Scarves: Fashion Over Function

Sure, it gets cold here in the South, but let’s be honest here: it doesn’t get that cold. This is great for us, because it means we don’t have to bundle up like the kid from A Christmas Story. We get to keep our layers to a minimum and don’t have to sacrifice fashion for warmth.



Perhaps the best example of this is the way we wear our scarves. Though it gets chilly here, it is not necessarily so cold that we actually need the scarf – but we want them because they’re cool. I live in Virginia, which we jokingly refer to as “the most Northern of the Southern states”, and scarves are a craze here, even when the weather is warm. In fact, some boutiques sell lines of “summer scarves”.



The fabrics we tend to make our scarves out of in Virginia are often lighter and looser, rather than the more practical thick woolen version often seen in colder climates. Whether worn draped loosely around the neck like a cowl-necked sweater, tied tight as a noose, or just hung around the shoulders, here in Ol’ Virginny, we tend to use our scarves for fashion purposes, not for their function!

By Caroline Sumner