Even though I ditched office life years ago, I’ve never stopped searching for the perfect black blazer. In my mind, it had every conceivable spec to fit my short, long-waisted body: oversize throughout, but cropped so that it wouldn’t fall past my hips. Shoulder pads that offered definition but didn’t make my wide shoulders look wider. Heavyweight (wool or wool-blend) and lined, with only a few buttons — nothing with double-breasted rows. Something that wouldn’t need much tailoring and could look equally chic over my black trousers and on top of my favorite white sweater dress. It was an Anine Bing or The Row blazer … just, you know, less expensive.
My closet is filled with the detritus of my search. In 2016, I bought a Zara blazer ($50): polyester, lined, and short enough to work for my body thanks to a little expert tailoring at the bottom ($30). It worked fine, but when it started to pill and show its age after a year, I wanted to level up. My next purchase, in 2017, was from Anthropologie ($85). It was also a lined poly blend, with a contrasting satin collar, and I felt appropriately fancy — except that it didn’t really fit my wider shoulders. I ignored that fact for a while until I got pregnant and accidentally split the lining in the back. In 2020, I opted for a favorite brand — Everlane, which is my go-to source for tees and trousers. Its blazers run long, though, so when I purchased the brand’s (wool-nylon blend, lined) option for $168, I looked like I was drowning in it. I took it to my tailor, hoping he could work his characteristic magic, but after two rounds ($60), I conceded that it would never look right. In total, I estimate that I spent almost $400.
Finally, in December 2023, I “caved”: I’d been stalking black blazers on Anine Bing for months, and its (lined, wool-blend) Madeleine option was on sale for $280. It was pretty much perfect out of the box — a little long in the cuffs, but I liked the bunched-up look. I wished I’d gotten it sooner and that I hadn’t spent so much time and money trying to get the others to measure up.
Stylist Allison Bornstein, who came up with the “wrong shoe theory” (choosing a surprising, counterintuitive shoe to add dimension to your outfit) and the “three-word method” (identifying three distinct words to characterize your style, then making sure your outfits embody all three) has a word for this phenomenon — it’s called the “cookie theory.”
As her analogy goes, if you’re trying to cut out sugar but really want a cookie at the end of your meal, you might find a low-sugar alternative as a way to avoid the sweet snack. Cut to: eating 20 chocolate rice cakes and still feeling unfulfilled. And, if you’re me, eventually eating the cookie. In much the same way, if you’ve got your eye on an item but can’t or don’t want to buy it immediately, it’s easy to find a dupe that sort of fits the bill.
“I saw people having the approximations of the things they liked,” she tells me over the phone. “Let’s say you really want a Burberry trench, but you’re not going to buy it. You might buy a few trenches that sort of serve the same purpose. Then when you’re putting together an outfit, you think, I would really like a trench with this. You actually don’t wear the trenches that you have. You almost don’t have a trench, because they’re not even an option.”
This is certainly true of investment pieces, but Bornstein insists it doesn’t have to be an expensive item — it could just be something you want and can’t get right now. “I’m passing by Zara, and they have something that kind of looks like the jeans I want. So I’ll just grab these now. But then you’re never going to grab the ones you like. Or you will, and then you’ll have too much shit.”
In my case, finding the perfect blazer to fit my body and aesthetic took time, experimentation, patience, and, yes, money. This process requires self-inquiry, too: being willing to ask what the piece needs to do for you and why certain options don’t serve that function. Bornstein suggests taking those extra few seconds to identify what’s not right for you. “It’s not about judging yourself: ‘This looks horrible on me, I look bad.’ It’s more, ‘This doesn’t work for me.’ I know it sounds cheesy, but can we learn? What can we take from this?”
On videos like this one, Bornstein gets commenters lamenting the difficulty of this process: They can’t afford the piece in question, or they can’t wait to save the funds because the piece will sell out. She concedes that changing your shopping patterns can be scary, but maintains that it’s possible. “Shop a little less. I’m not saying don’t buy stuff. I’m not saying get rid of everything you have. I’m just saying: Maybe have one extra thought.”
“It’s not always easy to have the thing that you want,” she adds. “The easiest thing is not actually the thing.”
Maybe your preferred piece will appear on a resale site in a few months. And if not, compare different brands and sizes — there’s likely an item that fits most or all of your requirements without breaking the bank. Don’t buy the easy dupe, and get the piece you want with the money you save (some of her clients write down the cost of cheaper items they’re tempted to buy, then use the total amount to get a single, pricier item at the end of the month).
Today, I wear my Anine Bing piece to drop off my kids, take work meetings, and go to upscale events. When I took headshots recently, the blazer was a no-brainer: I immediately felt more confident and powerful when I put it on over the outfits I’d brought for the shoot. It came with me to a recent trip to New York, and I wore it on my most important, high-stakes day: to meet with my New York Times editor, attend my Marie Claire editor’s book launch, and have coffee with my most important PR contacts. Each time I left my hotel, I added the blazer as a finishing touch. I’d look in the mirror — snap a photo, feeling like a total badass — and head out. Easy.
Katherine J. Igoe , 2024-05-28 13:00:05
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