English National Opera (ENO) - The Pirates of Penzance

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As some of you may know I am a massive music lover. I get totally lost in the moment when listening to certain songs/instrumentals. Opera isn't something I get to talk about very often, but it is something I enjoy. When you first come across opera, you either love it or hate it. I must say the first time I saw opera I was unsure, but eventually grew to enjoy and appreciate it. The singers just give me goosebumps, and the music takes me to another world! This post is written in collaboration with the English National Opera (ENO), and together with their new production of 'The Pirates of Penzenace', maybe it will help change your opinion on opera. 

A little bit about the ENO: It traces its roots back to 1931 when Lilian Baylis established the Sadler's Wells Opera Company and it was renamed the English National Opera in 1974. In 1984 it was also the first British opera company to tour the US. All their performances are in English which brilliant if you want to ease yourself into opera. The ENO are committed to creating new audiences by making their performances affordable and accessible to everyone, whilst at the same time collaborating with and providing new opportunities for new talent. 

From the poster above, you can already tell that The Pirates of Penzance seems rather quirky and fun, and that is exactly what it is. It is a comic opera, and was Gilbert & Sullivan's fifth collaboration. This fun production at the ENO will actually be BAFTA-award winner Mike Leigh's operatic directorial debut!  

As a brief overview, the story is based in Cornwall and follows Frederic (Robert Murray), a young pirate apprentice. Due to a misunderstanding by his nursery maid Ruth (Rebecca de Pont Davies) he was mistakenly placed into pirate apprenticeship. Although he despised the pirates' profession, he stayed on as he was bound by his sense of duty. He meets Mabel (Claudia Boyle), the daughter of Major-General Stanley (Andrew Shore), and they both fall in love. Frederic then finds that he was born on a leap year. This meant that he must remain as a pirate apprentice for another 63 years, until his actual 21st birthday. The only comfort he has is that Mabel has agreed to wait for him. 

Although I haven't seen this opera yet myself, having watched several of the videos from ENO's Youtube account, as well as reading up on the story, it is definitely something I would love to watch. If something has brilliant catchy music, I'm hooked instantly, but the costumes in this production are colourful and vibrant. What I love most is that this is a comic opera, it's always good to have a good giggle. Anyway below I just wanted to share with you all a couple of pictures from ENO's Facebook Page, and their trailer for this production. 

There are three remaining performances which you can see live at the London Coliseum, St Martin's Lane, London, WC2N 4E on Saturday 27 June 2015 at 14:30 and 19:30, and also Saturday 4 July 2015 at 18:30. If you are looking for something new to experience and want to have a laugh in a gorgeously decorated location this just might be what you need!

I hope you guys enjoyed this collaborated post :) Have you any of you seen The Pirates of Penzance, or any opera? If so, what has been your favourite? If not, would you like to get into it?

Take care and speak soon!

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Layers & Asymmetry | Outfit Inspiration #28

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I hope you've all had a terrific week! It's been pretty decent the past couple of days (I hope it holds up!) and I wanted to share with you an outfit I wore a couple of days ago. This white on white outfit is a perfect way to welcome the warmer weather, and keep cool. This outfit is bascially the exact opposite of the more casual version I posted HERE. I hope you enjoy! 

I had been looking for a white cami for ages but could not find anything that fitted my requirements. Requirements? What kind of requirements would a white cami need apart from being white and strappy?...Haha I can completely understand if it all seems quite silly but I wanted one that was chiffon and layered, too much to ask for? Possibly as none of my searches were unsuccessful, but then I found this beauty on Missguided. The downside is that it is quite long as you can see in the picture above...I can basically wear it as a dress! Also, it is slightly on the sheer side for me, so nude underwear it is. But I wanted to use that asymmetrical layering to my advantage by tucking it into the skort, making it look like a shorter cami. I was pretty chuffed with the result as it didn't look to shabby!

I absolutely adore this cream faux leather skort. I was never too keen on the usual white skort with the split of the two sides slap bang in the middle as I thought it looked a little odd and wouldn't suit me. I preferred something that was a little off centre. It took me absolutely ages to find this skort, and when I did they didn't have my size...typical! Anyway, after a good few months it finally came back in stock! I really like how it is cream as it makes a good contrast with the white cami in material and in colour. It costed £20 which is a little more than what I would have wanted to pay, but seeing as though I had been looking for something like this for ages I thought I might as well, rather than waste time finding something else. Apart from the price, another downside with this skort is that, because it is faux leather it's not that breathable, so I wouldn't recommend wearing this if you're going to end up being sweaty haha. 

Now, this jacket...ahhh what can I say other than I am in love! I was browsing for pale pink blazers as I only own black/grey (how summery haha) and found this gorgeous piece on Debenhams' website. It was the exact colour I wanted it too be, not too pink, was petite-sized and had zips! (I am a little obsessed with things that have a zip at the moment haha) But it was £55...I really liked it but didn't see how I could part with that kind of money. So I decided to wait and see whether it would drop in price, and kept browsing. It so happened that one day I clicked on the bookmark I had made for this jacket (who doesn't bookmark things they love?) and Debenhams had a sale whoop! It fell to £25! You'd probably think that's not a huge fall but to me it was and I felt justified, rightly or not, in purchasing it, and I am so happy I did. It's such a great colour for the summer, and just dresses any outfit up, like any blazer would. 

So below are just a couple of snaps with the blazer on. I just finished the look off with my powder blue clutch and some strappy heels. I managed to buy them for £15, down from £30, oh yeah! In a way I wish I had purchased heels with a thinner strap as I'm not sure whether they 'cut' my ankle too drastically, but then again the gold looks quite snazzy, doesn't it? They are out of stock at the moment but I will link it down below just in case they come back into stock.

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Outfit Details:

Blazer: Debenhams

Heels: Missguided // HERE [Similar]

Skort: Missguided // HERE

Asymmetric Cami: Missguided // HERE

Clutch: New Look

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I hope you guys liked this outfit :) What are your thoughts on skorts? What are your go to summer outfits?

Enjoy the rest of your day, and have a fantastic week ahead! Take care and speak soon!

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Galvin La Chapelle Review | lifeasapetite

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This week I'm sharing another restaurant review, and this time it's another Michelin Starred one: La Chapelle. We managed to book ourselves onto Bookatable's 3 courses & a glass of brut for £29 deal. The offer is available until 31 July so if any of you fancy trying a Michelin Starred place for a reasonable price I would definitely check out these offers.

It must seem as though we are always going through bookatable, but that's because they do such amazing offers, which allows us to try so many different restaurants without breaking the bank. Of course these kind of night outs are only an occasional thing as doing this every night would probably defeat the purpose of going for offers. Anyway, enough of that and onto the review!

As always, the first thing I look out for is the decor, and my goodness is this place gorgeous! I wish I had the chance to take a decent picture of the whole place, because it was so lovely! I'm not too sure what the building was before, but it is a Grade II listed building so it has the high ceilings, medieval-styled chandeliers and just beautiful architecture. 

 

These are the type of wine glasses I would love to have in my cupboard!

These are probably the biggest olives I've ever had! Although they weren't the best ones I've tasted, they
looked good. 

When You're Handed the Wine List...

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Gosh can you believe it's June already? I hope you've all had a fantastic week! Thank you for sharing the love on my last post about my new favourite Kpop band! I'm glad you guys enjoyed it and that I welcomed some of you into that whole new world. 

A few posts back I mentioned that I would be given a voucher to review one of the products from Wrappz, a site for personalised products and here it is! I decided to use the voucher to purchase a personalise a tea towel which cost £11.45, excluding postage. The tea towel is 100% cotton, and is approximately 60cm x 50cm. 

It was one of my best friend's birthday and as a little something extra I thought I'd get her something funny. She loves homeware items but also wine so I thought rather than just getting her a bottle, I thought I'd get her something wine related as well. I just googled wine related images/quotes and 'The Wine List' (HERE) came up as a suggestion. I just thought that it was so relatable, and true which was perfect for my friend, if not a little cheeky:p But seriously, who really understands the wine list when it's handed to you? Okay, maybe I'm the only one who looks at it and goes completely blank but I still thought this was pretty awesome. 

Wrappz's website is really easy to use, and quite self explanatory. The delivery was pretty speedy and it arrived four days after ordering. The one thing I was worried about was the quality of the image. When I first uploaded 'The Wine List' image and stretched it so it filled the print area, the text came out really blurry. The website had recommended images to be at least 300dpi in resolution, but I wasn't really sure what that meant so I tried to increase the image megabyte size a bit more, however it still came out blurry. So I didn't have much expectation. When it arrived though, I was pleasantly surprised with how it turned out. You could actually read the text! So I am really happy with the product, and my best friend was thrilled as well, and thankfully she saw the funny side to it too. 

Wrappz has offered my readers two offers: (1) 20% discount anything off the site: FBFAN20, (2) and a free phone and Ipad personalised skin: FREESKIN. With Father's Day just around the corner getting him something personalised like this would be perfect.

I hope you all enjoyed this post! What do you think of personalised gifts? Do you have the same reaction/thought process when given a wine menu? 

Have a great weekend! Take care and speak soon!

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