this website is Tina Rated and Tina Approved

End of the year rant. A few people have touched on this before, but I can’t help but throw in my unsolicited opinion. All these people asking “How can I get that Cabourn cameraman jacket, but for $Free.99?” have to realize that’s an impossible question to answer. You can’t. You just can’t. You might get a jacket that is two-tone, or approximates the aesthetics of the original. But it’s not the same. I’m not saying everyone needs to try and afford a jacket that costs over one thousand dollars. I’m just saying people need to stop the whole ‘look for less’ shit. If you want a J.Press jacket, but can’t afford to go out east and buy a new one, don’t go to Urban Outfitters, or H+M, or some other brand that makes a shoddy version of the J.Press jacket. Scour your thrift shops, antique shops, or go on Etsy or Ebay. Get a used original J. Press jacket. Need a cool M65 field jacket? Don’t buy that shitty J.Crew one just “because it has a slimmer fit”. The whole point (functionally and aesthetically) of a M65 is to be a little roomy. Need some cool, but cheap furniture for that new apartment in Brooklyn? Don’t fuck it up with Ikea furniture. I guarantee with a little elbow grease you can find amazing mid-century and primitive American made, solid wood furniture for Ikea prices. Plus isn’t the whole point of being a hipster the ability to look down your nose at how the hoi polloi all buy the same shit?

I know this is verging on a grumpy old man yelling “Buy moar expensive stuffs!”. But it’s not. I just think instead of always thinking “who makes that, but cheaper” we should think and support the people who’s products and shops we all blog and reblog about. Speaking of which, I feel like if you haven’t ever touched a product in real life, it’s hard to take your opinion about it more seriously than that dude who lives under the stairs. Not a good look when your polyvore looks are full of Bastian and Junya but you rock J.Crew. I’m not saying we aren’t allowed to admire or even write laudatory things about designers we enjoy. Nor am I saying that J.Crew is bad or of terrible quality or that if you shop there you aren’t crispy. I own stuff from there for sure. I just think the ‘personal looks’ need to reflect more of what we actually wear than what we’d like to wear. I find it infinitely more interesting to see someone’s actual gear than the gear they’d pick out if they were balling out of control. Really, we need to support the stores like Self Edge and Context and companies like The Hill-Side and Corter Leather. It would be heartbreaking if companies like these went out of business because we all talked about them but bought similar products from big box stores.