Missoni | Thankoon Pre-Fall 2015 | Sportmax | Opening Ceremony | Trussardi 1911

Way back in the first grade, tying a sweater around my waist was my go-to styling trick. How else would you deal with weather that fluctuated between cold in the morning and warm and sunny in the afternoon while still maintaining optimum mobility (the better to run around)? There was a long while when I had outgrown my childish fashions and decided that tying a sweater was soo immature, but now I'm in college and back to tying sweaters around my waist or over my shoulders. Seriously, middle school me was very wrong about many things when it came to style.

Tying a sweater around yourself is the best. Because, seriously, who wants to tote a sweater around once it warms up when you can integrate it into your outfit?

In the world of high fashion it seems that tying a sweater around your waist (or elsewhere) is totally en vogue again, as collections like Missoni and Thankoon are taking to the styling trick in new and inventive ways.

If tying around the waist is too pedestrian, you can do an asymmetrical shoulder tie à la Missoni or Trussardi. Opening Ceremony has an off-the-shoulder take if you want to show off your shoulder bones. Or, if you have a pullover, you can just stick your head through the top and leave the rest of the sweater as a makeshift scarf, like Thankoon does it.

No matter how you tie a sweater, it adds a certain cool factor that will make everyone envious of your look!

Look De Pernille | Style Du Monde | Pop Sugar | WhoWhatWear | Diego Zuko via Harper's Bazaar | We Wore What

Band of Outsiders; Tommy Hilfiger; Tory Burch; Marni; Opening Ceremony

When you grow up in a vacation town, you learn to loathe any temporary visitors above all other things. They infiltrate our beaches and most-beloved hangout spots, they seem to have trouble grasping the driving laws, and they ask you embarrassingly-ridiculous questions like "Where is the beach?" (Seriously, guys. It's a mile-wide island, it is not that hard to find the ocean.)

There are a lot of things about tourists that drive us locals absolutely insane, but the worst thing in the world has got to be their god-awful fashion sense. Fanny packs, socks with sandals, unironic Hawaiian shirts - the whole thing is an interesting sight (but not in a good way).

Marc Jacobs; Marni; J. Crew

And then comes Spring 2014. I had already seen the beginnings of the troubling trend on street style stars and I hoped it would quietly come and go, but Marc Jacobs and Miuccia Prada, to name a few perpetrators, took many aspects of tourist wear and turned them into sartorial stars. People can't stop gawking over the bedazzled Teva sandals at Prada and the socks-with-sandals combo at shows like Band of Outsiders.

For so long I've been sure that these were the clothes of the outsider, the stranger, the person who comes and actually stays at the fancy hotel that my friends and I occasionally sneak into. And now the tables have turned, and these tacky tourist staples are actually cool? No freakin' way.

Of course, where the tourist wears these garments out of comfort, utility, and mistaken stylishness, the fashion-savvy artfully arrange their fanny packs and visors with sleek, minimalist jumpsuits and dresses to achieve the ultimate fashion equilibrium between utterly cool and hopelessly dorky. Not an easy accomplishment, I must say, but even I'll admit they look pretty awesome.

The collections continue on, and I am seeing some trends solidify more and more, while new ones emerge as the days go on. Here are some memorable shows from the past few days:

ALEXANDER WANG


OPENING CEREMONY