MAY IN HALF A MINUTE

Now that we have lived one week of June, lets have a look at May in thirtyone seconds!

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THE SHANGRI-LA SUMMER SHOW, THE 5th EDTION

I made a poster and next week I am putting up a show - come go bananas with us, our co-performers and our students at The Shangri-La Summer Show 2019!

About 1/3 of the tickets are left, get yours from our webshop via tiny.cc/SUMMERSHOW2019

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AND THEN WE HAD MARCH

Not sure how it happened, but apparently the first quarter of this year has gone by already?
That can only mean that It'll be Christmas again in no time!


But first, lets set our minds on spring and the eventual summer! Here's what the switch from winter to spring looked like, and everything else and  in between, a second a day in March 2019.

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APRIL FOOLS & RUBIES KLUBIT

Entertainment-tip for this weekend:

April Fools Burlesque in Pikku Hanhi in Lahti and our RubiesKlubit: Hikiklubi at Sture 21 in Helsinki tomorrow! Come join the fun!

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TWENTY EIGHT SECONDS OF FEBRUARY

Because March is almost over by now, let us naturally (dum di dum...) look at the month before that; one-second-a-day: February 2019

These are so fun to do and I love watching other's mini videos of their months!

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THE ATELIERI O.HAAPALA BOOK

The crowd-funded Atelieri O.Haapala book is finally here and it is so beautiful I almost want to cry!

The bi-lingual book -the texts are both in Finnish and English- features the studio's portraits and distinctive style of photography from the last decade (the studio/project was active 2008-2016 and produced more than 7000 portraits),  taking you on a journey trough an imaginary past:

Performers, artists, family portraits, guests at events who photographed themselves in the popup photo booth, as well as some of the studio's own project series and adventure scenarios...

...not to forget a few of Saara and Marcos, the photographers', most iconic theme-looks!

But apart from being a book with hundreds of beautiful creative images to aesthetically enjoy, this work functions as quite the emotional nostalgia pack for me, being filled with amazing people, dear friends, and oh-so many memories.



The Atelieri O.Haapala book is a superb coffee table book and will most definitely make a great Christmas present! Get your own book via their website.

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THE SEASON(S) APPROACHING...

Let me first start this by saying that I am definitely and foremost waiting for Halloween (and now that the second week of October is about to start I consider Halloween-season here!).

But.

While it is as little as 80 days until Christmas (!!!),  it is only 56 until our yearly Christmas show, which this year will kick off the whole festive season:

This year we are celebrating at our Rubies-Klubit burlesque club's home venue Sture 21.

Tickets are on sale now; get them in time as they tend to sell out!

Poster by me, as usual.

Ps. and first Halloween, yes. Catch me at these Halloween events: Horror & Tease in Tampere Oct.13 and our very own Rubies Klubit: Demoniklubi on Oct.27!

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SUMMER CELEBRATIONS: THE SHANGRI-LA SUMMER SHOW JUNE 8!

If you want more sparkle in your life, and even if you don't, but just want to have fun and be entertained, come watch our studio's Summer Show Friday June 8th at Sture 21!
Coming to a show is always a win-win -  you have a great time and help put bread on the performers' tables. Plus get your daily/weekly/monhtly dose of sparkle and (biogradable) glitter.

It is already the 5th summer show we organize, and as usual we feature both students and teachers as well as resident Shangri-La performers. And a lot of other fun stuff! It's a bigger show than our regular clubs, and we turn the madness down a little bit (just a little) when hosting.

Find out more on the event page, and get your tickets from our webshop here: Summer Show tickets.

Also, a small reminder that I have created a discount code for my blog readers to our studio which gives -15% off pretty much everything - also summer show tickets! We have several summer classes and courses coming up in June as well so have a look at our studio's webpage (still only in Finnish I am afraid, although we do teach some classes in a multilingual style Finnish-English-Swedish).

The special only-for-you-discount to our webshop is FREELANCERS15

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HAPPILY EVER AFTER

You recently saw a couple of the photos we took with AskoJonathan Photography for my Happily Ever After-act.

Because behind-the-scenes photos always make things better here's the set up for the series.

A lot can be, and is done by photoshop, but the more you can put into the set organically the better.

So I had the other photoshootees of the day functioning as ground for my rose bushes. As one does.

Obviously the raw shots where there's a faun peeking out under my elbow are the best ones.

Here are some shots of how the actual act looks on stage -

photo: Bernhard Miettinen

photo: Minna Jerrman

photo: Bernhard Miettinen

It's my most Burton-esque act, that even though it begins eerie and sad, sort of a too-late Sleeping Beauty scenario, actually is rather humorous. In a tragicomic Burton kind of way. It started out as an idea for a quick Halloween act for our own event, where I wanted to dance with, what I first just planned as a ghost out of fabric, but then came up with - a skeleton (that you could see me craft on the kitchen floor in October...).  And then of course other things happen, as they tend to do in burlesque.

Some acts I plan for years before I start working with them practically, and some I work on for a year or years before they're out, but sometimes I get the idea and song on spot at once and can get practical right away, which was the case in this one. This act got to jump ahead in the queue (I usually have several acts in the making in one stage or another at once) and was stage ready in a month. Is is a lot of fun to perform (and my bony friend here has a great smile), even though the beginning got so sad I always get a little moved by it myself. Haha.

photo: Asko Jonathan Photography

And tonight it's on at the last ever Pirates Pleasures club: Witch Please!

Sail with me onto dark water at Wäiski!

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YOUR EASTER WITCH

Ok, perhaps not exactly. But suitably for a time of growth, flowers, resurrection and Easter witches Asko and I did a photoseries for my act Happily Ever After, which is something of a reversed Sleeping Beauty ghost story.

Photos by Asko Rantanen / Asko Jonathan Photography
Concept and muah by me.

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BUNNIES OFF DUTY

The Helsinki Burlesque Xmas Xtravaganza event I performed at all weekend long was truly fantastic but really sucked the juice out of me as well. Here's a Lynchian moment from when the party was over last night, with some go-go bunnies off-duty chilling.

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HALLOWEEN FUN, TODAY!

What to do today?
Let me help you with that:

Come to Sture 21 for a set of Dr. Sketchy's and then in the evening join the best, most sparkling and craziest Halloweenn party in town, when we throw our RubiesKlubit: MÖRKÖKLUBI Halloween burlesque show.
Booooh!

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FOUR THINGS RIGHT NOW: SUNDAY

In a time when I kind of dream I would catch the flu so I could lay in bed and just watch Netflix  with a clean consciousness (that wouldn't be able to happen even if it did happen) a weekend off is a truly amazing thing.  Being in a rather constant mode of constantly needing to perform and produce things, even anticipated events in the free time start feeling like something that you have to accomplish rather than get to experience and thus becomes harder to look forward to. They turn into another task to manage yourself trough. This weekend however was totally off-duty-time and on Friday I got into a real relaxation-mode as I attended the first night of the Superwood-festival (more on that later). And then I got to spend the rest of the weekend at home! Eddi is off on a three-week work trip to Yazd, the stepsons away for the autumn holidays so it's just been me and Dag (and some to do's and work which I have exceptionally well been able to neglect) enjoying the late autumn sunshine.

 The first frosty nights have arrived and left traces that won't melt away until the afternoon.

 Picking rowanberries, the last ones available, to dry for a tea infusion.

Enjoying  a chocolate-lingonberry cake that we baked with Dag!

And working on a new dance partner of mine for our up-coming Halloween show. Ergonomically on the kitchen floor; I've used up all other workspaces and surfaces available in the house.

And come evening, I might allow myself some non-guyilty Netflix time as well!

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UNDER THE MISTLE TEASE

I made a poster today.
And I am making an event in two months:

This will be the fifth edition of Under the Mistle Tease already! Crazy how time flies.
More info on the event page, tickets from our Studio Shangri-La webshop.

But before that it's time for our other event; the Halloween edition of Rubies Klubit: MÖRKÖKLUBI! October 28th at Sture 21.
Be there or, umm, be taken by some ghouls or so.

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À BRUXELLES!

Hello there!
I am on my way to Brussels to perform and it seems I am only, or well mostly, planning on wearing green things.
Must be a sign that autumn is here.

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THE SPECTACLE

A couple of photos from the gigantic number we created for the tenth and final Helsinki Burlesque Festival with both of our performing student troupes from our burlesque school  -

We are already on our eight and sixth season with the troupes, and so far we've created ten acts for them separately, but this was the first one we did with both troupes together and also the first one we put ourselves in as well. And it was, like said, the biggest number done over here so far. And as far as we've concerned, that ever will be; we'll stick to choreographing for max 15 persons; 27 was quite the challenge when it comes to rehearsal space and noise, mainly noise, in the studio.

Not sure when we'll get to do this act again with the full cast - smaller versions will most likely be seen, but I'm super happy that we got our ladies up on that big stage and made lots of epicness happen!

Photos with watermark by Tuomas Lairila and the others by Jari Miettinen.

(In case you've missed it, the studio we run is Studio Shangri-La and our burlesque school -first of it's kind when we started -is called the Shangri-La School of Showgirls.)

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RUBIES STYLE / POSING FOR LUCIE

Last November when in Prague we had a chance to do a quick (in the lobby of a dance studio) and fun shoot with fabulous photographer Lucie Kout.

These costumes are from our Give it Away-act that Ira-Maria Peltoniemi/Ira's Studio made for us.

Lucie will most likely be coming to Finland at some point this year so there will be a chance for pin-ups and performers, aspiring or established, to shoot with her. I'll post more info about that on my FB page when dates are set!

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FOR THE 10TH AND LAST TIME

Tonight the tenth -and final- Helsinki Burlesque Festival begins!
Just checked into the hotel (staying in the city to avoid the long drive home two nights in a row, plus to be able to sip some bubbly as well ;) and will head to the venue in just a bit.

Today we are opening the festival with a  gigantic number featuring  both of our performing student troupes on stage, as well as Tinker Bell and me. That means 27 pairs of legs dancing around and a whole lot of choreographing with small warrior orcs (from some role play game that one of our students gave us to use, the way some use chess pieces -  to structure formations and positions of the dancers on a small scale) before that  -it's an act and  a concept we've planned for over a year and have rehearsed for six months with the ladies and it's very rewarding to get it out on stage tonight. A A bit artsy (with proportions like this it has to), super classic and, as already said - huge. Above is a little sneak peek without giving too much away. For those of you with tickets, see you soon, for the rest, we'll get back to this in pictures later on.

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SHOWTIME!

A few photos from a show we did last week with The Ruby Knuckles Sextet.

All photos by Jani Karlsson.

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A SELFIE AND IT'S META VERSION

Last night at the club night I co-produce -RubiesKlubit -Nancy took a photo of me and these two gold sparkling performers, Bébe and Bent, while we were indulging in the act of taking mandatory backstage selfies.

I probably have a thousand of photos like these by now in my phone, smiling fab people with a lot of glitter on them squeezed together to fit an instagram square (as well, as fit in a tiny backstage). But they keep on appearing, just the heads in a different order, after every show...

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