I pierced my nose in college because I thought Grace Slick was pretty.

I got a white jean jacket and grew my hair out

That pic is marked private so I can't view it. Is it that bad?

jessamyn: I did the same thing! (only it wasn't Grace Slick, it was a girl on campus)

That pic is marked private so I can't view it. Is it that bad?

Jan, yes, it is.

awwww! And your friend is hilarious. I love you both.

I was going through some old pictures while cleaning out my mom's house last week (more about that later) and was amazed at how little my "look" has changed in the last 25 years or so. Levis, T-shirts, untucked button-down shirts (sloppy then, stylish now) and NB running shoes. I still get my hair cut twice a year whether I need it or not, although there's somewhat less of it now than there was in my twenties.

- they called me Cyndi Lauper in high school (they were jealous!)
- I always wanted feathered hair like Cadi Chapman down the road whose mom was a stewardess and very fashionable. She was aiming for Farrah Fawcet I suspect.

Having a Dad put a zillion photos of your childhood on Flickr pretty much means you can't pretend you were ever smart in the fashion department. Sometimes I pretend it's a skill I had once and then lost. Not so.

I thought blonde hair was stupid and went for a certain princessy Jennifer Connelly in Labyrinth brunette thing when I was 17.

Now I'm going for an Breakfast Club Ally Sheedy or Adventures in Babysitting Elizabeth Shue chunky layered bangsy thing. I guess with the intermittent pink in my blonde, I have to cop to Jem too.

Uh, any guesses which decade I was a child in?

It looks like I don't have the quintessential picture I'm thinking of scanned in yet, but in early high school I was told I looked like Molly Ringwold a lot, and after a while I gave in and did my hair like her. I never really thought I did very much, and after about a year I grew out of it anyway.

I'm trying to remember why I've made the choices I've made, sartorially speaking, but really, I can't. I think I've been trying to be cool, like my heroes have been...these people include, but aren't limited to:

Joe Strummer (but NOT Mick Jones, GAWD!), Iggy Pop (which is kinda funny, cos I'm so NOT built like Iggy, but then again, who is?), Jim Morrison (that one started when I was 12!).

Oddly enough, my normal, real-life look, has has been made up of Levi 501 jeans and dark, plain t-shirts for about 23 years now.

Argh. I forgot to confess. What with the two full closets, what with the hot pink, and the "power jewelry" and the stilettos and over-the-top everything, and the fact that I was inexplicably given 42 of her over the course of my childhood:

Barbie.

Fat Feminist Fabulous Barbie?

OMG, Sil. You are TOTALLY Ringwald!

I'm not posting any pictures, but I blame many of my sartorial misadventures on Lisa Bonet. Damn you to hell, Denise Huxtable!!!

Oh jeebus. Here’s where I tell a few tales on myself. Fortunately, there are no surviving pictures of me in my 20s – or if there are, I don’t have access to them. They’d either be at Mom & Dad’s or, possibly, in the possession of former girlfriends with whom I’m no longer in contact.

Hair first: Early 20s (which would be the early 80s) – somewhere between Elvis Costello’s pseudo-quiff and Pete Farndon’s mullet (far left), with an ill-advised rat-tail from about 81-83. (I so coveted the Bruce Foxton mullet but couldn’t get my hair to do that – in retrospect, not such a bad thing.) By 1984 I’d started doing theater, so what my hair looked like depended on what show I was doing. Between gigs, though, it was back to the Farndon do.

In the late 80s, I figured out that it was easier to just grow my hair out between shows and then cut it as needed for whatever role I might land. This sorta defaulted into a Mellencamp-type thing.

As far as clothes go, I used to be fairly picky about such things. The prevailing mental image of myself is a slate-gray suit coat over a band t-shirt (or possibly my beloved “eat the rich” shirt – mine was red), several band badges on the lapel (most of which I still have, somewhere), levi’s, chucks. I’ve also always loved white oxford shirts, and shirts with the tab collars so beloved of various garage bands. By the late 80s, I was doing the REM thrift store thing. I’d also started wearing flannels again, as I had in high school. Mostly because I was working in a warehouse, but there was also some band influence, too. These days I do it because, as our British friends might say, I can’t be arsed.

Well, you can see some pix of me in '80s here, and here.

Oh, wait. That's not me, that's Annie Lennox. um, yeah.

Hmmm. I'd have to say that I love the wardrobe selections made on House, and since I've been told I look similar to House, it follows that what he wears also looks good on me. It doesn't influence me too much, but it helps to see something and think "Oh that looks like something House would wear." Odds are it's a good look on me.

Every damn cartoon I ever read (props to the hernadrez brothers!). Barbarella and Audrey Hepburn.

Being in New York in the seventies/ early eighties.
Punk rock, club kids, genuine hippies, beatniks, ravers, 40s 50s 60s retro chic, cocktail hours, cartoons, but mostly friends who did it themselves and made me a crazed vintage shopper when it mean something and was remotely possible.

It's all costumes and make up.
When it breaks down, it's always durable goods that can take punishment and still look half decent.
Auditions are open for the right shoes, the right pants, the all purpose dress, the full purpose shirt, and the perfect underwear.

Currently wearing the free shirt and the giant underwear.

I want to find the right cruelty-free belt.

My what?
≡ Click to see image ≡

Nonsense, pips. You don't have a kettle.

*ducks*

I dunno that it was influenced by anybody so much as it just kind of evolved. I wore my dad's flannel shirts when I was a pre-teen and grew to like them and wore them so much that anything else feels weird. I don't try to make an 'ensemble'or anything but every once in a while some item (the screwhead earstuds, the minor league hats, some of my t-shirts) will just strike my fancy and I'll see that I've never seen anyone else wear them. Those are the items that I get complimented on the most. Today 4 people complimented me on my new Frank zappa t-shirt, for instance.

This is the look I was going for in 1980. I achieved the hair ... never the talent.