Fashion is like architecture. Clothes take up space just as buildings take up space. Both do the same thing. Both cover people. Both are designed. Yet there is a phrase, “plain and simple,” that I don’t like using to describe either architecture or fashion. “Plain” is a word that, no matter what diction you choose, sounds unexciting and tediously boring. “Plain” is a judgmental person’s go-to, so called “nicer” way of calling someone ugly. The interior design of a building that is painted a wash tone of an uneasy grey, filled with metal chairs and benches in attempting to create a “not-trying too hard” workspace, you could call plain. “Plain” is what the no-buttoning Amish happily call their clothes. Plain is a word that, to us computer-using people (i.e., not the Amish), isn’t usually positive. However, “simple,” a word used more sparingly, is used in admiration of thoughtful placing and intuitive thinking in making space pleasing. “Simple” is what describes Rick Owens’ inventively cut-out designs and perfectly soft materials. “Simple” is how the brutalist architecture (built only in concrete) of the Barbican Centre in London has achieved its popularity. “Simple” is a word that best praises fashion designers and great architects, those who have striven to attract admiration to their well-honed garment or discreetly tasteful structures. Or as Mies van der Rohe said more simply, “Less is more.”

Funnily, there is one garment in particular, that I would praise for its simplicity; it is all-American architecture you can wear: blue jeans, of course! But blue jeans can be “plain” or “simple” depending on the design. Perhaps the simplest garment there is, there are more styles of jeans floating in the online shopping cloud of Acne Studios and at Levis and in the windows of vintage stores and in Madewell shops as well as in the big name global sellers, like Sachs and Neimans. There are more kinds of jeans you curious people could ever count. There are ripped, colored, textured, stained, paint-splattered, cut up, cut down, buttoned or zipped, washed or structured, sewn or patched. There are your boyfriend’s jeans, cut boyfriend jeans, shimmy worthy skinny jeans, and suck-yourself-in high rise jeans. There are more jeans than I can possibly name and all the more I still have to try on. And I say, having the experience, not every type of jean will look good on. Some will be too tight, some too revealing, others not butt forming enough, and the rest of the “just not right ones” left lacking in the comfort factor. Jean shopping is where I might ask, “plain or simple”? And if you think plain, take them off right away and move on to the next. Such jeans have little to offer and are not worth the effort of opening your wallet. Don’t worry, a much cooler, much more “you” pair exists out there in the wide world of jeans. The jeans that have you say “simple” out aloud are the ones you want because they will be the ones the really tired you, the “not trying too hard” you will want to wear. These simple jeans will be there when you wake up, ready to go out, flawlessly pairing with any top or sweater in reach. Good blue jeans simply wear well.

xoxo,

Cecilia Roses

My Look: Polo Ralph Lauren top, Adriano Goldschmted ripped jeans, TopShop biker boots, tiger socks, vintage earrings, S. Ritter NYC Designs rock ring, and my locket