Festival Fancy Dress - Mermaid Inspiration for Hogsozzle 2016

What were your childhood dreams like? Floaty and hard to remember? Vivid and packed with sights and sounds from your everyday life? Did you dream about living a completely different life? In space or under the sea?

We did :)

Carrying on my mission to get more involved in festival fancy dress this year at Hogsozzle, I've roped some of the girls in our usual troupe into dressing up. We have a mermaid, an alien, a red Indian and possibly a pirate so far - I'm still working on the others! One of my very favourite friends Hayley will be making waves in a mermaid-themed outfit. She's always been the most difficult to convince into a fancy dress costume, but I was shore the lure of festival fun times would get her donning sparkles and diy-flower crowns with the rest of us - and she's taken to it like a mermaid to water.

Any mermaid worth her salt knows the power of a beautiful found-objects crown. These are all from Pinterest - I've linked the sources below but the web is rife with DIY's and inspiration for creating your own unique, perfectly tailored hair-piece. I love the ones that have used tumbled sea-glass in blues and greens, I bet they look beautiful in the sunlight.

Seashell Crown via Polyvore, Shell Crown - Chelsea Flower Crowns on Etsy, Dreamer Mermaid Crown - Wild & Free at FreePeople, Shell Hairpiece - CDeityDesigns on Etsy, Casting Spells Mermaid Crown - Wild and Free Jewelry, Shell Tiara - BigSkyCharm on Etsy (no longer available), Gypsylight Mermaid Crown - source unknown, Starfish & Shell tiara - DIY here by Running With Sisters, Seaglass Crown - Loschy on Etsy,  Steampunk Octopus Tiara - Angelyques on Etsy, Single Shell Tiara - from here, Dreamer Flower Crown, as before, Sea Queen Mermaid Crown - ScarletHarlow on Etsy, Shell Crown, Freepeople as before, Pink Flowers & Shell Crown - GardensOfWhimsy on Etsy.


Whilst I was doing research I came across some absolute treasures - how about these as the crowning glory for your festival fancy dress outfit?

This beautiful tiara is the style of branches and berries is housed at the Victoria & Albert Museum. It was gifted to the museum in 2003, but dates back to 1860! I would love to know the story behind this beautiful piece, this clearly has the power to make the wearer feel like a real mermaid princess. Find out more here.

Then, I came across this beauty:

I couldn't find a huge amount of information about this, other than it is a coral tiara housed in the Museum of the Jewellery in Vicenza. I think my Hayley would look just magical with one of these priceless beauties perched on her waves - might have a save up a little first though...

If you are into ocean-themed history, the British Museum has over 200 mermaid themed items for you to browse - go here to dive into some really magical treasures.

Of course, dressing up as a mermaid is about a lot more than wearing shells in your hair, here are some of my favourite ocean-inspired pieces from around the web.

Mermaid Leggings - Amazon, Shell Cross Body Bag - ASOS, Mermaid Platforms - Dollskill, Mermaid Bodysuit - New Look, Earrings - SparkJewelers on Etsy, Mermaid Sunglasses - Lyst , Aquarium Effect Nail Polishes - Barry M

I'll share all of our outfits after Hogsozzle, if you want to see them before you are going to have to come along - there's still tickets available here. Don't forget if you are stuck for ideas, Tickled Pink has plenty of ready-to-rock festival outfits for every Childhood Dream imagined, I'm shore you'll find something...(okay, I'm finished with the mermaid puns now!)

I've got more fancy dress inspiration posts lined up this week! Please feel free to share your festival fancy dress inspiration with me on Twitter, or in the comments below. 

If you are an event organiser or festival-business, I'd love to work with you this summer, get in touch by emailing me here.

FIN. :)