Karl Lagerfeld, an undisputed master of creative design, happens to be a master of crap when it comes to sound bites. In his time he’s insulted everyone from housewives to the overweight to ladies who dress like sluts without the intention of actually sleeping around (how dare!). And apparently he’s now targeting those who dress for comfort, too.
“Sweatpants are a sign of defeat. You lost control of your life, so you bought some sweatpants.” Lagerfeld once said, according to a Lynn Yaeger-penned piece on Vogue.com about his upcoming collection for Macy’s.
I’d never read that nugget of wisdom before. And I must respectively disagree.
For starters, I don’t know many people who have actually “bought” sweatpants. Sweatpants come free from Bar Mitzvahs, sorority formals and hurried walks of shame. Only an asshole actually buys sweatpants. In fact the same kind of asshole who buys sweatpants buys $100 temporary Chanel tattoos, too.
And the vast majority of sweatpants wearers are not wearing them because they’ve lost control of their lives. They’re wearing them because they spent the day with a thong up their ass in a tight pair of jeans and feel like breathing again.
For me personally, after a long day of managing my start up company, meeting my freelance deadlines, writing for my website, taking business development meetings, corresponding with my team, answering e-mails, covering events in four inch heels and — only if I’m lucky — running an errand or two, I do quite enjoy slipping into my favorite pair of Highland Park High School Class of 2002 sweats and directing my brain away from everything but the Real Housewives of New Jersey for a full two hours before I pass out, wake up and do it all over again.
Whenever feelings of defeat do happen to strike (which they inevitably do at some point of pretty much every single day), I don’t run for my sweatpants and give up. I take inventory of my goals and where I am on my path to achieving them. I look through my records to see which jobs owe me money. I clean off my desk. I cook a healthy meal. I go to the gym. I try on an amazing outfit and prance around my living room like a fool. I think about something I’ve done that makes me feel proud. I call someone I love. I go for a drive and listen to Motown. I may even cry. Then I come back home, stop whining, and put my eye right back on the prize.
Because that’s what we women do, whether we’re wearing a $5,000 Chanel suit or a pair of sweatpants that we “bought.”
Seeing that Karl is about to sell his designs at Macy’s — better known as a middle American Mecca — he’d better get used to being around pretty much everyone he’s ever offended in his life — pudgy, sweatpants-wearing, chocolate-loving housewives included.
Wouldn’t it be funny if one of them sat on him?
Photo: Karl Lagerfeld posed with Beth Ditto, who weighs more than 105 lbs., and survived. Imagine that.
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We don’t usually travel to Westwood Village from our lovely Los Feliz abode— there’s traffic there. And sorority girls who wear Lululemon pants to do non-yoga activities. But the other day we found ourselves on that side of town for a meeting and, while lost and looking for our car, stumbled upon Profeta, a charming Italian-style coffee shop that had nary a hint of the chain store feeling becoming increasingly common in caffeine purveyors these days.
