Back To Black:
On Readying
Your Wardrobe For Fall

Fashion — Oct 10

Fashion — Oct 10

So, there’s this rumor that New Yorkers wear all black. It’s true — we do. But ask any city slicker just why they shirk color and there are plenty of brash, valid reasons.

For example, black calls to mind power, eroticism, elegance, timelessness — just a few feelings that New Yorkers popularly identify with.

And the city itself is pretty dirty anyway. Valerie Steele, author and director at the Museum of Fashion at the Fashion Institute of Technology, once mused to the Times that, while color is a way to project a certain image of oneself, New Yorkers are far too pragmatic: “New York City is also a city of stone and black looks good in this environment. It wouldn’t look the same in a sunny Los Angeles milieu.” What she means is: You’ll be hard pressed to find a New Yorker wearing white (exclusively) and leaning against a subway door.

Like any uniform, however, there are detractors. And a lot of fashion folk, New York or elsewhere, still think an all-black look is, for lack of better words, uninspiring.

To those who say non, we raise our picks for how to take an all-black getup from drab to fab. Be it a Giannico mule, in all of its crystal glory or an Aspinal of London bag, in croc embossed leather, there’s luxury to be found in an arsenal of all-black accessories. And, to even nonbelievers that an all-black uniform isn’t just a style but a lifestyle, everyone can agree that the finer details go a long way. Shop our favorite styles here and across OliviaPalermo.com.

Credits Photographed by Jonathon Kambouris; Styled by Linden Elstran.
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