This post is not about trailers / writing / A Girl Like You / being published, so if you’re here to read about that stuff then scroll on down, sister.
This blog is about something completely shallow and delightful.
Clothes.
(I say 'clothes' because ‘fashion’ implies labels. I really can't respect women who just lurve labels regardless of what the piece actually looks like, it's somehow like being one of those WAG bikes who'd bang any footballer as long as he was premiere league. Don't get me wrong, I'm not anti-label and I lust for select pieces from Celine, The Row, Alexander Wang, etc, but the point is: we're not here to talk about labels.)
I like clothes. No, I LOVE them. I love getting dressed. I love the way the right outfit makes me feel tall and smart and confident and not in the least self-conscious. Getting dressed every day takes less than 10 minutes, but the mood-boosting effects last all day. It’s such an easy joy.
So inevitably, I enjoy talking about them. (This won’t surprise you if you (A) know me, or (B) have read The Dating Detox.)
The character in The Dating Detox names her outfits – Urban Warrior, St Germain Schoolgirl, etc. I did this when I was younger, these days I only do it by accident (I wore greige harem pants, a white vest, a leather bomber, skinny beige scarf, hair in a plait to a party a few weeks ago, and realised on the way there that I looked like a female Indiana Jones. Oops).
I think that perhaps, thinking about clothes is the perfect antidote to writing. I can’t read after I’ve been writing intensely. I can’t concentrate on other plotlines so movies are out, too. I can exercise but that’s not exactly exciting. I even have trouble talking to friends as my brain is all over the place. Looking at pretty things, however, is ideal.
So I walk to the art galleries on Westbourne Grove or flip through coffee table books in bookshops. More often, I open Vogue or my laptop and look for clothes. And I don’t mean to buy. But just for inspiration and ideas about what to wear.
I visit Refinery29 almost every day. This a brilliant online fashion magazine and it’s about how things are put together, not how much they cost. They have (IMHO) impeccable taste - their ‘one perfect outfit’ thing is ace.
Fashion magazines are damn inspiring and damn expensive (Vogue Italia at £10 defies belief) but http://fashiongonerogue.com/ brings together the best fashion editorials, ads and covers from all over the world. An awesome resource. The ads are consistently more inspiring than the editorial.
There are dozens - probably hundreds - of consistently good streetstyle fashion blogs, too. The Sartorialist is the best, and you should find some fun on Chictopia, Style Sighting http://www.stylesightings.com/, Show Me Your Wardrobe and of course Style.com.
There are also a lot of samey amateur vanity fashion blogs out there called things like La Petite Coucou En Verte. A wistful knock-kneed girl trying to channel ‘awkward ingenue’ takes askew photos of herself in the ugliest getup possible. There’s always a close-up of a bad shoe, with everything else blurry. So I shan't bother you with them. A French girl made a brilliant pisstake fashion blog, but I haven’t been able to find it again. (Don’t you hate it when you lose a blog?)
There are also a lot of well-written blogs from fashion journalists, but as much as I want to know who the next St Martin star is and how amaaaahhhzing it was that Chanel shipped in an iceberg from Patagonia, or whatever the fuck they did, for their show, it doesn’t help me figure out new ways to wear a pencil skirt and how I can make a nude dress work for me when I’m pale and blonde. Right? Right.
Okay. Enough talking about clothes. I’m off to Refinery 29. If you know any other really good fashion websites, please let me know...
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