Remember the color-changing dress? Now meet the purse
When the hue of a Kate Spade handbag confuses some on social media, its owner redirects attention from the fuss toward a good cause.
- Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year" award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
Every so often, another internet photo shows up along the lines of the infamous white-gold -- or is it blue-black? -- dress that became a meme last year.
But being at the heart of such an online fad isn't always glamorous.
Taylor F. Corso, of Jackson, Mississippi, tweeted a photo of her new Kate Spade handbag on Tuesday.
Before she knew it, Corso was at the center of another rainbow ruckus, with some people complimenting her on her white purse, and others on her blue bag.
Even though Corso told Twitter users her bag was blue, not everyone believed it.
@whyofcorso that bag is whiter than an improv show audience.
— Motion 2 Strike FEAR (@MotionToStrike) October 4, 2016
@whyofcorso it's really not white!? 😳
— Olivia Rage (@livtrain) October 4, 2016
The bag's manufacturer, designer Kate Spade, has no problem declaring the color to be "Mystic Blue" in its online catalog, but that didn't stop the debate.
@pnuts_mama @whyofcorso just like me, it is white.
— cm (@cm_handler) October 4, 2016
Not all respondents were just having fun, however. Some attacked Corso, criticizing her photography or accusing her of intentionally setting up the photo with an aim of going viral. (Many of those tweets have since been deleted.)
While sorting through the nastiness, Corso decided to turn the attention to a good cause. She'd already joined a team from work for the JDRF One Walk, which aims to raise money for research to cure juvenile diabetes.
"My employer said that if I am able to raise $500 for the cause, my dog, Roux, can walk with me!" Corso wrote on her fundraising page.
She'd raised enough for Roux to join in before posting the handbag photo on social media, but the flurry of attention inspired her to raise her goal and pin a tweet to the top of her Twitter page asking purse-debaters to open their own handbags (and wallets) to give to the cause.
She also reached out to Kate Spade with a request for donations, but has yet to hear back.
As for the purse, Kate Spade may call it Mystic Blue, and many tweeters may call it white, but Corso herself thinks it's somewhere in between.
"It's really a grayish blue, but I'm assuming that doesn't sound as marketable to Kate Spade customers." she said.