Musings on Carolyn
The domestic unknowns behind the skilled dresser that (sometimes) keep me up at night.
The pulsing locus of a digital thread that is unlikely ever to end, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, a powerful ghost influencer, bewitched me about two years ago. Even though her auspicious New York fairytale got abruptly interrupted in the darkest of ways, this woman’s ultra-minimalist and arrestingly coherent sense of style has won over moody critics and multifaceted fashion lovers alike. Carolyn has influenced my style in a handful of ways. More often than not, when I stare at those paparazzi shots of her and her husband, something previously unnoticed draws me in. Her straightforwardness is impossibly alluring. There’s no fuss. Nothing over the top. She’s confident and unapologetic about who she is in her choices of color and structure. She’s chic without trying too hard. There’s no jewelry, logos, or dizzying patterns to distract. Her personality is visible—even a bit palpable—but only on the surface. The cleanness of all her fashion ensembles made me wonder about the interconnectedness between one’s exterior and the convolutedness of one’s interior. Eventually, I made some rearrangements: I added new ingredients, removed some, and adjusted the scope of others. Having incorporated CBK tips and tricks into my style in the past year, I feel more lightweight, centered, and uncomplicated. I’ve switched to taking care of an ever-growing set of uniforms rather than piles of inauthentic responses to never-ending, vertiginous trends.
But every archive is finite. And mood boards can take up only so many walls (or tabs on your phone). Whenever it chooses to vehemently strike, there comes a point when the eye gets tired, bored, or distracted. The heart follows suit shortly after. It might be due to a cultural shift or a personal revolution. Or it might be that palm-sweating moment when you choose to admit you’ve been obsessing over a complete stranger. However, if you’re deeply invested, you tend to find different routes worth immersing yourself in. What was Carolyn like when no one was looking? Carolyn comes across as one of those women who doesn’t wear a lot of make up and seems utterly disconnected from her wondrous (almost poetic) looks yet deep down: She knows she’s a knockout. She knows she’s smart. She knows she deserves a luxurious and exciting life. So, she goes out and gets it. Perhaps the decor of her closet allowed her the headspace needed to put together her exquisite looks in the ways she did: a sacred space where quiet magic would unfold. Perhaps it discreetly matched her (most likely) marble-covered bathroom. Perhaps she organized her clothes according to texture rather than color. Perhaps she even had multiple exotic-scented candles exuding nonchalance somewhere in there as well. The iridescent mystery that encompasses her domestic life is what has kept my CBK spark going.
Did she rest her head on white linen pillowcases her maid was tasked to change every morning? Did she have hand cream and cigarettes next to her bed? Did she ever practice the calming ritual of cleaning one’s fridge on a slow weekend? Did she have flowers in her kitchen? Did she ever read a book while drinking her coffee in the morning? Was it really love at first sight? Did her lips ever get so dry they cracked? What did she do when she felt exhausted on a Thursday night? How did she sign her emails? Was she one of those women (I loathe) who likes to gossip in whispers with girlfriends in changing rooms? What did she indulge in when she wore her favorite jeans? Did she, in fact, secretly believe in the notion of having a best friend she could wholeheartedly trust? Why do I feel the angriest about the fact she had to quit her job at Calvin Klein?
Most importantly, what was it that made her laugh?
All speculative bits of information nudged in between a voluminous vortex of images have essentially shaped a CBK on mute for us to digest. But a sufficient, multilayered personality is nonexistent. What we’re left with is our ever-expanding yet prejudiced imagination with no anchor in sight. In more ways than one, whenever any person looks at pictures of CBK, they can’t help themselves and compose an abstract version of themselves. They project hopes, desires, worries, twisted fantasies. Above all else, our obsession with Carolyn is rooted in nostalgia for a time that revolved around the enchantment of a Kennedy bachelor. Women are still very much obsessed with the idea of being good enough for a Kennedy—that is why so many women (of all ages) want to dress like CBK and even attempt to approach life like she allegedly did. It’s not about aesthetics. It’s about extracting a precise, bulletproof formula for the complete conquest of an important and influential man. Who CBK ended up marrying couldn’t possibly be connected to what she had to say, what her values were, how cultivated she was, or her wit. It had to be about the clothes. But rest assured that wasn’t the case at all.
As the Yohji Yamamoto dress Carolyn wore to dinner in 1998 at the Supper Club followed by a performance from the Parsons Dance Company is about to be auctioned at Bonhams in New York this month, Ryan Murphy is rumored to be in the midst of developing a series about her marriage to John and I find myself on the precipice of devouring the recently published Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy by Elizabeth Beller. Overcome by restlessness, a means to truly draw the line between well-intentioned fiction and unhinged bias doesn’t seem to be at my disposal. Carolyn will change, in my mind, as I get older. She’s yet to become more complex, peculiar, and rebellious. Perhaps the customizable abundance of ways to intellectualize and color in this persona is, in actuality, what makes her an urban icon of some mystical sort.