Shirt – COS mens. Skirt – Topshop. Boots – Russell & Bromley ‘Outlander’. Sunnies – Blyszak

Puffer coat – WAVEN. Turtleneck – Uniqlo. Boots – Russell & Bromley.

I’ve always lived close to children. Well, doesn’t this sound wrong, let me start this sentence again.

London is littered with schools everywhere, and one cannot avoid living away from a school unless one owns a farm or lives inside a Sainsbury’s car park. In all of my seven apartments in the past ten years, our windows would immediately face onto nursery school playgrounds (which at any given time resemble a Ryanair plane-full of devil babies), ‘meet-me-by-the-bike-sheds’ bike sheds, and music rooms inhabited – every Mondays and Wednesdays – by not-very-musically-gifted sixth form kids. The noise was unbearable at first, but funnily after a while it became white noise that I needed in order to get about my day.

Now, hearing kids spilling out of the 336 bus, rumbling on about homework and Snapchat at 8:05AM is my cue for that first cup of coffee, and the school chime (in England there are no bells to be saved by apparently) is my green light for a cheeky mid-afternoon snack. This borrowed Back to School routine has never been more reassuring post-fashion month (DECADE, I swear). Here’s a digital spritz of L’Eau de Box of Crayons and some primary colours by way of Russell & Bromley Autumn picks to lure them kids into throwing a Haribo or two into our office windows.

The thing about being a crippling introvert, especially when your two out of three words in your unofficial (cringe) job title is ‘social’ and ‘influencer’ (heck even ‘media’ is a plural, SAVE ME), is that you don’t really have friends. By friends I don’t mean the people you hang out with because they look good on your Instagram feed (same logic applies to ordering photogenic food that you hate eating, like muesli – what am I, a bird?), it’s people who actually listen to your nerdery (?), like explaining the difference between Windows 8 and Windows 10 (and why there is no Windows 9* **).

This very blog is the realization that, for the past seven-going-on-eight years, I’ve been looking inwards and playing in front of the looking glass. And for the better half of said eight years, my £19 tripod was a pretty good pal until the day it chucked my (thankfully inexpensive) camera down on the asphalt outside the house, blurted ‘DONE WITH THIS SH*T’ and hobbled off, three legs and all. I knew I had to find some real friends then. Obviously it didn’t come easy – I met people, looked for buttons to press, and occasionally offered ham. I mostly made friends with parking meters and foxes.

*Because Seven EIGHT Nine. LMAO. GET IT. Seven ate Nine.
** This is why I have to buy friends onlinest.

Dress – Tata Naka. Jeans – Stylenanda. Pumps – Zara.

Skirt – Tara Jarmon. Shirtdress – Stylenanda. (On Sarah) Dress – Tata Naka

Charlie wears: all Charlie May. Ring – Mara. Choker – Maria Black.

Fast forward to 2016, I’m proud to say this gang of dorks are friends. I may have offered a day-trip to Brighton (chaperoned by this crazy Asian lady driver), carby road-snacks and bottomless-ish Moët & Chandon champagne as bait, but I suspect they would’ve done it for nothing. Let me introduce: You know Sarah: sunshine personified, looks a lot like a goddess, humour like a merry bunny. There’s Charlie – designer, girl crush and the real culprit behind the minimalist movement (Philo who?). Emarr, rising star to the world of the fast-spoken rhymes – SoOo talented IT HURTS (Don’t check his Soundcloud, it’s just full of AWESOME, you wouldn’t like it). Last but not least, albeit not pictured, Simon – whom you all know if you follow on Snapchat (sparkncube) – my feminist, zealous, flaming-ball-of-enthusiasm PA (who I may or may not pay to hang out with me). Cheers, and thank you for the #moetmoment. Who needs hydraulics if five of us can make a car bounce to Dr Dre.

Amulette de Cartier: pink gold, malachite, diamond

Perhaps it’s time to acknowledge that with my impending immigration across to the next age-box I am also slowly packing my bags for an ever titillating journey of ‘age-induced casual offensiveness’ that get oh-so-entertaining when fully ripe. If I smoked I might as well be a Parisian. Thirty-something, speaks her mind without the Chihuahua-quiver of a young-un’ or the fear of judgement, and a slight potty mouth… what a GLORIOUS prospect. Granted, I don’t mean to imply that age is the only factor that affects one’s frankness (some people – like my mother – were born with balls) (OK strike that), but my journey of expression seems to mature with age. Alas, I am also a Korean and hence inherently age-ist, which means I use the word ‘mature’ like I would when describing cheese, and isn’t mature cheese really just an older, stinkier version we all put up with…

For the time being, I’m enjoying sticking the proverbial hand out the window to test the weather before the journey – everyone and everything is subject to an inappropriate joke. (“Sorry, are you poor?”) The typical week at the Cube Collective office is divided into Monday, Ageist Tuesday, Insult Wednesday, Sexist Thursday, and Bloggerist Fridays. My PA suffers on all days but Friday, which is when we order a pizza and howl over badly written blog entries on the intranets. Truth is, while I joke, I do believe said political frankness helps a great deal in refining one’s outlook in becoming a critical adult because it turns silent slander (where inappropriate really is, literally, inappropriate) into constructive criticism lined with some brand of humour that challenges people to grow.

Lace top – Zara. Skirt – Milly. Necklace – Cartier.

creative direction SHINI PARK photo assistance SIMON SCHMIDT in collaboration with MAJE

Well, what do you know. It’s the sun. And it’s about damn time it paid a visit to this half of the hemisphere. Hey, I know we don’t have valet, or salted almonds while you wait, but book yourself an Airbnb, would ya? Stick around a while, because I’d very much like to stop donating bits of my shoe-sole leather to various wet patches around London and coming home* – drenched – to nine-freaking-umbrellas in the hallway like there’s some Mary Poppins Anonymous meeting going down in the second bedroom. Does the spoonful of sugar come with whiskey, pray tell?

The fact of the matter is, a true Londoner will refuse to carry an umbrella (or trusts the weather man with bad teeth), yet we are all big babies when it comes to a turn of weather. Case in point: exhibit A. Stick a pacifier in my mouth, make sure to burp me regularly, and go ahead and open up that mummy blog. Exploit this Londoner, because at the first chance of sun I will wear out the breeziest skirt I own, and then wail when it soaks to the point the pattern on my panties is public information. Speaking of breezy skirts, this Maje beauty called Joline (and there goes that song, ‘Jolene’, stuck in my head for the next 12 hours) is my current choice, which coincidentally only 200 pieces are available worldwide so don’t even spend a minute hesitating if you saw your name written along the sequins. As expected, the weather did do the usual topsy-turvy on the day of this shoot but it didn’t stop me from dancing in one of the busiest intersections around Bank and getting yelled/howled at by finance boys. So, is this how one obtains an investor?

*Weather miscalculation is apparently another hobby I can take quite seriously. Note to self: add ‘Creative Director of Weather’ into Instagram profile.

The ‘meh’ emoji is all-encompassing, and wholly made for this time of year. You know the one, with the mouth that looks like that pen-mark you make when you try out pens in Muji, that dash that just could not care less about being straight.

– this one.

Got your tree up yet? – meh. Time for some Mariah Carey? – meeehhhh. Sent out all your gifts? –meh (shiiiiiiiiiit?!). As usual, my impeccable timing have left me soiling my pants a little – what with a pile of gifts looking bored in a cold corner in the office, and my sheer repulsion for the local post-office taking physical shape and casting sarcastic (?), sticky webs over the whole thing. It doesn’t help that I’ve donated the last of our blue IKEA bags in the last charity shop round, which means WHAT DOES ONE USE TO TRANSPORT LARGE AMOUNTS OF SMALL ODD-SHAPED BITS AT ONE GO?

Coach x Basemen cosmetic pouches, Lipstick – Bobbi Brown

Come to think of it, I may in fact employ the same approach to gift-sending as to taxes: painfully last minute, and usually involving some form of begging/wailing in a public place. Hey Carey, all I want for Christmas is some TaskRabbit coupons so that my mother doesn’t write me out of her will all over again. (It is however, becoming a bit of an endearing annual tradition)

As acting ambassador, I thought I’d call in some Coach x Baseman bits that might spark some Coach gift ideas if you’re still stuck. I’m especially pining for the yellow lipstick case, just stuff some tampons in it and stun the giftee with your infallible resourcefulness.

In collaboration with Coach as the season’s digital ambassador.

Coat – Versus by Versace. Flares – Frame Denim. Bag – Coach ‘Crosby’ patchwork. Scarf – Coach x Baseman square Turtleneck – Lands’End