I’ve been reading “Gypset Style” by Julie Chaplin. I got it as a gift once, and well, every style blogger I know and every brand I know was singing its praises; so, I figured I should probably read it. And I don’t like it. I know, I’m going against the grain of everyone else. But I don’t like it for two very important reasons:

1. Most of the people it lauds and praises as gypsetters in the past died young, and often from drug overdoses.  So the pictures and shoots in the book are the glossied over versions because addiction is very hard on the body and their lives probably aren’t as picture perfect as they seem. And I don’t want my inspiration to be solely those who died tragically and young. I want it to be my great grandmother, who lived and worked and loved until she died in her 90s.
2. All of the people in the book are very well off. And while I have nothing against those who are well off and blazing their own trail, I do have an issue of aspiring and looking up to wealth. I think it purports another idea that we can only have the life we want if we have money. The idea that our lives won’t really start unless we have money. I’d like to think that there’s a way to live the out-of-the-box, out of the 9-to-5 life without necessarily being a trust fund guy, or a supermodel, or a rock star legacy. Again, not that there’s anything wrong with them being so.

I know that the term Gypset implies those well off, and so there’s nothing wrong with the content in that respect. My issue is with it being praised as a source of inspiration. Again, nothing wrong with those people being who they are, but I want my inspiration being the woman/man who finds gorgeous thrift store wares, or makes their own ‘whatever’, or laughs, and loves and is full of kindness. The person who doesn’t have the perfectly furnished home in a lavishly renovated Spanish villa but who is crafting their own beautiful perfect life wherever they happen to be. The person who understands why I will continue to darn my Dr. Who socks instead of throwing them away.

But we don’t write books about those people do we?

Vest & Boots – ThreadSence  //  Sweatshirt – Lucky Brand  //  Pants – Zara  //  Hat & Sunnies – UO  //  Gloves – Hudson’s Bay  // Necklace – Vanessa Mooney  // Rings – Threadsence and Artisan Fair Trade companies