Femme Crush Friday: Jenna Lyons

I adore Jenna Lyons. To me, she embodies female awesomeness – she is unrelentingly stylish, has buckets of business savvy, is responsible for some of my favourite outfits and interiors OF ALL TIME and she was in GIRLS. I mean, come on. Safe to say – she’s my FEMME CRUSH FRIDAY.

Jenna first came to my attention about a decade ago when my fashion curiosity was gaining momentum, her staple look was her thick, huge glasses and straight cut trousers, silk blouses and a slicked back pony. It might not seem that wild now but back then it was bizarre – but bizarre in all the right ways. It was very clear that this woman had style. In fact, she might have all of it. She is the Creative Director of J CREW but she didn't start out that way – she started in the company as an ‘assistant to an assistant’ over twenty years ago and worked her way up. When Jenna started at J CREW it was not a cool shopping destination, it was a shop to buy your basics but Jenna changed all that. She used her own signature style to improve the brand, focusing on higher quality fabrics and more fashion forward designs and in doing this elevated the name as well as growing the business profits immensely ($690 million in 2003 to just shy of $2 billion in 2011).

Her outfit to Solange's wedding. UTTER PERFECTION.

WHY A&TB LOVES JENNA:

• Always impeccably dressed

• Fantastic & innovative business women

• Worked her way to the top

• Has a signature style & sticks to it

• Out & Proud

• DETERMINED

• HARD WORKER

• Has genetic disorder incontinentia pigmenti, which had convinced her she was not great on the eye when in fact she’s a MAJOR babe

• Mates with Solange

• Starred in GIRLS – I mean who says you can be the Creative Director of an international fashion conglomerate AND an actor? Exactly.

• Insanely beautiful taste in interiors (see her townhouse below)

For a look at more ladies we dig — jump to our Pinterest board here OR click here to read previous blog posts. And if you'd like to tell us who you are crushing on and why, PLEASE DO, pop your comments below. Let's spread the love on FEMME CRUSH FRIDAY!