It's Fashion Friday!: Protect Your Peepers

           I might have a bit of a sunglasses acquisition issue. They’re such a fun thing to buy. An easy way to give a hint of something new to your appearance. An easy way to hide the squint you’re making at that person who has no idea what they’re talking about. AND they are medically necessary to PROTECT your beautiful peepers from those harmful glorious rays of light raining down from that magnificent ball of gas in the sky. 

       

The Original Wayfarer
in one of their "Rare Prints"
$165

     While particular styles may go in and out of trend, I really believe sunglasses are one area of fashion where people can do what they damn well please. The only guideline is that you attempt to do something that goes well with the shape and color of your face. A lot of fun is out there to be had! There are some standards we all know and love. The Wayfarer by Ray Ban is an older style that has resurfaced with “hipster cool.” Contrary to the belief of everyone living in Park Slope, this is NOT a universally flattering style. They are available in a wide variety of colors, however, so you may be able to find a pair that works for you. I had a pair. I don’t know if I ever showed you their demise, or told you about it, but a quick recap – picture my large, wrapped in a size 11 Saucony sneaker foot, eagerly reaching to make a sticky contact with the floor so I could hold a forearm plank, and instead landing smack in the middle of the lens of my Wayfarers. The SOUND! OH. I think it was as if the whole world was silent and all I could hear was shatter-crunching.

These are fun! Prada 'Baroque' will leave you
broke - $290 at Nordstrom.



            The beautiful thing about Ray Bans, and any other designer sunglass made by Luxottica Group, is that they can be sent back to them for repairs. And let me tell you, that is a good thing, because this is not a company whose quality I would bank on. Let me rephrase that. Luxottica’s proprietary brands, such as Ray Ban and Persol, are fine. Luxottica’s licensed brands, which would be a huge helping of your designer eyewear: Prada, D&G, Chanel, Ferragamo, Versace, anything you can buy at Lenscrafters… not so great. The most recent pair of eyeglasses (we all know how much those cost) I purchased actually started to flake at the temples – not a happy girl. Anyways, I will be sending back my Ray Bans with a request for assistance – I’ll let you know how that goes. The extra helpful people at Lenscrafters told me it would be cheaper to just buy a brand new pair. I don’t think so.

Mmmm. McQueen. $340.

             Safilo Group is the other designer eyewear licensing monster. They handle the accounts of Dior, Bottega Veneta, Alexander McQueen, Saint Laurent, and Marc Jacobs, among others. I recently acquired a pair of My Lady Dior’s in honor of my friend Janice. Janice got herself a beautiful Lady Dior handbag while we were working together at Anthropologie and now we can match. I am already excited by the improvement in quality of these glasses over those by Luxottica. I had noticed a piece on the temple was a bit loose the other day, you know how sometimes you can wiggle the joint between the front frame and the side up and down and back and forth? It was easily tightened with a jeweler’s screwdriver and on a cheaper pair of frames it would most likely have been glued. 

            Enough shop talk. The bottom line is, as long as the sunglasses you purchase are

Floral Square Frames. $5.80!! Now THAT'S
my price range. Forever21.

100% UV Protection, you are good to go! I tend to also prefer my sunglasses to be without nose pieces as I also use mine to keep the hair out of my face when I go indoors, and those little things get caught in hair. It's pretty embarrassing to have your sunglasses dangling from the side of your head when you want them on your nose. I say it’s good to have at least one really nice pair that you take good care of, and then have a bunch of cheap ones to put in every purse, in the car, in the kitchen, in your gym bag, anywhere you might find yourself squinting. TJ Maxx is a great place to get cheap sunglasses AND cheaper good sunglasses. Department store outlets are also great places to get cheaper good sunglasses. I tend to want to pay less as mine always seem to meet an untimely end. My favorite pair of purple Missoni sunglasses? My boss from hell THREW THEM AWAY. And then she lied about it. Pretended she knew nothing. It was the moment she told me “You know what? I want to buy you a new pair of sunglasses. I just feel so bad that your sunglasses went missing,” that gave her away. That was before she knew they were Missoni. I never told her I got them at TJ Maxx. I let her think that I paid hundreds of dollars for them. She was a horrible person.

       

There's always the vintage route.
$18.90 on Etsy.

     Before that, I had the one pair of Armani sunglasses I paid full price for. I had purchased them with my brother, at his encouragement. I loved them to death. They actually had a long life, before I forgot that I had taken them off and put them in my lap while I was driving. I then got out of the car. They fell onto the pavement. AND I STEPPED ON THEM. They were a wrap around style, very delicate, sort of frameless. And then they were a patterned style. Made everything look like spider webs.

            The moral of this story is to deck out your face with fun frames. Don’t spend to much. Buy what you like. If you can take care of it, go ahead and invest! If not, keep it cheap and don’t get too attached. Check out this lady!

It's Fashion Friday!: Who Needs Mace?!

Mr. Louboutin's handbag
will keep birds from landing
on your shoulder. And icedams. It
will definitely prevent icedams.
$1695

Yucko. I don't even remember
who to credit for this crap.

           It goes without saying that there will be trends that not everyone understands or finds himself moved by. I know for a fact that my mom was definitely not down with the low-low-rise jean craze (Thank goodness…. No self-respecting woman, especially past the age of 30, should be showing ass crack). She also did not appreciate the “guys wearing their jeans below their butt” trend, while my brother sported that look for a lot longer than we all would have liked. My friend Beth does not like over the knee boots, stating they remind her of prostitutes and pirates, neither of which she wants to dress like. Even my dog has preferences, being nice to the white dog living in the house behind us and really not liking the little black pug that sometimes wanders into our yard unattended to defecate wherever he chooses (Does that make my dog a racist?). I am baffled by and cannot wrap my head around the won’t-go-away trends of Spikes and Skulls.

            To specify, when I say spikes I am referring to anything pointy and made of metal that has been stuck on an article of clothing. You may call it a stud or a cone. Whatever you want to call it, I don’t get it. Most trends and fads stick around for a short while and then fade out. This one is not seeming to fade away. What exactly is the point of covering your accessories with spikes?

Ouch! At least after the blunt studs pierce
the skin the calf hair will feel nice  and soft.
House of Harlow 1960 'Tilly' $250

            I recall entering high school and there being a senior whose name was Thor. I’m not joking – his family was Swedish. Thor wore a black leather jacket with spikes on it. He had spiky blonde hair. I seem to remember there also being pointed dark accessories mixed in. THIS made sense. I found it edgy and dangerous. This was the kind of person you wanted to have by your side if you had to walk through a dark alley at night. The other two things that come to mind when I think of spikes are bulldogs/dog collars and nuns.

            The Missionaries of Charity (Mother Theresa’s branch of sisters) are one of the few branches of the Catholic church that still participate in corporal penance. So, these poor blessed little ladies wear spiked chains around their waist and biceps for at least an hour everyday to help connect them with the suffering of Jesus and the poor. Those are some badass, hardcore, edgy sisters.

These remind me of a triceratops.
I think they might leave a
nice imprint in a fresh tot's tush.
N.Y.L.A. 'Sibeta' $42

            When I see a young or older lady wearing a handbag covered in spikes, or wearing a pair of stilettos covered in spikes, I think of bulldogs, Thor, and nuns. I imagine those are not the desired impressions. Additionally, what happens if you have spikes on your handbag and you accidentally sit on it? Or you’re wearing it on the subway, and it’s crowded, and some thoughtless person pushes by you quickly and with force? Do you not worry about being covered in evenly spaced tiny bruises? If you have spikes on your shoes, you could hurt someone else. I actually see this as a pro and not a con. Shit-kicking shoes can really help you get your way in certain situations. As with guns, however, there’s always that chance of misfire. Perhaps a small child who has just learned to walk will tumble face first into your stud laden toe, becoming permanently disfigured, and forced to grow up to be a womanizing serial killer. You might take a tumble down the stairs and inadvertently kick your own ass, resulting in the odd tiny bruises you already got from your spike-covered handbag. Your skin will start to resemble that of a cheetah.

I like mohawks. I like silver. I like sparkles.
This shoe makes me want to gag.
And it's only $765 on sale. I don't care
if the label says Alexander McQueen.

            If that isn’t enough, skulls continue to adorn all kinds of apparel. “Oooh I’m so edgy! I have a skull on my scarf, and a skull on my handbag, and I even have skull jewelry.” I have a skull on top of my C-1 vertebra. Am I edgy too? If everyone does something, it’s not edgy. It’s not even interesting. It’s commonplace. Of all the people who claim to really like skulls, how many of them do you think actually do? I bet they just say they do because they think it’s cool. Even if you’re one of those people who says they’re into Day of the Dead, it’s DAY of the Dead not DAYS of the Dead. I really enjoy my kneecaps. I think I’ll have kneecaps printed on all of my t-shirts.

            Clearly, I just have a problem with people who do things because they think it makes them look a certain way, instead of doing things because they really like them. I had a radiologist once who gave me a steroid shot in my spine – he had a skull and bones embroidered on his lab-coat. I would wager to say that Dr. actually liked bones (or he was part of the Skull & Bones club at Yale, where he graduated from, and was not afraid to show it). And I’m fairly certain that Thor liked spikes, along with the color black, and probably things like Death Metal and maybe puppies (everyone likes puppies). For the rest of the uninventive ladies out there covering themselves in spikes and skulls, maybe you should try doing something different if you would like to stand out. Perhaps covering yourself in shards of glass would be much edgier, in the literal sense. They would sparkle in sunlight, and would definitely encourage people to stay away from you. And perhaps if you’re looking for a new object to print on everything you own, I don’t know… how about a trash can? Nothing says cool like taking care of litter.