Fashion junky Meghan Stier reports on sightings a the Oscar De La Renta show this afternoon:
"-Hal Rubenstein, dressed as a Prada pirate in all black save for a large gold earring. Say "Arrrrggg" for the camera, Hal.
-Leon Hall, looking mighty B-I-T-C-H-Y for a leprechaun. That Louis Vuitton man-purse he's toting should make anyone smile."
Car salesman or fashion designer? Really, the whole unbuttoned to the navel thing screams "Vegas Manwhore" to us. Despite his nightmarish personal choices, Lloyd Klein's Bryant Park show was evidently well-attended — if by well-attended one means that Jocelyn Wildenstein came out of her super-oxygenating stasis chamber to attend.
Lloyd Klein [NY Social Diary]
To summarize our extensive arguments regarding trucker hats: Do Not At Any Time Ever Wear Them Ever. More specifically, it is now fashion week, so please do not humiliate yourself or our City. We are concerned that this important news isn't spreading as quickly as it should, as evidenced by this letter from a reader: "OK i read this lil article on trucker hats that i guess you or some dumb ass wrote. Their is different reasons for wearing a trucker hat '1 you want to be in Style wit the young ones', '2 you want to come off as a Punk' and finally the reason i wear them is because their Bad Ass i just bought one that said Fuck Off and i think thats appropirate for wut im going to say to you on the Trucker hat topic."
It's not even Friday and the first brouhaha of fashion week is upon us.
Speaking of Details, Chic Happens (They're back! The first one in years!) reports that Editor in Chief Dan Peres recently had a blowup with fashion flack Pierre Rougier, who reps Balenciaga, Viktor & Rolf and Proenza Schouler. Rougier "threw a French fit" when he learned that client Viktor & Rolf would get a mere page in the men's fashion issue. Says the spy: "Dan called him an arrogant ass and said, 'I've lived in France but I've never met a bigger prick.'" Now, girls. Play nice.
French dissing [Chic Happens]
Mystified by this week's New York Magazine Fall Fashion issue? You're not alone: it's a mess. "In a culture saturated with pop-tart style, it's a relief to report that grown-up glamour is back in a big way," claims the opening story. But turn the page, and there's a spread on total pop-tart and foxy tennis-star Andy Roddick girlfriend Mandy Moore. Since former New York Magazine Fashion Editor Sally Singer left for Vogue, it seems each New York Fashion Issue is more phoned-in than the previous.
The Times helpfully brings us a bizarre in-depth history of Vogue Editor Anna Wintour's DESK. Yes. Evidently, Ms. Wintour's Alan Buchsbaum desk signifies that the 80s never ended. The desk also serves as a reminder for Ms. Wintour to do something for, like, people, as Buchsbaum was the first good friend of Ms. Wintour's who died of AIDS.
Jonathan Reynolds, food writer for the Times, celebrates the delicious fare of Popeye's with socialite and retired compulsive-bride Nina Griscom. (Can you remember how she got famous? Hey, neither can we!) Nina gets off some great lines which might be overlooked by those stunned by the oddness of the article:
Speaking of metrosexuals, John Paul Gaultier has launched a line of makeup for men. (I blame electroclash for convincing men that the Ziggy Stardust-style eyeliner was making a comeback.) Early reviews from men who were asked to try it:
·"Dennis, you can't go out like that. Your eyeliner is wonky and you've got lipstick on your teeth. Still, at least now we'll always know whose beer is whose: we'll be able to tell by the lipstick traces."
· "I must say I look almost healthy for once. But once you've started with this stuff you've got to keep using it to maintain the illusion. Imagine that: a row of us touching up our eyes at China White's. We'd get our heads kicked in. Still, does this eyeliner make my eyes look bluer? Is it waterproof?"
Dennis, your lipliner's wonky [Independent]
In an article on About.com, Nichole Robertson laments the people that still must be first to wear whatever the "Carrie Bradshaw" character was wearing in the most recent episode of "Sex and the City": "A few weeks ago, during the season premiere of Sex and the City, Carrie, played by Sarah Jessica Parker, wore a mess (at least twenty) of jet-black bobby pins in her highlighted blond hair. There was no rhyme or reason to their odd placement. It looked like her stylist just threw a handful of bobby pins at Carrie's hair to see how many would stick...In the days following the premiere, the walk to my 6th Avenue office proved that the Carrie disciples had fully embraced the bobby pin look. It started out slowlyjust one or two girls proudly sporting an almost-acceptable one or two bobby pins. But soon the numbers grew. More and more young women clipped on more and more bobby pins. Five. Ten. Twenty. It was unbelievable." Asks Ms. Robertson, "If Carrie got a tattoo of Mr. Big's member on her forehead, would the copycats inevitably do the same?" Of course they would, Nichole. They're sheep. Sheep, I tell you. There's only one acceptable course of action here: you must make an ironic t-shirt that says ["Sex and the City" designer/stylist] "Patricia Field is just fucking with you." Then you must wear it to the office.
[ADDITIONAL NOTE: Sex and the City, filming today: Place: East 92nd st, Btwn Park and Madison, Time: 7am to 10pm]
Bobby pins are the new black [About.com]
Sex and the City recently made a reference to a woman from Macon, Georgia wearing a scrunchie (scrunchie=one of those elastic hair accessories that tend to come in obnoxious colors and were worn primarily by bleached blonde pop stars in the 80s.) Southern women in Macon defend the scrunchie, saying it's "easy to use." (As if pragmatism were ever an excuse for bad fashion choices!) Tonya Polydoroff, a former Macon resident now living in Connecticut, disagrees: "In the year 2003, there is no reason to wear one outside of your home. ... There are so many other options out there that are stylish, more convenient to carry and appropriate for women over the age of 12."
Sex in the city throws hair-raising insult Macon's way [Macon telegraph]
Blogger Bunsen has created his own version of Bravo's "Queer eye for the straight guy" series (wherein five gay guys dress, style, and generally makeover helpless and slovenly straight guys.) The Bunsen version: "Black eye for the straight guy," starring Harvey Fierstein, Nathan Lane, Barry Diller, Rip Taylor, and the ghost of Rock Hudson. "Fierstein will head straight for your closet, tearing your ratty flannel shirts with his teeth. Be wary as Diller punches you in the breadbasket and as you stoop to catch your breath, works a healthy dollop of orange-marmalade-scented pomade into your hair moments before carving the telltale mark of Zorro across your scalp with Wuhl electric clippers. Just as you think you've gotten it all figured out, capricious Gemini, Rip Taylor is inside your kitchen cabinets, loudly shattering your finest Ikea earthenware and shaving your chest with the suprisingly sharp fragments."
A black eye for the straight guy special [Bunsen.tv]
Intelligencer, New York Magazine's gossip column, reports Naomi Campbell is trying to break up Heidi Klum's relationship with Flavio Briatore, whom Campbell used to date. I was more intrigued by the supermodel affection for Italian boyfriends. Not only is Klum seeing Briatore, but Linda Evangelista is together with Ugo Brachetti Peretti, of the oil fortune; and Campbell herself is dating a third Italian, Matteo Marzotto, the fashion magnate behind Hugo Boss. If two is a trend, in Gawker's book, then three is a law of nature.
Intelligencer [New York Magazine]
Variation on a themeor themes, rather: Aaron Bailey predicts the rise of the seemingly gay guido metrosexual and notes that the guidos at NJGuido.com are already sexually ambiguous and fashion-obsessed. "Now, it may be that these guys are indeed gay and dancing in a straight club. However, the more you look through the pictures, the blurrier the orientation lines become. If you mentioned to a bunch of these guys that they looked gay, I wonder how long it'd take before you were swimming with the fishes. Perhaps the blur lies in the fact that Italian fashion (Armani, Prada, Gucci, &c.) is popular with the gay and guido culture. Perhaps both non-guido gay and Italian-American men pay more attention to their bodies and looks than other ethnicities. No matter, I think it's interesting to see the similarities."
The gayification of the guido [601am]
Village Voice columnist Michael Musto on the "metrosexual" trend (high-maintenance straight men) on which the NYT's Warren St. John recently reported (and a German reporter recently plagiarized.) "now that straight guys have adopted all the narcissistic trends that were once started by gay men, the gays will surely reassert some specialness by loosening up a little, vanity-wise. (Yes, queens have been "straight acting" for years, but for straights to suddenly be "gay acting" is their worst nightmare.) The only cutting-edge thing to do now that hetero men get Brazilian waxes would be to totally let oneself go and maybe even pull the duct tape off those love handles. Sure enough, some gay bars are already attracting more diverse physical types than just the usual buff-bodied gym bunnies. (Not that I have anything against buff-bodied gym bunnies, mind you, blah blah blah.)"
La Dolce Musto [Village Voice]
It's arts-n-crafts day at the Black Table. Editor Eric Gillen provides instructions for making your own trucker hat out of garbage and extra office supplies, utilizing creative substitutes for the standard trucker hat components. ("STEP FOUR: 42 BEERS AND THREE HOT GLUE BURNS LATER, AND YOU GOTS SOME MESH. Of all the possible materials to make a mesh cap out of, none of them performed as well as the heap of six-pack, beer can rings that we collected in the kitchen after a long evening of caps. Sure, you can cut 'em and save the dolphins, but fuck it, they're not in style right now.") Martha Stewart would be proud. (Editor AJ Daulerio, right, models his own DIY trucker cap.)
A spade is a spade: how to make a trucker cap out of garbage [BlackTable]
Salon recently asked me to profile Ken Courtney (of "I fucked Chloe Sevigny" t-shirt/Ju$t Another Rich Kid fame) and it appears that the ironic fashion backlash has begun. A sample from Ken's hate mail: "I saw your site and have this to say: I hate you and everything you represent. Your 'clothes' are a fuckin' scam. Whatever it is that you consider 'cool' fucking sucks. Anyone stupid enough to buy your bullshit deserves to wear it so that when they are seen in the street, everyone will know that they are retarded. You iron on ugly letters, inane artfag phrases, and wack images onto thrift store refuse, then sell it for a lot of money to assholes who think they are so fucking stylish. YOU HAVE NO SOUL. You and your ilk are a bunch of T. Rex lookin, Fraggle Rock rejects who need to bathe. You are wack enough to get off on this hate-letter. DIE." Ken, of course, created an ad out of the email. The phrase "T. Rex lookin, Fraggle Rock rejects" is circled in red. (Targeted marketing.)
Flagrante t-shirt-o [Salon]
