Dear Ask the Stylist

I’d love to wear a “different” hat to the races this Christmas. Can you suggest anything?

Trilby hats are a great look for winter racing.

Make like Sonya Lennon (pictured) who is one of the judges at this year’s Most Stylish Lady competition at Leopardstown Christmas racing, with her bright trilby and cape combination.

Sonya’s chapeau of choice is Philip Treacy at The Design Centre, Powerscourt and you’ll also find some amazing trilby hats by Martha Lynn at Project 51  – pictured is one of Martha’s designs in purple (€275) which also comes in navy.

On the high street, we love the selection of trilbies at Aso, the nude one pictured is €28.25 at ASOS   while over at Topshop (£28) we found them in teal and in purple.

Wear over a jumpsuit, seperates or dress and accessorise with a pair of long leather gloves by Paula Rowan, (from €148.72), some faux fur and a stand out clutch.

- By Ann Marie Proudfoot, a personal a stylist at Proudfoot Style

Jennifer Rothwell is one of 15 designers involved in an exciting new Irish Designer Collective store, Project 51 on South William St Dublin 2 which opened this week.

Rothwell’s AW 11 collection (an amazing array of jersey dresses & jumpsuits and Trevi fountain print silk dresses & coats) will be available exclusively at this location where she’ll also be running courses for starting your own Fashion Label and Manufacturing Courses this September.

Project 51 – The Irish Design Collective, is a high end NYC Soho style luxury boutique filled with the best of Irish fashion, jewellery, millinery, accessories and furniture. It offers the ultimate shopping experience in a relaxed friendly atmosphere. Customers can choose from an amazing selection of luxury goods, from engagement rings to bridal wear, jewellery, evening wear, tailoring, millinery and luxury leather bags.

Project 51 is headed up by Eoin McDonnell owner of Precious, diamond and wedding rings specialist who tells us that ‘ For every €100 spent in a multinational store only €14 goes back into the local economy versus €45 through an Irish owned shop, thus by customers buying from Project 51 there is more money going back into the Irish economy’ ”.

Project 51 is strictly Irish designers who are based in Ireland and includes the following designers:

Ana Faye (Leather Bags)
Caiomhe Keane – Que-Va.com (Fashion)
Colette Van Jaar – Arcology.ie (Architect – sustainable furniture)
Claire O Connor    (Fashion)
Eily O Connell  (Jewellery)
Emma Taylor – RubyJewels.ie (Jewellery)
Eoin McDonnell – Precious.ie (Jewellery)
Geraldine Murphy – Saba.ie (Jewellery)
Heather Finn (Fashion)
Jennifer Rothwell (Fashion)
Martha Lynn (Millinery)
Sinead Doyle (Fashion)
Sinead Clarke – EssenC.ie (Fashion)
Vikki Shorten – VSLJewelry.com (Jewellery)
Yvonne Ryan – EveElla.com (Jewellery)

Two of the designers have even created gear for Lady Gaga (VSL cuffs ) and Michelle Obama (Claire O’Connor).

Watch the video we shot where we interviewed three of the Project 51 designers

Project 51 is located at 51 South William Street, Dublin 2. Tel 01 6795551

Check out the interiors and designs in our gallery below

[View with PicLens]

Dear  Ask the Stylist

I’m heading to the races this weekend for ladies Day at Leopardstown, judged by Philip Tracey (I guess a hat is a must then!).  What does one wear to a winter race meeting to look glam and still stay warm? Thanks !

With the racing season kicking off this weekend at the Hennessy Gold Cup (where Jasmine Guinness and Philip Treacy will be judging the Best Dressed Lady competition) we get in the mood with some racing outfit inspiration.

For this Ask the Stylist query, we turned to Martha Lynn for her expertise. Martha has won quite a few Ladies Day competitions herself, even at Leopardstown Races where the Hennessey Gold Cup takes place this Sunday.  She also happens to be a milliner (hat maker) and works out of her studio in Dublin, see www.marthalynnmillinery.com  and is pictured above in the red coat and hat.

Martha says:

Fur is really in at the moment and I picked up a lovely vintage one in London last year so I’m hoping to wear it to the next race meeting.

You can’t argue with fur when it comes to keeping you warm.

I know not everyone is a fur fan, so some good thermals will do the job and not interfere with your glamorous outfit!!

Stylist AnnMarie O'Connor, second from right, wearing fur at the races

With the racing season kicking off this weekend at the Hennessy Gold Cup (where Jasmine Guinness and Philip Treacy will be judging the Best Dressed Lady competition) we get in the mood with some racing outfit inspiration.

I got as a gift an animal print dress and matching shoes from Karen Millen.  I have been trying to match a head piece/bag/umbrella to it as I would like a nice outfit for the racing season. Any tips? S.

For this Ask the Stylist query, we turned to Martha Lynn for her expertise. Martha has won quite a few Ladies Day competitions herself, most recently at Leopardstown Races. She also happens to be a milliner (hat maker) and works out of her studio in Dublin.

The dress and shoes are amazing. Animal prints are very popular this season.

As the dress and shoes are matching I would probably go for some neutral accessories ie nothing too busy, to bring the outfit together.

I would suggest focusing in on either the black or the beige colours in the animal print. This also means that you will be able to wear your headpiece and accessories with a variety of different outfits.

I would also recommend going for a simple headpiece to compliment the pattern on the dress and shoes, as the pattern on the dress and shoes in themselves are the showpiece.

It would of course be ideal to get your hat or headpiece made to order to compliment your individual style, but if that was not an option there are a great variety of headpieces and fascinators available from some of the high street shops, like Accessorize and Marks and Spencers.

Avoca do a range of coloured umbrellas and occasionally have matching gloves.

I make hats and headpieces to order, to suit the character and individual taste of the costumer. I take into consideration their outfit, hair style and of course, the occasion. There are a variety of sample pieces on my website www.marthalynnmillinery.com

Each of them can be customized to suit your own style.

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Remember the Philip Treacy hat that Sarah Jessica Parker wore to the Sex in the City movie premiere in London in 2008?  The acorn. The flower. The butterflies.  And she wore another one of Treacy’s designs to the London Premiere of SATC2 only the other day. Entirely Amazing!

Well now Irish fashion followers can get their hands on custom made hat designed by Martha Lynn, a Phillip Treacy trained millner!

The hat is similar to the one pictured left in red and white,  is designed in beautiful pink and black, exclusively for the SATC2 charity event on May 29^th, to support the National Breast Cancer Research Institute.

The lucky winner you will have the chance to meet the creative designer Martha Lynn in person and have your photo taken to appear on WhatSheWears.ie.  The prize draw applies to everyone who signs up to the WhatSheWears.ie between 29^th May and 5^th June 2010.

About Martha Lynn

Martha Lynn is a young and passionate milliner based in Dublin, whose handmade creations fuse the traditional elements of millinery with a modern edge. From refined to ethereal, Martha combines the fashion mood of the moment with the wearer’s own style and personality to create pieces that are perfectly crafted, stunning and unique.

Spending countless hours of her childhood in her mother’s studio in Roscommon, Martha discovered her love for art at an early age and went on to complete a degree in Fine Art, specialising in sculpture at the Dun Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology. Following her graduation, Martha worked as a 3D visual artist for a leading architectural and design company in Dublin but realised her passion for millinery after studying under renowned Milliner, Ms. Aileen Keogan, at the Grafton Academy in Dublin, a fantastic teacher and an inspiration.

Now, in May 2010, Martha has just returned from doing an internship with both Philip Treacy and Stephen Jones in London. During her time there she worked on hats for both Valentino and Galliano for fashion week.

www.marthalynnmillinery.com

See the Best Dressed and the style from the event here or read about it here.

There was a predominant red theme amongst the finalists of the best dressed lady competition today at Leopardstown race course (see group photo above), with red and black being an ideal colour combination for around Christmas time.

In fact, it’s very tricky to be a stylish best dressed lady and keep warm at the same time but Martha Lynn from Roscommon (living in Donnybrook) knew how to do just that and won the Irish Tatler and Fran & Jane Most Stylish Lady Competition today at Lexus Chase Day at the Leopardstown Christmas Festival (Bank Holiday Monday 28 December).

What The Best Dressed Lady Wore

The Best Dressed Lady or  Most Stylish Lady as it’s known here, wore a black and red headpiece she made herself, a coat from Penneys that she had dyed red, a H&M dress, Wolford tights and red shoes from Zerep – proof that you can still look stunning on a budget and by reinventing your outerwear!

There was a fabulous turnout of beautiful and stylish women at the races including Lorraine Keane, Faith Amond, and finalists in the competition Jane Mulrooney from Galway and Catherine London from Mullingar. Sir Alex Ferguson was also in the crowd.

The Prize

Irish Tatler gave Martha Lynn the winner of the Most Stylish Lady Competition a 5 page photo shoot to be published in Irish Tatler’s April issue. Martha also bagged a €2,000 voucher to spend in Fran & Jane boutiques. Andrea Roche was joined by fellow judges Jessie Collins, the new editor of Irish Tatler and Laura Nolan from Fran & Jane boutiques.

Andrea Roche, Top Irish Model & Irish Tatler and Fran & Jane Ladies Day Judge said: – “There was an incredible array of gorgeous women at the races today, oodles of style and it was great to see people dressed for the weather and enjoying themselves as, while the sun is shining,  its fairly icy out there!

We had a hard job narrowing it down to 10 finalists as there was so many to choose from. Our delighted winner Martha Lynn went away with a €2,000 voucher for Fran & Jane which is a great way to sort out her New Year wardrobe and we’ll be seeing our winner in Irish Tatler next March which was a fantastic and unique prize.”

Proven track record for style

At WhatSheWears.ie, we’ve seen the winner dress in style before back at The Irish Derby in April (when she also looked stunning in red) – see our pictures here.

She also won the G Hotel best hat competition at the Galway Races when she won a bespoke Philip Treacy designed hat, quite like the one SJP wore to the SATC premiere. Catch the picture of her here.

Martha Lynn, Winner of the Best Dressed Lady said: – “I’m so delighted and excited to have won today, it’s pretty amazing as I go racing all around Ireland from Kilbeggan to the Curragh… I can’t wait for the Irish Tatler photo shoot although it’s a little daunting and I’ll have a blast spending the Fran & Jane voucher – something to really look forward to going into 2010.”

Race Day style must run in the family, as her sister, Louise Lynn won best dressed lady at last years Leopardstown Christmas festival.

Photo credit: Shane from Fennell Photography.

Related articles:

Best Dressed at the Dublin Horse Show

How to survive the Galway Races

Go Buy Now: Little Red Dress