Maybe I missed something along the way, but wasn’t there a time when people had real jobs? I’m not exactly sure what the job description for a “celebrity stylist” entails, but I’m pretty sure that it doesn’t include dressing your clients in outfits that can only be described as Opening Ceremony's women's section vomiting up “peyote trip at Joshua Tree” all over prints. I understand the role in principle. I mean, not everyone can be so lucky to have been blessed with the ability to dress themselves in the morning (and to all of you I’m terribly, terribly sorry). Sometimes celebrities seem drawn to nothing but the most gaudy, over the top flashy garbage, so there was once a time when their stylists had to step in and make them look, you know, like they weren’t on a seventy-two hour cocaine bender. But now it seems like celebrity stylists aren’t meant to prevent their clients from wearing that gold plated Versace chestpiece—instead, they encourage it. I’m not exactly sure why they do this, but I’d venture to guess it has something to do with clothing companies paying them lots and lots of money. If you’re job already has "celebrity" in the title, I'm going to go ahead and assume you aren’t exactly the most moral or hardworking person.
The real burning question with all this: how do they get away with it? Honestly, celebrities can’t have that little of an understanding of what looks good. They’ve been in movies before where they’ve looked good, and I’m sure throughout their younger days there had to be at least one time where they looked in the mirror and thought, "Wow, today wasn’t a total failure." When you’re getting dressed up like Chris Tucker in The Fifth Element how can you not simply stop, reflect for a single goddamn minute and realize that it’s all gone too far. Much, much too far.
Their suits were clean and tailored, their details were understated, not screaming, and they understood the importance of blending in, not having to be the center of attention regardless of how negative that attention was.
I feel like it’s akin to getting your haircut. The guy cutting your hair might tell you what he thinks you should do, but it’s not like you’ve been walking around for your entire life without any notion of what hairstyles look good, so you tell your barber what you want and then the two of you reach a happy medium like totally normal adult human beings. But oh no, with celebrity stylists it’s like watching a deranged toddler, who’s O.D.'d on Cookie Crisp and Gushers dress their G.I. Joe in clothes from “Barbie goes to Cancun and does way too much ecstasy.”
So, what’s the solution here? Well, actually, it’s pretty simple: everyone needs to just learn how to tone things down. The publicists and handlers need to realize that having a photo go viral because you’re client looks like a circus freak is worse than having no one see them at all. Celebrities need to learn how to form sentences (as hard as that may be) and actually tell their stylists that they think they look insane or, simply, like shit. And, most importantly, stylists or whatever you call them, need to learn the importance of simplicity. Look at the golden age of Hollywood. Those actors became immortal because they were CLASSIC. Their suits were clean and tailored, their details were understated, not screaming, and they understood the importance of blending in, not having to be the center of attention regardless of how negative that attention was. And that’s how celebrities should dress: simple, clean and just put together enough to cover up the fact that you’re insanely hungover from riding go karts on acid with Shia Labeouf and Willow Smith.
Jake Gallagher is a writer living in New York. Read his blog, Wax Wane, here and follow him on Twitter here.
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