Recognise the print? Gorgeous, right? It’s from London designer Georgia Hardinge’s AW12 collection – I’ve blogged about Georgia before here and here; her amazing designs have been worn by everyone from Florence + The Machine, Lady Gaga and Erin O’Connor to Beyonce, Alesha Dixon and fashion blogger Susie Bubble. Anyway, last night I popped round to her east London home to do some outfit planning for a do this week. Not a massively major do, but the first one I’ve been to in yonks, so I figured I needed some help. Georgia helped me try on five of her fantastic designs (1. full disclosure: I’m such a shortie two were sadly too long on me despite the mega-heels and clever tricks with belts and 2. note to self: when a designer offers to whip you up something floaty over the weekend, say YES!) and after a few mirror poses and snaps (plus me moaning about how my figure is not what it once was) it was soon quite obvious which was the right one. Full outfit post featuring the dress we chose to come. 

I’m quite pleased with my choice of shoes, I think the geometric detailing goes quite well with a Georgia Hardinge design. So these are a pair of Dries van Notens I’ve hauled out of retirement; they were bought in a Christmas sale at Harvey Nichols at least three years ago. Can you believe I used to wear these out to clubs and dance all night? Oh, how times have changed.

And this is the bag, it’s a vintage Oroton made in west Germany (Australian brand founded in 1938 but some of the older pieces were also made in west Germany, which is what is says on the inside tag making it quite a cool piece of sartorial history). Bought after some extremely hard bargaining in Spitalfields market. I didn’t want to get too fussy with statement jewellery so I thought the metallic gold would bring the right amount of measured glitz to the outfit.

What do you think? Do you like the combination of pieces? How much time do you spend planning a big night out?