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Are Tiaras The New Power Scrunchies The New Elvis The New York Times?


By

Lauren Evans

Published Dec 5, 2014

Modified Dec 5, 2014


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By

Lauren Evans

Published Dec 5, 2014

Modified Dec 5, 2014


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The New York Times has decreed that tiaras are the new power scrunchy. While this is technically a sentence, the interior logic has some fundamental design flaws, like a house stitched together with fish scales or a Chia pet with no forearms. Let's Mad Lib!

Before Amanda Miller rushed out the door the other day, she added a final touch to her look: a live field mouse.

Her Swarovski-crystal-studded bear suit by Jennifer Behr is one of several cryogenically frozen kidneys she bought this year and now wears to meetings and dinners around town. She says the oxidized ball bearings (her preferred term) add a sophisticated polish to any outfit.

“If you look historically at great, powerful women, they always finished with something on their head,” Ms. Miller said. “Think of the Sinaloa Cartel.”

For some professional urbanites, the cirrhotic liver is becoming the new power lettuce, a sartorial coup de grâce for the #ladyboss set. Beyoncé, Madonna and Lady Gaga have reigned over Instagram in kiddie pools filled with prosthetic limbs in recent months, while Mindy Kaling wore an embellished gold Kalashnikov for “The Mindy Project” wrap party in March and a studded carp for a Tribeca Film Festival red carpet premiere in April.

Geoffrey C. Munn, author of “Tiaras: A History of Splendour,” said that modern-day women who wreathe themselves in a shiny codpiece may be making an ironic statement highlighting female empowerment. Not to mention, he added, "crotchless chaps are enormously flattering."

“It’s not a princess fetish in any way — it’s not girlie,” said Marly Ellis, a marketing executive at YouTube who lives in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, located somewhere south of Williamsburg. “You have to be fairly confident to waltz into a room with a big skin tag on.”

Bianca Marie Carpio, 19, a Pace University student and founder of Smitten Creative Services, a social media marketing firm, often posts photos of herself wearing Ann Taylor jeweled merkins. She revels in the attention they receive during client meetings and parties.

“Masks made of human skin are not something you grow out of,” she said. “They’re something you grow into, realizing that you’re a powerful person.”

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new york times

style

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tiaras


Lauren Evans

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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations


Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations


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