When I entered the event, I fully expected to be greeted with expressions of confusion and dismay. Maybe a few are you okays? But my friend Shauna barely batted an eyelid. “Are they Balenciaga?” she asked, nonplussed, referring to this absolutely battered and destroyed £1,950 pair. When I told her they weren’t she nodded and then passed me a spicy marg, before launching into the evening’s itinerary. Nobody else mentioned my outfit. “Do you like my jeans?” I pressed one girl eventually. “Ooh, very nice,” she said vacantly, before pointing to the stains. “Although I thought that was car oil.” In a way, I felt flattered: my friends assumed that I could A) afford Balenciaga, and B) casually fix a car before attending a party. Both were sort of good?
Maybe this wasn’t the best place to be road-testing these jeans. My friends are used to me doing experiments in the name of content. No, I needed to go out into the real world, to navigate the mean streets and offices and saloons of London. I needed to see if I could pull off these jeans in public.
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First stop was a facial, at The Ardour Clinic in Marylebone, where I was sure someone would give me side eye for showing up in such a state. But nobody really payed any attention. Not even when I went into the pristine waiting room and laid across the couch. My facialist did ever so slightly twitch when I sat on the adjustable salon chair in the jeans, but that might have just been a trick of the light. Really, she was more interested in talking to me about microneedling. On the Tube home, too, there was a distinct lack of glances or double takes. Everyone was absorbed in their phones. They literally couldn’t care less that I was wearing these specially hand-picked jeans in the style of Romeo Beckham. I felt a bit insulted?
The following day, I decided to wear them to work, which could of course have gone one of two ways. On the one hand, I was in the Vogue office, looking like I’d just rolled in pig shit. On the other hand, I was in the Vogue office, where my colleagues have road-tested everything from Miu Miu’s sparkly knickers to Avavav’s distinctive four-toe boots and Balenciaga’s towel skirt. These mud wash jeans are small fry by comparison. Again, nobody really gave me a second glance. They were too busy replying to emails and tearing apart parcels containing skincare and water bottles. “Thoughts on jeans??” I finally demanded of my colleague Hayley, who gave me a once over and said, “Yeah, you can pull them off.” So there you have it: I can pull them off. Or, at least, I can wear them without fanfare. Which is very nearly the same thing.
