The Weekend & Work Week

Saturday Chelsea and I retraced our steps from the walking tour we had a few weeks back. We found Twinings Tea again, which of course was not open! But we'll go back another day to check it out. The store is the original home of the Twinings Tea company, located on The Strand not too far from our flat (first picture). We also connected a lot of other dots which was good, got to know our way around some other neighborhoods. The second picture is where cabbies were allowed to take breaks back in the day. They are still used today. Cabbies buy coffee and snacks inside. The general public is even allowed to purchase from them now as long as they can catch one that is opened. We sat in a nice park across the street from the Thames and had some ice cream. We finally saw some trees with a little color change! There's not many trees here and the ones you do see go from green to brown; there's no red or orange anywhere! We've been pretty lucky with the weather so far, its been fairly mild so it was nice to sit in the park.

Sunday morning we went to Abigail's, a deli around the corner from our flat. We saw that it had free WiFi when we walked by the night before so we decided to eat breakfast in there while we figured out the rest of our trip. We stayed there for breakfast and lunch and were able to book the rest of the hotels for Belgium.

We brought our stuff back to the flat then took the tube to Warcick Street in a section of London called Little Venice for a walking tour at 2 PM. It was soooooo pretty there (its located on the west side of London). There is A LOT of money in that section. Our guide pointed houses out where Paul McCartney, Angelica Houston, and the Lord of the Dance have lived. There were some really nice cars too. Most of the homes and flats go for millions of pounds. The architecture was mostly really pretty too. The canals had a lot of house boats which were cool to see. The tour was around 2 hours. Afterwards we had a late lunch/early dinner at a bar/restaurant right on the canal. It was really nice, we ate on the terrace. We both had hot apple cider, which was basically cider beer warmed up. It was good though. I had a grilled chicken burger too, with chips and salad.

Monday night Eya, Chelsea and I went out to dinner at this Italian restaurant by school that has a live piano player every night. The music was really good and I had really good pizza too :) Tuesday at work I labeled the retail mail out envelopes. Then I started finishing up the summer sketchbook so Rachel could send both of them to a customer by the end of the week. I was able to show John and Michael my branding and window brief finally!!!! They liked a lot of the ideas which was awesome!!! Michael liked the neon lights idea but wasn't sure it went with the brand's eco-ness, which I understand. Customers may not like the idea of an eco-friendly company using electricity like that, etc. They like the idea of something illuminated, because that's the only way people will see it at night, but they want something less obvious than a neon light. John gave me some information from a company they had contacted a few years back that I'm going to look into. The company specializes in films that cover glass (for privacy, advertisements, etc.). The Academy buses that you see completely wrapped in an advertisement, that is probably this company, that's what they specialize in. They want to go ahead with some of my ideas so now I have to get quotes from a few companies and start making some purchases for the store!!!! So its really good, I think it was received really well. Tuesday night Chelsea and I packed for our trip!!!! We're leaving Wednesday night, right after work.

Wednesday I worked on more ideas for the store. The creative director Tara is supposed to come into the office on Friday so John wants to be able to show her what I've been doing which is good because I want her to see it but its bad because I can't come in!!!!! Hopefully I'll get to meet and talk to her another time though. I left work a little bit early to meet Chelsea at St. Pancras Station so we could hop on the train to Brussels!!!!!

FINALLY Some Window Speak!!!!!

I finished up the sketchbook this week at work. I was able to print out a prototype on Wednesday and I started to cut out fabric swatches for each style (just waiting for a few more bulk fabric samples to come in) and it will be ready to show to John!!! Rachel is hoping to send it to a printer in the next couple of weeks!!! I stuffed some more envelopes too, for their retail customers. I'll have to stamp them next week because I never got a chance to go to the Post Office.

And I FINALLY got to talk to Rachel about my window concepts. I was sooooo excited and kind of nervous. First I told her about my cling idea for the market windows. Those windows should be changed more frequently since its where the shop door is and its in the market place, eye level. I mentioned my idea for a window calendar too, so the shop girls could stay up-to-date. Then I told her my idea for the other two sets, which she loved!!!! I proposed getting custom neon signs for each window to spell out a message using images, like UK Loves Braintree, Braintree Loves Earth. She really liked that idea. Then she started getting into all the other parts of the facade that she would like to see changed in some way. So I have a lot more branding to do now!!! She basically wants the whole outside redone!!! Then I need to put a proposal together with sources and estimates so that I can show it to John. I have to make sure there's a lot of pictures and that its very detailed, looked at from every angle. So I'm really excited about that :) Lots of work ahead of me!!!

Thursday Chelsea and I headed down to Harrod's to a salon. Chelsea was able to get her haircut for free there on Wednesday and they were doing color too. The girl that asked Chelsea to come in wasn't coming outside though! Maybe another day...so we decided to take a walk into the Chelsea/Kensington area and look at some of the shops there. That area is really nice, its where Chelsea works. Its similiar to the Upper East Side in NYC, there are not flats, there are houses. Lots of money in that area, which means lots of good clothes in the vintage and consignment shops :) We went into one called The Exchange which had REALLY REALLY nice stuff-Marc Jacobs, Louis Vuitton, Alexander McQueen, Dries Van Noten. As I was looking through the racks, I saw a dress that I own!!! A Diane Von Furstenburg one!!! I thought that was pretty funny.

After that we went to Trafalgar's Square where they were having a screening of archived films depicting transportation in London from 1896-2009. It was pretty cool. The first half was all silent films so it was accompanied by a live pianist. The square was packed. The screening kicked off the London film Festival. We didn't stay for the whole thing because it was a little chilly and I didn't want to get sick again! So we took the tube to Convent Garden to have dinner at Bella Italia.

Today for our Multi Cultural London class we went to Brick Lane. The Old Spitalfields Market wasn't open yet when we first got there so we went into Christ Church which is on the corner of Commercial and Fournier Streets. The Nave was closed but we could still see inside. It was really pretty except that it just had chairs for pews which just didn't go with the rest of the church. From there we went up to the BanglaCity Supermarket to check out the odd vegetables and other foods it had there which was cool to see. After that we went back to Old Spitalfields and looked around at all the booths, some different from when I was there on Sunday. The Truman Brewery wasn't open because that's only a Sunday Market and the rest of Brick Lane was pretty empty. There was an inside vintage market going on but that was it. Sunday is definitely the better day to go. We did get to try a curry house called Tayyabs. It wasn't on Brick Lane but our professor looked a bunch up and this seemed to get the best reviews and it was PACKED. It specializes in Punjabi dishes from Pakistan. The food was pretty good, we tried a chicken dish with rice. Pretty spicy too. We also went to the right bagel place!!!! The Beigel Bake on Brick Lane. We waited on line and I got a plain with butter and I have to say the place next door could give the original a run for its money.

Chelsea and I did some research and hotel booking for our trip too. We have a place to stay in Brussels (THANK YOU SO MUCH MOM!) and a place in Amsterdam. We still need to figure out the in between :)

Lazy and Love

Still getting over this sickness!!! I slept until at least 1 PM Thursday and was lazy all day. I sat at the pub down the street from us for probably 3 hours on my laptop. I really didn't feel like doing much and didn't think I should since I slept for that long.

Our Global Experiences coordinator emailed us that she was in town for her friend's birthday so she wanted to meet Chelsea and I at some point. She called me Thursday morning to see if we could meet up that night. She got to the flat around 10 PM and hung out for a while, asking us questions about the flat and our internships. She never actually gets to meet the participants so it was really cool for her to meet us (and easy too since there's only 2 of us!!).

Friday we had class. In our first class we started learning about Brick Lane, a long street that today runs through the heart of Banglatown, London's Bangladeshi-Sylheti community. Its been home to many different ethnic groups over the years. Today its a community that is in constant opposition-Bangladeshi's who want to change the area and Brits who want to preserve the Georgian, old-world look and feel of things. Next week we're going to the market to check things out (although I saw it today-see below). Rachel told me that since I liked Portobello Market so much, I should check out Spitalfields on Sunday, which runs into Brick Lane. My independent study professor said the same thing so that's what I checked out today (more on that below).

After class we came home, ate lunch and relaxed. Chelsea, Eya, and I met Chelsea's parents at Westminster Abbey for the Evensong which is a mass that is almost entirely sung by the choir. It was really nice, especially seeing the Abbey, because during the day you have to pay to visit, so we got to hear two choirs and see the inside for free! After the mass we went to Prezzo for dinner in Trafalgar's Square. Yet another great Italian restaurant, will definitely be going back there, especially for their mozzarella en carozza since Enzo's is no longer!!!! Later on we went to the Clerkenwell House, a bar/lounge right around the corner from our flat which is really nicely decorated and was okay to hang out in.

Saturday I slept until noon and decided to check out the area East and Southeast of our flat. I walked down Clerkenwell Road and it was absolutely empty. The weekends are really dead around us, shops are closed (except Starbucks of course!) and people are generally not around (not really sure where they are to be honest). The more down the road I went there were actually people walking around but still not a lot of shops or restaurants opened. I headed South towards St. Paul's and found a little street with a bunch of shops, like Links of London (jewelry), Jigsaw London (clothing), and Jones Bootmaker. All of those were closed too. I walked down to St. Paul's and there was a wedding there!!! At least I thought the wedding took place there until I overheard someone say that they don't have weddings there unless you're somebody important, they're probably just taking pictures there. Well that lady ruined it!!! It was still nice to see, all the English ladies with hats and headpieces. I walked down to where there are shops open, cafes and such, and went into Costa Coffee to have a mocha and a piece of carrot cake. The mocha was delicious and sooooooo pretty, as you can see above. As I was sitting there though I started to not feel very well; I felt a fever coming on so I decided to head home to lay in bed for the rest of the day.

Today I woke up and felt much better, I had no problem getting up at a decent hour which was good because I was heading to Spitalfields!!!! I got out of the house before 11 AM and took the tube to Liverpool Street. I made my way to Petticoat Lane Market, the first market you come to in the area. There are so many stalls set up on the streets there, many with clothing, shoes, and home goods. I found a really cute dress there, can't wait to wear it!!! From there I came to Brushfield Street where the Former Spitalfields Market stands now (between Brushfield and Lamb Streets). In there, there are a lot of stalls with up-and-coming designers' goods, t-shirts, dresses, coats, accessories. I found the best stuff in there. I went outside to get some money from the cash machine (ATM) and the que (the line) was outrageous!!! They always are actually which is so bizarre to me but it never fails. I think I waited almost 20 minutes to get some money. From Former Spitalfields I went up Fournier Street, which is what my independent study professor recommended, to check out the architecture and the building at the end of the street that was a church, then a temple, and now a mosque (because of the different ethnic groups inhabiting the Brick Lane area). I turned left onto Brick Lane and saw all of the different curry houses that line it, one after the other. Eventually I came to the Old Truman Brewery where the Spitalfields Sunday UpMarket takes place. Inside the brewery there are stalls of new and vintage goods and a slew of international foods. I had some sweet and sour chicken with vegetables and noodles-very, very good. I like the Former market better; I liked the goods there better. From there I walked up the rest of Brick Lane which reminded me A LOT of Englishtown. In the beginning it was people selling old clothes mainly, lined on either side of the street. But eventually it got into stalls where people were selling pretty much everything-batteries, shampoo, bedding. That part really reminded me of Englishtown. Towards the end there is a bagel shop (they spell it beigel) the Brick Lane Beigel Bake, which is supposed to be the last Jewish run shop in the area. There was a long line and I wanted to try one so I waited and got a mini plain with butter. I walked outside to the end and turned back only to see the Beigel Bake two doors down from the bagel shop I went into!!!! I was faked out. :P The bagel was still good though. From there I headed home with my purchases. I like this market the best so far, I will definitely be making a trip or two back at least to get the right bagel!

Work tomorrow which hopefully means some window speak :)

More Getaways

Sunday night, Eya, Bridget and I headed down to the Angel tube stop so we could go to Desperados Mexican Cantina and Cocktail Bar. I went there with everyone from work a few weeks ago. The food there is soooooooooo good. And the atmosphere is just really fun. On the way home we passed a bar where there was a stage by the front window and we saw an old Elvis impersonator! He was so funny looking! Eventually he came outside and started talking to us with his British accent! He was pretty funny.

Monday I was able to show Rachel my ideas for the summer catalog shoot. She emailed my inspirations to Tara, who is the creative person behind Braintree's catalog as well as the company's blog and cosmetic things on the site. I didn't do much on Monday because Rachel and John were out most of the day returning from a weekend visit to some customers.

Tuesday I started working on Braintree's sketchbooks for spring and summer 2010. A sketchbook is a catalog of all the season's styles including all of the colors each style will come in. It lists the style number, description, fabric, sizes available, and price for each item. I created it in Excel, one sheet for mens and one for womens and separate workbooks for spring and summer.

Tuesday night Chelsea and I went to Pizza Express for dinner. We had a coupon, two main courses for 10 quid! Then we went to her parents hotel so we could use their free WiFi!!! We booked our mid-semester break trip.............Belgium here we come!!!! I'm very excited!!! We booked a Eurostar train to Brussels that leaves Wednesday October 28th and a flight home from Amsterdam on Monday evening, November 2nd. In between that we will hopefully visit Ghent, Bruges, and Antwerp in Belgium!!!!

Today, Rachel told me that Tara liked some of my ideas/inspirations for the summer shoot!!! She also said Tara would be coming in next week sometime (she'd make sure it was a day I'm there) so we can all go over ideas for the shoot and the catalog layout. I finished the sketchbooks for spring and summer and now I'm just waiting on some more sketches from Sarah so each book will be complete. Once the files are complete we can send them to a printer to then be distributed to Braintree's sales representatives so they can show them to their wholesale clients. Then eventually the catalog that Braintree has now would become a marketing tool, more for retail customers.

I created an email blast to send out to all of the wholesale customers introducing them to the new winter collection. I also updated some lists for their records.

The owners/managers of a factory that Braintree deals with in China are visiting the area. They came into the office today and gave everyone chopstick sets!!! They're so cute!! So now I have a nice chopstick set :)

Hopefully NEXT week I will be able to show her my window ideas. I have to bring it to her attention again. I also need to show her the green publications and websites I found for them to send press kits to.

Another Week Gone By

Tuesday I didn't go into work because I had a sore throat that had started Sunday. I felt horrible Tuesday morning when I woke up so I decided to call out of work and go to the walk-in clinic in Soho. After waiting about an hour in the clinic, I saw the nurse who told me I had laryngitis. She told me I just had to wait it out and I couldn't take medication for it because its a viral infection. I was just happy it wasn't something worse. I went to work the next day with no voice!!! I've never lost my voice before. Rachel kept asking me if I was okay at work and if I needed to go home. I was a little tired (and I couldn't talk!!) but other than that I didn't feel too bad. At the end of the day I got some clothes!!! I picked out two things, a dress and a tunic, both made from bamboo, so cute!!! I'll probably grab a few more things next week too.

Thursday I woke up and had absolutely no voice. I didn't do much of anything. I went to TopShop (a store like H&M that is HUGE in London and just opened a location in NYC over the summer!!!). I bought a winter hat for when it gets colder out. Friday Chelsea and I had class. After talking to our professor for the independent study, we took a bus to the Imperial War Museum for our first class. We looked at the exhibit that displays what it was like for children in the UK during WWI. It included propaganda posters, survival packs that were carried everyday, and children's gas masks. Then we went upstairs to the Holocaust Exhibition which included a lot of photographs, newspapers, documents, artifacts, and films. They had a lot of interviews playing with Holocaust survivors. It was really interesting to see (Sean, you would have liked it a lot). After that I went home and Chelsea went to meet her parents who arrived on Thursday. I needed to rest because the next day I was going to Portobello Market with Chelsea and her parents.

Chelsea and I left our flat at about 9:30 AM Saturday for her parents' hotel right outside Lancaster Gate tube station. From there we walked to Notting Hill and found Portobello Road where the market began. Portobello Market is one of London's most famous and biggest markets. There are 2,000-plus vendors that include antiques, food, and new goods. There were TONS of people and so much stuff to look at. The beginning of the market was a lot of antiques. The food market was next, mainly vegetable stands but some patisseries and specialty foods like German, Spanish, and Thai. We will have to go back because we skipped over the fashion market, which extend on either side of Portobello Road. Those stalls are supposed to be FILLED with awesome vintage finds. The market is almost home to the movie "Notting Hill"'s (Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts) blue door and traveling bookstore. We found the traveling bookstore but we were told the blue door has since been painted black so that would be harder to find. Towards the end of the market was much, much less crowded which was nice. We turned off at the end of the road and headed for the tube to go back to our flat.

I was exhausted from walking around all day so I took a nap when we got home. Later on, Bridget and I walked to Covent Gardens to go to dinner at Bella Italia. Anglo had given Chelsea and I a map with discounts for certain sights and restaurants so we got 20% off our bill there. Our dinner was excellent and we both had really good desserts too. I don't have any plans for tomorrow except that Eya, Bridget, and I are going to the Mexican restaurant that I went to with everyone from work. Then on Monday I have work again and hopefully I will be able to share with Rachel my ideas for the summer photo shoot and my window display.

New Projects

Today at work Rachel and I talked about what their plan for me for the week was. She wants me to research ideas for Braintree's summer catalog photo shoot. It will be taken in January, so it will be done inside somewhere. She wanted me to find pictures and inspiration for that. She also wanted me to look up green and eco magazines and other publications so they can send their press kit to them to start getting more publicity. There is also two more databases she wants me to send catalogs to for fall/winter.

I was able to pull a lot of different inspiration shots from the internet for the catalog shoot. I'll go over them with her tomorrow to see if she likes them. I was also able to find a number of magazines and websites/blogs that Braintree would be able to send their press kit to. I also helped her and Sarah with first fit samples for summer '10. Hopefully I'll be able to show her my ideas for the windows this week too.

These are pictures of Versailles (first 4) and my last of the Eiffel Tower.

Paris, Versailles, and more Paris!

We went down for breakfast at around 9 AM, filled up on pan au chocolat, croissants and butter!!!! Soooo good!!! We headed out to the coach for a tour of Sacre Coeur Montmarte, which is two churches that overlook the whole city. We were up there for about an hour, got some souvenirs for some people :) and then we were off again. We walked down to the Moulin Rouge and then back to the coach to go to Notre Dame. Notre Dame was free to get in and you could take pictures. You could go up in the towers but you had to pay and we didn't have much time because we had to get on the coach to go to Versailles.

The city of Versailles was really pretty, I would definitely want to go back there to check it out. We got dropped off outside the Palace and walked into town to get some lunch. We all got baguettes; they were delicious!!!! I bought a pastry too, so good!!! After we ate we headed back to the Palace. We had 3.5 hours before we had to be back to the coach. The Palace is massive. Over 700 rooms, 1200 fireplaces...everything really extravagant. The chandeliers were beautiful. We didn't get to see much of the gardens. You would really need to spend all day at the Palace to see everything. We left around 6:30 to head back to Paris. We were free for the night from there. We decided to go out to dinner near our hotel in a little section called Bercy Village. Its kind of like Covent Gardens n London, lots of little shops and restaurants. We ate at a place called T Pour 2 . The food was a little pricey but it was really good. I had a warm goat cheese salad. It was goat cheese served on toast with greens and it came with a side of honey. I've never had goat cheese with honey but it was actually really good, cut the tanginess of the cheese. Then I had crepes for dessert!!! I had to have some crepes while I was in France!!! Crepes Suzette, traditional style, sooooo yummy!!!

We were going to go back to the hotel and change to go out, but we decided to just stay at the restaurant. The bartenders were really nice and invited us to meet them next door at a pub called Frog. After the restaurant closed, we headed next door. Frog was really cool, modeled after an English Pub. They played good music too. Eventually the bartenders and one of the waitresses came over to meet us and we all hung out there until that bar closed at around 3 AM. They told us that that particular night was called Paris Nuit Blanche or White Night. It celebrates art and culture in Paris and galleries, museums, and other places stay open all night for visitors with free entry too. We headed back to the hotel and went to bed.

Sunday, Chelsea and I got up a little late for breakfast but thankfully Eya saved us some croissants. We headed straight to the Louvre Museum and had 3 hours to spend there before heading back to London. We didn't have to pay to get into the Louvre because the first of every month is free, so that worked out really well! The security line wasn't very long either so we got right in and headed straight for the wing where the Mona Lisa and Venus de Milo are. There were LOTS of pushy people in those two spots; anything to get a picture!!! I was really surprised that you could take pictures all throughout the Louvre. After we saw those two we went back downstairs to where all the shops were and wandered around there for a while. Then we headed outside the Louvre where the glass pyramid and Arc du Carrousel are. We grabbed lunch out there, more delicious baguette sandwiches and another pastry for me!!!

We took our last pictures of the Eiffel Tower from out there too. We left around 1:30 PM. We stopped along the way for a quick break and again at Cheers, a wine and beer discount place where I bought some Belgium chocolates :) Then we drove the rest of the way to the ferry. The ride home seemed like it took forever. We didn't get home until 10:30. We were pretty tired from the whole weekend. It was definitely well worth it though and I will definitely be returning to Paris.

Paris, Day 1

Chelsea, Eyaluta, and I woke up around 4 AM this morning to be ready for a 5:15 pick-up on our way to Paris!!!! We got to Great Portland Station around 5:45; our coach was picking us up just after 6 AM. A few of us got on in London. We picked up a few more people along the way to Canterbury where we picked up another 20 so we had a full coach!!! We drove to Dover Port where we were able to get some breakfast (Burger King hash browns never tasted soooo good!!) and relax before boarding a ferry to take us over the English Channel and into France. The port was really nice. It sits below Dover Castle and a church and there are white cliffs all along the water. The ride over the Channel was nice too. The sun came in the whole time so we just sat and relaxed.

We docked at Calais in France!! And we were on our way to our lunch stop before heading into Paris. We got to Paris around 4 PM. There was a little traffic that we had to sit in before getting to the area where our hotel is, which is called Bercy. We dropped our bags off and freshened up before heading back out for a short driving tour of the city and then a river ferry ride. During the driving tour we saw Notre Dame, The Louvre, the Arc de Triumphe, the Eiffel Tower, and the Champs de Elysses (and the biggest Louis Vuitton store I've ever seen!). We got to the river ferry, which took off right in front of the Eiffel Tower down the Seine. It was really beautiful, all the buildings and bridges looked amazing, different from London, really ornate. We got back to the dock just in time for the Eiffel Tower to be lit up and to see it sparkling!!!!! Starting at around dusk, on every hour, the tower sparkles, literally twinkles, bulbs flashing all over the place, for 5 minutes. It was really breathtaking; everyone on the ferry gasped!!!

We got off the ferry and were free to do what we wanted so we decided to wait in line to go up the Eiffel Tower. There are two levels open to the public. The views of the city were amazing, its so pretty lit up at night, definitely a romantic spot!!! It was really chilly up there though!!! After the Eiffel Tower we were pretty hungry so we started walking toward the Metro station that would take us back to the hotel and we found a cute Italian restaurant (came all the way to France to eat some pasta!!!). The food was great and it was good to relax since we had had a pretty long day. After dinner we headed back to our hotel. We have breakfast at 9 tomorrow and then we're off to see some sights. In the afternoon we're going to Versailles and when we get back from there we are free for the night so we'll probably go out somewhere.