TAOBAO: BOY LONDON

Here's my virgin loot from Taobao! I wouldn't really call this a haul because there is only one item to show.

For those of you who don't know what Taobao is, you really should. In short, it's China eBay and they sell practically everything and anything. Well, basically, 90% of the things you own or wear comes from China. The thing about Taobao is that we (as in those of us who don't live in China) can't order the items directly from the website and we have to use an agent to place our orders. There are many agents who do Taobao sprees. Just do a quick Google search and all the agents will appear magically. I ordered this through smoochiezzsprees, which I will rant about their service later.

Everything on Taobao is fucking cheap, that is if you know how to search for the exact item that you want. The only catch here is that you have to know how to type in Mandarin. I finally feel like I didn't learn Chinese in school for ten years for nothing.

I had to go down to the P.O. to collect my parcel because I always opt for registered mail and somehow, whenever a parcel is delivered to my house... nobody is ever at home.

Here's the Boy London tee I bought from the amazing China eBay. I paid around $11 for it, inclusive of the domestic shipping and agent fees etc.

The quality of the tee was average but considering how much I paid for it, all is forgiven. Okay, the quality of my photos are also average but pardon the poor iPhone camera.

Now, let's talk about the service of smoochiezzsprees. Customer service wise, they were prompt in replying emails and polite. But other than that, everything else was pretty bad.

Seeing that I spree-ed with them once for Threadless and everything was fine, I decided to spree with them again. It was probably one of the worst decisions I've ever made. The waiting time for the Taobao spree on their website states 4-6 weeks, which was considered as pretty damn slow if you compare it with other agents, but I went along with it anyway because I decided to be patient. I paid for everything, including the 10% agent fees. Anyway, just so you know, everything was more expensive if you spree-ed with them because of their low exchange rate for currency.

Apart from this tee, I actually ordered another item, which was a pair of JC Spike Litas. Well, "inspired" anyway. This was what made me really upset about their service.

The updates of my order was generally fine until I realized it had been a month and I didn't receive any notifications of whether my items were being shipped out or what, so I decided to email them to ask about it. Thankfully, they replied to my email within a day or so, telling me that they update the statuses of shipping and arrival together, and at the same time reminding me that the seller speed was between 4 to 6 weeks. They also told me that they were expecting the arrival of my items by the end of next week, which is the end of week 5.

At the end of five weeks, I went back to check the website for my order statuses and I was so happy when it said that my items have arrived. I was beginning to feel happy and smoke rainbows until I read their email... which told me that my shoes were OUT OF STOCK.

Excuse me, you had five weeks to order my shit and you only told me my shoes were out of stock at the end of five weeks? Furthermore, that was an agonizing month of endless waiting because I was anticipating my shoes for the whole time. Man, that was really some service.

They did refund me the money pretty quickly, which I guess was the only other redeeming factor about the service.

I still wanted my shoes badly, so I ordered them through 65daigou along with my existing orders, which by far, is such a much better agent.

I have a huge ass Taobao parcel coming my way and I can't sleep because of it.

Just kidding. Hope you enjoyed reading this post!

Dying frenzy~

Recently, I have been helping my colleagues to bleach and dye their hair! The results were amazing. The colours used were Special Effects Electric Blue and Fish Bowl.

Everyone has coloured hair now!

HAUL: SHADES LOVIN' FROM TOBI

My shades from Tobi has arrived!

I placed an order with them on September 8 and the package arrived on September 19, so the total process took about 11 days. Shipping was through USPS First Class for $9.95, unless your order exceeds $150.

It came in a small box and my sister found the package right outside my doorstep because nobody was at home when the package arrived.

I couldn't contain my excitement when I saw the package on my table. I love receiving new packages. It was pretty well-wrapped, as you can see.

Finally ripped those bubble wraps open and here are the two pairs of shades I ordered! Read about my order here.

I haven't worn the funky pink pair out yet, but I can see it appearing in my ootds when my huge order from Taobao arrives. I have a huge upcoming post regarding my Taobao haul, so do check back often!

*Prices stated are in USD.

Eggplant hair

Faded Electric Blue over Atomic Pink after five days.

DIY Fashion: Cross Tank

We've all seen loads of cross printed tanks lately, especially from brands like Topshop or UNIF, but those cost at least $50. Here's how to rock the look and make your own cross tank with $10.

Here are the list of items you'll need:

• A plain tee or tank (I got a plain cotton tee from Bossini at 4 for $24 and made it into a tank, so that's around $6 for one.)
• Fabric paint (Art Friend has a shitload of fabric paints and I'm using a black colour from Marabu Textil.)
• Masking tape
• Paintbrushes
• Pencil
• Ruler
• Cardboard (or something you can slip in between the front and back of the shirt so that the paint doesn't seep through)
• Fabric scissors (optional)

The first step is pretty much optional and self-explanatory, which is to just snip off the sleeves of your tee to make it into a tank. If you don't want the sleeves to have the frayed look, a quick tip would be to line your scissors along the outermost stitch lining of the sleeve and snip off from there. But since I like the raw edge look, I snipped off from the inner stitching.

The next step would be to draw the outline of your cross using a pencil and ruler.

After you're satisfied with your design, tape the outline with masking tape. Press firmly around the edge of the masking tape where it comes in contact with your pencil lines because you don't want any paint to seep through beyond your outlines.

Last but not least, simply paint your shirt! It can be messy because there is the masking tape there to save the day. I gave it two coats of paint for maximum coverage, giving the first layer around five minutes to dry before painting it again.

Leave your tank to dry for at least 12 hours before peeling the masking tape off. Next, flip your shirt inside out and iron over the painted surface to seal the paint in. Lastly, give your shirt a rinse to wash off the excess dye and you're done! I have found that, to my surprise, washing the shirt for the first time not only gets rid of the excess paint, but it also gave it a very grungy look.

Thanks for reading, bye!

OOTD: Yin Yang

White shirt from F21 (self-cut), Yin Yang leggings from Topshop, inspired UNIF Hellraiser flats

DIY: Dip dye hair

Dip dye hair is so common nowadays and the trend was so last year, but people still do it because it's pretty to look at!

I get a lot of questions asked about my hair, especially on how I did my dip dyed hair myself, so I was thinking, why not blog about it? Most photos come from my iPhone and Instagram, so pardon the quality, but hey, we're all rocking the hipster trend, aren't we?

Here are the list of things you will need:

• Old shirt
• Gloves
• Tint brush
• Dye bowl
• Hair dye
• Hair bleach (bleaching powder + developer)
• Hair toner (optional)
• At least three hours

For my dye, I used Special Effects Atomic Pink for my first dip dye.

Special Effects hair dye in Atomic Pink and Blue Mayhem

I know these semi-permanent dyes are really hard to get in Singapore. I bought them from Fuelthearmy. Shipping will take nearly a month, so do plan ahead if you intend to dye your hair for a special occasion. There are a few other online shops in Singapore that do sprees for similar brands of semi-permanent hair dyes such as La Riche Directions or Manic Panic and they will reach your doorstep faster, but I haven't used any other brands except for Special Effects. I've read up on reviews on all these brands and it seems that Special Effects has the best lasting power and vibrancy. I really love Fuelthearmy though, they're efficient and so far, all my dyes had arrived safely. The shipping is more expensive than the dye itself, so do order with your friends to save on shipping costs. One bottle of Special Effects cost around SGD$16 after we ordered seven bottles from the website and split the cost.

The other hard-to-get thing in Singapore would be hair bleach. We don't really see many people here with crazy hair colours and even if there were, most people would get it done in a salon, so there isn't really a market for hair bleach. I got mine from Venus Beauty, which I guess is our local Sally's. Other places you can get hair bleach from would be Swanston from Chinatown or Mustafa Centre. I don't really have a picture of the hair bleach I use but the brand is Lolane and it comes in a purple packaging. The developer I use range between 9% to 12%, which is 30 to 40 vol. If all attempts in getting Lolane fail, you can always choose to buy Gatsby Ex-Hi Bleach or Palty Super Flash Sparkling Blonde from Watsons. I haven't really used box dye bleach before but I think the results would be pretty much the same because you end up frying your hair anyway.

Now, before you start, make sure you lay your entire toilet or wherever you're doing it with black trash bags or newspapers. Believe me, you do not want to get dye anywhere because once the dye touches anything, it's going to leave a permanent stain, which is why you will want to wear an old shirt that you don't mind throwing away and gloves. Another tip would be to put Vaseline around your hairline and ears to prevent staining on the skin. It's a very good tip and you should definitely listen to it.

Firstly, mix equal parts of bleaching powder and developer until you get a creamy consistency similar to that of icing. This part should be fairly simple because Lolane comes in equal amounts of powder and developer for mixing. Next, determine the length of your dip dye and just slap the bleach onto your hair.

I tied plaits so I could make sure I had even application on both sides. This had pros and cons because while I had even lengths of hair bleached, some parts were not even.

Anyway, this is how my hair turned out after one bleaching session. Take note not to leave the bleach on for more than 45 minutes.

As you can see, the colour was still fairly dark at some parts and I decided to bleach it again!

Second round of bleaching:

By now, you will see a lot of hair coming out and even hair melting off. It's perfectly normal because that's what bleaching does to hair. The in-between time taken to wash and dry the hair would be the most annoying part of the entire process but oh well, who cares, you're gonna have stunning hair. Just remember, the lighter your hair colour is, the more vibrant your hair dye will be. It's pretty much common sense.

The next step is optional because I realized it didn't really make much of a difference to the bleached hair. I toned my hair by mixing Schwarzkopf IGORA Royal 0-11 with Lolane developer. Maybe it's the mixing that didn't do it any good, or maybe the toner just sucks.

Anyway, the whole point of a toner is to remove any yellow tones in bleached hair. The colour I was going to put on was neon pink and I didn't want it to turn orange just because my hair had yellow tones. I guess it did help a little bit because the colour is slightly more ashy but I think I can make a better toner myself. I was experimenting with making lavender dye that day and basically, any lilac or lavender dye would make a good toner.

This was made by mixing Special Effects Electric Blue and Atomic Pink, diluted with a massive amount of conditioner. I will talk more about this in my future hair dying posts, which by the way, I'm going to dye my hair again in a couple of weeks and that's going to be really interesting to do.

The next and probably last step would be to apply your dye! Just literally slap on the pink dye and wrap your hair ends in aluminum foil. Now, we wait. I waited for a good two hours before washing it off. The colour came out sooooooooo bright! This was taken right after I blow-dried my hair. The colour was redder in real life initially but it faded to something like this within a few days.

I actually thought the dye would fade to light pink within two weeks or so, but no, my hair was so vibrant and pink I was starting to be scared that the pink would stay there forever. This was how my hair looked like after two months, with no photo filters at all.

I know, it actually looks freshly dyed. Special Effects is so awesome. This was taken on the same day I decided to change the pink to purple.

My SFX Electric Blue and Fish Bowl came a week ago so I had to play with it.

Special Effects Electric Blue diluted with a fuckload of conditioner

This was the exact dye I put on my pink tips because blue and pink gives... purple! Same as the previous dyeing job, apart from bleaching, I left this on for like a good two hours while I went to eat dinner and watch TV. Multi-tasking has its benefits.

My supposedly-purple dip dye came out bluer and darker than expected so I was a little bit disappointed but the colour faded after two washes and it's more purple than blue now!

I think that's pretty much everything you need to know about doing your own dip dye hair. Do it before the trend is over! Well, I think it's already pretty overrated but a splash of colour wouldn't hurt.

It's been fun writing this post, bye!

SHADES LOVIN' FROM TOBI

I have a new online shopping site to share - Tobi.com! I chanced upon Tobi accidentally while looking at some Youtube videos.

They were having this big 50% off your first purchase and I was in the mood for buying some shades. They had a lovely range although it's not exactly a big selection, but they had enough to satisfy my cravings.

The first pair I bought was this.

Tegan Sunglasses in Black

They were originally $12 but it was under the sale section and I managed to snag it for $3! That's probably cheaper than those from Singapore. These are your staple black shades that everyone should own a pair of.

Fun In The Sunglasses in Pink

This pair of shades was so adorable I couldn't resist buying it. It was originally $12, then it was on sale for $8 but I had an additional 50% off the original retail price, so I paid $6 for it in the end. The Tegan shades' final price was $3, so I couldn't use the discount coupon on that. These babies came in 10 colours but they only have the red ones left. Apparently, I bought the last pair of pink. For some strange reason, the pink ones were the most expensive out to the ten colours.

Anyway, originally I thought they had some free worldwide shipping policy but as it turns out, I thought wrong. Well, it still applies if your order exceeds $150, so I had to pay an additional $9.95 for international shipping. Still, two pairs of shades for less than $20 sounds like a good deal to me!

Shipping is going to take two to four weeks and I can't wait for them to arrive! I will blog about them again when they have safely arrived.

Click here for 50% off your total purchase!

Thanks for reading, bye!

*Prices stated are in USD.