How L.A. made this New York writer want a pair of cornflower-blue bells.
I will always credit my first job working at a fashion magazine with expanding what I affectionately call my “denim consciousness.” Before, I simply thought of jeans as just another kind of pant. That there were different shades of blue to consider, different ways the fabric could stretch or not stretch, different cuts and rises and flares—well, I had always been aware, but never especially particular. Denim was an afterthought, not the centerpiece.
This pair – Stella McCartney’s high-rise, cornflower blue stretch denim with an unapologetic flare – entered my closet in February, when I was living out in Los Angeles for the winter as a freelance writer, working on my short-story collection. There was something about the sun in Silverlake that month, the smell of jasmine as you walked down the street, and the way the palm trees raced up to the sky that just made me want them. This is partly because the Los Angeles that I love belongs in a Pynchon novel—it’s seedy, sprawling, and adventurous. It’s also partly because I am loving the seventies revival that marched down the spring 2015 runways last fall, and a flare jean seemed like a reasonable choice above the fringe and suede and everything else.
A flare is a lot of fabric. I find myself kicking up my heels when I walk. It can feel heavy, which is why I paired them with this floral Jane Mayle top, a pair of inconspicuous clay-colored Chloé flats, and an ice-blue vintage Dries van Noten overcoat. The rest of me needed to feel breezy and free, spring-like and daytime to compensate for all that bright blue pooling around my feet. And to think that I thought jeans were just another kind of pant!
THAT 70S GLOW Get the trend without going full fringe. Shop Thessaly’s Stella McCartney jeans at Net-a-Porter.com.
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