemy, Amon Amarth, Steel Panther, Skid Row, Children of Bodom, Apocalyptica were the bands I enjoyed the most playing on stage.
But it's not only about music, the whole structure, organization of the festival is awesome. You have this huge Wackinger Village - the medieval part of Wacken. The decoration here is conceived into the smallest details. You feel like entering the Middle Ages. You can play old school games like tug-of-wars or shoot with bow and arrows, dance, fight, smoke shisha, drink mint tea or enjoy Wacken blood with an XXL spit. I spend a lot of time here.
I've never seen a bigger food variety in one place - from standard food like Pizza or noodles to fish & chips, garlic bread, vegan plates, pork roast, duck, etc - you find everything ! Instead of a bar, there are big wooden ships where you can order Mead (Met, honey wine) or Wacken Blood (berry wine). The camping place is great because your car is standing in front of your tent so you don't need to walk for ages when arriving with your whole stuff on the back. Well everything is awesome here, Wacken makes a great job to satisfy over 80.000 metal heads.
This last weekend of July I exhibited with some several artists at another open air festival in Luxembourg (Bissen). FFYS offered a big variety of less famous bands but also some internationally well-known headliners like Milky Chance. But if you weren't into music the whole day, you had this artisitic option: the Sensibition. I really loved that corner where you had wooden lounges surrounded of minth and rosemary hedges, a small open tent with funny poets, clowns or magicians, a cute ta-ta-rhum hut where non-mainstream cocktails were maid and the exhibition itself. This corner looked like a fairy tale, like we just had walked into the secret garden of the witch in "Hansel & Gretel". Personally, I preferred this Sensibition corner to the music stages, because it's something unusual, something I've never seen before at a local festival.
Went to my favourite self-service market In Luxembourg (Altwies) yesterday: Kalendula. A local garden with organic vegetables and fruits. You feel like paradise within this natural beauty. Probably the most healthy shopping place you can find - local, organic, tasty and you pick the stuff you like. A very warm welcome is waiting for you and a fair trade.
Organic food is the future. Back to the roots. Once there was an organic world, but the term "organic" didn't exist because organic food was the only food you could get. Today, the most natural way to practice agriculture needs a specific name because "normal" food from the supermarket is full of pesticides. So I say - fuck Monsanto and fuck the mass market. Welcome local agriculture and natural vitamins.
My Summer started as official photographer at the biggest Luxembourgish open air festival - Rock-a-Field (Roeser, Luxembourg). It was such a great experience to stand on stage next to Jared Leto and Skrillex or talk to Triggerfinger in the backstage. I really loved the choice of the bands and the organization of the whole thing - very professionally and carefully organized weekend. You saw how much it was important for the (absolute lovely) crew to make everyone happy involved in the RAF. I never had so much fun while hunting the perfect moment during a festival.
On stage we had among others Ellie Goulding, 30 Seconds To Mars, The Hives, Kings Of Leon, Skrillex, Alice in Chains, Foster The People, Triggerfinger and Wiz Khalifa.
