That whole unisex thing

What'd I say? I found a post on nymag.com that said how prominent shoulders and triangular silhouettes are making a comeback. With these hard economic times, designers are sewing women stronger bodies to combat their troubles, it would seem.

http://nymag.com/daily/fashion/2009/02/crazy_shoulders.html#

Harem Pants Watch

They're everywhere: Place de la Concorde, Paris, France:


Saggy butt and stumpy legs. I'm sorry, there's no way this could ever look good.

Unisex Part 2: American Apparel CRAP

I wrote this article in a newspaper May 09, 2008 about American Apparel and their explicit website...enjoy!

Who knew that Crayola blue denim could be so raunchy? “Kristin in Slim Slacks” is putting on quite a show for a disheveled photographer who takes pictures of her highly sexualized body. Women in hot pants, tube socks and Members Only-style jackets dance around with a shirtless, hairy, jiggly rando who, according to the caption, is named Jonny. A woman practically moons the photographer. This isn’t soft-core internet porn. No, my friends, it’s the erotic advertising for American Apparel, patting itself on the back on the way to the bank as consumers these days, including Dartmouth students, buy it all up.

By showing explicit images of bodies, American Apparel conditions young people to be comfortable with the naked form, independent of shape and gender. Clearly confident models perpetuate the unisex culture American Apparel is crafting; their unquestioning pleasure in exposing themselves confronts shoppers with a lifestyle of both sexual neutrality and openness.
American Apparel has clothes that range from frumpy to flair, and everything is made of one of three materials: jersey, spandex, or polyester microfiber. There are countless high-waisted skirts, hot pants and V-neck T-shirts that come in any color. You must have noticed their heinous leggings — bright lamé, anyone? — strutting through classrooms, libraries and the gym. American Apparel clothes sometimes make you wonder if people are actually serious when wearing the brand’s prized pieces.

Although the materials certainly aren’t luxurious, and the actual styles aren’t all that original — many are ’70s and ’80s revivals with a little bit of 21st century mix ‘n’ match thrown in — I still open my new issues of Nylon and British Glamour to see look after look sprinkled with the stuff. Why has American Apparel, a brand mostly of basics, become ubiquitous?

Their advertisements are everywhere online, including Facebook, in which average-looking women (not emaciated Kate Moss types) wear spandex dresses, little makeup and disheveled hair while posing in front of plain, white backgrounds — such realism implies that any woman can wear American Apparel clothing. The popularity of the brand rides on the fact that their products can be worn by anybody and the prices are pretty low.

But, as has been said many times before about fashion, buying a particular brand can be equivalent to buying into a type of lifestyle. And the lifestyle American Apparel presents to its consumers is one of casual eroticism. The brand manages to sexualize a plain T-shirt by photographing a woman in bed wearing it with a pair of boy-briefs. A slouchy sweatshirt becomes suggestive when worn only with red hot pants.

While sexy-but-unisex clothing is generally presented in the form of a girlfriend wearing her boyfriend’s T-shirt, American Apparel takes gender neutrality to a different level. For this brand, wearing unisex clothing perpetuates androgyny that pervades runways and our own culture. Women used to wear hoop skirts and bustles while men wore pants. Nowadays it seems like women’s clothes can be easily interchanged for men’s. Wearing each other’s underwear may just be the next step toward a unisex culture. Maybe American Apparel has found its niche in those young adults who (perhaps subconsciously) want to defy social norms.

The future of mass culture is full of jersey and microfiber. When I go out and see two girls wearing the same black and white spandex minidress at a frat, I know that American Apparel has created a trend. When I see the same V-neck T-shirt on both a guy and a girl, I am reminded that the college student’s love affair with these clothes is powerful. American Apparel’s ability to surpass gender boundaries proves that its popularity will last for a while. Perhaps it’s the androgynous quality of American Apparel that makes the company find it necessary to expose their models: How else would we know his or her gender? Which raises another question: Why does that matter?

Unisex: Why now?

You know why? Female and male models have the same bodies so that designers can shape/distort them with their clothes? Re: YSL's new unisex collection discussed on The Cut.
http://nymag.com/daily/fashion/2009/02/ysl.html#photo=1
I heart YSL, and this is one of the many signs that times are a-changin'. Female models have the bodies of lanky 13-year-old boys, and what feminizes these designs are those waist-cinching belts. So what differentiates women and men is still that hourglass...there seems to be a problem here. It also seems like most of the clothing is slouchy, thereby allowing the body to transform the structure of the clothing to fit a male or female form.

I like the collection and the idea, forcing us to question what defines women's and men's clothing and all that jazz. Is the creation of a unisex line a regression, or progression? Is the future filled with shemales, and is this a good thing? Could we be taking this idea of equality between men and women too far? It's representative of a sort of evenness that one saw a glimmer of in the 80s with power suits, or even during many war periods when women wore more masculine clothes (see boxy shapes of the 40's). YSL certainly isn't the first house to have designed unisex clothing, but often there seems to be some kind of revolt or war these collections correlate with. So what war are we connecting this collection to? Why do we have unisex designer clothing again?

Shopping Research

I did some research this afternoon (vacation just started for me, so I was celebrating) and decided to cure myself of this little shopping depression I've been having lately. I bought the Thierry Mugler bag, which doesn't look like it came from Forever 21 because I bought it in black, and I bought myself some dressy shorts from Mango. After reading my Elle France magazine, I bought a tiny bit of peach blush to go with my berry lipstick, a trend they're saying is in for this spring.

I've missed saying things like "trend" and applying them to me.

It feels amazing.

My heart has been warmed and I can't help but smile even as I'm typing this remembering that I own some pretty cute things now.

I also feel happy because I'm helping to save the economy...?

Confessions of a Shopaholic

I found this Times article about the new movie, "Confessions of a Shopaholic," based on the book by Sophie Kinsella and thought it was well written; it didn't focus just on the movie, but the trend of consumerism in women, how the current weak economy highlights former indulgences, and what the relationship has been over time between women and shopping.

Is it bad that after reading this article I was inspired to go shopping? Perhaps I've been holding back too much--I feel as though most of my shopping experiences as of late have either been outings where I touch sweaters and scarves, commenting "This is nice," not even thinking about purchasing it, or where I read about clothing online or in my magazines (Vogue Paris and Elle France) Am I missing out on some kind of satisfaction from shopping? How can I get my enthusiasm back? Have I made a "guilty pleasure" more "guilty" than pleasurable, and is it wrong to do so? When is indulgence from spending money a good thing? Another question (I'm very inquisitive right now for some reason): if the difference between being a shopping addict and a regular indulgent consumer is that addicts ignore consequences, aka credit, aren't we all addicts? Don't we all ignore the consequences because we really don't need that new pair of shoes. So what do we need? What constitutes necessity over frivolity? I'm thinking frivolity is necessity because the happiness one gets from buying that new dress is irreplaceable.

Phew. That was a lot. Anyway, I'm going shopping this afternoon because I've been lacking that purchasing pleasure lately. I guess I'm also going to Paris next week, so I'm hoping that will remedy my fashion depression...

Gaga for Thierry

Browsing Perez Hilton a while ago, I came upon this picture of Lady Gaga donning a Thierry Mugler-inspired dress:
http://perezhilton.com/2009-01-27-lady-gaga-debuts-a-new-look
I like Lady Gaga (a friend of mine recently sent me an acoustic of her and she has a lovely voice), and I like Thierry Mugler not only for their perfume, Angel, but just for the appeal of all those crystals and the idea that if I bought something from them, I, too, could become queen (Naomi Watts?) of all those glittery stones. http://fr.boutique.thierrymugler.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/TopCategoriesDisplay?langId=-2&storeId=10101&catalogId=10701

At Galleries Lafayette, I thought the star-adorned purses were pretty cute, but sometimes I wonder if these kinds of things I could buy at Forever 21 and get it out of my system...when is it worth it to splurge? Is it ever worth it? I just started reading a book called Deluxe by Dana Thomas about the luxury goods industry and the amount of markup on purses is turning me off from designer bags in general...

Aladdin needs his pants back.

I'm seriously hoping this is all a joke because I'm really having trouble understanding WHY anyone, ANYONE would wear THESE:

I've seen but one person wearing harem pants in the US, and she was wearing a jumpsuit. In France, they're everywhere, with crotches hitting anywhere from the knees to the ankles. Oh, how I wish I'd had my camera at the time I saw those ankle-crotch pants on that sneaker-clad Toulousian college student! WTF! I guess it's those French Bohemians at work again, going against that bourgeoisie like they always do. "Let's revolt by wearing crotchless pants! Look at how formless and loosey-goosey we are--SO opposite of those rigid yuppies who wear real pants and skirts, not a [horrid] hybrid."

Why are harem pants horrid? They make legs look stumpy and wide, and in addition they allow us some extra room for our thighs to fit in...not necessarily a good thing. Plus, I'd be afraid that I'd trip in them.

Or maybe I'm just crazy; maybe harem pants mark the beginning of a new body ideal, of a new era of wide hips and big thighs--of having a natural body. Somehow I doubt that, though. They're still cinching that waist.

Boots=French

I'm studying in Toulouse, France for a trimester abroad, but normally I'm a student in the US. Here's a little something-something to entertain.

Without question, the women on our trip to Toulouse want to purchase French clothing, an act inevitably accomplished through a foreign frame of reference; we want to dabble in Frenchness without sacrificing all of our identity, adding bits to our closets that stretch our tastes but do not subvert our own standards. While shopping in a foreign country is obviously an experiment, we all wanted boots. The ubiquitous black over-the-knee ones seem to beckon. Unfortunately, we’ll be back on campus just in time to ruin those boots in the mud. A sacrifice we’re willing to make in the name of style.

In Toulouse, the easiest fashion accessory to obtain is boots (other than cigarettes). They line the floor of every window display along the narrow cobbled streets. Every Toulousian woman has a pair. And any woman who doesn’t (those who don’t either wear heels or are foreign) buys them during the after-Christmas sales; their Black Friday happened on January 7 and is still going on. Signs reading “Soldes” in all sorts of bright, tacky colors clutter brick facades. While finding boots on sale isn’t difficult, purchasing the perfect pair is.

After stepping into countless stores after class one day, we were dizzy from the influx of French flair. Sitting together in a shoe store while grooving to Barry White, our group of six American shoppers (backpacks and all) awkwardly asked for our European sizes and squeezed into boots of various colors and detailing. Kendall, having narrowed her selection down to two pairs, sat confounded by her nuanced choice between a pair with buckles and a pointy toe and a pair that was much tighter and of a slightly lighter hue. “C’est très difficile!” she cried, looking at the sales girl who then, like many French people we’ve encountered, remarked that she would get her manager who spoke English to help us. She returned with a man sporting shiny shoes and slicked back greasy hair. “Ze ones with ze buckles—zey are for older ladies. You don’t want zose,” he said, making some kind of joke about Olive Oyl and her little legs and big boots. “You definitely want ze tighter ones,” he continued, gesturing with his hands to convey something that meant “tighter.”

To our little shopping group from a college in the boonies, both pairs were adorable. But by French standards, since everyone, including my host mother, wears boots, the buckled ones were somehow “old.” Kendall ended up buying the tight ones after struggling with balancing fashion in France and usability in America, and she is très chic despite a few blisters here and there. While six of us are still searching for the perfect pair, I can proudly say four of us have bought boots. And, my, do we look Framerican.

Welcome!

Just wanted to welcome you to my new blog. The name comes from the poem, "L'invitation au voyage" by Charles Baudelaire, a 19th century poet whom I've had to study a ton in my French classes and have somewhat taken a liking to, despite his ivresse. He represents a time in France when modernity and beauty were questioned, so now I want to observe how we today thrive socially. I also plan on posting some thoughts on modern times in general. Enjoy!

--Photo taken in Aix-en-Provence, France