A Letter From Vivian: The Aurelia
A letter from the founder
Most colorful coats ask a woman to become the sort of woman who wears colorful coats. This one does not.
On the six things that made me choose the Aurelia, how it compares to the coat in your hall closet, and why it is $109.95 for our twentieth year.
I am Vivian, and I opened this boutique twenty years ago with one idea: that a woman should not have to choose between comfortable and beautiful.
There is a particular customer I have been trying to buy for since about our third year. She comes in, goes straight to the brightest thing on the rail, holds it up against herself, likes it — and puts it back. Not because it is wrong. Because it is a commitment. A coat in one strong color announces itself before she does, and she has to be in the mood for that every single morning, for five months, over everything she owns.
So she buys black again. She is not thrilled about it, and neither am I.
The other half of the trouble is warmth, and there you get two choices and you have owned both. There is the warm coat, which is warm because there is simply a great deal of it, and by four in the afternoon you can feel every ounce of it sitting on your shoulders. And there is the handsome one, cut beautifully and cut thin, so you put a sweater under it and something at the neck and you are cold anyway.
I never accepted that a woman had to choose.
The Aurelia is what I bought for her. Rust, gold, plum and charcoal drifted across a warm oatmeal ground, so the color is in the coat rather than on it — and the whole inside lined in brushed fleece, collar to hem and down through both sleeves. There were six things I would not do without.
The color is in it, not on it
This is the thing I was actually buying. Stand back and the Aurelia reads as a soft neutral — an oatmeal ground, the sort of thing a woman who owns four black coats will actually put on. Come closer and it is full of color: flecks and brushstrokes of rust, gold, plum and charcoal drifted across the weave like a canvas somebody has been working on for years, and a deep aubergine lattice that rises up near the hem. That is the trick of it. It is quiet from across a room and interesting from three feet away, which is exactly the wrong way round from most colorful coats and exactly the right way round for a woman who wants to be noticed rather than looked at.
“The oatmeal background is what I liked about Aurelia. There’s plenty of color in it, but it’s softer than the bright coats I usually see. Looks lovely with my brown boots.”
Suzette L., Charlottesville“I kept coming back to the pictures of this coat before ordering. The little rust and gold marks remind me of an old painting, and I love the dark plum pattern near the bottom. Wore it to a small gallery show with a friend, over the same black pants and top I wear everywhere. Felt nicely dressed without much effort.”
Lorraine M., Santa FeFleece all the way through, sleeves included
Lay it open and this is the part I would want you to look at. The brushed fleece runs collar to hem and then carries on down through both sleeves. Most makers line the body and stop at the shoulder, because the sleeves are where a lining costs them money and where nobody thinks to check. The reason it matters is arithmetic: a coat lined the whole way through is as warm as a heavy one at half the burden on your shoulders, and the shoulders are what get tired.
“Soft lining right down the sleeves, and room through the middle when I zip it. Very comfortable. I’ve been keeping it by the door.”
Helen D., SpokaneA hood that is lined and roomy, with a drawstring
Three separate decisions, and each one gets skipped somewhere. It is lined in the same fleece, so putting it up is warm rather than merely out of the wind. It is left roomy, so it goes over hair you have already done instead of flattening it. And there is a drawstring, so on the mornings that bite you pull it close instead of holding it shut with one hand while the other hand carries everything else.
Two pockets deep enough to leave the purse at home
Set into the front at hip height, and deep — a phone, a set of keys and a pair of gloves at the same time. That sounds like a small convenience and it is actually a different kind of morning. A coat with real pockets means the short walk needs nothing else: no bag over the shoulder, no strap to move when you take the coat off, nothing to leave behind on the back of a chair. I have never understood why so many makers treat a pocket as decoration.
“Finally, pockets I can actually use. My phone goes in one and my keys and gloves in the other. Makes a quick walk around the block much easier.”
Mona K., HarrisburgLong enough to cover, and it never grips at the middle
It falls past the hip, which is where a coat stops being a jacket and starts actually covering you. And it hangs straight down the front rather than being drawn in anywhere, so there is nothing gripping at the middle and nothing to arrange. A woman should be able to put a coat on over whatever she is already wearing and not have to think about what that does to her shape. It zips, top to hem, so you close it when the wind gets up and leave it open when it does not — and that is your decision to make each morning rather than mine.
Cut generous, S through 4XL
It is true to size and cut generous on purpose — to fit the woman rather than asking the woman to fit it. One piece of advice I would give you across the counter: if you like a thick sweater underneath, take one size up. It is a winter coat, and a winter coat that will not close over a sweater is a spring coat wearing the wrong label. Seven sizes, S through 4XL, every one of them the same price. And it goes in the machine — a cool cycle, then hung or laid flat to dry rather than tumbled, which is all a coat like this ever asks.
“I followed the suggestion to order a size up for a thick sweater, since that’s how I planned to wear mine. Happy with the extra room. I leave it unzipped in the car, then zip up and pull the hood a little closer when I get out. It’s getting plenty of use for ordinary errands.”
Myrna B., BoiseThe Aurelia, against the coat in your hall closet
| The usual winter coat | The Aurelia | |
|---|---|---|
| Warmth | Warm because it is thick | Fleece-lined collar to hem and through the sleeves |
| Weight | You can feel it by four o’clock | Half the burden on the shoulders |
| Hood | None, or thin and unlined | Roomy, fleece-lined, drawstring |
| Pockets | Shallow, so you carry a bag | Two deep, at the hip |
| The front | Black, navy, or a darker black | Color drifted through an oatmeal ground |
| Care | Dry clean, or shrink it once | Machine wash cool, air dry |
| Sizing | Stops at XL, if you are lucky | S through 4XL, one price |
I refuse to sell a woman a coat she has to be in the mood for. That is the whole reason the Aurelia is in the store.
Why we’re clearing it now
The Aurelia was $549.95 on the rail, which is what a coat finished this way goes for: color worked through the ground rather than printed on top of it, brushed fleece run collar to hem and down through both sleeves, and a hood lined in that same fleece. I am not going to stand here and tell you that is a small amount of money for a coat. But the store turns twenty this year, and my daughter Pearl is beside me at the counter most days now, which is not something I let myself count on in 2006. We wanted to mark it by handing something back to the women who kept our door open, so it is going out at a fifth of what it was.
I will give you the honest reasoning too. A coat is the one thing a woman wears over everything else she owns, so it is the piece people actually see, and it is the piece she keeps for years. This is the coat you buy now, before the morning you need it. If it is the one you reach for every day for the next five winters, then $109.95 was never really the point.
★★★★★4.8 out of 5 — from 3,524+ reviews
$549.95$109.95
20th Anniversary Sale — Save 80%
- Rust, gold, plum and charcoal drifted across a warm oatmeal ground
- A deep aubergine lattice rising near the hem
- Brushed fleece lining, collar to hem and through the sleeves
- A roomy fleece-lined hood with a drawstring
- A full-length zipper, top to hem
- Two deep front pockets at the hip
- Falls past the hip, and never grips at the middle
- Machine wash cool · air dry, never the dryer
- True to size · S, M, L, XL, 2XL, 3XL, 4XL
- Free UPS shipping · 30-day money-back guarantee
Every size the same price · while sizes last
Twenty years behind this counter and I can tell you what the careful ones do. A woman who wants color but will not wear a statement puts the coat on, and then she does something very small. She looks down at her own sleeve.
Not at the mirror. At her arm, on her own body, from above — which is how she is actually going to see this coat every day for the next five months. That is her working out whether she can live inside it, and it is a far better test than the mirror ever was.
Go and find your size.
— Vivian · Vivian & Pearl Newport
SEE THE AURELIA — $109.95 →This is a personal letter from the founder of Vivian & Pearl Newport. Customer reviews are quoted as written. · US family brand since 2006 · Free UPS shipping · 30-day money-back guarantee.