January 20, 2011

Urban Something


I love fashion. You might not be able to tell sometimes because I wear the same five things over and over again, but it's true. Urban Weeds is this Portland street style blog that I really enjoy because it's real people in Portland and not a bunch of rich people wearing very expensive designer things that they will throw away next season. It's a bit more true to life.

While I appreciate this guy's sentiments (I would wear crazy heels every day but they aren't that comfortable and my bike pedals ruin them and it's actually a little dangerous because sometimes they slip off the pedals when you're trying to get out of the way of an oncoming car on Sandy Blvd), I also feel like his outfit doesn't exemplify what he's saying. Maybe it was an unfortunate day for him. I mean, I guess if it's raining leather isn't that functional, but in general I'm not blown away by his look. There are a lot of dirtbags in Portland running around with leather jackets and hoodies. Maybe less with faux-hawks. But anywaaaaay.

Look at his belt! I just got all nostalgic. I don't know if you experienced this growing up, but all the Latino kids at my middle school did this. They wore khaki Dickies and a white tanktop and then either a navy blue Dickies shirts (probably somewhat gang-inspired but it was totally innocent), or a flannel shirt and then they only buttoned the top button. The girls did a similar thing but they also rocked the super-dark lipliner with nude lipstick and barrel-rolled bangs. They all had the same Nike vintage-look running shoes (black with white laces) and the icing on the cake was the belt. The belt was one of those nylon web types but it was always super long and they would let the end just hang down. It was kind of a badge of honor, you know, how long the belt was.  Super cool. The guys also greased their hair. The result was pretty great and when I think about it, they put a lot of effort into that look. Probably more than I did with my bushy hair, baby tees, and bellbottoms.

3 comments:

Caitlin said...

Omg, the Dickies look was totally represented at Evergreen Jr. High (and I was also the one wearing baby tees and bellbottoms...but with long greasy hair, braces and yarn necklaces. Sometimes even button down polyester shirts with ridiculous prints and big collars, did you do this too?) I always wanted the dark lipliner too but had to settle for some brown bonne bell coffee flavored lipgloss. There was also some weird crossover where some latinos skated or something and would wear band tshirts with dickies shorts and crispy white or black crew socks...but also with the dangly belt. Plus there were girls who rocked the one button flannel look fo sho...

To be completely honest, I think Urban Weeds barely even scratches the surface of Portland fashion. It kind of makes it look like we all live in the Netherlands and just wear some sort of variation of the tall boots skinny jeans nice coat outfit every day and have cute children. True, there are many bike riders here and that's a practical combo but...there's way more going on fashion-wise then that. You see more exciting stuff sitting at Albina Press for a few hours on a Tuesday than you do on Urban Weeds in a week.

huy said...

I think those latino Nike's are called The Cortez

Rachel Wrong said...

The Cortez. Fitting. Caitlin, Urban Weeds definitely prefers a certain aesthetic, but they also highlight a lot of people that I don't usually see in my oft-frequented venues. Maybe we should start a Portland fashion blog.I think we could do a decent job of presenting Portland: Style Capital of the . . . Willamette Valley.