*Pic courtesy of the wonderful Allie Brosh at http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com.au/2013/05/depression-part-two.html

Depression. I've had enough of you. Planning to medicate the fuck out of myself just to feel something again. Also, wanting to eat would be nice, don't want to wither out of existence just yet.

If only i could, i would gut you, burn you and hide your body in a shallow grave.

/done.

Heart in two places

Warning - dark thoughts ahead

Yeah.. so.. Traveling. And not just traveling but living emotionally between two countries. Sometimes it's easy and trouble free but as the years go by it becomes a pain that never really goes away. People ask me if we're going to stay in Australia when we're in here and every time i'm at home in Finland people ask the same thing and i can tell that at least a couple of them REALLY want us back. What do i say other than i don't know? Sure i'd love to be back more often but that would be a financial suicide and living in Finland is not a choice for me right now. Not sure if i want to live in Australia forever either but that's where we're at now and i need to accept that. Living between two cultures is not simple and i'm starting to think i have no home anymore or more maybe that i'm rootless. Don't really belong to either culture. Generally the way for me to know where i'm at with that depends on which end of the flight i cry of joy as we're landing. Last time it was Melbourne. One before that Helsinki. Go figure.

Once the idea of going back home has filled me with hope and joy i cannot stop it from taking over and therefore i create unnecessary expectations and scenarios that in broad daylight are not possible. That evidently sets me up for a huge disappointment at the other end, one which takes time and hours of hard work to let go and forget. And not only that. I seem to think that now that i see some problems a lot clearer that i used to, others would see them the same way too. So obviously wrong. Sometimes being far away from home lets my mind wonder to the things i thought were wrong over the years to slowly start working on them.. and as much as i am result-orientated i can't expect other people to change their ways just because their behavior might be hurting someone else. No one ever sees it when their ways need a serious re-evaluation or when they've fallen into such a depressive slump that they require others to lift them out of it.

But yes.. disappointment. That old friend. Will i ever learn to take things as they come and stop setting myself up for a failure? Or is that just who i am?

/end thoughts, end tears

Good hair days

I've been asked about my hair a lot in the last few years and it's probably due to the rate it's been changing from one color to another. I was born a Scandinavian blonde and i kept it like that til i turned about 15-16 (can't remember too well anymore.. also have no photos of my former blonde hair.) 

From blonde i went to dark red, then dark purple and eventually to black which i kept for over 9 years. Black as a hair color was so me and i loved it immensely. 

© Arto Soini
hair by me

After moving to Australia in 2009 i started craving for color. Not just any color but bright purple, purple being my favorite of all colors. Don't quite know what my logic was then when i went to a hairdresser that specializes in all sorts of goth colors and had my hair stripped off black and dyed medium pink (very vibrant and light in photos.) The color we used for it was Special Effects Burgundy Wine.

© J.Short
Hair by me

This was the start of my long-lasting love affair with Special Effects dyes. They have never faded to anything terrible and some of the dyes have stuck so that they're almost impossible to get rid of. Not bad for a line of semi-permanent dyes! :) Anyway that's how it stayed for almost 6 months before i ventured out to blue.. This time Special Effects Blue Mayhem. This is one of my absolute favorite shades, it was so vibrant and beautiful!

©Andrew Oatham
Hair by Lisa Oatham

Again i stayed with this blue for a fair while, shot few of my favorite shots and just generally enjoyed being a blue-haired freak. Thou no-one ever treated me like a freak, which still strikes me as odd, quite the contrary i got tons of compliments from complete strangers from children to old-timers and they were always so enthusiastic. This hair was the bomb! ♥ 

From blue i finally started going towards purple..with mostly black hair and the fringe being brighter than the rest of the purple. This time the dyes i mixed were Blue Mayhem, Wild Flower and Pimpin Purple, all from Special Effects.

©Joseph Darmenia
Hair by me

Now at this point i'm not sure how long i stayed purple, I've got a feeling it wasn't very long but who knows. Couple of months maybe! Anyway i dyed most of my hair black after missing it for a while and left a little bit of color at the front. And not just any color but bright hi-vis orange. An unusual choice, i admit but it was worth a try. Loved how easy this hair was to style but not how hard it was to mix with all the purple tones in my wardrobe! Color used was Napalm with a tiny bit of Cherry Bomb (both from Special Effects.)

©Jude Agar
Hair by me

From this i bleached it again (!!) and put the rest of my Cherry Bomb on top of it. Needless to say that didn't really work out and therefore there are no photos to publish of this mishap. Then i tried to go for blue again and even thou it worked a bit better it was no match for the beautiful blue i had before. On to the second proper bleach and some more blue! I actually had a hair plan for this time of the year (2012) as i was getting married in August and for that i needed it to be purple. :D This was what July 2012 looked like.. (again Blue Mayhem, this time mixed with Electric Blue and Blue-Haired Freak, all from Special Effects)

© Frank Packer
Hair by me

Then onto the Australian wedding hair... What a mission! For this job i booked an appointment with the girls that first transformed my black mane into the beautiful pink it was in early 2011. Now my hair has always been easy to dye and it even still stays in my head after all those bleaches (added bonus!) But as Murphy's law is what it is, that would not be the case when it comes to dying your hair before the big day. After the girls bleached my hair there was some electric blue left in my hair against all odds. It also survived the subsequent purple dye-mixture. So that meant that after my hair was bleached and dyed by professionals my hair had weird greenish-blue blotches. Not_happy! Lucky these blotches weren't too visible but this still had to be fixed before the wedding. Went to see the same girls again a couple of days after the first attempt and then my hair was stripped off all color (which made it light green-gray!) and re-dyed. This time it worked and all the wicked green was gone! Thank fuck! This was the result of 11 hours of work all up! Dyes used were Special Effects Wild Flower, Directions Plum (and few other ones that i can't remember).
A lovely cold purple to suit my Gallery Serpentine corset and skirt!

Wildilocks = hair magic

Actual photos of Australian wedding hair :)

©Sharne Perrett/Immerse Photography
Hair by Lisa Oatham


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©Sharne Perrett/Immerse Photography
Hair by Lisa Oatham

The day was magnificent (i will no doubt be making a post about both wedding parties soon enough) and within a week we flew to my beautiful home country Finland to have another wedding party. What a crazy idea that was, 2 weddings!! O_O

For the Finnish purple i used Wild Flower again but this time with Pimpin Purple. This made the purple a bit warmer to match the Finnish Dress that i got from Romantic Threads. Picture featuring my beautiful husband Jack and the surroundings of a medieval Häme Castle in Hämeenlinna, Finland ♥

©Riku Wallin/Visual Reality
Hair by me

Obviously the purple worked wonders and i kept it for a while due to 2 weddigns and a lenghty honeymoon. After we settled back home i found some unused Atomic Pink from the bathroom cupboard and decided to give it a go. My hair had faded a bit after the last so it really stuck. It was so much lighter than the pink i had before! o_O

© Maria Vesterinen (No photoshop! Natural light)
Hair, makeup, wristcuffs and feathers by me

From the pink i moved quite swiftly to red. Now at this point i had never had a successful dying session with any red but as the pink was so light i finally managed to get it right. The result was phenomenal and i'm still debating myself over which one i liked more, the bright blue mayhem or the bright red!
This red was constructed by mixing half Cherry Bomb and half Devilish (both Special Effects)

©Brad Blake
Hair by me

I had my hair red for a very long time (on my hair standards) and i enjoyed it quite a bit. I'm even thinking about going back to this red one day but we shall see if my future workplace will allow that. Doubt it at this point. Actually i'm now heading for all black hair again to be able to work in a government role, but not yet. Before that i'm playing with half' heads! This one was created with Garniers semi-permanent black and Jeans hair color in Magenta.

© Frank Packer
Hair by me

As of April 2013 my hair is the same as the previous picture, just with purple (Directions Purple and Special Effects Wild Flower) instead of Magenta. No picture of it yet. :P

So, that was my hair dye-adventure! Miss my Gothic looks and therefore will eventually go back to all black.
If not otherwise mentioned, all dye-jobs done by my husband Jack! :) For photoshoots i usually style my own hair but there have been a few deviations from this.
If you have any questions please ask :)

For the love of..shoes

Yeah, yeah, nothing new about a chick going nuts about heels. But how nuts.. Well, i'm fucking bonkers. Bought my first pair of fetish heels in 2004 and have since bought more than 16 pairs of Pleasers. Not to mention all the other heels! I only had 9 pairs of shoes with me when i came to Australia in 2009 and now i have more than i can count. Some people say i could use my money better but why would i?! And what do you mean better! What's wrong with shoes? They don't pay the mortgage i'm yet to have but they sure look amazing ;) Besides, i'm not planning on having any children so that leaves a lot of money for shoes!

©Dracovinia

I don't quite understand myself how they can be so important but they are. Especially my Pleasers. The bigger the heel the higher the priority for me. Crazyyyyyyyyy.

PS. Here's another arty-farty pic of my favorite pair.

©Dracovinia

Old World Glamour

A while ago i shot with a man whose style I've admired for ages. His name is Giuseppe Dante Sapienza.
His style is amazingly ethereal, clean and dream-like. Also, on the other hand his black and white shots are strong and bold. So when he wrote on Facebook that he's doing a series of tests i was quick to put my hand up and as it happened i was lucky enough to be chosen for one of his tests. We got along beautifully and i hope this is reflected in the images. Love the way i look in them, sort of like a performer from days long gone! Definitely a new experience. :)

*Hair, makeup and styling by me.
*All images in this post © G. Dante Sapienza

Happiness in Darkness

Hooray!! Blog is up and running :) Finally got the look of it together so that it pleases me (for now..)
Photographers in cover shot from left to right: ©Les Hardwick, ©Greg Desiatov, ©Arto Soini and ©Andrew Oatham.

Then onto the actual post..

I get so freaking happy when photographers appreciate my creative output and are willing to work with my ideas in order to get that perfect shot. So_fucking_happy. It's obviously something that works both ways, i love it when a photographer comes to me with an idea and asks me how about we do this and what do you think of that. Artists respecting each other and being creative together. Hell yeah. That's what i'm talking about.

Some of my favorite shots have been the result of such work, here's a few just to stress the point..

Photo © Heidi Järvi

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Photo © Arto Soini

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Photo © Frank Packer

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Photo © Justin Matthews