Basadi Betta | Madanagiri Hills | Karnataka

The Chamiers | Tamil Nadu

Getaway To Edinburgh

Best Indian Eats in Nottingham

I cannot believe it has been an entire academic year since I moved to Nottingham. I remember the first week here being absolutely awful because I was so homesick but as days went by I made new friends and settled into this new environment. The first trigger for homesickness is food; the yummy mummy's cooked food. Over the last year, I have found my top three Indian food places that I vouch to be the best in Nottingham. I am putting this together especially for those Indian international students who will be joining myself next year. If you find that you are ever homesick, do try these places out and I promise you will feel much better! 

1) Tamatanga Resturant 

This is one of those classy restaurants that unfortunately is a little too expensive on a student budget, however, it's definitely worth it once in a while. It's located in the corner house, which means it's not too far off University campus. The portions are really big and if taken away, it will last you two full meals. The spice level is definitely on par with back home and will make you tongue dance! 

2) Maharaj Sweets 

Maharaj sweets is 100% my favorite takeaway service. The food is made at home by a lady who my friends and I call our Aunty because the food she makes reminds us all of authentic home cooked food. It's a pure vegetarian place and hence a lot more appreciated by Indians. Since we have been ordering from them for quite a while they are kind enough to deliver to us too. It's once of the most student friendly take away in terms of money. I will recommend that you ought to try food from here if you are ever in Nottingham 

3) Indian Food Truck 

As many of you may know, India is known for its street food. When I moved to Nottingham I was craving for some late night spicy street food served like it is back home, unfortunately, I knew I wouldn't find something like that especially because everything in this country closes no later than 6pm. To my surprise on my stroll around the city on one sunny day I bumped into what I refer to as my favorite wrap food truck. Now don't expect him to stay open late but when he is open during the day, his Panner wraps with some garlic and mint sauce is the best thing you will try. Your taste buds will thank me for it! Quite inexpensive as centrally located next tot he victoria center past boots. Do try this place out and let me know what you think.

I can't wait to discover more places next year but for my first year, I think I have done quite well. I am looking forward to meeting a new group of people coming from all over the work next year! 

Love,

Sanj

Verde, the cleaning products range | Brand Launch

As a part of this module, my team and I have started a new brand called Verde. A cleaning products range. Our idea behind the brand is to create products made completely environmentally friendly, Child and animal-friendly, aesthetically pleasing, attractive, refillable packaging with the use of natural scents and ingredients that appeal the sense of smell. The products are targeted at modern and intelligent group of people, who would appreciate the new take on cleaning products. It is also targeted at young adults who are yet to form brand alliances.  The idea is for the products to be available for purchase in local supermarkets as well as online on their official website. The price will vary depending on the chosen product but it will not exceed £6-8 each. Our main goal is for the consumer to buy the product because of its affordability as well enjoy the benefits of a stylish, displayable product that does the job of cleaning better than any other brand. 

Scholarship Event

 This past week has been one of the most craziest weeks. I now truly understand what people say about University life a being the best experience of life. Not a single moment to breath juggling Uni life, work life, social life and personal life. This week also happened to have the most awaited event for me. One of the happiest moments while getting through into Trent was the honour of also being awarded a scholarship. Every year the scholarship students are invited to an awards evening, where we all get to wear formals and receive awards. This particular event was streamed live and had an after party with food, drinks and DJ that followed. It so happened that this event was on the same day as my Birthday this year. My favourite moment was sitting there in a room full of high achievers and thinking, 'this is it, I've made it. My life is perfect'. I genuinely feel so proud to have achieved this and awarded a scholarship. It was genuinely the best present I could have received on my Birthday.

Unfortunately, I was too excited to remember about writing a blog post and hence, forget to take some good picture.  However, I do have a few that I took on my phone as I simply had to share my pride and happiness on a blog post!

                                   

Love,

Sanjana

New Mac Store Launch

Last week the Mac store in Nottingham closed down as they were moving to a new store up the road, next to all other designer stores like American Apparel, Kurt Geiger etc. I found out the first day that the new store was opening and got myself there like true Mac fan I am! 

The store itself didn't have anything new, or exciting as if you've ever been to a mac store, you know that the visual merchandising and interior are the exact same no matter which store or part of the world. However, as a Mac enthusiast, all the unused, newly stocked products is what excited me. 

I had a little chat to the manager or the store and she explained to me that they moved because they were at the old store for almost seven years and just needed a re-wamp, a new look and feel to the store. They also have more space to house more products and a more makeup stations that allow customers to sit and try products they wish to buy. She did seem quite happy because they new store has the new Mac banner, allowing them to show customers how recent the store has opened. 

I was like a lost puppy running around trying on all the products (not that I don't do that anyway) but the fact that it was all brand new made me go crazy! I really like the way everything is set up. The only thing that's a little frightening for me, the store is exactly opposite to where I have started working and that is just going to be tough on my purse.  Oops! 

I wish the new store all the best and success! 

1st Year Fashion Show

The other day I realised how lucky I am to be studying and Nottingham Trent University. On Friday, the first year fashion design students set up a fashion show to showcase their work. The reason I found out about it was through a friend who was modelling for the them. I went to go support her as it was the first time she was walking the ramp but thankfully, I'd decided to take my handy dandy camera along. As soon as the show started, I took my camera out in awe. 

All the outfits showcased have used architecture as inspiration. This hit home for me because I used architecture as a theme for one of outfits I made at A-level. I know how complicated the designs have to be as the structure of each item as to be stiff and lined. Looking at the outcome of designs produced by level 1, I am extremely impressed. I wonder, If this is the level of work that goes into producing the designing in first year, I can't wait to see what they're work will look like at the degree show, when they finish their course. 

Fragrance Workshop

I know I talk about how much I love being on my course but It's days like today that helps me rekindle the flame. Our new project for this semester has been all about fragrance and hence the University had called in a guest lecturer, Karen Gilbert, who has spent years learning and teaching all about the art of perfumery. She hosts workshops, where people come in to try create their own fragrance or learn more about perfumes suited for them. We FCP students were lucky enough for her to come in and present a lecture and let us be part of a two hour workshop. 

It was quite an interesting workshop and I learnt a lot about the background in perfumery. I always knew a lot of ingredients go into making the perfect scent but being able to make it myself helped me understand the different levels (heart, fixable, notes, etc) so much more. 

My team and I wanted to experiment rather than get stressed about it so as a little joke, we made an imaginary lady, who was in her early 80s and didn't want to smell stereotypically 'old'. So we tried to create a fresh yet musky scent. She also wanted to feel youthful and smell good enough to go out for a date if she wanted. 

We just had fun with the whole thing and hence it was quite the enjoyable process. I now know so much more about what goes into creating a fragrances. I feel more confident after this workshop to communicate and promote the fragrance brand my team and I create for the new summative project. 

Headlock Vintage Fair

The Stripe Obsession

Nottingham Castle Light Night '16

Market Visual Awareness Project | The Final Straw

Market Visual Awareness Project | Part Three

I am back with another update of my FCP project. I am now almost at the end of writing this report. One last straw and then I can start placing it all onto Indesign and thinking about the layout and design, which quite exciting.

For the section of the project, we are meant to come up with a creative way to communicate and promote using denim. Lets call is the 'next big idea'. I started with looking for inspiration as I've found myself doing before. I found so many things that inspired me but I didn't want to use something that was overdone. I wanted to step out of the box and think a little more creatively.

Imagine this - You're in a amusement park and you see those cut-out boards that people put their face in and take pictures? Are you with me? Now imagine that in a retail store. Maybe in a store window or somewhere inside near the denim section. Lets step it up, think about all the different trends that jeans have been through in the last few decades. As I've pointed out in one of my previous blogs, jeans have been through everything they possibly can. I wanted to show case how we got from the straight cut or bell bottom to skinny with ripped, or mom/boyfriend jeans with fraying. So in the end, Imagine a raw of cut-out cardboard faces with different jeans throughout history. This would relate to product to experience. Customers who walked into the store would not only be educated about the history of jeans but also enjoy the experience of put their faces in cut-out cardboards and post it on social media to share with their friends. This could also be a tactic of marketing and promoting.

I'm just adding some photos that I used as inspiration to help you imagine what I was thinking about.

Bangalore Street Style | City Series

 After such a wonderful response on my last street style post, I wanted to go out and take a few more photographs of outfits on the street that I really liked. At university, we've been given an extra brief with the summative project, which is a city series. This doesn't have any specific guideline but from what I understand, it is where we can post anything we like from different cities we visit. I am taking the path of street style. Every new city I visit, I will make it a point to photograph street style there. It will be interesting to see how unique or different the style is in each individual city.

The first city I visited is Bangalore in India. This was convenient as its only about an hour's drive from where my family lives. Bangalore is an up and coming city in terms of fashion. Its always been known for good sense of style in general compared to other parts of India but over the years I've noticed the drastic change in much the fashion has evolved here.

Market Visual Awareness Project | Part Two