29/03/2014

Redecorating My Room: Part 1

About a month ago, I decided I had to change some things in my room. My bedroom probably is my favourite place in the entire world, but I felt like I could organize it a little bit better: I only come back home every two weeks and to find a pretty, tidy room is the best feeling ever for me. I need a cute little space to study and relax in, since life in Rome is so stressful.  
As soon as I was finished with my exams mid-February, I took a morning off from everything and give my bedroom a little restyling - hopefully it will inspire you to do the same :) 

bedroom decor

I liked how my books were organized before, but I was running out of space - if I had bought one  more book, I probably wouldn't have known where to put it. They were stacked two deep, so they were often hard to find. I decided to move them to a set of shelves that were already on another wall of the room (blog post coming on that soon!) and move the content that was there to these ones. Much more organized, huh?

bedroom decor

On the first shelves I put two Glossybox boxes where I store little bits and pieces, a Starbucks cup full of little memories and covered them with two pretty flower crowns I made a few years ago. On the background you can see a portrait of myself when I was 10, taking part in a rhythmic gymnastic competition :) I know I could fit so much more on this shelf, but it looks nice as it is, so I am probably going to leave it like that for now. 

bedroom decor

The next shelf is another pretty useless one, but at least it's nice to look at! I have a LadurĂ©e recipe book there, together with a LadurĂ©e tea box and a simple embroidery work I did during the Winter holidays. I love keeping a few quotes here and there in my bedroom - it's the place where I spend the most time when I'm at home, and they keep me motivated :) 

bedroom decor

The fourth shelf I left as it was before, with my foreign fashion magazine collection. I like how the white spines look together! The next shelf is filled with cardboard magazine organizers, in which I keep extra stationery, binders etc. I picked two packs of IKEA Flyt magazine files for super cheap, covered them with brown paper, glued some string around them and tied a little bow in the front. It took a few hours to do the whole process, but I couldn't be happier of how they turned out!

bedroom decor

I didn't make any change to this corner of my room, but I wanted to show it to you anyway :) I like to pick flowers from places where I go on holiday to, let them dry in a book and frame some of them. These, in particular, I picked from Sicily and Greece ♥

I hope you enjoyed this little peek at my room, and that you can take some inspiration from it. I believe that improving in the space you live in always has positive consequences! 

22/03/2014

A KIKO Combo

 kiko nail polish

After a long, long time, last week I went into KIKO and got out of the shop with two nail polishes. I hadn't bought any nail polish from the brand in such a long time, mainly because I had this idea of KIKO nail polishes being goopy and taking ages to dry up. And if you have been shopping at KIKO since they opened, you know what I'm talking about!
However, I decided to give their nail polish range a chance again and picked up #372 Nude and #215 Pearly Light Pink. The best part about KIKO is that they have such a huge variety of shades of every product, but surprisingly it was easy to choose only two nail polishes: I'm always on the hunt for new pretty nude shades! 

#372 Nude is a very close dupe to my favourite nail polish ever, Essie Sand Tropez - that's the reason I picked it in the first place! They look almost identical, but KIKO Nude is just a tad more pink. In some lights it looks more like a a pastel pink rather than a light beige.
Thankfully, the formulation has changed since I first tried KIKO nail polishes years ago: the formula is creamy and opaque, just a little bit streaky but nothing that can't be fixed; it also dries up fairly quickly. Unfortunately, it doesn't have the best wearing power: it doesn't chip, but it starts to show tip wear in only about two days. 

The other nail polish I got is #215 Pearly Light Pink, which I'm absolutely in love with! It's a very light almost white pink shade with a pearlescent finish - it looks very much like mother of pearl, which is exactly the reason why I got it. I love that it's opaque in two coats - these kind of shades are often very sheer. I think I will get a lot of use out of it in the Summertime :)

What do you think about KIKO nail polishes? Have you ever tried them?