Anyone can adjust what’s on the runway for use in their everyday wardrobe. Obviously this is a ready-to-wear piece destined for Androgynous Fridays at your new media workplace and this… is, but what do you wear when things turn–as they so often do–completely to shit? This column is here to help. Welcome to Runway to (Things Just Got) Real Life. You’re welcome in advance.
What to wear to: help a friend move when you reaaaaaaaallly don’t want to
The emails start to come around springtime. Nobody moves in the winter, of course, but as the ice starts to thaw and the sun stays out in the afternoon, something happens to your inbox. Subject line: “fun idea…” reveals the ‘idea’ to be “carrying all my possessions down one set of stairs and up another,” and the ‘fun’ nowhere to be found. Group messages promise pizza, beer, banter and eternal gratitude, and all of a sudden there you are again, carefully maneuvering a friend’s girlfriend’s upcycled couch into her third floor walk up. SOUND FAMILIAR? Possibly because you are one of the five people I roped into doing this just last week. Their kindness and general good natures made it impossible to escape. But maybe you are a worse type of person, or a lazier one, or maybe this is the fifth time this summer someone has asked you to move and no jury in the world would consider it a crime if you just threw all their possessions down the stairs and walked away in slow motion while putting on sunglasses. If you’ve been roped in to help someone move but just caaaaan’t, with this, anymore, let your friend Fashion do the talking.
Really unreasonable shoes
The goal here is to make it more or less impossible for you to help out, by virtue of your clothing and footwear. It’s like showing up at the cottage without a bathing suit because you don’t like zebra mussels. It’s not a ‘good sport’ move, but neither is forcing your loved ones to express their good sportiness via physical labour, especially with the costs of ‘man-with-a-van’ type services these days. The man-with-a-van bubble has FINALLY burst, and we should all be reaping the benefits of reasonably priced movers. To get out of helping regardless, might I suggest these Prabal Gurung delights? If anyone asks why you can’t help, stretch your legs out and say “Prabal Gurung.” They will either understand you cannot fuck with couture or think PG is a tragic degenerative condition, and your boots are important medical leg braces. Win-win.
All white everythang
The runway forecast for the fall season was cloudy, pals. Cloudy with a chance of greyscale. Sure, Proenza Schouler and Derek Lam were talking a big Winter Whites game, but who really has the balls? Make the most of the dwindling weeks before Labour day and pop on an all-white outfit while you still have that tan. Ghost-clothes are especially unhelpful in case of moving things out of storage units or basements, which tend to get dusty. If you were going for helpful, obviously Margiela’s rubber pants are a wipe-clean dream, if possibly a bit sweaty for moving. When someone smudges some house smut onto your fancy lace smock, be VERY noble about it. “It’s nothing, don’t worry about it. After all, my grandmother won’t mind that I got dust on her wedding dress now that she’s… no longer with us.”
The whispered threat of indecent exposure
The premise of this outfit strategy is the following: no one will ask you to carry things up to their bathroom if they’re worried they’re going to see your bathroom parts in the process. You don’t want to look like you’re trying to keep yourself away from stair-jobs with your tiny skirt, but you do want to have your friends offering to take whatever you’re carrying, in the interest of your modesty and their eyes. This doesn’t need to be pornographic. We’re not talking an all-you-can-gawk visual buffet, here. Perhaps a hint of underboob? A whisper of visible thong? A soupçon of butt crack? Elegance and restraint, with the underlying motivation that you are not above slipping a nip to get out of dealing with the bed frame.
#lol #doyougetit
Fun fur
Fun fur who, exactly? Fun for YOU, you non-lifting genius! You’ve already been to the gym once this month, you don’t need this enforced exercise. Nor will you be able to handle exertion of any kind in your fancy new fur (or faux-fur, come on, we’re bad people but we’re kind to animals) vest/coat/full-length jump suit. Too hot! Too sweaty! Too red in the face! Fur and its fake-o sister are back in a big way for autumn/winter, with Vogue and Glamour and the blogs and Internet Teens all “invest in statement outerwear!” In this case the statement is: “Please never ask me to help you move again. Pass the lemonade?”
Now kick back, relax, and let your friends carry you up the stairs on the credenza.
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Monica Heisey is a writer and comedian from Toronto. She has also written for VICE, Huffington Post, and She Does the City. Follow her on Twitter @monicaheisey.
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