I hope everyone has a fun and safe Halloween. I'll be attending a party tonight but since I have to work all day I won't be in costume...unless that costume is an over-worked retail manager! In which case I win first prize.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Style Icon: Bree Van De Kamp
Let's continue with style icon week! A style icon is a personal saint of your style world and serves many purposes--such as a starting line for a killer outfit or a persona to channel when things get tough at work. These women kick butt, take names, and look good while doing it. Their style is to be admired, dissected, and emulated but never copied--each should make you try to be a better version of yourself!
I love shows about middle-aged women. Television shows with young characters tend to target young people so if I want intelligent, self-possessed and feisty women I look to shows like Desperate Housewives. There's no surprise that my favorite housewife is Bree Van De Kamp. Her life is far from perfect but she insists on keeping up pretenses. She's a perfectionist. If I stayed home all day I would run a home as tight and neat as Bree who's spent years polishing the routine of her life. A lot of the comedy in the show surrounds how Bree keeps it together despite all the drama in her life while maintaining her perfect middle-class facade. In season four she tells her son "This family's reputation is already hanging by a thread. I mean first people thought that your step-father was a wife killer then your sister takes up with her history teacher and now we're supposed to parade a little bastard up and down the street? We might as well sit on the porch and play banjos!" And her style! Bree looks like she stepped out of a Ralph Lauren Polo ad. She taught me all the colors I could wear as a pale-skinned red-head to look stunning. Like a Stepford wife she has a strong twist of the 60s in her wardrobe--classic cuts, pearls, jewel tones and pastels, and that lovely flippy bubble-inspired hairdo!
Fabulous!
Style It: Bree had one of the best pregnancy wardrobes ever, as if every piece was bought from Modcloth and let-out just for her. To get an everyday Bree Van De Kamp look the classic cuts and candy colors of Old Navy or J.Crew will fit the bill, just be sure to mix your high and low with some fabulous faux-estate jewelry like this and lady-like shoes from here.
I love shows about middle-aged women. Television shows with young characters tend to target young people so if I want intelligent, self-possessed and feisty women I look to shows like Desperate Housewives. There's no surprise that my favorite housewife is Bree Van De Kamp. Her life is far from perfect but she insists on keeping up pretenses. She's a perfectionist. If I stayed home all day I would run a home as tight and neat as Bree who's spent years polishing the routine of her life. A lot of the comedy in the show surrounds how Bree keeps it together despite all the drama in her life while maintaining her perfect middle-class facade. In season four she tells her son "This family's reputation is already hanging by a thread. I mean first people thought that your step-father was a wife killer then your sister takes up with her history teacher and now we're supposed to parade a little bastard up and down the street? We might as well sit on the porch and play banjos!" And her style! Bree looks like she stepped out of a Ralph Lauren Polo ad. She taught me all the colors I could wear as a pale-skinned red-head to look stunning. Like a Stepford wife she has a strong twist of the 60s in her wardrobe--classic cuts, pearls, jewel tones and pastels, and that lovely flippy bubble-inspired hairdo!
Fabulous!
Style It: Bree had one of the best pregnancy wardrobes ever, as if every piece was bought from Modcloth and let-out just for her. To get an everyday Bree Van De Kamp look the classic cuts and candy colors of Old Navy or J.Crew will fit the bill, just be sure to mix your high and low with some fabulous faux-estate jewelry like this and lady-like shoes from here.
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Style Icon: Joan Holloway
Continuing with style icon week! A style icon is a personal saint of your style world and serves many purposes--such as a starting line for a killer outfit or a persona to channel when things get tough at work. These women reveal a part of yourself and encourage you to foster other virtues. Their style is to be admired, dissected, and emulated but never copied--each should make you try to be a better version of yourself.
Joan Holloway is a natural choice for a style icon. Mad Men has been inspiring the fashion world since it started airing in 2007. Joan won me over instantly with her easy grace, classy business clothes, and complete self-possession. She's polite yet blunt, elegant and put together. Most of all she's good at her job, makes it her art and excels at everything she does. She uses her femininity like battle armor, she is very calculated in how she dresses and what she reveals to those in the office. She uses her love life to blow off steam but keeps her personal life perfectly separated from her professional career. She maintains her facade at all times and keeps other people's secrets as well as her own. She has more integrity and honesty than anyone in the office. She clothes herself in shift dresses and high-waisted pencil skirts and never shows cleavage, as a curvy girl this realization completely changed my work wardrobe. Joan taught me how to show off my curves without exposing my body--a lesson every woman should learn.
Youch!
Style it: Look for jewel tones, little sleeves, scarf-like details around the high-neck, and a pencil silhouette. I've always had good luck at Banana Republic ($150) and J.Crew ($198) for shift dresses, keep in mind that spindly models do not show off the Joan-like possibilities of such dresses!
Joan Holloway is a natural choice for a style icon. Mad Men has been inspiring the fashion world since it started airing in 2007. Joan won me over instantly with her easy grace, classy business clothes, and complete self-possession. She's polite yet blunt, elegant and put together. Most of all she's good at her job, makes it her art and excels at everything she does. She uses her femininity like battle armor, she is very calculated in how she dresses and what she reveals to those in the office. She uses her love life to blow off steam but keeps her personal life perfectly separated from her professional career. She maintains her facade at all times and keeps other people's secrets as well as her own. She has more integrity and honesty than anyone in the office. She clothes herself in shift dresses and high-waisted pencil skirts and never shows cleavage, as a curvy girl this realization completely changed my work wardrobe. Joan taught me how to show off my curves without exposing my body--a lesson every woman should learn.
Youch!
Style it: Look for jewel tones, little sleeves, scarf-like details around the high-neck, and a pencil silhouette. I've always had good luck at Banana Republic ($150) and J.Crew ($198) for shift dresses, keep in mind that spindly models do not show off the Joan-like possibilities of such dresses!
Monday, October 22, 2012
Style Icon: Wanda Woodward
I've been dealing with RL recently and my blog has gone forlorn and unattended. To get myself back into the posting mood I've decided to share several of my style icons with you this week. This blog is all about different inspirations and incorporating them into your personal style. Identifying your style icons is a very important process. A style icon is a personal saint of your style world and serves many purposes--such as a starting point for a killer outfit or a persona to channel when things get tough at work. These women reveal a part of yourself and encourage you to foster other virtues. Their style is to be admired, dissected, and emulated but never copied--each should make you into a better version of yourself.
My first style icon of the week is Wanda Woodward from the movie Cry-Baby (1990). Wanda is part of the title-character's gang and is a true rebel without a cause, she comes from a very normal family and should be well-adjusted. She joins the drapes (slang for greaser in Baltimore at the time the movie takes place) because she is so privileged, things came too easy for her in life so she's bored. As a very sexual character (she is played by Traci Lords, famous for creating porn while underage) Wanda is the only one from the Cry Baby gang that is single, she puts up a wall between herself and men. Her style moments are plentiful (the whole movie is a style moment, really) and she draws attention in every scene with her blonde hair and baby bangs. She makes me want a leather motorcycle jacket. When she's not wearing a pencil dress like in the scene below she sports a longer gray pencil skirt, tight black off-the-shoulder tee, saddle shoes and her red Cry-Baby scarf around her neck. She says at one point "You'd never catch me dead in a full skirt." She knows how to stand up for herself and she exudes danger and un-attainability Be sure to check out some of the musical numbers on Youtube to get a real taste of the movie.
Isn't she fabulous?
Style It: Cry-Baby is such an obscure movie I had a conniption when I found this T-shirt at Hot Topic($23) and I channel Wanda whenever I throw on this red scarf ($10) from Vivcore.
My first style icon of the week is Wanda Woodward from the movie Cry-Baby (1990). Wanda is part of the title-character's gang and is a true rebel without a cause, she comes from a very normal family and should be well-adjusted. She joins the drapes (slang for greaser in Baltimore at the time the movie takes place) because she is so privileged, things came too easy for her in life so she's bored. As a very sexual character (she is played by Traci Lords, famous for creating porn while underage) Wanda is the only one from the Cry Baby gang that is single, she puts up a wall between herself and men. Her style moments are plentiful (the whole movie is a style moment, really) and she draws attention in every scene with her blonde hair and baby bangs. She makes me want a leather motorcycle jacket. When she's not wearing a pencil dress like in the scene below she sports a longer gray pencil skirt, tight black off-the-shoulder tee, saddle shoes and her red Cry-Baby scarf around her neck. She says at one point "You'd never catch me dead in a full skirt." She knows how to stand up for herself and she exudes danger and un-attainability Be sure to check out some of the musical numbers on Youtube to get a real taste of the movie.
Isn't she fabulous?
Style It: Cry-Baby is such an obscure movie I had a conniption when I found this T-shirt at Hot Topic($23) and I channel Wanda whenever I throw on this red scarf ($10) from Vivcore.
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