Fashion 101
- By Monsieur Z

If there's one thing that I absolutely cannot stand, it's trains. They're just so grimy and dirty, and all of that dust from the coal is an absolute nightmare to get out of any kind of fabric. You can put your favorite washing machine on 'heavy duty' and you'll still find trace amounts of soot stuck to your favorite cashmere blouse. It's a mess I tell ya'. That's why this month we're going to go over the basics of what you'll need to survive the train ride to Hogwarts and still keep your attire looking as fabulous as always.


Now, the biggest crime in fashion right now is to have a raincoat, especially when you can get umbrellas in a bunch of different designs that make up for it. No, my cat umbrella is not for sale, not even Umbridge could take this baby away from me. With that in mind, the only thing possible to help keep the soot off of our brand new cashmere blouse is to always carry around the portable fans that Muggles are fond of selling during the summer. I'm not talking just one or five, we're going to need twenty of them. When placed right alongside your calves and pointed upwards there's no way that coal dust would even bother getting attached to your clothes. (Bonus points if you pull off the 'Marilyn Monroe over the air vent' look as well. Only a select few at this school could get away with that look.)


Next, we are definitely going to have to take a look at that trunk that we all know we're going to lug around for our entire Hogwarts career. If any of us have any hope of being taken seriously then we can't keep that same dull, tan trunk around all the time. (Do not even think about dumping an entire collection of glittery unicorn stickers on it either, we are not Tina Belcher and will not be known as such.) The best way to improve that dull color is to splash some paint on it. Now, the pattern of paint splatters is currently in for the season. It might just be me but there is something about another person walking around with that obvious look that they're an artist that really gets my goat. Go and look for some paints just lying around and throw those babies onto your trunk!


As I've stated before, accessories are the most important part of any outfit --so we've got to make sure that this part is absolutely perfect. Obviously, nothing to do with sparkles or unicorns or even glitter, as all of that has been used so much before that I'm surprised the planet itself hasn't thrown them all into the furthest depths of outer space. However, this doesn't mean that pins, in general, can't be used. So go ahead and pull out any of those fandom pins or even the cute and adorable animal ones you might have. (No unicorns!) The more that you have hanging off of everything you can think of, the better. You might even try to be daring enough as to include bracelets to jangle along your arms. Those plastic ones don't jangle as much as true metal ones would, but sometimes you just have to use what you have access to.


That concludes this month's fashion tips, unfortunately. I would highly advise that everyone reading this takes my advice and makes this the best school year that they possibly can. After all, who would want to pay for some bogus tips that just make you break out in stress acne? That's right, nobody. So stay fashionable out there my little snakelettes.

Just remember to stay fashionable out there.
-Z