Koh-Koh the Gorilla

Sculptor Terence Koh in a gorilla-fur coat at Calvin Klein's First Look party. Given the moral activism of today's political climate, it's not surprising that monkey fur doesn't make more public appearances. Koh wears a good example of the 1910s dropped silhouette, a shape that mirrored the loose draping and loss of waistline in that era's dresses.

Whether you don a coat, throw paint against a wall, or write a sentence, someone, somewhere, will come along and critique it, as I am doing here.

Given the conceptualism of Koh's work, his pod-like cocoon coat becomes an installation of artist-as-art, the coat a fur vitrine. Koh is nearly diminished by the shape and texture of the garment, which acts as a barrier between the artist and both climatic and human elements. His head is nearly disembodied by the black, thematically mirroring sculptural casts he has done of his face. Or maybe it was just cold out.


Left: Bianca Jagger in monkey fur on the Rolling Stones' 1971 UK tour.




Koh's Web site

Monkey fur jackets available at Alexander Wang.

Image: Style.com

Do the Boob

When your eleven-year-old niece tells you that Victoria's Secret is for "babies," you know there's trouble in the heartland. We were shopping in one of those giant suburban malls that makes a sweeping statement about retail homogeneity. Wherever you go, there you are, be it California or Connecticut. Our vestigial need for instantly recognizable cultural landmarks is at its apex in the mall, where both fast food and faddish shops flash beacons so that we may signal back with our wallets. This is our security blanket, and it has become every bit a part of our fiber as a Norman Rockwell painting. We are never more than a few miles from a Big Mac or a Miracle Bra. Nor do we want to be.

If we are only able to navigate without individualism and are constitutionally unable to operate outside the herd, consider the latest in insidious retail persuasion: Victoria's Secret has quietly done a partial rebrand aimed at your prepubescent child. Yes, your eight-year-old-daughter can now carry forth the "pink" message. Unlike the viral promise of the annual Fantasy Bra and the major network lingerie show, Victoria's Secret is relying on word-of-mouth advertising to spread its new dogma around playgrounds everywhere.

Grab 'em young, that's how the saying goes, and they'll be customers for life. As a lifestyle retailer, Victoria's Secret has a formidable cultural valence.

This is being done without irony.

I hadn't been in a Victoria's Secret in some time, but not enough time had elapsed that I didn't recognize that a significant amount of repackaging had been done. While the former packaging had been neutral and fairly age-indistinct, the new had Victoria's Secret taking demographic focus from Limited Brands family member Bath and Body Works, and Bath and Body Works' pre-teen consumer. Now, the beauty area fairly screamed Disney. Plush pink animals, sparkle lotions, glitter gels...it was a stable for My Little Pony. One had the feeling that if they could have worked in puppies, unicorns, and candy necklaces they would have.

The clothing section was worse. The entire center of the store had been given over to clothing in sizes for elementary school girls. My average-sized niece was too large (and intellectual) for this merchandise, hence her comment. She knew what I did not. "PINK" logos adorned jackets, schoolbags, and tiny, tiny panties. The new girl next door is six years old.

"Those are for Asians," the teenage salesgirl responded to my inquiry.

This was what she had apparently been told to say, because the other line of inquiry was more cunning. And yet the argument failed on two levels: Americans may be overgrown, jolly white giants, but the "Asians" of the reply are simply not as small as the merchandise was. Moreover, a certain Japanese fashion subculture aside, the clothes bore marked similarities to merchandise found at Gymboree and were not exactly what your typical small-framed adult woman would wear.

The message of female empowerment embedded in the PINK imprimatur was now empowering female children, and a sly slogan it was. Female empowerment sallies onward, but Victoria's Secret does it with sexuality, capturing the attention of children still playing with another, albeit sterile, symbol of female empowerment, Barbie. Thanks to the original conception, the message is a mixed one, as is the ultimate behavioral goal. Victoria's Secret has never been simply product-oriented.

You could see that healthy and patriotic consumerism was at the root of this corporate decision. Bath and Body Works has been quietly rebranded away from its near-exclusive pre-teen market, and Victoria's Secret has been designated the heiress apparent. Recently, VS separated itself from adult cosmetic lines that were in direct competition with Sephora and placed a firm emphasis on their own glittery, cotton-candy products. Since the shift at Bath and Body Works predated that of Victoria's Secret, a good deal of corporate observation occurred before making the decision to re-route that rich preteen vein into the more "sophisticated" of the two markets, the one that was not competitive with Sephora. In other words, Limited Brands put Bath and Body Works head-to-head with the powerful LVMH Sephora brand, and when this occurred they moved the kiddie corral across the mall.

Obviously, the young consumer would not be able to discern the greater message, which is the same one that says Playboy and The Girls Next Door are a wholesome celebration of All-American female sexuality in its purest, non-pornographic form. The original Victoria's Secret apriorism of flirtatious, winsome sexuality now carries just as substantive a message on the playground as it does in the bedroom.

It's almost 2008. Sex sells, long live Lolita, and we've got our knickers in a twist.

On Which Fairies Cavort and Copulate

Certain philosophers would have had a field day with the fantastical nature of the Prada SS08 collection. The collection of techno-Thumbelina designs was meant as an escape from the nihilistic modern climate, a fantasy survival response to the global état d'affaires. According to Miuccia Prada, one could manage only by retreating into imagination, or in this case fairyland.

Some thought holds that if something is given import or authority, it is therefore real. The fantastical thing then must function in the real world and carry the weight of a reality. This appears to have been the message of the collection, set as it was against a neon throb. Whether this collection actually delved into Deleuzian philosophy or not wasn't made public, but it is interesting to consider that the concept of lack is a universally subconscious one.

I'd heard about the "sex" dress from a front-row friend, and upon closer inspection realize that what appears to be a copulating fairy couple bears some similarity to shunga netsuke (also known as erotic netsuke). The depiction on the dress appears to be one of the more achievable erotic positions; shunga netsuke are not known for the absolute real-world realization of their copulative postures. It is not unusual for the female partner of a netsuke couple to be balanced only on a very delicate (and tiny) anatomical part in a feat of equilibrium that would be, imagination aside, aerodynamically impossible.

Happily, the rather traditional position on the dress in question is eminently achievable and, dare I say it, banal.

Image (dress): Style.com

Art History

At the New York City Ballet Opening Night Gala, actress Jennifer Missoni channels Degas in a Catherine Malandrino frock.

Now, about that turn out...

Image: Style.com

Edward Degas, Little Dancer of Fourteen Years, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC

The Man Behind the Curtain

They say it's the singer, not the song, but when it comes to fashion shows and photography, the setting is crucial to communicating and delivering the correct emotion and tone.

Stella McCartney and Vivienne Westwood may have won the sexier, higher-profile honors, but at last night's British Fashion Awards, Michael Howells won the inaugural Isabella Blow Award for Fashion Creator. The award was created in memory of the idiosyncratic muse and fashion icon who died last May.

The title "Fashion Creator" seems bespoke for Howells, whose body of work transcends set design. A short list of his accomplishments includes production design for film, theatre, and advertising.

In whatever incarnation they may come--makeup artist, stylist, producer, or art director--the "fashion creator" has as much responsibility for the ultimate success of the designer's product as those in more visible, glamorous positions. It is this fashion creator who visualizes and articulates the look, and Howells has one long and ingenious vision.

One can imagine that Blow would be honored to have Howells as the premier recipient of this accolade.

Link: Portfolio of Howells' work

Estee Lauder and the American Cosmetic Conscious

The name Estee Lauder is so woven into the fabric of American cosmetic consciousness that it is impossible for women born during Baby Boom and later generations to remember a time when a Lauder "face" was not a symbol of the American woman in her most elegantly idealized form.

The model Lauder face was one with a serene, regal mien and democratic, All-American good looks. Unlike today's brooding Eastern European child-woman, the Lauder face had classical, symmetrical features devoid of quirkiness or exoticism. The best known of these faces, the model Karen Graham, was depicted as American aristocracy, often wearing sumptuous apparel and reposing in salon-like settings.

The cosmetic line that the faces represented has held firm across the decades. The growing empowerment of the youth voice and product globalization has seen the speedy promulgation of European runway images influence the American consumer with a constantly mutating cosmetic message. The speed and faddishness with which these directives changed made it increasingly difficult for the average woman to extrapolate them into a usable personal "look."

Assailed by an array of looks that changed seasonally and whimsically, a consumer might feel overwhelmed by trends and fashion dicta issued by the cutting-edge makeup artists whose work was often more artistic than it was wearable. The aesthetic fixity of Lauder's cosmetics ensured a message of essential good taste no matter the passing bias and trend.

Lauder's faces adapted gently; when America went outdoors in the 1970s the Lauder model did as well, taking up riding, tennis, and fly-fishing. Indoors, the model was urbanely domestic without being seen to pursue domesticity. Her homes had the heavy sort of decoration one might expect on Park Avenue, yet the cosmetics sold equally as briskly in the suburbs, where they took on an aspirational characteristic. Conceptually, the overall statement was one of health and good breeding, of tasteful occupation and quiet cultivation.

During what might have been a time of upheaval, the 1960s, Lauder's models sailed through women's liberation with skincare rather than political agendas. Twenty years later, the model Paulina Porizkova became the archetypal beautiful bride when women were becoming fierce, macho workplace competitors.

Lauder is a case where a static, consistent image has been a highly beneficial one. For 60 years, the substance of beauty has quietly seemed more prized over the popular cultural statement. By staying within a carefully defined color palette and message, Lauder maintains the image of the American upper-class woman as free from cultural distraction and divisiveness.

For Holiday 2007, Lauder's campaign is Into the Night, a look strongly based on a rich red lip and an illuminated complexion in tones of gold or platinum. Holiday looks have always been one of Lauder's strongest suits, relying as they do on a classically ornate palette and special multi-purpose highlighting powders. And the Lauder holiday gift sets are, as usual, the stuff of cosmetic legend.


Image: © Estee Lauder, Inc.

Important

Have you noticed that jewelry isn't "important" any longer? You used to hear about important jewelry in the context of scandalous relationships; William Randolph Hearst gave any number of important jewels to mistress Marion Davies. Wallis Simpson had important jewelry. Lovers imbued important jewelry with the symbology of wealth and influence: My family jewels are bigger than yours. Important jewelry was jewelry with a complicated story that tattled equally on the giver and the receiver.

Sometimes the story was ignominious and sometimes the story was tragic. American heiress Doris Duke had a collection of both diamonds and cataclysms, as did Barbara Hutton. We don't build our heiresses or our jewelry like this any longer. Hard cheese, of course, always tastes the same.

Jewelry was deemed important on the basis of its cost and its weight. The term fell out of favor as the world rotated on the axis of war and was replaced by the class-conscious "status piece" or the neutral "major piece." And we mustn't forget that such pieces were also cheekily referred to as "battle stripes" when the context in which they were received was predicated upon an illicit sexual relationship.

The fine line between importance and vulgarity spoke more to the perceived class of the wearer than it did to the piece itself. Before the real American democracy took hold, an arriviste wearing a twenty-carat diamond would be seen as tasteless and striving, whereas the same piece decorating the finger of a descendant of the "400" would be viewed with an entirely opposite aestheticism.

The cuff above is from the French jeweler Mauboussin, circa 1940. Mauboussin made a number of significant bracelet cuffs for the actress Marlene Dietrich, another bearer of a rich biography. Just as one doesn't hear of important jewels any longer, one rarely hears of Mauboussin, a company that has quietly gone about making jewelry in the French capital since shortly after Waterloo.

Link: Mauboussin ruby and diamond bracelet, price on request

Link: The collection of Doris Duke

Image: A la Vieille Russie

Diamond Dogs

Although I can't imagine my dog Brutus el Negro wearing a version fit for a pre-Bolshevik Empress, he might not notice that this somewhat less showy diamond lavalière dog collar is likewise fit for female canine royalty.

I read somewhere about a photoshoot involving a pug and a diamond necklace. While the camera was being set up, the petit chien hopped off his perch and wandered out of the studio and down Sunset Boulevard adorned in a million dollars' worth of canary diamonds. No one noticed as the dog strolled down the street of dreams, presumably in search of his own.

The handler caught up to the dog in the vicinity of the old Schwab's drugstore, where the burn of lost hope emanates as a silvery halogen cloud from this alien California planet.

The Jeune Chèri collar/necklace above was inspired by "the young energy and sweet warmth of puppies." I can attest to both of these qualities in Brutus, each equal to the other (she says as he sits at her feet and chews the heel of her shoe).

Come to think of it, perhaps this item would work for the male puppy after all, considering the macho crocodile used in the remainder of the collar.

Link: I Love Dogs Diamonds, Jeune Chèri necklace, $280,000.

If You Build a Bower, She Will Come

"Say it with flowers: on 13 & 14 December we are scheduled to photograph a story for V magazine featuring the one and only Kate Moss. SHOWstudio is offering an unique chance to be part of the shoot by sending a personal floral greeting to Kate."

This is going to sound terribly macabre, but the "flowery bower" reminds us very much of that bank of flowers at Kensington Palace. Even peonies can be tragic.

November: a great time to be an existentialist.



Link: Flowers4Kate

Déjà Vu, Viewed

Joe Eula (1925-2004) was a fashion illustrator whose career spanned from postwar New Look through the new millennium. His sketches were often just outlines that captured, in a few quick strokes, personality, identity, and movement. During the course of his career he also branched out into theatrical and housewares design, album and concert posters, and a longterm association as the creative director for Halston.

This photo (above) from Vogue Beauty Italia is very reminiscent of the signature Eula style. The upward momentum of the pen as it captures the nimbus of hair, the energy, the focus on one strongly defining characteristic and the secondary suggestions of others without such strong artistic gravitas.

Here, two from Eula's sketchbook.

Note how Marilyn is defined not so much by her face as by her left nipple and the cut of her dress, and how Gia's druggy, haywire energy and mischief are captured in firefly-like dashes of hair and the lack of symmetry in her eyes.

Laurence Olivier and Marilyn Monroe, The Prince and the Showgirl





Gia Carangi








Vogue scan from Foto Decadent

Wilkommen

In her second spring/summer collection, Carola Euler steps out of a universal seasonal safety zone and into what she has termed "a naive approach to luxury dressing." This approach has more geographic/historical specificity than Euler's 2007 collection; it is ever-so-slightly Devo meets Weimar Republic with a decided sportif edge that has been carried over from the previous year.

Although in the brief history of her career she has interjected the whimsical (a red-spangled wrestler's top) and the reverent (a t-shirt with a fluttery sleeve worthy of a Patou gown), the 2008 collection draws heavily on the idea of Germanic jeunesse brulée. The strongly Teutonic vibe to these designs is carried out in razor-sharp collars and functionality, working a reductive, neutral palette that appears to endow the items with an interesting anonymity, almost as if they were uniforms.

Shorts are one of the most important ideas for 2008. Although Euler cuts a nicely conservative, traditional pair, here she continues her affinity for adapting both wrestling and boxing garments into streetwear, a touch that would certainly prove viable for the rich wastrel on a buying spree that Euler had in mind when designing the collection. The athletic references also seem poised to recall a national pride in competitive sport.

Euler is interesting on many levels, not the least of which is her ability to refer without being sentimental. When she works with a concept, she takes it to its purest form, free of ornamentation. Her inspirations are many, judging from the handful of collections she has produced. The first spring/summer collection lacked the fixity of what she showed for 2008; her ideas here are carried throughout the set. Some Hamptons-ready preppiness in the earlier work has been replaced by clothing with a far stronger signature.

Note must be made of the through-line from the fall/winter campaign to the spring one. A strong continuity exists between these two and the extension from one to the other is a natural, organic one. This is a new designer who is quickly strengthening and refining her vision while including a good deal of personal idiosyncrasy of a type that too often fails to cross the pond and make it stateside.

Link: Carola Euler

Mouth of the Moment: Deep Cyclamen

The mouth of the month, or at least the mouth of the moment, is deep cyclamen. We wear this with a nude eye. We mean nude-naked, not nude beige. Deep red mouth, spare blush, that stripped eye. Although otherwise tempting, skip the black eyeliner. You are not Dita Von Teese. There has been too much of Dita Von Teese lately and you wouldn't want to be derivative. Derivative is deadly. Keep that festive thought in mind this holiday season.

Big Mama of all deep cyclamen lippies is Lancome's PS Kiss (far right), a limited-edition tube you apply as either a stain, a bite, or a fully committed canvas. Other fab tubes are Dior Rouge in Devilish Pink and Nars blood-on-her-hands Scarlett Empress.

Nini Ong silk scarf wrap, $215.00, at Barney's.

Black Friday Find: Edie Sedgwick

Edie Sedgwick did as much for black tights as Adam and Eve did for the apple.

Sedgwick, an uptown girl with a Factory family, wore the tights with mules, and simple pullover shirts. In most instances, dresses were not required. You'd need gams for this look. It won't work for any old ham hock.

Edie's look seems likely to have been at least partially inspired by Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face, which had been released eight years before this photograph was taken. As a downtown style icon, Edie knew no peer, concentrating her look on her eyes and her earrings, with clothes as careless backdrop. So new and exciting was Edie's exotic, slightly messy silhouette that Diana Vreeland used her as a model in a 1965 Vogue spread that dubbed Edie a "youthquaker."

The Adam + Eve dress (right) borrows the shape of a 1960s paper dress and something of Rudi Gernreich's futurism. Paired with the tights, as shown, the dress is a good facsimile of Edie's dressier moments, that is, when she covered her tail. Pair it with kitten heels and chandelier earrings and leave the drugs where they belong, downstairs at Max's.

Adam+Eve dress, $395.00, Neiman Marcus
Image: Neimanmarcus.com

Look, Ma, No Abs!

Maybe it's the jealous bitch in us, but we're tired of Geri Halliwell's abs. Maybe it's not the abs we're sick of, but the talk about the abs. Maybe we'd like someone to talk about us for a change. Maybe we're just a jealous bitch.

Maybe we're also wondering how the Roberto Cavalli sketch for the the upcoming Spice Girls tour adequately portrays only the bone-planed Posh as an identifiable body. This is fairly threatening. We have issues with facelessness. Then again, even the artistically challenged could probably do a credible job with Posh. Easy. Maybe not. My interpretation, right.

Also easy is the bustier/legging combo that mimics more than half of Posh's personal wardrobe. Too easy. We're really worried about this. No, we're not. Cavalli isn't doing cliché, he's doing caricature. Irony! Serious literary theme!

The outfit that inspired this design irritates me and has for some time; we wait for her to have a case of the vapors, but then we remember whalebone went out with the Jazz Age and that we will rot with the Schadenfreude.

Halliwell's absent abs are a relief here, since they dominated the "Headlines" video and the buzz surrounding the video. However, her design seems to be the anonymous costume of an Ice Capades chorus girl and not really reflective of Halliwell's transcendent, emotive personality. Huh?

The idea behind Baby Bunton's half-bride, half-can can outfit appears to have originated in the film Valmont. Specifically, the 18th-century skirtless dress worn by Fairuza Balk on the eve of her intended introduction to womanhood. Since Baby Bunton has recently had a baby Bunton and is as yet unmarried to pub cook Jade Jones, perhaps the not-quite-a-bride apprehension is just ridiculous inference on our part. We wonder why we care.

We don't recognize either of the Mels and figure we could find their counterpart at any London disco around New Year's Eve--this is England, after all.

Image source: Vogue.com

They Like Leggings in Malmo

We call your attention to Stockholm Street Style, a blog we cannot read, yet that minor impediment in no way dilutes SSS's charm. It's the old every-picture-tells-a-story aphorism in a country as far removed climactically from Southern California as we are from Jupiter.

They like leggings in Malmo! We've never gotten rid of our own leggings, even in the face of some fairly hostile opposition. In honor of the stylistic sensibleness of our cold Scandinavian cousins, we present shoes with which we pair our leggings, proudly. Use your imagination.








All shoes Zappos.com
Top: Pucci
Right: Sergio Rossi
Bottom: Donna Karan

Duplicate Double Agent

Moss, Mated Again

Kate Moss should prove a good match for Donna Karan's spring/summer 2008 campaign. Karan's citified energy centralizes the urban woman in a place of smooth sidewalk modernity that for spring 2008 draws heavily on the release of industrial pursuits and the simple enjoyment of a weekend afternoon picnic.

Even at her most hoydenish, Moss has always ridden ahead of the modeling slipstream. Over and over, she has either swept herself free from the machine or been allowed to sweep herself free from the machine. Moss has had so many moments of perfection that it is easy to lose count of which of these carries the greatest impact or makes the greatest statment. At her best, she is a pastiche of no influence, bad influence, and her own influence, all carried off with wonderfully insouciant nonchalance.

Karan's spring/summer campaign requires freckled cheer and a large dose of post-WW2 blue skies, an attitude that is at once proudly American and here best expressed by an Englishwoman. I wasn't a fan of the disinterested, glazed expression of Karan's Spring 2008 runway show; it felt overly cultivated and too blank for a collection that drew heavily on the thriving optimism of the era that provided its largest inspiration. Here, the clothes required unstudied personality and spontaneity, traits that have long been a Moss private label.

I Come Across the Desert

I may live beauty, I may write beauty, but I went to Tunisia with a single lipstick stuck in the pocket of my jeans. That lipgloss was Nars Sandpiper, and when it ran out halfway through my visit I kissed the boys bare-lipped.

So, yes, I travel light. And you thought I was high-maintenance.

Even though I carry a purse large enough to house a flock of geese, I don't carry makeup. I'd take along a copy of War and Peace before I'd bother rifling through whatever is permitted to be carried on board an airliner these days.

Back home in California, I scooped up the Nars Artist Palette from Sephora. Even though I already have most of these products individually (and sometimes in duplicate), I vowed to find some room in my bag for this limited edition volume.

Included in the slim black book are Style Snatcher beauty imperatives Ondine (eyeshadow: gentle foggy lilac), two Multiples in Copacabana and Malibu (opal; pinkish brown), and Trans-Siberian Express lipstick, a carmine red worthy of Tolstoy's Natasha.

The palette contains ten products in total, making it simple to create both day- and nighttime looks without ruffling the TSA's delicate feathers. Pair India Song and Night Star eyeshadows with Honolulu Honey lipstick; for le nightclubbing, well, pearlized gold/black Night Clubbing creates the ultimate in a sooty, urban eye. Gipsy and the wildly popular Dolce Vita lipsticks round out the kit. Style Snatcher particularly likes Dolce Vita paired with Night Clubbing; the combination is a ferocious mix of Mrs. Robinson and Lolita.

Talk about creative non-fiction.

Available at Sephora

Image: Merello, Figura con mano naranja

Ossie Reborn

"Three names defined 60s fashion in Britain: Mary Quant, Biba and the boutique Quorum owned by Alice Pollock, which sold the work of Clark and his wife and partner, the pattern-designer Celia Birtwell. You could not be young and alive in the late 60s and early 70s without wearing something that had its origins in the brain and fingers of Ossie Clark, his 30s and 40s-style chiffon dresses, often cut on the bias, in Birtwell's beautiful prints."

Ossie Clark had a brief but transcendent career, with designs that spanned Twiggy-mod to Topanga romantic. His first outfits, for Quorum, defined the Carnaby Street dolly bird look. By the tail end of the sixties, Clark had found his niche, sewing longer, floating designs of Birtwell's fanciful prints. At a time when the bulky maxi silhouette prevailed, Clark's dresses had drape, drugs, and movement. He, more than most, perfectly distilled the era's stylistic polyglotism, fusing Edwardian elements with futuristic ones and ethnic outlines with rock glam.

The Ossie Clark label is on the brink of a comeback under hot designer Avsh Alom Gur, whose own creations are as full of cultural implication as Clark's once were. Gur needn't have been part of the sixties to remember them; his recent work indicates that he is no stranger to the zeitgeist of caprice. Under Gur's direction, a candid reassessment of Clark's styling should not only be possible, but providential.

Link: The man who could do everything

Image sources: Vintageclothes. eu, V & A

Duquette-ism

Wonderful article in T: Style Magazine on the eve of the release of "Tony Duquette," a comprehensive folio of the designer's farrago whimsy.

Duquette's multi-referenced interiors combined taste with waste, matching chinoiserie and backlot fantasy with farmyard Americana, in a pointed, life-long rejection of the anonymous and sterile.

One gets the sense that the designer worked without a script, or that a script might have been constructed around a particular find or artifact. Viewed as a narrative of souped-up imagination and inventiveness, his works are an iconoclastic hybrid of Renaissance drama and Lemony Snicket, all the more relevant and important in response to what they oppose.

Image source: tonyduquette.com

Hippie Chic(k)

There is nothing Miss Mars a/k/a Style Snatcher likes better than luxe hippie (occasionally with a dash of musketeer). Here, two blouses from Roberto Cavalli; we are fairly certain we owned the forerunner of the purple blouse on the left and wore it a Rolling Stones concert at Madison Square Garden. And that, chickadees, is all we remember.

Brush Up Your Street French

I wasn't born with a golden décolleté*. Quel dommage, I am one of the unfortunates. My décolleté is a perfectly dull flesh tone, which means that it doesn't catch light, stop men in their tracks, or act as a missile deflector.

I need more than a drop of perfume in my cleavage. Thanks to push-up bras and water-filled cutlets, I am in more desperate shape than ever. Two perfectly globe-shaped breasts, B-cup, with no reflective properties whatsoever, unlike, say, those of Parisian women.

Style Snatcher was lucky enough to be on the main floor of Saks the day the Guerlain Forever Gold Radiant Powder hit the counters; it has since been atomized onto our hair, our chest, and various other strategic locations.

Radiant Powder is a high-tech product in a neo-retro package. As is expected with Guerlain, the shimmer is milled into a glow. In low, evening lighting, the powder is as incandescent as a firefly.

This is limited-edition décolleté enhancement; as with the very best holiday products it has sold out everywhere. My only advice to you is to mark your calendars for next October and understand that Guerlain is without peer in producing the ultimate in life's little limited editions.


*Also wasn't born with the cutesy abbreviation dé.

Sold out: Guerlain Forever Gold Radiant Powder

Fergie on December 2007 Allure

Come Bearing Gifts

Shopping is shopping. The transition from the eight-year-old pressing her nose against the window of FAO Schwartz to the thirty-eight-year-old pressing her nose against the window of Harrod's isn't so difficult as one would imagine.

Here, the venerable Steiff Studio brings us a (nearly) life-sized dromedary for all the wise men in our lives.

And he was dreading another tie.

Steiff Studio Dromedary

Image source: Steiff Teddy Bears UK catalogue

Party Favors

"It is a remarkable shopping list by any standards. And it has landed the Saudi ambassador to Britain with a possible £3m debt, and the embarrassment of having allegations about the ostentatious spending habits of the royal family laid bare.

Bills he is claimed to have run up on an array of luxury amusements include two top-of-the-range Chevrolet 4x4s, a thermal night vision kit for his Hummer H2, dozens of designer watches and jewels, a selection of handguns and two Arab karaoke machines. One takeaway meal came to almost $800 (£391). And then there is the $2,500 item on a trip to a hotel in Casablanca that reads: "Girls: party night 5". "

Saudi Ambassador to Britain exposes his wretched excess.

Image: Marc Steiner

Fuch(sia) you!

Fuchsia has always been a more protean color than it is given credit for. Wrongly exiled into pigment Siberia along with electric blue and chartreuse, fuchsia is poised to make a bold

comeback. A little dash of fuchsia is wonderful as an accessory, but it begs the question: What is fuchsia, exactly?

Our friends at Bergdorf Goodman have roped off a special fuchsia section that muddies the waters even farther. Many of the featured shoes, handbags, and belts are slyly nudged into fuschia nomenclature; witness an electric cyclaman Prada sandal, a violet Dior bag, a salmon clutch, and Dorothy's ruby red stilettos.

The best item in the collection is the Stella McCartney pump (below). The shoe is the same color as a Dior jacket Style Snatcher purchased in 1991 and very nearly the color of one of our all-time favorite lipsticks, Christian Dior 475 Tibet. The very fact that Tibet is still being manufactured tells us that fuchsia has never been far from the playing field. In the case of the pump, the color is the best rendition of fuchsia we've seen, but the shoe's forward platform lends the overall design the air of one of those kitschy high-heel shoe chairs you can pair with a molar stool. They claim this type of furniture fits into any decor, but don't believe them. Keep the shoes where they belong, on the pavement, and keep the teeth for biting.

Bergdorf fuchsia corral

Molar stool, if you must

Project Runway-Chris March

We're pretty sure you tuned in to last night's season premiere of Project Runway, where the new squad of seamsters worked with some unusually pricey fabrics. Unusual, that is, for a first episode, where the standard selection of materials has required much more creative hocus-pocus.

Style Snatcher had her eye on costume designer Chris March, primarily because March had a hand in the wiggy excesses at long-running Beach Blanket Babylon, a San Francisco must-see. We were expecting March's debut design to be a bit more flamboyant, drawing on his signature hallucinatory use of color or theme. His flair for madcap theatrical fou draws on Lewis Carroll, Carmen Miranda, cartoons, and Louis XIV, and his structural ability with behemothic breasts is unparalleled.

For someone who made his early mark with extravagant visual sight gags, March's first Runway design was commendably restrained. Not that we expected him to trot out what we applaud as a strong streak of outlandishness, but we were surprised to see that the big guy can actually go for the sleek and sane. This, of course, made us wonder whether under all that campy razzmatazz March was hiding a reservoir of department store commercialism. While not exactly haute design, his purple charmeuse dress with foiled twist neckline won Style Snatcher points for shape, tonality, and movement. What it lacked was wit, a wink, a wild notion, which we are hoping was a play-it-safe response to secure March a spot in the middle of the pack.

Still, we will be biting our manicure while waiting for the episode in which March drags out his inner fruit basket.

Chris March Design

Image sources: BravoTV.com

Oot and Aboot

Style Snatcher loves Giuseppe Zanotti. When Style Snatcher is bored--granted, not often--we love to go oot and aboot with our old pal Giuseppe. Giuseppe, or more precisely the boots of Giuseppe, has enlivened these odd dull moments with his mad Italiano craftiness.

Here, he has created a white wildebeest boot perfectly suited to our favorite guilty pleasure, pro ballroom dancer Edyta Sliwinska of Dancing with the Stars. We like Edyta because she lets it all hang out, or almost, an occupation that is not foreign to yours very truly. She also wears (stylishly, we might add), a flared leg warmer in an exciting quasi-Western style. If there is some purpose to these seemingly useless items we wait on tenterhooks for a brilliant explanation. But what do we know? We understand the evolution of functional design from A Chorus Line to Monday night television, but if there is some bona fide practicality to the article in question we have been blinded to the point.

The thing is, as much as we enjoy Edyta, we probably enjoy righteous indignation even more. It's amazing what a little bit of epidermis will do to people these days. Your people, not mine.

Giuseppe Zanotti boot from Zappos.com

The Buzz

We know what you're thinking. You've read the ad and thought, Golly gee, that's a really neat Treetent. I bet it would be fun to have sex in it and make it swing rhythmically back and forth simultaneous with all the humping and pumping. It's implied in the copy with a naughty semantic wink. Oh, boy! Can we try it right now, before supper?

Absolutely nyet.

And although there is something futuristic to it, and has Habitat 67 elements to it (see how many can hang from the same pine), what this green, seed-like structure really is is a personal hive. And this makes me very, very excited. It's wildly overpriced, but you are the Queen Bee, are you not? I am. It's a $50,000. hive for a very badly behaved insect and we love to sting.

Dré Wapenaar Treetent

Emergency Rations

We're so glad that Lindsay Lohan went shopping at Chanel after eating at the Ivy yesterday. Apparently the de-rehabbed Miss Lohan realized that she needed emergency fashion rations more than she needed a drink. It's good to see a starlet with some sense.

This dress, this schmatte, defies disingenuously. You can see the thought process that went into it: Shucks, this old rag?

And it just goes to show that no matter how good your legs are, they will always look worse when you cut them off like a ham hock in a pair of ankle boots.


Image: lindsayimages.org

It Takes Two Hands to Handle a Whopper

Of course we're not through (re-) reading our favorite piece of holiday literature, the Neiman Marcus Christmas book. And you thought Style Snatcher was strictly intellectual. Indeed, we have our moments with trendy topical fiction, but some things just give us a long pause for reflection elsewhere.

The first scholarly thought that came to mind upon seeing NM's Swami Conversational Robot was...Burger King. The next thought was, Whuh? Aside from the obvious familial relation to the dancing fast-food icon, we're relieved to see that artificial intelligence is being used intelligently. Because it could have been used for launching guided missile systems and other non-festive robotic Christmas gifts, and that would be a bit redundant, wouldn't it? Style Snatcher applauds Neiman Marcus for proving that there is still reason to rejoice in your fellow man.

We're thinking that at $75,000. this isn't quite a stocking stuffer, and certainly a disembodied talking head might make the wee ones pee their Pampers, but Style Snatcher applauds the sheer audacity. Always keep one step ahead of the game.

King me.

Swami Conversational Robot

Jazz Babies

John Galliano knows from things Japonais, and his spring 2008 couture collection proves the designer is no stranger things literary either; his latest catwalk sensation is a romantic turn around the greatest hits of F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Consider this dropped-waist flapper dress, and then consider the color. Orange! We haven't seen orange in years, and we certainly haven't seen it for spring. This fiery hue is usually set against autumn's leaves, but Galliano--on a winning streak after his oriental reiteration of the New Look--sends this color down the runway without any sense of seasonal displacement. The dress, and indeed the whole spring collection, has the strongest narrative line in a season with strong historically narrative statements. When he's at the top of his game, no one narrates better than Galliano. The twenties are back, baby, with a vengeance!

Style Snatcher would kill for some boy hips.

Image courtesy of Style.com

Pray for Rain

The Neiman Marcus Christmas book is a Style Snatcher favorite, simply because it always, always manages to top itself. No matter how outré, how outrageous, it was the year before, there is always something--or more than one thing-- so fabulously outlandish that it makes you cry abundant tears of joy and thanksgiving.

Sears Wishbook this isn't, my spendy little elves.

Try tying this one up for size and sticking it under the tree. It's a dragon topiary designed by Matthew Larkin, topiary designer extraordinaire. (We think it looks more like the Loch Ness Monster, but who's asking?) This living, breathing yard beast is a whopping 100 feet long. And here's the really swanky part: They build it on site, using indigenous plants. That's right, they whip it up out of your local hedges, so Bar Harbor's dragon will look different from the dragon of Bel Air. Who said it ain't easy being green?

Do people even have this much land any more? We thought that went out with McMansions, so it's nice to see that some people have come to their senses.

If this isn't the ultimate $35,000.00 holiday happening, I don't know what is. It has left even the Style Snatcher speechless, a rare and disturbing occurrence. Your lawn man will demand a hefty raise and extra worker's comp, the neighbors will say your dragon is blocking their view, and we haven't even gotten to the gold-leaf horns, claws, teeth, and fins. The only thing that could possibly spoil the unimpeachable beauty of this creature is...drought.

Pray for rain.

You know you want to.

Wave on Wave

Never heard of Pascal Mourgue? It's all right, chickies, that's what your friend Style Snatcher is for. Pascal Mourgue is a très chic artsy furniture designer with a background in sculpture. This means that he knows how to mold your behind to the cushion.

Is furniture art? This is a popular debate, and we think the matter is settled here once and for all. Mourgue's Downtown chair is a riff on the popular, post-Atomic Scandinavian "wave" style that was the height of cool way back in the hip sixties. Before you were born that is, but we can catch you up quickly.

Our fabulous pièd-a-terre with its twinkly view of city lights was held in suspense while we trolled the best of the Net for a showstopping way to rest our tired little feet. You say it's all in a day's work, but how much better can a day be when it winds up reclined like this? Ah, civilization.

The only thing missing is a butler bearing grapes...

The Downtown chaise is available at Linea, 8843-49 Beverly Boulevard, Los Angeles

Image courtesy of Linea.

Snatch It Up!

We've long had a secret beauty weapon we've refused to reveal to the general public. Today, though, we're feeling generous: Underneath our flawless makeup is none other than Smashbox Photo Finish Foundation Primer.

If you've not used a primer before, you're in for a surprise. Primers keep your makeup smooth and even, so you can say sayonara to those annoying little flakes and uneven, mottled areas. The main ingredient of a primer is silicon, which feels like silk gliding over your skin. The primer creates a barrier layer between your skin and your foundation, filling in pesky undereye areas where foundation usually gets trapped. The biggest argument for primer, though, may be that your makeup will be as fresh at midnight as it was in the morning.

Our own personal issue with foundation is that it wears off unevenly, discolors, or takes on enough shades of orange to be right at home in the Cirque du Soleil. A quick visit to Sephora to our favorite sales assistant Cheryl solved this universal problem. You apply Photo Finish to clean, moisturized skin and let it sink in, then apply your foundation as normal with fingers, brush, or sponge. And then you forget it. When you look in the mirror six hours later you'll wonder what's missing: It's all that hard work of taking your compact out of your purse and re-applying again and again and again. We don't know about you, but we have much better things to do with our time.

Photo Finish is available at Sephora stores or on line at the Sephora Web site.

Image courtesy of Sephora.

Choo Choo Train

It's not too late to board the Jimmy Choo choo-choo, and Style Snatcher has just the ticket with this incredible pair of metallic T-strap heels. What we like is the bold-gold ankle cuff; these sandals mean business. Big business, that is, for fashion divas walking high and proud in the four-inch stiletto heel. Ever had anyone stop you on the street just because they admired your footwear? We have. And then we went out for cocktails and dancing with the kind of glitterati you read about in New York magazine. We might have even married the guy, had we not had to hurry off to a book release party in Paris.

Step out, Style Snatchers, and let 'em know you have your own definition of gold standard.

Available at Bergdorf Goodman.

Image courtesy of Bergdorf Goodman.

Stella McCartney Resort Racerback Dress

Style Snatcher says look no farther than Stella McCartney for the dress of the 2007 resort season. McCartney's beaded racerback with dotted pinstripe detail and columns of rhinestones is flying off the racks. What makes this dress fantastic is the easy halter neckline and body-skimming design, along with the careful attention to the alignment of the stones.

McCartney's garments fit better than most, and the beauty is in the simplicity of the cut combined with their easy, eye-catching styles. The racerback dress is a clever update on the LBD phenomenon from the eighties viewed through the modern prism: One gets the idea that this little number could be tossed on après beach and kept on through breakfast at daylight. If you're not headed to the Bahamas in February like we are, don't fret. Style Snatcher says you modern-day Holly Golightlys can wear it anywhere champagne is served in delicate trumpet flutes.

Available at Neiman Marcus.

Image courtesy Neiman Marcus.