Edendale: The Anti-Hip

With a group of 6 very chatty people on a Friday evening, we wanted somewhere local and low pressure to eat and lounge. Edendale fits this bill to a tee with one of the best outdoor spaces in the city. Tons of seating, friendly locals, and a mixed age crowd of clients with the emphasis on people between 30 and 50. If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know Edendale is one of my favorite watering holes in the city, and I am a frequent client. I haven't spent much time there this summer at all, having done the majority of my misbehaving in Little Tokyo. There have been some changing of the guard at Edendale since I made myself a nuisance there last. Edendale has been overtaken by the Silverlake/Echo Park youth like dirty plates infested by ants at 3 pm on a summer picnic blanket.

Literally swarms of kids (and that's just how old I am, *shakes cane*) started pouring in the door at around 10 pm until it was standing room only in the bar, on both patios and the crowd started to press outward from both gates. The second we got up from our dirty table littered with dirty plates and glasses the teeming mass moved in to stake their claim, without waiting for the cleaning crew. Um, ew.

Here are a few things we noticed about the young east side crowd these days. The young men were all working to look douchey. Faux hawks, neo mullets, and anything and everything that might fall under the eponimous post-emo category circa 2008 with clothing to match. Think along these lines:


Pic courtesy of Emo Hairstyles for Boys


Pic courtesy of Emo Hairstyles


Pic courtesy of Design Classes UCLA

Yes, fingerless gloves, faux hawks, eye liner, studded belts, fedoras, etc.

And the girls, with one exception, were nowhere near as pretty. When I was young, rebelling against the beauty norm, I imagine our look was just as eye-roll inspiring. I remember vintage dresses and cowboy boots, crimped hair, ripped 501's, tearing the skirts and sleeves off of wedding dresses to make tops to wear with our oversized 501's, prune colored lipstick and ash white faces. Maybe it is the nostalgia for my early twenties that makes me remember this look as something really beautiful. I feel, and maybe wrongly so, that the east side girls trying desperately to be the antithesis of Paris Hilton & Kim Kardashian are working to look as ugly as humanly possible. Think Leanne from Project Runway, think Pat Benatar. Think skinny jeans, shapeless tee shirts and greasy hair. Iono.

I have been looking and looking for images that will show you what I am trying to describe, however, this look appears to be so new that there is not a name for it. This might help. Drew Barrymore was at the Edendale last night, having a nosh and sipping a tall beer. Her outfit in the following pictures pretty much sums up what the majority of the women were wearing:


Pic courtesy of styleitless.com


Pic courtesy of CelebBlackberrySightings.com

Yes, basically, baggy old tees, no makeup and long hair un-styled. I was actually a little surprised, and I am surprised by very little. How hard can you try to not try? Which begs the eternal question? Is there an anti-hip movement? In my mind, the ultimate hip is the anti-hip...

Now I just wonder when the guys are going to catch on and realize it is not longer cool among the uncool to look like you did anything more than fall out of bed.