Writing ‘hey look at my new shoes‘ feels a bit odd when everyone’s going mad over loo roll and tinned food without a care for clothes, but I don’t think there’s anything to be gained by deleting all blog posts I had planned. Buying a new pair of trainers is probably fairly low on most priority lists, but it’s more important now than ever to support your local businesses, right? So yes, look at my new shoes, that you may not buy now but hopefully might at some point in the future. You may remember I worked with Lanx Shoes last year on a little project styling their men’s collection, after I unw ..read more

Anyone who has followed this blog for a while may have noticed that this ‘fashion, lifestyle and travel blogger’ rarely blogs about fashion anymore. Joli House has become a ‘knitting, lifestyle, sometimes travel and occasionally fashion’ blog these days, and to be honest that’s perfectly fine with me! Fashion always seemed like an airy term for someone who isn’t exactly groundbreaking in their outfit choices. These days, if I do blog about personal style (as I prefer to call it), it’s usually because I’ve found a cool brand I think you should know about, or because I want to rant. Luckily you ..read more

Today I bring thee good shoes, a local (to me) British brand, and some of my favourite photos from a collaboration ever.  All the good stuff! I came across Lanx Shoes on Instagram, as is often the way these days.  They’re nice looking shoes with nice photos, but the ‘Made in Lancashire’ line caught my attention mostly.  Gotta have a nosey at anything made in your home county, of course.  I’m always on the look out for local brands and businesses making cool products or doing cool things.  After following Lanx for a wee while I saw their post about an Open Weekend / Sample Sale, and didn’t need ..read more

Second hand September – the catchy phrase you’ve probably seen floating around social media for the past month, and that I’m rather late to the bandwagon to write about but shall do so anyway. I haven’t strictly participated myself as I did buy two new items amongst a handful of charity shop clothes this September, but I’ve most definitely enjoyed the extra discussion it’s instigated. Attitudes towards second hand clothing – particularly in the blogger/influencer sphere – are a changing and that can never be a bad thing. Re-winding a little, I distinctly remember being told by a teacher on a h ..read more

Somewhat of a pink girly theme going on around these parts lately and I’m not mad about it! Here I introduce another knit of the pink and girly variety, this time with added fuzz and ribbons if the pink wasn’t enough. Lately I’ve flicked through many an old Rowan magazine (excellent procrastination if you ask me), and it would appear that around the time I was born was a good time to be a knitter. Now I started knitting pretty young, but I didn’t quite exit the womb with needles in hand.  How very convenient it is therefore that the pretty little knits of the late nineties and early noughties ..read more

A wee while ago I headed off on a very short and sweet trip to Cologne, where I didn’t see much of the city but did see lots of knitwear. I tagged along with the Rowan Yarns folks to the showcase of the new MODE at Rowan collection at HH Cologne, which you can check out on my story highlights and the MODE story highlights if you so wish.  The Rowan brand certainly isn’t new to this blog – been using their yarns and patterns for years, and more recently modelled for one of their books too – so it was great to check out the new range first hand before it launches and spend a weekend squishing ya ..read more

It’s rare that a single item receives a dedicated blog post these days, unless I made it, in which case I can write 900 words about a jumper. Often feels like there’s no real point, right? That said, this particular new wardrobe edition feels deserving of a little blog airtime, so here we are. Blog, meet my new red leather jacket. A couple of weeks ago I was kindly invited to an event with British brand Lakeland Leather at their Bowness store, a town I’ve visited many times. Most blogger events are in cities so was lovely to be invited to one in a prettier location, and the drive through the L ..read more

I first wrote about sustainability months ago, when it seemed like every blogger under the sun was adding their two penneth in response to the Stacey Dooley documentary about fast fashion and its impact on the environment.  I’d been shocked and disgusted and felt the need to say something.  At the time I did worry that it was just an of-the-moment buzzword that people felt obliged to comment on, and would be swiftly forgotten. Now I can’t speak for everyone who was flabbergasted at the time, but I know that I genuinely have kept to my word.  If my memory serves me well I’ve bought a grand tota ..read more

*Says there’s no point writing outfit posts any more* *Writes 1000 words about a particular type of dress* Ahem.  A dress worthy of a few hundred words though, don’t you think?  Given that I bought this exact same frock for both my mum and I (God bless the M&S yellow sticker sales), I would say so.  Midi skirts in general are worthy, anyway.  They’re absolutely bloody everywhere at the moment and I must say, I’ve fallen head over heels.  Head over shin, more accurately.  I cruised through a few high street websites (in the name of research, obviously) and on every single one, selecting ‘al ..read more

A red and gold themed Christmas tree, to be precise.  I’d originally intended for this to be a 2018 roundup post but started writing and realised that’s going to be a short novel, and at my current pace of ‘write a couple of sentences, remember a present I need to wrap, eat a mince pie, make a brew, stroke the cat, write another few sentences’… that may take me a while.  However, I deem it imperative that this skirt graces the blog before Christmas day so here I am.  Shouting from the rooftops that an obnoxiously bright and shiny skirt is the Best Thing Ever. Because really, if you can’t wear ..read more