I hope everyone is having a lovely one, whether you are a mom, a daughter, a sister, a husband, a son, a brother, etc. :) Since I didn't grow up with a mom (she was alive, just not in my life until well into my adulthood), I have many people I celebrate on Mother's Day...including my dad. So there you go. Just putting that PSA out there...think outside the box when it comes to celebrating the generosity of people who choose to raise other people.
Okay, so it has been forever since I did a "Would You Wear It if It J. Crew Made It Today" post. I figured you all would understand my inability to get my act together and get one of these out there within the past two month, lol. (Oh, and on that note, happy seven weeks, Angus!)
So I decided to go through my collection of J. Crew catalogs to find "mother/child" images, and amazingly they were kind of hard to find. There are a few out there, but I must be thinking of crewcuts catalogs when I think of child-centered images. (BTW, crewcuts catalogs don't have the parents, I thought they did, but I was mistaken.)
There are more than the two that I found, but I didn't have the energy to sort through all the catalogs. :) I think it will be fine, though.
This image shows what I assume is the "mom" figure model, and the cutie pie "daughter" figure model (she has aged out of crewcuts, btw, haven't seen her in a while) posing on a deserted road in Iceland. Now, since I had been in Iceland in 1998, I was all into this catalog. I loved seeing the barren, treeless landscapes and the clever ways they chose to shoot the natural scenery (the cover is the best--its image is next).
*BTW, it is hard for me to suspend disbelief in these sort of images...the model is super young and the girl is at least 8, making me think, "yeah, that's supposed to be her mom, but all I can see is a much older sister." Anyone else think that too?
Here's the thing...would I wear the outfits portrayed in the pages today (in the winter, clearly, not literally today)? For the most part the answer is a resounding yes. This catalog is from the Holiday 2008 catalog and J. Crew really was putting out some fab pieces, including Borge Gaveri handbags, gorgeous, well made coats, and some beyond adorable heels (Alessias, yum) which means I easily understood why a whole community would have grown out of this brand.
This outfit the model wears is a bit layered, but not messy. The only thing I personally would do differently is tuck in my tee-shirt and not wear that skull cap (I would probably try to find a wool cloche).
I actually own the coat, and love it. It is really pretty and classic. The fabric has a slight peppery look to it (looks like a pepper shaker was shaken over the fabric) that reminds me a lot of fabrics they use on mid-century modern furniture.
I really would love for CW to have the jacket pictured on the daughter, but maybe I will luck out and find it one day on ebay (unless one of you all have one laying around).
This model "mom" is the same model from Iceland, but they let her natural hair fly and aren't covering her up as much (she goes really bare on the cover, oh, my, check it out next). I don't know if the model "daughter" is the same as the one above, but I don't think so, she looks enough different that I think not. I do know this model is named Bella and used to be all over the crewcuts catalog, along with her brother Roman (they did a spread on their Christmas wish list in one of the holiday catalogs from last year which is how I know their names). Bella is like the model daughter above in that she is no longer in the catalogs (she is probably old enough to really "model" now).
So would I wear this outfit? This one is eh, maybe not, but not because of the styling. I personally dislike linen pants because they wrinkle so terribly, and I don't really like that necklace, but I know many JCAs who love it. The stripe popover is cute, but again, not really my thing.
However, if those were cotton pants, a Liberty print shirt, and another necklace, I would likely say yes...no real over the top craziness on Jenna Lyon's part here, just simple, easy, preppy styling. (And considering this is from the summer of 2009, right before really crazy styling started, it seems it was a last Nantucket themed, seersucker loving, prep gasp on J. Crew's part, too.)
Okay, that's all. I ask of you now...would you wear it? Extra points if you "bare" whether or not you would wear the one featured on the July 2009 cover. ;)
