Thursday, November 5, 2009

Day Fifty: In Which I Look Vaguely Disapproving and Clue You in to the Color Mafia

There's a brilliant scene in The Devil Wears Prada in which Meryl Streep's character explains to Anne Hathaway's character how her obviously inexpensive blue (?) sweater came to be the color that it is. She pegs it to the exact year and season of its production and the color's pre-runway origins.

Can you imagine how long the journey must be from the color prognosticators to Walmart? Actually, now that I think about it, the mothership has the kind of buying power that must command a pretty direct line to the prognosticators that be.

If you go into any retail store that sells clothing, you can easily determine what colors are currently in style. Check out the dresses and blouses or shirts for clues. Also scarves and shoes. You won't see a lot of brown this year because brown has been on the racks for about the last three or four years. Colors are rich this winter, like jewels: bright peacock blue, pomegranate, pumpkin, some red.

Who decides these things:

The International Colour Authority, for one. Their website is very mysterious. I like that they openly state that they meet twice a year, colors are planned twenty-four months ahead, and they never disclose their panelists' names. Cool.

There are other fun sites to poke around in. You can even find out what colors you'll be wearing next fall.

The mothership calls the color of the turtleneck I'm wearing here "Royal Spice." Huh? Looks like blue-green or peacock to me. It's a hard color to match things to. Black works best, I think. It's dreadful with denim.



Ensemble:
Faded Glory turtleneck sweater: $10; George cotton v-neck sweater: $3; Norma Kamali pants: $15: Necklace: $10; Earrings: $7; Earth Spirit shoes: $30
Total: $75

Love the colors together--glad to finally be able to wear the necklace. It was just too fancy to wear with other outfits and doesn't look great against my skin.

While this look appeals to me a great deal, I didn't feel fabulous wearing it. I tried to imagine that the pants were a nice, lined wool gabardine, and the v-neck was a finely wrought Italian wool. Sharp black leather boots with a 2-inch heel would have been just grand. I even would have worn this turtleneck--I like the color and it's nice and fitted and thin enough for layering. *sigh*

Tomorrow: I take a trip to Sam's Club in search of something warm to wear. It, uh, doesn't go so well.

Have a brilliant day!

6 comments:

  1. I think I see that sweater under an ivory colored, sleeveless, faux-fur zippered vest.

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  2. I was thinking "peacock" for the color of that as well, that's funny! I also find it amusing that there's a panel of ppl to decide what colors are going to be "in." I wonder if they'd take requests. I had a sweater a few seasons ago that I just Loved the color of, and now I can't find that color anywhere. *pout*

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  3. Maggie--Maybe with faux-fur trimmed boots? With pom poms?

    Carrie--Don't fret--It will come back in a few years!

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  4. I've been trying to figure out which color "mafia" was and just realized what you meant!

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  5. You crack me up! But I totally understand--that kind of thing gets me all the time.
    P.S. 2300 words today!

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  6. I'm lyrically challenged too. Max was playing a Metallica song for me I swear he said was called "Through the Belt Hole." I listened to it for a while and thought, what an odd song for a band to be singing. Thought It must have been a metaphor for . . . well, anything I guess. Turns out it was called For Whom the Bell Tolls. He still thinks I'm a geek, and I'm still thinking of The Color Mafia as a book title.

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