Can I Have Your Closet: Taylor Morgan

It's back! The beloved "Can I Have Your Closet" segment has returned, and with a vengeance. I mean, it doesn't have any particularly evil intentions, except to totally bug you out with the two new questions I added to the interview. And the awesome new people I've met and subsequently recruited for the task. Up first, we have Taylor Morgan.

I had seen Taylor meandering through the halls of my school for about a year and a half, secretly admiring her fearlessly imaginative sartorial choices. She is a year older than me, so naturally I assumed that she was a billion times cooler than me. My suspicions were confirmed when, after finally working up the courage to talk to her and ask her to do this with me, we conducted the interview and photoshoot in Lincoln Center during Fashion Week. Taylor gave amazing answers and went off on more than a few tangents, which I sadly could not include in this post due to the fact that the daunting length of the interview would have deemed it unreadable. She was also very honest and open, not shying away from the more invasive questions. Since the question-and-answer portion is so long, I won't say any more about Taylor. Her responses provide you with more information than a silly blurb written by me ever could.

Odelia: How would you describe your style?

Taylor: I'm really interested in Americana and the fifties...Actually, all 20^th century women's fashion. I really love older clothes. It sounds kinda stereotypical, but... Fifties would probably be my favorite. I guess I'd say costume-y is sort of what I go for.

Odelia: Who are your fashion icons and who do you admire aesthetically?

Taylor: It'll probably be characters from movies, even though it should be like, fashion designers. I like costume designers, like Edith Head, from the sixties, she's really cool. Her style was basic, I guess it was the costumes that she made... David Bowie, for sure. Glam rock is awesome but I can't really pull it off as well as I'd like to. Everybody in Rebel Without a Cause, and all the people in Norman Rockwell paintings.

Odelia: Where are your favorite places to shop?

Taylor: Reminiscence is a thrift store in Chelsea and it's really awesome, because they've been around for years and years, since the seventies, so they're not too full of themselves with all the vintage stuff. Salvation Army... I don't really shop, other than that. I guess for the essentials I'd say Gap.

Odelia: Gap is great. That's where I got this little guy (in reference to denim jacket). If you could own one or more items right now that you don't have, what would it or they be?

Taylor: Platform shoes, for sure. I've been looking for good seventies platform shoes forever, and they're not anywhere to be found.

(A small interlude during which we discussed how often we say 'um' and 'like.')

Odelia: Do you have a specific style in mind, like the ideal shoe, the one where if you were to find it, you would be like, “Ugh, yes!”

Taylor: There's this one that I saw, it exists somewhere, but in a museum some place. It's like a loafer, but with platforms, and in the center is a star, and then around the star, stripes coming out of it. But it's dark purple and white, so it's not too much. I guess too much would be bright pink.

Odelia: Or crazy metallic neon sparkles.

Taylor: Ugh, I hate neon.

Odelia: Yeah, I can't handle it. When that was a big thing a while ago...

Taylor: But I really like roller disco, which now is thought of as neon, but it wasn't all neon. They had cool stuff going on.

Odelia: Subdued neon.

Taylor: Classier neon. Is that even a thing?

(Another longer interlude during which Taylor related a story about going to a fashion show at ABC Carpet & Home and seeing Ke$ha there, and also being mistaken for Tavi Gevinson at the same event, which then led to a discussion about the tribulations and perks of fashion blogging.)

Odelia: Would you say that fashion is a big focus in your life?

Taylor: That is a good question. 'Cause I'm actually asking myself that a lot now. For the longest time, I knew that I wanted to be a fashion designer, and then a costume designer, and now I might not be interested in that anymore.

Odelia: That's what happened to me this year! That's what I wanted to do my whole life, and I was like, “This is like, working up to my dream!” and now it's more, “Wait, what, I don't wanna do this...”

Taylor: I've been told by everybody that I should do illustration. But then the minute I start being into illustration, I come into school wearing this and I get all these compliments, and it's like, “This is awesome! I should do this more!” And they're like, “Wow, you should--” Well, one teacher told me today that I have a 'gift,' and I was like, “Oh my God.” But then I'll sew something and it'll be a bag, and it's supposed to be a dress, and I'm like, “I'm definitely doing illustration.” I think it [fashion] would be a focus, but I'm just not sure how much of a focus I will keep it. Maybe I could illustrate fashion. Ah, that's like the same thing. Fashion designers do illustrate. Who knows.

Odelia: How would you describe personal style?

Taylor: I guess what you feel good in, matched with whether you think good thoughts when you see it. I feel confident when I like what I'm wearing, for sure. Maybe if you would like what you're wearing on someone else.

Odelia: That's interesting, I've never heard that before. How would you feel that high school has influenced your sartorial choices?

Taylor: I decided that I wanted to walk out of my house dressing well in sixth grade, but I guess that was my bad experimental phase. I had some good things, but I'm really glad I didn't have to deal with that in high school. I found myself in middle school so I could start high school already pretty much being set on what I wore and how I was. I guess I'm less prudish now. That would be one thing from high school. It's actually gone the opposite way: I wore lipstick and stuff in eighth grade and freshman year, and then I stopped. And I wore push-up bras, and I stopped. And I wore tons of skirts. In freshman year I had a boyfriend, and suddenly I was super feminine because of that. But now I have a girlfriend, and I've decided that, I don't know, in my head, it's the time to be more masculine, which is really a weird concept I guess. I've been doing a lot of suits. Today is sort of an exception.

Odelia: But there is a tie. That's a really cool tie. Did you buy that or make that?

Taylor: I made it. It's pleather. I tried to make a whole jacket, which kinda worked but not really, so I was like, “Well, I still have the fabric, I'll make a tie.”

Odelia: That's so cool! I have some pleather in my house because in seventh grade we had to do these colonial projects and I was stuck with shoemaking. I had wanted to do clothing, and I was like, “Wow, this sucks,” but then I read about it and it was actually really cool. So I wrote seventeen-page paper on colonial shoemaking. I'm kind of like an expert on colonial shoemaking, so I have a bunch of pleather just lying around my house. At first I thought it was really dorky, but it's actually super helpful. The other day my friend's shoe broke and I was like, “Oh you can just get an awl and whipstitch it,” and she was like, “What the hell are you talking about.” Anyway. Do you have anything else to say?

Taylor: Follow your dreams! [Laughs] No, that's not my last statement. I don't think I have anything else to say. 

[Photos by me.]

The skirt and the tie were made by her. Not only is she really good at dressing herself in clothing designed by other people, she can also create a look that is entirely her own. Ah, the joys of sewing. 

She's only a few garments away from completing her Sandy from Grease look.

It was approximately thirty degrees Farenheit while I was photographing her. I'm not really sure how she managed to stay in one piece without cracking into a billion Taylor-ice-cubes.

I forgot how much fun it is to talk to people about their personal style. People are really interesting and kewl! (Some of them)

Come back next Monday to see and read the pictures and verbal musings of my friend Alina Peña, who's basically the coolest, babeliest, and feminist (heh) chick I know. 

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