"Those boots don't look good on you."
"Those faded jeans look bad."
"Americans have bad taste."
"You're in your late 30s and you still dress like a student!”—recent generous observations immediately prior to style counsel by very franche French female friends, who mean no harm at all in such gentle criticisms; au contraire. Yet these "observations" have spurred a meditation on
French-American (actually indie American)style relations, and on an existential crisis to boot (please, no puns).
Due to some unexpected events in my life, lately I've had the opportunity to meet more French people than I have in the previous two years in Paris. I have to say that it's not usually the men (though they may be thinking it) that find my style pitoyable and in need of cultural surgery.
Granted, I don't have that many French friends yet, but the female ones I have have felt comfortable after awhile to mention that they don't like my style, or, perhaps more to the point, don't think I have any. My "problem" is then frequently attributed not to me, but to American culture—we just don't have good taste, poor slobs like us. Luckily I receive the pity of having been a naive victim of cultural conditioning. It’s not my fault: it’s my culture’s. As if I even follow the dictates of "normal" in my country of birth.
Surely you're tantalized, gentle reader. What is so "faux pas" then about my style?
Answer: My slip-on black boots are abominable. My choice vintage t-shirts little more than a textile of mucous slipped over the torso. My metal-zippered navy deliveryman's jacket hopelessly, tastelessly proletarian. And jeepers, how my pencil pants once revered by the Clash only offend the French peepers! Don't I read any fashion magazines? Ever charitable and believing it is never too late for a human being to receive a proper education, my friend offered to take me shopping one day and explain what looks good and what does not. I'm eagerly setting money aside for that lesson. But how did this happen? Actually, it has very little to do with sporting mainstream American style (though the French don't like that much, either). Allow me to reminisce for a moment.
Reminiscences and Influences
Article comments
1 - Cinnomin
No offense, but in american to the bone, If you dress closed to what you described, get a low cost fashion consultant. It sound like clothe you should only where to paint in.