New Website & Blog

Jiihaa! Finally I have my own website ready! So also the blog will from here on be there.

Take a look:

www.rokrokinc.com

www.rokrokinc.com/blogs/finnished

Midnightbazar 7.9.2013

Yesterday the RokRokInc. Outlet was open at the first Midnightbazar of the season. Feeling was good although people are seemingly still at the holidays here in Munich as the place was not as full as usually. But then again that just makes the shopping more comfortable.

I didn't have time to go through the offerings but I still managed to get a quick picture of my fleamarket friend Viktor who is the sweetest Bavarian man ever. And by the way, Viktor sells marvelous authentic 50's-80's. You just have to see them, it's like a candy store! (I forgot to take a picture of the jewelries but I'll add it here later.)

In the meanwhile I was getting the picture taken with Viktor,
Nadine was keeping the business going.

Market Season Opening

On Saturday I started the market season again after the summer vacation in the Nachtkonsum Zündapphalle and what I like about this place is that it spacious and well lighted so it is comfortable to shop there.

And it was great to see so many friends there again! And for example Antonia here also bought a custom bike. So cool! And notice the Augustiner beer bottle in the bottle holder and the matching Augustiner earrings. :D

Augustiner is the most popular beer in Münich. ...If it's the best one, about that there are many opinions.

Bavarian charm

These medals I found from a back yard sales next door to us. The sellers grandpa got them from hiking happenings mostly in the 60's and the 70's. I paid a fair price for the unique medals as well as for the story as I really like to know where my materials come from. The seller was also happy that the medals, that were for many years forgotten to the attic, would now see the day light once again.

In addition I have to say that I really like these back yard flea market days. It's when people that wouldn't normally go selling their stuff gather all their crap and present them to possible recyclers. Then it's possible to find this kind of treasures and also see what kind of people live around your quarter.

Bavarian Charm Pendants by RokRokInc.

A crown and coat-of-arms, alpines in a hiking shoe, religious stuff (the holy Mary...?)
and hard working men. What could be more Bavarian?

Quick visit in Helsinki

I stopped by in Helsinki in the end of August. The visit was kind of fully booked so I had time to visit only one flea market shop and this is what I found...somewhat granny feeling, or?

I bent the spoons already but I'm not
100 % sure what to do out of them.

Prague

A couple of weeks ago I visited Prague for the second time. My first time was year 2002 right after the awful flooding disaster. Back then the river side was totally ruined and there was nothing there. This time the lively river side boulevard in the night time was the best part of the city.

It all happened so fast that night: after this picture the boulevard started rapidly to get full of cheerful people drinking wine and having fun. A Latino band of at least eight musicians was playing outside and local punk was played in one of the bar boats. Then you could feel "the wind" before a storm and soon everyone was running for shelter in the middle of flying objects. I've never felt a wind that strong and this night the thunderstorm was the strongest one this summer. Not only in Prague but also throughout Germany from Munich to Berlin.

Calm before the storm at the riverside boulevard in Prague on a Tuesday night in August.

I also accidentally found one really cute vintage shop in Prague. The Boho shop (Francouzská 76, Prague 10) was small and had a few nicely selected vintage dresses, belts and other stuff. They also had some quite nice upcycled accessories that would be perfect for a plain hipster style with subdued colors.

The charming Boho vintage shop in Prague, in the up-coming district of Krymská.

Punk Challenge

They contacted me from Shopbevel and gave me a tip to take part in their punk and chains design challenge. In the end I decided to take part with my personal favorite that is the half plaited leather and half chain necklace.

What I love about this design that it's so adjustable and you can make endless one piece designs by varying the colors and materials. You can easily crate so many different styles from romantic and kitsch to punk and rock. In addition it is also possible to adjust the price by choice of materials and the amount of the chains and so on.

And of course also what makes this design my number one choice is that I never saw quite anything similar anywhere before and it has my favorite material: upcycled leather.

Leather Necklace by RokRokInc.

The skull design is made by me from the logo of our old punk rock festival in my hometown Kemi.
Check out the video: Alhonkaturock.

 

Flea Markets in Munich / Kleidermarkt

Kleidermarkt (Tal 30, 80331 Munich) looks great, is spacious and organized, has three storeys, and has somewhat well chosen products...but: again is is way too expensive. From some pieces you can pay a bit more if there is something special in them but 20 euros for a basic jeans skirt that was originally bought from H&M for less than that really does make any sense. Just annoying.

It looks nice but I wouldn't buy anything already just for the principle: recycled clothing
has to be cheaper than the equivalent new product unless it is vintage or somehow special.

DIY Upcycling Jewelry Workhop - Summer Edition

Last Sunday we had the summer's upcycling workshop in HUIJ, Munich. Here the merry and summery group and some of the creations from Sabrina and Selin: the cool and lovely teens that really got done a big amount of unique pieces of self-made jewelry that for sure will be envied at school. <3

Sabrina and Selin made leather heart earrings with pearls, leather bracelets,
button bracelet and leather bobby pin (in the picture) in addition
to shell pendants, lace bracelets and many more funky stuff.

Our crafting group on a hot afternoon after five hours crative time!

Nactkonsum Feierwerk, Munich

Yesterday I visited the summer Nachtkonsum night flea market here in Munich. They keep it at the Feierwerk which is a culture area for youth. Specially in the summer I love the place. There's a great atmosphere, good food from a trailer kitchen and it has some weird appeal even if it's kind of rough. Maybe that's why. It has the DIY feeling in itself already.

The Feierwerk offers concerts every week and the area consist of a bigger hall and a couple of smaller club/concert venues in the same back yard. So maybe after shopping and beer drinking at the Nachtkonsum you can still also pop into a live gig. ...Or do as we did yesterday: crash into a Saturday night goth party.

Creative with kids

Last week I did a couple of hours crafting with kids at a youth center summer party. It was great even though kids would need a bit more practice with handling the pliers. But creativity they surely have and actually in upcycling the creative process is even more important than the expertise.

And with kids it is also good to learn that you can achieve your wanted outcome in many ways. There are just little problems to solve and different solutions will probably take you to the same goal.

Tuana made herself a pair of earrings with letters and black & white pearls.

DIY Jewelry Workshop - Summer edition

As we had so much fun last time in the DIY Workshop, we will do it again. This time, as it is summer, I thought we could concentrate on more summery materials like shells, lace, feathers ans so on. Hopefully we'll get as nice group together as last time!

City hiking in Partnachklamm

Partnachklamm waterfalls in the Garmisch-Partenkirchen make a great little outdoor day trip from Munich. We visited there with my brother and his girlfriend just a while ago. The weather was perfect for a small city hiking: sunny but not too hot. (I am not up for "real" hiking so this route is perfect for lazy ass people like me.)

We took lunch salads to go and headed up to the waterfalls. It costs 3,5 euros but I am happy to pay that to keep the place clean since it is truly beautiful, mind relaxing and spirit uplifting place. First some 30 minutes of stentorian, turquoise clear waters and fairytale-like spots. Then a sunny backwater open where we enjoyed our salads in an amazing scenery.

After that we headed still upwards. Mostly people choose the way up to the bigger restaurant area Wettersteinalm. But we chose the a bit hidden and smaller way up to the Partnachalm restaurant which in my opinion is even more charming. And oh dear, the beer does taste like heaven after climbing up some forty minutes of a narrow path!

The Hacker-Pschorr beer: Bavarian heaven. ...In a close to the heaven scenery.

Check out the pictures from their own site: Partnachklamm photos

Maija's new RokRokInc. treasures

RokRokInc.'s wonderful regular customer Maija wrote on her blog on her new treasures. The text is in Finnish but take a look at the pictures! Poppastelua by Maija Poppanen.

Berlin Berlin!

Berlin was nice like always. And luckily it was at least a bit better weather than in Munich. I didn't have time to search for materials really and the outdoor flea markets happen during the weekend and we were there from Monday to Thursday. But I did go through some flea market shops. Reviews of them in my next post but first about our accommodation.

Our accommodation had a beautiful view towards the Alexander Platz.

We stayed in IMA Loft Apartments and I can happily say that it was a good choice. Nothing fancy but clean, great location and a relaxed atmosphere. And a cute cafe downstairs. We had for five persons a spacious loft that had everything we needed. A special plus for the stereo. I do recommend.

Our traveling crew at the IMA Loft Apartments in Berlin.

You gotta feel Berlin

Here's one great song about Berlin from the Finnish band The 69Eyes. I couldn't find an official video to this song, only live versions, so here it is with lyrics.

The band is one of my Finnish all time favorites. They call themselves the Helsinki Vampires and play gothic rock and do it incredibly stylish. Check out The 69 Eyes official website and a couple of my favorite songs: Lost Boys, Borderline, Gothic Girl and Brandon Lee.

The 69 Eyes - Feel Berlin with Lyrics

The 69 Eyes - Feel Berlin + Lyrics - MyVideo

Off to Berlin

Off to Berlin! It is almost 7 am we are already a lit late from the schedule. Again, I couldn't decide what to take so I took a little bit of this and that, and now by bag is once again so big. But as we travel by car so who cares.

I am so going to continue my sleep a bit.
That's why the pillow.

Last Panda - Girl's Gone Wild

Here for cheering up the Thursday some new music from Finland.

Last Panda - Girl's Gone Wild

DIY workshop

On Saturday we had the very first do it yourself jewelry workshop in a workshop cafe called HUIJ. We were a small but very creative group and it was such a great day. Everybody got almost addicted in creating more and more and indeed there were many wonderful pieces made and great ideas implemented. And in the end we granted ourselves a glass or two sparkling wine as it was such a busy day. :)

In addition the local TV made a clip of us for the new youngster show.
And here it is: Upcycling Insert for Bavarian TV

AND HERE ALSO SOME PICTURES:

More German music tips - Beatsteaks

BEATSTEAKS are also one of the current big rock bands here in Germany. For me they are just quite ok, but no doubt they are good. Maybe it is just that they have some British rock in them and I never really got friends with the British rock/pop.

Here my favourites: House On Fire and Hand in Hand. Beatsteaks has made also other quite interesting music videos, you can find more of them in Youtube.

German music tips - Kraftklub

Today I would recommend for you to check out the German band called KRAFTKLUB. It takes you to the weekend party feeling and as it is already Thursday so it is just the right time for it.

Since we are soon visiting Berlin, I guess the most suitable song is this: "Ich Will Nicht Nach Berlin" (I Don't Want To Go To Berlin). But other good songs are among others: Zu Jung and Mein Leben. You can also find the band in Spotify.

Workshop coming up!

Finally it is soon time for us to have our first DIY Jewelry Workshop. I have been gathering all week long some the stuff to the workshop material bank that I will take with me for others to use in their surprising creations.

I really wait to see what kind of ideas other people will get as my mind seems to get always somehow similar ideas. Though that creates I guess what you could call my style: simple, mostly strong colors and punk rock...ish.

But the most exciting is that the local Bavarian TV will join us and film a story how an old junk transfers into a jewelry. Luckily I found a perfect person from the design markets to star in the clip.

Our first ever upcycling workshop. Thumbs up that it goes well!

Marshmallows

Yesterday I made some marshmallows out of oven hardening modelling clay. I am not the best clay artist (far from it) but I have some tips for you.

For polymer clay crafts you need the clay, an oven and
a sharp knife. For cleaning up the dust some q-tips and water.

TIPS FOR MODELLING CLAY CRAFTS

1. Polymer clay/modelling clay gets dry and hard relative soon after opening the package. You can temporarily soften it to be able to mold it with a blow dryer's hot air. It won't last long though so you have to be quick after that.
2. Clay collects easily all the dust floating in the air. You can clean up the small particles of dust at least out of the surface with a wet q-tip.
3. You can stick the headpin in already before the oven so you don't need to drill a hole for it.
4. Handle the clay as gently as possible if you want the form to hold until the oven.

Restless in Munich

One of my old favorites is coming to visit Munich on Friday 25.5. at Backstage. Come join!

...The band brings me back to my youth years and specially to one summer trip to rock 'n' roll Jamboree that was the big rockabilly and psychobilly festival in Finland back in the days.

This was maybe year -98 and as usual we traveled there with a bus from northern Finland. And as usual we stopped at the big gas station before the festival area to buy more beer because all the reserves were already empty after 8 hours of driving.

It was a hot summer's day and I stayed outside enjoying the sun and my girly cider. I am an awful talkative person so I went to talk with some guys sitting on the grass. They talked English which was of course ok by me and I explained that we are going to this rockabilly event near by.

They were rock people themselves and they they asked if I had any favorite band that I am definitely going to check out. And indeed I had: Restless from England! "Do you happen to know the band?" I asked. ...Lauhgter... "Yes, we are the band!"

DIY markets 3.-5.5.

Jiihaa, finally handmade design markets also in Munich! Last weekend we had the best time at the DIY handmade design markets at Rotkreutzplatz in Munich. The market was the very first of the kind and all went super well, specially considering that it really was the first time.

With the lovely organizer in matching clothing, haha.
Well done Angelika! I'm already waiting for the next time.

I know in Munich here are quite a lot of people who make different kind of handicrafts and also people who appreciate handmade design and are looking for individual products to complement their personality and style. Now the mission is just to bring all of us together and make the handmade design a trend in here as well.

This time we had mostly jewelries but hopefully next time we will get even more different kind of products. And I truly hope the event will become regular and the handmade design culture in Munich will get a real boost.

Thanks everyone and see you soon again!

As always, the best that I get from the markets is the people I meet and have a chance to talk to. And what made me even happier was that there were so many guests that I have already met at the night markets. It is great to hear that they really have loved my jewelry and they came to check out what new do I have. ...Heart heart and a smiley!

Hoarding...

I am the kind of person who has a big big trouble throwing anything away. A bit like my granny: I just think you can use everything somehow again in some point in the future and in ways that you don't know yet. I know, sometimes it goes to far...

But this time for example I found an old mini skirt that I can't use anymore. (Don't ask why...) So, tadaa! This is what I got out of it.

All in all three different pairs of earrings from one mini skirt.

Hoarding reminds me about this crazy haunted house "flea market" in Helsinki. In the area called Linnunlaulu is an old house where lives an old man who used to run there a people's commune in the 60's. Now he lives there alone and he has filled the once beautiful and still prestige building with stuff literally from the floor to the ceiling. You can hardly even walk along the thin path between all the crap, and for sure not without getting claustrophobic. I have never seen anything like that!

So, this man runs there a flea market on weekends, though nobody dares to go in. I did it once and I learned that the owner comes from the same city as me. He even remembered my grandfather. And by the way he himself assured the house is truly haunted. But if you ever happen to walk around the Töölönlahti and happen to see a small sign saying "Kirpputori", I recommend you should visit there just for the experience. It is scary.

From the chain I bought from this haunted house I made earrings that almost reach the shoulders.
They give you the spooky gold shivers when they once in a while lightly touch your neck...
Picture of the house by Markus Jokela/HS.

Products by RokRokInc.

Zipper earrings

Chain Earrings

Make Munich Fair

The Make Munich fair is now successfully done. It was great two days and it was even more wonderful to notice that people are really inspired by crafting. At our workshop table it was busy all day long, amazing creations were made and joy was shared. We, that is me and my "partner in crafting" Paula, on our behalf got a huge amount of new ideas and interesting contacts. Superb!

And what I learned from others was that I still have to wait for the 3D printing technique to improve. It seems that for my purposes it would still be too slow and expensive. I actually wouldn't even really need it as I am for upcycling but nevertheless 3D printing is generally very fascinating.

Guests (left) and Paula (right) at our Make Munich recycling jewelry workshop.
From the chaos emerged always something beautiful.

Marina

Marina from Ukraine fell in love with the brand
new "Grannies" pendant. It is a really cool
contrast with the grandmom glasses
and a young chic girl.

Make Munich 20.-21.4.

Next weekend I'll take part in the first Maker Fair here in Munich, in Tonhalle. There we’ll share trends and innovations in 3D printing, DIY, hacking, tinkering and crafting. And of course I'll have my DIY Crafting table there as well. So, come and Do It Yourself!

Join the event in also in Facebook.

Postpalast 12.4.

Yesterday I was at the Midnightbazar night flea market at Postpalast here in Munich. The organizer is the same as in Reithalle so otherwise it was quite the same as Reithalle but the venue was much cozier. And the Jukebox Munich was delightful as always! ...Cute boys singing pretty so that can't go wrong.

Fei's new RokRokInc. items: red leather bracelet
and black cat brooch. Totally perfect for her!

Here my other reviews of flea markets in Munich:

Diakonia Kaufhaus
Nachtkonsum Zündapphalle

Nachtkonsum Tonhalle

Midnightbazar Reithalle

Mädelsmarkt

Great crafting music

...I have to comment right away as I recently remembered again Red Hot Chili Peppers and these legendary pieces of music history. I just love the early RHCP!

I remember the last horrific trips as a pre teenager traveling by car to somewhere with the family. Luckily I had my white and purple Walkman tape player and Red Hot Chili Peppers preventing my head from exploding, haha.

HERE SOME OF MY FAVORITES:

Fight Like A Brave

Catholic School Girls Rule

Knock Me Down

Diakonia Kaufhaus

Today I visited in my favorite recycling shop in Munich: Diakonia Kaufhaus at Dachauer Straße 192. The Kaufhaus is quite big and spacious. Their main business lies in furniture recycling but they have also music, kitchen ware, glassware, some clothing, sewing equipment and children's toys and games.

Diakonia Kaufhaus is not a trendy second hand shopping experience but what I like in this shop is that it's always clean, comfortable and well organized. The workers are nice and warm and the stuff always in good condition. The price rate is usually reasonable and sometimes it might be possible to ask for a multibuy discounts.

The other shoppers are mostly hearty people as well. For example today an older lady asked me if I can sew because I was going through the buttons (as usual). As I told that in fact I also do knitting, crocheting and crafting, our discussion went further from the lack of nowadays handicraft tradition in Munich via my grandmother to our porcelain repaired teeth. Lovely!

Christoph, my favorite employee with my favorite products
in my favorite second hand shop.

Here my previous reviews of flea markets in Munich:

Nachtkonsum Zündapphalle

Nachtkonsum Tonhalle

Midnightbazar Reithalle

Mädelsmarkt

 

Nachtkonsum 6.4. @ Zündapphalle

Yesterday Nachtkonsum had an exceptional location: Zündapphalle. This hall was twice as big as usual and totally freezing. No heating so it was as cold as outside, hrrrr.... And usually this time is wouldn't a problem but now it is the coldest spring here for ages.

Marja-Maija joined me with her awesome upcycled denim cellphone pockets and small bags.
I was freezing as I was finishing my table but luckily I had my winter jacket on!

All in all I like all the night markets in Munich but in addition to the awful coldness there was also couple of other disadvantages in this location. First of all you couldn't hear the music everywhere so there wasn't really party feeling. And secondly there were maybe just a little too many sellers and overflowing offer in products.

I bought this from M-M. It is perfect to my style, I love it!

Here my other reviews of flea markets in Munich:

Diakonia Kaufhaus

Nachtkonsum Tonhalle

Midnightbazar Reithalle
Midnightbazar Postpalast

Mädelsmarkt

Cassette tape pendant

Cassette tape pendant is very simple to make.
You just have to find a tape that you like!

For tape pendant you need 1 cm split rings, 2 pliers,
a drill, 2-3 cm drill bits, (spray paint) and chain.

HOW TO MAKE A CASSETTE TAPE PENDANT

1. Drill 2-3 mm holes to the tape both corners but not quite to the edge so that the chain will hang straight. I make the holes about there where there are the holes already.
2. Put in 1 cm split rings. Split rings in order to make it last better.
3. Add the chain. I like to use a bit chunky chain to balance the heavy pendant.

Making spray painted tape pendant will take the whole day
because you need to let the paint get dry between layers.

IF YOU'D LIKE TO PAINT THE TAPE

1. Choose a cassette. It has to be just plastic without any paper.
2. Drill the holes and insert the split rings.
   (Already now because you don't want to mess the paint later.)
3. Clean the cassette.
4. Spray both sides with plastic primer and let dry.
5. Spray both sides 5-10 layers of color (depending how thick layers you make). Let dry at least 30 minutes between the layers. (I have used again the rim spray paint with little sparkles, because it gives a nice finish and is most wear resistant.)
6. Spray both sides with paint protection spray and let dry.
7. Add the chain.

Painted tape pendant by RokRokInc.

Tape pendant by RokRokInc. 

 

Disco Ensemble

Here the weeks Finnish music tip: DISCO ENSEMBLE. The band plays indie-punk-electro-pop and has a good thing going on. They are on the road this summer and play quite a lot also in Germany for example at the festivals.

Earlier this year they played here in Munich as well and we were there of course. The bar was packed (partly from Finnish fans) and people seemed to be really taken away by their electric energy.

You can listen to the songs in Spotify. My favourite is Videotapes from the first album. Also Second Soul from the newest album is a gem.

Spade Is The Anti-Heart is their most recent single.

Shopping vintage and "vintage" clothing in London

So, what I found from London was two jackets. They both are from Brick Lane second hand markets. For the jeans jacket I paid faaar to much (£45) but for the army jacket I paid only £5. Still I'm happy about the jeans jacket as well because I finally found just the right material for my jeans vest. It is the right color, hardly used, small enough and of course Levi's. Bigger and more used ones I could have gotten for £20-25 but as I am so short legged I feel that tight upper part fits me better.

I seem to have this little perversion to 90's style. Maybe I am trying to feel like
15 years old forever. Anyhow, here's two new modification projects.
...As if I wouldn't have unfinished projects enough.

Around the Spitalfields and Brick Lane, as well as at the Camden Town Stable markets, you can find tens of second hand stores. But the thing with the vintage markets and shops in London is that they sell everything as vintage but actually most of them are just recycled clothing. But they surely always have vintage prices.

I found some cool stuff and of course some of the best items are real vintage. But I am totally not going to pay for used T-shirt £18 or square pattern shirt £20. Only the shoes were maybe in more sensible prices, it makes more sense to pay £20 for leather shoes than a pullover.

Street art somewhere around the Spitalfields/Brick Lane markets area.

Even though I am 100% pro recycling, it is stupid to pay more for a recycled product than what you would have to pay for an exactly same product but new. So, in this case I am going to wait that I will find something similar from the flea markets here in Munich or elsewhere.

If you are looking for a vintage shopping experience with more realistic recycled clothing prices I recommend the Colours shop in Berlin. (They also have the vintage part with more pricy stuff.) ...I'll visit Berlin in June so more about Berlin second hand shopping then. In the meanwhile I found: Top 10 vintage stores in Berlin.

Minja

Minja loves vintage style and she dances burlesque as a hobby so
the RokRokInc. old school wooden dice earrings fit her just perfectly.

My rock bar list, London

About bar hopping in London I have to say that it is impossible and pointless to try to visit all the good ones at once since there are so many and they are so scattered around the city. Maybe it is still worth pinning some places to your map so that you can stop by if your way happens to pass some place.

In front of the Cargo Club...don't go in there.

HERE'S MY LIST OF ROCK BARS & GIG VENUES IN LONDON:

direction: SCHOREDITCH - ISLINGTON

Strongroom

Paper Dress Vintage

Roadtrip

The Relentless Garage

The Fallen Angel

Slim Jim's Liquor Store

Rattlesnake

Filthy MacNasty's

Islington Academy

direction: CAMDEN

The Underworld

Dingwalls

Black Heart

Elephants Head

Dublin Castle

The Hobgoblin

Purple Turtle

Boston Arms

Barfly

Joe's

Aces and Eights

The Blues Kitchen

Not an interesting pub actually but always as funny!
Behind the Dirty Dicks is the Cock Hill...buahhahaa...

O2 Brixton Academy is a great concert venue because
it has a descending floor and so, also we hobbits can see!

Piece of Munich in London

Here we are, back from London. It is though always nice to be home. The weather in London was darn cold so we ended up doing mostly bar hopping. We checked out maybe twenty bars in two and a half days. We found some good ones and popped in also in some shitty ones only because we were freezing and needed some warm up. All in all, many liters of beer consumed!

In Paper Dress Vintage Bar/Boutique we found something very cozy and familiar: Löwenbräu beer!
It seemed somehow that also other beers from Munich are in and hip right now.
And of course, the RokRokInc. tape chain got some compliments!

Off to London!

So, off to London! We are traveling light since Ryanair has got so incredible strict hand luggage rules. No even a hand bag allowed in addition to the main hand luggage! ...And of course, I have to save some space if I happen to find something cool.

My backpack is like always, a work in process.

About Eurovision Song Contest

...Not really, haha. But in a way though.

This year there was in both German and Finnish qualifications for Eurovision Song Contest one good band taking part. These both are great upcoming bands and kind of local to me. They both are even better live so you should go and see them if you ever have the possibility.

La Brass Banda comes from our hoods here in Bayern and they combine traditional Bavarian rhythms and instruments to punk-ska-rock music. In German Eurovision Song Contest qualifications the band got the most votes from the people but the jury doomed them with only one point.

La Brass Banda gets you going for sure!

LA BRASS BANDA - NACKERT 

______________________________________________________________________


Last Panda comes from my hometown in Finland and the band members actually include my brother in the base. They combine modern pop sound to skate punk and have always a great live energy. Last Panda also made their way to the finals in the Finnish Eurovision Song Contest qualifications.

Last Panda has the right balance between attitude and fun.

LAST PANDA - SATURDAY FOREVER 

Never ending winter

Is this winter never going to end?? Today it is snowing again and it looks more Christmassy outside than at Christmas (at X-mas we had + 20 degrees). But now it's like in Finland. ...Sooo depressing. And it is exactly the too long winter that we are trying to escape.

I remember the first year here in Munich that we drank beer on a terrace and had open window picnic at home in February already. We opened the both big windows, put the sofa in front of the window, listened Bob Marley and enjoyed the sun in shorts. Oh well, not this year!

This is a normal sight from our Helsinki home's
balcony during the Easter...

...But it shouldn't be like this here in Munich.

London calling!

London is my ultimate favorite city in the world. I still remember the WOW-effect when I stepped out for the first time from the Camden town underground station. That was summer 1997 and I got a hot summer breeze on my face and gold shivers through my body as I was right a way blown away with the cool atmosphere. I had turned seventeen that spring and it was the most amazing sight I had ever seen, and it still has the same effect on me.

Anyway, now we'll have a quick visit in London during the Easter holidays as we'll meet a couple of our Finnish friends there. I am planning to hang out Saturday in Camden and Sunday at the Spitalfield markets. I don't think I'll have so much time for searching new materials for the RokRokInc. jewelries though. ...Maybe I'll concentrate on finding something small for myself...

Getting ready for the trip to London
with my RokRokInc. earrings.

Midnightbazar, Reithalle 23.3.

For a change I was last evening at the Midnightbazar night market in the Reithalle, Munchen. The Midnightbazar is a nice night market: the place is big and the clientele consists a lot of hipsters and trendy people. They sell beer, refreshments, some drinks and snacks and have a DJ playing music. An advantage is that they have a good lightning there so you can really see what you are buying.

Still somehow I prefer the competitor Nachtkonsum specially as a seller and maybe also as a customer. Though as a seller, a big plus for Midnightbazar is that they mark the places for sellers beforehand so that you don't need to wait in line early to secure a spot.

I met my lovely customers from the last night market and
they had on everything that they bought from me! It really
makes me happy when I see people wearing my stuff.
And girls: thanks again for the delicious muffins!

Here my other reviews of flea markets in Munich:

Diakonia Kaufhaus
Nachtkonsum Zündapphalle

Nachtkonsum Tonhalle

Midnightbazar Postpalast

Mädelsmarkt