Great Dames: Nina and Lauren
Nominated by Bonnie Bertram are the two women behind Panda Crumpet. Nina is 30 and lives in Southend with her two gorgeous little boys. She’s currently studying to be a counsellor and is in the final stages of her diploma. She likes to play her guitar (badly), collect china cats, tattoos and watch Doctor Who.
Lauren is 28 and shares a house in London with four friends. Having studied photography in Leeds and having worked as a milliner in Australia, she now works for an architectural conservation charity, and is a freelance web copy writer. She likes to play her accordion (badly), collect vintage buttons, tattoos, and hates Doctor Who.
The pair met in mid-2010 via Twitter, and soon started emailing about various dramas they were both going through. Trying to offer each other advice by way of swapping stories and experiences, they soon realised that most of what they thought were ‘dramas’ would probably seem quite amusing to the rest of the world. Thus, they decided a blog might be a fun way to share their ramblings.
What was your number one goal when you set about creating Panda & Crumpet?
When we first started talking, the things we were telling each other and the way we were telling them made us both laugh, and we thought it might make other people laugh too. Our real goal was a bit selfish really, as collating the things we were discussing in emails into public writing became really therapeutic for us. We thought being honest - however rude or embarrassing it might be - was really important, and we hoped people would find things to relate to and realise everyone has to deal with tricky things in their lives.
How do you think your blog is different than most?
The obvious way our blog is different is that we publish both our work separately rather than fully collaborating on one piece at a time. The topics we pick are a reflection of whatever we’re going through and are talking about at the time, but we have our own stories to tell, and our own voices to tell them with. We’re both really different people, and we have different ideas and opinions about most of the things we write about. The fact that we are actually both pretty clueless and a bit daft (and have a love of making very low-fi illustrations) is what pulls it together and makes it work as a partnership.
What is it about collaborating with the other that keeps you inspired and excited about Panda & Crumpet?
When we pick a title or topic, we go off and write separately so that despite what we might have told each other before, we’re never really sure what the content will end up like. We still find it really exciting when we share a new post with each other, because we both really enjoy each other’s writing. But however much we think we’ve shared, there’s always something new that will shock one of us or make us laugh.
Where did your nicknames come from?
Nothing particularly cryptic or exciting! We hadn’t been talking for that long when Lauren tweeted about having her third crumpet of the day (and sitting on it by accident). Nina decided she would be called Crumpet forever. Nina was wearing an amazing Panda jumper in her twitter profile picture and Pandaface or Pandafeatures became her nickname.
How does your blog reflect the concept of sisterhood? (Do you think it does?)
We both find boys a bit confusing - that’s what we first bonded over. Girls tend to stick together and help each other out about all kinds of things, which is basically what’s at the heart of our friendship as well as the blog. Although the practice of writing as a pair creates a sort of sisterhood between the two of us, we found really early on that rather than gathering a big group of girls all agreeing or joining in, that it was guys who like to get involved and kick off discussions.
Great Dames Q & A
Who is your greatest dame - living, fictional, celeb or otherwise?
CILLA BLACK
If you could go back and give your 16-year-old self one bit of advice, what would it be?
We actually wrote a whole blog post about this, but after writing it, we realised we probably wouldn’t tell ourselves to do a single thing differently, or we might not have ended up where or how we are today - which ain’t so bad, really.
What’s the finest song to have ever floated into your delicate lady ears?
Nina’s is “Blackbird” by The Beatles; Lauren’s is “Waterloo Sunset” by The Kinks.
What’s your most famed rant?
We’ve both got a bit of an aversion to seeing “LOL” typed anywhere. Nina never believes anyone ever really laughs out loud when they type it, and Lauren gets confused and thinks someone’s just abbreviating her name.
Where are you happiest?
IN BED.
(Source: greatdames.co.uk)
