Carolina Cup Week: The Hat

It's no secret that Carolina Cup is an event where a mantra is "Go big or go home." This is perfectly understood in your choice of a hat!

Last year I had that pink striped floppy hat, and two years ago I had a plain straw hat from Belk with a bow that I added myself:

It actually came initially attached with the most heinous zebra-y/giraffe-y scarf that I took off and then added the bow in place of! Keep that in mind while searching for hats--most attached scarves are removable with scissors and a little elbow grease!

The most important part about your hat is matching it with your dress of course! There are so many different options for Cup hats that you can choose!

Marley Lilly has certainly become a force to be reckoned with as far as Cup hat choices go! They have SO many different color options that you are bound to find one that will match your dress. They even offer monogramming too to make it personal!

Target has great options in-store if you need a hat in a pinch! What's great about a plain, straw hat like this one, is that you can add a ribbon to match your dress. Like I said, that's what I did two years ago and it was great! I tied a false bow, and glued it down with fabric glue--I even added a few staples in invisible spots to make it REALLY secure!

Yet again, the bigger the better! This hat from Amazon has my name all over it! I'd even love to rock this one AFTER the Cup!

What does your hat look like? Are you added fun accessories like a bow or sash?

ANYONE have any good suggestions on how to avoid hat head also? LET ME KNOW!

xxKatie

Carolina Cup: It's A Wrap!

CAROLINA CUP WAS A BLAST!

(Photo thanks to the Lilly Pulitzer Instagram, seen here!)

I can't explain how much fun I had! I spent about 2/3 of the day working and the other 1/3 popping around from tent to tent making the rounds to say hello to everyone!

As you can see, the day started out a little wet. And by a little I mean a few raindrops less than pouring. I had my fabulous pink Hunter boots on to stay dry and un-muddy! It worked out perfectly for the morning, but thankfully it perked up a bit and our weather majorly improved!

This is another view of my outfit:

As you can see, once the weather changed for the better, I slipped into my Platinum Jacks and was good to go!

And my Carolina Cup bangle stack:

It was a combo of bangles from my own collection including J. Crew and KEP Designs!

The dress on the left, the Lilly Pulitzer Lottie Dress in the Multi State of Mind Patch was probably the most popular dress that I saw! I don't think I could ever get sick of that patch though because I always learn new things when I see it!

Some of my favorite parts of the day were meeting LBP followers and Twitter friends, like sweet Morgan here! I felt like I knew her already and we both go, "I'M SO GLAD TO FINALLY MEET YOU!!" when we saw one another!

I was also SO excited to meet Sally, our fabulous Lilly rep who has made SO many of my important outfits possible (read: Cup, 21st Birthday, etc.)! How cute does she look in the Ricci shift in that same patch!? Kathryn and I had to snag a picture with her!

I was able to sneak off for a little while to find some of my friends and we all snagged a few pictures together!

All in all, Carolina Cup was a HUGE success! I don't know how I can beat it next year! I can't say thank you enough to all of the wonderful Lilly ladies who took me in as one of their own, LBP followers who came up and chatted, friends who paid me visits, and everyone else who made this such a fun day! This was TOTALLY the BEST CUP EVER!

Until next year, Carolina Cup!

xxKatie

Getting Closer!

Carolina Cup season is close to that of a holiday. There's this big build up for a day long event. There's special dress, a special place it's celebrated, and fun, food, and drinks are all involved. All the makings of a holiday. Clearly there's a special order of steps necessary for Cup:

Step 1: Dress

The dress is the most important part. From the dress you can decide everything else: hat, shoes, accessories, cooler, date's outfit, etc.

Step 2: Hat

People don't mess around with hats, we mean business. I wore a simple, small hat last year with a white bow that I made myself. It really looked good and matched my dress. It was a popular hat, and my friend and Cup buddy (we both slightly ditched our dates, which we can now admit to, almost a year later) Colleen and I actually ended up with the same hat:

This year I'll be wearing the hat above. Would you ever guess it's from FOREVER21?! I know, crazy right?

Step 3: Accessories

Your accessories totally depend on your dress and hat. If you have a plain hat, dress it up with bold accessories? Have a loud hat or dress: keep it simple or go without! Last year I had a bright dress, plain hat and went with a standard string of pearls. This year I'll have my hat and dress with that funky neckline, so I'll have to work on the rest very soon!

Step 4: Jacket

Often forgotten, a jacket or windbreaker of some sort is ESSENTIAL. Our bus got to Cup on the very early side and the grass was still dewy and it was windy. I was also glad I had my jacket when we got closer to going home as well. 

How  many Cup steps have you taken so far? The big day is getting closer and closer!

xxKatie

Cup Dress Week: Tracy's Dress

I am loving this Tracy Negoshian dress for Cup! I envision it with a straw hat with a HUGE navy blue bow tied around and on it! This dress would be so comfortable and incorporates Spring pastels with a solid navy background! 

Y'all know how much of a shift girl I am too! You'd be confident in this dress and you wouldn't have to worry about tugging on or holding up a strapless dress all day! I know when I'm in strapless dresses, I'm constantly worrying about the top and pulling on it even out of habit too!

I also love this wrap dress for Carolina Cup! I'd pair this with a WAY oversized pearl necklace a la this on from Ralph Lauren:

And I'd add a wide hot pink grosgrain pink ribbon to a hat!

Do you like strapless or dresses with a shift shape or straps for Cup?

xxKatie

Fascinated

I posted this picture to my facebook wall yesterday, but we were playing around with fascinators for Carolina Cup! 

We have the natural color version of this fascinator on! It comes in black, hot pink, turquoise, and the natural we were rockin'!

Carolina Cup hats are quintessential for a complete Cup outfit, but would you consider substituting a fascinator instead? They're so fun and fabulous!

xxKatie

707: Starboard Clothing Co. Giveaway!

Starboard Clothing Co. is teaming up to giveaway a product that hasn't even been OFFICIALLY announced yet! It's still a little bit of a secret, and I can't wait to help share it with y'all!

HATS!

Starboard Clothing has just come out with some awesome looking hats and will be doing a giveaway for these brand new beauties! They are making the hats in red, white, blue (above), and green too! How cool is that? They're made of a super comfy premium cotton twill, ideal for wearing anytime you need to block out the sun, or just show your Starboard style!

In order to enter today's giveaway here are all the ways:

1. Follow Let's Be Preppy (1 entry)

2. Like Let's Be Preppy on Facebook (2 entries)

3. Like Starboard Clothing Co. on Facebook (3 entries)

4. Follow Let's Be Preppy on Twitter (4 entries)

5. Follow Starboard Clothing Co. on Twitter (5 entries)

6. Tweet at @letbepreppy and @StarboardStyle about the giveaway! (6 entries)

Best of luck in the last giveaway!!! This giveaway will run until 11:59pm on Sunday! Can't wait to see who wins for the last day!!

xxKatie

704: Port Southern Giveaway!

"Fine Clothing with Southern Hospitality" is the slogan of Port Southern. Not only is Port Southern both of those things, but they're a friendly company too! I had so much fun emailing back and forth with Elizabeth and she was gracious enough to offer LBP readers a few options!!

One winner will get the ultimate Port Southern Prize Pack:

1. Dress

2. Hat 

3. Koozie (they come in 2 colors!)

4. Croakies (they come in 8 colors!)

And TWO winners will get another Port Southern Swag Prize Pack:

1. Hat

2. Koozie

3. Croakies

You have TONS of ways to enter this giveaway again today! 

1. Follow Let's Be Preppy (1 entry)

2. Like Let's Be Preppy on Facebook (2 entries)

3. Like Port Southern on Facebook (3 entries)

4. Follow Let's Be Preppy on Twitter (4 entries)

5. Follow Port Southern on Twitter (5 entries)

6. Tweet at @letbepreppy and @Port_Southern about the giveaway! (6 entries)

Good luck y'all!! And don't forget, you can keep entering all the other giveaways this week too! This one will end Thursday night at 11:59pm! Hope each and every one of you had safe and happy Thanksgivings!!

xxKatie

Pink + Patent + Ease

What happens when you combine all of those words? 

You get this fabulous little wristlet from Dooney and Bourke!

I picked up this wristlet for Carolina Cup back in April, and I've had it ever since.  You can see it above with my dress! I didn't use it too too much after Carolina Cup, but I've been using it as my primary wallet for the last two weeks. I hardly ever swap out my wallet because it can be difficult and cumbersome but I've been using this recently and I really like it! I may just have to transfer everything and make the switch official. It isn't exactly "fall" though, and that's holding me back just a little.

Do you prefer wallets over wristlets?  I'm not exactly sure what to do!

xxKatie

BBTS: Beachin' by the Sea

I'm off to la playa today! AND I'M OFFICIALLY DONE WITH SUMMER CLASSES! I have 4 weeks and 3 days of freedom until school starts for the fall semester! REAL SUMMER here I come! Well equipped with this big floppy guy:

I picked up this fun hat at Target (new neighbor Sara had this for Carolina Cup and looked SO cute!) since my new skin medicine makes me really sensitive. It's probably a little bit of overkill, but I'm channeling my inner SATC a la this guacamole scene:

I also love her fiery red nails! But my new hat and I will be promptly off to the beach and I cannot wait! BBTS is also the nickname of our beach house: Bancroft by the Sea! It's a little tradition for all the beach houses to have fun, personalized names. All the beach house families went to the Naval Academy and for anyone who's unfamiliar with Navy, Bancroft is the massive residence hall where all the mids live!

Here is the famed BBTS! I will be parked right in front come about 8pm tonight! Daddy and I are headed out the MINUTE I finish work and I'll be out there for my first REAL summer vacation since my Roadtrip LAAAAST summer. For the first time in over a year my schooling is BACK ON TRACK!

Here's for an awesome 4 weeks and 3 days left of summer full of the beach, the cape, roadtripping, working, shopping, grilling, baking, brideday-ing, you name it but NO MORE SCHOOL! Clearly this girl is quite excited!

xxKatie

Carolina Cup Week: The Dress

Well, Carolina Cup is certainly known for the wide variety of dresses. More or less, it's a sea of dresses and bowties. (Is there any better kind...?) The top choice is easily Lilly Pulitzer dresses, they're bright, colorful and eye-catching. I was added semi-last minute to the group, so I had to scramble a little to decide on what I was going to wear. I have quite the backstock in my own closet, so I decided on a dress that I've never worn around this crowd:

Now to all the people that know me, you know what I'm wearing!

However, if you don't really want to wear Lilly or don't have a fab strapless dress just laying around (or neatly hung up in the Lilly section of your closet, double clipped with another Betsey dress, both with outsides facing OUT so you can see them...) in your closet, you definitely need to check out a few other dress vendors that would be PERFECT for Carolina Cup:

1. LaRoque: Click that to check out the entire facebook album of all the Cup 2011 dresses! LaRoque is known for custom dresses, fit and tailored to YOU and YOU only. Getting one of these custom dresses is on my bucket list of things to do before I graduate!!

 

Check out the monogrammed sash!

Love that one shoulder!

2. Emma Graham Designs: EGD is simply taking over college campuses! Keep an eye out for LOTS of EGD at this year's Cup. The designer is even a Gamecock grad too, so obviously I have a soft spot in my heart!!

This style is the Aimee dress, don't you love how they added the corresponding bow to the derby hat? It's like they KNEW I'd be attending...

This skirt is the Dayna skirt, and for anyone who goes to UVA (read: Foxfields) definitely check out this skirt!!

Finally, this style is the Paige dress. I love the bits of blue thrown in with the yellow, what a spring-y pop of color! Think of all the shoe and accessory options that you'd have with this color combo through the spring and EASILY into the summer!!

Now I know that the dress is a MAJOR part of the Cup! What are you wearing!! I MUST know so that I know what to keep any eye out for!!

xxKatie

Carolina Cup Week: The Hats

In a style a la the Kentucky Derby, the Carolina Cup is famous for it's hats.

If you're not familiar with proper hat etiquette, check here--straight from fancy derby hat capital, Kentucky!!

Super popular this year were the Marley Lilly hats as made famous by Carly at College Prepster! ML even held a trunk show here at USC for some very lucky Kappa Delta sorority sisters and other girls on campus for Carolina Cup! Here are some of my favorite ML styles:

Great colors to match any bright dress for Cup!

LOVE this style and color! I have the PERFECT shift that would match this!

Carly's hat--what a great combo!

I love the pink and navy together! I think pink and black would look fab together too!

I love this basic style, it would match just about anything. I'd put white in for the monogram and it would match the dress I'm wearing perfectly!!

I am oh-so last minute, but I still need my hat!! Anyone have any advice for where to get one? I'm thinking to head over to department stores, BUT I have two tests Thursday and that's my 100% focus until then! After work ends at 5 on Thursday I'm good to go!

xxKatie