bunnyshop shopping fashion blog

Our Favorite Spots: Reader Mail

In today's Reader Mail:

Hi BS,

I feel like I should probably already know the answer to this, but! I was wondering if you could just give us your straight up answer: Where are the last five places you spent money online? And then I would be interested in what other people have to say. I bought sheets (really cheap!) at Overstock.

Thanks!
B.

Ours are totally weird and non-representative:

The Brooklyn poster we mentioned a while back
Mini DV head cleaner at B&H
A Powershot Canon camera at Best Buy
Fancy art paper at Dick Blick
and jeans at the Shopbop sale.

We love this question. What about everyone else?

If we thought about it, maybe we would have bought this dress: School of Women dress, was $154, now $61

Sales Sales Sales!

We swear we had no idea it was the sale time of year. May? Does that mean spring is over? Tss, we say to that. We basically want everything. We made a list of everything we need to own—we just realized our ballet flats have holes in them! It's Grapes of Wrath all over again, except with the dust!—and there were so many things on it. A sale is exactly what we need. A list is what we need to handle the sale, so that we do not buy crap. It's all coming together.

Like this LBD that's also SFW. And by that we mean 'safe for work,' rather than what we meant when we would use those letters when we were 14. Paul & Joe Sister dress, was $350, now $245

We hate to put something so expensive on the site, but we freaking love this dress, and it is half off (a thousand, more or less.) Work of art! Is what we're thinking. Temperley London dress, was $995, now $498

We don't know what it is but we still totally want a T Bags dress. We can never write 'T Bags' without thinking of Prison Break. T Bags dress, was $175, now $87.50

This is just the tip of the sale iceberg, as it were. Follow this link and you'll find all the newest sale offerings organized by price—lowest to highest.

It's the Friday Sponsor Shout-Out! (Continued!)

Ethnic sexy! Generally impossible to do, but not here. From our beloved sponsor, Zenys Boutique. Sky Pipper mini dress, $248

Madras! The Round Up

All of a sudden, we feel like we're seeing madras plaids everywhere, in a way we haven't since, like, 1989. Fair enough. We are most interested in the APC version—or, as the case may be summery diffusion line. At first we weren't so in love with this, but now we see it for what it properly is, which is we would wear every Saturday afternoon for all of July and August. APC Madras dress, $120

We are trying not to let all the preppiness interfere with our honest enjoyment of this skirt. J. Crew madras skirt, $64

We love description from Cape Madras: "Mini Mini skirts came into our line by demand from the local high school girls. We’re hoping they’re still not too long." Ha! Cape Madras mini-mini, $88

 

The Graduation Ceremony: Reader Mail

In today's Reader Mail:

Oh, congratulations! There are truly few things we enjoy more than a graduation ceremony: Honestly, we tear up from the opening bars of Pomp & Circumstance. This is true even for our own ceremony, at Columbia, which had so little actual pomp and circumstance that we—and we actually mean ourselves and our friends here, rather than the royal we—kept sending our friend Jay off to get us snacks from the store. That Sex and the City scene where Carrie realizes she spent the down payment to her apartment on shoes? That us and school. Who needs a house, we say! We're small. We fit in an apartment. We actually know someone who is graduating, and we just bought him what we are convinced is the platonic ideal of the American graduation present. We are exceptionally pleased with it.

Back to the matter at hand: We say, as we do with basically all special occasion dresses, think multiple uses. We'll also say that while we have quite a number of graduation photos, we're in our CU gown in all of them, so all you can see is Columbia blue and these J. Crew shoes that we loved until we moved to California, painted a wall, and splatted them with white paint. Wear whatever you like, we say as always, but we're going with a floral theme, because florals are very of the moment, we're thinking, day-appropriate, and possibly also for a wedding-type event. Trust us: If you're graduating, they're not that far behind.

We tried to lean toward chains here in case you're buying in a pinch and can't wait for mail order.

We love this Anthro dress. That is all. Searchlight Floral dress, $148

Now okay, we know we just said floral, but as long as this isn't too wedding \ white \ linen for what will likely be a long-ish day, we think this dress has like the nicest silhouette of any we've ever seen, ever, not that we are prone to exaggeration. But: lovely, no? Lauren Ralph Lauren linen dress, $140

This is a bit pricier than we wanted it to be, but the one we liked first actually has a fish print (seriously) rather than a floral print, as we'd hoped \ expected. Giverny-print dress, $350

This is a little bare, but we love BCBG dresses. BCBG jersey dress,

The Great Summer Mini-Skirt \ Recipe Extravaganza: Beverage

Our next recipe—a brief one, from M.:

1/3 fresh squeezed lemonade
2/3 sparkling water.
chilled.
super chilled.

sip.

For the next recipe, click here. And above: Pearl's dress, $126

Sale Item of the Day

We swear this is the prettiest dress we've seen in ages, and it's half off. Click here for the sale item of the day.

Organic Cotton: The Round-Up

We are so torn by J. Brand's new organic cotton mini-line! ("Mini" as in two choices.) Why are they not skinny? Why? We don't, we just don't get it. We're shaking our head, and moving on. Luckily, we're totally into this idea of wide(ish)-legged jeans at the moment, but we don't know why you don't make your big eco move with your brand-signature style.

We love this dress. We wish it were a couple inches shorter, but otherwise, we're in organic-cotton love. Linda Loudermilk wrap dress, $280

(Not organic cotton, but in hemp:) Like the dress above, from Beklina, one of our new favorite sites. Hand-printed scarves, $45

C&C California have a load of organic-cotton tops (as we would suspect they might), of which this is our favorite. C&C California organic cotton dress, $110

This tote bag design is a little bit more ... hippy than we tend to go, but lately we've been watching a lot of Jesus Christ Superstar so maybe it's all good. And if we had a nickel for every time we've bee called a "free spirit," we'd be writing this from our mansion-house. Organic cotton tote, $29

Our Great Summer Recipe Compendium: Berry Lemonade and Guacamole

The next recipe is from A.—or see the next one here.

I have a few fav. summer recipes. They are easy!

Berry Lemonade:
Put 1 Cup Frozen strawberries in a blender with 16 oz of organic lemonade. Perfect for a hot day. Blueberries, raspberries or a berry mixture can also be used.

Mexican Guacamole: learned this recipe in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico

2 medium avocado
1/4 yellow onion (cut into small pieces)
1 Roma tomato (cut into small pieces)
juice from 1/2 or 1 lime (to taste)
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 a cup of chopped fresh cilantro (to taste)

1.) Mash the avocado with a fork
2.) Mix in the onions, tomatoes, and half of the cilantro
3.) Add a little salt, pepper, and lime juice.
4.) See how it tastes, and keep adding more salt, pepper and lime juice until the guacamole tastes good to you.
5.) Throw the pit from the guacamole into the dip... the seed miraculously keeps the guacamole from turning brown.

See the next recipe here! And continuing with the best of the Shopbop sale, that's a Foley + Corinna dress, half off—was $495, now $247.50

Marimekko at H&M

We have no idea how or why H&M made their site pictures of their Marimekko tribute collection so. Unbelievably. Ugly. (See below.) But they're cute in person! Go, we say, if there's one near you.

Right? Totally bizarre. But we are totally into the maxi-dresses and bikinis.

Basic Boutique Discount Code Week!

This is just to remind that we still have a couple days left on the Basic Boutique discount! That's 20% off what you'd like from their super-good stock, which seems to us to have a very Gossip Girl selection. All the good labels, that is.

Today: Ulla Johnson's dress, which we wish we owned so we'd finally have something reasonable to wear to interviews, $330, with discount code "bunnyshop", $264

THANK GOD IT'S SPRING!

Seasonal affective disorder: We get it! With, in our opinion, everyone else in the appropriate hemisphere. We fucking hate winter. Hate it, hate it, hate it. But it's over! Done and dusted! We checked, and Yahoo! Answers (whatever) is saying that spring began this morning at 5:48 GMT ,which is, we think, 12:48 a.m. Eastern time. Hallelujah! We are so doing the flip-flopping hemispheres thing, as we have previously planned.

Moving forward, for no particular reason, the five things we want most for spring. Once again, we ask everyone else what they would like for spring.

More than anything, dark denim jeans. We honestly cannot believe we haven't bought these yet. Citizens high-waisted Genevas, $180

A super-bright dress. This is for the lifting of the spirit following the long, dark, but surprisingly non-snowy winter. Cathay circle dress, $294

Cuffed shorts. Cuffed shorts, in our opinion, make legs look slimmer. And that is the only sort of weight-management consideration we are ever going to get into here. American Eagle, by the way, is rapidly becoming our under-$30 clothing source. (By the way, that ridiculous self-tie is removable.) AE Paper Bag shorts, were $39.50, now $29.50

Gladiator sandals. Easy peasy, and these are cheap. Hopefully functioning as a slightly more together version of Havaianas. Topshop sandals, $30

Pink lip gloss. The only proper shade for spring. Tragically, the shade we're talking about has nothing to do with the one pictures. We want the frosted pink. Surprisingly adaptable! Stila Lip Glaze,  $22

Wearing Black at a Wedding: The Reader Mail

In today's Reader Mail:

Dear BS:

I am so confused. This may actually be more of an etiquette than a style question, but I hope you can help. My ex-boyfriend's wedding is coming up, and as we're still friends, I'm going. Now believe me, I couldn't care less—I have a much nicer boyfriend now, who'll be with me—but the only nice dress I have is black, and I just can't afford to buy another one. I know it's already a little iffy, wearing black to a wedding, and especially your ex-boyfriend's.... What do you think?

Love,
S.

Well, we think this: From an etiquette perspective—and we totally looked this up, for the billionth time—it is "officially" okay to wear black to an evening (but not a day) wedding. Who the fuck makes this up is what we want to know, but there you go.

We're assuming that the real problem is that you don't want to be sending any weird signals that you're in mourning over the ex. From your letter, we're assuming you've both had time to go on to nice relationships of your own, so it's probably been at least a year or so since your break-up. Honestly, if you had an option in our closet, we'd say go with that, because it just makes life easier, but as you don't—fuck it, we say. Wear the nice dress, and save your money, and if the chattering classes need something to talk about, consider the fact that you've done them a favor.

But who else has an opinion?

Above: DKNY empire waist dress, $295

Little Black Dress: The Sale Item of the Day

After handling the RSVP lines for their fashion show last month, we honestly have the worst Twinkle by Wenlan nightmares. This could be super cute, however, so we're working to deal with our misplaced aggression.

TbW flapper dress, was $450, now $225

L'Ecole des Femmes and Kate Nash in Lucky!

We are, of course, obsessed with Kate Nash, and we couldn't believe we saw her in the new issue of Lucky. Er, we could, but it was still totally awesome. Anyway, she made one of the best recommendations we've ever gotten out of the magazine: l'Ecole des Femmes. It is where we found this dress, which we lurvvvve. We are in love with it. We're all like ready to stop watching TV late at night to make it happy. It is the we're-moving-to-Paris dress.

Moving on: l'Ecole des Femmes striped dress, $240

Basic Boutique: Discount of the Week!

First, can we just say that those commercials all the networks are running about how the new TV shows are coming back? Those make us cry. Argh.

Anyhoo, we totally motivated last week—maybe it was all the extra time since we're in like week 10045439058 of repeats—and have lined up like nine billion discount weeks with some of our very favorite retailers! And kicking it all off: 20% this week at Basic Boutique, which stocks all our super-faves, like Vena Cava, Loeffler Randall, and Mint. And loads more.

We're kicking things off with Vena Cava. This dress is totally jolie laide, we're thinking, mais plus jolie que laide. (In our opinion. We can see people going either way on this.) We like to use our discounts for the bigger purchases. This would qualify as that.

So we're clear: The discount's good on anything at the shop; this is just one of our favorites. Vena Cava Haiti dress, was $495, with discount code "bunnyshop", $396

Spring's Best Buys: Reader Mail

In today's Reader Mail:

Dear BS:

Can you tell me the one thing—just one!—you're dying to have for spring? And please ask everyone else. I'm really curious about what people are buying this season.

Thanks!
XO
W.

Ooh, spring! Our favorite of the seasons, except for summer, but valuable in its own summer-enhancing way, since the worst thing about summer is the fact that unlike with spring, autumn's up next. Er, anyway, we wish their website were better designed \ online shopping more user-friendly, but we want a short, yellow, springtime-y dress. Like the one above. Bex bead dress, $188

Of course, that's what we want. What we need is a pair of the dark jeans we were discussing recently, and a dress we can wear to job-type functions without wondering if it's actually embarrassingly short. And we would be so excited to buy a pair of flat boots for next winter, on sale. What about everyone else?

Gap's European Collection

We keep forgetting about it. Does this look particularly European to anyone?

Although, now that we are done being all unpleasant, this does look a *bit* APC to us. No? Gap dress, $59.50

However, we are also going to say, with authority, that we have never, even seen any sort of shorts like this on an actual European:

Gap oversized denim shorts, $39.50

Those cute wedges at top aren't available online, but we're hoping if we get into the store they'll be there. In the meantime, we also like these flats, though we can only hope they're worth the price. Gap flats, $98

Sale Item of the Day

On our flight back from Miami last week, the guy sitting next to us was like, "Are you French?" Of course we are not, but we had like three million follow-up questions: Do you think we're French? What makes you think this? How could we look more French? Is it because we're wearing nothing but black?

We have no answers. We liked the question, though, even if he was probably looking for a translation-free way of asking for directions to the AirTrain. We feel like this dress is very French: See by Chloe drop-waist dress, was $470, now $231

Sale Item of the Day

Love this dress! Loved it when it first came out, love it even more now that it's on sale.

Anthropologie silk dress, was $238, now $119.95

Spring Fashion Trends! Today, the Yellow

Generally we pay as much attention to trends as we do to the Oscars: which, we hate to admit, is not very much. (We are famously Grinch-like about the Oscars. It is not because we hate movies. We love them. We just do not think Hollywood is very good for film as an artform, if you know what we mean, Michael Bay.) Er, tangent! And a Grinch-y one, as well. Anyway: spring trends. This year we have decided to pay attention, if for no other reason than it should get our minds off how much we hate the winter. We swear this is the last February we spend north of the equator.

Above: Thakoon and 3.1 Phillip Lim

Moving on: yellow! The lemoniest of the colors. And everywhere. Whenever we think of color trends, we think of that scene in The Devil Wears Prada where Meryl Streep goes off on the cerulean rant, which we have tried, unsuccessfully to find on YouTube.

Above: Behnaz Sarafpour and Michael Kors

Of course, we're probably not buying designer this season, seeing as how we failed to win MegaMillions, but we may try out this 12 St by Cynthia Vincent dress. It's much cuter up front, when you can see the embroidery.

Twelfth St. by Cynthia Vincent shift dress, $249 This is a bit cheaper and we like it just as much:

Forever 21 chiffon blouse, $19.80

Camouflage Wedding Dresses(!): Reader Mail

In today's amazing Reader Mail:

Dear BS:

I can hardly believe I'm considering this, but my fiance, bless his heart, is trying to get me to have a ... camouflage wedding. Luckily, I haven't been able to find a gown. However, I promised I'd try, which is where you come in. Any ideas? (Please say no.)

Love,
E.

This is a rather amazing coincidence, since we were recently dispatched to find same. And we agree: There is nothing out there. There is nothing, anyway, in the form of off-the-rack ... er, camo wedding dresses. However—and this is a big however—there is a tragically easy solution: working with a seamstress, and a few yards of your favorite camouflage. Or we'd start with Erika Sarkozi, who actually displays one—a surprisingly really nice looking one—on her site. After all, it's really about the silhouette, right?

We're torn between being all, Don't do anything we wouldn't do, and being all, That is actually totally funny. But then, we are not so reverent about the wedding thing. We guess we fall on the side, ever so slightly, that says, this is your day. We sense you're at least quietly entertaining the idea, but we do think that if you think he's being a bully, you get all, "Hell, no, bully! I'm wearing white to my wedding!" And then turn on The Biggest Loser: Couples and ignore the sulking. Er, this is why we write about clothing and not relationships.

The Sale at Bird!

We love Bird—it's the best boutique chainlet in Brooklyn (read: anywhere), an opinion not-at-all biased by the fact that we used to do some of their promotional writing. And sale! It is the only good thing about February.

Above: We think this is one of the most beautiful dresses ever. 3.1 Phillip Lim one-shoulder dress, was $660, now $449

Don't hold the unflattering angle against this dress, which we love. See by Chloe dress, was $410, now $229

This picture also makes us a bit sad. Trovata cashmere cardigan, was $225, now $129

And this picture makes it look a bit frumpy,we think, but Etoile by Isabel Marant is one of our favorite lines and we're just extremely confident that this looks adorable on. Etoile wool skirt, was $305, now $169

Dress This Mess

So we have this wedding we're going to in about a month. One of our absolutely favorite cousins is getting married, and we are going. We're so very excited to go - for a multitude of reasons. It's in a warm climate, we get to see our family, we get to get dressed up, we get to stay in a hotel (honestly, we think it's like the biggest treat in the world). We were actually least concerned with what to wear - we have a couple stand-by, nice dresses that double as wedding, cocktail party, and job interview wear all in one. Well, we recently heard that the men in the wedding will be wearing tuxes, the mother of the groom (our aunt) is wearing a gown - and we were surprised. Last we'd heard, the ceremony was going to be very small, and it is, shall we say, not our cousin's first wedding. But, it is the bride's first, so it's apparently a formal affair.

Our stand-by dresses will not do! We were fine with this, and actually in line at Forever 21 to try on a slew of short and/or sequined numbers (none costing more than $19.00) when we got an email - our cousin would now like us to be a part of the wedding! We have never been part of such a thing, except for our own. And this is much, much fancier. We realized that we will need to step up the level of dress, so here are the dresses we're thinking about now. But still! So much pressure!

J. Crew has never let us down for wedding dresses - ones we've attended, and our own. We really like this dotted dress - it's fun, it's lively, it's a little eccentric without getting whispered about.  The length is probably flattering on most people, the dots separate it from being a basic black dress, and the neckline leaves plenty of room for necklaces. We're thinking big, and turquoise or amber. Oh and best of all, it's on sale.

Polka Dotted Ballerina Dress, was $285, now $79.99

This dress is kind of a surprise to us - it's from J.Crew, but it seems really fashion forward. It's incredibly simple is its design, but we absolutely love the fluttery skirt, the color, and even the shoes shown with. We feel like this dress will probably look like ass on us, but we have a feeling it's going to be on our minds until we figure something else out. We will say that we hate that it's only available online, though

Silk Chiffon Josephine Dress, $175

We have this running joke with Dear Friend about how we desperately want a caftan. Hopefully our desire for a caftan will evaporate with our major gym/eating healthy efforts, but if we had to wear a caftan, this one from Foley + Corinna would be our choice. It seems less like a Dorothy Zsbornak caftan than it does a really pretty, simple, comfortable dress. We keep trying to figure out what the catch is - why it's on sale, why it's called a caftan. But we can't.

Foley + Corinna Long Braided Caftan, was $473, now $236.50

-LB

This Week's Mega-Sale

You know those times when "sale" means "actually still quite expensive"? This is one of those times. But it's eLuxury, so we can't say we weren't warned, and if we learned one thing from working Fashion Week, it's that sometimes, as much as want to rationalize it about 100 other ways, we really need to spend a whole fuckload more money on clothes than we spend. Fucking fashion industry. But again: We can't say we weren't warned. In any case, if we had an all-out event that we needed an all-out outfit for, we'd rather get it on sale. (Or at Century 21. Can we just say: We're finally getting double-duty out of a dress we wore to a friend's wedding last year, and are wearing to our best friend's wedding in two weeks) and we are practically jumping up and down with joy. Century 21 was where we bought our lovely $550 Filippa K dress for $49.99(!)).

Anyhoo: final clearance at eLuxury! We don't think there's any getting around the fact that this is a gorgeous dress. Versace gathered dress, was $1550, now $697

These are basically the only jeans in the entire sale that we want. Or would accept as a present. J Brand straight legs, were $158, now $109

This may be the most beautiful jacket we've ever seen. Narciso Rodriguez wool jacket, was $2170, now $977

We love how weird and Marc Jacobs-y this is. Marc by Marc Jacobs silk chiffon dress, was $388, now $289

We have two things to say about this dress: (1) It is incredibly unflattering. (2) We can't stop looking at it. The fact that (1) is not enough to override (2) is our personal cross to bear. Karta bubble dress, was $334, now $199
 

Our Favorite Color For Spring

You know what is our favorite thing in the world? When people who are partners at PR firms, and make $200,000 a year and have, like, sick days, come to work and cough all over the freelancers, and give the freelancers, who do not have sick days and barely have health insurance, their illness. Argh.

Anyway: In the significantly more cheerful news: all the new blue things! It's freaking everywhere. We love it. 

However, can we just say: APC YOUR WEBSITE SUCKS. Honestly, it's become the most frustrating retail website we've ever used, and that sucks, because we love APC. Everything about it, including this dress, except its shit website. Tank dress, $220