At the end of September I took a long(ish) holiday to the Spanish town of Estepona, Malaga to have some quality family time and get away from the madness of London. It was the right move for me as I got to have a few more days of summer – and who wouldn’t want that? As the organised (LOL) traveler that I am or aspire to be, I prepared accordingly for and packed only lightweight pieces.
So no, none of these outfits are relevant for London’s current autumn weather, but as I love recording and talking about my outfitting antics I can’t help but share what I wore in Estepona – this was less than three weeks ago and the temperatures weren’t far off from 30 degrees!
Dress and bag, Zara. Shoes, ASOS. Straw hat, borrowed from my mum.
Day 1 (or 2 if landing the day before at 8pm counts – it doesn’t for me!): Yes, it’s the Zara dress that was a bit of an Insta hit with lots of fashionable ladies and kind of a miss with me, as I explained in this post. The miss feelings continue as some of the stitches on this damn dress came undone, looking like a shrivelled mess. Not sure if there’s any point in keeping it. Yep, the hate is real – it’s also a reminder of how the quality of Zara is at times terrible.
Bathing suit (worn as top, seen here), Little Mistress. Skirt, Silvian Heach. Earrings, Monki. Bag, Zara. Shoes, ASOS.
Day 2 (pre-beach): I bought this bathing suit from Little Mistress in 2016 and I absolutely adore it, probably because it can pretty much be worn as a top – which I decided to do and loved! Call me a prude but I do find the criss-cross effect cleavage a little risqué, so wearing it as a top did make me feel self-conscious (it’s also pretty much impossible for me to go bra-free, I hate it) and was kind of a big deal for me. But I ended up feeling good and loved how the bathing suit looked with this skirt.
Dress, Kling. Earrings, Minueto. Bag, Zara. Shoes, ASOS.
Day 2 (post-beach): We spent the afternoon at the beach and because my bathing suit was a bit damp when we left, I threw on this cute little dress by Kling, which was a present from one of my best friends a few years ago and is the perfect pre & post beach cover up. I just need more beach holidays…
Dress, Dorothy Perkins. Bag, Zara. Shoes, Hobbs.
Day 3: Is that a maxi dress you see? I bought this dress in the sale quite a few years ago, and am ashamed to say I’d never worn it before this year’s trip to Estepona! But I wanted to hold on to it because I knew I would get some use out of it eventually – and it’s not often a petite girl will come across such an easy to wear ankle-length dress! #Noregrets.
T-shirt, Desigual. Skirt, Silvian Heach. Earrings, Minueto. Shoes, ASOS. Bag, from a variety store!
Day 4: I don’t have much yellow in my wardrobe, but I absolutely love this t-shirt by Desigual (from its SS’18 collection, although I bought it as a sample). It has a few see-through details and a lovely bee pattern that I just found so pretty and different (and not very Desigual). I paired it with this cute little bag I found in a variety store while there because it has bananas on it and hey, yellow on yellow is cool, right? I realise this is a very fruity outfit thanks to these shoes of dreams from ASOS, which have become my favourite shoe and are sadly dying.
T-shirt, Oasis. Skirt and shoes, ASOS. Earrings, Primark. Bag, from a variety store.
Day 5: I know the obvious choice would have been to wear my red shoes (I brought just two pairs of shoes with me to Malaga, I hate packing shoes), but my red shoes needed to go to hospital (AKA the shoe man because the soles were looking destroyed) so these fruit babies had to do. Other than that I love this outfit, although I think this skirt has shrunk. And of course I wore a t-shirt that said ‘hola’ to Spain (the worst thing is that I’m Spanish).
T-shirt and shoes, ASOS. Skirt, Silvian Heach. Earrings, Monki. Bag, from a variety store.
Day 6: A t-shirt with oranges, a tutti frutti pair of shoes and a little clutch bag with the word ‘delicious’ and some embroidered bananas – this is my fruitiest outfit of all! ASOS did some really cute slogan/graphic tees over the summer, and I loved the cheery vibe of this one. Although there’s a part of me that thinks this t-shirt deserves an orange separate.
Dress and shoes, ASOS. Bag, Zara. Earrings, Primark.
Day 7: Had I worn this cherry print dress in London, I would have paired it with a red bag and some red shoes. Well, I totally love how it looks with basket bags, and as my red shoes were still with the shoe fairies I had to go a little fruit-crazy again and wear my ASOS fruit shoes. As for the dress, a bit of 2017 Reformation/Realisation Par dupe and oh-so-Summer-2017, I bought it at the end of last of year – I checked ASOS’ site for what felt like months, waiting for it to come back in stock. When it finally did, summer was essentially over, meaning it only had its debut in 2018!
Dress, Compañia Fantastica. Bag, Zara. Shoes, ASOS.
Day 8: It’s Wally the wallaby! To be honest this dress was 100% overshadowed by what I did on the day, which was visit Benalmadena’s Butterfly Park. Not only was the park full of beautiful butterflies, colourful birds, an iguana and at least two tortoises – it’s also home to Wally the wallaby. I died of cuteness. But yes, this tomato dress is also a cutie – and just like my previous dress, I would have totally worn it with a red bag or the matching bag (yes, I have the matching bag) and my red shoes, which were still not ready.
T-shirt, Desigual. Skirt, Silvian Heach. Earrings, Night Time Holiday. Bag, Zara. Shoes, Hobbs.
Day 9: Last full day! Boohoo! Despite loving bright colours and striking prints, I don’t like the brand Desigual at all. BUT, I did find this t-shirt as well as the other one within the brand’s SS’18 collection. I LOVE the print on this one – the mosaic-inspired graphics are so colourful and fun.
T-shirt, from Vogue Spain. Skirt, Silvian Heach. Bag, Zara. Shoes, Hobbs.
Day 10: Airport chic, anyone? Hmmmm – not quite hun. This t-shirt was available with the August 2018 copy of Vogue Spain as part of the publication’s 30th anniversary (damn, it’s younger than me). I saw it all over Instagram and my mum kindly grabbed one for me. Needless to say, I love it – and felt very chic in it even though it’s not quite Kate Moss airport style.
This trip was not short of disastrous moments – in fact here is the list of everything that went wrong while I was in Estepona:
- My family and I were on the go for the most part of this trip, but there were times when of course we just chilled. It was during these times when I tried to get my nails done in Estepona – which proved to be mission impossible! I tried lots of different places, which all (politely) turned me away because I hadn’t made a booking. WTF?! One place even said to me “We’ve got nothing until next week.” It seems like everyone in Estepona was getting their nails done… I couldn’t believe it was like this in a small town in the South of Spain – that barely happens in London!! P.S.: My nails looked like sh*t when I got to Estepona and look even more sh*t now. First world problem, I know.
- I had some important life admin I really needed (well, wanted) to get sorted out while I was there, but was sadly unable to. This left me feeling a little stressed – but I got over it because you know, c’est la vie and all that jazz.
- My Olympus camera broke. Again. In the two years that I’ve had it it’s broken four times – three of these instances have happened when I was on holiday (Venice, Cork and now Estepona). It was my fault as I dropped it – but damn, this camera is way too fragile! Annoyed is an understatement.
- Speaking of broken tech, my mum’s phone died. I mean, it was time because it was a pretty old phone that’s had a good life, but it was still kind of annoying.
- My little Zara bag didn’t survive this trip either – one of the round wooden handles came off. Like I said, Zara’s quality is dreadful – but I think I can fix it.
- To top everything off, three nights before I was due to fly back to London I found out that the airline I was meant to be flying back with, Primera Air, had gone into liquidation. The hilarious thing is that Primera Air never sent through an email to let its customers know that well, it no longer existed and so customers were f*cked. In all honesty I had a weird feeling all along about them, as I’d never heard of them or flown with them before (I flew into Malaga with Jet2). Luckily the ticket hadn’t been that expensive, but it was still stressful and annoying (and not cheap) to have to buy a new return ticket.
Despite all of these disastrous happenings, it was one of the best trips I ever had. It was my most ‘touristy’ trip of all, even though I’ve been to Estepona quite a few times! It’s a lovely place and I’ll be doing a separate post on a few things you can get up to if you ever visit it.
Have I come back ready for autumn? Not exactly (as discussed here), but I can say there’s nothing like a late summer/early autumn getaway!
Pictures taken between September 24th and October 4th 2018 in Malaga, Spain.
xxx