Revelry Event

Forever ago in September I attended the latest Tea Party Club anniversary event called Revelry. The Tea Party Club host a grand lolita fashion event every year in London where you can shop from various indie and Japanese brands, meet special guests, socialise with other lolitas and Japanese street fashion fans and attend talks. It seemed they had a few issues this time though, from what I understand it seems the original planned brand that they hoped to get had to drop out. This caused issues as they obviously then had to secure someone else which delayed announcing any details and caused ticket sales to be very slow and much less than usual. Thankfully the girls have great organising skills and despite the issues managed to pull together a lovely event and secure Japanese brand Metamorphose Temps De Fille as the main guest! It was the first time that Meta had attended an event overseas too. The other guests included Hitomi from Grimoire, Toshie Mihashi (editor of the Gothic & Lolita Bible), Ai Akizuki (lolita model and founder of Gothic & Lolita & Punk no Kai) and new Kawaii brand Himitsu by Syrup.
I travelled down on the day for the main Saturday event. Unfortunately due to the delays in finalising things the cheaper train fares had already gone but luckily I had decided early on to buy a standard ticket this time so didn’t need to get there until 11am. This allowed me to get a slightly cheaper train. Anyway after a bit of confusion finding the location and the way in (it was held at Gray’s Inn) I arrived just a bit before 11am. The outside of the building is really grand:

I wore my Meta dress to the event with them being the chosen guest designer. It wasn’t as fancy an outfit as I hoped for but I just didn’t have the money or time to get hold of a different Meta dress. When we were allowed in I handed over the ticket and received a raffle ticket, postcard set and could choose a small wooden Tea Party Club badge.

I then went upstairs to check out the stalls. There weren’t as many stalls as I expected and Meta had already sold out of pretty much everything they brought. I had a good look around but only purchased these gorgeous jewellery items from Fantastic Grim. A ‘Woodland Adventure Basket Necklace’ and ‘Evil Eye Gothic Ring’.

Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/fantasticgrim

Etsy Page: https://www.etsy.com/shop/fantasticgrim

I would describe their jewellery as having a dark fairytale influence. Their jewellery is perfect for gothic, vintage, steampunk or mori girl styles. I was tempted to buy even more but resisted as I have too many accessories all ready. The eyeball ring cost £5 and the necklace £13. The little toadstool is so cute! I can’t wait to put together some co-ords with them.

I wasn’t as organised as usual so didn’t print off or check the timetable online beforehand. As a result while I was looking around the stalls I missed the opening/welcome talk, I did think it seemed very quiet up there. Luckily I made it to the Q&A session with the special guests which was the next item on the schedule. The Q&A was interesting though there seemed to be a few translation issues and some of the guests were unsure of how to answer some of the questions so it wasn’t quite as insightful as I thought it might be.

This was followed by a lunch break/quiz and treasure hunt. My team did quite well in the quiz (I was useless – so sorry!) but we lost when it came to a tie-breaker question.

Sheff Comm Group Photo:

Photo credit goes to the beautiful SugarNoor

I visited the bring and buy during the lunch break, it was chaos in there. It was so hard trying to get close to anything and you often ended up stuck waiting for a gap to try and move into. Petticoats don’t make it easy either. Lolita’s love the possibility of bargains, it’s always a really busy and popular feature. I didn’t find anything to buy though. They also had a table dedicated to new and really small start up brands that allowed them to sell some pieces. There were some really pretty things but I didn’t buy anything there either.

Next was the main event of the day, the Meta fashion show, which showcased brand new designs including some that hadn’t been seen by anyone yet. Sadly due to the room design it was hard to see the models over everyone’s heads and although the front section was raised it wasn’t very high. In fact the area being used as a stage was also the way in to the room so it was really awkward trying to get in or out once an event had kicked off. Anyway, here are the pics I took, I did the best I could but I couldn’t really see very well:

The next stage event was a presentation/talk by Ai Akizuki on lolita life in Japan. It was really interesting hearing what she had to say about being a lolita in Japan and her views about how the fashion is different between there and Europe. She also discussed the fact that she had struggled to find likeminded people which is what led her to found the group Gothic & Lolita & Punk no Kai in Japan. This group, like the Tea Party Club in the UK, is all about bringing people together that love lolita fashion and holding events so they get chance to meet and socialise. She recently graduated from the group to become a lolita model and act as a spokesperson for lolita fashion. She also answered some questions after her presentation, it was a really interesting talk and she is absolutely lovely!

You can find her blog here: http://www.aiakizuki.blogspot.jp/

Ai Akizuki’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCq0zUjbkTWVk6cCOQDvzjXw?annotation_id=annotation_3047076763&feature=iv&src_vid=AUJqKcvp4Nk&sub_confirmation=1

I had another wonder around the stalls and then it was time for the raffle – they give away so many prizes! Sadly I didn’t get one, again, but my friends all did as did loads of people and they were all really happy. Some of the prizes are amazing! Then they did a goodbye/closing talk and the usual chaos erupted for the large group photo and that conclude the Saturday of Revelry.

Photo credit goes to the Tea Party Club and their photographer.

Sum up: To be honest I felt it was a long way and quite a lot of money (event ticket plus travel) to do so little. I know they had various issues getting this event together so that’s probably the reason behind it but there weren’t many stalls, I couldn’t really see the fashion show properly and they only held two proper stage events. I did get to see some lovely people and do a spot of catching up but there were other times when you just sat and waited for a stage event to start and re-looked at everything you had already seen. It wasn’t their best event but they have Innocent World attending next year and I’m sure everything will go much smoother next time!