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You have found the perfect Christmas cocktail dress and now the only thing missing to bring it all together, are accessories. There are plenty of ways to make that dress, and most importantly, you, stand out; all you have to do is choose the right elements.

First thing to consider is the style of your dress. If your dress has a lot going on, for instance, very bold patterns, or, sparkles, than it is best to keep accessories at a minimum. Perhaps try some very subtle but elegant diamond jewelry, earrings can add a twinkle and enhance that sparkly dress. If your dress has a Christmas theme or Christmas patterns, avoid going overboard with Christmas jewelry. It will bombard the eye and you will end up looking like a Christmas package no one wants to unwrap. Try choosing solid color jewelry that matches the dress.

If you have a simple dress, you can have a lot of fun accessorizing. Gloves, shrugs, clutches and heels are really trendy and fun ways to spice up your party dress. With black dresses, always go for the gold. A gold necklace with a bold pendant or piece of sapphire jewelry will look stellar.

Also, if your dress has an unusual neckline, or, if it goes too high, opt for an interesting cocktail ring. Wearing a necklace with a high neckline dress is out of the question, so avoid it all cost. Earrings are passable, so long as they aren’t dangly. But a beautiful glitzy ring is really the best addition to an extravagant dress.

Gloves and hair bows are really “in” this season. If you have a long dress, match it up with a pair of long gloves and a satin bow to tie your hair back and look totally sophisticated.

Another pretty idea to try out is a flower corsage. Choose dark, rich, exotic flowers are for winter.

The last and most important is finding the right shoes. Once again, you have to make sure to work the shoes accordingly with the dress. If the dress is plain, go wild with the shoes; if the dress is fierce, simple shoes are best. One mistake too many women make is not buying shoes that fit them, or that are too high and uncomfortable to walk in. Be reasonable when it comes to shoes. There is no reason for you to ruin a perfectly wonderful evening because you can’t dance after fifteen minutes. There are always options for gorgeous shoes, you just have to look. Alexander McQueen has come out with some remarkably sexy flats this season, so you can keep those feet on the dance floor, all night long.

¹ Or so I have been told. I may have been lied to.

as well as two new tees

Another brandnew site: ink-hound.com launched last night, let Andrew the guy behind ink-hound describe in his own words what it´s all about:

“Hello everyone!
We will offer only one fitted style hat and one shirt at a time for 2-3 days and then they will be gone. This allows us to return ALL rights back to the artists after the sale. Artists will get $2 per item sold with no limit!

We not only will be offering fitted hats and tees but we will have long sleeve shirts, organic tees, hoodies, and both fitted and traditional tees as apparel options. Tees will sell for $12 and hats will only cost $16. Feel free to contact me andrew@ink-hound.com if you have questions!”

Sounds familiar? Yes, a bit. Sounds good? Oh yeah!!!

Every day at midnight, they list one new product that they discount at least 50% off the retail price. Recently, they’ve spotlighted a host of t-shirts from Beautiful/Decay and Mishka, several jackets from Dunderdon (a functional but quite stylish Swedish fashion brand), hoodies from all over, a couple pairs of sneakers, and even a duffel bag.

If you’d like an invitation to this new deal-a-day fashion site, don’t forget to leave a comment below and provide a valid email address in the appropriate field. We will use your email only to send you an invitation to Jack Threads.

Octaprintah! Design by Draco, sold @ LaFraise

(I own this btw)

CMYK tee by The Loots @ Karmaloop

Chance Of Rain by Jeff Sheldon @ scribtee

(I hope to own this soon btw)

Zapf Dingbats by Silberfischer (can you unveil the secret message?)

The Sound Of Color, by Fitz Hammond @ Threadless

CMYK? by Master Control @ Design By Humans

Smoking by Turn Nocturnal

This is actually a band shirt by the wicked Architecture In Helsinki, designed by Singer Cameron Bird, sold @ InSound

C M … guess what by yanmos @ Red Bubble

CMYK Ink Drop by Inku @ Bountee

Cosmissoda, a tee shop / clothing line based in Athens, Greece has added a whole bunch of fresh t-shirts to their shop. These here are 3 out of 9 new tees: Winers is the one above, immune, a style you can wear with or without skateboard and Creativism, one for the design nerd with certain political ideals;) Prices vary between 15 and 21 dollars.

Edwin is an art student in Singapore and his dream is a trip to London, so he had an idea: “Let Me Go To London is my self-initiated project to raise fund for my school trip to the UK. This tee is silk-screened onto 100% soft-touch cotton. The printing and cotton quality is of the best quality available in the market. My school trip would cost me around S$7k, going to London, Louborough University, Amsterdam and some other europe cities. This would not be able to completely cover the cost but this fund raising will definately subsidise part or it.” I think this is not only a very cool idea but also a really stylish design on an affordable shirt:)

It’s been a month now that the e-shop of vogelwerk.net has gone online. I discovered this brand at a festival and fell in love with these designs immediately. Its name can be roughly translated as “bird’s work” or “bird plant” or “bird company” or however you like it. Their collection consists of cleverly built monochrome patterns, such as “Faces” (left pic) whose overall impression is achieved by lining up little face drawings that are differently drawn. They are available on different shirt colors: purple, asphalt, heather grey, grass, raspberry … The white prints are made “by using a special bleaching color that extracts the color from the textile. The result is a permanent print that is not distinguishable from the surface structure of the textile itself.” The black prints are also barely noticeable, so if you don’t like the feeling of thick rubber layers on your chest, this might be something for you. They do not only have T-shirts, there’s also hoodies, long sleeves and jackets.

The verdict at Tolky Monkys‘ Microstories Contest is reached, and we have a winner:

Congratulations to Marisa who commented here and took away the best story prize. (The best name was given at Solo Pienso En Camisetas.) Since there were only two commenters and two shirts per blog given away, Ricky also takes away a surprise shirt.

I was a bit surprised there were not more participants though since these shirts are oh so awesome…

Full disclosure: the link is a bit self-serving, since the creators of Chronillogical are none other than the two Bonanziers (i.e., John and myself). That said, we wouldn’t be making the comic unless we thought it was pretty good, and I certainly wouldn’t be telling you about it unless I thought you might like it.

We’re in-between story arcs right now and the archive only has around thirty comics in it, which means it’s a stellar time to start reading. So c’mon in and join the fun!

“Tell You Grand Ma”

By MONSIEUR PIMPANT, artist / France

[visit monsieur-pimpant.blogspot.com]

$ 17.00

available at Design By Human

“Number 7″

By Tim Biskup, artist / Southern California

[visit timbiskup.com or think.faesthetic.com]

price: $ 25.00

available at threadless

“Main Course”

By GRAPHICAIRLINES, creative team consisting of 2 people, TAT & Vi / Hongkong

[visit graphicairlines.com]

price: $ 20.00

available at GRAPHICAIRLINES