The Fashionista Files

by Karen Robinovitz

  Claude Montana. He was born in 1949 in Paris to a German mother and Catalonian (Spanish) father. At an early age he traveled to London (1971) and began his career by designing papiermâché jewelry encrusted with rhinestones. He made his name by designing sexy leather motorcycle jackets that were must-haves in the 1980s. He designed haute couture for the House of Lanvin from 1990 to 1992, but was booted when his designs were considered too bold for the more traditional Lanvin customer. Montana, who greatly admired Madame Gres (1910–1993) as a couturiere, specialized in strong colors, monochromatic fabrics, and lots of leather and wool. His classic and structural pantsuits feature razor-sharp tailoring and strong silhouettes with dramatic proportions. Our idols, Simon Le Bon and Nick Rhodes of Duran Duran, wore his jackets in the eighties.

  Norman Norell. Norman David Levinson, born in Noblesville, Indiana, changed his name to Norman Norell after moving from New York to study fashion illustration at the Parson’s School of Design. He worked briefly as a costume designer for the Astoria Studio of Paramount Pictures at age twenty-two. For the next thirty-one years, Norell led American fashion. In 1960, Norell’s name alone appeared on the label when he became the sole owner of his company. Norell became known for his understated simple wool dresses with a high, round neckline, sequined cocktail dresses, and sailor motifs. His classic clothes were worn by his clients, such as actress Greer Garson, with a great devotion to the Norell aesthetic.

  HOW A-MUSE-ING

  Haute Heroine KAREN

  In the fall of 2003, Liz Collins, an up-and-coming designer who has become famous for doing sexy knits with peekaboo holes and loose stitches fused with tight stitches, crochet lace, body-loving silhouettes, and an eighties rocker-chick kind of punk MO that hangs in the closets of Sarah Jessica Parker, supermodel Devon Aoki, and Mariah Carey (to name a few), sent me an e-mail with a JPEG of a black knit bikini encrusted with Swarovski crystals and a built-in belly chain that wraps not once, not twice, but three times around the midsection. “I thought of you when I made this,” she wrote. Gulp. Why would that make her think of moi? I could never pull that kind of thing off. “Not with my love handles,” I wrote her back.

  “It just has such a sexy vibe, and with your crazy hair and fierce personality, I think you’re the only person who could pull it off,” she replied, adding that the entire inspiration for her collection— a chiffon-heavy line full of Marilyn Monroe–style dresses with tight-knit bodices and graceful royal-blue skirts imprinted with big white stars, crazy superhero capes, micromini knit dresses with webbed sleeves, red knit swimsuits made for jumping over buildings and hopping into the invisible jet—was Wonder Woman. Action-hero chic more intense than kryptonite.

  Liz and I first met a few years earlier while I was buying one of her pieces—what she deemed a “pimp daddy” fur-trimmed sweater coat. It was love at first sight. We instantly bonded as I strutted around the boutique in her fabulous creation. “It’s so you,” she shrieked. And we exchanged e-mail addresses on the spot, vowing to become friends. So, about that bikini. Liz was doing a big art project, in which twenty women she thought embodied the spirit of Wonder Woman would be photographed in one of her designs, hair and makeup artists included. “Just bring your sense of power,” she said, asking me to be one of the chosen few. I was flattered, beyond! Me, a muse? Of course I would do it. We set a date. I didn’t think about what wearing a knit bikini encrusted with crystals would actually mean at the time I agreed to do the shoot. (It means being photographed in a knit bikini encrusted with crystals!) And when Liz and her crew—makeup artist/pixie goddess Shyanne (that name!) and photographer Monika Merva, a Chelsea-based artist known for her documentary-style work that has been featured in Nylon, Details, Interview, and Surface (see www.monikamerva.com)—showed up at my apartment with my wardrobe—a teeny, itsy-bitsy black bikini (not even full briefs, mind you, but a skimpy Brazilian kind) and glimmering diamondlike silver crystals, hanging perfectly in a garment bag, I thought I might vomit.

  I held it up between my forefinger and thumb, as if there were something horribly wrong with it. “This is what I’m supposed to wear?” I mean, it was the fiercest thing I ever did see. But not for my body! Sadly, I had no choice. The makeup was going on my face (insanely gloppy mascara and smoky, smoky shadow with clear shiny lips), and Monika was thinking about the lighting in my apartment as she threw my white Mongolian fur pillow on the floor (my prop). I swallowed my pride. No time to be shy. I put on the swimsuit, along with black patent knee-high Dolce & Gabbana four-inch-heeled boots. Sha-zam! (Luckily, I had just returned from We Care and was a bit slimmer than usual.)

  I slithered on the floor, trying to flaunt my best angle (whatever position I could find that would allow for sucking in the gut and camouflaging problem areas with strategic hand placement). “Holy sexpot!” Liz said. Monika stood on a stool to shoot me from above, which tends to make for flattering shots. She did a few rolls in color and a few in grainy black-and-white for a sort of porn-chic mood. Between breaks I jockeyed phone calls (with headset), while sitting at my desk (in a far cry from my usual work attire) and felt very glad that I had yet to eat lunch.

  Oops! I forgot the headband!

  When it was all said and done, I didn’t even want to put my real clothes back on. Between all of the flashes of the camera and Liz loving how the whole thing looked, I felt, I must say, as cliché as it sounds, like Wonder Woman. I stopped being so self-conscious and embraced the moment. So what if my body isn’t anything like that of Kate Moss? Who cares if I’ll never look like Heidi Klum? The real Wonder Woman, per the 1940s comic (not the television show starring Lynda Carter) was not a skinny Minnie. She was strong. She had meat on her bones. She had biceps, developed quads, and battles with the Duke Mephisto Saturno of Saturn. She kicked butt in knee-high red stiletto boots. She had no time to worry about little things, like how her legs looked in those hot pants. So why should I? I’m Karen Robinovitz, dammit! If only I had the Amazon bulletdeflecting cuffs to match!

  THE INFLUENCERS

  A muse’s whole job is to inspire not just a designer, but the general public. Her every move and natural way is so alluring, so intoxicating, so becoming, so fetching. She’s the type of person who stops traffic and makes an entire room stare (in envy, lust, and awe). They are image makers and trendsetters. Meet the women fashionistas emulate the most:

  Babe Paley. Born Barbara Cushing in 19_? (who knows . . . a real muse must never reveal her age, darling, but she was considered the ultimate glamour girl from the fifties up until her death, due to cancer, in 1978), she was known simply as “Babe” to her friends. She was not born into high-society money, but her mother groomed her to marry well. She did: first to a Mortimer and then to a Paley, who was the chairman of CBS. Her jet-set life involved a billion-dollar art collection, traveling by yacht, an editor gig at Vogue in the forties, many, many homes designed by the famous Billy Baldwin, cocktails with best friend Slim Keith (see next page), and a close tie to Truman Capote, who later betrayed her by hardly masking her as a character in one of his biting books about the high life. She wrapped scarves around her purse handles; didn’t cover up her gray hair; mixed couture with loads of cheapie jewelry; ensconced herself in sable; donned Bill Blass, Oscar de la Renta, wide-brimmed hats, ruby-red lips; and kept her skin milky pale at all times. As flawlessly beautiful and chic as she was, she was also riddled with insecurity and marital problems. No one, alas, has it all. No matter how perfect their lives seem in pictures.

  Babe Paley. What a babe!

  Baby Jane Holzer. A rich-girl actress type who was probably Andy Warhol’s greatest starlet (she was in lots of his underground flicks) and got her nickname from a journalist at Women’s Wear Daily. Andy did a screen test (a.k.a. short film) of her unwrapping a stick of gum and brushing her teeth (who knew such mundane tasks as oral hygiene could be so damn sexy?). With her huge eyes and even huger flaxen-colored hair, Baby Jane was the vixen bombshell of the sixties, who wore go-go boots, microdresse
s, Pucci, Pucci, Pucci, and hung out with the Rolling Stones, art world wunderkinds, and the social mavens on the old-family-money circuit.

  Diana “Never mind about the facts; just project an image to the public” Vreeland. Ah, Diana! Such an eccentric, you were: The fashion editor of Bazaar for twenty-five years, editor in chief of Vogue, and ambassador to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute, she is perhaps one of the reasons fashion has come to the forefront of our society. She actually believed people who ate white bread had no dreams. Superskinny, with a worn face, clownish nose, and small, squinty eyes, she was considered unattractive, yet the matriarch of chic and style. Couture designers gave her wears for free because on her body they laid perfectly, and she was the ultimate marketing machine for chic, a walking advertisement for any brand name. She called her life neither fact nor fiction, but “faction.” And she was a spitfire of fashion words of wisdom. She used to send her entire office important memos with demands like: “more gray,” “get models with thicker eyebrows,” and “find poor Arabs in Greenwich Village to make belts.” Her personality was powerful, strong, magical, smart, intense. And her impact on the fashion front will last forever.

  Talitha Getty. The Bali-born top seventies model married oil-heir Paul Getty and embraced the glamorous jet-set life, traveling the world, living it up at her palace in Marrakech, and perfecting the nouveau-riche hippie, boho style with everything from patchwork caftans with jeweled necklines and capri pants to YSL. She was beautiful and rich, but damned. She suffered from depression and a nasty drug habit and eventually overdosed in her pool in Marrakech—in a fur coat. The yacht, Talitha G., once owned by the Getty family, remains one of the most decadent in the harbor and is charterable for upward of $100,000 per week.

  Slim Keith. Some women are born into their fortunes; others earn them the old-fashioned way: They marry them. Lady Slim Keith fell into the latter category. Born Nancy Gross in Salinas, California, by the age of twenty-two she had already appeared on the cover of Harper’s Bazaar. She graced the best-dressed list almost yearly, and was the first private citizen to receive the Neiman Marcus Fashion Award. This award was usually given to designers, or to honor someone who has made an impact on fashion. Her three husbands included Hollywood producer Howard Hawks, Broadway producer Leland Hayward (who showered her with jewels and sable furs), and Sir Kenneth Keith. Her best friends were Babe Paley and Truman Capote. Babe and Slim shared an interest in fashion and a mutual devotion to the same charities, which ensured their lifelong friendship. In the 1970s Slim lost both her best friends. Babe, an inveterate smoker, died of lung cancer; Truman was banished from Slim’s life after using her as the main character in his book Answered Prayers. Though her name was disguised, anyone who knew her could see in an instant just who “Lady Ina Coolbirth” was. Though he tried several times to beg her forgiveness, Slim never spoke to Truman again.

  Tina Chow. Half Japanese, half German-American, she started modeling as a teen (and did so sporadically her entire life), but it wasn’t until she moved to New York in the early seventies and became a Warhol-circle regular that she elevated to bold-face status. Chow loved fashion and amassed a legendary collection of vintage clothing. Manolo Blahnik and Antonio Lopez were among her closest friends. But it was her innate skill at pared-down elegance that made her an icon: sleek, clipped hair, minimal makeup, a daily uniform of white T-shirts, black Kenzo trousers, and maybe one of her bamboo-wrapped crystal jewels. As Yves Saint Laurent said, “fashion fades; style is eternal.” She married Michael Chow of Mr. Chow’s and partied with the Hollywood set—her boyfriends included Richard Gere. Her daughter, China Chow, is also a fashionista.

  Edie Sedgwick. During the mid-1960s, Edie Sedgwick was the constant companion of pop artist, sixties icon, and filmmaker Andy Warhol, and played a part in his early success. Edie became famous in New York as one of Andy Warhol’s “superstars,” dazzling everyone with her beauty, style, glamour, and wealth. “She was a very bright and well-spoken young lady, having a penchant for shopping.” Edie purchased everything from only the very best stores in New York, including glamorous clothes, as well as considerable quantities of makeup and those huge, shoulder-dusting earrings she made trendy. She managed to spend a large amount of her family inheritance. The Sedgwick family included a number of relatives who played a part in early American history. Edie helped transform the Factory’s reputation into a place to be seen for all New York’s wealthy socialites and trendsetters. During the period from 1963 until 1965, Edie was featured in leading magazines such as Time, Life, and Vogue.

  Jackie O. First she was Mrs. Kennedy, in demure Oleg Cassini gowns and white gloves. Her husband declared himself, “the man who accompanied Mrs. Kennedy to Paris.” She had a whisper-soft voice and a Vassar degree. Born to the WASP-y Bouvier family (her father, “Black Jack” Bouvier, was a handsome, rich rascal), she was a Miss Porter’s (a chi chi boarding school) girl and a style icon. She married Aristotle Onassis, one of the richest men in the world, and her Capri uniform of bandanna, oversize sunglasses, and cutoffs is still worn today. She was an editor at Doubleday and lived the rest of her life with her companion, Maurice Templesman. She lived the adage: First you marry for love, then money, then companionship.

  CHAPTER 7

  Cocktail Fodder:

  What to Read, Watch, See, and Do

  to Chic-up Your Schtick!

  Now that you look like a fashionista and you talk like a fashionista (isn’t life swell?), it’s time to embrace the full lifestyle, which means spiffy invitations to major events, parties, dinners, dances, balls, galas, and charity benefits, and keeping up on hot new trends across the globe. (You’ll be able to say things like “Did you know that the return of pigtails as an acceptable hairstyle for adults was brought on by Tokyo Street fashion?”) Being a fashionista actually means being able to focus on things other than fashion. A healthy obsession with the work of architect Frank Gehry is a perfect example, as he is responsible for the whimsical cafeteria in the Condé Nast headquarters in Manhattan, the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles. The occasional religious movement (Kabbalah, anyone?) and exotic travel destinations, whether you can afford to go there or not, are also hot topics.

  Whether you’re at your glamorous best friend’s wedding or one of Puff Daddy’s OTT birthday extravaganzas, you will need to show people that you’ve got more in your head than just cotton (or clothes). Welcome to your crash course in fashionista literacy and traditions. That means films, magazines, books, music, and all sorts of dialogue-stimulating things to do and topics to discuss intelligently to a discerning circle of irreverent fashion-following friends and acquaintances.

  The thing about fashionistas is that they appreciate fashion as something that’s more than just fabric you put on your body to look good. A true fashionista sees fashion as an art form that extends to an appreciation and reflection of high design, popular culture, society, political issues, architecture, ethnicity, and art, all of which conjure specific moods and emotions. Witness Yves Saint Laurent’s Mandarin smoking jackets, inspired by a trip to the Far East. Innovation can also be found in Helmut Lang’s forward-thinking trench coats, wherein loops were attached to the inner armholes so that the coat could be worn over the shoulder as well as in the traditional manner; that year he also showed jackets with puffed nylon built-in-neck-roll collars—perfect for the fashionista’s jet-set lifestyle, an inspired combination of form and function. Then there’s Nicholas Ghesquière at Balenciaga, who changed the silhouette by rediscovering the waist and giving women a new way to reimagine their bodies.

  While sometimes designers can go too far beyond the acceptable line and into politically questionable taste (French designer Jean Paul Gaultier’s 1989 collection that recalled Nazi uniforms— models marched the runway in black combat boots, harnessed coats, felt helmets—and John Galliano’s 1997 show for Christian Dior that displayed garments made of deconstructed wire, newspaper
tatters, and found objects, inspired by the homeless he used to spot on his morning jog come to mind), fashion at its best does not simply lie in the cut of the garment, but serves as an intelligent, savvy reflection of our times.

  In the nineties, a new breed of boutiques began to sell everything from avant-garde designer wares to glossy books about Buddhism and Zen, as well as home accessories and compilation CDs from world-respected DJs; and host gallery-quality art exhibits.

  There was a need for the kind of cross-cultural diversity that feeds hard-core shoppers, who care about trends and inspirations that transcend whatever the pant leg of the moment is.

  You may be able to impress fellow fashionistas by your knowledge of which designer is now heading up which couture house, but to take your lifestyle one step further, you need to know your pop-culture references, your French techno from your deep house music, your Godard from your Truffaut, your Mies van der Rohe from your Richard Meier, and your Cabo from your Cuba.

  THE FASHIONISTA FILM ARCHIVE

  Fashionistas thrive on films that showcase fashion, or movies that are overdramatic and laughingly bad—as long as they have style. Below, the essential films with short capsule synopses. We point out the “fashion highlight moment” (FHM) and how to use them in conversation to earn “bonus convo points” (BCP) for each.

  Classics from the Attic

  Breakfast at Tiffany’s—The end-all to fashionista films. A story of a small-town girl en route to big-city style and glamour, starring Audrey Hepburn, a goddess in classic trench coats, black cocktail dresses, and pigtails while it’s raining.

  FHM: When Audrey is digging around the bottom of her bed, looking for her shoe, and cries “Alligator!” Also when she puts on the big black hat with the white scarf.