Episode 9: A Chic-y Geek-y Day

Geek and Chic. These two words have become synonymous together as a regularly coined phrase.

The phrase was first used by the fashion industry in the mid 2000s to define the trend of incorporating stereotypically ‘geeky’ ensembles into their shows. It’s a sort of semi-sophisticated style; think retro work wear, high waists and sensible accessories.  It also made glasses an acceptable fashion piece.

Being a geek is not wearing fake glasses but being passionate about your subject.  Someone should conduct a study on the connection between wearing glasses and IQ. Is your brain bigger so it affects your eyes because there’s no room for them? Maybe wearing glasses means your eyes can be lazier so there’s more energy for brain function? I think not. I think the correlation between people wearing fake glasses and being idiots would be much stronger.

I diverge, apologies.

Recently though, it’s actually more of a description than a specific fashion movement. Like someone saying ‘yea they’re kind of geek chic’ really translates as ‘they seem really smart but are actually pretty cool and fun and don’t wear tweed jackets and bow ties either’. Unless it’s in fashion of course, but ‘geek’ has morphed from an insult to a compliment.

It is very cool indeed to be a geek. Since everyone has read the humorous breakdown of the comparison of wealth of Bill Gates vs. Michael Jordan (have a laugh at it here; http://imgur.com/gallery/y2Brq) there has been a mental shift to; “Oooh, probably shouldn’t make fun of the physics nerd. Captain of the rugby team as your formal date? Nah, Captain of the chess club please!”

So now that I’ve convinced you that I’m cool..... oh. Right. You aren’t buying it? Whatever. My Glasses are real!! And I quite enjoy my paradoxical life. Running from a Genetics lecture to the launch of the first heat of Miss Northern Ireland is all in a typical Thursday. Quick change from scrubs to stilettos, moving between environments where the scale of image importance ranges from nothing to everything.

Public lectures aren’t really the kind of place you get your photo taken at. If you even asked someone to take a photo of you beside a groundbreaking molecular model of the structure of DNA they would be like why? Did you win an award? So I have a photo for you of the presentation screen and my complimentary cup of tea.

A Miss NI heat is a different cup of tea all together, you get your photo taken beside everything and everyone! And I love both atmospheres; they are social and relaxing for completely opposite reasons which is why I think they complement each other so perfectly. That is the real thing connecting the words Geek and Chic. Yin and Yang, life is all about balance.

You want to hear about my day? Well alright then, seeing as it was a good one!

Work bit – 6am. YES, 6am. Did you think it was all social hilarity and no work?

“For every two minutes of glamour, there are eight hours of hard work.”

~Jessica Savitch

 

 Geek bit – So I worked a little earlier than usual so I could get to a public Genetics lecture at my University, Queens University Belfast (QUB), specifically the School of Biological Sciences.

 I love Genetics even more than I love crème eggs. We had a great introduction to the ethical questions raised by modern advancements in the field of Genetics, entitled Genethics, from Prof. Anne Hughes of QUB.

Since the completion of the Human Genome Project in April 2003 we have been made privy to a vast amount of data about ourselves. Our knowledge about genetic disorders as well as genetic susceptibility to certain illnesses has given us the potential to unlock personalised medicines and gene therapy. However;

“Knowledge Is Power”

~Sir Francis Bacon

“With great Power comes great Responsibility”

~Stanley Martin Leiber

Described wonderfully as the “50 Shades of Grey” in Genetics it demonstrates the varying shades of grey that people have on opinions of ethical importance, as well as the future problems we will encounter as our knowledge of genetics grows, perceptions of society develop and doctor patient relationships alter.

1.       Do you have the right to know the contents of your genetic code?

2.       And do others have the right to this information?

A potent decision in the near future for many people will be the potential for genetic screening of foetuses. This can include disorders from the mildly interfering to extremely debilitating like Kleinefelter Syndrome, Down Syndrome and Duchene Muscular Dystrophy.

With studies showing that the numbers of women terminating foetuses with genetic deficiencies is directly proportional to the doctor who gives them the news, needs for non-directive counselling is more crucial than ever. If the doctor suggests a termination is a viable option the responsibility is removed from the parents and can swing their decision either way.

Opposite problems also arise in that some parents can ask for attributes in their ‘designer babies’ for example to ensure the child has dwarfism if both parents are afflicted.

Screening of offspring can also implicate their parents. If a person decides to have themselves tested for say Huntington’s Disease as a grandparent has recently died of it, this directly affects their parent because if the test is positive their father or mother must also suffer from the disease.

There is also the potential for the information to be abused, for example by insurance companies.

Currently the UK operates a Freedom for Testing, Freedom from Testing policy.

Some great reads as recommended by Prof. Anne Hughes;

The Genius Factory - David Plotz

Bad Science - Ben Goldacre

 You can imagine that after this mental moral struggle than I needed a cosmo or two;

 

Chic bit – Forget the I’ve-been-up-since-6am hair and makeup, note my Monochrome on Thursday homies. Working the s/s13 trends. Of course that dress is 2 years old but its allllll about style, which is timeless, fashion is not.

“Fashion fades, only style remains the same.”

~ Coco Chanel

I had the absolute privilege of being a finalist in the Miss Northern Ireland contest in 2012 after I won Miss East Belfast. I had never been to anything like that before and just decided to go for it as I was getting a bit long in the tooth, it was always an experience I wanted to have. It was absolutely fantastic, from the heats to the photoshoots, interviews and of course the big finale over 3 days in Belfast and the gala final.

I’ve always loved attending shows like Belfast Fashionweek with all the glitz and fashion, and you don’t get more glamorous than Miss NI. The experience as well as the fun and friends made it one of the greatest weekends!

 Although it took me a few weeks to even look at tan, eyelashes, hair extensions or high heels again...

So I was invited to attend the first heat for the launch of Miss NI 2013 at Cafe Vaudeville in Belfast. Unbelievably I felt more nervous at that than I did even at my own heat or catwalk-ing in a bikini at the final. I think it was mostly uncontained excitement for the opportunity the girls competing will potentially have. It was great to be back though mingling with the girls;

Even if I did jog there from a genetics lecture with hair and make up from 12 hours before, I had half an hour to change into my dress and put on my eyelashes. It’s not easy keeping up appearances! I have to morph from a nerd to a former beauty pageant contestant.

I thought I would include my favourite Geek and Chic moments, do you see something in common in those pictures above? This me rocking at my graduation from QUB and winning Miss East Belfast. Thank you timeless, beautiful dress for two of the best days ever :).  It’s definitely my dress for success!

Episode 6: Rainbow Roses and Genetic Proposals

You can’t get blue roses.

You can however get these;

Rainbow Roses – These pictures aren’t modified, I know because I took them. These are in fact my very own valentine’s flowers from my one and only (see there’s me with them in the bottom left with my uber shoulder padded jacked, I was having a power day in work *power shoulders*).

Rainbow Roses I have decided are the most beautiful flowering fantastic-ness I’ve ever had in my possession, if every colour symbolises its own range of emotions surely they are the flowery embodiment of a relationship?

These of course do not occur naturally, obviously or by now there would be so many planted in my garden you would see it from space. This is a human manipulation of plant biology with a dash of chemistry.

I finished my exclamations of astonishment, gratitude and thanks with multiple kisses and swiftly started my technical examination of these beauties, they clearly weren’t sprayed and they certainly didn’t grow that way so, what? Did a magician trap a My Little Pony with its rainbow tail in these flowers of mine?

This is how it’s done, Simplicity at its finest, turns out no My Little Ponies were harmed;

·         Obviously you cannot use a coloured rose, they have their own pigments and enzymes and would just stay that colour or turn brown. (You know all colours together make brown. Think about it.)You have to start with a white specimen. The Venezuela Rose is a ‘Hybrid Tea, cream rose’ which shows up all the colours perfectly.

·         The rose is cut at full bloom diagonally in order to expose the greatest area possible for water uptake by exposing a higher number of xylem vessels.

·          The cut flower is then ‘Stem-dyed’. 4 beakers of Red, Blue, Green and Yellow water soluble dyes are prepared separately. The flower stem is slit vertically into 4 pieces and 1 end placed in each beaker.

·         Wait a few hours...

·         And by the beauty of transpiration, ta dah!

 

Blue Roses – I’m afraid I reeled you in with a porky pie just now. Blue roses are no longer condemned to the realms of legend with unicorns and leprechauns, but have been created in much the same way as my rainbow numbers for decades now.

However, this century, a feat of genetic engineering has created something much better.

We can’t make unicorns they said. We can’t make leprechauns they said. But instead they proposed to create the eternal symbol of mystery – the Blue Rose.

Culturally they have been associated with hope against unattainable love.

Molecular geneticists proposed to create the Royal of Roses by altering its genetic makeup – DNA.

Roses simply do not grow in blue colours as they lack a gene to create true blue pigment - Delphinidin. So the gene for the colour had to be stolen from the Pansy and the gene for the enzyme DFR was taken from the Iris. The enzyme is required to complete the delphinidin synthesis reaction.

Additionally to this the gene for the flower’s own pigment synthesis needed to be switched off. Cue RNAi, one of the most powerful biological tools discovered in the past 25 years. RNAi is as specific as the DNA sequence and can directly target specific genes to act as a switch in production of the protein created from that gene. In this case, an RNAi sequence was created to effectively silence the DFR gene that occurred naturally in the rose, creating the red colour and letting the new DFR gene which varied slightly to work instead.

Below you can see my rainbow rose, bottom left depicts a blue rose created using the same principle with dye, but above that is a photograph of a genetically engineered blue rose.

Truth is it’s not ACTUALLY blue. It’s a sort of mauve/lavender colour, this is because the RNAi didn’t completely block the rose’s natural colour synthesis and instead added a little red tinge to the blue.

But still its bluer than any other roses, and seeing as it grows this way it can answer ‘why yes, I’m a natural blue’ ;) to all those admirers.

Inspiration - My encounter with my own flowery creatures inspired my tentative steps into the floral and colourful realm of workwear;

I don't think any ponies were harmed in the making of this skirt either. Although I can say nothing for my workmates retinas.

Episode 3a: The Battle Against Uggs and Contamination

Stuck between a rock and a hard place.

A war on 2 fronts. Kaiser Wilhelm’s nightmare, and mine.

Longer than any war in history is the daily battle of how to be stylish and not interfere with your work.

Scientists have the same what to wear to work dilemma as every other female on the planet but we have extra contenders to consider. We have PPE (personal protective equipment) which can range from gloves and hairnets to safety shoes and protective suits. You can spend any amount of time in a day taking these on and off and so struggle to not look like you’ve been dragged through a hedge backwards when you’re not in PPE.

Sometimes I look in magazines and think, Yes that would be an absolutely delightful work outfit... if I only had to wear those shoes for 30mins while sitting down and if mini-skirts and bare legs were acceptable in the workplace. This is not sex and the city and any classy outfit I put together is immediately destroyed by black tights, cardigan (labs are controlled at temperatures which can only be described as constantly freezing) and this year and every years Winter staple – the coat.

Infact, the delights of our western European climate mean that actually the move from winter to summer wardrobe means you can wear courts instead of boots without getting frostbite in your toes and you drop the coat from furlined and chunky to a nice rainproof mac.

And so I rage battle every day to balance practicality for work and a little sophisticated style.

“You cannot climb the ladder of success in the outfit of failure”

~ Zig Ziglar

 

The biggest pitfall of workplace fashion has to be the Ugg boot. I have never invested in a pair because I see it as dangling over the precipice of a slippery slope into eventually not even brushing my hair and perpetually shuffling around the lab with my feet looking like a hoof on a cuddly toy horse. I KNOW they are comfy and very good for their designed purpose. So is my onesie and I don’t wear that to work. I won’t give in!

I’ll give you an example of the daily battle;

1 – Winning; I try to look professional and still look my age. Heels but ‘sensible’, stylish but not overdone, Classy but comfortable. If I accomplish any one of these things in an outfit I feel successful.

This is how I typically start the day,

See starting off alright, little bit of animal print, a few accessories, sensible long sleeved top for winter and I can remain as such doing office work until I actually have to do the practical part of my job, so morph into exhibit 2;

2 – It’s a draw;

Don’t get me wrong, getting your lab coat on feels all professional but is joyless for actually thinking you may look half decent. I do however rate this a draw because the shoes count for about 50% of an outfit in my eyes so we’re on the front line but we’re fighting back. However,

Sometimes even shoes can’t save you;

3 – Lost; Sometimes unfortunately, even small graces can’t be met and a venture into the cleanroom for R&D work is inevitable...

 

I don’t even have words for this. If you ever complain again ‘oh I can’t believe he/she/they saw me looking like that...’ just pause for a moment and remember this picture. Yea, don’t feel so bad now do you. Ugh.

Anyway,

I have to wear all my correct PPE to avoid contamination of myself and my work and also not give up on fashion and slide into dangerous Ugg boot territory. I lose a few battles but the war continues, I’ll keep you updated!

Episode 1: The Origins of 'Geek Chic'

As with all good problem solving we can begin to understand my meaning by breaking my title down into its significant parts;

Geek – This is me, at your scientific service. Science in every shape and form shapes my life and everything in it, something I have in common with the rest of the human race BUT we define my differences with;

Chic – I want to understand the inner workings of the world and intend to look fabulous while doing it. Fashion fulfils those ‘superficial’ needs of life which, trapped in labs of varying degrees, creatures known as scientists easily forget! Just because you have a white coat on doesn’t mean I can't see that ill founded idea of an outfit underneath!!

Finally,

Endeavours – I will endeavour to enlighten your life by bringing to your attention (and hopefully understanding) the daily joys and comic detail that scientific discoveries and facts bring to me. And because humans are a wonderfully multifaceted race I will spice it up with the delectably glamorous life of fashion.

You might think “Hold up!! Have you been taking or testing those drugs in your lab??”. The answer is no I’m not ‘cool’ enough to have tried any of the drugs I frequently test others for and I fully believe you can be a nerd and enjoy a stiletto, where do you think Geek Chic came from??

Moi.  I am the embodiment of this delightful phrase. So whether you’re reading this because you are a Pageant Queen or a President of Science club, enjoy my friends. (I’ve been both by the way...)