A few months ago, several people sent me links to an interview with Jane Aldridge of Sea of Shoes, depicting her as a narcissistic, clueless Mean Girl. They probably hoped I would take to my blog, going Nah nah, Jane got dissed!
My personal interest in Jane and her blog was extinguished long ago, after a staggering outpouring of abuse from her friends and associates. I appealed to Jane’s sense of decency, and she suggested that I write about something safe, “like muffins.” Finally, one of the worst trolls reluctantly agreed to stop contacting me, reporting that Jane was sick of my “whining emails.”
Thinking about Jane now, I see we’re not that different. I like to buy shoes. I buy shoes that I don’t even wear. I buy shoes that some people would find excessive and even stupid. Here is an example:
See? They are still in the box and god knows I don’t need them but I really love them.
In the spirit of solidarity with Jane, let me compliment her on her fabulous living room, pictured above. It was recently featured in a regional magazine celebrating all things Texan.
At only 20 years old, Jane has furnished her first apartment with modest but quirky good taste. She has shunned crass opulence in favor of a low key dorm room effect, perfect for a young girl on a budget. It’s a welcoming, homey living room where comfort is obviously the priority. And I love the carefully edited knick-knacks!
As a lazy slob who hasn’t even owned a full-length mirror in twenty years, I say kudos to Jane. May all her dreams come true.*
*Unless she wants a pair of those silver shoes, then no.
i agree that muffins are quite tasty, but i doubt i could eat one in that living room wtihout vomiting.
Random Fun Fact: My boyfriend and I have six of those steel wire chairs that we inherited from Wilt Chamberlain. Ours have funky Ladies Love Wilt fabric covers though. Not nearly so stylish.
Hooker in her dotage crib?
don’t blog about muffins! that can be dangerous too! some ladies take their muffins VERY seriously.
I luuuuuuuv those shoes! There’s nothing atall excessive or stupid about them. If they were size 11C I’d buy them off you. But then, 11C’s worth of shiny mirror surface might just be excessive.
When I was twenty I was still getting my furniture from the curb, being in college and everything. Wait, she doesn’t want to go to college. That explains the furniture.
Jane? Really? She is not worth mentioning unless you’re subject is entitled, self absorbed brats!
Well, as long as you don’t want to swing the cat you’d have a chance, I suppose.
And as long as you didn’t want to put a mug of coffee on those stupid tables.
I could say plenty more about this decor but I certainly don’t want to bring the trolls out of their caves again.
Jane dear, it’s all wonderful. Congrats!
In so far as I ever judge rooms, I think my main, no, my only, criteria would be, do I feel comfortable farting in this room? This room is definitely not fart-encouraging. Mind you, I could be tempted to have a go at farting through those wire-backed chairs, that could be positively musical.
I, too, admire your shoes. Simple and elegant, er, but not silver for me, just boring black!
I quite like the rug in Jane’s room, not so much the, how to call them – “sculptural accents”. And lamps. And little tables.
Completely off – topic: I’m stuck at a Miami hotel, currently writing from the lobby, hoping that my rebooked American Airlines flight to Quito will take off today. It’s HOT, rainy and humid. After 8 hours of being stuck at the Miami airport yesterday – THREE AA aircrafts had technical problems, or the AA lied to us through their teeth – my Ecuadorian next-seat companion in misery got me out of there in a record by lying that we travel together (I suspect some people are still waiting there to be rebooked). Consequently, I shared a room with my “nephew”, who provided good cheer, help and interesting conversation. Couldn’t wish for a better company. Gracias, Paul!
Oh Cricket, what an adventure.
You be careful now!
This is her space at 20???
Ugh. I have taken the wrong life path, clearly.
oh please, please take her on again.
It looks like a furniture shop…too much stuff in too little a space and none of it very happy in each others company. Porcelain cat? Gold lion? Lady with jug lamp? Window shaped mirrors? Really?
It’s a style I call “What American’s think European style is.” It really misses the mark, but I’m happy if Jane is happy.
I think it was interesting to seeing how far her trolls were prepared to go just to, hopefully, win a little more of her affection. Sycophants are such fun when they have mental health issues too.
Love the silver shoes! I have a pair that are unconventional brogues with an elongated toe. They aren’t nearly as shiny as your patent ones. Just the other day a young boy asked me if they were my wife’s? haha
my curiosity is getting the better of me, could i please have the link to this interview?
That room could induce seizures.
I just noticed, reflecting in the right hand mirror, a giant statue with a bun on it’s head : S
C’mon Jane, throw some of that shite out and buy some Missoni. Ahhh, brainwave….maybe it looks the way it does because it was all gifted. I saw pictures of Jane Mansfield’s abode yesterday…she’d been gifted, too….such an interior tragedy.
See here…
http://uncleeddiestheorycorner.blogspot.co.uk/2009/09/jayne-mansfields-house.html
Waaaaaay too much going on in that living room. It’s positively seizure-inducing. And where is the life-sized portrait of Jane Herself? Should that not be the focal point, rather than the golden naked lady lamp, or the giant porcelain cat, or the elongated pyramid, or the faux Louis XVI chairs, or the…I give up.
That Texas Monthly article about Jane was so funny, but their outrageous reaction to it (even after they themselves fact-checked it several times) was even funnier. Between that, her Palm Springs-style apartment and her tedious, boring blog, I think that at the tender age of 20, Jane Aldridge is demonstrating clear signs of early senility.
The rug’s puckered…..
I accidentally wandered into the “back stage” area at the giant, local antique mart the other day. Jane’s apartment looks a lot like that: a mess of styles and eras crowded together in a too small space.
Yo those shoes rule! Wear them with everything!! I almost bought a (totally unnecessary) seafoam green patent leather pair from Topshop, then hesitated, reasoning that I didn’t really need them, and then by the time I returned to my senses they were sold out! One of the top regrets in my life, for sure.
Her place
(my previous comment cut off, goddang)
Yo those shoes rule! Wear them with everything!! I almost bought a (totally unnecessary) seafoam green patent leather pair from Topshop, then hesitated, reasoning that I didn’t really need them, and then by the time I returned to my senses they were sold out! One of the top regrets in my life, for sure.
Her place is interesting. Those sculptures taking up the coffee tables are weird. But I take it people aren’t just coming over and sitting down and conversing in that room all the time, chatting about their latest full price purchases from Saks or how dreadfully poor people dress or whatever. It looks like more of a poorly ‘curated’ museum of tacky sculpture than a functional tea room or salon, I take it.
I’m certain no one ‘sits’ in this room Period.
Pretentious and obviously done by some
pseudo Texan ‘designer’ Not the 20 year
old herself.
Dear suspended,
bite you tongue. Jayne Mansfield’s pink palace was my dream home and I was DEVASTATED when it was destroyed a few years ago.
Jane has asshole friends with no life or meaning apart from defending her apparently. Who has time to send threatening emails anyway ?
If you found a common ground to make peace, I think it’s great. We all want the same things in this world but we use different roads to reach them. As long as we can still have dreams that nobody can guess, we are safe I think.
Sorry Patni. I disagree with its destruction, too, but please, logs and gold lamé? That is just a mind fuck (more so, than carpeted walls and ceiling.)
Transvestite lumberjack = strange kind of glamour.
Each of those Warren Platner chairs costs more than my car. I’m serious. I love you, Sister Wolf!
Suspended & Patni – It’s a style my late father would have called “classy.”
I loved your shoes. They are so cute!!
Those shoes are fabulous. I have a pair similar and wear them a LOT. They are surprisingly versatile while also bringing the funk.
Her twitter is hilarious and hypocritical. She’ll retweet five things about Gaza then post iphone mirror pics then retweet about poverty then post about her dog hoarding…it’s funny how she attempts to ‘care’ about the world!!
1) I want the silver shoes as devotional objects and 2) my cat wants the porcelain cat statue to be his lawfully wedded wife.