Heading to APW last weekend, I was prepared to feel hopelessly un-hip. I usually do, when I go to New York. (Or LA, for that matter, but I digress.) My wardrobe is very much that of a potentially professional woman who never really has a need to dress professionally, and as such, I generally resort to jeans, leggings, solid-hue tops… perhaps a clearance dress from Target if I need to play fancy. I feel good about my wardrobe. I like how I look. And after last weekend, where I fully expected to meet my untimely fashion demise, I feel even better.

Witness:

Were I back at the Vibes, I might possibly have been caught dead in the hippie skirt, and we’re all aware of the ubiquitous “summer scarf”. But I cannot condone the combination of the two, especially with aviator glasses, which I’ve never particularly enjoyed.

Even worse is the Summer Scarf on a dude.

It was seriously ninety degrees. That can’t feel good.

And let’s talk about the high-waisted, wide-leg pants craze.

I like the pants actually – I do! – but I think they need to be worn with caution. Which is why I don’t. And, possibly, why she shouldn’t either.

Here we venture into the hipster costume danger zone…

This actually looked better in person than it does in photo, and I contemplated not including this one at all. But then I was like, ok, skirt with cutoffs with bathing suit top… weird. (Full disclosure: I wore a skirt as a top with cutoffs to APW. Then I decided it was too hot, ditched the cutoffs, and in the ensuing hours probably flashed more people than I’d care to number. But anyway.)

The next picture brings me to dangerous water, because I have a good friend who’s worn pretty much the same outfit. Several times.

but I still can’t condone it. I don’t know why, exactly, but on this dude here, I just can’t.

Likewise:

My dear friend Shannox left a comment on Flickr in favor of this dress, and she is someone whose fashion sense I admire wholeheartedly. However, I’m sticking by my initial sentiment: “hi, your dress is UGLY”. Because that shit is. Ugly.

Then there’s these tights:

which would be appropriate as legwear for Jem’s backup singers or as a Halloween costume where you’re disguised as some kind of She-Swamp-Thing. I’m pretty sure that neither is applicable.

And while many of you out there may be thinking “holy christ, erin, what a cunt you’re becoming. All you do is bitch and moan and post up shitty video. You suck.” Hey, I’m not going to argue! BUT, I don’t think anybody in her right mind could argue that this:

is even kind of remotely OK. At all. Ever. Even the dude in the white shirt is like, “damn. lime green spandex. motherFUCKER.” And lest you think I’ve gone soft in my old age, I’m not letting bike-shorts girl in the background off the hook, either. You can’t really tell from the photo, but she’s wearing one of those shiny-metallic American Apparel bathing suits on top, which kind of overshadows the bottomwear. Every time she turned around, I was blinded with fuschia hipster death rays.

Let’s end on a non-douchey-old-bitch note:

I give an A+. Not that I would belt my puff-sleeve T-shirt and wear it with leggings, but I’m almost thirty. I can’t do that shit. I commend this brave young woman for taking her youth and running – for DARING TO GO WHERE FEW WOULD TRAVEL, and pulling it off. Maybe now my kid won’t be ugly.