Fibonacci's Scrunchie
An idiot's mathematical guide to accessorizing
There are so many things I can’t believe we still don’t know. We don’t know how whales sleep. We don’t know how to fabricate birth control pills that don’t make me want to kill myself. There’s not one New York restaurant owner who knows how to match the dimensions of their two-top tables to their satellite dish-sized entree plates. And we don’t know how to make a single t-shirt that isn’t made to fit the body of a cheese stick.
That last one has been true since at least my pre-adolescence, when my wardrobe consisted of 85% complimentary rec soccer Gildans. Every one of them was long and slim, shaped to get hitched on my belly and hang to my knees, long enough to obscure all but the bottom inch of my loudly-plaided Bermuda shorts.
But I didn’t fret. I fretted about other stuff, for sure, like my arm hair and my parents’ ban on the Sims, but not about this. My maxi-length Purple Team jersey was not a problem, but an opportunity. A chance to, with the proper technique and know-how, elevate everything I had going on to near transcendence. In the way of my people, all eight-year-olds with the same predisposition, I would gather the excess shirt at my right hip between curled finger and thumb, fasten it with one of my 150 ponytail holders, et voilà — I was the hottest girl in the entire world (do not ask for pictures).
However rudimentary, I count this among my first forays into Styling — my love for getting dressed in its most nascent stage. I still can’t let a shirt just be a shirt, I feel all but naked in even the “Best” basics. As a runoff of my general disposition (a lack of the sophistication inherent to minimalism + a pervasive need for some semblance of individuality + wanting to have the Most Fun Possible at all times), I cannot leave the house without adding some third thing, some accent piece, some little garnish to mess around with.
But even beyond acting as an indicator of my contemporary styling sentiments, the t-shirt side-pony would also prove prescient as to where I believe the essential lines of styling should always be drawn. While the waiters at every sexy new high-concept dining experience look completely flummoxed to find absolutely no room to fit two kale caesars, we have known innately, forever, that asymmetry is inherent to beauty. Michelangelo knew it when he carved David poised in contrapposto. John Thomas Smith knew it when he articulated his Rule Of Thirds — that a photo’s focus should never be central within its composition, not even close.
That flaccid loop of fabric cocked at my side would prove the first point in the golden rule of natural composition. From there springs a spiral from hip, diagonally up my torso to my chest, curving at my opposite waist and dipping just below my belly button. And it’s along these edges that my compulsion to accessorize persists. I’m picturing the snail-shell shape of the Fibonacci sequence and I’m tossing clothes around its curves.
And so my mathematical outfit theory is born: that every garment has the potential to unlock geometrical perfection, and that the map laid by the golden ratio is the essential guide — wrist (1), chest (2), waist (3), hip (4). I made a list of all my favorite ways to adorn every point, and if you see me without at least one point covered call the doctor and the police. I’m either deathly ill or someone has medically altered themselves to look like me and I don’t trust they’ll use that power for good.
In-Your-Face Scrunchies (Fibonacci 1)
Ever since I found it at the Last Ever Mara Hoffman sample sale, my big red scrunchie has served as my most prevalent accent piece and emotional support. Like an adult pacifier to me.
Mara Hoffman is dead, (the brand, not the founder, who posts so much zany shit on Instagram it is impossible to forget she is alive), and thus so are any twins to my scrunchie, but so many scrunchies will do. My favorite purveyors are Maryam Nassir Zadeh and Merrma Earth and Charlie Beads.
Flower Brooches (Fibonacci 2, 4)
When people ask where I’m from I say it’s complicated because technically I was physically born in Charlottesville, Virginia but spiritually I was born during my summer abroad in Copenhagen, do you get that? I can explain it more if — oh you want me to shut the hell up? Okay skål!
I went back for the first time since college last September and it was there that, with my belly full of grød, I found the next accessory that would change my life at Damernes Magasin. The Nørrebro shop makes and sells the most perfect silk roses, fashioned to be worn as hair clips, neck ties, belts, and brooches. The latter is my most preferred, eat your heart out Carrie Bradshaw.
I wore it every day I wasn't wearing my scrunchie until I took it to see The Nutcracker and lost it in all the excitement of those white leggings (y’all know the ones if you know the ones.)
Very honorable mention: My friend and genius most fashionable person I know
wears this brooch in a way that blows my mind. She just wrote about all of her favorite brooches in her debut (!) Substack predicting the return of ‘80s fashion. READ THAT.Pony Ribbons (Fibonacci 2, 4)
Post leggings-induced tragedy my black silk flower brooch awakened in me an obsession with the power of big pins, leaving me primed and ready for the release of this perfect thing by Sandy Liang. But that’s $200 and now completely sold out. Why do that when you can be like me and get seven the genuine articles off eBay for like $10?
I need to get off my a** and order the necessary tools to add little pins to the back of each of these (and the actually 12 others that I own) but until I then I’m hooking them to collars and pockets.
Silk Scarves (Fibonacci 3)
Among the top-three most formative aspects of my college experience (the other two being aforementioned summer in to Copenhagen and like… clinical depression), Man Repeller and
in many ways made me who I am. Even now, she brought a whole new joie to getting dressed with that scarf trick. When folded in a triangle over button downs and dresses, under t-shirts and jackets, the effects are transformative. They add shape and color where once woefully absent.
Looking for my perfect scarf acts as a beautiful and uncomplicated Rorschach test. There’s no need to consider fit or use case. All I have to do is stare for four seconds to ascertain if the colors and pattern make me :) and if they do I’m adding to my Etsy collection (entitled “I think I’m gonna scarf”). There are really good options on eBay, too, and some overpriced ones on The RealReal.
Aprons (Fibonacci 3)
These have been a new and gripping obsession, spurred on by gifts from two of my best friends. For Christmas, Juliana (from before!) gave me a brick red suede fringe apron, about eight inches long, with a tiny patch pocket and snaps that fasten at my back waist. It’s my favorite accessory I own, rivaled only by the crocheted apron
got me for my birthday. Isabel just wrote a heavily researched and delightful letter on the history of aprons and you should read it right here.
I looked everywhere for something even remotely close to my perfect suede fringe apron belt and found only these three $$ options from YSL, Saint Laurent and Herve Masson. It is heartening that they at least exist. Meanwhile Etsy boasts a beautiful glut of crocheted aprons I love and want.
That’s all of them! Love you mean it say it back:
Pony Recommends:
Y’all that show that everyone is talking about… Lemme talk about it. Adolescence on Netflix left me jaw on the floor every single episode. I thought it was so unbelievably well acted and poignant and gripping and the whole one-shot thing is like !!!!!!. Seriously don’t ask me to do an impression of the dad’s accent :P I haven’t even been practicing.
I went to Welcome Home this Sunday with my friend Sarah and we got the olive oil cake and a bread pudding to share. The olive oil cake was good, but the bread pudding was slap your mom unbelievably amazing. We were both taking bites looking at each other with tears welling in our eyes like in Holes when Zero and Stanley have those peaches on the mountain after eating only onions for forever.
I’m so back on my RealReal grind and of course experience malaise and ennui like 75% of my time spent shoveling through the slough of sleeveless tops styled accidentally styled as skirts and way-too-expensive Prada sweaters that look like they’ve been sitting in swamp water. I have a new favorite search term, though, that has exponentially improved my enjoyment — filtering for my size in “vintage - unbranded” unearths the kookiest, most delightful garments imaginable, all distinctly weird and anti-trend. It is so fun I want these effed up things.
I’ve made this salmon salad for myself before, intending on having it for work lunches, but it’s one of those recipes that is actually too refined for that treatment. It is bastardized in tupperware and begs to be properly plated. I had my friend Heather over for dinner this weekend and cooked it for us then and put it in a special dish and it shone. As with anything that calls for radishes, it is perfect special spring meal.
I made all of the effing collages in this newsletter on Zeen! It is a brand new app run by really nice people that just launched today (OMG). They were sweet enough to invite me to try it out early (brag) and I sincerely love using it. You can have three months of premium membership through this special link they gave me cuz they love me (I’m projecting) and because I love you (THAT is a fact).
LOVE! i like learning what a summer in Copenhagen, clinical depression, and Man Repeller have in common. + feels divinely planned that i'm wearing a big ass scrunchie today
This post was so much fun!!! I’m trying your technique today <3