Great Outfits in Fashion History: Jenna Lyons' Excellent Tuxedo Jumpsuit

Photo&colon; Lars Niki/Corbis via Getty Images

There are perfectly good celebrity style moments, and then there are the looks that really stick with you, the ones you try desperately to recreate at home. In ‘Great Outfits in Fashion History,’ Fashionista editors are revisiting their all-time favorite lewks.

I didn’t realize how much I missed having regular Jenna Lyons content until I started watching the new season of “Real Housewives of New York.” Of course, it’s not like she’s disappeared since leaving J.Crew in 2017 — she has her false eyelashes brand and has remained active on Instagram. But it’s different than when she was such a presence on the fashion scene, especially during the Peak J.Crew era of the 2010s. And as many have pointed out for the unfamiliar discovering her on “RHONY,” she shaped the way Americans dressed, in ways both subtle and overt, through her work for the brand and her own personal style. All the layering, mixed prints, button-downs… I still roll my sleeves following Lyons’ method.

All that is to say: Lyons’ event photo archive is a treasure trove of Great Outfits. But if I had to pick just one, it would have to be her black tuxedo jumpsuit from the 2015 CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund awards celebration. It’s clever and irreverent, sharp and forward-thinking. (It’s so forward-thinking, Prada sent jumpsuits infused with this sensibility down its Fall 2023 runway earlier this year.)

Lyons the jumpsuit over an unbuttoned blue shirt, so that her chest was exposed to where the blazer-like top of the jumpsuit clasped, and the sleeves peeked out at the wrist. She threw on a pair of jeweled statement earrings (very J.Crew in 2015), carried a pink envelope clutch and donned black pointed-toe heels — and her signature oversized glasses, of course. A lover of an unexpected pop-of-color, she finished the look off with a swipe of peachy-orange lipstick.

J.Crew’s going through a renaissance under Olympia Gayot, but reminisce about the Jenna Lyons era by recreating her 2015 look with the pieces below.