The Thing About Stripes.

As any of my teachers would have told you, I’m a natural troublemaker. A particular boat-rocker, I have a knack for sensing what I’m meant to not do… and doing it. So since time immemorial, fat girls have been told that a) thou shalt not wear horizontal stripes and b) God will smite those chubsters who wear a double-breasted anything. Naturally, when I set eyes on this Marc by Marc Jacobs jacket, I was enraptured. In its own right, it is a beautiful jacket. It’s exactly the right size, shape and length. The colours are simply perfect. The buttons are beauteous. There’s something utterly delicious about this jacket and yet, for me, picking up this jacket in the shop and it being a label ‘L’, it should have screamed ‘NO, BETHANY, PUT ME DOWN’. So I tried it on. And I loved it even more. Somehow, I just don’t care that it’s both horizontal-striped and double breasted. It’s me in a jacket: obnoxious, bright, difficult and loud. When I look at myself in the mirror wearing this jacket, I simply can’t tell if it ‘suits’ me or not, if the stripes make me look twice my size and if the double-breast has the same effect, but I do feel happy. I don’t wear designer clothes often, if partly because Marc Jacobs is one of the few designers that makes clothes in my size, so this is a beautiful and rare gem for me. In short, this post is meant to motivate y’all out of adhering to the frighteningly restrictive ‘style rules’ the fashion press like to invent. Every time I read an article on ‘how to dress for your size/shape’, I want to stick pins in my eyes. Evidently journalists are not explaining to me how to lift my arms or button up a dress. They are dictating what ‘looks good’ on an ‘apple’, ‘pear’, ‘hourglass’, ‘athletic’ or ‘boyish’ shape. Let’s face it: what is more becoming to a lady than confidence and genuine enjoyment? This, friends, is how I know this jacket is a winner. It may laugh in the face of fashion journo rules, and yet when I wear it, I’m filled with an uncommon joy and priceless delight. Go forth and break the rules.