My Fashion Haus: Style Imitating Art, “Monkey”

Sweet fashionistas,

Curled up in my daughter’s guest bedroom tonight listening to the rain outside my window.  PC reports we had rain and quarter-sized hail at home tonight, too.   I’m sure our plants and our yard are delighting in the rain as much as we are.

Joining some librarian friends for their Style Imitating Art or SIA post.  It’s been awhile since I last participated in a Style Imitating Art round up.  In fact, almost a year ago when I put together this outfit interpretation of the curated piece, a GIF called “On the Road”.  These posts are always fun and encourage me to be more creative.

Style Imitating Art, “Monkey”

This month’s art was curated by my friend Daenel at Living Outside the Stacks.  This color lithograph print is entitled “Monkey”, from the “Quadrupeds” series (N41).  And was used for an advertisement for Allen & Ginter Cigarettes in 1890.

Would never have guessed that this print was from a set of cards used to advertised cigarettes.  Nothing about the art screams ‘smoking’ or tobacco to me!  Unless, somehow, they are suggesting that smoking their product makes you feel like you are on a rain forest holiday.  Or makes you feel like a monkey, bird or coconut.  I can be dense at times.  Like all of those wonderful Super Bowl ads?  Half the time, I can’t figure out what they are selling, either.

My SIA Interpretation Outfit

The colors of this piece are what caught my attention first. And then maybe the laid back feel of setting.  I remembered my years in Panama, weekends at the beach, snuggled up with the girls in a hammock.  The sounds of the rain forest animals, the smell of incredible humidity and impending rain.  The coco and fried fish vendors setting up make shift booths to sell their wares on the beach.

My soft yellow brushed twill pants seemed like the perfect piece to build my outfit around.  With them, I paired a floral sleeveless blouse in olive, dark green, white and that same duckling color and olive loafers.  Chose some chandelier earrings that reminded me of a wind chime in their shape.  And for kicks, grabbed my Curious George or maybe more appropriately, my Jorge Curioso and a banana to complete the look.

My pants and top are from Loft Outlet.  The shoes are Limelight loafers from Rack Room.  Had fun putting together some similar pieces below.  I love that tunic from Lily.  It has an English garden feel to me.  And those banana earrings would have been a fun accessory for my outfit.

Somehow I managed to set a timer for this next photo and completely cut off ole Jorge monkey and most of my head.  But my neck looks pretty good so decided to go with it.  You know what my face looks like already, right?

Maybe I could photoshop the photo below onto the photo above?

Nah, proportion doesn’t seem quite right for that. Oh, well.  Now that you’ve seen my Style Imitating Art-inspired outfit, won’t you swing over to Daenel’s to see what she came up with?

Your Turn

If you’ve been moved to put together your own look for today’s prompt, be sure to tell me about it below and then send a photo of your outfit to Daenel at livingoutsidethestacks@gmail.com by 10 pm EST, 05.22, to be featured with everyone else for Wednesday’s round up post.  Hope to see you there!!

You know, I was thinking that I didn’t incorporate the turquoise blue or the berry red colors of the lithograph into my look.  Think I focused on the green because…well, green is the best color in the world.  So can we just say that my eye color and LipSense shade represent the turquoise and berry?  Quite by accident!  Linking up this bit of silliness with my seriously fashionable friends, Laura at I do deClaire, Carrie at Curly Crafty Mom and Jennie at A Pocketful of Polka Dots.

Thank you, sugar plums, for stopping by and indulging my monkey-ing around!

Hugs and kisses,