Cruising novelty chocolate shops, buying a second Walkman because it seems rude not to, stocking up on a bit more duty-free Clarins, fourteen fashion magazines and three more Booker-nominated doorstops, just in case you tear through the others in the first week, is all part of the process.
If you’re doing the carry-on thing, you then add all these new possessions to your already considerable burden so that you approach the departure gate resembling a biblical donkey. Then you have to cram it all under the seat in front of you, because someone else has already filled the overhead storage space with their in-flight baggage, while you were still looking feverishly at the chocolate macadamia nut koalas.
On domestic flights in America, where they are much more lenient about the size of bags and how many you can take into the cabin, everyone uses those trolley cases and carry-on suitpacks. Nobody checks their luggage. It can be quite hard getting to your seat climbing over all the Christmas trees, Thanksgiving turkeys, shoe trunks and lawn-mowers. The holds on those planes must be completely empty. It’s a miracle they don’t fly upside down.
It doesn’t get better. Once you reach the other end and have unbuckled your lower limbs, you then have to lug your friend the carry-on bag around a terrifying foreign airport and into the terrifying foreign airport lavatory where you have to rest it on your knees, because the floor is completely out of the question. Meanwhile all those people foolish enough to stow their luggage are strolling about stretching luxuriously and doing some more airport shopping.
The final insult comes when you reach your pensione and find that everything in the stupid carry-on bag is crushed beyond recognition and covered in a layer of Beauty Flash Balm. Marvellous. It’s the only way to travel. Can’t imagine why anyone would ever check their bags.
See you at carousel three.
Learning from the lovable eccentrics
Is international style guru Anna Piaggi stark raving mad, or has she figured out a brilliant solution to the fashion problem? Look, here she comes just a-walking down the street in velveteen pantaloons, an admiral’s coat, a miniature top hat and a ruff that wouldn’t look out of place on Sir Walter Raleigh. And that’s just daywear. We won’t even get into the blue-streaked and shaved hair, or the boiled lolly rings on every finger. The chick is crazy. Kooked. Flip city.
But although she dresses like she’s on day release from the high security wing, Planet Nuts, Piaggi – who once came to Sydney for Australian Fashion Week with her usual container load of nuns’ nighties, laughing cavalier hats and velveteen straitjackets – is worshipped in high fashion circles.
She works for the Bible (Italian Vogue). She’s Karl Lagerfeld’s great friend. She’s front row à-go-go at every fashion show from Faubourg St Honoré to 7th Avenue. Calvin, Romeo and Helmut are always thrilled to see her, and I admit I was one of those out at the Sydney fashion shows mouthing Isn’t She Marvellous? every time she turned up there looking like a troll doll on acid.
But I don’t think she’s quite as loopy as she looks. I reckon what Piaggi must have figured out, sometime in the early 1960s, is that you can jump off the fashion treadmill, even when you are one of the donkeys which turn it, by becoming a Lovable Eccentric, one of those wild and wacky individuals who wear whatever they feel like, completely untrammelled by trend and convention.
You know the people I mean. They look wacko the did-dlyo and they don’t care; in fact, they love it. Their style might be defined by a colour (usually purple), or a bygone era, like the freeze-framed folk who carry on dressing as they did when they were young and beautiful (Princess Margaret), or from a time they wish they’d lived in (‘punks’ born after 1960).
The 1950s is a favourite togzone for these types. Witness the Sydney-based lipstick entrepreneur who always dresses like she’s off for a clam bake with Elvis, her denims rolled up to the calf, her hair in a bleached blonde quiff. And then there are those twits in London who get around in the full Edwardian Monty all the time. Even on Saturday mornings.
Op shop treasures we mere normals would not have been able to distinguish from the general tangle of stained polyester and free-form acrylic knits feature large on the lovably eccentric shopping list, along with kaftans, beads and all manner of ethnic tat.
This is clever, because it makes getting dressed very cheap. You can get a look without getting a loan. Anna Piaggi practically emptied an Oxford Street Javanese scarf shop while she was in Sydney, scoring a trunkful of new geegaws for the price of one Jil Sander trouser leg. And once you are outside fashion in this way, it must be such a relief never to be confronted with the moment when your favourite $900 jacket stops whispering ‘last season’ and starts yelling TWO YEARS AND HOLDING.
Plus, as a lovable eccentric, you need never worry about being inappropriately dressed, because you always will be – by other people’s cramped suburban standards, that is. By your own, you will never look anything short of magnificent. Look at me, see me shine in my patchwork satin shortie jelabah, my rainbow head wrap and my favourite emerald-green Doc Martens.
The truly fashion-enslaved suffer for their obsession, but lovable eccentrics just have a heap of fun with the whole thing. While you and I are wondering whether we can wear velvet in December, or a straw hat to the autumn racing carnival, they are bum up in the dress-up box rootling around for their favourite purple cloak. Now who looks stupid?
Fat chance
I like Lycra. Lycra likes me. Lycra and I are in such harmony that every time I breathe in, Lycra breathes in and, more importantly, every time I breathe out, Lycra breathes out. Let it go. Aaaaaaaaah.
Lycra is my friend. Lycra makes me feel like I’m wearing pyjamas when I look like I’m wearing tailored pants. With Lycra you can get off a plane looking like you mean business, feeling like you’re wearing a tracksuit. Lycra is so comfy that, if you close your eyes when you are wearing trousers, a skirt or even a whole suit containing it, you feel as if you’re in one of those dreams when you’ve gone to work in your nightie.
Lycra makes dressing so easy. They put it through everything these days. Remember when it was just in shiny gym gear? Spandex – ha! Now it’s in every fabric, from simple cotton drill to satin and the most expensive wools. You can even get a raincoat with Lycra in it, if you really want one.
It’s used in underwear, so knickers don’t sag, and in body shirts, so they cling. It’s used in tight tailored jackets that feel like cardigans and in crêpe evening dresses that fit where they hit and drape where they don’t.
And there’s more. It resists creasing. Garments worn day after day hold their shape. It adds clingy zing to the simplest garment. Lycra is freedom. Lycra is glamour. Lycra is one of the greatest inventions of the twentieth century.
But.
Butt. Butt and gut. Like many good friends, Lycra doesn’t always tell you the hurtful truth. A pair of Lycra pants worn several times a week will accommodate a slowly expanding waistline with no protest. As your girth steadily increases, your friendly trousers ease ever outwards. On they go, every morning, and you think, ‘How marvellous. I got married in these trousers and they still fit me.’
The problem is that your Lycra pants have middle-age spread, too. Not only do they wax and wane with the natural monthly cycle of a woman’s womby area, they are also capable of sustained growth.
Over the months, a pair of Lycra pants gradually grows. It’s a very slow process, like the formation of a stalactite, but after a couple of years of constant wear and not enough sit-ups on your part, a size-ten trouser will have swelled beyond a twelve.
The real problem is that you don’t realise what has happened until you blithely try to slip into a pair of trousers you used to wear before you discovered Lycra. They’ll feel like a tourniquet. These are tough-love trousers which aren’t afraid to tell you the truth. Fatty.
So take heed. Enjoy the cosy comfort of Lycra but, like all things, use it in moderation. Every now and again remind yourself what it is like to wear real clothes. Clothes
that don’t take into account that you have to eat a lot of big lunches for work, or that you can’t bear to throw away the food the children leave.
And do the odd sit-up.
Teen queens
This is one for the girls. Teenage girls. I have been spending a lot of time in the company of this species of late, with my own four nieces and some friends’ daughters. Really, it would be hard to meet anyone nicer.
They are very funny and they sure can cuss good. They are still young enough to be enthusiastic and cuddly and to find wrinklies interesting (if a little stupid).
They like all the good stuff. Clothes, boys, shoes, make-up, pizza, King of the Hill, soccer, Charlotte Brontë, Matt Le Blanc, Joni Mitchell. And if you win their trust, they will even get their old Barbies out from under their beds and let you play with them.
There is nothing they like more than spending a glorious sunny afternoon watching Roman Holiday on cable with the curtains closed and a never-ending packet of Tim Tams. Plus they care deeply about wogongs, global warming and stray dogs. They oversee the household recycling and do sponsored swims for breast cancer research. They hate the Spice Girls. You see, superior beings.
Which is why I am concerned that they are not being fully educated in some of the little details that will make adulthood more congenial. So here is my list of:
Things I wish I had known at 14
Washing-up liquid applied directly to the fabric can remove most known stains.
Never wear a hat wider than your shoulders.
Never wear white to a wedding, as you may upstage the bride.
Never shave your legs – learn to wax your own.
Wearing scent before noon is inconsiderate.
Too much mascara makes you look cheap – learn to dye your own eyelashes.
Braces on your teeth are worth it, as are sensible shoes, at least until you stop growing.
Only people with very beautiful hands and very beautiful rings can get away with jewellery on their forefingers.
Don’t let anyone cut your cuticles, ever.
Make the most of fun, cheap clothes, as this is the last time you will be able to wear them.
Stick-on tattoos are a laugh; real tattoos are a liability.
Send a written reply to wedding invitations.
Expensive drycleaners are worth it, but you can hand-wash a lot of things which say Dry Clean Only.
The girl at school who gets kissed the most now may not be happy in later life.
There is no such thing as nice cheap shoes (except espadrilles).
Don’t believe everything you read in magazines.
White shoes, white handbag – don’t do it.
Your mother is right when she says your physics homework is more important than watching The Simpsons.
Likewise when she says your hair needs a trim.
There are other hairstyles apart from the centre parting.
At a formal dinner or luncheon with place cards, turn yours around so other people will remember your name.
Those cheap wash-out hair dyes from pharmacies are probably not as nice as your own hair colour.
Work hard at French.
It is never too early to establish a skincare routine.
On Friday nights you can dress as trashily as you like (but you don’t have to behave that way too).
Thankyou notes will get you everywhere.
You are young and you are gorgeous.
Use sunblock and you’ll stay that way.
You do not need to go on a diet.
The virus
I think I’ve got a virus. There’s a really nasty 24-hour bug going around and I think I’ve got it. Everyone’s had it. The symptoms are a splitting headache, strong waves of nausea, a very dry mouth and an intense craving for bacon and eggs. I’ve got them all.
It must be one of those mutant resistant strains, because it keeps going away and then coming back. Some of my friends have had it several times. You think you’re over it, then you wake up and have it all over again. The only thing that seems to make it better is Coca-Cola. I’ve really got a bad dose this morning.
It’s not just physical, either, this virus. It gives you these intense feelings of self-hatred and some of the great unanswerable questions of life go around in your head like a toy train. Why did I do chew and show in Rockpool? Why did I decide to start drinking Cointreau at 2 am? Why did I do a pole-dancing display with a lamppost in Devonshire Street? Why did I sing ‘Good Year for the Roses’ using a beer bottle as a microphone?
Another symptom is unexplained bruising all over your body, especially on your back. I’ve got a corker on my left buttock. Roughly the same shape as Taiwan and about the same size.
Come to think of it, maybe it’s not a virus. Maybe I was mugged, because there was $200 in my wallet last night and there’s only a five this morning. And where did those Star City matches come from? I don’t smoke and there’s half a packet of Marlboro Lights in my bag. I was mugged and they put cigarettes in my handbag to confuse me.
I think they left their phone number, too, because there’s something that looks like the word Simon and a Paddington number written on a beer mat. In eyeliner pencil.
And why do I have an Amex receipt for $154 which seems to say ‘Bourbon and Beefsteak’ on it? I don’t even like bourbon. Don’t think about whisky. Don’t think about whisky.
I’m going to vomit.
Maybe if I have another sleep I’ll feel better. I can’t sleep, the bed is full of crumbs. I’m too hot. I’m too cold. I’m going to clean my teeth. God, this toothpaste is rough.
I must have food.
I’ve had four pieces of toast and Vegemite, a tomato, a black banana and some Sara Lee ice-cream. It was all we had, but it’s not enough. I’ve got to have eggs. Maybe I’m pregnant. I feel nauseous and I’ve got food cravings.
I’m getting up. I’m going to Victoria Street, if I can make it up the hill. Fried eggs. Crispy bacon. Toast dripping with butter. Butter dripping with butter. Orange juice. Tim Tams. Coca-Cola. Chocolate ice-cream. Chocolate Paddle-pops. Caramello Koalas. Maybe I’ll get a taxi to Woolloomooloo and have a pie. Maybe I’ll get a taxi to the bathroom.
I’ll tell you another thing about this virus. It really puts you off alcohol.
Smart casual
There are two words which strike terror into the wardrobes of even the most confident of stylemeisters: Smart Casual.
This is a clothing concept which makes otherwise sensible people do things as foolish as tucking the back of their polo shirt in while leaving the front hanging out, or wearing sandshoes without socks. Just two examples which make it quite clear – it ain’t smart and it ain’t casual.
No other dress code instils such anxiety. An embassy ball in Paris? Not a problem. Lunch with Nan Kempner at Le Cirque? A cinch. Highland dancing at Balmoral? I’ll press my plaid. But a barbecue in Toorak – forget it, I haven’t got a THING to wear.
One prominent Australian fashion commentator, who dresses for the Melbourne Cup and Paris fashion shows with effortless chic, told me recently she has come up with the perfect solution for smart casual dressing – she doesn’t go out at weekends.
I think she’s on to something. I’d certainly be happier throwing a quick look together for Truman Capote’s Black and White Ball than for an afternoon watching polo at Warwick Farm.
But why, you may well ask, does it matter a jot what you wear to sit on a piece of parched grass in a semi-industrial area of Sydney and watch sweaty men thundering up and down on sweatier horses?
Well, it doesn’t really (unless you are harbouring ambitions to help an Argentinian get the stains out of his britches after the last chukka); but, semiotically speaking, what you wear to tread the divots matters hugely.
Because to get smart casual wrong, to be overdressed at the polo, high-heeled on a Halverson, or absolutely unkempt at absolute waterfront Sunday morning drinks, is to reveal yourself as hopelessly unsophisticated. Smart casual
is an international secret society and you’re not a member. Well, not in those denims and trainers, sweetheart.
What makes it so hard is that, unlike the cast-in-stone traditional commandments of short for cocktails, long for white tie, these are unwritten rules. The coded laws of smart casual make the Dead Sea scrolls look as straightforward as the Kings Cross Coca-Cola sign.
And it’s all too easy to be a smart casualty. There are so many cringey little traps to fall into. Too many red accents, too much mixing and matching, and you’ll just look jaunty. Stripes and anchor prints? Natty. Cheap old clothes meticulously starched and ironed? Band-box smart.
If you don’t get it just right you can be accidentally feral (T-shirts with attitude problems) or Gold Coast (white denim, gold shoes, belts, baseball caps and teeth). Or just look like you live in Mosman, or Malvern (ironed jeans).
But, in fact, the secret of successful smart casual is very simple. All you need to do is buy some ridiculously overpriced clothes, called ‘Designer Sportswear’ (which just means paying fifty times the Target rate for some cotton jersey), and then treat them with utter contempt.
Why, these white pants only cost me $300, of course I don’t mind sitting on wet grass/in the ocean spray/next to the barbecue in them. To get comfortable with that feeling, wear them first to clean the hull of your boat, or to re-grout the bathroom. Put them in the dog’s basket straight from the carrier bag.
As long as the clothes scream Expensive, your demeanour screams Like I Give A Shit and your mouth screams Hello Darling!, you’ll be part of the casually smart set.
Or you could just stay in.
Shoe Money Page 3
