We had a great time at the Wintersun festival – it was a bit like the best school camp ever: but for grown ups. At our rented apartment, it was Glamour Central as Tim and I shared with the wonderful Candice and Miss Carly of the Lindy Charm School for Girls. Boy do those ladies know how to look fabulous! I’m not used to applying my lipstick before breakfast: good thing I brought spares.

The week was pretty much spent hanging out with gorgeous lovely people wearing vintage clothing, and seeing wonderful ’40s and ’50s style bands, doing lots of walking, admiring amazing cars (more than I’ve ever seen before) and eating and drinking. Dreamy, huh? We were also staying opposite the beach but despite good intentions I didn’t manage to take that long walk along the shore: it served as a beautiful backdrop to all the action.

Soon into the week it was my birthday, so as a treat Candice did my make up and Chrissy from the Lindy Charm School did my hair: the result is my new avatar, I like it so much – of course, now I’m going to have to try harder to have glamourous hair more often, as it makes a big difference.

Highlights were the Circa swimwear parade and the ’50s style Cake Bake – here is a small selection of my pics of the week. Hope it gives you a bit of an idea of how much fun it was, and how much I’m looking forward to the next one.

As always, click on each image to see in full – and if you’d like to see more of my car pics, see Candice’s blog “Super Kawaii Mama” or more of my Cake Bake pics or some pics of the swimwear parade – see my previous post with images from the Goldcoast Bulletin.

I’d like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who helped with Circa’s swimwear parade too:
- The wonderful models: Sandy, Nicole, Laura, Candice, Tamara, Beverley, Izzy, Jasmine, Chrissy, Kesenya and Alannah (aged four).
- The gorgeous backstage team: Carly (hair and dressing), Nicole and Jodie (dressing), Ray (music).
- The fabulous Scott Baker for being the best MC and doing improvised Elvis moves when we had a bit of a backstage kerfuffle (can’t wait to see the video).
- The Circa team who repaired and restored and got everything ready: Esther, Victoria, Fiona and Marianne.
- The glamourous ladies of the Lindy Charm School for inviting Circa and helping us get it all together.
- and last but not least: the wonderful Wintersun audience for being there and being a part of it all. Thank you all!

UPDATE: Candice has edited this wonderful video of the swimwear parade – you can see it here!

Our feet have hardly hit the ground since we got here on Monday – there’s been so much preparation for the parade but today the first one was one. Here are some pics by Jay Nel-McIntosh for Goldcoast.com.au. There are lots more too, and a video so stay tuned – as well, I managed to take some shots of the fabulous cars yesterday – which is lucky because today and tomorrow the hoardes have descended and you can hardly get a clear shot for all the crowds!

These images are only of a small part of the parade: we had ten models plus adorable Alannah (age 4) and forty swimsuits from the late ’20s to the mid ’70s.

The second swimwear parade is on at 2pm tomorrow at the big stage in Godwin Park – get there early to grab a good position – after today’s success we expect it to be very busy tomorrow!
Official Wintersun site.

I can’t believe that Wintersun starts next Friday! I’m not sure what’s happened to the year – it seemed like just last week that Mistresses Chrissy and Kim from the wonderful Lindy Charm School were inviting Circa to stage a swimwear parade and all of a sudden it’s almost here.

Here are the details about the Vintage parade – it’s on Saturday June 12th and Sunday June 13th. Fittings are being held this week in Melbourne and next week in Coolangatta, and there are plenty of fabulous styles (mens as well as ladies) from the ’20s to the ’70s – although we’ll be focusing on ’40s-’50s – and sizes from 6 to 16. Some of them were recently displayed at the Ballarat Heritage Weekend.

If you’d like to join us on the catwalk, it’s not too late! Please email me asap at
nicole@circavintageclothing.com.au

Photo reproduced courtesy The Wintersun Festival Assn Inc or Sun Promotions P/L: aren’t they all adorable?

And speaking of Wintersun, as well as the Circa vintage parades, there will be lots of stalls including the Lindy Charm School will host a vintage clothing stall with lots of great frocks and accessories from the US, plus vintage hair dos, make up and nails, a ’50s style Cake Bake Off competition, more than a 100 bands and performers and around 1500 hot rods, classic and custom cars on show. Good thing it runs for ten days, or you’d never get to fit it all in!

This is going to be big. And, if Wintersun goes well, we’re going to have to start thinking about Greazefest.

I’ve just got back from Ballarat, from setting up the swimwear exhibition. I’m sure that you’re all going to see it this weekend (it is, after all, free entry) but in case you can’t make it, here are some pics – twenty two of my finest ladies swimsuits from the late 1920s to the 1970s, roughly in chronological order of era.

Here is the info about the exhibition. It’s only on this weekend, at the Trades Hall (24 Camp Street) and there are lots of other fabulous things happening so I encourage you to make the trip, if you’re not fortunate to already live in the fair city.

Regular readers will probably recognise a few swimsuits – some of these were featured on ABC’s Collectors, my book Love Vintage and the fashion parade for Madeleine Hamilton’s book launch for “Our Girls”. I was so thrilled to receive one in particular, it got it’s own post.

Whilst setting up, a photographer from Ballarat Courier newspaper popped by, so I expect there may be some coverage this weekend in the local press. Hurrah! An unexpected photo session and a reminder that carrying red lipstick with you can be a very good thing.

Mannequins provided Mannequin Revolution.

As you know, Circa is hosting a vintage swimwear parade at the Wintersun festival in June, and it’s been a wonderful excuse to stock up on swimwear from the ’30s to the ’60s (not that I needed one).

Although I’ve bought quite a few lately, some styles are particularly hard to come by so I turned to the Vintage Fashion Guild for help. I’ve bought over thirty suits from fellow VFG traders around the world now and finally began to feel as if I have enough. That’s on top of about thirty or so that I already had.

But there was one style that I really wanted – and I found it on ebay, from a seller who wouldn’t ship outside of the US. Thankfully Jennifer from Vintage Visage came to my rescue, and the following beauty was mine for the princely sum of $3.99US. I don’t think the seller knew what she had…and she photographed it badly. Oh dear.

I waited eagerly for it’s arrival and here it is – from the late 1930s or early 1940s, it’s made of ribbed knitted wool and features a cut-out midriff and adjustable straps that can be worn either halter-neck or cross-over style. The straps have been replaced, and it looks like it’s gone a few rounds in a washing machine but all in she’s looking pretty good for seventy years old.

Here’s Fiona showing the swimsuit to much better effect:

In case you’re wondering why the swimsuit has suspenders attached, don’t worry….it’s not some wacky old-fangled kind of bathing suit, it’s just that Fiona (like all well behaved ladies) has kept her underwear on when trying it on. Doesn’t she look smashing?

If you’d like one for yourself, I found a nice stretch satin version on Glamoursurf’s website. This one will be appearing at Wintersun in June – and speaking of which, thank you to everyone who has volunteered to model or help out, I shall be contacting you soon with some shots of swimwear that will be available for the parade, and yes, we’re still looking for models – please email me at nicole@circavintageclothing.com.au

Wintersun, Australia’s leading rock & roll nostalgia retro event is held annually in Coolangatta – from the website:

Wintersun 2010 starts on Friday 4th June and ends with the huge Best of Wintersun Concert on Monday 14th June. Featuring almost 1500 Hot Rods, Custom and Classic Cars, more than 100 bands and performers, dancing, movies, and competitions. The festival is held in the border coastal towns of Coolangatta and Tweed Heads on the New South Wales & Queensland border. Many events are free, some are in the streets while others are in the local clubs and shopping centres.

I’m excited to announce that in collaboration with the Lindy Charm School for Girls, Circa will be presenting a vintage swimsuit fashion parade.

What: The History of the Bathing Suit – a retrospective parade.
Where: Stage 8, Goodwin Park, Wintersun Precinct – Coolangatta, Queensland.
When: 2pm Saturday 12th June and 2pm Sunday 13th June.
Cost: free

Poster design courtesy Karlee Slater – click on image to see larger.

Now here’s where you can help – we’re looking for volunteers to help us with the parade. We need models (men and ladies), dressers and hair and make up artists. If you’re going to Wintersun and would like to be involved in this fun event, please email me at nicole@circavintageclothing.com.au

Thank you!

For those who missed last Friday night’s episode of ABC1 “Collectors”, here is the segment where I talk about vintage swimwear – and the lovely Candice deVille does a wonderful job modelling some of my ladies designs. You’ll also get to see a bit of Circa, which has recently been expanded to include a better fitting room area, complete with rose print carpet.

It will be repeated on ABC2 on Monday night. The full episode can be viewed online for a limited time.

If you’re received this post via email subscription, the above embedded video may not be appearing – in which case, please click on this link.

Since the book has come out, I’ve been doing a bit of writerly publicity – there are a few magazine articles still to come out, an appearance on Deborah Cameron’s ABC radio show in Sydney and a nice big article in the Age by James Cockington (I’ll post it when I get around to scanning it, so that you can see the photos too, but you can read it online here).

Recently I got to go on national ABC Radio for the Coodabeen Champions. Tim has edited the segment down to the 13 minutes we chat about the book and vintage. Click on the link below – be warned, it starts to play right away!

Nicole on the Coodabeen Champions.

There was also a mention of the book in a reading guide included in the Sydney Morning Herald and another mention in the latest Qantas inflight magazine. Also: lots of blogs (which is especially wonderful)!

As well – look out for the Collectors segment on vintage swimwear this Friday at 8pm. The episode guide is already up on the ABC website – if you look very carefully you can see a tiny image of me in my wisteria-print dressing gown, admiring shop mannequin Clark in his shiny ’40s bathing trunks. Can’t wait to see Candice parading the women’s swimwear.

From the website:
Nicole Jenkins literally parades her collection of vintage and retro swimwear, with familiar names like Jantzen and Speedo going back to the 40s. The ladies’ one-piece cossies from the 50s make for a very attractive tableau.

It will be repeated on Monday evening, and available for download from the website after it screens.

Last Friday we had a film crew at Circa to shoot a segment on vintage swimwear for ABC programme The Collectors.

I spoke about my love for vintage, as well as mens and ladies swimsuits from the ’20s to the ’70s. I set up the window for the annual swimwear display (usually it happens when it’s actually summer but allowances needed to be made), and best of all – Candice modelled some of the best pieces from my collection.

Here you can see Candice dressed in an ultra-glamourous strapless ’50s Jantzen style made from ruched lace. She looks the part, doesn’t she?

Photo courtesy SuperKawaiiMama/Candice.

You can see some of the other swimsuits I talked about here – some will be in the shop soon, available for new homes just in time for summer.

You’ll have to wait until it screens on December 4th (8pm on Channel ABC) to see how good Candice looks in them, though.

UPDATE: The ABC has bumped it back a week and the episode will now be screened on December 11th.

For those who are based in Sydney (or likely to go in the next few months) a great new exhibition is opening next week on the history of swimwear.

Exposed! the story of swimwear highlights the designs and designers, past and present, at the forefront of Australian swimwear fashion.

What: Exposed! The Story of Swimwear.
Where: Australian National Maritime Museum, South Gallery, Darling Harbour
When: July 2nd to October 25th, 2009.
Cost: free!

More information at the ANMM website. Image courtesy ANMM.

It looks like this is a travelling exhibition so those who live in Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane, Wagga Wagga and Newcastle will see it later. Sadly, it’s not coming to Melbourne – perhaps a trip is in order?

UPDATE: nice article about the exhibition from The Australian.

Speaking of swimwear, if you’d like something gorgeous for this summer you might like to check out the website of Glamoursurf a vintage site that specialises in bathing suits. Here’s one of my favourites:

1940s jersey Hawaiian print swimsuit. Image courtesy Glamoursurf.