Sunday, November 13, 2011

Sorry if my last post was obnoxious..

So I was beginning to think that my blog was broken. But I think that my last post may have come across as too boastful. Sorry if that was the case, I was simply proud that I'd been published in the NYTimes (and I have no co-workers to share things with).

I think from now on I might not talk about those kinds of things. I've realised this week that I care about it a lot more than anyone else does.

So this weekend I made a pie, here are the results. The crust was revolting and I'm considering binning it or scooping out the custard and eating it straight from the dish. What to do...

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Thursday, November 03, 2011

Don't get mad, get in The New York Times ....

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Best morning ever, the lovely Simone from the New York Times contacted me to let me know that we've been mentioned on her blog today...

At first when I found out that Vogue Italy and Vogue USA had essentially copied my idea I was a little crushed to say the least. But then I realised that this only validates the fact that my company is a good idea and worth pursuing. I've been boot-strapping this thing for nearly 2.5 years now and I can tell you that all of the tinned tuna for lunch is really worth it to be mentioned in The New York Times. Here's hoping that Wikifashion will continue to get bigger ....

Saturday, October 01, 2011

Mini Brisbane fashion meet up at Zuri..

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Our second fashion meetup was held at Zuri bar where we celebrated my lovely friend's Summer 2012 collection launch for her label ~ Zafiro. Gosh I need to start running if I want to wear those gorgeous pieces, eek. When did it become October?

It was lovely to finally meet Fran from Opinion Slave..
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+ Kaity of modernlegacy..
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Can't wait for our next meetup! If anyone is in Brisbane and would love to join the Brisbane fashion meetup sign up here.

All photos are from Opinion Slave... (silly me didn't take one photo).

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Brisbane Fashion Industry meetup ~ Zafiro Summer 2012 launch

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My lovely friend and founder of Zafiro Australia is launching her Summer 2012 collection at Zuri bar on the 29th of September. So I decided that it would be a great opportunity to hold a Brisbane Fashion meetup to celebrate + cheer the brand on.

If you're in Brisbane and would love to come along and have a few cocktails and buy a new bikini, you should RSVP here. It would be great to meet some fellow Brisbane bloggers!

Monday, September 19, 2011

The Sydney Morning Herald..

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While I was in San Francisco, the lovely fashion editor from The Sydney Morning Herald wrote a feature on Wikifashion. After a full day at a conference I rushed back to our hotel to do a skype interview at 11pm with her and this is the result. I'm really happy with how things turned out and thankfully didn't mumble (too much).

While I was in New York I had a few meetings with editors and fashion founders + the lovely Karlee from Business Insider interviewed me, here's the article.

I'm still a little jet lagged though I promise to put up a few pictures from my trip. Unfortunately I didn't do any sightseeing (didn't even see the Golden Gate bridge, even though I was in San Fran for two weeks), so my photos are really limited..


Wednesday, September 07, 2011

Laduree New York + I'm still jet lagged...

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It's 2:30 am in New York and of course I've woken from my sleep, this jet lag will be the death of me. I'm contemplating watching Home and Away (not homesick just really bored). Yesterday was probably the most exciting/fun/incredible day of my entire life. I can't believe I flew into New York for the first time, maneuvered my way through the city alone, met so many cool people who are doing even cooler things and decided that I need to come back here on a more permanent basis. This place is just way too good not to fall in love with it.

On my way to a meeting I stopped off at the newly opened Laduree, I was there when it opened at 9am and already the line was out the door. Strangely enough it was my boyfriend who asked if I could drop by, he loves macarons. For a guy that is otherwise very manly with his tastes, I can't help but laugh at this picture when I think of him begging me to buy some for him.

Wednesday, August 03, 2011

New York for one day...

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When my boyfriend told me he would be traveling to San Francisco for three days I was a little sad and decided that I should be going too! Although being the founder of a startup doesn't really offer me the luxury of such spur of the moment travel. Lovely C said that he would help me come along too if I made it worthwhile for Wikifashion. Worthwhile I have made it! We're having a meetup in San Fran and over 20 bloggers are attending..I'm suffering from mild (extreme) event planning anxiety.

We're also meeting up with a lot of cool people there who hopefully can give us some advice about which direction to take the site in.

Last but not least I get to fly to New York for 1.5 days. Yes I'm flying 7 hours there and back for less than two days. I'm a little miffed that my second time in New York will be as short as my first, but I am not going to complain because it's New York. I would be a spoiled little brat if I did that. I hate when people say this, but I can't divulge why I'm going, suffice to say if things pan out I will be able to tell you in September sometime! Hopefully I'll be able to squeeze in another visit to Magnolias, TopShop (I missed it last time), Kusmi Tea and Central Park (I didn't visit in April, silly!).

Sunday, July 17, 2011

I turned a quarter of a century...and a few other things.

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I had my usual catch up with my lovely friends on Tuesday over tea and decided to splurge and purchase a sticky date pudding instead of a scone. It was yummy and a lovely way to celebrate Wikifashion's 2nd birthday!

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On Friday I turned 25. It was such a lovely few days in the lead up to it... I went to Harry Potter at Gold Class, saw Cirque du Soleil and then my boyfriend had organised a surprise party with all of my friends at a Japanese restaurant in the city. We had our own room, which was in a traditional Japanese style. Far too spoilt! I purchased my birthday dress from Princess Polly. It's always good for finding something unique..

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I've been reminiscing about White Sands in New Mexico ~

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I have a major book lemming ~

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I took my lovely Delilah to the park today, she had fun as per usual.

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Who would have thought I'd find my life quote in a American chain restaurant? Not me.

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There's Wikileaks, Wikipedia and then Wikifashion. I love that we were included amongst these wikis! It made me laugh a bit. Very sweet though!


Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Meetup San Francisco, Union Square ~ September

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So because I just couldn't get enough of San Francisco (two days was not at all sufficient!) we'll be returning to San Fran in September for a few days. If you'd like to come to our meetup, we'll bring some lovely little totes and share some sweets too, no doubt!

We'll be meeting on the 4th of September in Union Square, location + time have not been decided. If you have any tips regarding a venue, please do share! Friends and partners are very welcome too.

If you'd like to come, please join our page here + for more details..

Love to see you all there if you're in the area...

Wednesday, July 06, 2011

Tsumori Chisato, polka dots + bircher muesli...

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While making a page for Tsumori Chisato I noticed that the web page matched my tea cup. So naturally I took a photo on instagram! Cute, no?

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This is the lovely bircher muesli I devoured on Tuesday morning. I prepared it the evening before by soaking half a cup of oats in greek yoghurt and apricot nectar. I then topped it with a fresh date, stewed apple, almonds and blueberries. It was delicious!


Sunday, July 03, 2011

Vodka & Caviar and Finn's 1st birthday..

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My gorgeous little nephew had his 1st birthday party today. It was blue and orange themed, my sister went to so much effort, even the cake was blue and orange sponge with white icing. I think he appreciated it, although he had tanked it by the time we cut the cake...

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My favourite nail polish for the moment ~ a bright glossy red. It's Vodka & Caviar from OPI.

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I made cake pops for Finn's birthday. I'd spent an hour threading straws through one another, as I couldn't find lolly pop sticks anywhere...at first the icing was a bit tricky, but I think I got the hang of it. They gave the adults a major sugar high though!

My boyfriend went straight to bed after the party, I think he was so exhausted from being around ten babies..

How were your weekends?

Friday, July 01, 2011

Wikifashion forum... what do you want?

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I'm in the process of creating the subjects within the Wikifashion forum and wanted to consult my lovely readers.

So what would you like to see in our forum? I'm all ears! Weddings, relationships, book club.. what else?

Hope you all have lovely weekends.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Ellegirl says I put the wiki in fashion?

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Well I certainly don't put the fashion in wiki, that's for sure! The lovely Jaclyn over at Ellegirl was kind enough to interview Coen and I for a feature on their site last week. Being so far away we also organised our own photo shoot. It was a little awkward to say the least, I really didn't like people watching us out in public. I wanted to scream at them, "Yes I'm not crazy, I don' t have any aspirations to be a model. I'm simply a little nerd on the net".

Although our photographer was so awesome and very professional- it was his 30th anniversary as a photographer that day. He also detested green, which made things a little difficult- grass is rather hard to avoid. Although I couldn't stop laughing at the look on his face when he found out about our obnoxiously bright green ute.

If you're interested in reading our little feature, hop on over here.

Sorry again for being such a lousy blogger, I'm a wiki girl at heart I guess? Speaking of Wikifashion, the handsome person in the photo above is hyped up on energy drinks and programming a forum as I type! I'm very excited, I'll actually have people to talk to while I'm wiki-ing it up.

It won't just be for fashion though, we'll also be introducing a general section, where you can talk about whatever you'd like. I think I'll even create my own book club. What do you think?

Sunday, June 05, 2011

Kerbside rat..

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Excuse the drowned rat appearance, I can assure you I attempted to 'do' my hair before I went out. Though it tends to resume its default bird nest look after about three drinks or so. I believe the look on my face is a result of my boyfriend informing me of the name of my drink- escort. Sacrebleu!

If you squint really hard, you'll be able to see the dark yellow polish from my previous post. I've decided I do like it. Although it reminds me of McDonalds and everytime I glance at my hands I get a hankering for french fries.

Just in case you're wondering where this photo was taken, it's from Kerbside Bar on Saturday night. If you're in Brisbane you must go. They furnished the bar with seats/couches that they picked up from the footpath. It doesn't sound too appealing, but trust me it's really fun. They even have a swing chair..

Monday, May 23, 2011

AA polishes..

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Here are a few polishes that I grabbed from American Apparel while I was in Vancouver. The darker yellow resembles baby food to me. Although my boyfriend seemed to be rather enamoured with it, so I decided to give it a whirl..

Sorry for being really lazy with blogging lately. To be honest, I can't do "outfit posts" because I'm back to my usual schedule which involves me sitting for 10 hours a day in front of my computer in my lovely house clothes. You don't want to see this!

Tomorrow I'm joining my local library and need some recommendations for good fiction books. I usually only read non-fiction, so I'm a bit lost as to good fiction reads?

Friday, May 20, 2011

SS Bacon Bits.

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During our five weeks in the USA we drove around in a rather large, 25 foot to be exact! RV. I wasn't very fond of it to begin with. We had no hot water during the Rockies and the smoke alarm gave me an electric shock after it fell off the roof.

But after the first week or so and the boys figuring out what was wrong with the hot water, I grew quite fond of our RV. We quickly named him SS Bacon bits. Why? Because people in the US seemed to be bacon crazy. Every spinach salad had bacon in it, the cocktails had bacon, even the toothpaste. I took photographic evidence to prove this...can anyone explain the bacon obsession in the US? I'm still a little confused.

Monday, May 16, 2011

Road tripping....can I go back now?

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This is on day one of our roadtrip, we'd just unpacked and I'd piled clothing on myself like I was a pack horse. I think at that stage we were starting to drive through the Canadian rocky's. So it was more than a little cold....

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Poor Coen's shoelaces kept coming undone everywhere we went. So it was only natural that we documented this all over the USA. We have photos of him tying his shoelaces in every city and tourist destination you can think of. This is a photo of me frantically trying to get the camera function working on my iphone so I could take a snap of him in Washington. Thankfully our resident cameraman had his fancy DSLR around his neck at all times.

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Here we are at Niagara Falls. Naturally the water isn't bright pink, I think it was mood lighting for all the lovely guys proposing to their girls.

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

Happy to be home...would rather be back on the teacup ride th... on Twitpic

Happy to be home...would rather be back on the teacup ride th... on Twitpic

Thursday, April 28, 2011

New Mexico...


This is one of my favourite photos from the trip so far.....This was taken a few days ago at the White Sands in New Mexico.

After this we went to a shop off the highway to buy fireworks and the biggest sparklers I've ever seen and lit them in the middle of the desert while listening to the coyotes in the background.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

A few photos for Coral: California....


At the Hollywood Bowl and sign lookout... it was a little windy!
The Grauman's Chinese Theatre was so much fun... my hands were a perfect match for Emma Watson, Marilyn Monroe and Bette Davis. My boyfriend's matched Gregory Peck's and Matt Damon's..
A few snaps while walking down Sunset Boulevard, during sunset... it was so pretty.

Sorry for the lacklustre blogging. I'm attempting to write this while driving in an RV on our way to San Francisco...the roads are not fit for blogging here. I'll be sure to upload more photos and videos when I have better internet access. Hope all is well with my lovely blogging friends

Friday, March 25, 2011

Kelly Cutrone in Australia...

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I just read on the Vogue Forums that Kelly Cutrone was in Australia for the launch of Gideon Shoes. She also attended book signings and graciously spent several minutes with each of her fans writing them personalised messages...

To say that I'm a little heartbroken is an understatement. I would have hopped on a plane to Sydney with my tattered copy of her book to be signed in a heart beat. If you haven't read her book, I suggest you do. Especially if you're deviating off the school-uni-work-mortgage-etc path (that's just my choice, this is a great choice for many people ).. basically her book was like listening to my parents advice in reverse.

Not many people are going to really tell you to do what you want with life and mean it. Really they'll most likely suggest the most boring degree to complete (in case you're wondering it's economics) so you can get a stable job (government) at the end of it. But no one will ever tell you that that's so so very boring. Kelly probably would. That's why you should read her book. (Don't bother with Borders, not many physical stores have copies. Try the bookdepository)

Maybe when I'm in New York in a few weeks for my Wikifashion meetup I might run into her? Perhaps I can park my motorhome outside People's Revolution and pop in for a quick chat...(that would be hilarious).

PS. Just looked at the book depository and she has a new book up for pre-order, "Normal Gets You Nowhere").

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Wikifashion USA/Canada road trip + meetups

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According to the count down in my diary, I'm leaving on my trip in 11 days! That means I need to hop to it with our Wikifashion meetups. We'll be traveling 13,000 kms across Canada and around the USA in a little under a month.

I've decided we'll be having meetups in:
  • New York (most likely on the 12th April at Spot Dessert Bar 6:00pm
  • San Francisco
  • Portland
  • Austin
Here's our travel map if you want more details ... or if you want us to organise another meetup!

I'll be writing most of the details here and also on the Wikifashion tumblr. Let me know if you'd like to come, we'll be giving out free Wikifashion bags and a few other goodies. Love to see you there

Join our meetup group for all of our details + RSVP. Once I'm on the road this will be much easier for me to organize and make restaurant bookings...

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Wikifashion at SXSW...

Over the weekend Wikifashion was one of the sponsors at the Texas Style Council at SXSW. Unfortunately I wasn't there, I was sleep tight on the other side of the world. But the point is Wikifashion was there! Next year Coen and I will join our totes in Texas

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The gorgeous Indiana of Adored Austin was one of the organisers of the event. How cute is that tutu? Gosh next year I'm going, if only to wear cowboy boots and a tutu!

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You can see our tote in the middle of the pic...

Found more photos of the bag here and here.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Brisbane Fashion Industry meetup part deux...

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Following the success (three people is good going for our first meet) of our first meet, I've just scheduled another meetup for this month. We'll be gathering again at Kerbside Bar on the 28th of this month at 6:30pm.

If you're a blogger (I know there are a few of you in Brisbane!), someone who is just a little curious about fashion or if you are involved in the industry we'd love you to join us...RSVP.

Sunday, March 06, 2011

Why women and wikis do mix...

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Over the last few months there has been a discussion surrounding the fact that only 13% of Wikipedia's contributors are female. The study that discovered this statistic is the catalyst for Sue Gardner's new initiative to involve more women in Wikipedia and to increase their contribution rate to 25% by 2015.

After reading the debate in the New York Times, something that seemed obvious to me just didn't seem to really pop out from any of the debaters. Or perhaps it is obvious and other women just wouldn't say it? Women like things that look pretty..I know that a lot of people might jump out at me for over simplifying the problem and being patronising. But I really don't think that it's something that people should feel shameful about.

Men and women find different aspects of sites, cars, clothing or food appealing for whatever reason. For a lot of women something that looks down right gorgeous is more appealing and they may be more likely to form an attachment to and want to use. I'm not at all a techie, nor am I an expert in design (I'm a trained econometrician). But I am a founder and dedicated user of a wiki that has a contributor base of 94% women-in fact many are fashion bloggers who are not usually described as geeks.

This statistic is not something that I set out to achieve, quite the contrary, I wanted to make sure that just as many men as women used my wiki. But this just hasn't happened. If you take the time to look at my wiki you might see why. It's more than a little pretty, but don't just take my word for it- quora agrees with me. When I say pretty, I mean aesthetically but also it's user friendly. It's less cluttered and a little less overwhelming than traditional wikis have been- très girl friendly.

Another argument as to why it has such a high female contributor rate is the content-fashion. Many might argue that this topic is not something that appeals to many men and they may very well be correct. But a key thread that appeared throughout many of the articles I've read on this topic is that women are disinterested in technology and prefer to use social sites such as facebook or twitter. I think it's this notion that women just don't like technology that is the most damaging. Although a lot of our users who have first used the site found the syntax confusing, many of them persevered and learned how to use mediawiki effectively.

Consequently many would contact me or report that they loved using it once they got the hang of it and would then feel a form of ownership over the pages they were creating. This would be the same intrinsic motivator that causes many of the men who contribute to Wikipedia, to continue to do so. For anyone who remembers their first edit on Wikipedia and is not a programmer themselves, they may remember it as being a little daunting. It takes time and effort to learn how to contribute properly. Something that editors on Wikipedia may not be so encouraging or forgiving of?

What I've unintentionally highlighted with my own site is not that women don't like wikis or are willing to contribute to them (wikipedia's study on the site's usage revealed that 31% of their readers are women), but that they perhaps don't find the site all that intuitive or appealing to edit, ergo Wikipedia you're that really smart nerd in high school that all the cool girls secretly wanted to date but wouldn't dare.

Although the site has made strides in it's appearance lately, with a new redesign and the introduction of mediawiki v16 came an easier editing system, I think it will take a little more than that to attract women to the site. Perhaps make the help sections a little more understandable for the average non-techie and introduce some mechanisms for a more encouraging environment for learning the syntax (this would also prove helpful for new male editors)? Of course being easier on the eye wouldn't go astray.


Wednesday, March 02, 2011

Wikifashion contributors are the coolest...

Not only did the gorgeous Fi from Previously Owned write the loveliest post about us, she re-jazzed our badges and made two of the cutest badges I've ever seen (only a little bit biased). See for yourself...how cute are they?

If you love them too, feel free to take one for yourself




Guess what? The Wikifashion USA/Canada tour is only 30 days away now! Getting so so excited...now I just need some recommendations about what I should pack. Any Vancouver girls, what should I wear in April? Will it still be really cold? Any advice would be fantastic...

Thursday, February 24, 2011

Brisbane Fashion Industry meetup part one...

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Here are a few quick snaps from our first meetup at Kerbside. I think it went rather well considering there were only three of us (haha). Oh well we have to start somewhere! It was great fun, as you can see from my photo I look very pleased with my iphone for some reason?!

The drink that looks vaguely like a mojito was in fact alcohol free and quite delicious apparently. I had a berry number which was really lovely, and also sans alcohol. The bartender was a little horrified when we asked for them, although slightly less so than when we had asked for the tea menu!

All in all it was a lot of fun and hopefully next time a few more Brisbane fashion (bloggers, designers, business owners etc) peeps come out of the woodworks and join us. Would you be inclined to join us if I brought cupcakes? Because next time there will be some ♥ I've heard bloggers like cake!

Monday, February 14, 2011

Happy Valentine's Day ♥ Wikifashion

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Happy Valentine’s day… to show our ♥ to our contributors we’re giving away a Tiffany heart necklace + a Diana mini en rose…. simply go to our Facebook page to enter. Happy Valentine’s Day xoxo

I'd love all of my blog readers to enter, I know so many of you have supported us over the last 18 months! What did everyone do for Valentine's Day? C was lovely enough to buy me a bunch of pink tulips, which were so pretty...

Saturday, February 12, 2011

Wikifashion was on Mashable this week + meet our lovely video bloggers

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As you all know we relaunched Wikifashion this week, I basically have had no sleep and developed a family of ulcers in my mouth (eek). But who cares, when you're in Mashable? I'm not sure if many of my readers would know what Mashable is, but suffice to say if you're in tech, it's a pretty cool thing to happen.

Not only that, but about 20 minutes after it was published, the lovely Tony Wang (of Google boutiques fame) mentioned us at the IFB conference in New York-watching the livestream at 3am in the morning was definitely worth it.

Also, Wikifashion has its own blog, which I don't think I mentioned before? We have two super cute Californian gals who have done an awesome video for us on how to style high-waisted pants. Hop on over and take a look, I would really appreciate it.

I'm off now to have a lovely breakfast with the workaholic boyfriend before he heads off to his office for the weekend. I hope you have lovely weekends x

Tuesday, February 08, 2011

Hey wiki you're so fine..

Wikifashion from Wikifashion on Vimeo.


You're so fine you blow my mind, hey wiki, hey wiki.

The redesign is finally here... it's taken over 18 months of slogging away and living off noodles (+ strawberries) but it's here.

It would mean so much to me if you could reblog this video or even mention the redesign on your blogs. A wiki is only possible with the help and obsessive of its contributors + I know just how obsessed my readers are about fashion!

There has been much talk over the years (Mashable + WSJ) about how women simply aren't interested in wikis, I think that's untrue and I'm going to change that with Wikifashion. I think that women just need a wiki that they love, are passionate about and lets face it, one that looks this pretty really helps.




Monday, January 31, 2011

Grab one of our Wikifashion tote bags...

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Our tote bags just arrived this morning.

If you would like to buy one, just hop on over here. I'll do my best to ship them out as soon as possible... I know that uni will be starting soon and many of you will need a good book/library bag to haul everything around. Mine's already filled!


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