Friday, February 15, 2008

Are you a Serena or a Blair?



I just discovered Gossip Girl. It's an immensely popular show but seeing as I don't have a TV, it took me a little while to get motivated enough to Google around and find episodes online. Now that I've found them, though, I'm hooked.

The show is about the scandalous lives of some upper-crust Manhattan teenagers, and the conceit of the series is that some mystery "gossip girl" somehow learns all the gossip and puts it online, so the rumor mill is on constant overdrive.

People are going bonkers over the show in part because all the characters are ridiculously pretty and fashionable. The two main characters, Serena and Blair, have differing styles of dress. Serena's style is sort of hippie/Anthropologie - despite being a dyed-in-the-wool New Yorker, her style seems influenced by California surfer chic (something I can definitely relate to). Blair, in contrast, is ultra-preppy and buttoned up at all times - she's all about tailored silk dresses, plaid, houndstooth and headbands.

Copying the fashions of a TV show is sort of lame, but inspiration can come from anywhere, right? America's teenagers would do well to trade their UGG boots for a high-heeled suede version (a la Serena), or ratty sweatshirts and t-shirts for crisp white Oxford shirts topped by cardigans (a la Blair).

In one episode, I was grabbed by a cropped houndstooth cardigan that Blair was wearing. I'm normally afraid of houndsooth because it can be so loud, but it worked on her. I couldn't find any good houndstooth examples, but I found lots of other prints. My favorite is the New York & Co zebra print.

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