Gunn's Golden Rules

Whenever people say, “I can’t get my fashion right because I’m on a budget,” I say, “Guess what? Even if you have an unlimited budget, sometimes you can’t do it.”

I’d also like to encourage you to use this anecdote as your own if you’re ever around people who are flaunting their wealth and talking about buying expensive things. Just say: “I go shopping all the time. I’m tryingto spend money. I mean, I tried on this fourteen-thousand-dollar Yves St. Laurent dress and thought: I don’t hate it.Then I thought, At least I can leave with a pair of Manolos,but they didn’t have my size!”

When it comes to strategic shopping, I love a surgical strike. I believe in knowing what it is you want. If it’s a lot of things, go with a list. Don’t get distracted by what’s around you.

I don’t like shopping if I’m looking for something specific. I’d rather do that kind of thing online. But I like doing shopping research, seeing what’s out there at the stores. I look at all the fashion shows, but it doesn’t necessarily translate to what the buyers are buying.

Speaking of which, do you know what the buyers are buying? Crocs.

I can’t imagine a more aesthetically offensive item of footwear than Crocs. That little strap! I shudder.

Plus, they’re dangerous. I was at Bloomingdale’s and saw a little girl sobbing because the escalator had eaten her shoe. The charms (yes, there are charms that one can purchase to embellish those dreadful hunks of plastic) get caught on things, too. I’ve yet to see any condition where Crocs look good, including the beach. Why not flip-flops? I know Crocs are affordable. Well, so are Converse and lots of other brands that don’t look like hooves.

But who knows? I came around somewhat to Uggs. I used to put Crocs and Uggs in the same sentence, but I don’t anymore. The Ugg brand has evolved. They do some much more fashionable things now. I’m not as despondent.

I know I’m in the minority on this. The Crocs people are laughing all the way to the bank. Their profits were up something like 500 percent last year. You’ll still never catch me dead wearing them, even if it is a “casual Friday.”

Casual Fridays are an invitation for people to go too far. One day I went to visit the Parsons board chairman, whom I’d seen only in a suit. There he was in dad jeans—flood pants to boot—and a polo shirt that was way too big. I hadn’t realized it was casual Friday. It was like being the only person not told about Opposite Day. In any case, I was appalled.

The other thing that makes me crazy is the bare midriff. It’s a don’t-let-this-happen-to-you-ever category of problem. I loved the Season 7 Curb Your Enthusiasmepisode entitled “The Bare Midriff,” in which a woman named Maureen goes around the office in a tiny shirt that reveals her whole stomach—and what they call a muffin top. Larry says she’s not dressing appropriately and would she please wear a longer shirt. Maureen gets very defensive and says, “I’ve lost sixty-eight pounds in two years. I’m very proud and I want to flaunt what I’ve got!”

At a gym, a bare midriff is fine. I’ve never been in a gym—well, not since high school. I’m sure there are all kinds of things there that are just fine because they stay there. Things can happen around a pool or at a beach that wouldn’t happen in a formal dining room.

At the office, though, no matter what kind of shape you’re in, showing off that much of your body isn’t right. These days, though, I see accidental bare midriffs more often than intentional ones.

Low-rise jeans are great, but ladies, you need a belt, or a tunic, or a unitard. I say this to women all the time who are very pear-shaped: wear a low-rise jean, because if it fits you in the hip it won’t fit you in the waist. Just wear a top that covers the waistband.

Otherwise, anytime you bend over, everyone sees everything. One of our segment producers is adorable, but she’s so whatever’s-whatever about belts and things that I’ve seen almost every part of her anatomy.

I find myself yelling, “Please don’t bend over. I’ll get it!”

And you know what’s funny: I’ve never heard a woman acknowledge that she’d just flashed me. I think it’s so common now.

Doing as many makeovers as I do, I’ve learned a few things about what makes women feel better about themselves. The starting point is usually getting a new haircut. I don’t want to generalize, because every case is different, but I think it’s best to err on the side of styling your hair shorter the older you get. In my opinion, it’s generally not a good look for women over thirty to have hair way below their shoulders.

I LOVE WRITING MY fashion advice column for Marie Claire. Those are real questions. One question I received was from a woman who said she had a Herve Leger dress in dark purple, which I assume was the famous Leger color aubergine. She was wearing it to a swanky Beverly Hills engagement party with a beige patent-leather peep-toe stiletto. Her mother said her clutch should match the shoes, and my questioner asked if that was indeed the case.

I began by saying I love Herve Leger and I love aubergine, but why would you wear beige with that? Matching is hard. Make it easy on yourself. Go with a metallic! Beige dresses things down. Really, a good rule is no beige after five.

If it’s after five, people call it “nude,” but that’s not in my vocabulary because it’s a racist color name. Depending on what your skin tone is, that beigy color may or may not be nude.

Now, wearing a true nude, meaning matching your skin color, is a whole different matter. You usually look odd, I think. It’s like a body suit even when it’s a voluminous dress. Kirsten Dunst does that all the time, and I don’t consider her a fashion role model. (Sorry, Kirsten.)

You don’t know what colors work for you until you try a bunch of things on. If you’re pale and you look at Iman and think, That color’s fantastic on her. I’m going to get that dress,stop right there!

Dark women are blessed in many ways, because they have so many more colors that look great on them. Lighter women don’t know it, but there aren’t as many colors that work with fair skin.

So try to think outside the box and try on colors you would never consider. You’ll probably be surprised that some unexpected color—persimmon, coral, or teal—works like magic with your skin.

And don’t worry about the so-called rules of colors. The No White after Labor Day rule was meant to be broken. But it’s true that white is not very practical in New York City. I have a pair of white jeans that the J. Crew catalog convinced me to buy. What I learned once I put them on: thin white pants need to be lined, because otherwise they reveal the line between your leg and your underpants, and that’s not my favorite look. The jeans have languished in my closet.

What’s another “rule”: Don’t wear black and brown together? That’s ridiculous. You do have to be careful about the brown. It shouldn’t be tan or some midtone, but chocolate brown is really chic. I once saw a woman on the street wearing chocolate suede boots with black opaque tights and a black dress. She looked fantastic.

I will say that I think it’s funny that strangers take my fashion advice when my own family completely ignores it. Case in point: During the holiday season, my family wears Christmas sweaters every single day. Christmas sweaters! Is there a bigger fashion don’t?

But for those of you who do listen to me, here’s my general advice about keeping your wardrobe fresh: It’s helpful just to drop into stores and try things on for information whenever you think of it. It’s essential to get a sense of what cuts and colors look best on you, and you can’t always do that when you have to find a dress for a wedding during your lunch hour. You can learn so much just by asking yourself objectively, “Does this look good on me?”

Size is difficult, because different brands run small or large. So you’re likely to have a range, 8–10 say, or 2–4, or 14–16. But if you don’t spend the time figuring out your range, you’re likely to be very frustrated each time you go shopping, because you won’t even know what sizes to pick off the rack.

Figuring these things out is just a part of everyday life.

You know how I am about all these matters. You can reject any or all of what I say, obviously. These are just the things that I think are good rules of thumb for enjoying your life as a social being. I also have no problem if you want to find a cave and have someone roll a boulder in front of it. To each his own.

In a recent memoir about filming Some Like It Hot,the 1959 comedy with Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis says at first he