Alexa...Who can I follow for fashion inspo?

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The rarest breed of woman - one who can rock a low pony and not look like a young colonial boy, one who has her own clothing line joining European style with vintage funk and a dash of cute school teacher (Miss Katherine from Holes vibes), one with a killer music taste and important things to say.

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Alexa Chung is a true inspiration. She first came on the scene as a model, working for brands like Fanta and Elle before she was even 18 years old. She also had a lot of gigs being featured in music videos, which paved the way for her subsequent career in cementing the bond between music and fashion.

MTV Rocks was a channel that, well, was exactly what is sounds like. It broadcasted rock and alternative music all day and night, and featured a show called Gonzo that Alexa hosted. She also hosted It’s On With Alexa Chung in 2009, a show where she would interview a wide range of artists in different fields, from songwriter John Mayer, to pop star Lady Gaga to even movie stars like Daniel Radcliffe.

The same year, she started as a contributing editor of British Vogue, interviewing fashion icons, even Karl Lagerfeld. He told her she’s “beautiful and clever...a modern girl.” UMMMM. I would pay $500 for Karl Lagerfeld to tell me what day of the week it was. Incredible praise coming from a fashion genius (but also, let’s not forget about That Time Karl Tried to Get Alexa to Wear a Beard. Yes, even fashion geniuses can have slight - and by slight I mean super weird and kind of rude - missteps). Alexa herself has been on the cover of Vogue like five times and has written for and been written about in Vogue over 300 times (I tried to count, but I’m really bad at math and after like 27 articles the scroll button on the side of the screen was really tiny and still at the very top of the page, so I’m making an educated guess).

In between all this, she dated the frontman of the Arctic Monkeys AND is still way cooler even without him. She has since been in many more music videos, most recently for the bassist of Tame Impala, Cameron Avery for his song “Dance With Me.”

And yes, if you didn’t think she could do anything more cool, in 2015 she co-founded an app called Villoid that allows fashion designers, gurus, and influencers alike to have the opportunity to follow and pave what’s new and fresh in fashion. It’s basically a way to create mood boards for clothes. And if you still can’t picture its purpose, Forbes describes it as an incarnation of Cher’s closet technology in the movie Clueless.

Her clothing line launched in 2017, and has introduced to the world a way of dressing like you live in the 1800s but are still hot as hell in 2019. The line debuted at London fashion week subsequently after, and everyone’s been drooling over it. Honestly, her clothes are super expensive. And I’m never going to buy them, sorry. Maybe (MAYBE) if I had a million dollars I would shovel it out for a $700 coat like *this* (okaY HOW cute) A good way around breaking the bank would probably just be finding similar items at thrift stores or your mom’s closet and style them the way she does. Like these looks - might not be as effortless as just buying the original but it’s worth the deep dive into your closet!

But nonetheless, Miss Chung is all sorts of inspiration. There’s even an Instagram account called @artlexachung that juxtaposes photos of Alexa next to real artwork that is strikingly similar.

After quitting modeling in her younger years, she cited her subsequent unhealthy body image as a factor. In an interview with Fashionista she explains her feelings about shame: “I mean there’s definitely days where I’m like, I look disgusting. But that’s being a human being. I don’t think anyone on the planet can look at themselves in the mirror every day and be like fuck, I’m fucking great...Self esteem, that’s something you’ve got to work on yourself. I know for me it’s different every day.” She did eventually return to modeling and still kills it. That doesn’t mean she’s conquered loving herself and the way she looks, and she’s quite honest about that - but what she’s even more candid about is the problem of comparing yourself to others - instead we should be supporting other girls instead of being intimidated by them. She says, “it’s about time people stopped judging women on their appearance and more on their intellect.”

And on top of this, she wrote a book. It’s called It, and throughout it she writes, draws, and even photographs her musings about fashion, music, and life. She asserts it’s not an autobiography, but it does include bits about her experience of being an It Girl, an icon that people look up to. She explains she doesn’t exactly want to be a role model because often being “It” just makes you an object to look at -- to point at, to judge, and to deduce. She points out the sexist undertones surrounding fashion especially and the women who surround themselves in this industry. Speaking of her experience in The Observer, she spells it out: “I used to have a voice because I was interviewing people and writing, but as soon as I got swept up in the fashion world, I was just a pretty girl at a party wearing a pretty dress. [In those circumstances] you’re not worth anything other than the outfit on your back.”

Alexa Chung has been my go-to fashion icon for a long time now. And it’s not just because of what she wears and how she wears it, but moreover it’s the way she so visibly and candidly holds up her chin amidst the ugliness of that pretty fashion world. I would always watch her interviews from MTV Rocks on YouTube growing up, and I loved the way she was able to connect with so many different people, and when It came out, reading it was like a sigh of relief, a feeling of understanding between two girls -- her and I -- that fashion was cool and it was okay that it was cool.

She’s all sorts of beauty. And while you may not be able to afford her clothing line, you can absolutely look to her for inspiration in even more things than fashion. Alexa Chung is not just an icon, but as a woman especially she has been an important figure in fashion and music, paving the way for a simpler but deeper connection to the both. She makes fashion important. It has roots in music, and it has roots in making the world the way it is. She makes it clear that a girl who loves clothes can be more than just a pretty face, but she can learn to be strong, to be clever, to be vibrant by the way she adorns herself with dignity, being proud of the way she thinks, not just in her closet, and how she walks, not just on the runway.

Finally, I’ll leave you with this quote from her that says it all - “I’m bad at trends. Just wear what you want and what suits you.”

Fashion, Whats NewHannah RexingerAlexa Chung, Fashion, Inspo, Lady Gaga, John MayerComment