Festivals

I know it’s the middle of the festival season and I am a bit late writing this post but this year I will be going to Reading festival which is at the end of August. Anyway, sometimes it’s hard to decide what clothes to take to a festival, especially whilst living in Britain as you need to be prepared for any kind of weather. The thing with festivals is that you shouldn’t be taking any clothes that you don’t want to get a bit wrecked but at the same time you still want to be able to wear nice clothes. The good thing about festivals is that you can literally wear whatever you feel like and no one will judge you for it because the everyone there is doing the same. A festival at the end of the day is about the music, mosh pits and getting pissed with your mates so in all honesty it really doesn’t matter what clothes you take. However there are a few essential clothing items that you will need to bring.

First off I find it really useful to have a bumbag. Personally I have a Eastpak black one which cost me about £20 but if you just search on ebay its easy to find ones for only a few quid which will do the same job. its just useful as a way of carrying your essentials. But just as a warning, if you are male with a bum bag it will be searched every time you enter the arena so you will need to hide your alcohol and drugs elsewhere. I tend to wer them over my shoulder as more of a shoulder bag.

Next you will need a hat. Unless you are willing to queue for about an hour just for a shower then you’ll need a hat to hide your lovely greasy locks. Recently I bought an anvil plain black hat off Amazon and it only cost me £4.

And of course you will need a pair of sunglasses to hide your bloodshot eyes from the rest of the world and also to keep the sun out of your eyes. If you are like me and like to mosh pit then don’t take expensive sunglasses as there is a high chance that they will fall off your head or break.

And lastly, dont be shy with colours at a festival. Go all out with your bright coloured t shirts and shit shirts. Just take the basics and a few pairs of shorts and a pair of beaters (shoes you don’t mind wrecking) and of course do be prepared for the rain, even if it is sunny in the day and you do have a fire in the night, it can still be quite cold so take a few layers just to make sure that you are warm enough.

Sunglasses

A lot of sunglasses these days are very expensive, however the price is usually reflected in the quality of the lenses and cheap sunglasses often have poor lenses and could cause some damage to your eyesight. However I feel its always important to own a cheap pair or a few cheap pairs of sunglasses for things such as festivals and from personal experience, sunglasses often break at festivals and so you don’t want to be taking a really expensive pair.

When buying sunglasses it’s important to consider what style suits you the most as different style of sunglasses suit different shape heads etc. . I quite recently bought a nice cheap pair of black Kurt Cobain style sunglasses off of ebay. They only cost me roughly £2 and I’ve used them a fair amount of times when I haven’t wanted to ruin my other pair. There’s a selection of colours on offer which can be found by simply just searching ‘Kurt Cobain style sunglasses’ into the search bar on Ebay. This style has become really popular this summer, especially in white but i opted for the black colourway as I find black sunglasses to be the most appropriate.

If you are looking for a different style of sunglasses for cheap, personally I really like the rayban wayfarer style sunglasses and again cheap alternatives for these can be found simply just by searching on ebay for men sunglasses and these wouldn’t cost you more than £3 I imagine. However I would recommend that you pay a little bit extra to secure that your sunglasses are UV protected. Many high street companies such as Asos and Urban Outfitters offer a good array of sunglasses roughly at the price of £15 with many different styles to suit your personal preference. I would recommend going for a classy pair of black sunglasses or going all out with a nice pair of vintage sunglasses (as pictured) to complete the perfect vintage, stand out outfit.

The classy pair of sunglasses

The Kurt Cobain style sunglasses

The vintage style sunglasses

The classic raybans wayfarers

Bucket Hats

I thought I should do a piece on bucket hats as it is summer and personally I do think bucket hats can help for a great summer outfit. However I am aware that bucket hats are a particular taste and many people would never think to wear one.

More recently I have seen bucket hats come back into fashion and they are perfect for summer holidays. Many more expensive street style companies have released bucket hats, from palace often releasing bucket hats and supreme’s most recent in the spring summer collection of 2017 and also with previous collaborations with comme des garcons.  Also less hyped street companies do a selection of bucket hats such as stussy and carhartt. However if you are like me, you don’t really want to be spending roughly £35 on a hat that wont be worn that often and so want a hat for under £5 or maybe a little bit more. Personally I feel that massive branding on hats such as the stussy bucket hat ruins the hat completely and would much rather settle for a plain hat.

There is many options online for cheap bucket hats and personally I own two, a khaki green one and a black one. Both of these hats were purchased on ebay for about £2 each and there are many options for colours, ranging from bright, stand out colours to more neutral colours. I would recommend that you stick to the neutral colours for a bucket hat. Also the fitting of the hat is essential so i would also recommend that you check the sizing of the hats on ebay before purchasing because the sizing tend to differ quite a bit and a bucket hat that is too small doesn’t look very good at all.

And lastly, how to style a bucket hat. Styling a bucket hat isn’t that difficult especially if the colour is pretty plain and therefore goes with most outfits. It is perfect for a bit of a vintage look to your outfit as bucket hats stem from old hip hop with companies such as kangol producing many hats. I usually wear mine on holiday and so wear it with either a white or black tank top tucked into my shorts or just a plain white t-shirts. I would keep the outfit nice and simple with a bucket hat because the hat itself can quite often be a bit of a statement and so I would try to not overdo it with the rest of your outfit, however this doesn’t stop you from wearing it with what you feel is right for the outfit.