#ValentinaFashionDesigner | Valentina Expressions

No Woman Needs To Be Told How To Wear Black | Valentina Cirasola | Designer

11 Sep 2015 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Friday Fashion Tags: #2015FallColors, #EarthToneColors, #PantoneFall2015, #ValentinaCirasolaAuthor, #ValentinaFashionDesigner, #WarmPalette

Welcome to my Friday Fashion episode.
No woman needs to be told how to wear black….. it’s all the other colors that bring doubts, confusion and chaos. Colors define a unique point of view, define personality, define the attitude of each season, provoke, demand attention, express creative moods and show off your personal style. We are connected to colors, each of our chakras hosts one color that vibrates our life and yet there are many women out there who insist on wearing black.

The color palette of fall 2015 is very warm, emulates the earth, focuses on nature’s colors and both men and women will wear it. Some people believe it is a copy of the ‘70s colors, maybe, and there is nothing wrong with that, history repeats itself with a new meaning. We are seeing Bohemian, Hippy, Global Nomads, and Gipsy style again as much as geometric asymmetrical cuts all in the name of colors of food, spices, wines, sand, earth and leaves textures.

Green in its many tints and tones appears to be a very important color for Fall 2015. It will not be conceived as military-style only. Forest, Olive, Stormy Weather, Desert Sage and Dried Herb will go so well with Oak Buff, Cadmium Orange and especially Marsala. If you feel good combining Cadmium Orange with Marsala, do it, show off your style.

Here it is my combination of only four colors and the various solutions possible with them.

With all these colors available to us, we have no need to wear all that black anymore. It’s so ’90s and so “end of an era”. In this millennium we became more aware of our environment and we want to protect it. We got closer to earth and natural food, both essences for our well-being. In some ways, we are only expressing these new feelings with the colors nature offers to us.

Need a color consultation? I am always ready and prompt to answer any of your challenges. Ciao,
Valentina
https://valentinadesigns.com/services#fashion-services

Valentina Cirasola is a trained Fashion and Interior Designer, born in Italy in a family of artists. Style surrounded her since the beginning of her life. Her many years of experience led her to offer consultations in both specializations and now she can remodel homes as well as personal images. To better help people in the world, she offers consultations online. She is the author of three books. Get your copy of Valentina’s book on colors: ©RED-A Voyage Into Colors on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/qNxXrB
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

Thinking of Creole | Valentina Cirasola | Designer

21 Aug 2015 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Friday Fashion Tags: #CreoleFashion, #EthnicFabrics, #EthnicFashion, #StellaJean2014FallFashion, #StellaJeanFashion, #ValentinaExpressionsEtsy, #ValentinaFashionDesigner

Welcome to my Friday Fashion.
Blending cultures, flavors, colors, continents, new and old in a feminine way is the kind of fashion style most suitable for me. I feel comfortable in tight pencil skirts with large prints and oversize ethnic jacket. I also feel to carry well extravagant pieces such as this beaded collier I just made for my Etsy store https://www.etsy.com/shop/ValentinaExpressions – Vibrant colors and mixing patterns is something I do very well in both my fashion and home interior design work.

Why am I attracted to ethnic fabrics? I come from an ancient rustic, rustic land, rugged nature and homemade food. The people of my land weave palm leaves and baskets by hands, carry food wrapped in large hand weaved napkins, recycle fabric of outdated clothes into a new piece of clothing, or reuse it as a dust rag and hang colorful clothes on the balcony. I am attracted to folk music and to everything that vibrates history.

I find so much inspiration in the Stella Jean’s fashion collection. Originally from Haiti, the first independent black republic in the world with its history embedded in West Africa, Stella Jean now lives in Milan. She mixes the fabrics of villages in Ethiopia, Ghana, Haiti, Kenya and Mali with Italian tailored style and creates unique, sensual elegance without being ostentatious nor ridiculous.

Stella Jean participates since 2013 in the Ethical Fashion Initiative that allows artisans living in urban districts and rural poor to take control over their lives and change them for the better. She works with artisans from all over the world, encouraging a fashion without borders and against colonization. With her work, she re-establish equilibrium between stories of different worlds through the use of symbols of the various cultures.

Fabrics, decorations or finished products made by some of the most talented artisans in the world compose Stella Jean’s fashion collection: hand-woven textiles from Burkina Faso, hand-dyed fabrics from Mali, leather bags from Ethiopia and custom jewelry from Haiti. This is a great mix of colors and arts from various cultures that hardly will go out of style in six months.
This ethnic fashion remains fresh throughout the years and I believe we need at least one piece in our wardrobe to make a statement. Ciao,
Valentina
https://valentinadesigns.com/services#fashion-services

It Is Not The Hawaiian Leis | Valentina Cirasola | Designer

14 Aug 2015 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Friday Fashion Tags: #CoralNecklace, #FashionJewelry, #RedVoyageIntoColors, #SummerJewelry, #ValentinaFashionDesigner, #VintageBrooch, #VintageFashionAccessories

Welcome to my Friday Fashion episode.
In Chinatown I feel like a kid in a town fair. Colors, especially the color red and gold burst from pillar to post, pungent food smell comes out of every restaurant, some food do not appeal to my nose, but that’s OK, I don’t have to eat everything I see. Chinese people are very laborious, I can feel the hustle and bustle of Chinatown. Shops are full of tchotchke, trinkets and ornaments for tourists the same everywhere competing with one another. It is common to find food, fashion items and home cleaning utensils sharing the space in the same store. Once every ten shops, one might find a special shop with upscale merchandise, original fashion and attractive one of a kind items.

In a jewelry shop, I found this coral necklace. It is double the length you see in the photo. I bought it out of impulse, the light of the store was so vivid that made every piece of jewelry bright and shiny, but when I brought it home I realized the colors did not suit my face and it looked too much like a Hawaiian flower leis, the kind of garland tourists receive as a sign of welcome or farewell. I had the idea to combine it with something else in a treasure chest. Vintage brooches and flowers pins fixed the look of this necklace to my liking. Now, I wear it wrapped around the neck twice and I attach the brooches or the flower as a pendant depending on the time of the day and the season.

Buying on impulse often is a waste of money if nothing else can be done to alter the piece to your liking and most certainly that piece will end up in the landfill, or in the closet contributing to the expansion of clutter. Knowing our body shape and the colors that complement our skin tone will reduce or totally stop the temptation of buying on impulse. In my case, since I collect many fashion items of interest, I can mix and match easily and I am able to turn things around to make them into something else. I keep my seamstress at work and happy.

Now, go to your wardrobe and pull out some items, clothes or jewelry you don’t like much. Can you change the look by pairing it with something else, or detract something from it? If you are in doubt and before discarding any piece call the expert stylist. I am always available for consultation in person and online. Ciao,
Valentina
https://valentinadesigns.com/services#fashion-services

Valentina Cirasola is a trained Fashion and Interior Designer, born in Italy in a family of artists. Style surrounded her since the beginning of her life. Her many years of experience led her to offer consultations in both specializations and now she can remodel homes as well as personal images. To better help people in the world she offers consultations online. She is the author of three books. Get your copy of Valentina’s book on colors: ©RED-A Voyage Into Colors on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/xUZfk0
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

Can’t Come In With Palazzo Pants | Valentina Cirasola | Designer

27 Jun 2015 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Friday Fashion Tags: #PalazzoPants, #RedVoyageIntoColors, #SummerPants, #ValentinaCirasolaAuthor, #ValentinaFashionDesigner

Welcome to my Friday Fashion episode.

They are colorful, fun and easy to wear, they flow as you walk and they have a cooling effect in the summer, they are the palazzo pants. Palazzo pants became a popular trend in the late 1960s and early 1970s, now back in fashion more than 50 years later. New ideas in fashion are never really new, they have lived somewhere in different times, in fact, Katharine Hepburn, Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich in the ‘30s and ‘40s were the first actresses to wear men style wide-legged cuffed trousers. However, even if in many ways pants have liberated women from cumbersome garments and made easier for women to climb on horses or go in and out of cars, there has been a time, only 50 years ago, when women could not enter an upscale restaurant dressed in trousers, they were considered inappropriate garment for the evening.

Palazzo pants came to solve that problem, as they flare out from the waist to the ankle and look very much like a long skirt when the woman is standing still.

(photo courtesy of Boston Proper.com)

Palazzo pants are perfect for the tall, slender woman. Due to the tube-like shape top and bottom, this kind of pants is becoming on a person with large hips, helping re-balancing the figure and putting it in proportions with the rest of the body. It is not perfect for the short and stocky woman, even if she is on high hills. The choice is yours. Ciao,
Valentina
https://valentinadesigns.com/services#fashion-services

Valentina Cirasola is a trained Fashion and Interior Designer, born in Italy in a family of artists. Style surrounded her since the beginning of her life. Her many years of experience led her to offer consultations in both specializations and now she can remodel homes as well as personal images. To better help people in the world she offers consultations online. She is the author of three books. Get your copy of Valentina’s book on colors: ©RED-A Voyage Into Colors on
Amazon: http://goo.gl/qNxXrB
Barnes&Nobles: http://goo.gl/q7dQ3w

Hello World! | Valentina Cirasola | Interior Designer

11 Jan 2010 Leave a comment

by Valentina in Home Designs Master Tags: #DecoratingTips, #HomeStyle, #HomeTrend, #HowToUseColors, #InteriorDesign, #ValentinaFashionDesigner, #ValentinaInteriorsDesigns

Hello World, Happy New Year and Happy New You!
The festivities are over, guests are gone, the Christmas decorations are gone and left a hollow space, outside is kind of cold and grey. How do we pick a cheerful mood again? Redecorate and make any space, or the entire home ready for the Spring. Now, is the perfect time to get rid of all those items that have occupied a space in your home for a long time and donate them.
Redefine conversation areas with a new throw rug and colorful pillows on the seating. Reupholster a sofa, or chairs in a new fabric and give them a new life. Rearrange and rotate all of your art work on the walls. When you take out art work that has been in the closet for a while, it looks new and interesting again, but if you really don’t like it anymore, refresh, free your closets from clutter and donate.

Refresh the walls by painting them with vivid and cheerful colors welcoming the Spring. Rotate your furniture too and pick up chairs and accessories from other rooms to mix and match as you like. Rooms don’t have to look the same year after year. By doing this, you create a flow of positive energy in your home.

Add fresh flowers in each room and plant cooking spices that you can keep in pots inside the kitchen window and use them for a new fresh cooking style.
Clean all your windows inside and out and wash the curtains.
Decorate your front door landing with a variety of new pots for new plants and garden ornaments.
Reclaim dead spaces. If you need more storage space in your home, there are many areas people don’t think of using.
For example, the part underneath a stair case can be filled with shelves and drawers, add decorative doors in the front and you have an attractive storage room that now has become an integral part of the room.

Bookshelf spaces of 6″ to 8″ can be created all around doors. I love to see books in every corner of the house, I place them everywhere, not just in the library room.
The space under a window can be used to create a built-in banquette seat with storage capacity inside for blankets, toys and sport gears. Fill the top of the banquette with decorative pillows and nobody will ever know what’s inside.
Clean and polish all your shoes, why? They look good and it is a new year!
What I am saying is, celebrate every day of your life, not just December with all the Christmas lights, glitters and decorations. Every day is equally precious.

Please forward this article to anyone you think might be interested in reading it and let me know what you think by leaving a comment below. Thank you.

Valentina
Interior Designer
Website: www.Valentinadesigns.com

Valentina Cirasola is an Italian Interior and Fashion Designer, working in the USA and Europe. She combines well fashion and interior in any of her design work. She loves to remodel homes and loves to turn unattractive spaces into castles.
Fashion designing has been her first career choice that made her happy in her own company for fifteen years.
Author of the book: ©Come Mia Nonna–A Return to Simplicity
Booksite: outskirtspress.com/ComeMiaNonna
Author of the forthcoming book on the subject of Colors