The Blazer

At the beginning of the summer a well-known women's fashion magazine asked their readers for essay submissions for their Personal Style issue. They were looking for 500-word explorations focused on "a treasured piece from your wardrobe." I'd been looking at my wardrobe in that way for years, searching for the gems that define it, that explain the root of my style, but I hadn't written something in that vein for quite awhile.

The issue is now on newsstands, so I know for certain that my submission was not chosen. But that doesn't really matter. I write best when there is an assignment involved, a task to steer my occasionally muddled thoughts. I can't shake the school girl. I doubt that I ever will. And this assignment gave me a chance to return to my roots in some ways. I'm not including a picture of me wearing the item because none exists. Maybe I'll get around to that someday when I stop hiding from people clutching cameras.

I thought about lengthening it but I like its crispness. 500 words on the nose. My middle school self is particularly proud of that fact.

I’m not sure how I made it through my east coast, prep school existence without amassing a closet full of blazers. After spending my earliest years in a Catholic school uniform, I happily greeted the relatively laid back dress code of the girls’ school that I began attending in the fifth grade. For good or for ill, I relished the chance to participate fully in the trends that would become signposts of a 1990s adolescence. Blazers were nowhere to be found among the plaid skirts and the platform shoes from Wild Pair and the flared jeans.

At the age of 26 and back at home after being chewed up and spat out by the economy and New York City, I turned to my mother’s closet for a temporary solution to a sudden problem. When it comes to personal style, she and I reside miles apart. After the ups and downs of my trend-obsessed adolescence, I settled into a restrained classicism. She had always been, and continues to be, a colorful risk taker. During my youngest years, she wrapped her hair in vibrant printed scarves and wore one long earring instead of two. She is comfortable with imbalance in a way that I never have been. I long saw her wardrobe as a place for play and fantasy but rarely for inspiration. However, my employment roller coaster had led me to an apparel retail job for the holiday season and a blazer or two would be necessary. I searched through her closet for the first time in years and was stunned to find hidden among the pieces that I’d come to associate with her persona and her presence a classic wool blazer in navy with notch lapels, gold buttons, and a maroon silk lining. The shoulder pads marked it as a relic of the 1980s, but she assured me that she could remove them.

It was the beginning of a beginning. The blazer was longer in the torso than many that I’d seen for women, which made it perfect for me, and for her, as above average height is a trait that we share. It opened me up to new ways in which my mother and I are connected, and it happily started my descent down a slippery slope. The blazers that I collected over the next five years would prove themselves to be more than simple tools to help me ease my way through a life in retail. They became a way to elevate a tee or offset the femininity of a sun dress. They became makeshift jackets and occasional umbrellas. As their number grew so did their breadth. My closet now houses linen and bird's eye tweed, seersucker and shawl collar tuxedo varieties. But I most often return to the classic option that I found hiding in my mother's closet all those years ago. Timeless is a word thrown around in fashion circles quite a bit but that term fits the blazer perfectly. And it, in turn, fits me.

Favorite of the Day: Carolina Herrera

Child Samantha was always drawn to the "pretty pretty". The big skirts. The sweeping trains. Adult Samantha isn't as easily impressed by such things. But there are some designers who do that work so well, who can still draw out my slumbering love for drama.

Carolina Herrera produces those types of ensembles every season, but in the midst of a season of black and white and utility they stood out even more than usual. Not just for their beauty, because so many of the clothes presented during this week are beautiful, but for the way that they spoke to one another.

Everything felt connected. Each piece told one part of the same story.

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Favorite of the Day: Alexander Wang

New York Fashion Week is at the halfway mark, and I find myself bored. Everything started to bleed together almost from the beginning, and it's been hard to become excited by collection after collection of the same old thing. But the Alexander Wang show provided me with a jolt.

I watched the livestream in my room and found myself standing up. Bouncing around. Dancing to the music. The clothes were thrilling. The girls sped down the runway. He was playing with the prevalent sporting motif but that has always been his wheelhouse, and unlike most others he continues to provide fresh takes on it. These were not off-duty yoga looks, devoid of shape or life. 

They were sharp and tailored and hard and sexy. 

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Favorite of the Day: Cacharel

Fall has started to settle into itself and everyone is taking full advantage. Yet as fashion month nears its end, I've started to yearn for things that are typically spring and summer. For clothes that are fun and light and pretty. It's something that's been missing for most of the season, but some of it could be found in the clothing at Cacharel.

So much of it was easy and uncomplicated. 

One could not help thinking of long days and warm nights.

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Favorite of the Day: Gareth Pugh

There was a softer story being told at the Gareth Pugh show on September 25th. The stark blacks and crisps whites that have featured heavily in his collections over the years were joined by colors that seemed to spring from the bleeding together of the two. The silhouettes, usually so strong and, at times, oppressive, had a touch of the languid to them.

They were markers of a slow evolution and a reluctance to stand still.


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Favorite of the Day: Dolce & Gabbana

If I had to I could pinpoint when the shift started at Dolce & Gabbana. When the clothes deviated from the sexiness for sexiness' sake mantra that has become less and less important in Milan. When the inspiration began to sprout from the long, storied, tortuous, and bloody history of Italy. But the exact moment is unimportant. It's this Dolce & Gabbana, the one that has entered a second act of sorts, that continues to captivate me.

This season the focus was on the ruins of the once great Roman empire, both architectural and monetary. Oversized sequins called to mind a melting pot filled with emperor-faced coins. Vines of flowers mimicked those that one might find littering long broken columns.

And sometimes the silhouettes called to mind a more recent Italian image, that seen in mid-20th century cinema.


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Favorite of the Day: Holly Fulton

The best in prints and patterns is what many expect to see whenever the focus shifts from New York to London. And after a New York season full of stripped down "modernity", the lovingly creative jumble of London elicits a sigh of relief.

At Holly Fulton, the prints were front and center as they are every season. The colors were somewhat muted and the shapes more ladylike.

But in places the youthful rebel couldn't be contained.


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Favorite of the Day: Reed Krakoff

Searching for through lines in the world of fashion can be difficult. Designers often jump from inspiration to inspiration, sometimes in the same season. There are those who do so expertly, Prabal Gurung comes to mind, but many start to lose themselves in the process. Everything becomes a jumble of that painting they saw at the MoMA and that beach that they visited on the Mediterranean.

Reed Krakoff is the second of my Resort 2014 favorites to make an appearance here and for good reason. There is a clear thread that connects that collection to this one, yet the clothes are not weighed down by sameness. There was a progression forward, but that movement occurred while still keeping in mind what came before.

Timeless, easy clothing.

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Favorite of the Day: DKNY

Birthdays have never been my thing. When my friends finally convinced me to do something for my 25th, I settled on Thai food and bowling and funfetti cupcakes. It was the kind of low key affair that I so often crave.

But the 25th anniversary of a fashion line calls for a blowout celebration. In an industry that is often fickle, that kind of longevity is something to be lauded. DKNY has lasted, and prospered, by remaining true to its core tenets. The brand continues to be the go to for that young New York City woman looking to outfit all aspects of her life.

This season she was as cool as she always is, wearing clothes that were sporty and savvy in that unique NYC way.

And let's not forget sexy.


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Favorite of the Day: Prabal Gurung

The Resort 2014 collection from Prabal Gurung was one of my favorites of the season. It's a fashion cliché to applaud a designer's point of view, but as we moved into day three of the Spring/Summer 2014 midriff parade, it became evident how important such things are.

Prabal Gurung has a clear idea of the woman that he is designing for. After a Resort season filled with strong and stark silhouettes, colors, and prints, things softened up a bit.

But they never softened too much.

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Favorite of the Day: Tanya Taylor

I first learned about Tanya Taylor a year ago when her collection was shown during a small presentation. 12 months later on September 5th her clothes had moved from the static to the fluid as her most recent collection made its way down one of New York fashion week's many runways.

A year later some of the clothes, especially those of the lace or floral variety, still have that antique edge to them. But the Tanya Taylor girl has also started to come into her own. The dusty quality of that previous season's colors has been replaced with a youthful vibrancy.

And some of these clothes would never be found in her great aunt's closet.


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Favorite of the Day: Kenzo

One expects the clothes for cooler climes to be more serious, more about function and warmth and utility. As I've said before, I like things to be in their place and of their time, but I was delighted by the prints play that occurred at the Kenzo.

It was cheeky and fun and youthful. 

But with its heavier fabrics and deeper shades, it didn't seem out of place in the narrative of the season.

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