I was trying to get the rhythm of dancing in my heavy winter boots when Mick made his way over to me (in his sleek tailored trousers and barely buttoned shirt), grabbed my hips, and started dancing. And I mean really dancing. I think I went into some kind of trance, because I barely remember any of it, and I wasn’t that drunk. Okay, I was pretty drunk, but the rest of the evening, before and after, is clear enough in my memory. All I know for sure is that I let go and danced like mad. We took a few breaks, all as a group, to go back to our table and get another drink and sit down for a minute. And every time we went back to the dance floor, Mick wanted to dance with me. I am an okay dancer, but not a great one. Like most people, my dancing ability increases in direct proportion to the amount of alcohol I consume. Even in the moment, I realized that I’d never danced better in my whole life. You know what happens when you play tennis with someone who is miles better than you, and you play above your usual ability? Well, Mick raised my dancing game, and I’m reminded of that night every time I hear “Moves Like Jagger” on the radio. Adam Levine isn’t kidding.
Four hours later, we stepped out onto the street. Although we were still in a group, I was nervous. All my friends were obviously wondering if Mick was going to try to take me home. It wasn’t possible: As much as I was loving the attention, I’d already been with my future husband, Christopher, for two years. I was deeply in love with him and knew for sure that I’d never do anything to jeopardize that. So when we all piled into Mick’s car, I was relieved when he whispered into my ear, “If you give me your number, maybe we can go dancing again some time.” I wrote it down for him but thought, Well, that’s nice of him to ask, but he’s never going to call. He gave me a kiss on the cheek. Nice guy. Perfect night.
But then he called! I’d been back at work in New York for a week when the phone rang. The number was blocked, and I didn’t dare pick up, thinking it might be him. “Hi, uh, Amanda . . . it’s Mick,” his sleepy voice said on my answering machine. “I’ll be in New York next week and I thought we could see each other.” (When I would leave that job a year later, I recorded that message, which I’d saved, so that I could keep it as a souvenir of my unlikely encounter. I must still have it somewhere today.)
Here is where the delusion began. I had to call him back; it would be too much of a shame not to. And then if he asked to see me, it would be too rude to say no. Saying “Well, I have a boyfriend” on the phone seemed unimaginably awkward and lame. And I did want to see him again—I just didn’t want to sleep with him. Or kiss him. Or anything. You must be rolling your eyes. I’m actually rolling my eyes as I write! But I was twenty-four, so give me a break.
I decided that if he’d agree to have lunch with me, I would do it. How dangerous could lunch be? I was so nervous calling him back. I remember that my voice was shaking. We agreed to have lunch the next day—he suggested I meet him in the lobby of the Pierre and then we’d walk to a neighborhood restaurant.
From left: Anh Duong, Lucy Sykes, me, and Plum Sykes on our night out with Mick in Paris, 1999.
Did I really think Mick Jagger and I were going to walk down the street together and casually pop in somewhere to eat? Without having our picture taken? If it crossed my mind at the time, I ignored it. But I knew I had to tell Christopher what I was doing—having lunch with Mick Jagger. Being the annoyingly unflappable person he is, Christopher said, “Say hi to him for me.”
So I naively walked into the Pierre looking for Mick. I wore my second-favorite pair of Joseph trousers—mushroom-colored flares with a burgundy velvet tuxedo stripe up the side; a chunky, cream-colored Narciso Rodriguez sweater; and my favorite hunter green suede Stephane Kélian high-heeled boots. My goal was to be stylish but not overtly sexy. When I didn’t see him in the lobby, I went up to the desk and gave the secret code name he had instructed me to use. The clerk nodded to a burly, plainclothed man in the corner, who approached me. “Right this way, Miss Cutter,” he said, showing me the way to an elevator. When he pressed PH, I began to understand that I was in trouble. How was I going to get out of this?
The man led me off the elevator, through the second door of a foyer into a giant apartment, and then disappeared. Mick was on the sofa, with a small table set for two nearby and Mary J. Blige playing on the stereo. It was awful. I was so nervous. I was terrified of sitting down next to him on the couch, but it was clear that lunch wasn’t going to be served yet, so I just stood around for a few minutes trying not to look too mortified. We talked about what he was reading in the New York Times (something to do with India) and then he suggested I sit down on the sofa. Not wanting to be the idiot who forbids a kiss before he even tries, I sat down tentatively. He suggested I come closer, as if we were definitely more than friends. That’s when I looked sheepish and said, “I can’t.”
“I’m really sorry,” I explained. “I had a great time with you in Paris and I thought it would be fun to see you again, but I have a boyfriend who I really love and who you actually know.” When I explained that I was with Christopher (who knew Mick through his sister, Annabel), he laughed sweetly and then immediately relaxed, as did I, to a smaller degree. We ate our lunch—a rather banal spaghetti with tomato sauce and basil—while chatting about the friends we had in common, what we loved about New York, and, oddly enough, about his parents. Over the course of lunch, I began to feel like he was no longer rock star Mick Jagger. He was lovely and soft and sweet and, in a weird way, almost protective of me—almost like a father having lunch with his daughter. (I suppose that isn’t such an odd idea, considering he is more than thirty years older than I am.) We had a friendly hug good-bye that afternoon.
Much to my surprise, it wasn’t the last time I saw Mick. He called me a few weeks later, just to say hi, and when I told him I would be in Paris the next month he suggested we go out dancing again. We did meet up, as before, with his friends and mine, and we had another dance. The energy wasn’t as high that night, now that we were definitively just friends, but it was fun nonetheless. We didn’t talk again on the phone, but I see him from time to time with mutual friends or at a fashion show. He is always as friendly and sincere as he was that embarrassing day on the couch at the Pierre.
Lauren Hutton strikes the perfect balance of classic and bohemian.
STYLE INFLUENCE
LAUREN HUTTON
DESPITE LIVING in Europe and being married to an Englishman, I consider myself typically American. In that regard, no one inspires me more than Lauren Hutton, whose looks and style have barely changed over the past four decades, and who epitomizes the very essence of classic American chic. I am inspired by her love of sportswear, her ability to make the most casual clothes look elegant and her steady relevance in nearly every decade in which I can find a photo of her. But beyond the iconic status of her style is the remarkably strong presence of the person who inhabits it—the gap in her teeth, the straw backpack she never leaves at home, the naturally curly hair, the bazillion trillion watts of her smile. For me, Lauren Hutton is the whole package.
That time when my Tuleh pants split right down the middle at an art opening, 2000. Photo by Christopher.
TRY ANYTHING THAT GRABS YOUR ATTENTION—YOU GOTTA START SOMEWHERE!
FROM A STYLE point of view, I spent all of my twenties being a chameleon. I took influence and inspiration from wherever it came, and tried it on. At twenty-two, I was what some people now call a “gallerina,” one of the well-raised, polite girls pretty enough to charm billionaires into buying art at blue-chip galleries.
Before I’d even arrived at Gagosian, I had the gallerina uniform down pat. Patricia Herrera, my college roommate for two years, was born into a family of fashion royalty (she is Carolina’s daughter), lived in New York City, and at age twenty already had her own personal style thoroughly worked out. I was so impressed at the time by the flashiest of my fellow students—the girls who wore Marc Jacobs for Perry Ellis grunge, head-to-toe Chanel and hot-off-the-runway Ra
lph Lauren. But I realize now that the person who influenced me the most in the long run was Patricia. She had beautiful clothes, but they were not overtly attention-seeking or even recognizable as belonging to any certain designer. She was casual, unpretentious, and yet chic in an elegant and understated way.
Patricia taught me about buying pants at Joseph, the tiny English boutique on Madison Avenue that had fifty styles of perfectly cut, stretch trousers in cotton, wool tweed, leather, and even pleather, for those, like me, on a more modest college budget. Patricia would wear her chic Joseph pants with Converse All-Stars way before it was cool to wear tailoring with sneakers. I could afford only one pair of Josephs at a time, but I made it a goal to save up so I could buy one pair each season. Soon I had a nice little collection of perfect pants.
Patricia also taught me about Free Lance boots. Free Lance was a shoe company that had a boutique in SoHo, and they’d nailed the perfect jodhpur boot with a chunky two-inch heel. They were casual enough to wear every day but nice enough to wear to work or a job interview. They were at the top of my price range so I had only one pair, in black leather. They were classic.
And finally, Patricia introduced me to Equipment shirts. I was familiar with the brand because my mom wore their shirts, and until then I assumed that I couldn’t afford anything my mom wore. And I was right, but when I got my job at Gagosian, I went to Equipment the day before I was due to start and bought myself a black washed silk military-style shirt that I still wear today.
So in I walked on my first day at the gallery in my new Equipment shirt, black pleather Joseph pants, and only boots. It was an intimidating crowd in an even more intimidating environment, but my outfit gave me confidence, as if to say “I belong here.”
After I left Gagosian and went to work at Frédéric Fekkai, it was the first time I had any disposable income. My healthier wallet gave me the chance to experiment more with trendy and frivolous pieces. I bought two pairs of stiletto boots at the Stephane Kélian sample sale, a Jamin Puech fabric bag with ostrich feather trim on a business trip to Paris, and a few embroidered slip dresses from Ghost (all iconic nineties pieces). I’d also discovered the unique and affordable finds to be had at the Paris flea market: silk flower pins, sequin headbands, and engraved gold hoop earrings. Worn with my more tailored Joseph and Zara pieces, it was a good mix of classic masculinity and more whimsical feminine pieces.
While I was at Fekkai, I got a call from Vogue asking to photograph me for their “Best-Dressed List.” Needless to say, I was over the moon. I was a humble shopper, meaning that my clothing budget was just a fraction of what many of my friends and contemporaries in fashion spent (and without all the freebies a magazine editor receives), but the necessity to find things in unconventional places had made my style unique, and I was proud to be recognized for that.
André Leon Talley was the stylist on the shoot, and he thought it would be fun to put me in a huge, and I really mean huge, Tuleh ballgown. It was a black strapless cotton dress with a fitted bodice and a giant, crinoline-supported voluminous skirt covered in bows. Gisele Bündchen had worn the same dress in white in another magazine, and I couldn’t believe that I would have the chance to wear something so over the top, so high fashion. When I put it on, I was transformed, and André took one look at me and said, “You’re keeping that.” After a polite protest on my part, André called the designers and announced that I should keep the dress. Being young designers on the rise, and obviously beholden to Vogue, what could they say other than “yes”?
The reality of owning that dress was way less glamorous than the fantasy of it. Or maybe it was glamorous in a Holly Golightly kind of way. The dress really was huge, and it weighed a ton. It didn’t fit in the tiny closet in my walk-up apartment, and so for three weeks it lay across my sofa, covering the entire thing so you couldn’t actually sit down. It also dawned on me that I wouldn’t have many opportunities to wear this behemoth of a fairy-tale dress. A few weeks later, Josh Patner, one of the Tuleh designers, called and sheepishly explained that the dress, which had a whopping $10,000 retail value, had been ordered by a client, and that to make another one would be prohibitively expensive for them. He asked if I’d allow them to sell my dress to the client, and in exchange, they would let me come to the showroom and order anything I wanted from the collection. We instantly bonded in our mutual relief as I responded with a resounding “Yes!” and made plans to go to the studio.
I’d seen a friend wearing Tuleh a few months prior, and then seen more of the collection on the racks at Bergdorf Goodman. It was one of the most original brands I’d discovered in a long time. In the midst of all the grungy gloom and restrained minimalism of the nineties, Tuleh was exuberant and happy and colorful and feminine. At the showroom I ordered ruffled floral blouses, sexy secretary windowpane-checked skirts, a cropped fox-fur vest, menswear-tailored classic wool pants, and a stunning red chiffon cocktail dress. I felt like I’d found my look, and I couldn’t get over my luck in receiving all these clothes for free.
Just as my Tuleh love affair was beginning, I left my job at Fekkai and went to work at Hogan, an Italian accessories brand owned by Tod’s that played the role of its younger, sportier little sister. (More on working at Hogan in the next chapter.)
My style while working at Hogan was inspired by the tomboy, preppy look of the brand, but in my off-duty time, I loved the contrast of being the ultragirly, feminine Tuleh girl. Designers Josh Patner and Bryan Bradley lived around the corner from me in the West Village, and while I was committed to working at Hogan during the week, I’d wander over to their apartment on Sundays to talk about inspiration, fabrics for their next collection, and what was missing from my wardrobe. I longed to be that glamorous girl that the Tuleh clothes encouraged me to be. I wanted to wear heels, curl my hair, and wear red lipstick. I wanted the pleasure of dolling myself up every morning.
And then, life took me by surprise. I got pregnant! I’d been with Christopher for four years and I knew I wanted to spend my life with him, and so we decided to get married. Trouble was, my job at Hogan required me to travel to Europe for at least a week every month, and often longer. Suddenly my priorities changed drastically, and I knew that my current lifestyle wasn’t going to work for me.
Hogan, being the Italian family-oriented company that they are, offered me a generous consulting gig, allowing me to do much of the same work—forecasting trends, giving design direction, and suggesting new product ideas—as a part-time job with no travel requirements. When the deal was sealed, I realized I’d have the best of all worlds: I could keep my steady and secure day job, be home to nurture my new family, and work with Tuleh (who could afford only to pay me in clothes!) in my spare time.
It all worked perfectly for a while, until I found myself struggling to find a balance. I knew the time had come to make a decision. While the Hogan job definitely represented a part of me, I knew that the work I did at Tuleh was a much bigger opportunity for my personal creative expression, and I convinced my husband to temporarily support me while I devoted myself completely to making it enough of a success to be able to afford to hire me.
Chatting on the phone at home in my favorite Tuleh blouse, 2002.
One of my favorite Tuleh shows, 2000.
With my plan in mind, I asked Josh and Bryan out to dinner. We went to the restaurant at Industria, the trendy photography studio complex in our mutual West Village neighborhood. I always had such a laugh with the two of them. Josh was extroverted, emotional and outspoken—he dreamed big and was passionate about everything he loved. He had an idea a minute and was never hesitant to express them. He was also wickedly funny and did the best impressions of people. At Tuleh, he came up with the inspiration, the big idea behind the collection, and then faithfully saw it through to completion, managing every detail. He was also a brilliant stylist. Any look I could make or Bryan could make, Josh could make better. Bryan, on the other hand, was far more r
eserved and shy. He chose his words carefully and expressed them sincerely. He loved reading and was careful about the friends he chose. And he was a brilliant designer. He could design anything. He could dream up a dress, sketch it, create the pattern, and fit it with a sense of natural ease that impressed everyone in the studio and subsequently in the fashion world. At the end of the dinner that night, I asked them if they would take me on in the studio full-time, and they graciously and enthusiastically accepted.
Wearing a dress from that same show to Emilia Fanjul’s wedding rehearsal in the Dominican Republic, 2002.
My title at Tuleh was creative director, but more specifically, my job was to be the female voice—the embodiment of the ideal customer—in every aspect of the conception, design, execution, presentation, and sales of each collection. I shared with Josh and Bryan what was missing from my closet, what I was in the mood for, what I wanted to wear. I helped them choose fabrics and come up with new silhouettes and proportions. I tried on muslins and test-drove newly finished pieces. I stayed at the studio until three A.M. every night in the week before their shows styling looks, accessorizing them, proposing ideas for hair and makeup, choosing the right model for the right outfit. When all that was said and done, I always wore (showed off!) my favorite outfit from the collection for the sales meetings with the stores and eventually, when we discovered that I was good at selling clothes to the clients, traveled around the country working the trunk shows at Saks and Neiman.
Always Pack a Party Dress: And Other Lessons Learned From a (Half) Life in Fashion Page 8
