Archive for February, 2011

A few words

A B O U T   T H E   S I T E  :

Girls of a Certain Age wanted to be Tatum O’Neal in Bad News Bears. Or Brooke Shields in Endless Love. They read every word of Go Ask Alice and believed it. They wept to Carole King, rocked out to Blondie, and made out with their boyfriends to Led Zeppelin II.

Girls of a Certain Age were band dorks, soccer stars, and anorexics; horsey types and Rocky Horror types and weird, hostile girls nobody talked to but who wound up writing for the funniest show on TV.

Girls of a Certain Age don’t mind calling themselves feminists. They think the whole idea that people are still fighting over whether a woman can be smart and obsess over cute little tops at the same time is as boring as watching a clock tick.

They look at pictures of their moms at their age and somehow don’t feel as grown up. Which bothered them for a while, but doesn’t anymore. Because they’re obviously grown-ups—albiet grown-ups who can’t quite part with the notion that motorcycle boots, if styled properly, can make for a perfectly acceptable evening look.

This blog is about the many Girls of a Certain Age who inspire with their style and wit and brains.  It’s about figuring out a new and somewhat tweaked way to look chic and distinctive and sexy—because, as a wise person once said, the older you get, the dumber cool looks. Girls of a Certain Age  is about people and events in the popular culture that are too hilarious, irksome, or wackadoo to go un-noted. But mostly, of course, it is about shopping: online, in boutiques, in massive chains and tiny fleas and anywhere else that money can be exchanged for goods.

A B O U T   M E  :

My name is Kim France.  I’ve been around for a while. I’ve learned a few things, and have failed, sometimes quite spectacularly, to learn others.

I worked in magazines for ages. Along with a very talented group of people, I launched Lucky magazine in 2000 and was its editor in chief for ten years. Before that I worked at and wrote for many, many publications. I was a staff writer at Sassy, a deputy editor at New York, a senior writer at Elle. I saw a lot of bands in the 90s, and wrote about a lot of them too, in places like Rolling Stone and Vibe and Spin.

When Lucky ended, I decided I didn’t want to be in magazines anymore and decided to write a memoir. I decided not to write a memoir anymore. Then I started blogging for my friends, and I kind of liked it. And I hope you do too. Although if you’re not a fan of personal pronouns and dystopian world views, you might not. Forewarned is forearmed.