The month of January is all about taking risks, and this January, I want to embody the same level of composure and winking sense of “Y’all see this?” that Frank Ocean brought to Virgil Abloh’s menswear fashion show for Louis Vuitton on Thursday.
This flex is absolutely further proof that Ocean probably looks good in anything. He rolled up to Paris wearing a bright orange puffer jacket, jeans, a beanie, and a huuuuuge, perfectly slouchy, deep green bag. Vogue calls it a “man tote,” but gender is a social construct and I know I’m going to spend the rest of winter thinking about how to acquire a similar bag and don a similar look. (The bag is Céline from the days of Phoebe Philo, according to Out, which also confirmed the bag is no longer available to buy. So I will have to get creative, because no way am I buying that on the secondhand market; I’m not made of money.)
Ocean carrying this large, fun, swishy bag to the fashion show is exactly the type of energy I want to bring to the rest of 2019. Forget everything you’ve heard about big dick energy; I now realize that all of the things I want to manifest in the new year will only be achievable through big bag energy, in which Ocean is now a pioneer.
Does he have a secret? It sure looks like it; the bag—the way its dark hue pops against the neon of the orange puffer—dares you to stare a little longer. What’s in it? There’s enough room to fit a book (or two) in there, maybe a note from a lover, maybe an extra pair of cozy shoes to slip into at the end of a day of runaway-hopping. Who can say? I certainly can’t—and that’s part of the allure of the big bag. I love it and now I covet it.
Ocean’s sartorial move bucks the stereotype long associated with big bags—that the women who carry them have big emotional baggage they’re lugging around—and reclaims the penchant for excess. You have this one wild and precious life, as Mary Oliver once wrote and countless Instagram poets have since parroted. What will you do with it? I know what I’ll do: Buy a big bag. Be a little extra. Wear a flower in my hair. The possibilities—for you and for me and for Frank Ocean—are endless.