Coachella 2017

As it's nearly that time of year again and and as I've long promised to my friends, here's a blog post about when I attended Coachella last year.

Flashback to sometime around December 2016 to January 2017 when the Coachella line up was announced (I think!) I saw New Order was playing. My parents know the people who roadie for New Order and do their sound. Therefore I mentioned it to my mum in passing, not thinking much of it.

Then flashback/flashforward to February 2017, my mum called me at school one day and is like "do you want to go to Coachella?". It's safe to say I was shocked, my friends were all around me and as I told them they all were in disbelief. I was going to Coachella.

Then flashback/flashforward to April 2017, I boarded my flight with my mum to San Francisco. There we stayed one night, as our flight was a layover, with my mum's aunt. San Francisco is beautiful, I love the old houses and I was especially excited because I had a trip planned to San Francisco in July. My great aunt took us to an amazing Mexican restaurant just down the road from her house. Mexican is my favourite type of cuisine and where I live they really don't do it justice, so it was all I could honestly asked for. I had my first ever quesadilla (which was truly beautiful) and now I'm completely obsessed with them.

The next day we went to the airport and were on our way to LA. American internal flights are great compared to our British ones, the number of free snacks I got was amazing. We landed and got an Uber to our AirBnb apartment in Downtown LA.

We only had a few days in LA so we wanted to make the most of doing things whilst we could. I'd been to LA before with school and had seen all the typical touristy things like the Hollywood Walk of Fame and therefore wasn't bothered about seeing them all again. My mum online had seen Grand Central Market, we both love food and therefore that was the first spot we went to. It was filled with different types of food from all over the world. We shared ceviche and a Thai curry, before venturing to my favourite place: the ice cream stand. The ice cream place inside the market was called McConnells, it was so good I still dream about their ice cream sandwiches today. In fact I went there both of the days we were in LA.

We then went exploring more of Downtown LA, my mum had also found this amazing bookstore called The Last Bookstore. It was so beautiful inside with little hidden corners that you could find yourself getting lost in. There was this amazing tunnel inside built out of books that you could walk through, as well as many other great photo opportunities.

In the evening my mum's cousin (who lives in LA) took us to this amazing Japanese restaurant up in the hills. They served sushi on little boats and when we arrived I realised that's where they'd filmed the ending of Nocturnal Animals so I was quite excited. 

LA was actually a little bit chillier than I remembered, especially in the evening so I regretted my first day's outfit due to coldness.

I wore a silky scarf tied as a headband from Asos. I paired it with my heart shaped Coachella x H&M sunglasses and heart dangly earrings from Urban Outfitters. I went for a yellow floral dress from Hollister and my yellow Converse as I wanted something light and flowy with sturdy shoes as I knew we'd be walking around lots. 

On our second day in LA we went to a Cambodian for breakfast that my mum had found online. The food was so delicious and definitely authentic. I had a rice and beef dish.

We then walked to Japan Town, where there was a mall filled with shops selling thing such as clothes, toys etc as well as many restaurants selling Japanese food. I found this place that sold ice cream and milkshakes with homemade honey in them. As it was a lot hotter this day, I got a vanilla milkshake with honey in it, it was so cooling. Then we walked to this ramen place that was amazing, it was super packed so you could tell it was going to be good. 

This day was so much hotter, yet due to the day before's weather I unfortunately opted for a slightly warmer outfit.

I wore my glittery cat eye sunglasses from Urban Outfitters (that I'm still obsessed with, they make any outfit look cool) and as my hoop earrings from Urban Outfitters (that I unfortunately lost one of recently). I also wore my top I bought from Zara just before going on this trip, which has bananas and avocados all over it and an open back. I paired this with my flowy elephant trousers that I got in TJ Maxx when I went to New York City and my yellow Converse again as we walked a lot.

The next day we picked up our hire car and my mum drove us both to Palm Desert where we were staying for Coachella. 

We drove to the place we had rented, dropped off our stuff, refreshed ourselves quickly and drove straight to Coachella. 

The first person I saw was Mac DeMarco who was so cute in his little straw hat and the perfect music to listen to while lazing in the sun. Then I quickly left a bit through MacDeMarco to catch Glass Animals, who again were very appropriately ambient.

We then had loads of time to kill as the next person we wanted to see was Radiohead who were playing at the very end. We fluttered between Mac Miller, the XX and DJ Shadow. When it got dark my mum and I were both so cold, it gets very very windy in the evening/night. I was in shorts and had only brought a poncho to keep me warm and my mum only had a little jacket. The combination of the wind and our exhaustion from travelling made for not a time. Therefore, when Radiohead came on and with their sound continuously messing up, we left only a few songs into their performance (despite me being desperate to see Creep). 

For the first day I wore a headband I've had for years in my hair, my heart shaped sunglasses and some little flower earrings that are my mum's. I paired it with this big chunky necklace that is very festival appropriate with a low cut Kendall & Kylie top that ties so you can see a little bit of your bra underneath. Therefore I paired it with a red lacy bralet I got from H&M which matched with the red high waisted American Apparel shorts I had bought in LA just a few days before. I also wore my silver boots from Asos, which I wore for all 3 days at the festival. 

On day two we got there earlier than we had done the day before as I wanted to see Blossoms. It was so funny to see the amount of people who were actually also from Manchester (where I'm from). Blossoms kept talking about all these traditionally British things such as going to Whetherspoons. There were these American girls around me which were so confused and kept being like "what's a Whetherspoons?". 

Getting there earlier was so tiring because it was boiling hot, I felt like I was going to melt. Plus, there was no one who I was that desperate to see till later and I couldn't be bothered anyway cause it was too hot. My mum and I went exploring round the different VIP areas (as we had VIP tickets). We got food in one of them where I had a quesadilla, but it was so expensive everywhere. We didn't plan to eat at the festival everyday cause it was so painfully pricey but we wanted to try some food just once. I would definitely recommend if you can eating before and after you come. We then went to the VIP Rose Garden where we had a nap and met some super cute brightly coloured dogs.

As it cooled down I went to see bands such as The Atomics, Two Door Cinema Club and Local Natives. Whilst walking to sit down in one of the VIP areas we saw Brooklyn Beckham wandering around with his friends and a bodyguard. Later, my mum and I went to this visual experience in which they projected lights onto the ceiling and you lay in the cool room staring up at the ceiling, it was quite trippy. After this we went to see Warpaint and then Lady Gaga. Whilst watching Lady Gaga, Kylie Jenner and James Franco also walked past us!

On the second day I wore my sparkly Urban Outfitters sunglasses, with dangly earrings that are my mum's, and a red velvet choker from River Island. I wore a top which I had bought just before going, from & Other Stories which is like a tie silky pink top, it reminds me of a ballerina. I wore a pink/magenta coloured bralet from New Look underneath with a gem sticker stuck on my chest. I also wore my floral loose Hollister shorts and my silver boots again.

The next day we went to see Skepta first, my mum and I both love Skepta and had seen him before at his own gig in Manchester. It was so funny to see how all the Americans dance to grime music and seeing the BT telephone box on stage in the middle of California.

I then went to see one of my favourite bands Grouplove, which I loved it was so nice and happy. My mum and I then went to chill in the VIP area again where, one after the other, I bumped into Alessandra Ambrosio and Sara Sampaio. Breaking the cool Coachella protocol (by pretending I was just a dumb Brit) I asked them both for photos. Sara especially was so lovely, despite my embarrassing gushing.

I then went to see DJ Khaled, who was disastrous. The arena was packed so you couldn't even get in and he kept playing 20 seconds of a random song before changing it and being like "another one". I left early cause there were too many people and it was boring. I joined my mum who was napping in one of the VIP areas, there we saw Adam Lambert and Arielle Vandenberg and on the way I bumped into Herizen Guardiola (who I also embarrassingly gushed to for ages, but she was so lovely).

I then went to see Hans Zimmer who was amazing but I left early to go see Lorde. Lorde is one of my favourite singers so I was so excited to see her and I managed to get so close to the front. She played some unheard songs off Melodrama (as it hadn't been released yet) which was so cool to hear. Her performance was incredible, as were the sparkly trousers she was wearing.

We then went to see New Order and met up with my mum's friend who was doing the sound. He invited us to go into the sound area with him, we declined as we wanted to sneak out to see Kendrick Lamar and everyone in the crowd was so shocked and confused as to why we'd declined. They were also hilariously obsessed with his Manchester accent. We then snuck out to see Kendrick, who was also amazing, before leaving.

For my third and final Coachella outfit I wore a scarf of my dad's as a headband with my heartshaped H&M x Coachella sunglasses and Urban Outfitters earrings again. I paired it with a neon pink silky dress of my mum's from the 80s. I paired it with a lacy red bralet from H&M underneath, so you could just see it peaking out slightly. I love these two bright colours together. I even got photographed in this outfit for someone's blog as they were a fashion colour forecaster, and said that this pink was about to be very in ;)

Coachella was definitely an experience. It's a completely different atmosphere to any other music festival I've ever been to before. Americans are so polite at festivals, they give you so much space in the crowd compared to British festivals where everyone just sits on each other and shoves you. The heat was also something I've never had to deal with at a festival, dancing in the sun whilst probably dehydrated is definitely something. It's also very weird to not have to wear wellies and a raincoat at a festival. I also feel the vibe of the festival is very weird, whilst I really did enjoy myself I feel it's a very overhyped festival, there's nothing that uniquely special about it. Many of the people seem to be there for the photo opportunity or to say they've been to Coachella, rather than the music itself which I thought was so odd especially considering the price of the ticket. I enjoyed myself, got to see some of my favourite artists live and got to experience something not every British teenage girl experiences. My only tips for Coachella are to make sure you bring something warm for the evening, drink plenty of water and try not to go too early in the day when it's boiling hot, if you do take breaks in the shade. I wouldn't do anything differently however, except maybe say hi to Kylie Jenner.

The next day we drove back to LA where we were staying with my mum's cousin in Santa Monica for one night before flying back. When we got there we dropped off our stuff and went for ice cream (of course!). We found this place called Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams which had some of the best salted caramel ice cream I've ever had in my life.

The next day we wandered down Venice Beach, where we saw Billie Piper! Before stopping off for breakfast at this cafe near by. We had a delicious baked breakfast in a skillet pan, similar to the Turkish breakfasts.

I had such a lovely time seeing LA as well, it was a side to LA I hadn't seen before. When I went with school previously and did all the touristy things, I hadn't enjoyed it and hadn't had the best impression of the city. However, I would definitely go back now, it's such a lovely place with loads of amazing food places.

Thanks for reading,

Roma x