Hi People!!!!!
How are you? I know a lot of people ask that to be polite, but I really do care, I promise. I apologize again for my irregular postings lately, but I’m hoping once I’m settled into my new job (started yesterday!!!!) I will be able to get back on my usual schedule. This week’s newsletter inspired by the start of award show season explores my thoughts on red carpet fashion and whether or not it even really matters anymore. Enjoy!
Red carpet style might matter more than you think
I have never really been one to watch award shows, primarily because I binge reality TV instead of watching anything worthy of a nomination (though those bars are sometimes conspicuously low for certain groups...), but I have always enjoyed seeing the red carpet looks. In the time before I had social media—that now feels like it never even happened—I absorbed the highs and the lows of the red carpet from Joan Rivers’s Fashion Police. It wasn’t something I ever watched religiously, but I would always try to catch it during awards season to break down Hollywood’s best and worst looks with Joan and the other so-called experts. Though she revolutionized red carpet reporting with the question, “Who are you wearing?” her takes on the style of the stars mostly came from her opinionated personality rather than a real knowledge of fashion, which I loved at the time. As a kid, I was always simultaneously drawn to fashion and intimidated by it. It sometimes felt like an interest and industry reserved for big cities and rich people and lofty intellectuals. Joan was rich and famous, but her opinions were funny one-liners that anyone with eyes could understand, decidedly low brow and uninterested in art. Looking back at the old clips, I more often side with George Kotsiopoulos, a magazine editor and stylist who appreciated the more artistic elements, not just how they flattered the wearer’s body.
Flash forward to 2021, Fashion Police has been canceled for four years after hanging on for dear life after Joan’s passing in 2014. I can’t imagine the show airing today in its last known form. It’s not really the fact that they’re making fun of people and their outfits that bothers me. I like jokes! And I think good faith humor is sorely needed in fashion. It’s that sooooooo many of the jokes (and general outfit critiques) were misogynistic jabs at the women’s bodies and their sexuality. Like I discussed ad nauseam in my last newsletter, the relationships between sexuality and femininity and body image and fashion have substantially progressed in recent years, and as a result, sex appeal is not the one and only goal on the red carpet anymore. So probably for the better, cheap shots about how someone’s body looks in an a dress or the number of people they slept with simply wouldn’t fly anymore. (To be fair, I think Joan did balance many of these blows with equally vicious and sexist jabs at herself. Giuliana Rancic... Not so much.)
I am currently trying to make a list of people who could host a modern day version, someone who can be funny without being mean (or at least without being mean in the way the patriarchy wants us to be mean), intelligent, and informed about fashion without being intimidating to the middle school version of myself. My mind is mostly blank. The Project Runway judges seem to do a good job at this sort of entertaining yet evolved fashion critique, but their quips certainly aren’t the star of the show like Joan’s were. Part of me is tempted to say that maybe we just shouldn’t talk about the bad, only uplift the good, but A) that’s significantly less fun. I am a big believer in a healthy level of shit talk. And B) saying that we can’t critique fashion and style at all seems like a bad conclusion to draw here, similar to thinking than any critique of a woman is anti-feminist. But because our style is so intimately tied to our personality and personhood, fashion so thoroughly connected to how we see women and their bodies, the lines between entertaining critiques and bullying become heavily blurred. Still, I firmly believe it would be possible to make a show that is both wildly entertaining and empowering, critiquing the designs rather than the woman (and bodies) in them.
In addition to our slowly changing society (thank god), we also have a changing relationship to celebrities due to social media. Which leads me to the biggest question of this circuitous rant: do people even care about red carpet style anymore? I enjoy seeing them on social media, but I probably wouldn’t have picked favorites even just in my own head if I hadn’t thought to post them to my Instagram account for all of you. When I think about celebrity style, my mind goes first to street style. Obviously the tabloids were putting this out there in the days before social media, but now celebrities (and the new breed of celebrities the internet created with bloggers and then influencers) flood our feeds with pictures of their outfits all on their own, accessible to anyone with an Instagram account, not just the people willing to buy a magazine. I personally love to take inspiration from celebrity style, but my Pinterest boards are filled with these everyday looks, not red carpet attire. I love to look at a pretty dress as much as anyone, but I’m far more engaged with the casual looks that might actually relate to my everyday life. And since celebrities are giving us glimpses into their everyday lives (some more candidly than others), does the aspirational glamour of the red carpet still hold the same power as it once did? As when the glossy magazine images and red carpet snapshots were our only peeks into celebrity life?
Thinking about how we critique celebrity fashion of course also brings up thoughts about how we talk about women in the media in general, a hot topic of the moment after everyone on the internet watched Framing Britney Spears and Meghan and Harry’s interview with Oprah. Which leads me to my next supporting material, a seemingly unrelated newsletter post by Haley Nahman on the difference between niceness and kindness and how they play into policy and real social change. Haley claims that our newfound awareness of all the microaggressions women and minority groups face is a form of niceness; policies that improve the lives of these groups in tangible ways are kindness. Paying a great deal of attention to how women in Hollywood are treated is nice, but taking the experiences of all women seriously is kindness. And while I agree that action is more important than just being vigilant to unfair stereotypes and criticism and changing the way we talk, at the end of the day, words do matter. Like it or not, the way we talk about groups shapes perceptions and changes lives. (Just look at how much the words of the media affected the lives of Britney and Meghan.) And the words we use to describe the rich and famous set the tone for how we talk about everyone down the rest of the food chain. I am hopeful that this phenomenon could also work in reverse. Maybe sometimes niceness can lead to kindness? We have to start somewhere I suppose. Fair warning, I am about to apply this metaphor to a highly frivolous question. (This newsletter is supposed to be fun after all!!!) I have to wonder, how could changing the way we talk about celebrity style impact the rest of us? Maybe if we stop critiquing starlets for being too sexy or too modest or only focusing on whether or not her outfit is “flattering” (really a question of whether or not it makes her look thin enough), the rest of us could be free from the internal voices asking us the same questions. Perhaps my longing for a modern, feminist, genuinely fashion-forward version of Fashion Police isn’t so selfish or silly after all.
I realize that I have mostly asked a bunch of questions in this essay instead of answering any of them, so I will feed you with glamorous photos from the Critic’s Choice awards instead of actual wisdom.
Questions of the week
“my question is what are your thoughts on the 'fashion rules' of only wearing certain colors during each season? it's something I literally never think about when picking out what to wear”
My answer is, of course, that I do not believe in fashion rules as a concept, and therefore I think you should wear whatever colors you please all year long. However, I do find myself gravitating toward different palettes at different times of the year. It’s not that I shy away from wearing white in the winter or black in the spring (I think they can actually be very refreshing touches), it’s more that the clothing I have in “seasonal” colors happens to also be in seasonal materials. If you never think about it, I would just keep doing what you’re doing. Don’t let your great-grandmother’s arbitrary rules hold you back!!!!
My question for you
Do you still care about award show style? If so, which one do you think produces the most iconic looks?
New Year’s resolution update
In February, I stuck with January’s purchasing pattern and kept myself to only one new purchase, though that purchase did contain multiple items... Before my Valentine’s Day trip to New York I realized I was not at all prepared to be walking around in the snow, so I went to Nordstrom and stocked up gloves, hats, scarves, and ordered a pair of long johns from Half Days (made from recycled materials so they don’t count!!!) Ironically, the snowpocalypse hit in Dallas while I was up north, and NYC was surprisingly pleasant. It definitely made me regret not buying these jeans instead, but I know all that gear will come in handy for winter in the city next year.
Recs of the week
Follow @uuppod on Instagram, and subscribe to the podcast to support my new job. I won’t disappoint you, I promise!
Watch Veronica Mars on Hulu. Or maybe don’t if you have stuff to do because I am now deeply invested in the life of a teenage detective.
If you have a dog or cat, buy them this toy from Fable Pets. It keeps Hugo entertained for hours.
If you have the opportunity to take over a private karaoke room (preferably soundproof) with your friends for an evening, I highly recommend it.
Well, that is everything my currently very limited attention span has to offer you this week. I hope you enjoyed it and that you’ll reply or comment or DM to tell me so. Or do me a fantastic favor and forward it to all of your friends (or just subscribe their emails without asking, I’m not picky). I hope the rest of your week is filled with chicken nuggets and sample sales.
Cheers,
Maddy
Still chuckling (out loud!) at the tie-down comment but love the gently funny critique. I nominate YOU to host the next Fashion Police and speaking of that, maybe it should not be police (so political now) but Fashion _______? I don’t know....
Curious about names 👆 since i dont recognize anyone these days. Also video of the kareoke!! 🤣