Stylist Shops River Island

ITS SHOPPING SUNDAY!!

And today I'm checking out River Island, a high street shop full of bold, trend led pieces.

In the last couple of years, the brand has gone from strength to strength - and its press preview is one of the ones I look forward to the most as they always have such great stuff on show.

So, lets see how I got on in their Oxford Street store...

Today I tried on: Floral shorts, white vest, white sweatshirt, lemon jacket, black vest, white shorts, floral skirt, lemon dungarees, floral coat, stripe trench.

Ok River Island, we're on.....

First up, when life gives you lemons, what do you do? Put them on dungarees of course and add a matching jacket for good measure. These lemon print denim dungarees (£40, size 10) and jacket (£55, size 10) are verging close to the line of ridiculous, but close enough to make them just bloody perfect.

My second River Island outfit is the Geisha-Gal kimono-esq wrap around skirt/skirts combo (£30, size 10). That's right, the SKORT is back, and it ain't bad. 

I've paired it with this excellent black silky vest (£20, size 12 so that it fits oversized) which I would suggest buying in every colour for summer.

Now folks, you know how much I love a matching outfit, it must stem from my childhood spent in shell suits, so this shorts (£30, size 10) and coat (£75, size 10) combo slightly rocks my world. 

Obviously worn with the ubiquitous silky vest (£20, size 12) in white - told you it was worth a purchase.

The coat will also look freaking awesome with rolled up ripped skinny jeans and Birkenstocks this summer...

Head to toe white is my favourite sartorial challenge - the challenge being not getting myself filthy within the first ten minutes of leaving the house. If you can master that, this is probably my favourite look... 

The brushed cotton jumper (£28, size M) wasn't the best quality (you can see bits of material fluffing off on my arm and my hair) - although it was soft, comfortable and lightweight enough for British summer. The bleached denim shorts (£28, size 12) are meant to fit high waisted but I tried them in a bigger size so they would ride low on the hips like a gangsta, rather than high on the bum cheeks like a 16 year old. 

And yes I fell for them folks. 

Madly. Deeply. 

They came home with me.

Finally, the patterned silk trench - something I've seen a lot of brands doing for summer. It's the new summer kimono, chuck it on over shorts and a tee - or even over a bikini round the pool. This one (£65, size 10) is both graphic and floral and totally and utterly great.

So - what do you think? What do you love? Hate? What will you be adding to your summer wardrobe from River Island?

Answers on a postcard.

(Or the comments box below)