Why I hate "chill."

(see also: don't f*cking tell me to relax)

I’ve spoken before about something I call “the tyranny of casual” or “the bullying effect of effortless dressing.” Basically the idea (and what shitty irony) of people judging other people for looking too dressed up.

Over the weekend, I was reading my friend Rose (add her name to the drinking game along with Prada, Tibi, Castanet, pizza and you will be very drunk very fast with me) and she was talking about style, fashion, and luxury, referencing an op-ed by Eugene Rabkin.

This op-ed cites how, in the past couple decades, “creativity and quality have been increasingly driven apart.” Rabkin theorizes that luxury fashion (not style, not how we put things together, but the fashion itself) has become “a sea of sameness.” But something else stuck out to me in the piece. It was this: “Whether you were a Yohji Yamamoto person, or a Helmut Lang person, or a Martin Margiela person, you signed onto an aesthetic universe underpinned by a wider cultural ethos … By wearing their clothes one signaled not only a certain level of sophistication, but also a certain level of cultural knowledge.”

It’s the “signaling” part. Was I reading it right? Are we really dressing to “signal something” to others, versus looking inward, dressing to feel at ease within ourselves? That perfect calm of internal/external alignment?

The thing that bothered me about quiet luxury is how it brings a newer, more stringent level of judgement to the table - where once we worried about looking good (to ourselves and maybe our friends) most of that was achievable when you applied yourself, whether you had natural style (whether that exists is another matter we can debate)or not. You could feel good as you define “feeling good.” And you could feel aware enough, part of a now. QL took it all a step further. Where some might feel great in say, an LV logo 2 piece set, as easy to pull together as geranimals and get on with their life, now you have to worry about not only looking good but looking subtle-good. Harder to obtain. Definitionally exclusionary. But ok, I guess with the right bank account but also connections (say someone in the premier designer part of Saks) QL is “achievable.” Think: Wool pants and sweaters from The Row, a shirt and jacket from Loro Piana or something, all in neutrals maybe. A Belgian loafer. (I mean I don’t even know, and I’d need help.)

Ok. But the vast majority of my life is casual to “low key business casual.” And probably yours too. Amid the seven days in a week, I spend most of my time running around. My challenge is inevitably having enough style to feel myself without feeling forced and fighting the casualness of what I have to do.

Now, theoretically, I’m supposed to be quiet in my luxury, and I’m supposed to be not trying too hard, ever, not just on weekends, and not yoga pants not trying too hard but a perfect chillllll not trying too hard. And I suppose, I’m also supposed to be me.

Casually Impossible

Casual is so hard for me that back in the day I indulged in the ultimate oxymoron: I used a personal stylist to help me look less … styled? I marched into the 5th Avenue Club at Saks to spend an entire session (duration: don’t ask) on dressing casually. Then, my ask was: “what to wear on weekend days.” Today, it’s far more important, because I no longer bifurcate my clothing or my life — so as I mentioned now it’s not just weekends. Casual has a deeper role than before.

I’ve spent my entire life trying to look more casual, trying to fit in with surroundings like camp, boat rides, Maine. Looking for shorts when I didn’t feel good in shorts and jeans when I didn’t feel good in jeans. Looking for hidden platforms (etc.) when I didn’t feel good in flats. Once, I loved wedge espadrilles (and before them, wedge sneakers), probably for the same reason “casual Cali girl” Jennifer Aniston does. Because they give her a lift while keeping her safe from judgey eyes, allowing her to feel she’s still as ever that chill girl. (That’s what imagine she thinks, because that’s been me. But I also know it doesn’t totally “work” because I judged her! I saw this picture below and checked multiple times to make sure it was from this year; that’s the judgment.) But she is likely drawn to the wedge vs. heel, the espadrille fabrication so she can do what she wants (look more willowy) without the casual cops. (See also, the ripped jean. For many many years a staple in my own arsenal.)

It’s Not You. It’s Them. (And sometimes me. But I’m working on it.)

What this line in the piece Rose shared, the line about “signaling,” suddenly confirmed for me is something I’ve already articulated: how much I wish we could work on training ourselves to limit judgement, rather than suggesting, in so many ways, that people are supposed to look casual. Or logo free. (Or any other way.) But my added aha was this: Only then will we truly get away from that “sea of sameness.” Because that would allow us, freed from worrying about what we might signal, to dress the way we want. And that, ultimately, would lead to more experimentation.

Whether the results are “good” or “bad” is pointless — it’s subjective. But what’s factual is that if we chill experimentation (pun intended), we lose what we all love. If we keep on judging each other as “better than” for looking relaxed, or understated, or eased, or effortless or whatever, whether that’s about the fashion or about the style, the result will be the same. People designing and dressing from a place of fear, fear of ridicule for looking different. And when that happens, we’re headed forwhat Rabkin calls, on the fashion front, “a parade of homogeneity.”

And this is why I hate the word “chill.” Oh how I HATE that word, I suddenly realize! Another aha. And it’s the first C of the Tibi style vocabulary’s CMC, or “chill modern classic” mantra, which has been so seminal to my style thinking and something I respect for that reason. But. But.

The Chill Pill

There’s a cliquey-ness in “chill” that operates on so many levels. Much more so than eased, or relaxed. Chill is most often used with “out'“ - as a directive. Chill out. Fucking chill. Or that delight of my youth: Take a chill pill.

It’s an obnoxious word used to divide and demean. “God, mom, chill.” Or you’re arguing with your s/o and he says “ok, chill.” That’s not gonna end well. It’s like Ramona going “Calm down. Take a Xanax.” I don’t want to be told to chill. Or to dress more chill. And I’m definitely not selecting this as a word to say to myself.

Like QL, “chill” is one more barrier to separate each other. It isn’t something everybody can achieve by applying themselves. And if you dig a little deeper, there’s the same implicit snobbery. I go back to an incident in law school that a Black classmate recounted. Everyone was moving into their dorm in their chill moving clothes (he was in a sweatshirt and Levis). And a white girl, another classmate of ours, when he got on the elevator she was already on, stopped short of her lit up floor, pushed the next possible floor and got off. If you read the news at all, you know that chill dressing, for some people, can be dangerous. It’s a privilege. I can see why some people stay dressed up for a wide range of reasons I should never judge and can never know firsthand. There are also, of course, those who don’t feel comfortable in the gear of chill because of body issues and probably a host of cultural or other reasons. It’s on us to make that comfortable and not “uncool” or “too try-hard.”

And it doesn’t go unnoticed by me that chill is often spoken to women. “Can’t she be more chill?” Like “aggressive” (a compliment when used about a man), they’re telling us we’re too uptight, that we’re making something out of nothing.

Accidental. And Approachable.

Then there’s the far less weighty matter of those who just want to feel like ourselves in casual settings. Especially with the world telling us to just — look effortless! And the irony of how very hard that is.

I want fashion to be democratic, a space where the innately gifted and the dabbler can both play and enjoy. And here I’m confronted with something that practice, study, and curiosity just can’t give me.

Most often, the harder I try, the more “chill” skitters away. The rare occasions when I *think* (I don’t even fucking know!) I achieve chill are usually when I’m forced to get out of my own way because there’s no time to fuss. An actual accident, mostly.

Like this - I wanted to go greet my in-laws. I’m wearing slippers:

(Btw, was still mocked for the gold pants. Can’t chill. Can’t chill. Can’t chill.)

Or this, where I just needed coffee.

Or this, where the bus was gonna leave.

I believe generally in the 3-word-plus-modifier approach, “style DNA,” and I help people find theirs because it unlocks so much. And I believe in the basics of the Tibi 3, the ideas of them — (1) modern, (2) something tied to tradition/mannishness (my word of choice is “heritage”) and (3) some element of ease. But I replaced “chill” with “approachable.” I sometimes wonder if that’s the right word; often in my head the phrase I reach for is actually “eased out.” Like I’m in the mirror and something’s off and I say - it’s not “eased out” enough. I do like clothing that’s loose and feels easy and slightly askew and interesting in that way, a foil to the heritage buttoned-up ness. But I like “approachable” as my word, because it reminds me, beyond fashion, of the person I want to be. Which in fact style is supposed to bring me closer to.

“Chill” is a word for clique-y girls, the skinny girls, the almost lanky straight haired girls, the IYKYK girls (who are largely all, IMO, deep down, insecure girls like all the rest of us and likely more so), the ones who say the street style in Paris this year was “awful” and the costuming in And Just Like That is “a mockery” or whatever. Especially for someone like me who digests a lot of this style and fashion stuff, a regular reminder not to become (as if I could) that girl or anything like her is a good thing, as far as I’m concerned. “Approachable” is a signal inward, not outward, and one I’m grateful for. Especially at this midpoint of life, where I’m more focused than ever on the person in the clothes and who I want her to be.