Fashion Week

This is going to be a good one.  Are you ready for it?  I don’t know whether I’m quite ready to write it, frankly.  I’m not sure whether I can do it justice.  First of all, I’m celebrating a long but very successful and fulfilling fashion week with the best cheese I’ve purchased so far and a glass of red wine that pairs quite nicely, I think.  I’m reading the label of the paper the little cake of cheese was wrapped in, and it says “lait brebis”, which is ewe’s milk.  So I’m essentially eating what lambs get to have everyday just in a different form.  Lucky jerks.  Actually, today we had a lecture on the production of accessories, and we learned that you have to calculate a 30% loss in materials when it comes to animal skin.  And the animal skin isn’t the full skin, so pretty much baby lambs are killed for about 40% of their skin to be used in a half of a bag.  So they aren’t quite so lucky.  I do like fashion, but that’s just unnecessary.  It’s funny, because this season’s collections were brimming with all types of furs and skins.  Today’s class convinced me even further that I want to work for Stella McCartney, who’s super enviro conscious and ethical, but still produces really nice stuff…specially lingerie, which is what I want to go into intitially.

Ok, enough with the tangent.  I had to ease myself into attacking all that’s been going on.  So, fashion shows.  I’m sorry, I’m going to do a lot of name dropping.  A good resource if you want to match faces and shows to the names is style.com – you can look up the shows, the models, everything.  I watched A.F. Vandevorst, Leonard, and Dress 33.  I worked at Estrella Arch, Jeremy Bueno, Veronique Branquinho, Manish Arora, and Elie Saab… I think that’s it.  The only one’s that are on style.com are Vandevorst, Veronique, and Elie Saab, but I highly recommend also looking up at least Manish Arora because his stuff was really dramatic and fun.  Estrella Arch was my first and prolly my least exciting.  I liked some of her stuff, even though some of it was unfinished and unfunctional and still had sewing marks and unfinished seams.  But they do production within like two weeks before the show in order to be trendy, so it makes sense.  Her color scheme was black and neon green and pink, with a little white.  She had some Schiaparelli influences, and then some really pretty horizontally pleated assymetrical black knit dresses.  It was my first show so I didn’t know what to expect and it didn’t run so smoothly.  I was assigned a model, Tullulah Morton, who had two outfits: a suede fringy black jacket with black heels, and bright pink leather and knit tight pants and a black loose v-neck sweater with a bright pink onesie that you had to snap at the crotch underneath.  And two pairs of shoes that were a size too small.  She was the first model to arrive to the dressing room, and she didn’t have her makeup or hair done.  I told her we were doing a rehearsal and she had to change.  I turned around to talk to someone else, and when I turned back I almost ran my head into her naked boobs (they are at eye level).  The dressing room was so tiny, and about 14 of us had to be in there.  The only “super model” that was in that show was Ikeliene Stange, who I talked to about the designer Ruffian, and she was really sweet.  Tullulah had to go and get here hair and makeup done, so I was late getting her into her first outfit for the show.  You have less than a minute to dress the girl when she gets back from her first run.  So I was waiting ready with the nylon onesie all scrunched up in the appropriate places to throw over her conehead hairdo when she got back.  But she took it from me and started putting it on backwards, so I had to take it back and rescrunch it as she put on her leather pants halfway, I reput the flimsy shirt on her, and someone was trying to help me but was retarded and started turning the sleeve inside out.  I had to kinda yell at her in order for her to snap out of her panicked fumbling to tell her it was fine and she didn’t need to do that.  Meanwhile people are yelling at me to be quicker and the model’s throwing out obsenities.  We snap the onesies, yank on the leather pants, I jam her feet into the too small pink pumps, and she’s off for her second run.  And that was Estrella Arch.  We sat around for 3 hours before the show, the show itself was a frenzy, and after 15 minutes, it’s done.  I don’t really mind the stress or the yelling because it’s kinda like I’m a part of a machine in a factory.  We have to produce something, and if we’re lacking or not working right, the mechanic’s going to swear at us as s/he fixes the problem.  It’s nothing personal.

The second show we worked at was Jeremy Bueno.  It was a lot more casual.  He is a graduate of the Paris American Academy.  His show was held in the coolest building I’ve seen in Paris.  I was so in love with it the minute I walked in the door.  It was old and unrestored with all the original doors and fixtures.  All the wood was old and weathered and exposed, but there was this juxtoposition because some things were really well taken care of.  Make up and hair was in a room that looked like the library from Beauty and the Beast.  The dressing room was like a library you’d find in an old fashioned mansion, with dark oak cabinets and a tall ceiling and heavy drapes.  And then the runway was in a room that kind of reminded me of the Holy Names auditorium or something you’d find in St. Joes.  I just knew there was something special about this place.  And then I found out that it was the place where the Lumiere bros made their first films, and they tried to keep it in the same condition since that time.  Which is SO cool, because I love the vaudeville and the beginning of film and the Lumiere brothers were some of my favorites.  To give you a little taste, they were the first to create a “movie theater”, and their calling card was the film of a train coming towards the camera where movie goers quotably jumped out of the way back in the beginning of the 1900s.  So, I was on board and stoked to be there.  There was a French filmmaker doing some sort of piece with the models before the show, and he was staging this model taking cameras from paparazzi and throwing them to the ground, and he wanted us to stand behind the camera and use the flashes on our digital cameras to add effect.  It was fun.  It reminded me of AV tech projects in high school.  We waited around for a couple hours (I explored the building as we were waiting), and when it was time to go over the outfits for the show and dress the models, we discovered some “uh ohs”.  Apparently Jeremy had never used or knew how to use organza before because some of the dresses were coming apart at the seams, which had to be quickly dealed with.  The outfits themselves were celestial themed, and really reminded me of the first film ever made with special effects, Melies’ “Trip to the moon”, the show itself sounded awesome.  We couldn’t see it because we were bustling about backstage, but they had a Pink Floyd laser show to accompany the star themed ensembles.  Dressing was really unorganized, but the walk was so long that we had plenty of time between outfits to make all the models look flawless.  I asked the designer whether he was inspired by early film for the collection, and whether the place was picked intentionally to go with the collection, but I was reminded that I’m just way too much of a nerd and he hardly knew anything about the Lumieres or early film.  There were quite a few cute guys at that show, but it’s the worst place to try to talk to guys because you’re surrounded by models and beautiful people and you’re sweating and stinking like a pig because you’re running around trying to make sure everything’s where it’s supposed to be.  And I was there for 4 hours and these people just showed up in their freshly fabulous outfits 20 minutes ago.  My point being, this is the first time in my life I can remember actually making the effort to talk to a guy and him showing no interest at all.  But, I had a great time anyway.  Afterwards my roommate Amy, me, and this new student Hillary went to Le Deux Magots, which is a famous café, and had a little dinner and hung out for a long time drinking wine and laughing about all the run ins we’ve had with the French – both good and bad.  We explained to her that we know the complete lowdown on the status of our upstairs neighbor’s relationship.  And everytime they have a little afternoon or evening delight, all of our surrounding neighbors have strategies to drown out the sound.  We turn up the music, our next door neighbor vacuums.  We know this because when there’s a hint of it stopping, all the neighbors turn down their music or turn off their vacuum, but without fail they start up again, so once again we’ll hear the vacuum going or other people’s music turned up.  It’s funny.  And Hillary has had about every thing that could go wrong go wrong.  The guy she was staying with came onto her the first night, so she had to find a new place, which she had to find within pretty much 48 hours, so it’s been a trip for all of us.

Ugh, sorry, enough with the tangents.

Veronique Branquinho was a show I was nervous about and didn’t expect to be laid back.  But it was by far my favorite.  It’s funny how thing’s work out that way.  It was in the same venue as the Estrella Arch show.  Her clothing was so classic and beautifully tailored, and it felt like butter.  It was split into black, beige, and ivory mini collections. My model at that show was my favorite.  Her name was Alina, and she was so calm and collected and positive.  I took a picture with her after the show and she wanted to even look at it, which I was really surprised by.  And afterwards she even thanked me and kissed me on both cheeks.  The pace of the show was just as quick, but a lot more organized and relaxed.  Even though I had the wrong size shoes for my model.  I had to put in three inserts in order for her to not fall out of them.  I even corrected the designer on what shoes go to what model!  I had it down.  And the designer was totally open to listening, it’s not like I was some brat trying to tell her what to do.  She seemed really cool.  After the show they had the most BOMB hors d’oeuvres.  I can’t even explain a couple of them because I have no idea what they were.  I had 4 different ones and a few glasses of champagne.  One of the hors d’oeuvres was a seaweed salad wrapped in something sushi like and it was pinned together with a tiny clothespin, and then there were these cookies that were like little sandwiches with a cream inside, and the outside was a cookie that was crispy on the outside and an almost caramelly brownie consistency on the inside.  I wish I could explain the flavor, but I don’t even know, it was kind of butterscotch/ginger.  I don’t know, it was yummy.  The models thought so, too, they were crowding round the tables scarfing down the appetizers like ravenous wolves.   I met my future husband as I was sipping some champagne.  He was this beautiful guy with well manicured dreads, miles of style, a face that I didn’t know could exist, and so much passion for what he does.  I soon found out he was a bit older than me, and I think he realized I was a bit younger, so he never put off that he was interested at all.  I don’t know whether he was even straight.  It’s so hard to tell in Europe, and in the fashion industry.  He said he designed from 1996-2002, and got spent on it, so he taught (or assisted teaching) and now he owns a boutique in London called “The Convenience Store” where he sells Veronique amongst others.  The reason I thought he was so cool besides the obvious was that he vocalized all the things I’ve been thinking about fashion lately and it was really refreshing to hear.  Very down to earth and an interpretive artistic view versus the whole “I’m a slave to the fashion gods” point of view, which I’ve been really burnt out on recently.  I like to do things in moderation, but I’m still a passionate creator.  So it was nice to meet someone else with that kind of attitude.  And it’s usually embarrassing for me to talk about fashion because so many people view it as an unintelligent subject, so it was nice to talk to someone who shares the same cultural perspective and interpretation on fashion and that clothes are such a big part of his life like it is mine.  He had a few words of wisdom because he had a few years on me, and I came out of the conversation really refreshed and ready to take on the rest of the shows.  

That night we went dancing in a way too crowded bar and I met a couple of new friends, Amine and Muegged, who my friend Elizabeth and I ended up hanging out with and playing uno with and watching the Discovery Channel until 4 am.  And I’m being 100% honest.  They told us we were going to a house party, but I guess something got lost in translation cause we just went to their apartment and hung out for forever.  Amine’s a good friend to stick around because he took it upon himself to be a French tutor for me and he absolutely refuses to speak in English sometimes in order for me to “progress”.  That and he doesn’t speak English that well.  He also decided to call me “Jennifer Aniston”, because “Hattie” is too hard (the French don’t pronounce H’s).

I have two more shows to explain!  Lordy.  I’m going to be brief.  Manish Arora is a crazy designer from India, his designs are high quality couture with the most detailed techniques and incredibly crafted structure.  His inspiration for fall 09 was butterflies, and he had these quilted pieced together pieces that looked like butterfly wings, and they consisted of velvet, leather, jewels, and lots of beading.  It was a good show, and I was fascinated to go around and look at how all the pieces were constructed.  My model was from the Seattle area.  So that’s that.

Elie Saab was the biggest of the shows we worked at.  He’s a designer for a lot of Hollywood, especially come oscar season.  I saw a lot of supermodels who were in that show:  Coco Rocha, Chanel Iman, Jessica Stam, Heidi Mount, Sasha Pivovarova (if you look them up on Style.com you may recognize some of the faces).  It was nuts to see these girls in the flesh after seeing so many of their pictures in countless adds and spreads in magazines.  The clothes were stunning and classic.  My model’s name was Ksenia Kahnovich, if you look her up on style.com, the first two pictures are the outfits I put her in.  I really liked the first dress, the beigy grey one, but they had me add this necklace to it and it was so much more beautiful with out it.  The dress already had some jewels on the border of the lace, and I feel it had so much character without the barnacle looking additional necklace.  The bare lace was so much more provocative and classically sexy.  I didn’t really agree with the stylist for the Elie Saab show, and apparently neither did the old stylist who was still on staff.  They were arguing until the last minute.  If you look at the show, I think the accessories even take away from some of the overall ensembles.  But it was really well organized, and I had the whole dressing thing down to a tee by then, so it was a piece of cake.  And I got a picture with the model of the moment, Chanel Iman, which was the cherry on top of my fashion week.

Other adventures.  I went to Fontainebleau with Amy and Hillary last Sunday.  It was the “weekend home” of the royalty of Versailles, which means that it was still the hugest building and grounds I’ve ever seen in my life.  Every room of the castle was lavishly and ornately decorated and every room had a huge fireplace.  And there were so many discreet and hidden doors!  I was thinking of “the secret garden” the entire time I was there because it reminded me so much of that castle.  I wanted to find some private corridor that led to a secret room or garden, but alas, all the doors were locked.  I checked.  I was so giddy when I was there.  I don’t remember feeling that way since I was little.  It’s a rare feeling.  When you’re an adult, you can appreciate things or think they’re beautiful, but it’s so rare to have that full blown childlike excited contentment to explore the new.  The gardens were my favorite part.  The day started out raining, which was perfect for us to be roaming about the castle, but then it cleared up when we went out to explore the grounds.  I half expected a troop of horses and hounds to come gallivanting out hunting for rabbits.  It was so nice to get some fresh air in such a beautiful woody/manor setting.  We happened upon a fountain with swans in it, and I got to feed a swan directly from my hand.  It made me miss my ducks.  This trip made me want to get a bunny and more ducks when I get back home.

Sidenote: I read recently that the rabbit is supposed to be the animal of this time because it symbolizes rebirth, collection, intuition, and quiet persuasion.  I thought that very fitting considering the economy and all the hell that needs to be figured out.

I found an incredible music venue, too.  We went to Fleche D’Or (flesh of gold) after the Elie Saab fashion show.  If you imagine Central Perk Café from the tv show Friends being transformed to a music venue/bar you arrive at something like Fleche D’Or.  It had cute comfie couches and it was just a really nice ambience and they had bands that were my flavor and the type I truly enjoy dancing too.  Not even like good Michael Jackson dancing too, but like the Strokes and T. Rex I like dancing to style.  Which I’ve never found outside of my bedroom.  The live bands that played all sang in English, though, even though they were French.  I find that a lot.  It’s kind of disappointing because French is so beautiful to listen to in song.  I was kind of even talking to the cab driver on the way home about how beautiful French songs are, and how excited I am when I actually hear them here.  And I spoke to him 100% in French, thank you very much.  I understood 90% of what he was saying, too.  But he talked very very slowly.  We had a conversation the entire time, he, my friend Laurel, and I.  One of the first things the French are guaranteed to want to hear about is Obama.  I’ve had to talk to so many people about it.  I tell them I voted for the green party and avoid any conflict as much as possible.  I was talking to this very drunk girl from South Africa about it one night and she was expressing pretty much the way I felt about the whole thing, and how nervous she was about the state of the world being in such unknown unexperienced hands, and how it sucked to watch it all because all the world depends on the United States and they couldn’t do anything about it, which got another guy from Wales a little heated, at which point I butted in and said that the thing I’ve learned from it all is that I don’t like politics because most of what it does for people like us is point out our differences when really everyone has more things in common than we have different.  And politics is not a conversation that should be dealt with in drunk minds.  So luckily that killed it, because the Presidential election is one of my most uncomfortable topics and as soon as people find out I’m American I just wait for them to ask me about something related to it all at which point I flinch.

School is going swimmingly, too.  Peter Carman, the president, mentioned to the costume teacher that I had an interest in costume (I don’t even remember telling him this), and so she offered for me to make purely historic pieces instead of modern pieces.  So I chose a time period, the 1890’s, about Mary Poppin’s time, and I’m going to make a jacket, a skirt, and now I guess an actual hat in genuine costume construction – which is totally different than the way we make clothes right now and the true secret to making costume look like it did back in the day.  But it means that I won’t be making an haute couture jacket, which I’m kind of sad about, but I don’t want to go into Haute Couture, so it’s a compromise and it’ll look better on my resume to be the assistant designer to  Colleen Atwood ;)

Hmm,  I think that’s actually it for now.  All is well and I am once again head over heels for Paris.  I gage my level of interest by nutella crepes.  I haven’t had one for over two weeks now, and everytime there’s a lull I comfort myself with one.  So as long as I stay busy, the more stories, and the less love handles I’ll have when I return home. xox