I’m a Southern California girl born and raised and I love coats. Honestly, words can’t even begin to explain how much I love them. Wool coats, puffer coats, long coats, short coats… I find them all irresistible. It’s weird though, considering I don’t live somewhere where I really ever get to (or need to) wear them. I always told myself they would come in handy when I headed to the east coast for college… and then I decided to stay in Southern California for college too. Oops.
My love affair with coats began with my dad’s coat collection. The number of coats he had accumulated over the years filled up our entire coat closet and as I got older, I decided I wanted a collection of my own. It didn’t help that it seemed like every time I walked by the J.Crew window each outfit was accessorized with a perfectly coordinated coat. As time went by I began to be more and more infatuated with the idea of having a coat for every type of outfit.
I got my first “big girl” coat in the eighth grade when my dad surprised me in J.Crew and bought me a long black wool coat, agreeing with my argument that “every girl needs a long black coat in her wardrobe.” That coat was the beginning of the end. I wore it every chance I had and felt as stylish as Jenna Lyons herself as I paraded around town in my wool coat – despite it not actually being that cold outside. Soon after that I acquired (thanks to my dad… again) a J.Crew long black puffer coat that tied in a bow around the waist (similar minus the fur). After that, the prospect of having my own collection seemed like a real possibility and I started asking for coats for every gift-giving holiday. If you ask my mom she will say that the number of coats I accumulated in the coming years was “wretched excess” but if you ask my dad and I, we would both agree that we were just building a collection to last a lifetime. My freshman year of high school, while on a trip to the desert for New Years, my family was out shopping and I forgot to bring a jacket with me. I was absolutely freezing, so we ducked into J.Crew (naturally) and after a 5 minute conversation in which my dad and I both agreed one was a necessary building block in any solid coat collection, I walked out with my most prized coat in my collection to this day – a long, wool, camel-colored coat with silk lining, a tie at the waist, and big black buttons. Eventually, I added J.Crew’s Majesty Peacoat (in two different colors), a J.Crew Parka (I know, a parka in Southern California…), a short white shiny puffer jacket, and many many more coats to the collection.
You may be asking why I’m going through all this effort to tell to you about my coats – “We get it Sammy… Coats are your thing” – but the reason I’m talking about this is not to brag about my collection. This is about how these coats have become a part of my life story. I’ll never forget the feeling I felt when I received that first black coat, the giggle I let out as I put on my first puffer coat, or the joy I had as I marched through town on New Years, sniffling through an awful cold just because I wanted to show off my new camel coat to the whole world. I wore my hot pink majesty peacoat when dressing up as London Tipton for a costume day at school and I wore my navy one to my USC interview last December. I’ve chosen to invest in good quality coats rather than asking for and buying multitudes of less expensive items, because these coats have become a part of who I am. They carry memories that I want to be able to remember for years and years to come and ensuring that these coats last is essential to taking the memories with me as I grow up and live more memorable events in them.
J.Crew is not sponsoring this post in any way, but I want to take a moment to thank them for creating great quality items that have lasted for years so far and will last for many more to come. Because of the care they have put into creating such amazing coats, I have accumulated clothes that not just make a strong wardrobe, but also trigger memories that make me want to smile and share my joy with others.