Taking the 90's into the Art nouveau era

"Winter dressing is all about having chic outerwear"

George Kotsiopoulis

This is my coat, it was my Mum's back in the day, I was in my final years at school in the early 90's when she bought it. This coat has seen better days, so let's do something about it...

M'self in my mum's old coat & my lovely fairy goddaughter (whose not even as old as said coat!!) Photo credit: Tiffany Shaw

It's very 90's but easily updatable, well, I say "update" what I actually mean is "make it look roughly at least a hundred years old" - it's a full length grey wool coat, with grey leopard print faux fur on the collar and cuffs, all the original buttons are still there but want to replace them all with something a little more ornate & on top of that the lining has absolutely had it! It needs pulling out and replacing completely, same thing goes for the pocket bags.

Here's the plan:

Firstly, I'm going to send her to the dry cleaners, because it's been a while & she could definitely do with a bit of a spa day!

To dye, or not to dye? That is the question...

I'm not really much of a grey girl, I'm not anti grey, it's just not me - I like colour, but I'm kind of limited in the places I can go... Black, Navy or a dark blue, forest green, deep teal, deep purple or a deep blood red. Not sure which just yet, I definitely need to cogitate that a little bit longer, add your votes in the comments below!

I need to unpick the entire lining & the pocket bags & trace the pieces out to cut out the all new spangley sexy lining. While I have the seam ripper out I want to unpick the collar and cuffs as I also want to say goodbye to the grey scale leopard print faux fur & replace it with something a bit sexier, not sure what yet but, ya can't rush these decisions, though, can ya? Same idea for the buttons, they're naff grey plastic jobs at the moment & they gotta go! Maybe something along these lines...

Antique Champleve Grey Enamel Pierced Buttons: Victorian Buttons, Set of 4 - Etsy UK

Finally, I'm thinking I want to embellish this beauty, not sure what... Sew on gems? Soutashe? Embroidery? Something else? I have no idea at this point, I'll let you know in the follow up blog post when all of this has been completed.

Watch this space (Well, it's probably best you don't, all this might take a while, I'm sure you have something far more constructive to do than hang around on my website for what might prove to be months...)