In order to shop on taobao effectively, you will first need to know that taobao is somewhat like eBay. The seller creates listings in which you will be able to order an item. Most sellers on taobao carry items in bulk unlike eBay where most of them carry only one item.

There aren’t regular payment options like credit card/Paypal on taobao which is why there are many buying/shopping services site that offer to buy on taobao for a small fee. We use Peeka as they are easy to use. Peeka also has an advantage over the rest as they calculate economy shipping based on volume and not weight (note that this is for Singapore only).

Basically this tutorial will teach you:

• How to search for an item on taobao.
• Ordering the item via Peeka.
• Paying for the item using Peeka.

How to search for the item you want on taobao.

When you arrive on taobao you will be greeted with a scary wall of gibberish (especially when you don’t read mandarin).

The main thing you need to worry about at this point of time is the search field.

Enter your search terms (eg. Ann Demeulemeester) into the search field and hit the search button. I have mentioned previously that some of the listings do have the brands listed in english and it shouldn’t be that much of a problem trying to find something from a specific brand. The problem comes in when you need to find something specific like shoes, bags, blazers or pants.

Continuing on using Ann Demeulemeester as an example, here is the results page that we get after hitting the search button.

The results page will display a list of items that coincide with your search terms, however if the item that you are searching for is very generic or has a high number of search results, you might want to narrow your search down. The area highlighted in blue are the subcategories that are listed within the search results.

At this moment we have:

1. 女鞋 （women’s shoes）
2. 女装 （women’s wear）
3. 其他 （others）

Within the blue boxes are subcategories of women’s shoes, women’s wear and others.

There are a few things you need to know before buying on taobao and they are pretty similar to buying on eBay.

Seller rating

Sellers on taobao are graded according to the symbol beside their seller name.

There are hearts, diamonds, crowns and gold crowns graded in that order and there can be 1-5 of them. For example, a seller with one diamond has better seller ratings than a seller with 5 hearts. Generally, I only buy from sellers with diamonds and above.

Photos

It is important that you pick sellers that have pictures of the actual products especially when it is a replica of a brand item where pictures of it are easily accessible online. The seller will usually state that it is “实图” which means that it is pictures of the actual product as opposed to pictures found on the internet. Sometimes, several listings from different sellers can have similar pictures which I believe are provided by the same manufacturer.

User feedback

If you read Mandarin, there is the bonus option of being able to read the individual feedback that is left for the items. They may provide information on whether the sizing runs big or small or if the quality of the item is good.

Now that you have selected an item, click on it to be directed to the item listing’s page.

Anatomy of a listing

There are several things we need to take note of before proceeding with an order on Peeka.sg. Below is an example of how an average listing looks like.

1. URL of the listing. This will have to be input into the order form on Peeka.
2. Seller name and rating. The seller has a rating symbol of one diamond. It should be safe to purchase from them
3. Item name
4. 价格 (Price)
5. 促销 (Discount/Offer) There are time-based discounts on taobao which is similar to eBay. The brackets states the time in which the offer expires.
6. 尺码 (Size)
7. 颜色分类 (Colour)

Now that you have all the information you need, the biggest hurdle is over. It’s time to head on over to Peeka to proceed with your order.

If you haven’t signed up for an account on Peeka, you should do so. The site is in english so it is easy to navigate. Once you have signed up for an account, click on “New Order” on your dashboard to start a new order.

Your order ID is as stated, just select your delivery type and if you would like to include shipping insurance to your order. Dawn had the wisdom to click on it the first time we had ordered, one of our items came damaged and we received a new item because we bought insurance. Click on “next”.

Enter the URL of the item which you want to buy and click on “next”. Peeka will fetch the necessary information.

You will be able to see most of the item information including price and shipping from the seller to Peeka’s China receiving centre. Do note that Peeka will fetch the highest price that is listed and if the item is on discount, you will need to correct the amount. You will need to enter the colour and size on your own as well.

To proceed, click on “add to order”. Once the listing is available on your Peeka order page, there will be an automated calculation at the bottom stating the subtotal, exchange rate, handling fee, tax , insurance and deposit amount required and total amount.

In order for Peeka to proceed with your order, they will need a deposit amount from you. Payment can be via bank transfers for Singaporeans or residents with a Singaporean bank account. They also accept Paypal on occasions but you will need to email Peeka regarding the fees that may be involved for using Paypal.

Once the deposit has been paid, Peeka will order the items on your behalf. You will receive email updates on the ordering of the items or when the item is out of stock. You are still able to add items to the order until all the items in the order has reached the China receiving centre or if your deposit amount falls below 80% of the total amount.

Peeka will send another email for final quotation which includes shipment charges when all your items have been received at the China receiving centre. You will then be required to pay that amount before the item is shipped to Singapore.

The staff from Peeka are very helpful and I am constantly impressed by how efficient they are in answering my queries. Do note that they do operate regular office hours and do deliveries themselves instead of using Singpost. Before I receive any flak, I’d like to state that we are not in any way affiliated with Peeka or taobao and are not paid for this. We would just like to recommend a good service. We have used Peeka a few times to order from taobao and are very pleased with their services.

If there are further inquiries regarding Peeka, there’s a helpful FAQ located on their website. They can also be reached using email or phone.

Helpful Keywords for shopping on taobao.

Clothing styles:

• 欧美 – European / American style. What you see in street snaps and blogs, mostly.
• 英伦 – English style – lots of tweed, plaid, penny loafers and school inspired blazers.
• 日韩 – Korean / Japanese style. Tends to be frillier and girlier.
• Clothing inspired by what actors in Korean / Japanese drama wore.

Shoes

• 男鞋 – mens shoes
• 女鞋 – womens shoes

Heel type for shoes

• 坡跟 – wedges
• 防水台 – platform
• 高跟 – heels
• If you want platform wedges, simply combine both to form 防水台坡跟

Types of shoes

• 单鞋 – pumps / sandals
• 凉鞋 – sandals
• 平底鞋 – flats
• 靴子 – boots

Types of material used

• 真皮 – real leather
• 人造革/PU – fake leather
• 亮皮 – patent leather
• 蕾丝 – lace

Different Brands

• 亚历山大王 – Alexander Wang
• 亚历山大麦昆 – Alexander McQueen

Colours

• 黑色 – Black
• 白色 – White
• 灰色 – Grey
• 红色 – Red
• 蓝色 – Blue
• 绿色 – Green
• 黄色 – Yellow
• 紫色 – Purple

We hope that you’ve enjoyed this tutorial. Happy shopping on Peeka and taobao!

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Also, it’s Christmas!

Here’s a list of the makeup used:

• Creme Base: MAC Paint Blank Canvas
• Dark Brown Eyeshadow: MAC Charcoal Brown
• Medium Brown Eyeshadow: MAC Tempting
• Highlighter: MAC Shroom
• Liquid Eyeliner: Heavy Rotation Black
• Pencil Eyeliner: Etude House Black
• Mascara: Maybelline Voluminous
• Blusher: NARS Deep Throat

Hope everyone enjoyed the makeup tutorial. We welcome all feedback. Please let us know what you think.

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We know how expensive these harnesses are online and somehow we think that with a little thought and creativity, you can create a beautiful, one-of-a-kind harness for yourself.

Here are the materials you need:

• A variety of chains, length is dependent on the design you have in mind. We like to choose heavier chains cause they weigh down on your body instead of shifting around. We like to mix chains too.
• Craft Pliers
• Jumps rings
• Lobster claw clasp
• Mannequin or someone to do this on

First we make 2 loops of chain, one around the neck and one around the arm.

After that we join the two loops using 2 lengths of chains; one at the shoulder and one would be at the center of your collarbone.

Continue adding in lengths of chain in-between the first 2 length of chains that you have added. To ensure that they look nice, ensure that the spacing in between the chains are even.

Just keep adding~!!

Et Voila~! Make sure you’ve added an opening at the back of the neck with a jump ring and lobster claw clasp.

Here’s the final product! Hope you’ve enjoyed this DIY.

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One of the features on our new layout is the “read more” button. This way, the page loads faster cause there is less images to clutter it up. So do click on it if you’d like to see the rest of this entry!

Here’s my stash and I included my routine as well, not in the listed order. (I start with face, eyes, cheeks then lips)

L-R: MAC lipsticks in Myth, Myth (unused), Blankety and Peachstock.

I am a huge, huge fan of nude lips.

L-R: Rose Salve as lip balm, Majorlica Majorca lip gloss, MAC plushglass in Fulfilled and Wildly Lush, Heavy Rotation lip concealer.

I love MAC plushglasses. The vanilla scent smells soooo delicious. The lip concealer is from a Japanese brand. If you have pigmented or unevenly coloured lips like mine, lightly pat it on to cancel out any colour before putting on lipstick or lip gloss.

L-R: Majorlica Majorca foundation, MAC concealer, Revlon liquid foundation.

Self explainatory.

L-R: Majorlica eyeshadow, KATE gel eyeliner, MAC eyeshadow in Tempting, MAC eyeshadow in Black Tied, MAC Antiquitease eyeshadow palette, Heavy Rotation liquid eyeliner, NARS eyeshadow duo in Isolde, Cordura and Alahambra.

I am a fan of browns and neutrals. I keep my eye makeup pretty simple in terms of colour. A highlighting shade all over the eyes to the brow bone, a medium tone up to the crease and a darker shade at the outer corners and near the lashline. Keep the colours in the same family, of course.

L-R: Majorlica Majorca mascaras, Tiffa glitter eyeliner, Ettusais brow mascara, Heroine make and springheart eyebrow pencils.

When having dyed hair, it’s important to make the portieres match the drapes. (matching carpets optional) Anyway, it sends me into a hissing fit when I see huge bushy black eyebrows with light, bleached hair. Nothing screams “sloppy” quite like that. So, please girls! Either use eyebrow mascaras to cover the original colour or use creme bleaches! (Both are recommended if you have really light bleached hair)

L-R: NARS Orgasm, MAC Fleur Power, NARS Super Orgasm.

I have warm, rather olive skin so peachier shades tend to suit me more.

That’s pretty much it for makeup! I hope this answers most of your questions. If you have any more queries, please feel free to comment over here or at our Formspring!

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It’s been long since we had a post on DIY Fashion. We apologise on that part, the past month has been pretty crazy with the holiday season and setting up resolutions and priorities as the year drew to an end. We have load of exciting things lined up for Monoxious this year. Do watch out for them.

Today we present something which we have been procrastinating for quite a while (which is not good since fashion waits for no one.) and raved about it back here. We finally got round to doing it after I managed to find some awesome trimmings which I though would be ideal for this little DIY project. We teach you how to make your own Elastic Harness which is inspired by Jean Pierre Braganza’s S/S 2009 (SO LAST YR OMG!!!!)

These are what you will need. We forced Dawn’s cat to be in this photo but umm… she doesn’t like being our model.

• Elastics (approx 5yards)
• Trimmings with hook and eye
• Pins
• Black thread
• Dress form (not pictured)
• Optional: Black Sock cat (for entertainment)

Start pinning your elastics to the dress form. There’s really no rules on how it should go on, we left the fastening in front so it’s easier to wear.

Just keep doing it until you’re satisfied or run out of elastics. Start marking them with white tailor chalk so you know which strap goes where. I find numbering them useful.

I marked the lines a little further as you can see as elastics are stretchable and you would want the harness to be slightly snug when wearing.

Sew all the straps together~!!!! It might be a bit of a trouble cause you might get confused so so many similar straps hanging around. Again, I numbered my pieces so I know which one goes where, but that’s the way I roll, you might find some other methods useful too.

And here’s the completed piece~!!!

We hope you’ve enjoyed this DIY Clothes tutorial and hopefully you find it useful~ We would love to see examples that you have made, just link back to this page on your blog when you are showcasing yours. Thank you~!!

Also, we welcome all comments, questions and suggestions for future DIYs. Please let us know what you would like to see.

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We start of with a simple men’s shirt.

This one’s from Primark [omg cheapppppp!!!] and dare I say I bought a couple to rip up and deconstruct. A little wrinkly I know, it was fresh off from the packaging so yeahhh… let’s proceed.

Excuse the srs face. It’s about 1am when I took this picture. I’m not naked you pervs~!!

We start off with buttoning the shirt at your waist. Obviously it’s not going to start at the collar, I managed to button mine about 2 buttons down, it should probably be the same for you.

After that, we try and form a drape in the skirt so it doesn’t look that boring. Here we will be buttoning the alternate buttonholes to the buttons.

Follow the diagram drawing above and you should be able to get a the first drape going. We’ll now move on to the second drape.

And this is what you should end up with after the buttonholes are in place. So total, just 3 buttons.
Tip: if you have a longer shirt, the drape will be more obvious and thus more interesting when worn.

After that we tie the sleeves together. It also serves as securing the waist so if the buttons accidentally pop, you won’t be baring your booty to the world.

And there we have it~!!!

We hope that you’ve enjoyed this tutorial~!! do let us know what you think and show us an alternative way to wearing your boyfriend’s shirt~!!

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We were so smitten with it we decided that we needed some bling on our lace stockings.

All you need is a bunch of bling. A delightful mix of flat sequins (cos we hate the faceted ones), Swarovski crystals and beads will transform your dull lace stockings into something awesome.

These are the ones that we are using today, I have a stash of sequins which I bought for no apparent reason, guess it came to good use now.

Here are some pointers that we would like to share:

• Sew the embellishments on while you are wearing the stockings or else the thread that you use to hold them down might not allow for stretch when you’re done sewing.
• Go really random from the bottom and work your way up. It’s more interesting that way.
• Try not to sew the embellishments on the inner calf and thigh area, these parts tend to rub against each other when you walk and the embellishments might come off or get caught on each other.
• Lace stockings with a tighter weave tends to work better since the embellishments are unlikely to get caught. Dawn and I worked on different stockings and it turns out mine always get caught cos the “holes” are too big.

And here is a teaser for the final product! Do look out for the next post where you can see them in action. We hope you’ve enjoyed this tutorial! <3

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You will need:

• Wire cutters and pliers
• Craft Glue
• Scissors
• Black Wires (or if you’re interested in making feathered headbands of other colours, choose a colour that complements the feathers)
• Black feathers (or whatever colour rocks your boat)

The wires I have selected are a 20 gauge and a 18 gauge as I find them malleable but yet strong enough to maintain the shape.

Dawn has done an awesome job of classifying my feathers, they either curve right or curve left.

First you need to measure your head circumference. My head is pretty small (I’m not kidding, I can wear kid sized hats) so I’m not going to give you an estimate length. Just wind the wire around your head, leave some allowance, then cut the wire.

After you have done so, wind the wires around each other. How nice or how ghetto the end product will look depends on you. Being sort of OCD, I have made sure they look pretty decent.

You should end up with something that looks pretty much like this.

It could’ve looked better, let’s just pretend we didn’t have the time to clean up the work.

Moving on, cut a piece of the thinner wire (about 10-15cm long) to make the framework for the feathers to go on. They can be longer or shorter depending on how you’d like them to look. The best bet is both estimation and experimentation. I would go with a longer length so in case of mistakes, I could just cut the excess away.

Wind it around the base like so.

The aim is to create a triangle, sorta like a Shark’s fin.

Do the same to the other side and you should end up with something that looks like this.

Next we arrange the feather onto the framework and adjust and trim it accordingly since no 2 feathers are alike. We would aim to make the both sides of the headband look symmetrical.

There will be 2 feathers on each side so it kinda sandwiches the wire frame. It also looks neater this way. Once you’re happy with the 2 feathers, pile on the glue on one of them.

And stick the other feather on top of it, making sure that the wire frame is sandwiched nicely in between.

Some parts of the glue may be showing. If you’re using a glue like mine that dries clear, do not panic. Otherwise, there’s always a marker you could use to colour over it.

Trim off the excess.

And it should end up looking like this right now.

Rinse and repeat.

Your end product should look like this.

Somewhat looking like the pic I nicked from Luisaviaroma.

Much love and thanks to Dawn who has been the one documenting this tutorial. Her photos are awesome aren’t they

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