Conde's Richest Intern?

Naturally, my reaction when I first heard of New York Rangers Sean Avery's internship at Vogue was "Vom." The man thinks he's a fashion maven because he owns YSL patent leather high-tops and a "lovely cashmere throw" from Calvin Klein? Please. His smugness--just because he can afford expensive pieces and knows of fashion designers who are among the most recognizable brand names in the business--irritates me. I also hoped he wasn't taking a college student's place--someone who would actually need the internship.

It gets worse.

Last week, WWD reported that Avery has already started his--paid--internship. Yes, paid.

Conde Nast does not pay its interns, yet Avery, who made $2 million with the Rangers this year, is earning minimum wage at Vogue. Why a millionaire is being paid to intern at a magazine when college students either work for free or--in many cases--pay to intern (via credits) is beyond me. Also, there are many students who can't afford to work a non-paid, full-time internship in the summer. So, of course, the working-class or unprivileged kids are being denied the opportunity to break into the industry, while the ones with the money and the means reap the benefits. Same old story.

But what makes me really despise him (despite his antics on ice), is that he gets to go to the couture shows. So. Un. Fair. Even the Pittsburgh Penguins' victory over the Rangers--the reason why Avery could start his internship so early--is small, inadequate consolation.

Anna Got the Memo...

Glasses are hot.


Photo by Steven Meisel for Vogue.

However, May's cover model Gwyneth looks way better in the current issue of V.

What to Wear to a Costume Party

Strangely, more people attended the Costume Institute gala dressed in accordance to the theme this year than last. The theme this year was superheroes. Last year was the early 1900s designer Paul Poiret. More people were willing to dress up in superhero kitsch than drop-waisted dresses or embroidered and beaded Oriental-influenced coats? I will never understand celebrities.

Of course, "superheroes" welcomes all manners of body-con, spangled, glittered, and sequined fashion; so I guess the surprising amount of superhero-love on display at the gala really isn't so surprising after all.

I am not going to go about analyzing the red carpet fashion--Fashionologie has done a pretty good job with that--but I have found myself rather obsessed with the Givenchy gown wore by Christina Ricci:


image from style.com

This is the perfect superhero dress. It has the Wonder Woman bustier thing going on, but it is partially obscured by the diaphanous pink layers. This is an allusion to the superhero's necessity to cover their real identities (their unitards, second skin, whatever) with "normal" clothing. The pink tulle(?) obscures the bustier but doesn't completely cover it--it is a facade. The part of the red bustier that is exposed forms a heart--a witty play on Superman's S. The juxtaposition of frothy pink and the almost tawdry-looking red sateen also reminds me of the nice-girl/dominatrix duality of early female super hero comics, but in a more subtle, and entirely modern, way.

Not to mention that this dress fits Ricci like a glove and is a stunner on its own. I would wear it--superhero theme or no superhero theme.

Just for fun, my two other favorite dresses of the evening. I loved Anna Wintour's Chanel dress, conceptually. I loved Sofia Coppola's Marc Jacobs dress, emotionally:


images, style.com

Doc Martens' Popularity = Economic Barometer?

A teaser for an article--actually, more like a brief write-up--on Doc Martens' comeback in the online fashion magazine/newsletter JC Report was surely tantalizing:

The last time the fashion world fancied Dr. Martens grunge had seeped into the mainstream (thank you, Mr. Jacobs) and our economy was lagging. Today, things aren't much different. As colored jeans, cartoons and, of course, plaid flannel float to the surface, Docs are also re-emerging. In fact, it's almost as if the utilitarian footwear—created in 1945 by German Klaus Maertens as an alternative to the traditional army boot—sees a fashion renaissance any time there's talk of recession.

I clicked to read the article, expecting a sort of parallel history of Doc Martens in relation to economic history, labor movements, class struggle, etc. No such luck. Instead we get this:

In fact, by the late '90s tech boom, Docs were on the sartorial back burner, and in 2003 the company closed their flagship location in London's Convent Garden. They also quit producing the shoe in the UK, moving manufacturing—like many other gently-priced brands—to Asia. ...

Now, as economic woes drag us down yet again, Docs are looking more and more appropriate. Kimberly Barta, vice president of marketing for Dr. Martens, says that this time around, the shoe won't belong to one clan—such as the punks in the '70s or the grunge rockers of the '90s. Fashion today, more than ever, is democratic. "Tribes are not what they once were," says Barta. "There is no longer one or two or three dominant 'cultures' driving purchasing. The brand today belongs to many different groups."

Okay, first, this really doesn't tell us anything about why Docs are poised for comebacks during economic hard times--besides their being "gently-priced," which isn't enough. Why? Because:

1. Docs aren't that cheap; and
2. Plenty of other less expensive shoes have been produced, why aren't they having comebacks?

Sure, Docs, which generally cost between $100-$150, are certainly less expensive than many brand name shoes; Frye boots, to continue with the designer worker/utilitarian shoe theme, say, can cost between $200 and $1,000. And since the JC Report is a fashion website/newsletter, its readers are accustomed to seeing $400+ price tags throughout its (virtual) pages. Still, I remember pleading with my mom for a pair of Docs when I was in high school and her balking at the, what we viewed at the time to be, extravagant price tag. (Though many enthusiasts keep and wear the same pair of Docs for years and years, maintaining that the shoes' durability warrants their price tag.) Perhaps if I went to high school now, inflation would make the cost of Docs seem downright cheap, and my mother would more easily concede to buying me a pair. Back in the late '90s, however, we weren't desensitized to high prices through brand-name-dropping shows--like Sex and the City and, now, Gossip Girl--or the "democratization of fashion," which, though it has made the manufacturing of more-affordable "fashionable" clothes faster and more accessible, has also made more exclusive brands and clothing more covetable to a greater number of people. To spend over $100 on a pair of shoes was, in the heyday of grunge and My So-Called Life, embarrassing and superficial. Now, owning a $400 bag with someone's logo splashed on the front is vital and confused with being "fashionable."

As for why Docs are having a comeback ... the article never explains, but the working-class shoe has certain symbolic allure to certain types of people, particularly rebellious adolescents from middle-class and upper-middle-class families who see themselves in opposition to their families' bourgeois ideals.

But symbols co-opted by more and more people--first to a specific group and then by the masses who turn it into a full-blown trend--tend to become stripped of their meaning. I don't understand Barta's claim that this time around Docs won't belong to a specific clan, because in the '90s it wasn't just grunge rockers who wore Docs, it was, eventually, everyone. At my high school, in a moderately affluent suburb of Pittsburgh, everyone wore Docs. The rebels wore the black boots with tight cuffed jeans and wallet chains and Misfits T-shirts while the preps wore the brown ones with their Abercrombie sweater vests. Even the potheads wore Docs with their hemp necklaces and Dickie overalls covered in paint. Why did they wear them? Because they were cool. And cool, after a while, transcends clan lines, until what was cool becomes so pervasive that it is not cool anymore and thus goes away but eventually comes back. Pop culture--not just fashion--is cyclical.

The thing is: I don't really see youth culture nowadays as a culture of rebellion, or nihilism, or rejection--if anything, I see it as a culture of complacency. So, I don't see them turning to Docs as a result of frustration with cultural norms, ideas or even the economy.

HOWEVER, I think I do sense that Docs are trying to appeal to a more fashion-savvy culture. Last year, the company enlisted Japanese designer Yohji Yamamoto to design a line. (Yohji's awesome--and also very high fashion.) Their ads and website definitely seem to be more fashion-driven than its marketing in the past. (Whether this is subversive or selling out is a matter of opinion, or remains to be seen.) Therefore, I find the reasoning for Doc's so-called fashion renaissance not to be the economy, but something much more complex and ambiguous: its desire to reinvent itself.

Newsflash: Fashion Mags Heart Celebs!

From WWD:

ELLE ON EARTH: Female icons long have served as the driving buzz factor for women's magazines. Now the Hachette Filipacchi Médias-owned French Elle has spawned an entire magazine devoted to the subject. Dubbed "Very Elle," the first issue of the new biannual glossy, with Amber Valletta on its cover, boasts a run of edgy fashion spreads featuring "It" girls. These include Chloë Sevigny in her New York loft; Charlotte Gainsbourg photographed by her sister, Kate Barry, in a faded rococo French hotel, as well as a shoot starring Rolling Stones offspring Elizabeth Jagger and Theodora Richards frolicking at the Joshua Tree National Park. Features include an interview with Youssef Nabi, director of L'Oréal Paris, as well as a profile of the hip French music video production team Jonas & François. The publication comes in a slightly bigger format than its mother magazine. "The approach is very visual, but there may be more text in the next issue," commented publisher Franck Espiasse-Cabau, who added that the concept may be picked up in other territories. "It's a creative way of working with icons that allows us to work with new photographers and have a different editorial approach than that of our weekly magazine, which is news-sensitive," he said. The title has a print run of 150,000 copies and is priced at 4.90 euros, or around $8. The next issue is set for October.

And this differs from every other magazine how? Though, yes, maybe I would buy for the Charlotte Gainsbourg photos.

Too Cool to Care

Before I really delve into this blog post, I want to point out that Élodie Bouchez is totally rocking the heavy brows in this New York Times' T magazine shoot (styled by Marc Jacobs).


Marc and Élodie, with bling; photo by Maciek Kobielski for T magazine

I love thick eyebrows. I keep trying to grow mine, but they always get too unwieldy, and I end up plucking them. The trick is to grow them out but carefully groom and cultivate them, which I have no patience for. I tend to let them grow all crazy and haphazardly and then just get them waxed.

It's interesting that Marc apparently does not style his eponymous label's ads (he gives his long-time photographer and collaborator Juergen Teller free reign), because some of these photographs resemble Teller's work for him. There's the intimacy of a girl playing dress up in her bedroom and the ritual of grooming in these photos, themes that are in several of Jacobs' previous ad campaigns, such as the ones featuring Dakota Fanning and Winona Ryder. Particularly in these ones:


Jacobs' clothes look appealing on the rack or in person, but I tend to think they photograph not too well. They tend to look awkward or not particularly well-made or just underwhelming. Yet, his clothes are photographed quite frequently (no doubt due to his status and popularity) for magazine shoots. (I do, however, think his accessories look great in editorials.) It's interesting (and smart), then, that his own ads tend to obscure the clothing--or to give the impression that the clothing is not that important. You don't look at, say, filmmaker Harmony Korine wolfing down a hamburger and think "Wow, I want that shirt he's wearing!" No, you think, I wish I were cool enough not to be self-conscious about wolfing down a hamburger at some diner for a fashion ad, not to mention I wish I were cool enough not to brush my hair or look like I've showered yet still be asked to pose for a hip fashion ad. You don't look at Meg White sitting cross-legged in the woods and think "I want that dress!" No, you think, I want to be her.

It's like the photographs of Élodie Bouchez above. Did I look at that black hoodie and think "I want that"? No. I thought, "Damn, she's cool. And I want her eyebrows. And her French insouciance. And to look that good in a hoodie and nothing else."

So, I don't believe Jacobs when he tells Cathy Horyn (in a NYT article about his collaboration with Teller) that his ads are "not aspirational." He says, pointing at a photograph of Cindy Sherman Juergen Teller styled to look like "dumpy siblings," "You wouldn’t look at them and say, 'Oh, mmm, that dress is so attractive.'" But aspiration goes deeper than just aspiring to own a dress in a photograph. It's about wanting access into an exclusive world. Teller's photographs for Jacobs' ads do depict an exclusive world--one maybe populated by eccentrics and weirdos, but impossibly hip eccentrics and weirdos. His subjects don't really look fashionable, but they look as if they transcend fashion. Meg White, Winona Ryder, Kirsten MacMenamy, Charlotte Rampling, Sofia Coppola, Jennifer Jason Leigh: All these subjects look incredibly cool and (naturally, maddeningly) beautiful in these ads--and they look like they couldn't care less. Marc's ad peddle a specific type of luxury: the luxury of not caring, of being able to make people want to be you without even making an effort and despite looking slightly crazy. Now, that is to be a part of the exclusive world of Marc. Somehow he can convince people that they can be part of the cool crowd if they wear his clothes. Which they can't. But that is the genius of Jacobs' advertising -- he makes that coolness seem at once elusive and tangible. But is he just teasing? I guess we'll never know.

In Which Raquel Tries to Write About Perfumes

I wrote about perfumes, and it got published.

It was kind of fun.

Rei Kawakubo for H&M

The many strange faces of Comme des Garcons; images from style.com

I have never waited in line for the unveiling of an H&M designer collection. (I did not live remotely near an H&M for the Karl Lagerfeld and Stella McCartney collections, and the Victor & Rolf and Roberto Cavalli collections failed to interest me.) However, I will probably bring a sleeping bag and camp out overnight for the Rei Kawakubo (of Comme des Garcons) collaboration.

Of course, a Kawakubo collaboration with everyone's favorite fast-fashion company is like a poor fashionista's wet dream. Comme des Garcons--at an affordable price! Yes, please. But, well, what about the legions of trendy high schoolers and co-eds who shop at H&M? Most of these shoppers have, likely, never heard of Kawakubo or her fashion collective Comme des Garcons. And they would likely run away shrieking from her designs--cotton candy pink dresses with elevated hands on the shoulders and hips; shirts and dresses so twisted and gnarled they resemble straight jackets; weird padding in the hip area; red tutus; layered, heavy skirts that hit right at the calf. These are not for mall rats who like their Louis Vuitton Murakami bags or their little Chanel interlocking C rhinestone earrings. The woman who wears Comme des Garcons scoffs at these pedestrian things.

This marks a big departure for H&M: Lagerfeld, McCartney and Cavalli are resolutely commercial designers, and even Viktor & Rolf's off-kilter collections have become conventionally so--they are too literal to be truly unsettling and strange. Kawakubo, however, is high priestess of the fashion avant garde, a postmodern Elsa Schiaparelli: a surrealist with a fondness for irony and, even, the tawdry. Her clothing is highly conceptual and is rarely photographed for mainstream fashion magazines. (She also doesn't do advertising for her own line, nor for the other collections under the Comme des Garcons umbrella). She also seems to have little interest in actually selling her clothes, though she has a rabid, loyal--if small--fan base. It'll be interesting to see how Kawakubo adapts her ideals to the world of fast-fashion. And if H&M shoppers will buy it.

The Color and the Shape

So, Vogue's "Shape" issue, the one with the controversial cover, has offended scores of people not only with what many regard as a careless (if inadvertent) depiction of racial stereotypes ("Google image King Kong for a comparison," said an incensed blogger at Feministe), but with its insensitive handling of, oh yes, shape.


Does this model look a size 6 or 8 to you? Photograph by Annie Leibovitz for Vogue

Of course, this is nothing new. The "Shape" issue has always put on a front of embracing women of all shapes and sizes (La Wintour writes in her editor letter that today's models are "pale and thin, entirely lacking in the joyfulness and charm that once defined the supermodels"), only to feature the same rail-thin models it uses in every issue and the same clothes made exclusively for women who wear a size 2. (Particularly ridiculous is the text accompanying photographs of willowy model Daria Werbowy and skateboarder Shaun White: "What do Daria Werbowy and White have in common? Snowboarding, design, and a slim build that welcomes volume--ideal for sizes 6 to 8." Um, does Vogue realize that in one of these photos Werbowy is wearing super-tight gold Balenciaga pants/leggings that would make even me -- at barely 105 pounds -- look like a zaftig.)

Another ridiculous proclamation: Every body type -- except for athletic! -- looks good in a bikini.

But perhaps more cringe-worthy is in Wintour's letter, after she laments the current state of disintegrating models, she writes of putting the not-so-skinny Mulleavy sisters, the Rodarte designers, on a four-month diet. Instead of making the designers go on a diet to better fit the fashion industry's ideal of what a woman should look like, why didn't Vogue do an article about the Mulleavy's feelings about working an industry so focused on looks and weight and not fitting the mold? What do they themselves wear? And while they are certainly a part of the high fashion world, can they themselves buy and wear the uniform required to be in that world?

***

Back in the good old days, plumpness signified wealth and project high status. Dimples were coveted, as were ample bosoms (hello, corsets!). But at some point this all changed and thinness came to be associated with wealth and high class. (I want to blame this on Chanel, but I feel like this reversal happened -- or began to happen -- some time earlier.) Now, thinness means you have money to go to the gym, have a personal trainer, buy health products and organic food, and go to spas. Before, eating was a luxury. Now, not eating -- or not HAVING to eat -- is. This is ridiculous.

But not only are the fashion industry and media dictating the weight of the upper-class, they are dictating the shape. Apparently, the classy fashionista has a reedy frame and a boyish, flat chest. As Hannah Betts, whose chest is an impressive 32E, writes in an article for the Telegraph:

Breasts, one may infer, represent the difference between the haute and the high street. Where flat chests are chic and classy, so heaving bosoms are judged trashy, de trop.

Breasts, trashy? I would understand if fashionistas merely scorned severely low-cut tops, but, no, apparently, they don't want breasts at all -- covered or uncovered:

As the owner of a 32E bosom, I was once informed that the Vivienne Westwood clothes I was eyeing up were for women who want to look as if they have breasts, not for those already in possession of them. On another occasion, a designer stared at my unclothed form and stuttered: "Hourglass!" in tones one might use to utter the word "paedophile". Most mortifying of all was the moment an Armani tailor waved her hand dismissively across my chest, before pronouncing: "These are not Armani!"

And now Vogue has joined in. Fashion director Lucinda Chambers makes it clear that a girl's best assets are worse than last season: they are over, over, over, and must be disguised at all costs.

In the latest edition she tells a full-chested writer who wants to know how the new spring look will work for her: "You need a minimiser bra." She brooks no negotiation. "Marks & Spencer does a brilliant one. This isn't the Eighties. It isn't a pay and display moment. Hasn't been for ages. Even Roberto Cavalli didn't put any breasts out there. Dolce & Gabbana? Elegant, quiet, ladylike cocktail dresses."

A boyish physique has long been the ideal in the lush, homoerotic environs of high style. But, of late, a glossy sub-genre has flourished in which flat-chested fashionistas scorn their well-endowed sisters, or urge them to "hide and disguise" in - ye gods - bandeau tops. Gucci and Jil Sander are mad for them this spring.

How can a body type be "over"? How can the size of one's chest relate social status? How can people actually think the size of one's chest relates to her social status or intelligence or personality? How can I take part in an industry that promotes such drivel?

Sigh, it's always some existential quandary for the socially conscious, feminist fashion lover...

Frida and Karl in Harper's Bazaar

Now, I am not the biggest Gucci fan, and I am particularly not crazy about Gucci under Frida Giannini's creative direction (Giannini replaced Tom Ford). I found her last spring collection rather juvenile, rather Forever 21. Which is funny, since, according to a Harper's Bazaar story on the designer's "personal style," Giannini is too chi chi for H&M:

Once, she ventured into the outer orbit of cheap fashion, donning a red-and-black-printed dress from H&M. "My colleagues gave me so much grief when I wore it to the office," she recalls. "I was so mortified that I gave it to a girlfriend."

Hey, if Karl Lagerfeld and Stella McCartney aren't too good for H&M, you, dear Frida, most certainly aren't.

Speaking of Lagerfeld, I generally like the Kaiser's photography, but what is up with the "Couture in Bloom" editorial in Harper's Bazaar?


Photos by Karl Lagerfeld for Harper's Bazaar

Of course, one could blame the stylist, or the person responsible for dressing up Doutzen Kroes as Lolita at the Easter parade. Who is HB's audience anyway, eight-year-old girls? Humbert Humberts? What is it with sexualizing the infantilized girl? Why do women's fashion magazines hate women? So many questions...