rose crown

I bought some fake black roses and affixed them to a headband. That is all.

..

.

that photo of me freaks me out because I'm getting a definite Noel Fielding vibe off of it

SAVILIUM ROSACEAE

INCOCTUS ET FRIGIDUS

Cold and stormy roses, translated into the beauty that is a raw cheesecake. I couldn't help myself. It's mid-May and already 100 degrees. All the foliage is dying, exceptionally battered by a strange thunderstorm that swept through the central valley a week ago.

Savilium is one of the names for an ancient Roman cheesecake; rosaceae is the rose family name. Incoctus is uncooked and frigidus is, well, frigid--frozen, that is. While this cheesecake is a far cry from the traditional cake laden with cheese and sugars and flours, it retains the decadence with sweet medjool dates, spangled raw honey, and ends with the subtle wash of roses in full bloom.

This recipe makes enough for one 6" round, and takes about 8 hours between soaking & chilling times, so do plan ahead on this one. It can be made vegan by substituting the raw honey for a sweetener of your choice. A springform or tarte pan is highly recommended.

It is worth noting that the rose extract used in this recipe is not rose essential oil, or rose perfume oil, but culinary rose extract. I purchased mine from Sur La Table.

 SAVILIUM ROSACEAE
❦

for the crust: 

1/2 cup pecans

6 medjool dates

dash of salt

for the filling:

1 1/2 cups cashews, soaked for at least 4 hours

4 tablespoons of coconut oil (melted)

juice of one lime

4 tablespoons of raw honey

1/2 tsp rose extract

1 tsp vanilla extract

pinch of salt

1. Line your pan with parchment paper. Blend the pecans, dates, and salt together in a food processor until a sticky crust forms (this should take about a minute). Press into the bottom of the pan and freeze for two hours.

2. For the filling, blend all filling ingredients together in a food processor (or blender) until smooth. (I made the error of doing this at 3am while the rest of my family slept, and didn't get to blend until perfectly smooth, for fear of the noise waking anyone up. Yours will hopefully will turn out better than mine.)

3. Pour filling into the pan & spread until smooth. Freeze overnight, of for a few hours until firm. To extract from the pan, place it in a hot water bath for just under a minute. Serve by slicing with a warm knife, and enjoy.

COMING SOON: OUR QUEEN MILK

OUR QUEEN MILK

a collection

features the pieces 

HIS SOUL'S WORTH WAS MEASURED IN SECONDS TO IMPACT - a heady, irreverent, figurative mash up, co-written by Fritz Bogott 

OUR QUEEN MILK - a cobweb. A PLANTED SEED (the boys) HOW TO CUT (the girl) LAMBSKIN (the queen, the king) and AN ETERNAL GRAVE (the newlyweds) 

WHY AREN'T YOU IN THE ARMS OF YOUR DEAD LOVER? - a cornucopia of age-old smut, dripping mimosas and bats that can't relate to the bottom of the well 

CRYPTID PERSONALS - a decaying love poem under the powder of new snow

OUR QUEEN MILK is 64 luxurious, dove grey linen pages, with 18 b&w illustrations. Hand bound, signed & numbered, softcover, with one special edition hand embroidered hardcover.

please note, content and illustrations are of a certain 18+ nature. a vine preview of the test print can be viewed here.

run count of books and price are forthcoming

projected run of no more than 20 ; projected price ~ $25

expected release in June/July 2013

☓ you are a king reptile ☓

THE 1660

Oh I really wish having these photos meant that the entire ensemble was done.

My mother took these photos of me in my 90% finished 1660s gown, and as you can see, we had some difficulty coordinating her taking photos and me not moving, so every last one of them came out with all of me or some of me blurry. But they'll have to do.

The skirt was originally about an 1.5" too big at the waist, and so today I unpicked the waistband and removed the ties and redid it, and evidently made it too small. That, and the fact that I don't have a quilted petticoat for this yet, are the only "unfinished" bits of the outfit.

My jewellery isn't quite spot on either, but that was all I had. ALSO NO I did not do my hair for this, this is just how I wear it when I'm at home. (Maybe you can tell the sides are shaved?)



The neckline of the shift I think is a bit too big, since it wants to gather and doesn't really lay correctly. The opening of the bodice requires a great number of pins to keep it somewhat flat, and even then they like to pop out. Also, I can't really move my arms, so the wearability of this dress is very low, and it's insanely impractical for doing anything in.

But of course I still love it. Well, frankly, I'm rather thrilled about the whole thing & couldn't care less about the imperfections.

My post-1680s shoes with fake buckles (the shoelaces are laced through the backs of the buckles to keep them on.) I'm wearing my silk stockings from American Duchess, which are still white, and I still have plans to natural dye them some sort of greenish-yellow colour.

Even though it has minor shortcomings, I'm very very pleased with it, and wish I had somewhere to wear it.

[I am aware that the Gala at Costume College this year is 17th century, but you're looking at one very very poor person here]

The bodice is fully boned with cane, mostly machine sewn, with hand sewn sleeves, trimmed in silk ribbon & metallic lace from Britex Fabrics (who have amazing customer service). It laces up the front with 28 hand whipped eyelets. Made of a golden-mustard satin (of some sort) and sewn in Gutterman linen thread.

The shift is made from some off-white linen of a rather rough weave which was given to me. It is entirely hand sewn with flat-felled seams. It was patterned by myself.

The skirt is entirely hand sewn, patterned by myself, and gathered with knife pleats.

If you'd like to view the making-of posts, just click on "the sixteen-sixty" tag at the bottom of the post. Overall, I worked on it (off and on, but mostly off) for a total of seven months. Since all the fabric was given to me, and I used cane from my stash, I only had to buy thread & trim, which made the final cost of the dress about $35.

THE 1660s, GENTLY FINISHED

"Gently finished" is just a nice way of saying "not really finished."

The bodice I finished (yes, fully!) yesterday after putting maybe about 7 more hours of work on it that day and the day before. I finally got the bottom tabs trimmed, and put cuff (cuff things) on the sleeves.

I thought I had an old skirt from a nonsense thing I made back in high school that I could wear with the bodice to take photos with, just to show what it ought to look like, but it disappeared or I cut it up to use the fabric for mock ups...

So excuse the bodice being worn with leggings.

this is my favourite part, really, all those amazing pleats and that strange, lustrous, enchanting armcye shape

As you can see in the photos, the front doesn't like staying closed. I've taken to sticking about 9 pins in the front to keep it somewhat closed, but it's never going to lie perfectly flat.

The skirt is where we get the "gently finished" going. It's not hemmed, and the waist is evidently a bit too large, since there's a lot of slipping down going on. So I get to unpick the waistband (AWESOME) and put some extra pleats in there.

In one of my older in-progress posts on this outfit, I had mentioned that I was going to make the skirt out of a light blue satin (there's a picture of it towards the end of the post), but I changed my mind and went with this amazing peacock blue satin. Paired with the golden bodice (the webcam really doesn't pick up its colour well) it's got a very strong Vermeer vibe going on, which pleases me.

The fabric was about 48" wide and I only had 99" inches of it, so I used every inch of fabric I had on the bolt. The Dreamstress in her post on the skirt for her 17th century dress mentions that skirts of the era were somewhere around 115"-150", but as she rationalized sizing hers up a bit (she went with 150") to translate to a more modern figure, I rationalized keeping mine a bit smaller, since, well, I am a very small person. And besides, I wanted to use this fabric. So I did.

As you can probably tell, I don't have undergarments for this yet. I might tackle the quilted petticoat before I go into attempting a shift again (I'm still slightly confused about how to do flat felled seams that connect/intersect, so shift gores are very daunting) and since the quilted petticoat I started last september I just know is too big/heavy/bulky, I'm going to just start a new one. That I know I can find cotton & batting for already in my stash. However, I don't have any linen for the shift. And I'm torn between being way way way too poor to buy linen for an outfit I'm probably never going to wear (other than a photoshoot maybe) and wanting it to be historically accurate and, well, breathable and comfortable.

We'll see what happens.

(I'll probably give in and buy some linen. And then cry later because I'm so so poor and have no idea where my money goes

It's on stuff like this you idiot)

BONUS WEIRD PICTURE:

Me and my (new!) cat Lily, waiting for Vermeer to paint us, since we're both so, uh, beautiful.

BLUTSAUGER

B L V T S A V G E R

self

03.25.13, 10:12 PM

aged 23 years, 5 months and 16 days

MIX : EMPIRES, the REVENANT

:EMPIRES: from bathhouse on 8tracks Radio.

novel mix for the work in progress

ZEUS GRANTS STUPID WISHES

The fruits of last winter + spring's labours have finally manifested in print form! I've been long working with Cory of Myths RETOLD! genius, and when he got a book deal, I got an illustration job.

With Penguin.

So, it's a very big deal, and the book is so so lovely and it's amazing to finally see it.

It comes out on March 5th and is available to preorder now. You can find links to purchase, and a bit about it, on the Myths RETOLD! site.

UPDATE:

here's a photo of me with the book in our local Barnes & Noble!

TAROT.TWO

the hanged man / ten of swords

An art trade with Roberto Faust, ie @BILGERVTI, resulted in these two tarot cards. He either has very good taste, or purposefully picked two which synced up with my love of drawing male nudes and swords. Either way, it was a great project to get myself to do something outside of myself (er, like an assignment I guess) and I enjoyed it quite a lot. 

Also you should totally check out his work on instagram because he draws, like, literally perfect flash. (The piece he drew for me is the witchy hand with "CORPSEHANDS" written in runes above it!)

THE PERFECT SHIRT FOR THE GOTH INTO 90S BRITPOP

I felt it was time for more imaginary shopping, so I headed over to Topshop dot com and... this:

Yeah I screamed about it on twitter. I mean, it's only a Blur shirt, which happens to be black, which basically makes it the perfect shirt for the goth into 90s britpop.

Here's hoping I get one of my paychecks soon.

As for the rest of the shopping: 

this photo is super misleading cause alex james is currently not available for purchase through Topshop

The thing about living in central california is, well, it may be february still, and it may have snowed at my house a few days ago, but the summers here are so long, and so intense, that you have to start thinking about them well in advance. Maybe it's just a coping mechanism. Or maybe because, as someone that doesn't wear colour anymore (I'm really hesitant to call myself goth because that brings to mind horrible memories of high school hot topic goths in bondage pants), it's really really difficult to wear clothes and look okay/feel comfortable with yourself emotionally in the summer.

So I have to start planning now.

And my main planning is sandals. Other than that, I really don't know how to address my summer wardrobe. I have my black milk ribs swimsuit which I suspect I will be trying to pass off as an outfit in some capacity via sheer layering and more sheer layering and wearing it as a top... all much to my mother's disdain.

But the rest I suppose... ah, it's a mish-mash.

THE SHOES

Menswear will never not be a trend for me--IT'S A WAY OF LIFE--especially when it comes to shoes. And I like both of these--and suspect that the woven sandals would be really easy to find at Target or something. Of course, it's the pointed toes & ankle buckle sandals which are my favourite (obviously they're the more expensive of the pair) and true, ankel buckles will cut off your legs and I'm already really short but then idgaf because I just wanna be a cool goth boy in the hot hot summers.

THAT SWEATER

Man I still do not have a black knit sweater, and this one is good because it is both of those things, and cropped. Which is brilliant for my really shortness, which a normal-sized sweater (OR DEAR GOD ANYTHING OVERSIZED) makes look downright frumpy. Not drapey chic hanging-out-in-your-boyfriend's-shirt, but like, I look like a potato.

So, this sweater. It would be good for me.

SOCKS, MAN

Freak yeah I like socks. The only colour I wear is socks, actually! I know! How cool!

But these printed ones are like crazy are good, and the NEON GREEN FISHNETTY ONES, both of which would be lovely giving that gap between jeans & moto boots a hint of colour.

I know, I'm starting to sound like a fashun mag. 

FREAKING EARRINGS THAT UNDERSTAND ME & MY NEEDS

Put this under Things I Have Ranted About On Twitter Countless Times: how no one really understands 'chandelier' or 'duster' when it comes to 'earrings'. Like seriously,  have you been on the internet looking for these things? TWO INCHES AIN'T GONNA BE DUSTIN NOTHING, Y'ALL. 

Sadly, these earrings are still $25 on sale (and that's half off!) and also the photo wouldn't load so idk I just took a screenshot.

But man, Topshop representing a girl's needs. The need to be dusted by her own earrings. MAN I TELL YOU.

MAKE UP BRUSHES (ANY REALLY)

Cause like ugh my face.

AND THEN ALEX JAMES

cheese

ROMANTICISM / MYSTICISM

In quick summation, I have arrived at the point of studying the Gothic fiction movement--one of the finer points of the Romanticism movement. In high school, when I was writing my first few novels, I knew that I had a Romanticism bent, but now having gone through a few different phases of writing, and now studying Gothicism, I can confirm that, if I belong to any genre at all, or if my aims and view of fiction can be tied down to anything, it is the Gothic.

From Montague Summers' The Gothic Quest - A History of the Gothic Novel:

Romanticism is, in effect, a supernaturalism, and the highest form of Romanticism, in its purest and best endeavour, raised upwards to the sublime, is Mysticism. Indeed some definitions of Mysticism would well night serve for Romanticism, although of course we have passed from literature to an even higher sphere. Von Hartmann, however, extends the name of mystic to "eminent art-geniuses who owe their productions to inspirations of genius, and not to the work of their consciousness, eg Phidias, Æschylus, Raphael, Beethoven," since "Mysticism is the filling of the consciousness with content (feeling, though, desire), by an involuntary emergence of the same out of the unconscious." Bouchitté pregnantly observes: "Mysticism consists in giving to the spontaneity of the intelligence as a large part than to the other faculties." Dean Inge has a very striking and pertinent passage: "The phase of thought or feeling which we call Mysticism has its origin in that which is the raw material of all religion, and perhaps of all philosophy and art as well, namely, that dim consciousness of the beyond, which is part of our nature as human beings." 

Romanticism is literary Mysticism.

The point of a creative work being the result of inspiration as opposed to an effort of consciousness holds very true for me, as I can't write anything "on demand"--when I do, or when I try to force any part of a narrative, it's horrible, lifeless, and confused.

My creative life, then, is mostly waiting to have dreams.

And once I have that framework, I can write.

And it is a kind of mystic thing.

IN CIRCLES

I don't blog a lot about fashion here, but dressing strangely and slightly subversively has always been a huge part of who I am. 2013 might be the year I go into fashion blogging ("fashun blogging"), and in meditation of this, I've put together some of my favourite "fashionable" people. Of course, day to day I wear loungewear because I work from home ("work from home") and don't have a lot of places to go. And when I do go out, it's a bit more Rick Owens than, say, Kevin Barnes as Georgie Fruit or Björk in her swan dress.

But slowly these black-drapey-layers-of-goth are merging with the glittery opulence of my favourites. 

We're getting there.

KEVIN BARNES

(of Montreal)

good prints, good faux-jabot shirts, and (out of shot) good leggings

good poses

the best & most beautiful glitter make up 

good horses

THE GORILLAZ

lanky legs, rolled up jeans, motorcycle boots, jackets and patches

also, not real

skulls, capes & lucky lungs

difficult to replicate within reason: not having your two front teeth

hand with the rising thumb, I < 3 YOKO, hip hoop, virus T, 23, olympic smoker

NOEL FIELDING

(the finer half of the Goth Detectives)

good hair, beautiful hair, loves his hair

GOOD SHOES except I was too lazy to find a good photo

(winklepickers, chelsea boots, e t c)

makes a very good Vlad Dracula

and of course

BJÖRK

UNTITLED NUDE #2 (MAYBE?)

Who knows if that 'title' is taken yet or not--I have so many nude guys just hanging around it's really difficult to keep track of them anymore.

But, so, I was sharing some art links with someone on twitter and realised that I never scanned this painting once it had been finished (which was sometime last spring.)

So here it is, the second woodblock nude.

roughly 5.25" x 3.5" 

on oak (I think)

[if you want to see the other woodblock nudes, just click on the tag at the bottom of the post]

HOW TO WRITE A BOOK IN FIVE EASY STEPS

I hate writing advice. writing advice is shit and poison because it almost always tries to make you write like someone else.

[ie the big headed person who wrote the advice]

you're the only person that can teach you how to write

I'm not saying these are "principles" instead of "rules"

[insert joke from Adaptation. about McKee's 10 commandments]

and I'm not saying these will work for everyone, let alone anyone

but this is what I know

which is very little

because the more I write

the less I know about writing as a whole

because everything is different

and everything is its own being

but not in a new-agey way

like your stupid book doesn't have a soul

your characters aren't your children

they don't have "minds of their own"

get over yourself

it's just a bunch of words.

I've written eight books, and half of them have been bad

because I was trying to write like other people

instead of writing like myself.

this is how to write a book

in five easy steps:

1. STEAL

from your real life

put in that thing

you noticed about bananas 

from this morning

it will feel more true

than anything you could've come up with

from filling out a character chart

or making up backstories 

of childhoods

that were never lived

2. DON'T TRY

too hard

to be perfect

don't try

to write like anyone else.

when you do try 

be okay with failing

a lot

especially at first

be really bad at writing for a while

and don't beat yourself up

be okay at writing for a while

and don't beat yourself up

be better at writing for a while

and still don't beat yourself up 

because it's not perfect

(it will never be perfect)

don't try

to be perfect

or anyone else

or anything that isn't you

3. BE SELFISH

it's your fucking book

it's not anyone else's fucking book

anything done with real passion is admirable

and inspiring

or at least infectious

and if you want to write about moths for 12 pages

write about moths for 12 pages

write about their beauty

and your fascination

with the slow palpitation of their wings

moving like 

bellows

and how when they die

they become so fragile

and if someone says that you shouldn't write 12 pages about moths becuase no one will read it

it's their problem

not yours

and they can go write a shitty book not about moths if they want to.

it's your book

fill it with your unembarrassed passions

(or even 

your embarrassed passions)

just remember--

be selfish

and write for the you that is not the name 

your parents gave you

or the one you gave you;

your twitter handle,

your pseudonym,

your "platform",

or the you 

that your friends think you are

be selfish 

and write about what you see

in your daydreams

4. WANT

you know how boredom happens?

it's becuase there's nothing you want

either to do

or eat

or watch

or read

or listen to

or make

but

when you want to kiss someone

when you want to paint something

when you want to learn a new language

when you want to read your favourite book again

when you want to grow your own herbs to make the perfect pesto

life becomes exciting again

you have purpose

even if it is fleeting

and it will carry you to somewhere else in time

where there will be a new want

which will carry you somewhere else again…

books are exactly the same

art is like life / life is like art

and the people in books need wants too

otherwise they get the same sunday blues you do

wandering around the house in the afternoon

lounging on the bed

bored

to

death

and boredom--like passion--is infectious

and you will bore yourself with your book

and you will bore everyone that may someday read your book

humans are kind of dumb

we want to want things

(even little things)

because it feels like purpose

5. YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE TO LISTEN

to your own rules

see

I don't have a fifth point

what the hell do I know

(F)ART DUMP

You guys, art is such a racket.

this one's also up on paulie's blog. but I like it so much that I'm putting it here as well.

I just. drew. a bunch of nonsense. and changed the colours all around and fiddled with layer types until it was cool and weird and too colourful and busy and it pleases me with its lo-fi saturation and hellfires.

and more of my rather mediocre & boring digital painting

it'd be nice if I could combine the two of these styles.

I might just go nuts on this second one.

sometimes I care too much.

EDIT:

I drew some nonsense over it, and it feels better.

also, there's this in-progress screencap I forgot about, which is a bit cool cause it's so pale and eerie: