Big Ugly Shoes Won't Go Away and More Stuff That Also Won't Go Away

Maybe if you were full on glam rocking these boots, they would be cool. They need something like a skintight glitter jumpsuit to balance things out. Paired with saggy denim shorts, gauzy blouses and sheer shirts, they are just clumpy and awkward. I saw a girl recently wearing the glitter version of these ubiquitous shoes and cut-offs just like in the photo above. It was a train wreck. But it's always sad when you see girls struggling in their heels when they could be wearing Converse and looking a lot better.

And speaking of saggy cut-offs, please stop wearing them!

At least where them with an old t-shirt. But instead, people insist on this revolutionary concept they themselves invented, mixing "high" with "low" and cut-offs with heels. It's very fresh to do this, as opposed to the "too perfect, matching" look people always say they are against but no one really wears because it is out to match.

Speaking of the last photo, another trend I hate is the intentionally unlaced lace-up boots. To me, the appeal of lace-up boots is the tight, clean, laced-up look:

The crotch and boot combo is red-hot on this one!!!!



I guess this girl is twelve years old so maybe I shouldn't be criticizing her fashion choices. Again though, those American Apparel disco spandex pants are meant to be worn with a disco slut outfit, like Olivia Newton John in the last scene of Grease, not with a brown sweater and a pair of Timberlands you swiped off a hobo. Good job on the space nails, though. Speaking of which: ever since I got into space, space got really popular: space conspiracy?????

Perhaps the trend I hated most this summer was the insanely low cut arm hole, especially on a dude:


To me, this is the last thing to highlight on anyone, and Jared Leto must be well into his 50s by now. He is posing with some evil developer here who helped destroy New York, making Jared's shirt bitterly ironic. He's also wearing one glove omg what a douche.

Photos of Inspiration: NYC

Not all of these are from New York, but the idea is inspiring. If only the city was a bit more like this. And oh man, Travolta was such a babe.

Ugly AA: We are Still "Inspired" by the 90's Because There's Nothing Else Left

Great, an Andy Kaufman shirt with the huge, hideous face of Andy Kaufman on it. You'd think we'd have gotten over our short-lived fascination with this guy after that Jim Carrey movie came out, but he is probably one of Dov Charney's personal heroes or something. I hope this goes on sale.

The look du jour. Flimsy fabric, tent-like volume, huge armholes.

This look is so nasty. This is the kind of dress pregnant Christian teens in Lifetime movies wore in the year 1996, with gelled poofy straight bangs in front and a perm in back. This and the next look from their vintage collection!
The 90's was the lumpiest, most colorless decade of them all. And now they are back with a shapeless, murky-colored vengeance! From floppy denim shirts all bunched along the sleeves to prints featuring your finest tans, blacks, and grays.

"What's going on? Why am I wearing this?" I've already posted this shirt before, but this one has cut-out sleeves. Also, do these ladies need some mousse or what???

So, as we all know, American Apparel is like, for gay rights and workers rights and stuff, but they do hate women (why else would they start a sheer poly maxi skirt trend?) in classic patriarchal fashion. This is your typical ad.

BUT! These are their male models???


And this? A brown turtleneck tucked into baggy-crotched, huge pair of khakis? On this guy?! Talk about a double standard. Where are the bashful, vaguely "ethnic" hunks with their dicks showing through their sheer underwear?

How very reassuring for the male American Apparel shoppers.

Designers Love Little Kids

Above are some fashion ads (and one editorial) starring the Fanning sisters for Marc Jacobs and actor Hailee Steinfeld for Miu Miu.

Fashion designers act as though they choose very young teens for their ad campaigns because of each girl's innate style and unique, muse-like ability to inspire them- when, clearly, the real reason designers like children is because they represent a coltish, unsullied female ideal (of course, most women can tell you that, as a very young teen, they felt neither coltish nor unsullied.)

These young ladies fit right in with the current (current meaning several years, but it's not like fashion has come up with anything new lately) fashion model, who also has a distinctly un-womenly look, and is usually put out to pasture before her teens end. Perhaps we remember Gemma Ward, whose distinctly childlike look catapulted her to fame and then disappeared once she grew into a less childlike body?

Not that all this is new; we all know models are young and it's not like you can't find equally creepy photos of young Brooke Shields. But designers act as though the young girl's agency and not her childlike looks are the reason behind her newfound modeling career. If the deisgners were really into the fact that these young women are actors, maybe they would ask them to do something in these photos instead of look scared, big-eyed, and limp.

At least the first round of Marc Jacobs photos with Dakota Fanning emphasized the fact that she was a hammy little kid playing dress-up (speaking of which, god Marc Jacobs ads are fug with their deliberately "undone" look):

Whereas, for round two, she is just your run-of-the-mill Lolita type with a perfume bottle between her legs:

The fact that these girls are supposed to be talented actresses comes in second to their position as highly styled pubescent fashion plates. Ideally, we would find young women inspiring, but not because they look so baby prostitute-like when they peer out sexily and vacantly from behind a pricey purse, but because they have other, real talents to offer. Also, girls of this age are supposed to be wearing two different-colored Converse, which they Sharpied on themselves, not getting their hair and make-up prepped for six hours by some stylist.

Vintage on eBay

Late 30's/early 40's two piece set: size 4/6.

Late 1930's ragamuffin handmade feedsack dress with heart pocket: size 12/14

40's Scarecrow novelty print dress: size XS

1930's depression era rayon floral dress: size 6ish.

I finally listed some more stuff on eBay! They are listed for after 7pm, West Coast time tonight.

I'm also thinking of starting on etsy shop, but it seems like you really have to promote yourself, and I'm so lazy, you know?

Sable Starr: Queen of the Pussies

Here are some photos of 70's groupie teen Sable Starr. Famous groupies tend to be the coolest, most popular, most aggressive, and most charismatic girl in the room, so it's always kind of a downer reading their stories- had they been guys, they probably would have been rock stars themselves.

Sable was like 14 when she dated/slept with all these dudes, which seems like it flew a bit more in the 70's. Not that I'm condoning it, man. These pubescent groupies would hit the scene in halter tops, daisy dukes, boas, and mile high platforms.

In her memoir, I'm With the Band, fellow famous groupie Pamela Des Barres trashes Sable and her ilk; I guess the baby groupies were mean to her and called her an "old bag" in front of the Whiskey or something which she took personally even though she was only 23 herself. To quoth Bebe Buell, "Who does Pamela think she is? Queen of the pussies?"

Anyway, she had the 70s trash look down, that's for sure.

Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg Are Gross

Since I moved to New York especially, it seems 60's French pop is inescapable. Sometimes I think if I hear that song "Bonnie and Clyde" with Jane Birkin or whoever* it is singing in that French accent I'm gonna kill someone. It seems like everyone can conveniently play this shit because it is retro and French and seems vaguely stylish and won't offend. I am also tired of seeing photos of lank, blank-faced Jane Birkin and disturbingly frog-like Serge Gainsbourg all over fashion inspiration posts like he is not old enough to be her inbred father.

It's as though we've forgotten these canonical relationships of past eras were informed by the extreme sexism of their day, especially the 1960's era musicians and "their women."

Seriously, these look like people you'd see getting into a violent altercation in a dollar store.

Ugh! What is this nasty chauvinistic shit? May I remind you he sang a song called "Lemon Incest" with his teenage daughter? Aside from the fact that people still seem convinced the French are superior fashion-wise to Americans even though I see French people everyday who look just as shittily dressed as those of us in the US, with the advent of fast-paced modern technology it matters less and less what the story of the images we are posting as inspiration on our blogs are.

I recently read Faithfull by Marianne Faithfull, and for much of the book, she talks about being depressed, drug-addicted, anorexic, angry regarding how she was used and only valued for her beauty, all the while this fiction of her as a person and especially Mick Jagger's girlfriend was being created. But these aspects don't show up in our inspiration posts.

It's not like we can't post photos of Marianne to inspire us, but if we have the internet to repost photos we know nothing about, we also have it as tool to find out about these people and not gloss over the fact that Serge Gainsbourg is gross, you know?

*I guess it was Bridget Bardot. Whatevs.