"One piece of advice I can give is this: do not buy anything camel. It used to be a durable classic, but fashion has got hold of it this year and inverted its values. It's now so trendy and everywhere that you'll go off it by December. And - here's a weird thing to look out for in any mid-to-low price coat - much of it appears to have been extruded out of a mysterious form of hairy sponge. When you reach out to touch what your eye is promising must be beautifully tactile camel hair, cashmere or vicuña, what you get is a handful of thin, lightweight, foamy-feeling stuff. This deceptive product of some fiendish chemist's lab allows the material to keep its structure so that any extras, such as proper facings and linings, can be done away with. Two points here: this material tends to crease, turning shabby in no time, and it's useless in the cold. I categorise these as fake coats. From the manufacturers' point of view, this low-cost way of making a "coat" appear nice and substantial, while doing away with the substance of traditional tailoring, is supposedly an answer to the reality that it's too warm to warrant a heavy coat most of the time. That's one way of getting around climate change, but it's a big quality cheat, too."
I had to agree with her remark that being such a huge trend, you're bound to see camel EVERYWHERE and end up being completely be over it by December. As much as I love fashion, I don't want to look like a fashion victim and I really don't like wearing easily recognizable pieces either. *cough*H&M aviator jacket*cough*
A winter coat is too large an investment to risk being completely bored with it before the year is out. So, taking Sarah's advice to heart, I decided to pass up this camel beauty from Zara that I'd been eyeing up since the end of the summer...
and go for this classic beige coat from New Yorker instead.
Maybe it's wishful thinking, but it reminds me of this outfit Anne Hathaway wore in The Devil wears Prada.
In any case, I'm happy with my choice. This is a coat I'll be comfortable wearing not only all of this winter, but probably also quite a few winters to come. Besides, there are so many other ways to wear camel. Right now I'm loving it with red...
(Harper's Bazaar September 2010)
How are you guys planning to wear the camel trend?
