Oct 10, 2012

Capital Food Fight

Madeline Beard Fashion, Food capital food fight, culinary, fashion, food, Mexico 1 Comment

The last 48 hours has been pretty nuts — between design work, a midterm and packing for Mexico, I feel like I have barely been able to catch my breath. Last night I had the chance to take a break from all the madness to attend Capital Food Fight, a huge culinary event to benefit DC Central Kitchen. I started working as the graphic design intern for DCCK this summer and a huge part of the internship has been doing all of the design work for the event (everything from the program to posters to promo cards to invites). It was pretty surreal to walk into the Ronald Reagan Building and see hundreds of people holding the program I designed — definitely one of the most rewarding experiences I have had as a graphic designer so far.

The event in itself was amazing. I now know the true meaning of having eyes bigger than my stomach — over 60 restaurants made tasting plates for the event and I think I attempted to try a good 30 dishes. As a college student in her first semester without a meal plan, this change in my consistent “soup, salad and occasional Chinese takeout” diet was like foodie heaven. Below are a few photos I snapped from the event, but first here’s what I decided to wear:

I chose to go with a feminine/masculine pairing. For some reason, I was really inspired by both Carrie’s tuxedo for Stanford and Anthony’s wedding in Sex and the City 2 and Anne Hathaway’s tuxedo look when she hosted the Oscars. No idea where that inspiration came from, it just sort of popped into my brain as I was digging through my closet and I just thought I’d go with it.

And the perfect way to end the evening:

I leave for Mexico in T-5 hours. Maybe I will finish packing? Maybe I will sleep? Both seem pretty ambitious at this point in the night. Looking forward to sharing all of my travels with you guys, for now I need to figure out where I buried all my sandals and stashed my sunscreen…

♥

Oct 7, 2012

Weekend Recap : Into the Woods

Madeline Beard Other Adventures good time, Maryland, retreat, sisters 2 Comments

I just got home from spending the last 24 hours on a retreat with my sorority sisters in rural Maryland and it was honestly everything I needed at this point in time. The middle of the semester is probably one of the most exhausting points: people start to get sick, all of a sudden it’s time for midterms and it feels as though everything starts to converge with very little time to just chill.

I was anxious at first about taking a whole day to just go off the grid and hang out. This next week will be a mad dash until Wednesday — tomorrow is Capital Food Fight, Tuesday I have a midterm and Wednesday morning I jet off to Mexico. The timing of everything had me a little freaked out. In retrospect, I can’t imagine not having gone. I feel totally rejuvenated, mind, body and soul. This trip helped me realize that sometimes it’s important to just let yourself escape — go off into the woods, roll around in some grass and dirt (you know, if you’re into that kind of thing), laugh with your friends and count all your lucky stars (speaking of stars, I forget how many you can see when you venture outside the city). Sure, tonight I will be cramming and attempting to balance my various assignments, but at least I can do that knowing that my time spent away from textbooks was completely worth it.

During the trip, I rediscovered a song that sums up my current frame of mind pretty perfectly:

Hope everyone else had a great weekend, get ready for an eventful week of posts on SLB! Looking forward to sharing all of my adventures with you guys.

♥

Oct 5, 2012

Fashion Friday: Denim Rebel

Madeline Beard Fashion canadian tuxedo, combat boots, denim, fashion, leather, studs 1 Comment

Meet Andrew Purzak:

We have Public Speaking together every Thursday and last night I finally worked up the courage to ask him to be in my column. Judging by the consistently cool outfits he dons in class, I had a feeling he wouldn’t disappoint. When he showed up for our shoot today in this rock star-worthy Canadian tuxedo, I couldn’t have been more happy. I have a huge admiration for risk takers, and I feel like Andrew falls into that category. From his DIY studded collar to his combat boots, Andrew fully embraces his own aesthetic and it just works.

For all AU students reading this, check out next Thursday’s issue of The Eagle to find out more about Andrew’s personal style. For all my other readers, I’ll post a link to the article when it goes live.

And in the true spirit of Fashion Friday, I’m sharing the Anna Wintour fan art my roommate Aditi just sent me. I think my personal favorites are “Anna Wintour’s face on a chair” and “Anna As Campbell’s Soup, On A Tshirt”. More adventures to come, for now I’m going to give my brain a much needed rest and indulge in some candy corn and Project Runway. Happy Friday, there’s no better feeling than making it to another weekend.

♥