Shelley O: Making Good Choices

Displaying the First Guns once again.

U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama speaks at a Democratic National Committee fundraiser in New York in a modified Donna Karan dress. She was introduced to the crowd by Sarah Jessica Parker.

She arrived at the event wearing a Donna Karan coat.

Donna Karan Collection

Let's talk "dressing your body type." We find sometimes that when we discuss certain options for certain body types, there is wide disagreement about the correct way of going about it. Michelle Obama has well-developed arms and broad shoulders. Wearing a cowl halter accentuates how broad her shoulders are. To us, that's a good thing. There's a difference between accentuating a body part and making it look worse. It took us a while to figure out why she favors cardigans so much. It's because when she wears a jacket instead of a cardigan, she's not accentuating her shoulders, she's making them look bigger than they are. So yes, her shoulders are very prominent here but to our way of thinking that's a good thing.

Now let's talk hips. There have been plenty of times where we praised an outfit of hers and there were comments to the effect of "Are you kidding me? Look at her hips!" As if there was some magical garment that was going to shrink her hips for her. Look, the First Lady has a set of hips. That's no big deal. When she wears big poofy skirts that's the equivalent of putting on a jacket over her shoulders. It only serves to make them look bigger than they are and throw the natural proportions of her body out of whack. That's why we're always repeating the mantra "Sheath dresses, Shelley. Forever and ever." Now, you could argue that the ruching across the torso is drawing too much attention to her hips, but again: she's got a set of hips on her. There's no point in pretending she doesn't and comments to that effect imply there's something "wrong" about her body that needs to be "corrected" by her clothes. You dress the body you have and you figure out ways to show off the good parts and own the parts you might not love.

This is a long way of saying that plenty of people will look at her in this outfit and declare it a bad choice because, "Her shoulders look huge! Her hips look gigantic!" We disagree rather strongly. We think this outfit represents very smart choices on her part. Although granted, we're not huge fans of the ruching. We also love the necklace and the coat is to-die-for. We think this is a great look for her.

One final note: We are very pleased that our readership has increased dramatically in the past few months but this means there are a lot of new people commenting here. We're thrilled to have y'all, but remember this: this is a fashion and pop culture blog. This is NOT a political blog. Leave the politics out of the comments section. Talk about the clothes, please.

[Photo Credit: getty/wwd.com/neimanmarcus.com]

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Labels: Donna Karan, Michelle Obama