Walking with the Muses

by Pat Cleveland

  I eventually caught up with Donna, who introduced me to the girl with the white face—Jane Forth—and her other friend, Andy Warhol, who smiled at me with twinkling eyes and then gave me a heavy-duty once-over, twice. Donna pulled me aside and whispered, “He’s a filmmaker, and I’m making a movie with him. How about that?”

  Making movies? Not bad, I thought. Then another guy—a small, tanned South American with a Spanish accent, dressed flamboyantly in feathers and fringe—came over and started complimenting me. His name was Giorgio di Sant’Angelo—he dramatically rolled the R in “Giorgio”—and he asked me if I would do his show. I told him to get in touch with me through Stephen. I really didn’t know who he or anybody else was, partly because at that time there wasn’t a big who’s who in the fashion world. We were all just starting out and trying to make our mark.

  The next day, at half past six in the morning, I was in the greenroom at Vogue, being sketched by Maning. We worked all day—though it never really felt like work, because Maning would talk so entertainingly about fashion history or his travels with Mrs. Vreeland or his love for the legendary couturier Madame Grès—and then I was off to another party with Stephen, this time at the photographer Berry Berenson’s apartment, a beautiful floor-through with all-white walls; it was the first example I’d seen of a new type of living space called a loft. That evening Stephen invited me to spend the weekend with him and his friends on Fire Island. I was over the moon. Finally, a weekend away from the city! And to a place I’d always wanted to visit.

  We were leaving on Friday afternoon. I spent that morning doing publicity shots with Stephen and another model, a Brazilian hippie named Ramona Sanchez, for Women’s Wear Daily. Afterward, Stephen decided to give us a tutorial in walking in his style of clothing. Bobby and Hector were there to help with the critique.

  “Bobby,” Stephen said. “Show them how the walk goes.”

  Bobby, who was about four feet tall, was standing next to Ramona, who was six feet tall. As he demonstrated how to do the walk, with Stephen directing, we all cracked up. We laughed so hard we could barely breathe, much less walk.

  That walk, “a modern couture walk but with a twist,” according to Stephen (who invented it), reminded me of the one Maning had taught me, but even more extreme. In other words, it was an exaggerated version of an already exaggerated form. I had to jut my hip bones forward as far as possible, then lean back with one leg forward and my tailbone tucked in. The idea was to get a straight line from my neck to my knee, so it looked as though I was leaning back on something, the way you would lean on a bar. But I had to be in forward motion as I leaned. Ramona and I practiced until we got it right.

  “So,” Stephen said, “that’s the walk you’ll do in the next show.” He didn’t teach anyone else how to do it. It was our secret. And that walk, combined with the moves Maning taught me and a few dancelike flourishes of my own that I improvised along the way, would become my trademark on the runway.

  Before we left Stephen’s studio, he dressed me in a multicolored jumpsuit and topped it off with a pair of silver mirrored sunglasses just like the ones he wore. We looked like space aliens, but it was great fun to see people and not have them see your eyes.

  Friday afternoons at Bendel’s were highly anticipated. Sometimes photographers would be waiting to snap pictures of celebrities going in or out of the store. That was where I saw Bill Cunningham, the beloved New York Times “On the Street” photographer who then worked for Women’s Wear Daily. “Smile, you kids!” he said, and flash! I felt like a movie star as Stephen, Hector, Bobby, and I quickly dashed into the waiting limo and dove into the backseat.

  We were catching the last ferry, and when we arrived at the dock, I looked around and saw nothing but boys! boys! boys! And more boys, with an occasional stylish, interesting-looking female sprinkled in here and there for visual relief. Sometimes I couldn’t tell who were the boys and who were the girls, but what the heck, it didn’t matter. Fun belonged to everyone, and it was there to be had.

  We stood in the ticket line, catching bits and pieces of all the different social groups and plans around us:

  “Yes, well, we have to redecorate for the party tomorrow.”

  “Okay. You bring the food and I’ll bring the boys.”

  “Look at Miss Thing over there. Looks like she’s been out for weeks.”

  “Oh! Don’t let her see you, she’ll want to come, too.”

  “Pull your hat down, honey, she might not recognize you.”

  Then there it was, pulling up to the dock, the five o’clock ferry. As we boarded, I noticed how many people were carrying little dogs in their arms. Some of these dogs were so well groomed that they looked better than I did. Onto the boat we all went—dogs, bags, boys, and girls with jewels and summer looks. As we sat on the wooden benches, the mainland disappeared. I was so excited; I couldn’t wait to step foot on “The Island.” All my cares blew away with the wind.

  The island appeared as if out of a dream. There was a small hotel by the dock called the Botel, and the sundeck was swarming with people. It looked like a late-afternoon dance in full swing. As the ferry’s ropes were thrown out to the dock, everyone on both sides started waving. The sun was still high enough in the sky to give the evening that warm, late-day summer feeling.

  Because the island was so tiny, everyone was immediately friends with everyone else. Fire Island was a sort of utopia built on having fun and being creative, and all doors were unlocked. It seemed like everyone there was connected with the business of art, as a designer, an interior decorator, a painter, a chef, a writer. Even the playwright Tennessee Williams was there. We were staying at the home of Paul McGregor, who was known as “the hairstylist to the stars.” Paul had sent someone to greet us at the dock with a little red wagon for our luggage. I was charmed by that; I’d never been in a place that allowed no automobiles whatsoever. We set off for Paul’s house—one of the first to be built on the island, and pretty isolated from the rest—and stopped on the way at a small grocery to pick up a few provisions. I was shocked to see people milling around in bathing suits, chatting and shopping for food.

  We walked up a long wooden boardwalk between a grove of pine trees and bunches of wild rosebushes. The sea air hit me. The combined scents of pine and salt water and the musk oil worn by the boys was intoxicating. As we made our way along the path with our wagon, we were greeted left and right by other islanders welcoming us and inviting us to parties. I was proud to be with Stephen and the boys, because when people saw us, they just lit up.

  Paul’s house was large and modern, a wood-and-glass structure he’d designed himself. Stephen had told me that virtually everyone on the island had a custom-designed house because he was either a famous architect or was good friends with one. Two heads peeked out from an upper level: Tracy the photographer, who’d arrived earlier, and Stephen’s best friend, Roz, who came outside in a sheer white caftan, beautiful brown hair cascading over her shoulders. She took care of the business side of Stephen’s World and was one of those rare people who are naturally beautiful, both inside and out. She greeted me with a warm hug, like a sister. I put my bags in the room Roz was using, then went upstairs to the huge living space, with its high-beamed ceiling shaped into a pyramid, wooden verandas, floor-to-ceiling glass walls, and white hammocks strung around the room. Roz was relaxing in one of them by the open kitchen; she’d already prepared appetizers for us.

  Tracy was here to work, though. He wasted no time preparing to take photos. Stephen, Bobby, and Hector dressed and painted me, and as the sun began to descend, I posed with wet hair, veiled only in a sheer flowery silk scarf over my naked body. I heard the waves crash behind me and felt as though I’d struck my best pose yet, with Tracy and Stephen directing me.

  We changed clothes and sets until the last rays of natural sunlight were gone. The boys created a room out of red chiffon and silk, then put me in a leather-fringed dress as the breeze blew through the windows and ruffled th
e fringe. I could tell exactly when they got the shot they wanted. Everything felt so sensuous; this was truly what photographers called “making love through the lens.” Now I felt fully ensconced in Stephen’s world, with a new family of the most inspired people I’d ever met in my life.

  Roz cooked dinner, and then it was time to party. The house had only one bathroom, the site of its sole mirror, and we all rushed to use it. The girls went first. In addition to Roz, me, and a girl named Daryl, there was Pat Ast, another of Stephen’s pals. Weighing around two hundred pounds, she was one of the first plus-size models; she was also sarcastic, aggressive, pushy, stylish, and a drama queen on her way to becoming a big star. For some reason, she had a grudge against me from the word go. Every time I saw her, she’d tell me I had no charisma. It was like having a wicked queen constantly trying to cast an evil spell on me.

  When it came time to dress, we would don whatever outfit we had packed, only to have Stephen re-dress everyone. He’d pull something out of his seemingly bottomless duffel—yet another aspect of Stephen’s genius was that he designed clothes that could fold up so small you could fit a hundred dresses into a tiny bag—and fling it across the room to someone, and he or she would put it on. At some point, Stephen ran out of stuff, but he still wanted to dress me, so he gave me his own clothes to wear. So there I was, dressed like a boy, in a pair of Goody Two Shoes platform wedges.

  Shooting stars and a bass sound guided us to the Botel. We went arm in arm, talking and laughing and being free, passing blunts from person to person. As we walked along, people greeted us and stared at me. Well, not at me, exactly, but at the way I was dressed. Stephen was already known as the designers’ designer, and people got a lot of ideas and inspiration from him. If Stephen conceived it, it was bound to pop up soon in someone’s collection.

  Heads turned like magnets to metal when we arrived at the Botel. The music was so loud we couldn’t really converse, so we drank instead. I stuck to fruit punch and put the little paper umbrella in my hair for decoration. From then on, that was where my paper umbrellas usually ended up. The place was packed with beautiful guys and a few girls whom everyone seemed to be calling “hags.” The primary mode of socializing was to dance as hard and as fast and as much as you could. People always wonder how models stay in shape. Here’s the secret: They test-drive their clothes on the dance floor. And in those days, I was one of the best test pilots around.

  Our fashion tribe squeezed its way through the mass of dancing until we reached our post. Everyone wanted to be near Stephen; he had incredible energy and effervescence. The new dance that summer was a saucy Latin creation called the bump—fresh in more than one sense of the word—that was like a wacky tango emanating from the legs and hips. It felt really sexy to “bump” against someone in that way. Stephen was unquestionably the “it” boy that summer, and everyone was falling for him, even the other designers. I knew exactly how they felt: They all wanted to leave their gray-by-contrast world and join Stephen’s free-spirited, rainbow-colored world.

  The weekend flew by in a blur of colors and bodies and music, and before I knew it, we were on the ferry again, heading back to reality.

  chapter 24

  OUR DAY WILL COME

  The Essence shoot, 1970. Me (center) playing volleyball with Norma Jean Darden (left) and Ramona Saunders (far right).

  Courtesy of Kourkin Pakchanian.

  At last, one of my go-sees had paid off! Just before leaving for Fire Island, I’d had a rather rushed meeting with Gordon Parks, the celebrated composer, poet, novelist, film director, and, in case that wasn’t enough, now the editorial director of Essence, the new magazine for black women. Though it had been an honor to meet him, I’d been a bit distracted by the impending trip to Fire Island. So imagine my surprise and excitement when he ended up picking me to appear in the premier issue. Best of all, we were shooting in a bucolic setting in upstate New York, which meant another weekend away from the city.

  I went to the address where the van was being loaded and was met by three cultured, beautiful women of color who introduced themselves as Susan Taylor, the primary stylist, and Iona and Sandra, her assistants. There was a sense of soulfulness about them—a spiritual depth—that was vital, since they were in charge of making the first issue a success.

  “How does that look?” Susan asked, holding up a pair of shoes next to a dress. She had creamy caramel-colored skin and wore her hair in African-styled braids, but what I loved most about her were her sparkling almond-shaped eyes.

  Iona snapped her fingers and said, “Tell me ’bout it, sister,” meaning it looked great. Iona laughed and smiled with such radiance that I just wanted to keep looking at her. She was a churchgoing, soft-spoken girl who said things like “God knows what you’re doing” and “God knows what’s in your heart.”

  Sandra, the tallest of the three, said, “It looks fly, don’t you think?” She liked to crack jokes and said “don’t you think?” at the end of each sentence, and the funny thing was, you actually would have to think.

  These women were the essence of Essence: young, black, proud, and eager to share that pride with everyone. They were the first black fashion editors I’d met since Ebony, and it was inspiring to watch them meet the challenges of the times. They were spearheading a new trend in black culture, and I was definitely in on it, even though I was constantly aware that I was half-Viking.

  So while blacks were often denied opportunities because of their skin color—and believe me, I lost plenty of jobs because I didn’t have the conventional all-American looks that higher-ups at fashion magazines considered pretty—I also got passed over for jobs that went to models who were a deeper shade of brown. (I admit I found some satisfaction in the fact that I’d be appearing in the first issue of Essence, the very magazine that Anthony Barboza had refused to photograph me for because I wasn’t “black enough.”) As it turned out, Essence was inclusive enough to want someone like me in its pages.

  It was a terrific shoot. Four of us had been tapped to be featured in that first issue, including Carol Hobbs; Norma Jean Darden (the girl Stephen had been expecting that day I walked in); Ramona Saunders, who would become a good friend; and me. It was a clear August day when we piled into the van and headed upstate. After riding through miles and miles of farmland, we stopped in front of a grand, romantic-looking turn-of-the-century mansion, which functioned as both our stage set and our hotel.

  Over two gorgeous days, we shot several photos. One particularly memorable picture was of all four of us playing volleyball in long taffeta skirts with beautiful calico underskirts that made us look like schoolgirls of that pre–World War I era. In another shot, we posed between the garden doors and the pillars in the conservatory and on the veranda. The experience was like stepping out of time. Everyone on the shoot, from the models to the editors to the photographer and crew, bonded because we knew we were participating in something beautiful and important.

  If all my jobs had been as pleasant and solid as that one, I wouldn’t have had a complaint in the world. But I was frustrated with Ford’s representation. The Essence job had been the result of a go-see that Ford had booked, but on the whole I felt the agency wasn’t doing enough to steer my career in the right direction, and the most likely reason for that was because Eileen Ford didn’t believe in me. At the end of the day, she just didn’t think I was pretty enough to be a truly successful model.

  In fact, my primary income stemmed from three sources that Ford had nothing to do with. There was my work at Vogue, being fitted in outfits and sketched by Maning; there was being Stephen’s fitting model, which was the direct result of my work at Vogue; and then there was the regular gig I’d been doing on Seventh Avenue as a fitting model for the wonderful French émigré designer Jacques Tiffeau, which had materialized through the recommendation of Mrs. Johnson from Ebony. At that time, the French designers were the most important in the world of fashion, but America was an exciting frontier. The possibilities were lim
itless, and the fiercely independent Monsieur Tiffeau was eager to push the limits. We worked well together, and photographs of me wearing his clothes appeared regularly in the Daily News.

  Meanwhile, Ford would often book me for jobs like one that involved standing in front of a bank on the corner of Fifty-Ninth Street and Lexington Avenue handing out fliers, dressed as a huge yellow chicken. Or another weeklong assignment where I had to remain motionless in a store window like a mannequin for an entire afternoon, moving only slightly to startle passersby. By the end of the week, I had a crowd at the window, and I rather enjoyed putting on a show, especially for kids, but this was not the career I had in mind.

  I tried to concentrate on the money I was making—I’d hum the popular song “Takin’ It to the Bank” every time I deposited a check—but I was getting impatient. I wanted more, which was why, on a sunny day in September at eight-thirty in the morning, I found myself in the office of Wilhelmina Models, a relatively new agency founded by the stunning Dutch model Wilhelmina and her husband, Bruce Cooper. I’d heard that Wilhelmina had a broader, more modern concept of beauty—one that maybe, just maybe, was modern and broad enough to include me.