Glossed Over

Lowest Common Denominator: Glamour, May

26, 22, 24: Ages of the actresses appearing on Glamour’s multiple May covers (Freida Pinto, Emma Stone, and Ashley Greene, respectively)

39, 40: Ages of Amy Poehler, who’s profiled on page 214, and Tina Fey, whose book is all-too-briefly excerpted on page 72

8: Women in swimsuits depicted on page 32 as the epitome of “total confidence we all envy”

50: Percent of those women who are professional actors or athletes

$45: Price of a dress from Express suggested for its similarity to the D&G dress Stone wore on her cover

$1,395: Price of Stone’s actual cover dress

2: Letters published complaining that size 12-14 model Robyn Lawley, whose photo accompanied March’s “97% of Women Will Be Cruel to Their Bodies Today,” was too “perfect”

Zip: Amount of acknowledgement from Glamour about the same readers’ pleas to include all shapes and sizes in their photos (though they did interview Lawley about the readers’ criticism, as if that’s Lawley’s fault)

98: Page on which Glamour recommends a $132 t-shirt screenprinted with a cat’s face 

5: Tricks cited in “What Helps Reese [Witherspoon] Look Like Reese”

0: Mentions of genetics in “What Helps Reese Look Like Reese”

10: Items writer Josh Aiello’s girlfriend carries in her purse, according to “Inside Her Bag: The Final Frontier”

8: Number of times Aiello busts out a girls-are-so-strange stereotype in his commentary. Women carry a lot of stuff! How do they find things in their bags? “I have hands. Do they need cream?” he asks about a tube of L’Occitane lotion. The aneursym-inducing conundrum of differentiating between lip balm and lipstick, he says, “boggles the male mind.” Sheesh.

$20: The “highly affordable” fee for a lap dance, according to “What’s Up with the Stripper Thing?”

None: Despite the claim on the cover and the NSFW tag on the article, actual photos of naked man parts in “The Ultimate Guide to His Man Parts” (There are two models with bare buttocks, but that’s hardly what Glamour’s trying to imply by boasting “with pictures!” on the cover.)

2: Couples who got engaged after the woman cooked “Engagement Chicken,” according to “7 Dishes to Get You Everything You Want in Life”

Thousands: Approximate number of Google users searching for the term “engagement chicken” who've landed on this blog since I first posted about it in 2006. Is my shameless ploy for Google traffic better or worse than believing that a chicken dish can compel a man to propose? You decide!

Vogue Liveblog 2010: The One with Halle Berry on the Cover

The other day someone asked me why I still do the liveblog. After all, I've done it three years in a row. Isn't it time to move on? To which I say: Definitely not! I've been so focused on my day job lately that I'm barely finding time to read anything. (Alas, snarking on fashion magazines does not pay the rent, though I'm willing to entertain offers.) If not for this liveblog, I might never read September Vogue. That page count is intimidating!

As always, the rules: I have not opened this issue of Vogue. I have not read what any other writers thought about this issue. I'll be looking at everything except the cover for the first time. The liveblog happens in real time, so just hit refresh on this post to see the latest entries. And I'll be posting periodic updates on Twitter and Facebook throughout the day, too.

Here we go!

Is Elle Bad for Women? Elle Editor Says No

The August edition of Elle is out, but I’m still chewing on the “Editor’s Letter” from the July issue, wherein editor-in-chief Roberta Myers defends herself and the magazine. The charge: is women’s media harmful to women?

If you guessed that Myers said “no,” congratulations! Here’s her inauspicious start:

On May 3, I went on the Today show, and in a segment about the winds of change blowing down last season’s runways, I uttered the words “[Elle Macpherson] is not a skinny girl.” Not skinny as in, not one of the anorexic, near-dead models that Ann Curry and I had just been talking about… How ironic that I was actually praising the presence of an almost 50-year-old demonstrably busty and athletic woman as a hopeful sign in an industry where the models have always been way too skinny (read: underweight).

This might be an understandable explanation if Elle had never taken part in the industry tradition of using “way too skinny” models, and if comparing favorably to a “near-dead” model were a meaningfully positive evaluation. Is that how low the bar is now?

“Well, Roberta, she’s definitely still among the living. I even held a mirror in front of her face and detected exhalation!”

“She'll look great in the new Vuitton. Let’s book her!”

[The furor that erupted following her statement] was about what it was about 15 years ago, when I was an editor at Seventeen, and 10 years ago, when I was an editor at Mirabella: In the “who’s responsible for my self-hating body image” debate, there’s no debate at all.

That’s because, in the “who’s responsible for portraying pre-menarche girls as the pinnacle of female achievement” debate, there’s no debate at all.

As New York blogger Amy Odell put it, magazines for women “make us feel bad about ourselves.” I wrote to Amy, hoping she might…explore that a little bit on assignment, but she never wrote me back. Alas.

If only there were more than one blogger who might explain this! If Amy isn’t available, I certainly am.

Why do images of women who are prettier, slimmer, younger, darker, lighter, smaller, taller seem like an affront to our self-worth?

Oh, only because they’re used to point out how flawed we are in comparison, and then sell us products to fix ourselves.

And would self-esteem generally rise were models to look more like the rest of us—5’4” and 165 pounds, the current build of the average American woman?

Um, YES. Obviously.

It’s curious to me that there’s still a belief that the media puts too much pressure on women to be thin, because as a measure of influence it’s an utter failure: The average woman has added 20 pounds to her frame in less than 30 years. More than one third of adult American women are obese, a medically devastating (and expensive) condition.

Hey, did you hear that? It’s the death knell of print media. Isn't the publishing industry’s profit model entirely predicated upon influencing readers and then peddling that power to advertisers?

But seriously: It’s curious to me that Myers ignores the increasing amount of research that being overweight is not necessarily an indicator of poor health. And that the relative affordability of processed and fast foods and the sluggish economy might have more to do with the general rise in the population’s weight than her magazine. And that Elle vacillates between influential and ineffectual depending on whether it suits her argument.

The attractive people favored by media as a whole—movies, TV, magazines, websites—can seem oppressive at times, though they do reflect this truth: Good-looking people get attention.

While this may be true, it also ignores that, beyond the fashion industry, there is no universally accepted definition of “good-looking.” Any model who deviates from the youthful, emaciated standard is shoved into a story about camouflaging those flaws or becomes an excuse for a magazine to onanistically praise its own open-mindedness. Which, you know, could "seem oppressive."

As we grow up and out into the world, how much does the presence of women who have more of whatever it is (brains, success, piano-playing ability) that bothers us about ourselves really hurt us? ...as an adult I realized it felt good to be told I was attractive. And it didn’t diminish my accomplishments one bit.

In other words: “I don’t have self-esteem issues, so I don’t understand why anyone else would. And I’m not publishing this in a national magazine because I feel the need to prove anything.”

And it’s a fair question to ask if media is setting, or reflecting, the cultural norms. Feminism allows us to be, pursue, remake ourselves however we like, so it’s challenging to consider what’s the right amount of “change” advice (let’s not call it improvement) for Elle to offer...

You know, I'm loath to make any kind of definitive statement about the nature of feminism, but I’m going to have to go out on a limb here: I’m pretty sure feminism doesn’t exist so we can “be, pursue, remake ourselves” according to Elle’s high-priced doctrine. It’s so we can “be, pursue, remake ourselves” as anything we want. Anything! Even, say, equal to men, whose magazines—last I checked—don’t contain nearly as many condescending explanations of why their readers’ feelings are totally unjustified.

Do we think that if Elle and the rest of “women’s” media stopped running stories about the latest skin saver, we’re all stop caring about our faces?

Scare quotes and a straw man.

And if the average model (under 20, 5’10”, and 124 pounds) were suddenly replaced by a 35-year-old five-footer, would we no longer find the leggy teenager beautiful?

Is there a reason we can't have both? Because—this might blow your mind—we could find them both beautiful.

Yes, we love [the musicians in this issue] for the way they look! And for the way they sing, write, perform, and otherwise rock our worlds. In every way, I flunk by comparison. And the world is so much more interesting for it.

Wait, so Myers admits to feeling inferior in comparison to these women...when that’s the same attitude she decried earlier.

Admittedly, it’s a daunting task to justify the existence of an entire industry. And while I don’t think anyone expects Myers to launch an all-out attack on her own livelihood and, like, immediately cease Elle’s publication, it isn’t unreasonable to hope for a genuine attempt to answer the fashion industry's critics. Instead, we get clichés, contradictions, and almost zero acknowledgment of magazines’  role in promoting the outrage that inspired Myers’ response. Women’s magazines can't speak for all women, but it would be a vast improvement if they at least tried to speak to us.

Related: Elle Editor Goes on the Offensive, Gets "Real"

Australia Introduces Body-Image Standards for Fashion Industry

Women’s Wear Daily reported this morning about a new Australian program touted as “the world’s first body image initiative.” The voluntary code of conduct, developed in partnership with eating-disorder support group The Butterfly Foundation, will designate magazines, fashion retailers and designers, and modeling agencies that comply with the guidelines as “body image friendly.” The criteria, as reported in WWD:

Recommendations include disclosing and avoiding the digital enhancement of images; banning ultra-thin female models or overly muscular male ones, in addition to models under the age of 16 to advertise adult clothes; employing a greater diversity of ethnicities and model body sizes; eschewing editorial and advertising content that promotes negative body image through rapid weight loss and cosmetic surgery, and, for retailers, carrying a wider variety of clothing sizes that better reflects the demands of the community.

There is, I think, small cause for concern about the ban on “ultra-thin female models or overly muscular male ones”—what are the determining factors for these body types? Will naturally slender or naturally sculpted models be excluded? The idea shouldn’t be that any one type of body is better; it should be that there is beauty in all sizes of bodies.

But that message seems lost on a retailer quoted in the WWD article. While she acknowledges that today's models are thinner than ever before, former model Belinda Seper says,

“Fashion is for, generally speaking, women who are in good physical shape, who choose to take care of themselves.”

And if that isn't illogical enough for you, read on!

Seper harbors doubts that larger sizes would in fact sell. Just 10 percent of her merchandise is a size 16 (size 14 in the U.S.)

So larger sizes don’t sell as well as smaller sizes…but she doesn’t stock as much larger-sized merchandise. Good news, Belinda: I think I see the problem!

In any case, this program is a positive step. Australia has a female prime minister and now this? America, I hope you’re paying attention.

Update: This is the relevant section of the guidelines for determining whether a model is at a naturally sustainable weight: "Where there is concern about the healthy weight of a model, organisations are encouraged to take steps to satisfy themselves the model is healthy before employing them." And here's the full text of the guidelines [PDF].

Vogue Takes Its Turn in the Lara Stone Sideshow

I haven’t read an issue of Vogue in three months, but good news for me: nothing’s changed! In her January “Letter from the Editor,” Anna Wintour demonstrates the magazine’s remarkably persistent distance from the real world.

[French fashion designer Sophie Theallet] is a very rare creature in fashion these days. As [Lanvin designer Alber] Elbaz told the crowd, it is too often the case these days that people elect to work in style industries in pursuit of fame, not skills. “Why does every girl over five feet tall and age thirteen want to be a model?” he asked. “Why don’t they ever want to be a seamstress?”

Yeah! Why be the beautiful woman who wears the clothes when you could be the poorly paid one who makes them?

Never a magazine to back down from a completely indefensible viewpoint, the issue also includes an article detailing the struggles of size-four model Lara Stone. Which is great, you know, because Vogue clearly offers an unbiased perspective on the fashion industry’s obsession with preternatural thinness. (Sigh.)

From “Hello, Gorgeous”:

It’s hard to say which came first—the superskinny model or the size 0 sample. Either way, the trend has been tough on both the models, who find it nearly impossible to maintain that body type past the age of seventeen, and the magazines that want to show clothes on models who aren’t painfully thin.

Vogue not being one of those magazines, obviously.

Designers who use the superskinny girls defend the trend, saying clothes hang better on a coat hanger. But the opposite is also true—some clothes look better on bodies with “boobs,” which is why Stone’s career has flourished.

What a charming pair of sentences! Slender women's bodies are compared to coat hangers, the fashion industry's ideal woman is actually an inanimate object, and we learn clothes aren't designed for humans. Oh, and for those who don't happen to resemble a hanger, guess what! One model who is still way thinner than most of us is enough to represent us! Who says the fashion industry doesn't love women?

Stone doesn’t blame fashion for her problems. “I like my job,” she says… She doesn’t even blame the designers—“That is their aesthetic. It’s not for me to say whether it’s right or wrong.”

Well, I’ll say it. It is wrong to call a woman fat because she doesn’t resemble a wire hanger. Also wrong? Not blaming designers. Canonizing a coat hanger as the ideal female form isn't the worst thing they could do, but it's probably illegal to make clothes out of asbestos.

By the way, those difficulties writer Rebecca Johnson refers to? They include a recent stint in rehab for alcohol abuse—a habit that began when Stone tried drinking to lose weight. In a sentence so callous that I can't quite believe it's in print, Johnson says this:

Her problems—if you can even call them that—recall the poet Rilke's definition of fame as the collection of misunderstandings that gather around a person.

Got that? Stone's drinking was reminiscent of Rilke, and not, say, indicative of a destructive atmosphere in the fashion world.

“People still tell me I’m fat, but when I look in the mirror, that’s not what I see.”

Maybe Wintour and Elbaz are on to something: why would a woman aspire to be a model when this is how models are treated?

Stone’s recent surge in prominence may well lead to a positive shift in attitudes—but until then, it’s disheartening to see her continually treated like a size-four sideshow.  Her shape makes her an anomaly in the fashion world, but by focusing on her "fat" size-four body, magazines seem to overlook that she's an anomaly in the real world, too.

Related: What W Really Thinks About Women's Bodies

W: Death Does Not Become Her

Good news, fashionistas! Death doesn't mean forsaking your love of cutting-edge fashion. Just take a look at W's September issue, which features scads of stylish women who just happen to be posed as if they've died or are dying a painful, violent death. Apparently, Gucci and the Grim Reaper need not be mutually exclusive.

From Steven Klein's "Academy," here's the classic just-barely-hanging-on-to-life pose. If this were a movie, she'd have reached up and grabbed the fence with her last breath. Lara Stone really rocks that deathly pallor, doesn't she?

From "Woodstock," photographed by Juergen Teller, actress Jennifer Jason Leigh sprawls on a pool deck in a manner suggesting a struggle:

 

Then we have the snakebite victim:

The woman who is awfully happy about her children lying slain next to her:

A vehicular manslaughter:

From "Sunday in the Park," shot by Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott, two limp women in lingerie:

 

And the all-important disposal of the evidence (an unsettling postscript to this photo of happier times in the canoe):

"Paper Bag Princess," photographed by Craig McDean, takes literally the maxim about fashion to die for:

Is slumping against a wall, limbs askew, supposed to be chic?

Evidently!

 

And let's not forget Lanvin's charmless death-by-cats ad, shot by Steven Meisel.

 

Perhaps these portrayals aren't meant to invoke death, but the women in these photos appear weak, helpless, and stripped of their agency. What's the intended message? "Hey, ladies, the last outfit you'll ever wear should be special!"

It's no coincidence that these pictorials were shot by male photographers. Whether these images are the result of lazy art direction, latent sexism, or some other motive, I can't say. But men don't live every day shadowed by the specter of random violence. Women are taught to walk in groups, carry our keys poking through our fingers as a makeshift weapon, and scream "Fire!" instead of "Help!" because no one pays attention to the latter. When you've been indoctrinated that your personal safety is constantly in jeopardy, photographs implying danger are not arty or deep. They're the embodiment of your worst fears.

Maybe that's why photographers find such tableaux so appealing. But dead women in designer clothes isn't a fashion statement, and normalizing violence against women in the pages of a women's magazine doesn't make for edgy editorial. It just makes us fashion victims.

Related: W Redefines "Fashion Victim" in Furry Photo Spread

The 5 Ways Glamour Undermines Its Size-12 Self-Acceptance Message

There’s been quite a bit of discussion recently about the photo of model Lizzi Miller in September’s Glamour. See, Lizzi has something that rarely appears in fashion glossies: a non-concave stomach. So readers—in the apparent joy of seeing a body that remotely resembles their own in a magazine—have sent letter after letter of praise to Glamour HQ.

In her blog, editor-in-chief Cindi Leive mentions Glamour’s “commitment to celebrating all kinds of beauty,” which makes me wonder whether she even reads her own magazine. I’ll give credit where credit is due: this photo and the overwhelming response give me a little hope. But a photo—even this photo—isn’t enough.

Here’s why:

1.    Lizzi Miller’s photo appears in a story called “What Everyone But You Sees About Your Body,” which is ostensibly promoting body confidence. But why illustrate this piece with a plus-size model? The implication is that larger women are the ones who need this advice, because, you know, skinny females apparently pop out of the womb bursting with self-confidence.

2.    Leive describes Miller as a non-supermodel whose body is “wait for it…normal,” as if she (Leive) has nothing to do with the models who populate every other page of the magazine. Yeah, I’m pretty sure it isn’t readers who clamor for a parade of sylphs month after month.

3.    The hubbub over Miller doesn’t just mean they’ve done something positive. It means Glamour is failing its readers. If a single photo has generated such a response, then the magazine isn’t regularly depicting the women it purportedly speaks to. A picture of a plus-size model shouldn’t be a favor to readers. It should be a frequent way of representing them—not to the exclusion of slender women, but alongside and equal with them.

4.    If I could say one word to Cindi Leive, it would be this: “context.” A plus-size model in Glamour is great. Loving your body is fantastic. But the positive message is diluted by the rest of this issue’s content: a “Health Answers, Please!” column about weight-loss supplements, a feature called “Beware the 1,140-Calorie Breakfast,” the usual spate of super-thin models, and in “Your Instant Whole-Body Makeover,” the warning that poor posture “can even make you look like you’ve gained a few pounds.” The horror! Here’s a thought: Stop fear-mongering about fat and maybe there wouldn’t be a need for articles about self-acceptance. Which brings me to...

5.    Leive’s blog post completely fails to acknowledge that Glamour is complicit in this situation. You know why it’s refreshing to see a model who looks like Miller? Because we so rarely see anyone who looks like her in any fashion magazine. Sure, Glamour is leagues beyond Vogue or W in terms of body-type diversity, but that’s damning with faint praise.   

What do you think?

Related: What W Really Thinks About Women’s Bodies

Lowest Common Denominator: Glamour, September

3: Number of exclamation points in the coverline touting the Jessica Simpson story

$13,000: Value of “stuff you want” that Glamour is giving away, per page 64

1: Number of days editor-in-chief Cindi Leive’s assistant spent dressed as Lady Gaga for the “Dare of the Month”

3.5: Time, in minutes, before most women would be sent home from the office if they showed up in fishnets and a leotard

So, so much: Amount I covet the Hugo Boss bag in the ad following page 78

12: Size clothing worn by model Crystal Renn, whose book, Hungry, is reviewed in “Do Get the Season’s Stylish Reads Here,” complete with an excerpt of a “moment we love”

Perhaps 1: Number of size-12 models photographed by Glamour for this issue (keep reading)

2009: Year in which Glamour apparently thinks red lipstick was invented, given their extravagant praise of the stuff on page 89

3: Pages of lipstick ads surrounding the aforementioned feature (1 immediately before and 2 right after)

Nil: Value of the advice given by Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana to “play up your prettiest parts.” Really? I shouldn’t highlight my worst features?

100: Page on which Faith Hill recommends Coldplay. You know, they’re that obscure new band you might otherwise have never heard of?

100: Coincidentally, also the page on which I lost my patience with mega-rich celebrities sharing their “knowledge.” See also: why I don’t subject myself to GOOP

50: Percent of men surveyed by Glamour who told the magazine they “groom their privates”

15: Age, approximate, at which I last used the word “privates” non-ironically

1987: Year in which pleated high-waisted pants, like those shown on page 116, should remain. What’s next, paperbag waists?

Zero: Amount the use of “Kate Moss” as a verb, as in “11 Touches That ‘Kate Moss’ Your Wardrobe” on page 133, should be tolerated. Please stop. Now.

5: Number of “fantasies he’s having about you right now” and suggested “real way[s] to romance a guy,” as detailed in the “Men, Sex & Love” section

194: Page you should turn to right now to see a model who actually might be a size 12

+1: Points for featuring Robin Givhan in “Meet the Woman on Michelle Watch”

-10: Points for the article not actually being about Givhan, despite its title

35: Percent of survey respondents who think cover star Jessica Simpson should reunite with ex-husband Nick Lachey

Infinite: My astonishment that people actually have an opinion about who Jessica Simpson should date

0: Approximate number of Americans other than me who have neither read nor seen any part of the Twilight series. Four of the films’ stars appear in a beauty feature called—what else?—“Twilight Beauty”

+1: For including a same-sex pair in “Secrets of Happy Couples”

2,497: Estimated appearances of Clinique’s Dramatically Different Moisturizing Lotion in stories similar to “24 Best Beauty Buys Now”

36: Financial tips dispensed in “Your Money,” starting on page 268

Not surprisingly, 0: Recommendations in the aforementioned article to invest in clothes or shoes

4: Violent incidents mentioned in “Sex with a Stranger”

1: Number of men in the same article confessing to “really want[ing] to kill” a woman because she wouldn’t have sex with him

5: Meals actress Meryl Streep claims to get from a single chicken in “Hey, Glamour Readers! Julia Child is Making You Dinner”

What W Really Thinks About Women's Bodies

This is model Lara Stone on the cover of the August issue of W.

 

This is Lara Stone modeling inside that same issue.

And this is Lara Stone in her underwear, also from the August issue.

These are some of the terms used to describe Lara Stone in the editor's letter and the article “Fashion’s It Girl”:

• “a little meat on her bones” (W’s deputy editor, Julie L. Belcove)
• “voluptuous frame”  (the article’s author, Sarah Haight)
• “a mix of a warrior and Brigitte Bardot” (designer Isabel Marant)
• “her body…a refreshing aesthetic shift away from the prepubescent boy figure that has lately dominated fashion” (Haight)
• “big, bad and beautiful” (photographer Bruce Weber)

And this is how Lara Stone describes her own body:

“A lot of people say it’s nice to see someone who won’t break in half when you touch them,” she says… “But I am still a woman and a person, and if you’re compared and confronted with your colleagues, and they’re all half your size, you think, F---, I’m really fat! And then on other days, I’m like, Oh, I’m not that bad.”

“Not that bad”? A woman who makes money posing in her underwear is “not that bad”?

The fashion industry—and, in turn, the fashion media—have such a warped concept of slimness that a model like Lara Stone is so much larger than her contemporaries that they feel the need to explain her presence. If Stone’s body is such an outlier, what does that say about the rest of us?

Worse, the magazine saw fit to issue the disclaimer that Stone “is, it should be noted, a very lithe five foot ten.” Why, yes, do note that! As if there’s the slightest chance someone is going to look at these photos and think Stone needs to, like, slow down on the Cheetos.

The article mentions multiple times that her look is a modeling-world anomaly. And that gives editors, photographers, and designers the chance to explain why they hired her—which is really just a whole lot of self-congratulatory masturbation about how open-minded they are, like they have to somehow justify (to us!) casting a woman whose ribs don't poke out above her cleavage. Yeah, they’re real body-image mavericks. What a revolution. If they truly believed that Stone’s shape is so enviable, why the need for justification? If the “meat on her bones” is so praiseworthy, why don’t we see more models with “meat”?

Her figure may be in vogue, but the rest of us have to live with our bodies no matter what magazines deem the ideal shape of the moment. Perhaps the industry could stop treating Stone like a freakshow long enough to realize how very hypocritical it is to praise her curves and how insulting it is to us when they’re compelled to rationalize featuring a woman with hips and a bustline. We have those. We get it.

Clearly, the fashion industry doesn’t.

Related: The Language of Magazines: Is “Curvy” Completely Meaningless?

Lucky Thinks You Have the Body of a Model

The cover of Lucky’s August issue claims it features “The Best Jeans for Your Body—Ever!”

Unfortunately, it looks like the footnote to that coverline was omitted in what was surely a grievous copyediting error. After perusing the fashion spread in question, I’m certain that cover line should have read:

The Best Jeans for Your Body—Ever*

*if you are 5’11” and weigh 125 pounds

See, unlike most features that bill themselves as suggesting clothes “for your body” and therefore present at least a token range of body types, Lucky depicts only a slender model, head and torso cropped out of the frame, wearing the featured jeans. Ah, yes, it's the time-honored fashion magazine tradition of publishing cover lines that bear no resemblance to the article! 

So if you are very tall and your thighs don’t touch, you’re in luck! Not under contract with Ford Models? Lucky does not acknowledge your existence. Or your need for well-fitting pants. 

To be fair, the feature does include plenty of advice about how jeans should fit for optimum flattery. But is there a pair of snug pink straight-legs on earth that would look good on anyone but a model? (That's an actual example from page 115.)

While “The Lucky Guide to Denim” lacks body-type diversity, it does feature a range of denim trends. Some highlights:

Studded: Lucky calls these “unapologetically punky” and “a bit dangerous”—and nothing says punky and dangerous like $460 Just Cavalli denim!

Shredded: Ooh, jeans that are “all-out destroyed” are “rebellious.” What exactly are bleached and slashed jeans rebelling against? Pants that are, like, intact?

Dark, clean skinny: Says Lucky, these are the “ultimate day-to-night jean.” And they certainly are, if you work at a fashion magazine and jeans constitute appropriate office attire.

At the end of the guide, there's a promotion for an online video offering “tips on how to look great in jeans.” But why bother watching it? According to this feature, looking fantastic is simple. Just be genetically blessed and let the pants do the rest!