The death of Jane Birkin, who passed away this week aged 76, got me thinking about “it girls” or “cool girls” (or whatever you want to call them) and how much I dislike the phrase, the concept, the fetishisation of it – everything.
Birkin is often cited as the first, the ultimate, “cool girl”, with her Chelsea childhood, slim hips and cigarettes, children by different men, her unkempt, much older boyfriend and the dash of scandal lent by movie nude scenes and the breathy sex-song “Je t’aime… Moi Non Plus”.
And then, the ultimate stamp of establishment approval: the un-gettably expensive brand Hermès not only named a bag after her, they made damned sure that throughout its lifetime, it has retained its status. It is no Fendi Baguette or Mulberry Bayswater, lurching in and out of fashion: the Birkin bag has a standing now approaching that of Stonehenge.
I don’t begrudge Birkin any of this. She lived her life on her own terms and made a terrific go of it.
What I do find a bit appalling, though, is the industry that has sprung up around the idea of the cool girl. This is not because of Birkin but, yes, her image has informed it, along with other women over the years (we could argue forever about who). The body shape, the doe eyes, the “don’t care” hair, the faint whiff of sexual deviance.
In 2023 this has all been distilled and filtered and focus-grouped and then marketed to death. Brands constantly try to flog me stuff that promises to make me into a cool girl. Buy this lipstick and be a cool girl. Wear these jeans and you will be a cool girl. This is what cool girls wear and what they drink and where they go on holiday. Two French brands, Sézane and Rouje, do a pretty neat trade in flogging a literal French cool girl aesthetic, by putting slim models with flat chests in oversized shirts open to the navel and giant earrings.
But truly being a cool girl hasn’t really got anything to do with what you wear. An authentic cool girl must have all the entry-level qualities, plus two magic ingredients, which are, one, a drifty, dreamy security that no matter what you get up to, things will work out OK in the end. And two, a total rejection of shame: shame does not apply to you, no matter what you do, if you are a cool girl. This is not because you are a cool girl, it’s why you are a cool girl.
I have, so many times, hovered over the “buy” button on the Sézane website, droolingly in love with the aesthetic, before I come to my senses and remember that I have got a 34C chest and if I wore an oversized shirt open to the naval I would be arrested. Giant earrings make me look deranged.
And who can manufacture that genuine cool girl insouciance? Even now, with a home and a family I’m not completely sure that things will work out OK in the end. I remember very well the precariousness of my life aged 23 and I’ve never really shaken it off. I’ve never had the confidence to be as mute or diffident as cool girls usually are. I feel compelled to talk and tell jokes. Silence, I’ve always thought, implies you think you’re enough just to look at.
And the shame thing? The older I get the more I understand how much all of our choices and decisions in life are motivated by the avoidance of shame.
Just this weekend I read an interview with the singer Self Esteem, who said, “my worst fear is people on the internet calling me fat. It’s just hell. I can’t shut it out. Any smart thing I’ve said is completely negated if someone calls me that.” Her life is soaked, even with talent, success and an adoring fanbase on her side, in a fear of being fat-shamed.
Shame is that powerful, it’s that pervasive and it is a real threat. Birkin managed to pull off the trick of combining beauty, art, sultriness, scandal and bohemianism while simultaneously charming the establishment. This is far more of a high-wire act than she made it appear. And while society will sometimes choose to endorse a woman like Birkin, it is also quite capable of tossing her to the wolves and calling her trash.
For most of us, that’s too much of a gamble.