While 2009 was the year of affordable designer collaborations and tough-luxe style, it also brought us hammer pants, nipple pasties and designs from Lindsey Lohan (scary!!).
Now that the year has come to a close, we're nominating the Top Five Fashion Fails of 2009 that MUST be left behind. All disobedient readers of this post won't make it past the end of January. Yes, that is a threat.
FASHION FAIL #1 - Skinny Jeans for Men
Yes - baggy jeans died with gangster rap in the 90's but that shouldn't mean that men can parade around in stretch jeans with 5% lycra. There's no valid reason that your jeans should be tighter than a Kim Kardashian dress.
A fitted look (not too baggy, not too tight) is ideal. Here's the test: If you can't get into your jeans without shimmying or sitting on the bed to pull yourself in, you have failed at life.
Besides the obvious hygiene issue (I mean isn't breathability a necessity for you guys?), it's unfair for me to have to pretend like you don't notice me noticing the unsightly bulge threatening to bust through all that lycra for a breath of fresh air.
And if skinny jeans for women look best with stilettos---because they make your feet appear smaller, how do you think you look with the boat-sized, giant shoes you pair with your skinnies? Disaster.com. Please do better. FAIL.
FASHION FAIL #2 - Harem Pants
Wearing harem pants didn't make you look exotic, fashion-forward or sensual. You looked like you had an adult diaper sewn into the seat of your pants and wore them with a purse and stilettos.
We tried to give you advice, but you wouldn't listen. We clearly said: look for harem pants that aren't super baggy. Never did we suggest to have extra material flowing in the wind like a Tyra weave. But the bigger the pants, the more you liked them.
Unwieldy and just unflattering, these pants were nothing short of hideous and just wouldn't go away for the better part of 2009. Try as we might, we couldn't feel sorry for the otherwise beautiful people that put on an upside down parachute and Louboutins as though it was attractive.
If Hammer wore them and lost all his money, and they made Beyonce look crazy, why would you think they'd work for us normal folks? FAIL.
FASHION FAIL #3 - Leotard
Please don't hate me for saying this, but putting on a leotard won't magically make your legs appear like Beyonce's or Amber Rose's.
Those dimples that were there before---but thankfully hidden under jeans---will be free for everyone to see in your leotard and boots. And if your legs look like toothpicks, a leotard will make it appear like you're walking on stilts. Just not okay.
Besides the fact that unless you're coming off the stage from a (real) Fosse performance or walking down Hunter's point, there's no acceptable reason to be out in a leotard and hooker boots in public. Since when is it okay to come out before you finished getting dressed?
Please do better next year. FAIL.
FASHION FAIL #4 - Ed Hardy
When Ed Hardy the designer won't even wear Ed Hardy, you know you have a problem. At one point, the trendy, edgy, tattooed designs were selling like Susan Boyle. Now they're collecting dust in the stores along with Rihanna's CD (I kid!).
Truthfully, once the crop of cool, bad kids stopped wearing Ed Hardy designs, and the Snookies and Situations of the world started buying them in bulk, there was nothing anyone could do to help. They were banished to No-Man's land where old Fubu, Mecca and Iceberg garments go to die.
Ed Hardy, get a new Creative Director, makeover, celebrity spokesperson and maybe you can return (a la Phat Farm). If not, FAIL.
FASHION FAIL #5 - Spandex
Please Lord let my days of seeing liquid leggings stuffed to the brim with thigh meat be far behind. I cannot, in good faith, endure the sight of women in black liquid leggings that, as some guy on Twitter said, look like walking oil spills.
And Nicki Minaj, camel toe is a vicious, evil, ungodly vision---and one of many signs that you need to pry yourself out of the leggings (we know they took forever to get on) and do away with them for 2010.
Other signs? Repeat trips to the gyno (as again, breathability is essential to health!). When the waistband and seams leave a red imprint on your stomach and legs (Yes, this happens. It's like you held your legs in a chokehold all day. That's gotta leave a bruise). FAIL.
What do you think Glamazons? Am I wrong to curse the day that Ed Hardy and Unisex Skinny Jeans became a trend? What Fashion Fails did I miss? Speak now...so we don't have to suffer through another decade of bad fashion.
Kisses,
Coutura
