It all started with my desk mate and fellow blogger, Sienna.

Her long, curly locks were artistically pined up in twisted strands at the top of her head. In the midst of this gorgeous brunette nest, she had pinned a darling bird figurine perched next to two robin’s eggs. Amazing.

Then it was the girl at my favorite coffee shop, who had fashioned several blooming flowers behind her ear with her hair all piled off to the side in quirky but darling manner.

I coined it: The Whimsical Updo.

The thing I love about this hair style is that anything goes. A scrap of your favorite ribbon, an elegant peacock feather, a string of pearls, fresh picked flowers … just pin them on and attain instant “fairy tale princess” status. The more creative and cute, the better.

Let your hair go naturally wavy or add some body and texture with a sea salt spray. Pile randomly on the top of your crown and secure with a mound of bobby pins. Garnish as desired.

For inspiration, check out these amazing looks captured by London-based photographer Joanna Kustra. Then check our selection of hair accessories to get started.

I had never even heard of British actress Carey Mulligan until I went to see her staring role in An Education. And it wasn’t until I looked her up on IMDB that I realized I’d not only seen Carey play Kitty Bennet in the remake of Pride and Prejudice, but I had actually watched her perform live in Chekhov’s The Seagull at the Royal Court Theatre in London.

She had always stood out to me, but it wasn’t until An Education that I really took notice of the girl who’s rumored to be the next Audrey Hepburn. I loved watching her character’s growth throughout the movie, from the smart school girl who threw caution to the wind, to a woman who was wiser to the ways of the world but more spirited than ever.

Her fashion style also changes with her growth. She starts out in her plain school girl uniform and then experiments with her new grown-up lifestyle by donning elegant coats, dresses and updos. I loved the movie and the message, and her performance was fresh and honest. I look forward to seeing more of Carey’s work in the future, and this time, I won’t have to read her name in the credits to know who she is.

We have been doing model profiles and interviews with models from our vintage section, however, we have not yet done a profile on any of the in-house LuLu*s models!

So, I am here to introduce you to one of the first Lulus.com models and one that will be leaving us and moving to LONDON this month! We are sad but very excited for her and (selfishly) can’t wait to get fashion updates from London!!!

Here is Serine…. and she is, needless to say, one of the funkiest and fun models I have EVER worked with! Below are some pics done outside LuLu*s (in my designs) for a little sneak peak into her “real” personality!! Keep posted this week for the newest pictures of Serine in CUTE dresses on Lulus.com!!

Serine was born in Santa Cruz, California. She grew up in San Francisco, and then moved to Chico, California, for high school. During her junior year of high school, Serine got an internship at the LuLu*s Fashion Lounge boutique in downtown Chico.

Soon after she began her internship, the Lulus.com website was launched, and she became one of the online team! Now, Serine does everything from modeling on the site to supervising and coordinating our inventory.

In her time off, Serine travels. Her favorite places are Serbia, Croatia, London, Amsterdam, Bosnia, Switzerland, Greece, and Rome. At the end of this month, Serine is actually leaving us and moving to London. When she gets there, Serine plans to work in the fashion industry.

Pictures were taken by Daniel De Porres and Kyle Delmar.

Following a recent trip to the newly remodeled MODERN wing of the Art Institute of Chicago, I found the Josh Goot Spring 2010 line that showed in London surprisingly reminiscent of the Roy Lichtenstein paintings I was just admiring!

These dresses are color blocked in a cartoonish comic book way and employ the black dotted shading of comic illustrations. When blown up to the proportion of a Lichtenstein (which is huge) the pixels of comics become a graphic element of their own.

These pixels, dots, or whatever you would like to call them are used by Goot this season in order to create Lichtenstein comic book garments. The pixelated shading creates an almost three dimensional feeling to some of his silhouettes.

No matter how commercialized the Lichtenstein paintings get, I still find this blown-out-of-proportion, comic book look pretty cool in life size. 

OH NO BABE!

“Louise Gray is in her groove now, and like a street Pied Piper of London’s East End, she’s going to be pulling a lot of followers with her.”

I love it when I find new designers that give me a crisp look at what could happen in fashion. This season, I have found a few so far, and one of those people is Louise Gray.

Gray is a young designer that has used her textile background in the right way. Gray mixes and matches vibrant and jarring prints and shapes to create a unique Louise Gray girl for Spring 2010! This collection is fresh and refreshing for a time in which many find themselves looking at the ever resourceful and safe ditsy prints mixed with color blocked shift silhouettes.

Creative energy emanates from this collection. Louise Gray used finger paints for makeup and even put fake earring holes in the model’s ears. The shoes are a great with a new, and somewhat destructed, twist on the current theme of strappy gladiator shoes. The color palette and patterns created an 80′s nostalgia in 21st-century textiles.

The graffiti-sprayed designs, bright colors, and lots of bows brought a bit of familiarity to this funkified look, which Sarah Mower from Style.com says is fitting for “a punchy young girl with a rebellious streak … [or] like-minded types with an eye for something off-kilter and vivid.”