Tag Archives: Zara

Style

Hello Sailor – Again

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Straight from the runways to the stores, it’s all about stripes for Spring 2011. To be sure, stripes are never out of style – think Coco Chanel in a classic French-sailor striped tee or “la marinière,” Audrey Hepburn or even James Dean, proving even pretty, bad boys can rock horizontal stripes.

You cannot step into high street retailers Forever 21, H&M, Zara or even Old Navy right now without stripes jumping out at you. These pics (above) show just a smidge of what’s on offer at Forever 21 in New York’s Union Square. There’s traditional blue and white, nautical red, white and blue and even knotted nautical-style rope belts and a quirky Popeye t-shirt to accent the theme.

It seems every place is screaming Hello Sailor for Spring.

Raves, Style

Buns, Boyswear and Beauty

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This bout of spring-like weather has me in an uncommonly good mood, so instead of ranting about the incredibly tedious Oscars, or the recent Park Slope-driven debate about whether it’s okay to take children to bars (though I might get to this shortly), I thought I would rave about a couple of things.

One-A-Penny, Two-A-Penny …

Every year around this time I crave real, fruit-laden hot cross buns, the sort I grew up eating toasted and dripping with butter. I have been into countless bakeries around New York and usually my request for hot cross buns is greeted with a blank stare. Or, if I can find them, they are cakey and light, sparse on the candied fruit and peels and heavy on white frosting and sticky glazes. I still haven’t found a version entirely reminiscent of the hot cross buns I remember from childhood, but I am thrilled to finally come close.

Bread Alone at the Union Square Greenmarkets has hot cross buns for the next few weeks preceding Easter. They are heavy with fruit and yeasty as I remember. The only downer is that like all the buns I have tasted here, they have an icing cross instead of a traditional dough one, which means you can’t put them in the toaster or the oven. Still, at around a buck a piece, they’re worth it.

Zara Boys

Also on the rave list this week is the boys’ section of Zara, my beloved shopping haunt, with locations dotted around New York. The store on Fifth Ave near 18th Street, which is dangerously close to my office, has super stylish children’s clothes on the upper level. I discovered that not only are the accessories great and inexpensive for my children, but there are finds to be had for a smallish female too.

I picked up a graffiti-patterned belt for my son and grabbed myself one in brown leather with brass grommets too; I picked him up a spring-weight scarf with skulls + crossbones and found a blue + white striped one for me. You get the idea. The belt was about $15 and beat anything I could find in the women’s section, and the scarf was under $10 and totally sated my current addiction to blue + white stripes.

Liberty of London

And I am hoping to have a serious rave by the weekend, as I gear up for Liberty of London for Target range to go on sale. I’ve been a huge fan of the international fabric label since I was too young to buy it; with its pretty florals and oh-so-English Garden sweetness. I still have a little cloth Liberty print bag my mother bought me on a shopping trip to Melbourne some 30 years ago. Wind the clock forward, and now I’m eyeing a teapot and a heap of breezy sundresses for me and my almost 5yo daughter.

The designer range hits Target.com and select stores March 14, but we lucky New Yorkers can get a sneak peak and shop beginning Wednesday at a pop-up store at 1095 Sixth Ave. at 42nd Street near Bryant Park.

Style

Move Over Skinnies

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Who knew a new pair of jeans could prompt so many questions. At 40-plus, I’ve been sliding into skinny jeans day-in, day-out for at least the past four years. But today I put on a pair of boyfriend jeans, the baggy, just rolled out of bed slouchy denim look of the moment. What are these jeans? Turn around. How did you choose your size? What are you meant to wear with them? The questions came thick and fast from skinny and boot-cut wearing mamas in my midst.

I believe it was Katie Holmes who rejuvenated the “boyfriend” label after she was spotted running around New York way back in 2008 in oversized, scruffy jeans that may well have been borrowed from husband Tom Cruise. All the usual celebs from Jennifer Aniston to Lindsay Lohan have been seen wearing them since, and with spring lines hitting the stores, so-called boyfriend jeans look to have nudged skinny jeans to the side, at least temporarily. I dismissed the new trend a few months back when I tried the Gap version. I looked about four-foot-nothing, with tree stumps for legs. They were the most unflattering jeans I had worn in ages. But some of the more recent version are cut slimmer and definitely work better, even for the height challenged. And never mind the look for now; it’s all about the comfort. A day in my newest jeans was something of a denim renaissance. After the shackles of skinny jeans, at last I could move freely; my ankles weren’t in a vice, there were no seam imprints running down my calves, and the proportion works really well with skinny tees and long, boyish cardigans.

Right now I’m coveting a pair of Current Elliott cropped boyfriend jeans but balk at paying $200 plus for daily denim. Instead, I went for Zara’s $59 version in a worn blue wash. Urban Outfitters has some too around $58, and also offers a slim boyfriend cut, which is basically less baggy but still straight from hip to ankle. It’s been awhile since I was anywhere near a boyfriend’s jeans but I guess they must always have jeans with holes, or at least fraying, because that’s the most typical finish I’ve seen so far. As for how to wear them; there are a couple of things to remember; firstly, they must be turned up at the cuff to convey the look and avoid just looking shapeless. And secondly, with all that androgyny below the waist, something fitted and feminine works best on top. With shoes, anything goes. I like a heel with the cropped jeans, and for the ankle-grazing cuts, something girly like a ballet flat, beachcomber-esque like Keds, or even ankle-high boots work.

Far be it from me to dismiss skinny jeans altogether; there is a place for them, tucked into boots, under a swingy jacket or with tunics and sneakers. Leggings, too, fall into the skinny class. But I realized I may have gone too far into the skinny thing when my four year old daughter proclaimed that she will only ever wear skinnies. “I don’t like jeans that open at the bottom, like daddy’s,” she announced while dressing for school one morning. She hasn’t voiced and opinion on the new boyfriend jeans yet.