agingracefully

What is it about french women?  I swear, I’ve always had this odd obsession, as I know many woman have.  I’m always purchasing the latest book by one of the french woman I admire, over the past few years I have basically bought the same book over and over again simply written by different fashionable cool ladies I like.  When Inez de la Fressange came out with “Parisian Chic”, I had to have it.  When Caroline de Maigret and friends came out with “How to be Parisian Wherever You Are: Love, Style and Bad Habits”, had to have it.   Garance Doré’s “Love Style Life”, also had to have it.  I even bought that book “Bringing Up Bébé by Pamela Druckerman (ok, not a fashion book per se but you get the idea).  It is like my secret love of romantic comedies.  It’s basically always the same story arch, you almost always know exactly what is going to happen, and they always give you that warm happy feeling (even if you are squirming slightly inside about the predictability of it all).  These books on French style, French way of being,  French way of living, French way of eating, French way of bringing up kids, French way of je ne sais quoi, always give you what you want.  They deliver.  And they are all very much alike, just with different perspectives because they are written by different women.  What really gets me is that even the mer fact of reading such a book means you probably will never be it, have it, live it-- you know that intangible je ne sais quoi French “thing”-- and yet, I still keep buying them!

But you know what I think it is, they just make it look so darn effortless.  I know it is not but that is what it looks like.  And aside from dying their hair, they really don’t seem to do that much.  They really seem to have a knack for how to age gracefully.  They appear to shy away from going under the knife, of getting Botox and if they do these things, it is so subtle you hardly notice it.  They embrace aging with a sexiness and ownership that I find incredibly appealing.

Instead of clinging on to youth and trying so darn hard to stay 25 forever like so many aging women of the US of A, they take hold of their age and want to look healthy, fresh and stylish for the age that they are, not doing everything in their power to look younger and younger.  The majority of aging women in the United States are disempowered and it is not our fault by any means, the media really doesn’t help us at all, however, I do think we can take some solid queues from the French ladies-- feel empowered by your age and experience is sexy.  Loving yourself is sexy.  Taking care of yourself is sexy.  And when you go crazy with plastic surgery and Botox, hoping to stay youthful, it just sends a horrible red flag of insecurity.  Insecurity of just being you.  The true, gracefully aging, you.  Which is beautiful.  

Caroline de Maigret

Ines de la Fressange

Garance Doré

Emmanuelle Alt

Charlotte Gainsbourg

Isabel Marant

Vanessa Paradis

Marion Cotilliard

Juliette Binoche