Hiding from Responsibility

It's been way too long since I've tagged a post as "Dalies".  Baad.  This is why I'm hiding my shamed face in these pictures.

that last one is just for the boots.  The cowboy-inspired rainboots a-hem.

My work uniform is all black.  I'm allowed grey, as long as it's covered by black (you'd think I worked in a funeral parlour) making it both very easy and very difficult to dress for work.  In any other kind of weather I'd just rotate black dresses, but January means pants for most of the time, which means I end up wearing a black blazer/cardigan, black jeans, and a black top to work.  I'm starting to *shock* crave colour.  It's weird.  I need Punch so I can tolerate wearing black all the time, because all of a sudden when I look at something I think "well if it's not black I can't wear it to work, so......"

P.S IMADEAVEST!  I saw the circle vest at American Apparel last weekend and went all nuts, in part because of the many ways to wear it (golly gee, no way).  Until I realised it is a big circle with two smaller circles cut out of it for arm holes that costs $35.

So I went to Fabricland and made my own in about 15 mins (including reinforcing sewing time) for $7.  There it is up there.  A little longer than the AA one, which is good because it creates a larger hood if I want to wear it upside-down.

Yeah, This Is Still About Clothes.

I've just been off on planet "away" for awhile.  

Here is one thing that doesn't cover everything only a snapshot.  I actually wish I had taken an outfit photo a week and a half ago when I wore the same Pink Floyd shirt 3 days in a row (I know it was gross, but in my defence - day two was laundry day and I had the decency to throw it in there for those few hours) because it would illustrate the story a bit better.

I have mentioned many a time that I dressed badly in high school.  Like, ill-fitting jeans and t-shirts, never a skirt in sight.  I also went to a hippy arts school (Rosedale Heights for the very curious) that had no auditions and no strict "major" system (so you could branch out into more than one aspect if you wanted to).  There was a very creative and cool atmosphere, especially when I first got there.  I remember being struck by the volume of manic panic-ed heads, torn clothing, and metal (there was a lot of metal).

Okay the point - their general presence made me want to be a punk.  For awhile I had this secret desire to stomp around in Docs and style my hair with wood glue though I never did because I knew that there was just no way I could pull it off;  I didn't even swear, let alone actually listen to punk rock.

  

Now, I kind of figure it was the metal and the chains.  I like the picture, the attitude that metal projects, how safe it is and makes one feel.  Slowly I seem to have integrated a lot of metal into the general rotation of jewelry 'round my neck, wrists and fingers, piling them on top of one another and wrapping them around already slightly torn sleeves.  Is this a return to my 14 year old dreams of punkdom?  Shall I go back to The Clash and Rise Against, develop a snarl and curl my lip for no particular reason?

I highly doubt it.  The reason is probably more along the lines to the trend to stud everything in sight, tearing and shredding the rest, and the influence of Ms. Lanphear and her preferences for metal cuffs that would make Wonder Woman drool.  

I kind of wish I could see whether this will just be a passing trend (for me) or I'll stick to it.  This isn't the first time I've wrapped a chain around my wrist, but how far from the last is it?  I've loved my cuffs for as long as I can remember but if bare wrists and knuckles come into vogue what will happen to my cut-out silvers and golds?

Tryin' the Blingin' on the Wristin'

This was my wrist today.  The rest was not particularly noteworthy soooo I focused on my wrist (also making the "outifit post" a bajillion times easier).

Comments included: a joke about selling fake rolexes, being on Toronto/London/Tokyo time, forgetting the time, being on time, e.t.c.  Not that it matters much anymore, I quite like this.  Next time I'm thinking of going smallest to largest face.  

Part of the comfort is from my love of cuffs.  Almost all of my bracelets are cuffs.  Silver, brass, cut out, solid, most (I'd say about 90% of my wrist jewelry?) are cuffs.  I like how protective they are.  I like that they climb up my arms, into my sleeves as if trying to give the impression that my arms are in fact made of metals.

Another positive - the watches over the sleeves made me stop stretching my sleeves over my hands (The equivalent of putting that gross tasting liquid on your fingernails to stop from chewing them).

Later: I found out who belongs to those shoes, apparently The Sartorialist liked them too:

  

Wasson and The Wangs Sounds Like A Groovin' Band

Doesn't it?

I think so.  Like a Shangri-La's-esque girl group with edge.  Or maybe a relaxed California surf-rock band?  I dunno, I was thinking that after re-reading my last post about pink and subliminal messaging (readreadreadreadthisblog)

Continuing with the whole "Wangian Aesthetic" I dressed like this to go to a gallery this past, extremely rainy Saturday night.  The pin is (was) my mother's, and is being added to my collection of elephant themed jewelry.

I feel like this is too comfortable to be true.  Because as it drapes and falls all over my shoulders and I'm stretching out all in and over my shirt I'm thinking "this is clean and simple and comfortable and I can stuff to this".

But the point is to not add "stuff" to it.  The point (as I see it) is to keep it so simple that you start thinking it is complicated.  Sort of like waving your hands in front of a bully's face to distract him before you run off in the opposite direction.  To doubt the simplicity of a garment is an exercise in creativity (how did she do that? How did she make it fit that way?) that gets the mind thinking past what to add and instead thinking how to add.  Or how to fit.

Mildly frugal as well.  The next step, after thrift shopping, is learning how to work with only two pieces at once.  Or as few as possible.

It seems to work best with only one accessory is my point.

I'm Against The Colour Pink

and yet it appears on the bottles of the perfumes I decided were very "me".

According to my mother every proper young lady needs a "scent" so she sent me to the Bay with a wee bit o' cashola to get one.  I narrowed it down to these two and then down to Ma Dame which has a very nice, smooth, mellow scent, but makes me feel like I am merely a pawn in the current preoccupation with Agyness Dean.

I wonder why we do this.  Like, how far down does this go? When I am old will I be the androgynous grandmother who has finally cut her hair into a spikey pixie cut?  Or will I be wearing oversized, cut up shirts and black skinny jeans a la Erin Wasson and the Wangs? Is the susceptibility of a person related to how cool they think they are or how cool they think they ought to be?  One does not have to read No Logo or have a degree in marketing/business/advertising/journalism/psychology/related to see that we of the now are the highly desired group.  The ones that everyone wants to gain their loyalty and trust for the few months we can turn our attention spans to them.  But how does it happen?

I want to know whether the Agyness comes before the Blogs or vice-versa.  Would Wang be Wang without Rumi et all?  I would also like to know (for future reference) whether or not these fascinations and inspirations will be replaced with newer, shinier versions of the above or whether I really will be the androgynous grandmother wearing oversized shirts and black skinny jeans.

The Non-shirt

Attempt 1 at a long, non-shirt.  I wore pants and this shirt that I found somewhere in my apartment (I think it's my dad's) and wore it with a belt in this "I'm so lazy today and must reflect this in what I wear" so there we go.  And I swear I'll never do this again unless I'm sick because it was just too lazy.  It was too wrinkled.  It was too big and too slouchy and too much of too much.  Even with black skinny jeans (jeans that have yet to fail me when paired with anything else) I could not justify wearing this big slouchy super-dressed down shirt.  

I need clean lines.  I know I need/want solid, clean lines, and yet I keep trying stuff like this where there is no definition whatsoever.  Whyyyyyyy?

This was attempt #2.  Where I found my iron and wore a shirtdress instead.  An improvement, I think.  And a way to wear a non-shirt that I can throw on and not process and still look okay.  It looks a little like jammies but I guess that makes it okay when I fall asleep on the subway on the way back from work.

Hoo-rah. (!)

I wonder what it would look like with a bow tie?  Or a teeny little scarf thing around the collar?

Backward

My computer is slowly, painstakingly being fixed. Sadly for me, photoshop is yet to be reinstalled (mostly due to the fact that I seem to have Photoshop CS for MAC and my Windows operating system doesn't accept that? Sorry. Windows is not a team player). So I (and you) are stuck with unintentionally unglossed up photos that are as of  yet un-auto contrasted or auto leveled.

Je suis très français avec mon livre concernant la philosophie post-modern et les raies noires et blanches. Oh-hon-hon.

I guess the little sailor-y details of the blazer don't show up in the photos I chose, but it is a very straight and well structured double-breasted blazer. And the 3/4 sleeves with the rolled up pants were interesting....unintentionally together which is nice. Also: believe it or not those are the only pair of flats I currently own. My taupe ones died, and another pair I bought are at the shoemakers so I'm stuck with sunshine on my feet.

For the first time ever I actually dressed with the intention of looking like someone else. Specifically, this was a misguided attempt at Jean Seberg.

I'm not sure why I went with her. She isn't my go-to style icon, nor do I know anything about her or find her style particularly inspiring. To tell the truth, I think I put on the shirt and then thought "hey, this is like that actress.....whatsername" and when I figured out her name, I rolled the cuffs to go along with it (which is apparently a big trend now). While browsing images in order to compare original to misguided attempt, I did find many little outfits of hers that I liked. Elements from them might work in dressing casually - for me. It is all clean, put together, able, fluid. The image is grounded in a certain delicateness that comes from its simplicity. Nothing big or drapey or overflowing, but A, B, and C; plain but not entirely simple.

As in the photo to the right; I really like her hat. I would wear something like it and I would sit like that with same questioning look on my face. I also like the stripes.

But I feel like I could never re-create it to my own personal imagining of it. Like I would fall short in some way, or it wouldn't translate. The same way that a vintage dress from say....1960-blah doesn't have the same look that it did in 1960-blah. This is my backward way of explaining that I have no go-to style icon. And that I have no intention of going to look for one because knowing myself the way I do, I would just get frustrated that I can't re-create it the way it is in the pictures.

Way Later:  Another, more articulate response to that Adbusters article I complained about a few days ago is here; at MarathonPacks.  Along with links to a few more of 'em.

BAHAHAHA Oh, Adbusters.

DISCLAIMER: I didn't edit this, nor am I officially qualified to have an opinion.  I just spew out what pops up in my head, that's sort of the point of a blog anyhow so don't complain. Please.

This article only made me laugh because of the irony that is so neatly and carefully (yet sloppily and recklessly) sewn into it.  I'm sorry but the people who read Adbusters are the glorified hipsters.  The ones who protest to the label, who complain about hipsters while riding around on their racing bikes and who joined greenpeace in order to have real proof that they're pledging their undying allegiance to the fight for Earth.  The ones who complain about Nike and wear Converse.

At least, the people I know who read Adbusters are like this.

And complain as much as we want about hipsters and hipster culture, it is a defined group.  Who are, in their own twisted, copycat way, genuine.  They drink, they party, they shop at American Apparel, they show up to work hung over, they ignore politics until it shows up on a t-shirt, they celeb-watch, they are apathetic and self-absorbed.  It is a fun lifestyle because it is the lifestyle of those who have the luxury of fun.  Oh okay, it used to be underground.  Well maybe now it has enough money to move out of a basement apartment.  It's not the death of anything, it's the mutation of the creature we've been growing in the dark corner of the underground.

I can't help but think it's a reaction to the age we live in.  Where everyone is afraid of....everything.  Being watched, being followed, afraid of what is "over there" and how soon it'll be "over here".  Mass paranoia didn't create people who are attentive to detail and who want to saturate themselves with all the crap that happens so they can fix it.  Instead, all this negativity has created a generation of people who want nothing to do with it.  They want to find a way to pay less attention to conflict because (let's face it) there's no getting away from it.

Maybe that is why keffiiyah (sp?) scarves became such a popular fashion accessory?  If you want to ignore the grand significance of a symbol of social conflict, why not make it a symbol of the apathetic uniform? Enough hypothesizing, I haven't done enough research to really think that through and commit to a strong argument. 

This is an argument and complaint that has been written before.  With the death of punk or hip hop or any other counterculture that snuck its way into the mainstream.  Hipsterdom is the latest in a long line of lost ownership.  That is the reason why people are starting to complain.  The irony and attention to aesthetics tied to Hipsterdom have gotten out of hand, but back before people paid attention to it, it was called "indie" and promoted as an acceptable option, an alternative, to the mainstream that no one wants to be a part of.

It is dead, because it is the mainstream (and no one wants to be mainstream).  

Punk is dead.

Rock is dead.

Metal is dead.

Indie is dead.

RIP  culture, apparently no one likes it when you crawl out of the corner anymore.

*later: my favourite quote: "Are you a hipster"  "'Fuck no' she says, laughing back the last of her glass before she hops off to the dance floor"

Because an article bashing Hipster-ism is basically her answer wrapped up in an eco-friendly, hemp bow.  Oh, and the photos of hipsters are from the cobrasnake

Ageless Adolescent Aesthetic.

I have a really odd obsession with the 60s. Not the whole decade, not the events of it or the politics or the whole "hippie generation", strictly the popular culture of the 60s. I love The Beatles more for the effect they had on people, and what they did. The macroculture of the 60s is what attracts me so much to certain parts of that decade. We still have elements of culture that are common to almost everyone in this generation but back then.....it just seemed even more together. And way cooler.

It all makes me want to be a Shindigger. I suppose years into the future someone might feel the same way about MOD or MTV Live or a similar show, but I think that the constant blather about celebrity and random "news events" takes away from (and gives less time to) having music on the show. Live music. Live music that can potentially be iconic (wow, how badly does the pop culture junkie want to be part of popular culture).

I really love what she's wearing in this (see, relating back to style). The tunic and the mary janes are awesome. I'm thinking of copying this, if I can find my t-strap shoes...

GIANT SHOES! AHEM! GIANT SHOES!

I have a lot of others bookmarked but it would take too long to go through all of them. These are just some that makes me feel really nostalgic for a time where I wasn't even a concept. It's popular culture at it's television-announcer-voice, sharp, spiffy, and well enunciated finest.

The Backlist.

Oh it's been awhile. I may have mentioned this before but these past weeks have been full-moon crazy. I've gone out more often than I have in the past few months. And now I finally got around to a) taking pictures of my outfits and b) uploading them to my computer.
So here is my back list.

#1: PRIDE WEEKEND

I had 5 minutes to come up with an outfit that would last into the wee hours of the morn. It would survive drinking, and a raucous street party with beads and drag queens and Ginger (a very good Vietnamese restaurant chain). To I was looking at my wardrobe and came up with a dress.....and pants.

Which I tucked the front in to a came up with this funny coattail outfit thing. With the blazer it looks like a coattail thing.
I dunno. I'm proud of myself for this. It is definitely far from the worst outfit I've ever put together. It is a long ways away from what I used to think about wearing in high school. And I came up with it in 5 minutes and not really truly considering what I wore. It is progress because I found a way to not think and still look acceptable/mediocre/good/okay. Which is nice. I don't want to jinx it through overanalysis but uh.....it's nice.








#2 A PLAY


I wore this to a play (as show and tell games go). It was a very good play, part of the Toronto Fringe Festival to which I suggest everyone go. There was also a blazer but I took it off anyway so...really whatevs on the blazer bit. Ahem.

The belt is H&M and was $10 at full price. Very useful. I'm really not into prints (as I have slowly come to accept) but I like having big shapes. Like, one big shape that is interesting and mildly intricate. I would prefer if it were just one big flower but hey. Beggers can't be choosers. They just sort of reach out and grab.










#3 DAVID SEDARIS (!)

I wore this and met David Sedaris.

Yeah. That's right. I met David Sedaris. Amy's big brother. Humorist and general awesomeist extraordinaire. From now on, whenever I read Naked or Me Talk Pretty One Day or even The Santaland Diaries (which everyone should read. Everyone and anyone who has had a seasonal temporary day job should read. Especially if that temp job was around the holiday season) I will hear his voice. He read from both his new book and an upcoming one. A gem? "(before I quit smoking) I recruited a teenager to take my place".

He gave me Turkish newspaper doilies. And I got him to sign the play he wrote with his sister and his stamped it with a Turkish stamp that he says meant Invalid. My response? "That is okay sir.".

I called him sir. I was also ridiculously nervous so he probably thought I was insane. When I'm a little nerve wracked I end up saying everything as if it were one continuous thought or sentence. He looked at me as if I were insane or about to cry.


Neither is true. But whatever. I wore a safari jacket and Calvin Klein via Value Village shorts. It was original. And maybe one day he'll be at another book talk and he'll tell someone about the crazy girl in a safari jacket who nervously told him a story about the doll she used to think was going to kill her.


OMG I MIGHT BE A SEDARIS ANECDOTE!

The Beginning

Today there is no style/fashion/clothing oriented posting. It was laundry day. You do not want to see me on laundry day, I think that would be pushing the title of my blog just a teensy bit.

However, while coming back I was stuck walking behind 3 very slow people. All were wearing head to toe black (how, I have no idea, it was disgusting outside), oxfords, leather man-bags, and smoking.

After passing them, I heard one of them say "oh my god that's brilliant a little trolley" "It's amazing. How......."
They kept discussing the old shopping cart + canvas bag combo in which I cart around my laundry when I'm too lazy to carry it around in a bag. The three trendy trendy boys were very impressed by my old lady shopping cart and I thought - "this is how it starts".

Isn't it? Someone was walking down the street, smoking, lazy, bored, discussing outdated philosophies when suddenly they saw someone wearing a scarf, or a pair of glasses that made them look really smart, or American Apparel, and they adopted it. And then their friends did, and then the people who copy their friends did.

And then they get all angry because the people who copy the people who copy their friends start wearing it and they think that it's become trashy, cliche, and overdone.

** I forgot to add this before. It is somewhat relevant.
I was going through my mom's closet today and I found a pair of AMERICAN APPAREL SLIM SLACKS.
likeomigawdnofreakinwayi'mtotallybuggin **

Every Time.

I used to have this problem where I'd buy clothes that were on sale.
The problem with it was that I had no...filter. No way to judge what I was buying. I wouldn't really think about it or anything I'd buy it because I liked it and it was on sale or it was cheap or whatever.

No when I buy something I do try to think of where/when/with what I'll wear it - I colour co-ordinate at the very least. Occasionally though, I do slip up and end up buying something else that just doesn't go. Or I try it on and think "yeah, sure, why not it's cheap" and I get home and realize that I wasted my money. It usually happens when I go to Value Village or any other thrift store. I go, I pick out a bunch of clothes, I try them on weed out the horrible from the no so horrible from the good and end up taking one of the horrible items home with me because I think:
"oh, I'll alter it" (I won't),
"I'll tuck it into something else" (I can't),
"It's not as long as I think it is" (It's longer),
or "I have shoes to go with this" (. . . . . .this is usually true)
I don't really know why this is. I'm getting better at it, now I'm down to just one.
Today I went to a By-The-Pound store near my house. I need skirts for work. I figure I'll find a nice, vintage/old/thrifted skirt for cheap and hey, maybe a scarf or shirt while I'm there. So I did the whole dance, searched for what fit me and went off to try them all on. I was easily convinced for a shirt and shoes but then I tried on this:

And bought it.




I um....don't really know why. It looks okay if I alter it. I also adjusted it in a way where the front is shorter and the back is a bit of a tail...and it looks okay like that.
The problem is, I'm sure this will end up balled up in the back of my closet along with a few other dresses, shirts, and skirts that I've collected over the years.

Why do I do this? I feel as if I should know myself better and be aware of the fact that I probably won't get around to altering this thing yet I still added it to my pile. "oh it barely even registers on the scale" - that is probably true so why didn't I just go the other way? It's not going to change the price so why did I take it anyway?

In the past year of reform I have actually paid attention to what fits me where. What my body is like, what it does, how it works. Because of all this I am able to buy and wear clothing that fits me better and then have the luxury of altering my purchases in order to look good wearing what looks good.

So why can't I shake this one (really) bad shopping habit?

p.s: thanks to all the lovely comments. I know it may be bad etiquette to not reply to them but I don't know what to say. Thanks. :D

Wallet's Remorse.

I spent a lot of money today.

(Hi, how are you all, sorry for not updating in the past few days frankly I just felt I had nothing/very little to say. I took a few new headshots yesterday, they turned out quite nice. I also wore a few outfits and since it rained I had to take them inside and because I live in a basement they're kind of dark. The pictures I mean, pictures of the outfits, not the actual outfits themselves. Well I did have to take them inside, because they'd have gotten wet, right? And one of them was pretty dark. But I was talking about the pictures, and I'll put them up anyhow, I'd like to see what the internet thinks. Or doesn't think. whatever. Anyhow, I was saying, I spent a lot of money.......)

A LOT.

I also happen to plan on spending a nice chunk of my finances on a pair of shoes tomorrow.
But only a nice chunk, my wallet remorse is mostly for today's spending on the following:

A black skirt from Aritzia

I do like the way it looks. A high waist that is just about knee-high. It has pockets and is what is called a "tulip skirt". I have nothing like it right now, it's a thicker linen, feels nice, and I'm going to stop trying to justify a $90 skirt, because no matter how many times I tell myself that I'll wear it all the time at work, my cheap ass won't let me.













And a white shirt. A crisp, clean white shirt that won't last a week before it becomes a wrinkled mess (even though I will try to keep it nice. Fingers crossed)

Yes. I know what you're not thinking.
It is part of the 3.1 Phillip Lim collection for the Gap. And because I know you're not interested; it was on sale because that isn't Gap's big selling gimmick anymore. Will I probably go back in two weeks to get the remaining, even-more-marked-down pieces? Most likely.

At first I thought these two would work well together (black skirt, white shirt, classic clean combination or something) but because of the shapes....they really don't.
I mean, maybe on someone else.......actually no. Not even on someone else. The shirt is one that should really be tucked in or cinched at the waist or something because of all the volume at the top (created, I'm assuming, by the pleating thing). The skirt does something similar: volume up top while more fitted down low. Also probably because of the pleating (or the "tulip" shape?). So you get the effect of parachute-esque fabrics wrapped around you. One could always really try to wrap something around up top thereby loosing the beautiful detailing in the shirt. Or try to control the tulip bloom of the skirt, thereby ruining the point of the tulip skirt (I'm milking this, can you tell?).

Or, once could not wear these two pieces together and instead find a fitted top/bottom in order to provide some kind of contrast in what one is wearing as opposed to trying to inflate oneself to microvave-popcorn proportions.