We have been taking your nominations of local style icons, people who have a great sense of style whether that be a friend, family, co-worker. We have loved meeting these people, here we want to show you the stylish people of Barnsley! We have interviewed them along with pictures of their favourite outfits.

Have you heard of the Barnsley Card before? It's a new scheme being outlaid across Barnsley as a town wide loyalty discount card. Many shops have already signed up and seeing the benefits of the shoppers with their card. It's free for Businesses to sign up to the card and at the tiny expenses of £1.99 a month for shoppers to sign up for their own card (shh! We have a discount for you to use further down)! All businesses involved will offer at least a 10% discount on your bill, some offering extras on top as well! And these aren't just available in the town centre shops, you can find them in the surrounding villages and on online shops that are based in the Barnsley area!


New businesses are signing up daily, growing to the already large list of places you can use it. Everything from restaurants, retailers, services and more. As for your fashion fixes, you can use your Barnsley card in places like Kingston Jewellers, Oh Sew Sweet Shop, Labels For Less, DOMO, The Wedding Date, Browns Jewellers and more. If you are a business, you can sign up to the scheme for free! The full sign up form is on the website barnsleycard.com.


We have been given a little present to offer to you all to get your Barnsley Card even cheaper, for just £1.49 per month! When you sign up to your card on barnsleycard.com input the code BFC50 to get it for the cheaper rate. You will then receive your card through post and regular email updates about new places you can use it at.

A while ago I visited the Cannon Hall Museum for their Tales of a Wedding Dress exhibition, showing handmade historical dresses from local people and we heard about their stories. Last weekend I was back at Cannon Hall for their Farm Food Festival (which was lovely!) and I decided to go back into the museum and realised they have more wedding dresses in that were from films and television series. They were spread through the rest of the museum where the rooms are set up as they were once before which made the dresses look very settled in their environments.

Here's the photos I took of the dresses, they were so beautiful and so detailed. Some of the dresses were on spinning podiums, enabling you to see all sides of the costumes. I really recommend seeing all theses beautiful gowns if you are ever visiting Cannon Hall!

Pura Cosmetics is an amazing local beauty products business, specialising in lip care. They started out in the 'I Know I Can' Challenge, a local entrepreneur competition for schools and colleges, but have continued on the business and grow and progress to where they are now. I was very lucky in being gifted some lip balms and lip scrubs from Pura and also was given another one of their scrubs when I attended the Lucy May Lingerie Launch Party, receiving it in a goody bag along with other items and cards.



When I was first sent their products, I received a Strawberry Daiquiri lip balm, Fruits of the Forest lip balm, Revitalising Raspberry lip scrub and a Sex on the Beach lip scrub, plus the extra one I got was the Classic Coconut. They all smelt delicious! It really put a smile on my day when I recieved them, along with a hand-written note about them and with some leaflets and cards. However I was actually late in receiving them as I had missed the delivery and then didn't get through to the post office til almost 2 weeks later! So on a little side note, it would have been great if the box was the size to fit through my letterbox ha!



I'm not a big beauty regime sort of gal, but I found fitting this into my routine incredibly easy! The lip scrubs are like a 30 second job, seriously! Buff out the scrubs either with your finger or any brush of your choice and then rinse off. Then apply on some of the lip balms in an array of gorgeous smelling flavours. As a matter of fact, I have these products spread all round my house. One of the lip balms stays in my hand bag, another in my bathroom along with a scrub and then a couple more scrubs spread about for whenever I feel like my lips need some care.



I love the presentation of the products, the pink labels really stand out and I like the added details on the Cocktails range with the little cocktail symbols. The fonts used and how they are matched well the the flavours makes it nice and clear what product you are buying. The size of the pots and just right, the lip balms in little plastic tubs and the scrubs in capped jars, meaning they can fit anywhere in any space.



The business and products are built on a great foundation, all products being 100% cruelty-free and vegan certified, whilst still being EU cosmetic tested and complaint certified. They are also an award-winning business, winning the I Know I Can Competition, The Jacqueline Gold Women In Business Award, Pride of Barnsley Start-Up of the Year and the Theo Paphitis' Small Business Sunday Award. How amazing is all that!



I 100% recommend these products and I already know many other people that have their products amongst their beauty regime. I'm excited to see what other ranges they will come up with! Like their facebook page: www.facebook.com/PuraCosmetics and order their items from their website here: www.puracosmetics.co.uk

The Cudworth Bunny Trail is a fun a activity for anyone who's wanting to explore the Barnsley village of Cudworth. Set up by owners of The Wishes Card Shop, it was a way to help connect the independent shops and get more customers to visit them. The idea is there's 9 bunnies hiding within 9 different shops on the main high street, people go round collecting stickers from each shop once they have spotted the elusive bunny, once they collected them all, return to the Wishes shop to receive a little prize.



It has been going since the 19th of June and finishes 30th September, with other smaller activities with it along the way. Their most recent one was a bunny colouring competition where you received a bunny cutout and had to imaginatively colour it in, in order to win an Itty Bitty toy from Wishes.




The Bunnies are hidden in 9 shops up and down the main high street, Four Seasons, Buttercups Florist, Katie Newsam Fashion, Infinity Jewellers, Barnsley Animal Rescue Charity, The Co-op, Deacon's Superdec, Poppy's Cafe and Wishes. Each having their own different coloured bunny to find, some were hidden in shop window displays, some were hidden inside the shop. There were even a couple of them that hid it very well, whilst others made it very clear where to find it.



It was great when I visited the trail, I saw quite a few people dashing in and out of the shops to collect the different stickers. Both adults and children running around with their special leaflets and maps to find them, even some admitting they weren't even aware of some of the shops before doing the trail. This immediately showed that the scheme was working how it should be.



They are already planning another bunny trail next year, with the hopes of more shops getting involved and more activities to do along the way. This is all in aid of the #cudworthiscool campaign, to create more of a buzz around Cudworth and what it has to offer in Barnsley. Have you been to do the Bunny Trail?

Lucy May Lingerie is a brand new fashion company that creates beautiful handmade underwear. They had their official launch party June 24th at the Old Chemist in Barnsley town centre where they invited ladies who have been their first customers, brave women who have had boudoir photos taken with Masque Photography, friends and family, local bloggers and press.

The launch party was co-hosted with Katie Portman, writer and blogger of Pouting in Heels, Helen Booth of Masque Photography and owners of Lucy May Lingerie, Natalie & Paula. The scene of the launch party was the top floor of The Old Chemist bar near The Civic. It's the first time I had been on the top floor and was surprised at how lovely the room was, a glass roof, classic wooden beams, large hanging light bulbs and with a quirky bar, which were handing out glasses of champagne and serving cocktails. Around the room were examples of Helen's photography, featuring beautiful women of sensuous boudoir photography, as well as mannequins showcasing some of the lingerie. The room soon filled up to 50+ guests all here to support this great occasion.

I brought my mum with me as my plus 1 to this ladies-only event and sat on the second row near the front so I could take some great photos. However after about 5 minutes, Katie patted on my shoulder and mentioned bloggers and press have reserved seats on the front row, so we got bumped up! We felt rather special as it's the first time I'd been invited to a fashion show as a blogger and then was bumped to the front row. We also had our pictures taken by Charlotte Kaye of Charlotte Elizabeth Photography, who was there taking all of the professional photos of the show.


Katie opened the evening by making all of the introductions to Lucy May Lingerie, a brand that is based in the Sheffield/Barnsley area and that they are named after their Grandma. They were using the hashtag #Discoveranewyou for the evening, which all of the bloggers used amongst their social medias. Owner Natalie was then invited up to give a more in depth explanation of the brand, they had been on social media for the last 3 years as they have been building the business, using Lucy May as a persona, trying to portray a particular lifestyle. They put up a video showing what kind of things they've shared on their social medias, including inspirational photos, quote pictures, showing ladies to give themselves time-out, their inner-selves and escapism. After this, Natalie went into explaining the design processes, handmaking the underwear and more with a second video showing their photoshoot pictures, products that will be available purchase and the finer details.



The first fashion show begin with a group of beautiful women of different shapes, sizes and ages, in soft silk black robes, all carrying an array of Masque Photography's photo boards. Many of these photos were the women themselves carrying them, proving they were already brave bold ladies. They all had their make-up done by Masque Photography's team Make-up Artist, which looked amazing! And all had personal fittings with Natalie & Paula for their underwear. After this, the ladies were invited back out and stood in a line at the front and did a cheeky de-robe wiggle before strutting down the catwalk in the Lucy May lingerie. It was such a momentous moment for everyone to be here supporting these women who were beautiful and bold in their own way. I know I would never have the confidence to do what they did but I felt so inspired by their energy and was fully rooting them on! They were showcasing the Maybella range, all were detailed black lace with flashes of red florals. All looked similar but with different detailing like straps, cuts and styles.



After the show, they were invited back out and had a little interview with Katie, to talk about them feeling empowered and to appreciate their own beauty. You could feel the atmosphere as they were gleaming with pride of what they had just achieved. We also had an interview between Katie and Helen to talk about boudoir photography and what it can do for your own self-confidence, whether you'd want to prove something for yourself or for your significant other, but ensured the experience has bounds of positivity.



I left the party feeling lifted and proud of the ladies that had strutted their stuff, proving that ladies supporting ladies will always be the way to go! Lucy May Lingerie also offers fitting parties in your own home, where the party can go from the Old Chemist to your living room! All-in-all, the launch party was a great success and the company is growing daily. We can't wait to see how they progress!

LMB Crafts is a local business that creates sweet accessories, crafting kits, home decor and more. They are launching a brand new DIY Kit, so we interviewed owner Leanne to ask her all about them.

Why did you decide to starting doing kits?
"I started the kits because of requests from my customers. At fairs and networking I’d get asked how I make something because they thought it was great or wanted to show it to someone else so they could have a go, at first I was reluctant but then I remembered how much I used to love showing my guides (I was once a girl guide and Ranger leader) how to do something and then, them being so proud of what they’d made. That’s how the sock monkeys came about in the first place and I love to pass on my skills to others."

Tell us about your new kit?
"The New kit is different from previous kits. It’s all about the basics of machine sewing. Again this was based on customer requests. Kids aged 8 upwards were unsure when it came to machine sewing, mums weren’t too sure either so I put together the mini flower tote kit to guide them through the process of making something pretty and practical but nice and simple on the sewing machine."

What was your inspiration for it?
"Ha ha as above really, kids wanting to sew and not knowing how. Mums wanting their kids to sew but not knowing where to start or go for help that wasn’t going to cost the earth."
What level of sewer do you need to be to create it?
"It’s a really basic kit, straight lines all the way. So really basic. Ideal for beginners!"

Where can we buy your range of kits from?
"All my kits are available through Etsy (www.etsy.com/shop/leannescrafts) or you can contact me through facebook (@lmbcrafts) or I’m usually at local craft fairs every month or so."
Follow LMB Crafts on Facebook and Twitter.

Today is also International Museum Day, so we had the pleasure of visiting the Tales Of The Wedding Dress Exhibition at The Cannon Hall Museum. We joined in on the Curatorial Tour of the exhibition, which I enjoyed far more than if I had just visited it on my own. The stories behind the dresses were incredibly intriguing and special in their own right, especially with some being old dresses from as far back as the 1920's. The dresses that are currently on show are the locally handmade ones and then at the end of the month, wedding dress from film and television will be put on show. I highly recommend visiting the exhibition. Here's a few photos from my visit.