Pahl and I went to the Old Lyme Inn for their Alice themed afternoon tea in April 2024 as a reconnaissance mission to see if it would be a venue and theme my fashion club would be interested in. We had a blast last year, and as a result of my mission, I ended up hosting 2 other teas at the Old Lyme Inn while waiting for the Alice Tea theme to come up again. Last year I went as a interpretation of Alice with a white dress with a blue architectural print on it, the matching head bow, printed blue and white tights and a storm blue wool coat. Pahl was a version of the Mad Hatter. 

This year, when I presented the theme to my fashion club, Sarah R thought we should all go as different characters from the book, to make things interesting and creative. I knew that this year, I was going to change my tune. I would no longer be Alice, but instead I would be an interpretation of the White Rabbit. And I wasn't going in a dress either... I was going to don pantaloons, knee high socks, a waist cinching elaborate tail coat, and a medium size top hat.  

If you thought I had started planning this outfit months in advance--you are correct! The first piece I acquired was the tail coat from Chinese indie brand Immortal Thorn. I have an affinity for this style of diamond pattern, which is considered a harlequin style or sometimes referred to as rhombus pattern. The coat itself is white with gold lace and embroidery of different playing card suits. It's also lined with black and white diamond pattern. It is best worn with a stand collar blouse of various lengths. Just after I acquired the coat in December of 2024, I found that someone happened to be selling a black and white diamond pattern shirt from the brand Lady Sloth on Lace Market. The pantaloons also became available at around the same time, from someone who was selling them used in an international forum for the fashion I am a part of. By January 2025 I had the meat and potatoes of my outfit, but I still needed some accessories to complete the look. 

The boots I ordered in February and it took about a month for them to be made. They are a combination of white suede and scalloped lace cutouts and they do not have a zipper, so they do require some time to put on and lace up. The hat I had purchased in March from Chinese Indie brand Fox Cherry. It is a very versatile piece and comes with two additional attachments. It can get quite heavy, especially when worn to the side, so I only put on one of them. The bag is a very inexpensive clock over the shoulder bag, and it was still available in the white and gold---PERFECTION! The playing card socks that are white and gray I had ordered a few years ago to go with a different dress (that of course I've never worn them with), but they worked with the look. I have since acquired black and white diamond over the knee socks that will really pull this look together next time!

You could say Sarah H had been planning their outfit for even longer than I had with mine. They acquired the blue color way and matching apron and headdress of Japanese brand Metamorphose's "Wondercard" OP over a year ago, and they had been waiting for an occasion to wear it. Sarah wore a blonde wig, a white long sleeve cotton blouse, white and black striped tights and black platform mary janes. We matched really well with our playing card motif, so I asked Sarah F to snap this photo of us together. 

Jax started their coordinate with the purple color way of Magical Artefact JSK, also by Metamorphose. This print features black cats with gold lurex lace, gold buttons and charms and black ribbon. They wore a long sleeve black blouse under it and black tights with different colored cartoon style cat eyes on it. They also have a black fuzzy cat bag with orange eyes, and a pink furry cat ear head band, which also matches their shoes. 

Sarah R decided to style a few different brands together for a sweet style ouji look. The blouse and shorts she is wearing are from the Japanese brand Liz Liza. She is also wearing a waist coat, outer coat, and carrying a parasol from the Japanese brand Angelic Pretty. Gray striped and dotted over the knee socks and pink boots complete the look. 

I really like this photo that Sarah F took of them because not only do they look like the characters that they are representing, but they are also acting in character. Especially Sarah R as the Door Mouse. 10/10 for acting and looking the part!

And Pahl was the Mad Hatter, once again. In fact I made a comparison of every time he's dressed as the Mad Hatter, and ever single time, he wears these pants. He does change up his waist coat, tail coat, bow tie, shoes, and top hat. He's thinking of maybe trying to go as the March Hare next time we find ourselves at an Alice themed event, but he needs to make some rabbit ears and attach them to a top hat to pull that one off!

I honestly really enjoyed dressing up as a whole group with different characters. However, we did confuse OTHER tea attendees with our outfits, to the point that many people asked to take photos with us and had assumed that the inn hired us for the tea. At one point I had to just let someone know that we didn't work there and to ask permission before taking photos. If anyone, the White Rabbit should be able to act as the bouncer!

Back in early March of 2025, about the weekend after I went to the Doll Shop for Girls Day, Pahl and I went on an Afternoon Tea Adventure in Chicopee, Massachusetts. The Hampton County Hexenbruts were having a Witchy Alice in Wonderland themed tea party with an escape room and dance performance. I was intrigued on so many levels and was resolute in attending even though there wasn't a whole lot of information about the event. It turned out it was the very first time this event ever happened.  We learned about the tea party through a Steampunk group we are a part of, who has members that are both Steampunks and Hexenbruts. Hexenbrut is both a German dance group and a specific dance which originated with this group with the song, Schuttel Deinen Speck, "Shake your Booty" by German rapper Peter Fox.  This particular dance is loosely choreographed and Hexenbrut groups throughout the world perform it. We were lucky to see a live performance by the Hampton County Group at the conclusion of the tea event. And what was also great was that if you knew the dance and had your own broom (or something broom-like), you could also perform the dance with the troupe because it is universally the same thing throughout the world. Unfortunately it was maybe the second time I'd seen it performed ever and I had never learned it officially, so I was simply enjoying the performance. 

Every table was uniquely decorated with a time piece, a teapot, flowers, unique tea settings and a little goodie bag. There were plenty of specifically Alice in Wonderland themed teas to choose from and lots of tea sandwiches and sweets to eat. In fact they had a lot of leftovers and encouraged us to go up for seconds and thirds. It was AMAZING in that aspect as Afternoon Teas are not normally a gastronomically filling endeavor.

We only knew two other people who attended this event--Alan Kendzior and Kit Catlett, who both took amazing photos, for which I sourced throughout this blog post. We met them at other Steampunk events in the past so we all sat together for the tea. Kit also tried to help Pahl and I solve the puzzles in the escape room, but we were pretty much lost with the second puzzle with the cipher. There were 3 additional puzzles afterwards and well, we didn't get those either. It was a very hard escape room! But luckily it wasn't a serious one and if you had to leave early, you could without an issue. 

Now this was the second Alice in Wonderland themed tea I have attended, but the first one with a Witchy twist. I was excited to put my creativity to good use. I decided to start the outfit with the Gloomth Pink Cotton Maid dress with the original "Cake" artwork matching apron. The dress is innocent enough, but the Apron shows a woman wearing a bonnet with cloven feet about to cut a layered cake, while a skeletal figure (also wearing a dress and a bonnet) and several wrist watches waits in anticipation. It's morbid and weird, and kinda witchy. To drive home the witchy aspects, I added black and white striped tights with lavender scrunch socks at the base. Then I decided to make it a little punk. I added lavender and black mary janes that have spikes, a duo belted waist belt with excess rivets, a coffin shaped necklace with a real spiderweb in it, a headband with a black bow and additionally unnecessary but visually exciting rivets and charms, and a lavender bat shaped bag with spiderweb embroidery on it. Did I need to add lavender to this outfit? NOPE. Did I? Absolutely. 

Pahl likes to go to these events as the Mad Hatter. He's got it down. He started with these striped linen pants, and added his paisley earth toned waistcoat over a white blouse. He is wearing his brown oxfords and a dark brown leather top hat with embossed tentacles and hidden eyes. A blue octopus bow tie and a green velvet tailcoat complete his look along with other eye and octopus rings. He's the Mad Steampunk Hatter this time. 

I loved Kit's outfit as the Queen of Hearts. All of her outfit was completely modified by herself. She had made most of the costume a few years ago for a similarly themed Steampunk event, but added the sash, diamond arm pattern, and the ruff recently when she acquired Valentines themed fabric on sale at a fabric store. I am always inspired when people make an outfit from scratch out of many different materials. I hope to be able to do this someday myself!

"The secret, Alice, is to surround yourself with people who make your heart smile. It's then, only then, that you'll find Wonderland"-The Mad Hatter. I would definitely say that the energy in the room was amazing and everyone was having a splendid time. The costumes other people made/wore were so incredibly creative too--I felt that my coordinate while carefully planned was simple in comparison. That's why for my next Alice themed tea (in April 2025), I made sure to dress up as a different character other than Alice. Between Steampunk, EGL fashion, and any other local tea place that has monthly themes, we are sure to run into more opportunities to reuse and rework our Wonderland outfits or generate new ideas completely as this is a theme we adore and apparently other people do too!