Molly Bloom knows style

If you read my latest article for the radio station you know that wrap dresses are the thing right now. There is a section of the new Bloomingdale’s in San Francisco that is devoted to Diane Von Furstenberg and her archetypal wrap dresses. Lots of department store brands and national shops are pushing their own versions of this flattering dress.

Kara Janx’s wrap dresses are adorable. Most wrap dresses are one solid color or an all-over print. Janx pairs two complementary colors that give the basic design some ooomph. The wider wrap piece in a contrasting color is a nice change. She also makes sexy silk wrap dresses that are drapier than their jersey counterparts.

I have a simple black wrap dress that I bought off the rack. It’s cute but not this cute. Suddenly it’s lacking. And what it’s lacking is color. Janx’s burgundy and pink is very mgl dot com, n’est-ce pas? And the blue on blue silk number pictured above would really bring out my eyes.

Janx was on the second season of Project Runway. Her collection at Olympus Fashion Week (which did not air on TV) can be viewed at her site.

Thanks to Kathryn for sending!

I wrote a column about dresses for the radio station. You should read it. In a dress.

I wear sunglasses fog or shine. I have light eyes that cannot handle sun — I cannot remember a time when I didn’t wear shades.

The same pair of red Ray-Bans has been with me for four years. The other day I bent down and my sunglasses slide off my nose. I picked them up and placed them back on. Again with the sliding all the way off and crashing to the sidewalk. Upon closer inspection, I saw that the stems are stretched out. I gently tried to bend the bridge of the glasses, hoping they would shrink back to size. No luck. Time for new shades.

Now I’m looking for new sunglasses, and as is always the case when shopping for something I need, I can’t find a thing. I saw a perfect-looking photo of Oliver Peoples sunglasses online (not that I would buy shades without having tried them on first) but they are sold out everywhere.

I may have to make due with stop-gap shades but cheap sunglasses never fit like the real thing. Put on a pair of cheap sunglasses and then try on a pair made of more substantial materials and you will toss that pair you bought at Brass Plum. Cheap shades are more fragile than nice pairs and will break when a breeze kicks up. I was sitting around chatting one afternoon when Pop! my fabulous white shades with the pink rhinestones cracked literally in front of my eyes. Danger lurks in those $8 Manhattan street vendor spectacles.

Don’t we all think it’s time to say “toodle-ooo” to cargo pants? They’ve been around for a long time. Too long. When I saw silk cargo pants in L.A. a few years ago, I thought we were really at the end of that rope (or pocket, whatever). But retailers persist in adding them to new collections.

I can grant cargo pants exceptions to people on safari, in the wilderness or on fishing expeditions. Perhaps they have cargo for those pockets. Cellphones, iPods, Blackberries and other citified accoutrements don’t count. Consider a bag. The overloaded pockets thing is so 1999.

When there are TV show flashbacks to the late 1990s and ’00s, characters will be wearing cargo pants. Cargo pants are the bell-bottoms of our time, longer lived than parachute pants but just as emblematic. I’ve seen enough.