Jezebel
The Urban Outfitters Summer catalog has hit mailboxes and there's a world of ugly inside. Oh, not everything is hideous, but there are a few things — sure to be seen on your local hipster — that just seem cringe-inducing. High-waisted shorts, lacy underwear as outerwear, Soviet-era shoes? The offenders, after the jump.
1. A bikini with a face on the butt.
One question: Is this an upgrade or a downgrade from having "Juicy" on your ass?
Insight Tura bikini, $88
2. Candy-colored sunglasses.
There's nothing wrong with fun sunglasses. Especially during summer, for crying out loud! It's a time to be silly. But maybe the Olsens, Kiki Dunst and Ashlee Simpson have ruined them? Or maybe it's the brain-dead expression on this model's face. I'm suspicious of colorful frames now. I think maybe they render you dumb.
Crystal frame sunglasses, $$18; neon gradient sunglasses, $14; twilght aviators, $14; golden ratio sunglasses, $14.
3. High-waisted short-shorts.
This seems self-explanatory. When there is more fabric above the crotch than below, you've got a problem.
Top: Covet Bamboo highrise short, $98
Bottom: Lux cult classic short, $48.
4. A lace leotard.
An item named after a David Lynch movie is always going to be problematic.
Wild at heart one-piece, $28.
5. Hideous shoes.
Come on, people. Is ugly is the new pretty? Is 1979 East German chic all the rage?
Top: Zabriskie boot, $78; entwined T-strap flat, $48.
Bottom: C2 elements sandal, $158; encircled sandal, $38; infinity sandal, $38; Bernson gladiator sandals, $175.
Earlier: Urban Outfitters, Free People & Anthropologie: What's The Difference?
Urban Outfitters: Sequins, High-Waisted Trousers & The Return Of The Miserable Model
The New Urban Outfitters: I Want To Sell You This Skirt But My Dog Just Died
Comments
I really hate the gladiator sandals, very few feet look good in these sandals.
Whoo hoo --- polterwang-inducing shorts and cankle shoes. No wonder I need the sunglasses so I don't see what I'm wearing.
The high-waisted short-shorts kept striking me a couple years back, but a dedicated coalition of Lower East Side waitresses seem to have brought me around to liking them. I mean, file with the earlier post about retro swimsuits: it's pleasantly Gidget-y.
ok, the lace leotard is fucking hot. anything named after a david lynch movie is going to be AWESOME. additionally, high-waisted shorts look slammin on some, but having no waist personally, i cannot endorse.
I am NOT wearing high waisted shorts. I don't want my crotch to look hungry.
My ray bans from last year were forcibly removed from my posession and I was told I'm not allowed to wear them anymore. So I'm going to buy a pair of those brown tinted old lady 70's sunglasses.
The second dress is cute but I'd kind of like to have a waist this year.
Yes, but does the lace leotard have a snap-crotch??
I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say I actually think the panda bear butt is kinda cute, but girl's gotta have an awesome butt to pull it off.
I hate that shirt she's wearing more. But mostly because I hate shirts that look like normal tees and then turn out to be backless. It's like "hey, let's cover you up but then make it impossible for you to wear a bra." Well fuck that, I like wearing bras.
High wasted anything just seems really unflattering to me.
also, anything that causes people to look at my but is bad.
I swear I saw the model in #4 in that outfit.
COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT!!!
So that's what the Blair Witch looks like. Prettier than I expected, but if I had on that outfit I'd be hiding in the woods too.
The sandals in the bottom left corner of the last picture remind me of the hissing dinosaur in Jurassic Park, you know, the one that spits out poison? Ugh.
i have a theory that when the economy starts hitting the skids, ugly-pretty becomes the style. granted, my only evidence are zubas and high waisted shorts, but still.
Those bamboo high waist shorts are made even worse by the pleats.
OMG, does anyone remember the high waisted shorts/jeans with the foldover triangular flaps?! Express used to have them in like 1988 or so. Fucking hideous. I really hope UO brings that shit back for my own personal amusement.
fug.
alls around.
Second dress; I kan haz?
Formal shorts; DEATH TO YOU!
I'm impressed they managed to fit so many fashion mistakes in so little material on the first pair of high-waisted shorts.
Pleats, unflattering cut, badly placed puffy pockets, yolking, tight crotch, mulitpal denim covered buttons. It's like they were trying to get them all out on one garmet.
Maybe they had a bet.
Fashion has officially passed me by. I think it started with skinny jeans on non-skinny people like myself. If these are my options, I'll stick to my bootcut jeans and resign myself to hipsters calling me "M'am."
@blackbirdfly:
No pls
OMG, I had those brown t-strap shoes when I was in high school. Oh, the 80s....fashion I really, truly, don't EVER want to repeat. If they put blazers with huge shoulder pads on them with the shorts, it would complete the outfit. And they'd be starring in Working Girl
That's a seriously creepy face on those panties.
I was SO disappointed when I got this yesterday! UO always delivers the cute shoes, but there were none in this catalog. Boo-urns.
I spend all of my summer days in stark forest settings wearing my fedora, so I can personally relate to this catalogue.
You know why all the ugly? Because these peeps are in Philadelphia, and as polled earlier this year, ain't nothin' pretty 'round these parts.
:)
The bikini butt face is a downgrade because it costs $88. No thanks, UO. Getting my cheap on at Old Navy this year.
@megnificent: Ugh, that will constantly come unsnapped. I had a long torso and large chest during the leotards day of the early 90's...very difficult area to use a saftey pin...
I like the sunglasses. I got similar ones in pearl white last weekend, and I'm in love.
Two things I'm guilty of: always wearing high wasted shorts and always being highly wasted. TERRIBLE COMBO! Shockingly, I've yet to pee my short pants.
Pretty sure that ugly has been the new pretty for a few years now!
When I first saw the face on the butt I thought it was cute because I thought it was an animal, and I thought it was underwear. Now I realize it's neither, and mostly just disturbing.
I went shopping at an Urban Outfitters with a friend of mine from High School with whom I no longer have anything in common-- we thought it was cool when we were sixteen, and we had to pass the time somehow-- and you know what? I got some cute things, and those things are all big compliment winners. They have okay stuff! And I would totally wear those shorts.
Like the shoes, and the lace leotard is not that bad. At least their stuff is not the boring over-hyped stuff at department stores and such.
I'm kind of on the fence with the C2 elements sandals. They're kind of awesome.
B-b-but having a gigantic face on my ass is like, the way I deter enemies! It's nature! It's SCIENCE.
They should just change their name to "Suburban Outfitters" already. No one in the city dresses that badly, and only suburban kids using Daddy's credit card are going to buy an ugly-a** bikini costing $88.
i kind of like the face bikini. now if only it was a particular face we could custom order.... :)
i also like the white sandals. they're not tooooo glatiatorish in my opinion. The high waisted pants, shorts, etc. have got to goooo. If those toothpick moddles looks wide in them... the rest of us don't stand a chance.
@ForeverBlueGirl: Or are they the gladiator ones? Anyway the wonked out looking ones.
i just brought the $38 sandal and i've been getting nothing but compliments.
love urban but it doesn't mean that i have to like everything in their catalog.
they look so unhappy. it is a nice day they are getting paid but you can tell they are all thinking "i really hope no one see's me in this crap"
High waisted shorts are just WRONG. And are those suspenders pictured with the dark denim ones? The apocalypse is nigh.
The sandals on the left with the circular thingies look like they were patterned after old fabric coasters...no arch support. Ugh-lee.
Usually I'm a steadfast opponent of words-on-the-butt, but I actually like that bathing suit. Not that I would EVER pay that much for something I'd wear 2x a year, max.
@eleanorstrousers: I'm with you.
Also, I wore a lace leaotard like that back in 1988, with a black bolero jacket. My semester-abroad roommates said I sould life my arms up whilst ordering my usual pint so they could all drink free. I nixed that idea.
You know what high waists mean to me? BLOAT. They cut me off right where my gut needs to do its processing.
That whole shoot just makes me itchy, and annoyed. What a shitty place to go and hang out especially in 1991 Z Cavaricci shorts.
@langtry: Oh those leotards! So uncomfortable, yet we thought we were so sexy! I'm old.
That second model looks like she's been cast in a zombie movie directed by Christian Dior.
!@langtry: Damn, I can't type for shite today! Should have read ...
I wore a lace leotard like that back in 1988, with a black bolero jacket. My semester-abroad roommates said I should lift my arms up whilst ordering my usual pint so they could all drink free. I nixed that idea.
@Kittenish: As I said, it was 1988 and I was a sophomore at Syracuse's London program. Damn, I miss those days, and my youth!
Give your baby, Beau, a kiss for me. I love seeing his picture whenever you post!
On the plus side, you can legitimately call someone in that bikini an assface.
@tonightineed: @