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88 fashionably loud and incredibly baroque The heavy jewels, brilliant embroidery and exquisite lace of fall’s finery shine among ’s glittering streets. PHOTOGRAPHY BY KATJA RAHLWES STYLING BY SABINA SCHREDER 94 The collecTor At his home in the French countryside, Christian Louboutin adds to his treasures with a vast new archive of his beloved shoe designs. BY DANA THOmAS PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALExANDRE BAILHACHE PRODuCED BY CAROLINA IRvING 104 dreaming in oTToman , a city built on contradictions, has a thriving cultural scene that is forging a bridge between its past and its future. BY LAWRENCE OSBORNE PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANDRES GONzALEz 112 ausTeriTy measures A new crop of coats are strikingly voluminous and bold. PHOTOGRAPHY BY BEN TOmS STYLING BY ROBBIE SPENCER 120 like home, only beTTer ’s most exclusive new club is a stylistic reflection of its owner’s impeccable taste at home. BY RITA KONIG PHOTOGRAPHY BY JAmES mERRELL AND ROLAND BEAuFRE

cover Photography by Katja Rahlwes in Paris. Ralph Lauren Collection cape and pants; Dries van Noten blouse; Chanel necklace and earrings; Sonia Boyajian necklace; Chanel Fine Jewelry watch

this page Photography by Julia Hetta. 80 Céline jacket and shirt; Hugo boss tie For details see Sources, page 130.

19

0912_WSJ_TOC_04.indd 19 7/24/12 12:35 PM 07242012113700 CONTENTS

“He smiles broadly and, at that moment, the richest man in Japan unbuttons his shirt to show me his Uniqlo underwear.”

—“this man wants to clothe the planet,” p. 64

28 editor’s letter 50 tracked Donatella Versace 32 backstory oversees her couture show, a glamorous 34 market report: dinner and a raucous trend after-party. Autumnal hues and gypsy looks set fall’s tone. 56 partnership A generation apart, radio 38 market report: auteur Ira Glass and teen news blogger Tavi Gevinson adds high are kindred spirits. jewelry to its repertoire in a new shop on 60 style the Place Vendôme. The visionary Diana Vreeland was a force to 45 soapbox be reckoned with— ’s head designer, in fashion and in her Alber Elbaz, empowers own family. women through fashion. 104

HE ac H Bail RE xand ann; alE FFM ; BEn Ho MS n To Ez; BE gonzal RES : and lEFT P RoM To F SE 94 60 112 clockwi

CloCkwise from top Istanbul’s Sakirin mosque; Franzi Mueller in a Maison Martin Margiela coat; a memo Diana Vreeland online @WSJ.COM/MAGAZINE wrote on the themes of the 1960s when she was editor at Vogue; Exclusive photos of Christian Louboutin’s Paris apartment. Also, outtakes from “Dreaming in Ottoman,” the expansive gardens at Christian Louboutin’s country home our exploration of the ancient yet modern city of Istanbul. wsj.com/magazine. in France’s Vendée region.

20 SEPTEMBER 2012

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120 73 45

“Sometimes you don’t really need armor to feel protected. Sometimes maybe you need just a chiffon dress to hug you.” —Alber elbAz, “soApbox,” p. 45 TaMaT on T M aul B hi 64 renegade 80 fashion Japan’s richest man The season’s gamine wants to dress you and looks make a convincing everyone you know. argument in favor of the subtle appeal that comes from 73 making it aTi; REnE & Radka T

The inspiration behind foregoing frills and RP Valentino’s fall collection embracing tomboy chic. is a group of iconic

women that includes Patti 132 still/life anilo Sca

Smith, Joyce Carol Oates, A look at the most ; d

Louise Bourgeois and adored possessions of FRE Susan Sontag. the fashion designer au L’Wren Scott—items 76 design that form an emotional The designs of the ’70s portrait of the woman look better than ever, behind them. : Roland BE EFT

owing to the clean but P l luxe aesthetic of the era’s furniture designers, RoM To

like Maria Pergay, Pierre F

Paulin, Francois-Xavier SE 50 and Claude Lalanne. clockwi

Get WSJ Saturday CloCkwise from top Club owner Robin ’s Knightsbridge Get a Saturday-only subscription to The Wall Street Journal for a weekly fix of smart style and culture. IncludesOFF DUTY, home; a gown from Valentino’s fall collection stands among a guide to your not-at-work life; REVIEW, the best in ideas, books and culture; and, of course, the monthly WSJ. Magazine. inspiration boards; Lanvin designer Alber Elbaz; models lounge at 1-888-681-9216 or www.subscribe.wsj.com/getweekend. the Ritz Paris before walking in Versace’s couture show.

24 SEPTEMBER 2012

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ExpEcT ThE unExpEcTED we look forward to the crisp, bracing spirit of fall, with its empty notebooks and sharpened pen- cils, the cooling of temperatures and the updating of closets—all the possibilities of a renewed mood and a fresh start. While we anticipate the rituals of this time of year, what really excites us and heralds the season are all the wonderful new things we didn’t see coming. This issue pays tribute to the unforeseen in ways that we hope will inspire and delight: crazy, over- the-top fashion, as seen on our cover, that offers a sense of freedom and fun (page 88); Lanvin designer Alber Elbaz, who, while remarkably humble and shy, belted out a heartfelt rendition of “Que Sera Sera” on stage after his 10th-anniversary show (page 45); the high-school blogger phenomenon Tavi Gevinson, who had her 15 minutes of fame four years ago, got bashed by the very press that courted her and then, undaunted, launched the online teen magazine Rookie with the help of mentor and like-minded friend Ira Glass (page 56); pictures that reveal how dressing like a boy can be a very feminine thing to do (page 80); a Middle Eastern city that is styl- ishly embracing its complex Ottoman heritage as it forges its cultural future (page 104); and Christian Louboutin, a passionate gardener and collector of beautiful things who also happens to make some of the most coveted shoes on earth (page 94). Finally, we introduce a new back page: Still/Life will feature a cultural icon sharing a selection of his or her most beloved possessions—a kind of self- portrait told through personal artifacts. This month fashion designer—and Mick Jagger lady friend—

L’Wren Scott inaugurates the page. Happy autumn! w yoRk nE

Deborah Needleman, Editor in Chief any, MP [email protected] Co SS

fashion illustrated Antonio Lopez’s 1966 drawing was inspired by a Francis Bacon painting. Ei

A retrospective of the artist’s work will be held at The Suzanne Geiss Company in New York starting September 7. E G y ThE Suzann

editor in chief Deborah Needleman executive style editor David Farber assistant to the editor puBlisher Anthony Cenname RTES creative director Patrick Li market editor Andrew Lutjens Alainna Lexie Beddie gloBal advertising director , Cou executive editor Chris Knutsen copy chief Minju Pak weB editors Allison Lichter, Robin Kawakami Stephanie Arnold managing editor Brekke Fletcher contriButing art director Shawn Carney european editor Rita Konig associate puBlisher/europe fashion features director photo editor Damian Prado contriButing editors Claudio Piovesana Whitney Vargas senior associate editor Adrienne Gaffney Alexa Brazilian, Michael Clerizo (watches), Business manager z & Juan RaMoS

photo director Nadia Vellam production manager Scott White Sara Ruffin Costello, Carolina Irving, Joshua Julie Checketts PE art director Pierre Tardif junior designer Alex Konsevick Levine, Ambra Medda, Meenal Mistry, senior marketing manager

senior editor Megan Conway fashion assistant Jane Chapman Charlotte Moss, David Netto, Dana Thomas Jillian Maxwell onio Lo

WSJ. Issue 28, September 2012, Copyright 2012, Dow Jones and Company, Inc. All rights reserved. See the magazine online at www.wsjmagazine.com. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is prohibited. WSJ. magazine is provided as a supplement to of anT TE edgy and provocative, image-maker and stylist, The Wall Street Journal for subscribers who receive delivery of the Saturday Weekend Edition and on newsstands. WSJ. magazine is not available for individual retail sale. For Customer Service, please call 866-WSJ-MAGZ (866-975-6249), send email to mag.feedback@wsj a .com, or write us at: 84 Second Avenue, Chicopee, MA 01020. For Advertising inquiries, please email us at [email protected]. For reprints, please call 800-843-0008, email [email protected], or visit our reprints Web address at www.djreprints.com. ST carine roitfeld edits her signature look into a collection of © E chic colours and tools inspired by her aesthetic.

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Louboutin’s favorite workout is swinging on the trapeze. THE COLLECTOR p. 94 Contributing style editor Carolina Irving, who has known Christian Louboutin for 25 years, was among the first with whom Louboutin shared his plans for a new shoe archive on the grounds of his house in the French countryside. Contributing editor Dana Thomas, a longtime fan of Louboutin’s work, who wears his shoes almost exclusively, went to see it for herself one rainy Sunday. “I don’t wear anything else, except my running shoes, Havaianas and a pair of sandals from St. Tropez,” she says. From left: Bailhache; Louboutin Photographer Alexandre Bailhache recalls Louboutin’s idea to brave in his walled garden; Irving, in one of the jackets she designs the rain for a portrait with an umbrella. “It was very Mary Poppins!” under the Irving & Fine label.

FASHIONABLY LOUD AND INCREDIBLY BAROQUE p. 88 The famed Place de la Concorde and Place Vendôme set the scene for our fall fashion story celebrating the season’s love affair with gold.WSJ. Creative Director Patrick Li imagined the shoot as “everything a bit too much,” with Dutch model Daphne Groeneveld playing an extravagantly styled Prussian princess touring Paris. According to Li, “Photographer Katja Rahlwes documented our fictional character through From left: Over-the-top glasses; stylist Sabina

her own relentlessly glamorous and sexy lens.” Schreder; Groeneveld with ANDRES GONZALEZ; COURTESY ANDRES GONZALEZ Lagerfeld bag; Rahlwes.

p. 80 From left: Roiphe; GIRLS WILL BE BOYS Julia; Hannes; Katie Roiphe isn’t the oxford-wearing gamine in men’s clothing LENOX SQUARE SHORT HILLS SOUTH COAST PLAZA ROYAL HAWAIIAN SHOPPING CENTER 1800.336.3469 .COM Roiphe’s new book, that she describes in her essay on tomboys. “I am actually not a out this month. tomboy and barely ever wear flat shoes,” she says, adding, “but my daughter Violet is, because ‘girls clothes take too much time.’ ” Hannes Hetta, who styled the shoot alongside his sister, photographer Julia Hetta, better appreciates the trend behind fall’s slouchy jackets and boxy brogues for women. “I have a real thing for tomboy dressing. I think every woman should consider a little bit of menswear in their wardrobe.”

From left: Osborne; DREAMING IN OTTOMAN p. 104 Sakirin, the first Lawrence Osborne, who has lived in Istanbul for the last year, mosque designed by a woman; Gonzalez. BAL HARBOUR AMERICANA MANHASSET describes it as a “secretive and beautiful city that never quite NEW YORK BEVERLY HILLS BEVERLY CENTER HOUSTON GALLERIA THE PALAZZO ALA MOANA CENTER ASPEN BELLAGIO CITYCENTER CAESARS PALACE yields its true core to the outsider. Perhaps Istanbul is so dense,” he says, “that it cannot be unraveled in the way that one would come to understand a Western city.” Photographer Andres Gonzalez, who divides his time between Istanbul and Portland, Maine, was struck by the city’s hidden residential treasures. “Many of the homes couldn’t be seen from the streets,” says Gonzalez. Istanbul now boasts “The door or gate would open up to lush gardens and grand décor. almost as many It was mind-blowing to see how some Istanbulis make such an billionaires as London

atmospheric space for themselves despite the overcrowded city.” and many more than Paris. TOP ROW, FROM LEFT: MIKAEL ZUMSTEIN; ALEXANDRETHIRD ROW, BAILHACHE;FROM LEFT: ©DAVID ANNAX SCHORI; PRUTTING/BFANYC.COM.N/C; COURTESY HANNES SECOND HETTA;ROW, FROM RANDOMLEFT: COURTESYHOUSE. FOURTHMERCURA; ROW, STEFANIEFROM LEFT: KUNZ;COURTESY WSJ. LAWRENCEMAGAZINE; OSBORNE; COURTESY KATJA RAHLWES.

32 SEPTEMBER 2012

0912_WSJ_Contribs_02.indd 32 7/23/12 2:40 PM  MARKET REPORT TREND

InTO ThE MysTIc From ornate gems to exotic embroidery, a gypsy spirit is in the air

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For details see Sources, page 130. Christian Boutiques: www.dior.com

34 SEPTEMBER 2012 aRTwoRkS By DaniEl SEan MuRPhy PhoTogRaPhy By F. MaRTin RaMin

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shAdEs Of AuTuMn Color is one of the 1 cornerstones of fall style with rich tones in tomato and sage 2 The New Miracle

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1 Louis Vuitton 2 Pomellato ring 3 Devi Kroell clutch Introducing the Moisturizing Soft Cream, which delivers 4 H. Stern earrings 5 Tod’s purse miraculous benefits. Its luxurious formula penetrates deeply 6 lipstick 4 to replenish moisture and strengthen skin. Renewed and energized, For details see Sources, page 130. skin looks youthfully radiant. Bergdorf Goodman Neiman Marcus Saks Fifth Avenue 36 SEPTEMBER 2012 aRTwoRkS By DaniEl SEan MuRPhy PhoTogRaPhy By F. MaRTin RaMin LaMer.com

0912_WJS_MarketReport_Autumnal_02.indd 36 7/19/12 5:33 PM 07192012163613 marKET rEporT NEWS REED KRAKOFF LLC 012 ©2 It’s fIttIng that the shape of the Place Vendôme in Paris resem- bles an emerald-cut diamond. For nearly 120 years, the world’s leading high jewelers have lined the gently beveled square. Frédéric Boucheron was the first tenant of the sort, moving his store into No. 26 in 1893, just five years before the Ritz hotel opened its doors nearby. In 1902, Joseph Chaumet settled into No. 12, and four years after that came Van Cleef & Arpels at No. 22. On and on it went. Today, it’s also home to Breguet, Piaget, Buccellati, Rolex, Mikimoto, Patek Philippe, Hublot, Repossi and Mauboussin, as well as the fine jewelry boutiques for Dior and Chanel. And, now, Louis Vuitton. The French luxury label has opened its first high jewelry boutique at No. 23. A coveted spot on the plaza isn’t easy to find. “If you miss it, you have to wait 10 years, so we decided to go for it,” says Hamdi Chatti, vice president of fine jewelry and

Louis Vuitton watches. Like all of Vuitton’s retail spaces, the glittering new store Haute JoaiLLerie is designed by architect Peter Marino. The 1,600-square-foot bou- necklace, cuff and ring from the Paris tique has two private salons and a workshop on the fourth and fifth Vendôme Collection; floors. The ground-floor windows are shaded by a metallic chain-mail the new shop in Paris. curtain, which diffuses natural light while providing clients with just the right amount of privacy. A mirrored sculpture by contemporary American artist Teresita Fernandez hangs from the two-story-high ceiling like a shower of crystal raindrops frozen mid-fall. In addition diamonds to a watch showcase and permanent collections of monogram and nail-head-motif pieces, the store stocks the impres- in paris sive one-of-a-kind designs of Lorenz Bäumer, the house’s artistic director of fine jewelry. It used to be high jewelry The boutique signals Vuitton’s push into the haute joaillerie arena, but its presence also signi- was the province of great fies a growing trend among high-fashion brands jewelry houses, like Cartier to enter into or deepen their commitment to fine jewelry. Last fall, Dolce & Gabbana and Salvatore and Bulgari. Now a number Ferragamo debuted their own collections. The of fashion brands are getting former played on its Sicilian roots, creating rosa-

ries and crosses in rubies, sapphires and pearls. )

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38 sePteMBer 2012

0912_WSJ_FineJewelry_03.indd 38 7/23/12 2:48 PM 07232012134913 MARKET REPORT NEWS

and diamonds. “We are not a brand that goes in too many different directions, but many of our competitors are in fine jewelry and cus- tomers were asking for it,” Ferragamo’s CEO Michele Norsa says.

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couture collection. This July, Versace, which has sold fine jewelry FA since 1998, did the same, showcas- ing 16 one-of-a-kind Atelier Versace cocktail rings during its haute couture show. (Plans to open fine Vuitton’s new boutique jewelry boutiques are in the works.) signifies a growing trend Add to the list Hermès, Ralph Lauren and Bottega Veneta, all of which among high-fashion BOSS Black HUGO BOSS have recently launched or doubled brands to enter into or their offerings. Expanding toward the higher deepen their commitment end of the luxury spectrum might to fine jewelry. seem counterintuitive in an industry that’s characteristically spun off in the other direction—with secondary lines, fragrances and licensed products. But unlike more mainstream consumer categories that are still struggling as a result of the financial crisis, luxury has been on ARMANI PRIVÉ the upswing since 2010. According to a forecast report by Altagamma, necklace, the Italian luxury goods lobby, jewelry and watch sales are expected to ring and cuff rise another 10 percent this year. For Vuitton, which, despite creative director ’s influ- ential ready-to-wear lines, is still best known for handbags, staking a claim in the category has the potential to elevate the brand. The

158-year-old label didn’t launch jewelry until 2001, when Jacobs designed a playful charm bracelet with collectible travel-themed trinkets, like a miniature Speedy bag and a tiny gold Eiffel Tower studded with diamonds. According to Chatti, Jacobs intended the bracelet as a one-off but reconsidered when he was approached on a flight by a customer who had bought three and wanted more. Since then, Vuitton is making up for lost time. In 2004, Jacobs created the first complete 110-piece fine jewelry collection that established core styles. He eventually appointed Camille Miceli, his stylish head of communications who had been dabbling in design, as creative advi- sor for jewelry. She worked on buzzy projects like a collaboration with rapper Pharrell Williams that yielded bracelets and brooches

RALPH LAUREN inspired by French heraldry. In 2008, the label patented two petal- FINE JEWELRY like diamond cuts to replicate the exact graphic flower and clover New Romantic motifs of its iconic monogram. CEO Yves Carcelle calls the designs Chandelier earrings and Modern Art “a challenge of epic aesthetic and technical proportions.”

Deco cuff With the hire of Bäumer a year later, Vuitton made its intentions ALL PHOTOGRAPHY THIS AND FOLLOWING PAGE BY F. MARTIN RAMIN; STYLING BY ANNE CARDENAS shop online hugoboss.com

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about entering the fine jewelry arena clear. Bäumer had spent two decades at Chanel while also designing his own line. (He, too, has a private showroom in the Place Vendôme, on the third floor of No. 4, and plans to open his own shop there as well.) Since his arrival, he’s

created four collections for Vuitton. The first was an elaborate bib ® ® ® necklace with multicolored sapphires, white diamonds and spinels TheNEWCiti Platinum Select / AAdvantage card. that formed overlapping kaleidoscopic circles. It looks like the intri- FREE CHECKED BAG PRIORITY BOARDING EARN DOUBLE MILES AND MORE cate workings of a watch. Tapping into Vuitton’s travel heritage, he called the range L’Ame du Voyage, or the Soul of the Trip, and it was Learn about all the enhanced benefits at citi.com/journey LOVE THE JOURNEY. inspired by everything from Notre Dame’s stained glass to the Maasai. This year’s collection, Escale à Paris, is based on various iconic land- marks in the city—but only those that Vuitton himself would have seen in the late 19th century. The pièce de résistance is the Champs- Elysées necklace: a diamond sautoir with dark-red spinels running its length to approximate streetlights; a diamond-studded white-gold Arc de Triomphe rests at the clavicle. Bäumer also quietly accepts custom commissions for Vuitton. A bracelet and ring workshop has been designed over the Place Vendôme boutique, where from the Horsebit clients can come in to personally choose stones with a gemologist and Collection then meet with Bäumer to work out a design. However, just entering FreeCheckedBag:Baggagefeewaiverisfordomestictravelanddoesnotapplytooversizedoroverweightbags. Double Miles: Earn 2 AAdvantage® miles for every $1 you spend on eligible American Airlines purchases. For details see the workshop, Chatti carefully notes, is an earned privilege. “You need American Airlines reserves the right to change the AAdvantage® programanditstermsandconditionsatanytimewithoutnotice,andtoendtheAAdvantage® program with six months’ notice. Sources, page 130. to order first,” he says with a smile. “It’s like a club.” American Airlines is not responsible for products or services offered by other participating companies. For complete AAdvantage® program details, visit www.aa.com/aadvantage. American Airlines and AAdvantagewithScissorEagledesignaretrademarksofAmericanAirlines,Inc.Citibankisnotresponsibleforproductsorservicesofferedbyothercompanies.Cardmemberbenefitsaresubjecttochange. ©2012Citibank,N.A.Citi,Citibank,CitiwithArcDesignandPlatinumSelectareregisteredservicemarksofCitigroupInc.

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0912_WSJ_FineJewelry_03.indd 42 7/24/12 10:41 AM 07242012094354 Ideas & PeoPle

soA p B oX

purity of vision At his studio in Paris, Elbaz has asked that everything be white and for his staff to wear white work coats so that the neutrality of the space can lead to greater creativity.

Alber elbAz is A rAre bird in a business oft domi- founded in 1889 by Jeanne Lanvin, was barely breath- nated by ego and drama. Humble, funny and all about ing when Elbaz arrived in 2001. Almost overnight, the the work, the beloved Lanvin designer eschews the designer’s whisper-light frocks and beribboned acces- ALBER ELBAZ high-profile social life of his star clients. Likening him- sories became favorites of both critics and consumers. self to “a concierge in a beautiful hotel,” he feels it’s A rare coupling of mystery and wearability, the clothes The Lanvin designer best not to hobnob with the guests: “It’s good not to reflect the sensibility of their creator, who says he works offers his touching take on know all these people, not to go to all these parties, to from intuition and emotion and is a dogged ignorer just be in the shadows a little bit and be able to dream. of trends. “I want to know where is that committee in why he will forever That way I can keep the fantasy of who they are and Switzerland that sits to decide what is in and what is believe in the transformative what they are looking for.” out,” he says. “I don’t listen to the formula makers. I The Moroccan-born Elbaz began his career with think maybe I have a selective hearing disorder.” magic of fashion in New York before moving in 1997 to This year, after his knockout 10th-anniversary show, Paris, where he soon landed the top job at Yves Saint Elbaz treated the crowd to a performance of “Que Sera Laurent. Abruptly replaced by Tom Ford when Gucci Sera,” including the gender-tweaked line, “When I was Group bought the company, he eventually moved to just a little boy, I asked my mother what will I be?” Lanvin, where he has clearly had the last laugh. The When he finished singing, every woman in the room BY JULIA REED world’s longest-running fashion house, which was was cheering, grateful for the path he’d chosen. photogRAphY BY REnE & RADkA

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I THINK FASHION IS ONE THING to the world, MASTER OF CEREMONY translate it and make it relevant. For me, I don’t want and it’s another to the people who work in Runway looks from to see a maharajah on Fifth Avenue. So I have to ask: Elbaz’s fall 10th-anniversary it. It seems like one of those glam jobs in collection, which echoes Is it comfortable? Can you enter a taxi? Can you have which you wake up and don’t have cereal many of the themes he is dessert if you wear that dress? And sometimes I have because you have champagne, and you best known for; the designer to be honest: “F--- the dessert, get the dress!” In the serenading the crowd. mostly start at 6 o’clock—not in the morn- end, the most beautiful thing is that nobody will know ing but in the evening—and by 7 you have where it comes from. The idea is that you look at a to rush to do something else. The reality is dress and say, “Well, that’s a great dress.” It doesn’t very, very different. Producing so many col- matter if you take it from the maharajah, from Brigitte lections every year, starting from scratch and Bardot, from the ’60s or the ’80s. The important thing turning creation into business—it is a very dif- is to erase the evidence. ficult thing to do. What do you wear in a bad economy? This is a very, There was a time when designers hated other very sensitive issue. On one hand, you say that when designers. But today there is actually major things are going sour—when everything is not as easy respect between many of us. We understand and fun as it used to be—maybe there is some element each other. We are all going through the same that can bring fun and joy again. And it’s chocolates, stressful process. Before shows we send each maybe it’s love, and it’s a beautiful red dress. If I other little cards with congratulations; we send were a buyer today in one of the American depart- each other flowers. We’re kind of a crazy fam- ment stores, I would go with extremes—the most ily, but still a family. There are many designers beautiful, the more expensive, the more eccentric. I really respect and love. I love Azzedine (Alaïa). I would take risks. The worst thing would be to I like Narciso (Rodriguez) and Marc (Jacobs) and buy only the little black dress. You know why? Nicolas (Ghesquiére) from Balenciaga. The first col- Because everyone has it already. I would go lection Raf Simons did for Dior was gorgeous. I’m not with a purple dress, something different. jealous of people—I’m only jealous of people who can On the other hand, the world is going eat and not gain weight. I respect talent. When I see through so many changes. People are protest- talent and when I see a good person who comes with ing about salaries and they can’t afford to buy the talent, I melt. a home. There are a lot of companies that are Fashion used to be a family business. For years and taking what we are creating and translating years, it was the kind of business in which mothers and them to the masses. So we cannot be accused fathers and children and grandchildren would all work of eating cake when the world needs to have together. And there was something in that. Because bread. Because in our little domain, we create family is the only place where you feel comfortable enough to make mistakes, and in creation, mistakes are really important. They drive you forward. We have no titles at Lanvin; at lunch everybody eats together and the studio feels as one. I don’t believe in a hierar- chy, in a pyramid of people reporting to other people who report to me. I always say that if you really want the truth you have to go to the basement because that is where things happen. If you look for the truth in the penthouse, usually it’s fake. I feel today we have to relearn how to be small again. The industry now is very strong and very powerful and very big and loud. I think it’s an important time to go back to design, to think small and to go back to creativity. It’s not just about marketing, but about creativity again, about a return to intu- ition, to emotion. We have to bring joy to people—that’s the essence of the job. I’ve never worked with a muse or thought, Oh, I am so inspired by her, because I’m not doing the collection for one woman. I’m making it for different women, different ages, different body shapes, different colors. Everything can inspire you: a story, a conversation with a buyer, a need, an editor’s comment. All we are as designers are infantile anten- nae. We are just so childish and naïve. We have to capture the moment and then we have to project that back into our work. I have an idea

and sometimes it is very grand, then I have to ERIC RYAN/GETTY IMAGES (ELBAZ); FIRSTVIEW (RUNWAY)

46 SEPTEMBER 2012

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modernist you have to make something a little bit ugly. And if you make it really ugly then it’s really modern and really cool. But beauty is never démodé. Beauty is the one thing I think everyone is seeking. That’s it—to touch beautiful things, to make women feel beautiful. And this is power, you know, to feel beautiful. I always maxmara.com 1.866.MAXMARA say that women are very strong and men are powerful. But beauty gives you both strength and power. I never think of it. It’s just one of those natural things. It’s the only thing I know how to do. Not everything I do is perfect, but I learn from mis- takes. Once I was told that a girl who had done our campaign in the previous season was out, that she was no longer the right person to use. And I was a sucker, I said okay. A month later I saw her on the street walk- ing with her sister, and when she saw me she started to cry. She said, “Why didn’t you take me, Alber?” And I felt so small and so stupid and such a victim of the system that I said, “Never again.” That’s what I mean when I say that I’m going back to intuition and to feel- ing and to what I believe. Sometimes you don’t really need armor to feel protected. Sometimes maybe you need just a chiffon dress to hug you. And if you feel that the dress hugs you and the dress loves you, you feel strong and protected. I never consider myself as doing sexy clothes at all, but then after the show people tell me, “Wow, the girls are so sexy.” You know why? Because they feel fearless. ideas that are being translated by High Street a sea- TRUE COLOR Two different women told me two son, or even an hour, later. I think the fact that we are Alber wearing his different things at two different times, signature necktie the source of the High Street fashion is good. A year and glasses; a classic and I always go back to them. One per- and a half ago I did a project with H&M, which is some- Lanvin cocktail dress son told me that every time she wears thing I would never have done before, but I thought with a kicky peplum. Lanvin men fall in love with her, and it was important. It was about giving something to I thought that was so beautiful. The people that they could not afford, something that they other one told me that she was in a taxi only dreamed about. And it felt good to know that going to face her husband’s lawyer 95 percent of the clothes had sold around the world because she was getting a divorce, but within four hours. she was wearing Lanvin and she felt I’ve never felt bad about going to extremes, and so protected. If I can make men fall in it’s not about how much it costs. When you work in love with women and if I can protect an atelier that is located in central Paris and not on women, I think I can die peacefully. a boat in China, it’s different. When you do a design A week before he died, I called and you do it seven or more times to find the right cut Mr. Beene and told him that every- and the right proportion, it’s not easy to get there, thing I know he taught me. He was and that’s why it’s costly. I don’t just buy the dresses my boss and he was my family. I was somewhere and present them on the runway—I make coming out of nowhere without any grand them. Sometimes it takes me 10 hours to make one portfolio. I didn’t come from a big school. jacket, one skirt. The fact that you are touching some- I came from to New York and had thing yourself brings emotion to it. I was watching a One woman told a little job making mother-of-the-bride chef on television and he took a lemon and squeezed me every time she dresses. He taught me that it doesn’t matter it with his hand. He said that he could do it with a where you come from but where you are going. machine, but he felt that if he did it with his own hand wears Lanvin men He never did things just because you are sup- the person eating the salad would be able to taste fall in love with her. posed to do them. He had the ability to create what he put into it. I put all of me into my work. This and to laugh and to make women feel beauti- is all I have: I don’t have kids; I don’t have a family Another told me ful and to mix technology and beauty together. that I created. But I feel that every day I create a new she wore Lanvin to I think that because he was overweight and I’m family. My life in that sense is complete. I find excite- overweight, our fantasy was lightness. So we ment at work; I don’t need anything afterwards. At face her husband’s projected our fantasy to the clothes, and now all I 10 o’clock at night, all I want to do is come home and divorce lawyer do is light, light clothes because it’s the one thing I watch Kim Kardashian get a haircut—it’s like a vaca- don’t have. That is why I’m too afraid to lose weight tion, you don’t have to think. because she because then I might make heavy clothes. You are

It seems as though every time you want to be a felt protected. laughing, but I am not. FIRSTVIEW (RUNWAY)

48 SEPTEMBER 2012 Edited from Julia Reed’s interview with Alber Elbaz.

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t RACKe D 2012 H.Stern® | www.hstern.net/ancientamerica

donatella versace It would be easy to categorize the perpetually tanned and toned designer as a fictional fashion character in a candy-coated fantasy—were she not such a shrewd powerhouse

BY Adrienne gAffneY photogrAphY BY thiBAult montAmAt

FiFteen years ago, Donatella Versace bid her brother farewell Kane under her wing as the designer of her lower-priced Versus line go time In the hours in the lobby of the Ritz Paris without realizing that it would be the and made a foray into mass market, with an H&M collaboration that before her couture show, Donatella last time she would see him. This year’s Versace haute couture show, sold out in half an hour in some places. transforms a wing held at the hotel—the site of so many of Gianni’s presentations—was Donatella herself might veer into caricature were she not such a of the Ritz to her center of operations historic on a multitude of levels, completing the passing of the torch perfect embodiment of her brand. The 57-year-old, who’s overcome as she previews the and highlighting the titan that Donatella has become. her own battles with drug abuse, never has a bleach-blonde hair out collection for a group As the 2008 recession ushered in an era of austerity, Versace’s of place. When she travels—usually with her Jack Russell, Audrey— of reporters. unrestrained opulence made the fashion house a likely victim. her hotel suite is redecorated to Versace standards ahead of time. Donatella responded decisively, bringing in a new CEO, Gian She wears her clothes tight, her heels high and smokes wherever she Giacomo Ferraris, who responded by cutting the workforce by 26 pleases. A thoroughly modern businesswoman with a fascination for percent, closing stores in Japan and centralizing production to American politics, Donatella designs some of the most sizzling and tighten costs. overtly sexy clothes in the industry. Last year, Versace, which remains family-owned, returned to Never having aspired to be a true designer before her brother’s tragic profit, generating $420 million in revenue. At the same time, she’s death, she finds herself the star of the frenzied show on the day of her launched a haute couture collection, taken rising star Christopher second couture presentation. Cue the music. Katie Holmes wears H.stern jewelry

50 SeptemBer 2012 New York Fifth Avenue | Crystals at City Center Las Vegas | The Village of Merrick Park Coral Gables

0912_WSJ_Tracked_04.indd 50 7/23/12 3:31 PM 07232012143304 0912_WSJ_Tracked_04.indd 52 IDEAS &IDEAS PEOPLE TRACKED 52 SEPTEMBER 2012 her favorite room in the hotel, with nerves. people inherentourage She considers her 4.7-inch heels ‘flats’ ‘flats’ heels 4.7-inch her considers She all times), her driver in and her her and Milan in driver her times), all created by Versace for the first time. time. first the for Versace by created Her personal assistant, her security at the Ritz hotel’s Vendôme Suite, Suite, Vendôme hotel’s Ritz at the and wears them to walk her dog. her towalk them wears and guard (who remains with her at at her with remains (who guard Coffee, yogurt, 1 Marlboro Red. 1Marlboro yogurt, Coffee, one-of-a-kind jewels as part of of part as jewels one-of-a-kind Donatella’s standard height. Each model will wear the couture rings hair and makeup artists. makeup and hair 6:30 her runway look. Wakes up inch heels Breakfast 42 42 7 5

a.m.

Heads down from her room answering last-minute calls and e-mails led by the legendary Pat McGrath Pat McGrath legendary the by led where she has been holed up work to prepare 26 models. makeup artists to prepare for the show. the for to prepare and 22 hairstylists at at hairstylists 22 and 32 3

p.m. 

Discusses the Discusses seating plan with her PR staff for the postshow dinner. postshow the for PRstaff her with working 8-hour shifts around the clock. have been flown to Paris from Milan Milan from Paris to flown been have of the straps and buckles measured measured buckles and straps of the crystals and crystals rose-gold embroidery Each is a couture creation, crafted crafted creation, acouture is Each to fit the models’ legs precisely. as a corset for the foot, with all all with foot, the for acorset as and divided into teams, each each teams, into divided and tarot cardsigns 21 on the belts in the show. the in belts the on seamstresses pairs ofshoespairs depicted in Swarovski on hand for the show. show. the for hand on 3:55 56 6

p.m.

sunglasses—before the presentation begins. outfit no. 3—a short black Versace couture couture Versace black 3—a short no. outfit Donatella watches from the audience of the game and is devastated by the result. the by devastated is and game the of Melanie Ward and Versace design design Versace and Ward Melanie Donatella appears for her show in in show her for appears Donatella against Spain in the European Cup final. final. Cup European the in Spain against dress, Versace diamond ring and Runway is cleared goals scoredgoals by Italy Donatella has been keeping track director director Lorenza Baschieri. alongside McGrath, stylist during theduring day outfit changes for rehearsal 6:30 5 0

p.m.

7/23/12 3:31 PM

© PAUL SEHEULT/EYE UBIQUITOUS/CORBIS (RITZ); STOCKBYTE (CIGARETTE); IMAGE SOURCE (COFFEE); ADAM GAULT/OJO IMAGES (YOGURT); COUR TESY ATELIER VERSACE (JEWELRY); MARTIN ROSE/GETTY IMAGES (PLAYER) op Co ti nt on ac s, t us n de and at 1- st 80 ination 0- of Th st th a Wh Th St Th PO 3. at e fense RS e cha 0L CHE 29 io th ar rg e e n rill e. or ic V6 mi wo Dea to por fir ne ti yo le tu n’ le sc in h s u r t he rb ng te pric per di have usa.co st w o rru lea es sr di ma ga up pt m. slen esel beh y Po at io mi llon t ©2 va yo n. ve ry 01 . in Fu 2 ur Tr an d rs Po $5 lec el le gi ue s th vi d rsch edeli ne sc onom e rang to ch e 76 wh er ta Cars 5, it y al base s of e e fa of eel Nor vers e sp ke se 75 4 d th or on ns up Am Ca EP a ts at in er s 0. to A su Po ic io ca es a, 76 rpri ti ns yo rsch Inc ye ma r th . ro . 5 tes Po sing Po ot mi . e— rsch ur nn Ac rsch e s, le tu e amoun lmil al s re it th co ta ’s per e. e e brea mm ea an ne Th ge en ta nk Di of t an w ex ds er nk d se Cay e perien rang at lo es en is bel e w- th to en no su wi t end ll us eDi ne el ce re va ag su ry e aw ca th . th bs to n ob and . esel e at rq titut fu ue ta se tc ay el rv with e. ke . in anc An s g h e . d of al it l tr af . fi c laws tal at l ti me s. Al l pric es show n ar e Po rsch e su gg es t ed re ta lpie on prices il ly . MS RP excl porscheusa.com/cayennediesel ude s ta x, lic en se , re gi st ra ti on , de a le r pr ep , IDEAS & PEOPLE TRACKED

meetings with9 reporters (print, online, TV) throughout the afternoon. Donatella gives them a preview of the looks.

guests100 at a seated dinner at the hotel’s L’Espadon restaurant. minutes15 with and her daughter backstage before the show, which is held atop the Ritz’s pool. Donatella walks them through several pieces, as models 11:45 p.m. and stylists work frantically. Arrives at the after-party already underway in the Ritz’s pool room, which has been completely transformed into a nightclub.

Countless iPhone photos taken by celebs and mortals alike.

songs danced5 to by Donatella, including George Michael’s “Freedom” (which Donatella requested) and 26looks shown “Paper Planes,” performed live by M.I.A. looks26 shown On the menu Raspberry-dressed lobster, dover sole and a citrus-fruits savarin with both red and white wine. claps and 8dance moves from Donatella as she watches the show on a monitor backstage before emerging to take her bow. 2,000roses flown in from South America for the room’s centerpiece, 12 a.m. in Donatella’s favorite colors. Slips out of the party

celebrities8 dressed 1 by Versace tiny look of dismay for the show, including Christina Hendricks, and heads straight to bed, as the hotel

when a model nearly slips on the runway. Elizabeth Banks, M.I.A. and Jessica Alba. is seamlessly returned to its former state. WSJ. MAGAZINE (MENU)

54 SEPTEMBER 2012

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Pa Rt N e RShiP Media Match Gevinson, editor of online magazine Rookie, and Glass, host of This American Life, having a coffee (and hot chocolate) break at New York’s Highliner Restaurant.

Both Ira Glass and tavI GevInson are fascinated Still, Gevinson was hardly new to life in the spot- by the magical realism of everyday life, whether it’s light. By the time Rookie launched last September, she The Blogger first encounters with the unknown (Glass) or the daily was already famous, thanks to the personal blog she eccentricities of Midwestern teenage-hood (Gevinson). started at age 11. The fashion world was smitten with and The As host of the much-adored, long-running radio show her oddball dressing and dyed-grey hair; here was a This American Life, Glass has become something like our prepubescent wunderkind who looked a bit like Miss national storyteller, providing a forum for highly per- Havisham. Seemingly overnight, Gevinson received radio STar sonal yet idiosyncratic stories concerning everything windfalls that typically come to those many times her from gossip to gambling. In roughly the same amount of age: a column in Harper’s Bazaar; coveted front-row She’s in high school and time his show’s been on the airwaves, Gevinson, a junior runway seats; a collaboration with avant-garde label he’s 53, but nevertheless, in high school, has come of age. Last year she launched Rodarte—and then the inevitable ire of jealous detrac- Rookie, her feverishly read online magazine for girls who tors. But now, with Rookie thriving, Gevinson’s status as Tavi Gevinson and Ira Glass are, like its editor, precocious, fashion-obsessed and a an Internet stalwart seems firmly secure. are kindred spirits whose little offbeat. In her inaugural editor’s letter, she issued These days, Glass and Gevinson mostly talk at Rookie “infinite big fat thank-you’s” to a roster of facilitating parties or on conference calls—Gevinson sitting atop off-kilter charisma turns adults that included Glass, whom she referred to with her daisy-print bed in Oak Park, Illinois; Glass padding fans into disciples affectionate mockery as “Cool Dad.” around his kitchen in New York. His jokes are met with a Gevinson and Glass’s generation-straddling friend- not uncommon eye roll, but their rapport is a sweet one. ship began when they were introduced through Glass’s After discovering that Gevinson was using her comput- wife, Anaheed Alani, who is now Rookie’s story editor. As er’s internal mic to record herself singing and playing a media veteran himself, Glass acted as a sort of protector the guitar, Glass gave her one that was able to capture By AlicE GREGoRy for Rookie, encouraging Gevinson, now 16, to pursue sole high notes. As thanks, she sent him a heartfelt rendition PHoToGRAPHy By kyoko HAMAdA ownership and helping her to navigate industry perils. of “Moon River.”

56 SEPTEMBER 2012

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ira on Tavi Tavi on ira

the fIrst tIme I met tavI was during a breakfast meeting in New York at Le I can only ImaGIne how weIrd it would be for your wife to come home and say Grainne, one of those faux-French places where you can get omelets and crepes. she’s going to start working for a 15-year-old, then look up this kid online and see She looked really tiny and really young, and she was still dressed like a little photos of what looks like an 80-year-old granny wearing bag-lady layers. kid—this was before Tavi had There’s a line in my May editor’s letter about Sex and the City, where I reread it decided she was going to dress and was like, “That joke’s too out there.” I considered taking it out, but you know it “pretty,” like a more typical “I wasn’t that confident was 1 a.m., so I just went with it. The next day I considered taking it out again, but teenage girl. She would explain then Anaheed forwarded me an e-mail from Ira where he had just pasted that line that she was giving a talk at the at her age, and I’m not and wrote “Funny!” so I left it. Met or MoMA or something, that confident now. I’m a Talking to Ira is really interesting because he tries to refrain from saying things but then her father would inter- that are stupid or a waste of time. Not like an obsessive dictator, but like someone — rupt to be like, “Okay, Tavi, here reporter if I don’t who only wants to share what he thinks could be insightful to another person, and are the things on the menu that interview someone, I don’t aside from those things, he just wants to listen to other people and not be a ham. you would eat.” I think she got have much to say.” He likes puns and people being peculiar. Sometimes he tells a hilarious story and hot chocolate. It was like, “Oh, when I try to retell it to a friend, I realize that whatever happened wasn’t actually YOUR TIME IS VALUABLE. right. You’re a child.” that funny or interesting, or even a Pre-Internet, my guess is happening at all. He’s just really great she would have been just a at talking. YOUR SAFETY IS NON-NEGOTIABLE. really bright, nerdy kid who I had always thought of business was into lots of stuff and made and creativity as being totally sepa- little things that some people rate, but Ira helped me to see that in her circle would see. But they’re actually really related to one John Waters wouldn’t be quot- ing her. wouldn’t be quoting her. She’s invented “Like me, Ira’s her own paradigm, like all the people who do the best creative interested in stories work: They invent their own about normal humans paradigm and then they inhabit being incredible, that paradigm better than any- This time, you don’t have to choose between speed and safety. NetJets® can get body else could. about magical things Tavi is capable of both mel- you there faster. No lines. No delays. No hassles. But most importantly, we offer the ancholy and fantastic optimism. happening in It’s weird to say, but she seems places that might highest safety standards in the industry. We have the most stringent maintenance and like a peer, like a fully devel- operational procedures. Our pilots are the most highly trained. Add the world’s largest oped writer, editor and maker of seem boring.” things. She absorbs things and private jet fleet and the unmatched resources of Berkshire Hathaway, and why would has figured out how to render another. He never told me what to do it in prose that’s fun to read— but acted as a guide, helping me fig- you choose anyone else? it’s impressive as a real-time ure out what I wanted, and in a way, documenting of a teenage girl’s that’s what we want to be for readers thoughts. And her pop-culture of Rookie. It’s not about us granting knowledge is weirdly encyclo- BiRdS of a featheR Gevinson found her ideal mentor in Glass. anyone permission; it’s about letting pedic. I remember her writing in girls know they can grant themselves some post a few years ago, “This reminded me of a Joni Mitchell song.” And I was permission. That spirit formed when Ira made me reconsider what I truly wanted SHARE | LEASE | CARD | CHARTER | MANAGEMENT like, “Why is anything reminding you of a Joni Mitchell song? You’re 13! Why is that the site to be. even happening?” Ira continually has really great insights about being independent but main- NETJ ETS.COM | 877.JET. 2909 One of the things that’s really terrible when you’re a kid is that you can’t just go stream. Like me, he’s interested in stories about normal humans being incredible, out and get a drink. I mean, Tavi can’t drive, she can’t just get in a car and take off. about magical things happening in places that might seem boring. A Berkshire Hathaway company. She has all the adult work without any of the adult freedoms. I don’t even know if He’s been the ideal mentor for Rookie, offering advice, support and an she has a bank account. I guess she must? I told her that by doing the Web site, she understanding of what I want the site to be, but editorially, he doesn’t claim to was saying goodbye to being a kid. Her time wasn’t going to be her own, and she was understand the mind of the teenage girl. After we published a post about stickers, going to be working constantly. She chose that with open eyes and has been very he was like, “Is that the name of a drug? Are you speaking in code?” So I covered a grown-up about it in a way that is really impressive and sobering. piece of paper completely with stickers and gave it to him. I made sure there wasn’t I wasn’t that confident at her age, and I’m not that confident now. I’m not being any white space. facetious. I’m a reporter—if I don’t interview someone, I don’t have much to say and Anaheed and I are working on the proposal for a Rookie book, and Ira was like, All fractional aircraft offered by NetJets® in the are managed and operated by NetJets Aviation, Inc. Executive Jet® I definitely can’t just sit down and knock out 800 words on any subject you give me. “It needs to be a girls-punch-you-out kind of thing,” so now we just refer to the Management, Inc. provides management services for customers with aircraft that are not fractionally owned, and provides charter air On a school night. With trig homework. I mean, respect. I wish there was a way to book as the girls-punch-you-out thing. I actually do think we should call it Girls transportation services using select aircraft from its managed fleet. Marquis Jet® Partners, Inc. sells the Marquis Jet Card®. Marquis punctuate that, so it’s like someone in a rap video. Re-spect. Punch You Out Thing, just so it will follow him around forever. Jet Card flights are operated by NetJets Aviation under its 14 CFR Part 135 Air Carrier Certificate. Each of these companies is a wholly owned subsidiary of NetJets Inc. ©2012 NetJets Inc. All rights reserved. NetJets, Executive Jet, Marquis Jet, and Marquis Jet Card are registered service marks. 58 SEPTEMBER 2012 Edited from Alice Gregory’s interviews with Tavi Gevinson and ira Glass.

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S t Y le influential style arbiter of the 20th century. familY album “I am Diana, a goddess,” she wrote in a subsequent Right: Vreeland with her son Frecky diary entry, and, “therefore, ought to be wonderful, (top), his wife, Betty, pure, marvelous, as only I alone can make myself.” and their sons, Nicky and Alexander. That extraordinary self-invention is the subject of Below: Alexander Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has to Travel, a new docu- today, with his mentary by Lisa Immordino Vreeland, the wife of the wife, Lisa, and their daughter, legendary editor’s grandson, Alexander Vreeland. (The Olivia, at home in film, which is being released in the U.S. this month, Bridgehampton. was codirected by Bent-Jorgen Perlmutt and Frederic Tcheng, the editing team behind 2008’s Valentino: The Last Emperor.) Featuring interviews with not only fashion insiders—like former Women’s Wear Daily editor John Fairchild and photographer —but with Vreeland’s own sons, who remain openly conflicted about their mother, the film presents and interested,” Alexander says. He an intimate and layered portrait of a complex woman: and his brother, Nicky, now the abbot of tough and emotionally distant but bearing a dazzlingly a Tibetan Buddhist monastery, called outsize spirit and keen sense of fantasy. her Nonina. “Of course, she was from a “I didn’t just see her as a fashion person,” explains generation that wasn’t really changing Lisa, sitting under a grape arbor beside the couple’s diapers,” Alexander adds with a smile. coats, one year, for Alexander and his brother—“but shingle-style cottage in Bridgehampton. “I really loved Instead, there were drives through the East End in she wasn’t sitting there art-directing our lives.” And her philosophical side.” Truman Capote’s Jaguar, which, he recalls, had a con- there were Rolling Stones concerts and woozy after- Vreeland offered up her prescriptions for living in sole between the front seats that always seemed to parties with Mick and the boys. a monthly column called “Why Don’t You,” penned for be stuffed with cash. “He’d open it up and say, ‘Go buy Still, Alexander admits, “She was a much better Bazaar beginning in 1936. “Why don’t you wear violet something!’ ” There were fashionable gifts—shearling grandmother than a mother.” In the film, his uncle Tim velvet mittens with everything?” she describes growing up wishing he had suggested, displaying a signature a different mother altogether—a “nice mix of frivolity and papal decree. mom, like all my friends had.” Or, as his “Why don’t you have your cigarettes father, Frecky, puts it, “She always made Phy ©1989 arizona board of regents stamped with a personal insignia?” it clear that she wanted us to be origi- S.J. Perelman lampooned the column nals. ‘You’ve got to be either first in the

hotogra in , but he’d missed class or the bottom of the class—don’t the point: The more preposterous be in the middle.’ That’s a wretched ortrait) ortrait) the suggestions, the more liberating piece of advice to give a schoolkid!” the effect. Oh, why the heck not? the “My father struggled with it,” lounge act Diana Vreeland with column demanded of women who Alexander says. “She was very busy with her husband, Reed, were then beginning to see the pos- her own life.” sons Frecky and Tim sibilities being shaken loose by the And she became even busier. Vreeland and niece Emi-Lu Astor at the Vreelands’ modern era—what’s stopping you? didn’t even begin her career until she country house in “She was trying to teach people was 30, and the period of her greatest Brewster, New York. lessons,” Lisa notes. “She was saying, influence occurred in her sixties, when untitled, n.d. ‘Go out there and push your life, dis- most of us are dreaming of retirement. photograph by cover things, try a different point of Her success, Alexander says, derived Louise Dahl-Wolfe view.’ I felt like that was something I not only from her perceptiveness and could benefit from.” creativity but from her extraordinary A few years ago, inspired by discipline. During her Vogue years, he A GODDESS In thE fAmILy Vreeland’s mettle, Lisa—formerly a remembers the family coming home late PR executive for Polo and the founder from dinner and watching as Nonina Diana Vreeland’s style, visionary talent and love of fantasy left an indelible mark on of the sportswear line Industria— boldly resolved to direct a film, her fashion and the culture at large—but a more complex legacy at home first, about Vreeland’s life. At the 2011 Toronto Film Festival, it was eagerly by aaron gell

Production from original negative. louise dahl-wolfe archive. center for creative P snapped up by Samuel Goldwyn in a late-night bidding war. One day in 1918, 14-year-Old Diana Dalziel opened her diary and began to reflect the miniskirt, the bikini and the false eyelash. Perhaps more important, she gave While Lisa never met Vreeland, “I am Diana, a goddess,” on her long search for a feminine role model, a “perfect” girl she might choose to the fashion world the high-low mix that still prevails today. A well-born product Alexander, who oversaw marketing she wrote in her diary, emulate. The pursuit hadn’t yielded any acceptable candidates. Thus, she would try of Parisian society, she was famous for her exacting standards, directing her staff for Ralph Lauren and Giorgio Armani a new tack: “I shall be that girl,” she declared. to iron her dollar bills and Kleenex, and polish the soles of her shoes with a rhino before becoming executor of his grand- “and, therefore, ought Still, the future Diana Vreeland never quite gave up looking, and the fruits of her horn. But she was also enthralled by pop culture, palling around with Warren Beatty Posthumous digital re mother’s estate, happily shared his to be wonderful, pure, search would fill the pages of Harper’s Bazaar, where she served as the fashion edi- and Jack Nicholson, helping to redefine our notions of beauty by featuring uncon- own memories and insights. “She was tor in the 1940s and ’50s and, later, at Vogue, which she steered during the hothouse ventional models like Penelope Tree and and championing the denim blue a wonderful grandmother, very sup- marvelous, as only I ben hoffmann (Portrait of alexander, lisa and olivia); courtesy of emi lu astor and rachel ward (black & white P ’60s, in the process introducing American women to such stylistic innovations as jean. Along the way, she became an icon in her own right, almost certainly the most n.d. untitled. ben hoffmann (Portrait of alexander, lisa and olivia); courtesy of emi lu astor and rachel ward (black & whiteportive, P encouraging, open-minded alone can make myself.”

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age of elegance -

Left: Vreeland in ree

“She made it clear that v Berlin in the 1960s

she wanted us to be with her grandsons, iana Nicky and Alexander. originals. ‘You’ve got to Below: A portrait of Vreeland painted by be either first in the William Acton. class or at the bottom

of the class—don’t be Pictures); Portrait of d in the middle.’” state (family e reeland v iana iana got right to work. “There were two light boxes on her

dining-room table and briefcases with images she reeland v needed to look at,” he recalls. “She’d have her white work and plaY gloves on and her big wax pencil, and she’d mark in red Vreeland’s address book, a 1947 issue of what she wanted to see blown up. She did not go to bed Harper’s Bazaar and rederick until every image had been looked at.” galleys of stories to be published in Even with that work ethic, he says, she retained her the magazine.

sense of fun. “You don’t see that playfulness anymore in Below: Vreeland in courtesy of f the fashion world,” he points out. the late 1940s, with

her son Tim and cton a In 1971, Vreeland was fired from Vogue by Condé husband Reed. Nast’s legendary editorial director Alexander illiam illiam Liberman. Her tastes were deemed insufficiently com- mercial for the times, her shoots too extravagant. replaced her at the top of the masthead, and Vreeland fell into a depression. “It was very difficult land Painted by w for her,” Alexander remembers. “She had no money ben hoffmann (address book and magazines); courtesy of the d and a lifestyle that was still very expensive. She went into the hospital one or two times”—taking a room at Lenox Hill to “sort of rest a bit.” Frecky called her friend Jacqueline Onassis, who came for a visit. “After Jackie, everyone started coming,” Alexander recalls. “Suddenly it became a very social thing. People were dropping by all afternoon and evening.” Vreeland’s friends rallied to her cause: After she landed a position as a consultant to the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum, they pitched in to cover her salary of $25,000 per year. Vreeland’s blockbuster exhibitions for the Met—which included shows devoted to Balenciaga, the Ballets Russes and the of China, Russia and India—made for another indelible chapter in a remarkable career. Through it all, her vivid imagination remained her greatest asset. Even in her mid-eighties, she maintained the ability to see past the everyday and invent a more glamorous, spellbinding reality. Alexander, who cared for his grandmother in her final years, often accompa- nied her to Lenox Hill to have her emphysema treated. On one particularly chaotic day, Vreeland wound up spending hours on a gurney in the hallway, waiting for a room, amid a harrowing scene: Drunks were handcuffed to adjacent beds, screams echoed through the corridor, bloodied patients were wheeled past. None of it seemed to trouble Diana Vreeland. Nonina turned to her grandson and beckoned him close. Her narrow eyes were gleeful—she had something to say. “Alexander, this is wonderful,” she whispered. “It’s like the streets of Naples!”

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REn E gaDE

scaling up Tadashi Yanai plans to open “hundreds and hundreds” of new stores in the U.S.

Tadashi Yanai, founder of The global clothing stores in —including a gargantuan flag- retailer Uniqlo, is on the other end of a videoconference ship on Fifth Avenue, the second-biggest store in the THIS MAN screen. From his Tokyo office, Yanai-san speaks enthusi- Uniqlo empire. He lured designer Jil Sander out of astically about Uniqlo’s innovative fabrics. “Americans retirement for a wildly successful multi-season collabo- WANTS TO believe cotton is best,” he says, “but we’ve invented ration. And then there’s the retail environment: Yanai’s new fabrics that will change your lifestyle.” First, scripted sales techniques and sleek spaces are studied Yanai marvels over Heattech, a proprietary warmth- by Uniqlo managers in Japan before being spread to C L O T H E generating Uniqlo cloth developed in partnership with markets around the globe. the Japanese company that provides carbon-fiber for Uniqlo will open two new U.S. stores this fall—in THE PLANET Boeing 787 Dreamliners. Next, he boasts that Airism, San Francisco and New Jersey—while also launching an Uniqlo’s cooling fabric, is “so light you don’t even e-commerce site. The company hopes to add “hundreds Tadashi Yanai’s ambitious know you’re wearing it. It is the number-one must-buy and hundreds” of stores here, from coast to coast, at a product for summer.” rate of 20 to 30 a year. In short, Uniqlo is vowing to beat expansion plans would I ask if he wears it on steamy Tokyo workdays. Gap at its own game, clothing all of America in basics transform Uniqlo into He smiles broadly and, at that moment, the richest at affordable prices. Can a brand rooted in Japan—one man in Japan unbuttons his shirt to show me his employing a distinctly minimalist aesthetic—become a globally dominant brand. Uniqlo underwear. a mainstream U.S. retail force, invading malls in the Meet the Japanese Yanai is refreshingly open about his goals these Midwest and in Sunbelt suburbs? days: making Uniqlo the number-one apparel retailer Yanai thinks it can, largely because he sees zero mogul who intends to beat in the world. His target—$50 billion in yearly revenue difference between shoppers in Manhattan and in Gap at its own game by 2020—will require whiplash gains above Uniqlo’s Milwaukee. In this sense, he draws inspiration from current revenue of $12 billion, driving the company a noted American minimalist: Steve Jobs, another ahead of front-runners Inditex (which owns Zara), H&M retail entrepreneur who had boundless confidence and and Gap. This swaggering ambition might ring hollow a knack for turning simplicity into chic. It’s become if Yanai hadn’t already turned heads among apparel- almost cliché to compare successful emerging brands BY SETh STEvEnSon industry cognoscenti. He established a beachhead in to Apple, or to equate an iconoclastic business leader to PhoTogRaPhY BY ERic chung the American market, opening three attention-getting Jobs. But this is precisely how Yanai views his mission

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and himself. To him, Uniqlo is less like other clothing companies and The Japanese business leaders he admires hail mainly from the more like Jobs’s high-tech corporate temple: on a constant quest for technology sector—self-made men like SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son innovation, guided by a holistic vision that aims to do much more than and Nidec’s Shigenobu Nagamori. But, in general, he says, “We lack MORE TROUBLE FOR simply move merchandise. an entrepreneurial culture in Japan.” His real heroes are Sam Walton Uniqlo’s creative director, Naoki Takizawa, a former Issey Miyake and Jobs, which is why he yearned to plant his flag in America—where chief designer, tells this story about the first time he met Yanai: “I had entrepreneurial chutzpah is a religion. been trained to imagine specific customers when I designed an item— In 2005, Uniqlo landed on U.S. shores, opening a trio of their demographics, their income levels, their lifestyles. But Yanai-san small shops in New Jersey malls. They performed poorly said he didn’t want a fashion designer who defines target customers. Yanai’s heroes are and were soon shut down. “No one knew who we were,” ‘Leverage your competence for the mass public!’ he told me. It’s why U.S. CEO Shin Odake says. “You can’t succeed as a casual he made Uniqlo’s slogan ‘Made For All.’ He wanted me to think about Sam Walton and Steve clothing store when you have no brand recognition; you’re THE EUROZONE. the Apple iPhone, which wasn’t made for a certain customer but was, Jobs, which is why in a small, ordinary space with less than 10,000 square feet. instead, about creating a perfect product. It’s for everyone. It’s effec- he yearned to plant People need a reason to get excited about you.” tive and reliable. But its design scheme still gives it strong branding. his flag in America— Undaunted, one year later Yanai rebooted Uniqlo in He wanted me to achieve the same thing with clothes.” America—this time with a 36,000-square-foot store in SoHo, where entrepreneurial lower Manhattan’s fashion mecca. Two more New York City building on a sleepY familY apparel business that had existed since chutzpah is a religion. locations followed within a few years: a glassy, gleaming 1949, Yanai opened his first Uniqlo (shortened from “Unique Clothing 64,000-square-foot shop on 34th Street and another 89,000 Warehouse”) in Hiroshima in 1984. Expanding steadily over the follow- square feet parked on a prime stretch of Fifth Avenue. The ing decade, he launched strip-mall and suburban stand-alone stores Fifth Avenue colossus expanded a space previously occupied by Brooks throughout Japan and, finally, breached Tokyo city limits with a Harajuku Brothers and is backed by a $300 million, 15-year lease. flagship shop in 1998. Soon after, Uniqlo hit upon the product that would “Flagship stores on high-profile streets are extremely important transform the retailer from a ho-hum chain store into a Japanese house- to the brand outside of Japan,” says Odake. “They make a statement. hold name: A $20 fleece jacket, in a rainbow of colors, found the sweet They spur word of mouth. We can attract higher-level talent. I’m not spot of the recession-strapped Japanese middle class. No longer an sure Jil Sander would have worked with us back in 2005, before we expensive technical fabric meant for mountain climbing, fleece could be had these stores.” worn on the street or around the office. Uniqlo fleece became ubiquitous When Uniqlo announced its partnership with Sander in 2009 (they in Japan—in the year 2000 alone, it sold 26 million. It also gave Yanai a parted ways amicably in 2011, after several seasons of her +J line), taste of what it’s like to leave your mark on an entire society. the German designer’s minimalist aesthetic was well-tailored to the Japanese chain and became a cult favorite among fashion cognoscenti. Uniqlo’s bread and butter is solidly made, stylishly cut basics: oxford shirts; polos; V-neck sweaters; unadorned denim. As the brand grows in the U.S., it has drawn comparisons to Zara and H&M. But Uniqlo is not, in fact, “fast fashion” (even though Yanai’s umbrella com- pany—which has additional holdings in Theory, Helmut Lang and the French chains Comptoir des Cotonniers and Princesse Tam Tam—is registered under the name Fast Retailing Co., Ltd.). A brand like Zara attempts to chase trends, reacting nimbly season after season. When an unanticipated mini- fad for purple crocheted tops emerges, Zara will scramble to move a new item from the factory floor to store shelves in about two weeks. Uniqlo employs a nearly opposite supply-chain strategy: It places gargantuan orders up to a full year in advance, allowing it to negotiate rock-bottom costs for high-quality work. It then passes on those savings to its customers. Because it sells wardrobe essentials, it can count on fairly stable demand. “Our predictive planning is But Yanai wasn’t nearly satisfied. As far back as the mid-’90s, when thE aRt of very accurate,” says Odake, “so we rarely do heavy markdowns. We Uniqlo was still a small-time regional player, he’d already begun writ- folDing don’t operate any outlets in Japan.” At Uniqlo, clothes are ing memos laying out detailed plans for global expansion. By the early displayed according This basics-not-fads approach is particularly well-suited to 2000s, convinced that the brand had conquered Japan, he began to to precise instructions America’s recessionary moment. “There are only a few categories that from Tokyo. turn his focus overseas, to Europe and East Asia. women will still pay designer prices for,” says Janet Kloppenburg, an Yanai is a man of ruthless ambition and bold declarations, bucking independent retail-apparel analyst. “It’s the must-have handbag, the the mold of the traditional, cautious Japanese executive. Last year, he best-fitting jeans in the business, the Jimmy Choos or Louboutins. No 2012 “MOST DEPENDABLE MIDSIZE PREMIUM CAR” ) — J.D. POWER AND ASSOCIATES wrote an essay for McKinsey Quarterly in which he complained that one wants to pay up for basic underpinnings. You want to keep those RE o

“Japan’s biggest problems are conservatism and cowardice” and that inexpensive so you can free up your budget to mix in some more expen- ST “Japanese businesspeople and companies are lacking in individuality.” sive fashion items. Uniqlo is budget-friendly, but it doesn’t feel cheap.” During our videoconference, he pleaded with me, “Please write that

of uniqlo ( uniqlo of Things just got more challenging across the pond. According to a recent J.D. Power and Associates study, the Japan’s leaders must speak out. We have had 22 years of a stagnant To manY indusTrY observers, Uniqlo’s “Made For All” rallying cry Genesis was ranked “Most Dependable Midsize Premium Car,” outperforming more expensive European slump. I tell people that we must have the courage to share what we and its assortment of solid-color casual wear are eerily reminiscent RTESY luxury vehicles. Which to us means only one thing: European sovereignty over these matters is officially over. feel, but no one follows me.” of Gap. Not today’s Gap—a lumbering giant in decline—but Gap in its cou

66 SEPTEMBER 2012 The Hyundai Genesis received the lowest number of problems per 100 vehicles among midsize premium cars in the proprietary J.D. Power and Associates 2012 Vehicle Dependability Study SM. Study based on 31,325 consumer responses measuring problems consumers experienced in the past 12 months with three-year-old vehicles (2009 model-year cars and trucks). Proprietary study results are based on experiences and perceptions of consumers surveyed October-December 2011. Your experiences may vary. Visit jdpower.com. Hyundai is a registered trademark of Hyundai Motor Company. All rights reserved. ©2012 Hyundai Motor America.

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heyday, the late ’80s and ’90s, when its pocket tees and pleated khakis costumed the planet. “Gap was rooted in the American lifestyle,” says Yanai. “It was wanted by people. I purchased a lot of Gap clothes. But today there is nothing to be intrigued by. You don’t feel any excitement.” As for Gap subsidiary Banana Republic? “It was like a European luxury brand that was reinterpreted for America and made affordable. But now you don’t feel that luxury anymore and, at the same time, it’s gotten more expensive.” With Old Navy—the low-cost corner of the Gap triumvirate—there is a sense that the designs lack focus. (Gap declined to comment for this article.) Creative director Takizawa feels that if there’s one thing Uniqlo can steal from Gap’s dusty playbook, it’s the genius for merchandising that Mickey Drexler, for- more than 800 stores, some of the brand’s luster has been worn away mer CEO of Gap, now at J. Crew, once by strip-mall locations and humdrum atmospheres. The Japanese slang brought to the brand. “It was just sim- term “Unibare” is meant derisively, applied to someone caught, embar- ple clothes, a T-shirt. But he called it a rassingly, clad in one of Uniqlo’s ubiquitous core items. ‘pocket tee’ and made it an item of desire. Fit is another possible hurdle. Uniqlo’s cuts are ideal for Japanese There would be a store window with only bodies, but the brand will likely need to tweak its designs to outfit a more white pocket tees one week and then rotund slice of the American populace. This is a surmountable obstacle: all different colors the next. There was Cutting and sewing are the last steps in the apparel-manufacturing excitement about the stores.” process. Uniqlo can still order those same high-quality fabrics well in Uniqlo has managed to return excite- advance and adapt its sizing to an average American shopper. ment to the apparel store. Though its For now, Uniqlo’s American invasion is all systems go. The San clothes are basic, its retail spaces are Francisco store opening this fall will be 29,000 square feet over three novel and edgy, with sleek lines, wide- floors. The Garden State Plaza store in New Jersey—Uniqlo’s first tip- open expanses and flashing video toe back into a U.S. mall after its failed 2005 foray—will be an imposing monitors. Uniqlo painstakingly curates its displays, taking orders uniqlonEs 43,000 square feet. U.S. CEO Odake has hinted that Uniqlo might run straight from Tokyo. It stacks items high and fans out an impressive The sun never sets on the empire. range of colors. Racks and shelves are impeccably neat, squared off, Clockwise from top shipshape. Service is pinpoint attentive, modeled on Japan’s more for- right: Flagship stores in Paris, Shanghai, mal attitude toward retail transactions. Credit cards are handed back Beijing and New York to customers with both hands, with a touch of pomp. Greetings are (5th Avenue). dictated by central headquarters and recited like mantras. Store man- agers from around the world are all flown to Tokyo to receive several months of indoctrination at Uniqlo’s global training academy. The upshot: “It’s almost like an Apple store,” says Kloppenburg. “It’s a high-tech environment you might associate with a more prestigious product. They treat customers with low and moderate incomes in a way they might not be accustomed to.” At present, Uniqlo enjoys a singular niche in the New York mar- ketplace. Its affordable clothes are tinged with hipness, stemming from the brand’s Japanese prov- enance, limited American availability and Manhattan gloss. If there’s a challenge still to be met, it’s that the its entire global e-commerce platform from the U.S., where tech talent brand’s vow to achieve an is abundant, and he openly suggests that he’d like to replace himself enormous American pres- with an American executive to head up operations here. In a symbolic ence will eventually force move, Yanai declared earlier this year that English is Uniqlo’s official it to expand beyond urban corporate language. centers and prime nuggets In May, Uniqlo appointed a slightly surprising brand ambassador: )

of real estate. When your Novak Djokovic. The tennis player would seem at first glance to be a RES o

footprint is 200 to 300 spokesman more suited to endorsing a sports brand like Nike or Adidas, ST stores, each venue can’t rather than a casual-wear brand like Uniqlo. But he provides instant be an eye-popping flag- global visibility of a sort Yanai craves. What’s more, while Djokovic is

ship destination. In Japan, also constantly jockeying for supremacy with fierce competitors, he’s ( uniqlo of

where Uniqlo has blan- already notched a signature accomplishment Yanai-san envies: He’s RTESY

keted the countryside with reached number one in the world. cou

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amazing grace Designers Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli stand in front of the inspiration boards for their fall collection at their studio on the Piazza Mignanelli, in Rome.

Spend enough time backStage at fashion shows, and embroidered finery; Patti Smith; Maria Callas; Louise you become fluent in inspiration speak, the language Bourgeois; Joyce Carol Oates; and Susan Sontag, All the lA dies designers throw around to characterize their new to name a few. They are strong-browed, smart and a clothes: “uptown eccentric”; “downtown lady; “Navajo bit untamed. Valentino’s fall collection is princess meets Ibiza raver”; “ meets Edie For Chiuri and Piccioli, women are the “protago- a poetic nod to a select group Beale.” With the nonstop churn of the industry’s gears, nists of our collection.” About their fall muses, Piccioli the descriptions fly at a dizzying pace until they become says, “These are women with their own lives—they are of freethinking women. more than a bit meaningless. But something about the very individual. Their beauty is linked to their talent. A look at the muses references for Valentino’s fall collection requires slow- It’s a different idea of beauty.” Chiuri adds, scarcely ing down and savoring. The buzzwords that designers missing a beat: “In the past, Valentino was only one who inspired the fashion Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli use are idea of beauty. We believe it’s about the person, not more conceptual—folk, roots, identity—but they’ve just her face.” BY meenal mistrY brought their ideas to life with specific images: 19th- You could see hints of their muses on the run- WW1 HEURE SAUTANTE PINK GOLD · With power reserve · Limited edition of 50 pieces · www.bellross.com photographY BY Danilo scarpati century portraits of Eastern European women in their way. They chose Smith because they had recently

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SUSAN SONTAG, 1975

THE ARTISTS’ MUSE Left: The androgynous organza blouse and leather culottes capture the energy of Patti Smith, and her undefinable relationship with Robert Mapplethorpe. EXOTIC INTERPRETATION A calvary wool coat channels the rich Byzantine-style textiles worn by American sculptor Louise Nevelson (pictured, above, in 1980). Below: The short-sleeved tulle top with beaded embroidery reflects the dramatic opulence of Maria Callas in the 1969 film Medea. NORMAN SEEF (SMITH & MAPPLETHORPE); TED THAI/TIME & LIFE PICTURES/GETTY IMAGES (BOURGEOIS); PETER HUJAR NORMAN SEEF (SMITH & MAPPLETHORPE); TED THAI/TIME & LIFE PICTURES/GETTY IMAGES (BOURGEOIS); PETER HUJAR GELATIN-SILVER PRINT, IMAGE: 14 3/4 X 14 3/4 INCHES; 38 X 38 CM. SHEET: 19 3/4 X 15 7/8 INCHES; 50 X 40 CM.; FIRSTVIEW (RUNWAY FIRSTVIEW CM.; 40 X 50 INCHES; 7/8 15 X 3/4 19 SHEET: CM. 38 X 38 INCHES; 3/4 14 X 3/4 14 IMAGE: PRINT, GELATIN-SILVER

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY The embroidered crew neck evokes the sensual and earthy explorations of sculptor Louise Bourgeois (pictured, above, in 1983). This short midnight-blue jacket, right, attempts to convey the cool confidence of Susan Sontag (pictured, below, in 1975). Far right: The designers’ inspiration board and sketches for the collection, up close. read her memoir, Just Kids, and were 2008, sees their task less as a reinvention of the elegant fascinated by the undefinable qual- Valentino DNA and more of an evolution. For fall, a puff- ity of the relationship she had with sleeved Chantilly lace dress looks traditionally sweet, Robert Mapplethorpe. They could but the floral embroidery is actually heavy wool, almost envision her in a vaguely androgynous like an exoskeleton. Their take on the fur coat is a patch- white shirt in organza and cotton with work of the most luxurious astrakhan: mink, velvet and black leather culottes. “The shirt is very goat fur. Janis Joplin would have loved it. The designers saw male and female, but it’s very fragile,” They also played with subtle shifts in propor- Bourgeois’s art Piccioli says. “Darkness done in an elegant tion, punctuating each style with low-heeled way.” The designers saw Bourgeois’s art and Mary Janes—a refreshing break from the ubiq- and her “femininity her “femininity and sensuality” in their rustic uitous (and obvious) teetering stiletto. They call and sensuality” fisherman’s sweater embroidered with tiny the style the Tango. Even their long-sleeved, high- in their rustic sparkling beads—all black but teeming with shouldered evening dresses are cut high at the WHAT’S IN A FACE texture. They took a light hand with their ref- ankle to show off the shoes. “It gives you a different Above: A mood board fisherman’s sweater erences so that the clothes felt of our moment, kind of confident walk,” Piccioli says. “It’s like a at the Valentino studio, distilling a longing for pieces that are intelligent, dancing shoe, to go until the late hours—or danc- featuring Charlotte embroidered with Rampling, Penelope Tree poetic and also a little tough. ing your whole life.” No doubt, their liberated muses

and Callas, among others. tiny sparkling beads. NANCY R. SCHIFF/HULTON ARCHIVE/GETTY IMAGES (NEVELSON); SAN MARCO/BFI (CALLAS); FIRSTVIEW (RUNWAY SHOTS) GALLERY MARKS MATTHEW OF COURTESY ARCHIVE, HUJAR PETER THE © The Italian duo, who took over the house in would approve.

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0912_WSJ_MakingIt_03.indd 74 7/23/12 3:49 PM 0912_WSJ_MakingIt_03.indd 75 7/23/12 3:49 PM   JIL SANDER PLACES & THINGS

D esigN gabriella crespi Clockwise from left: The Z desk, (also, below), circa 1974, in Aerin Lauder’s dressing room; an extendable coffee table made of wood, covered in brass, from the ’70s; a pyramid table lamp, circa 1970.

Cu E THE ’70S Long maligned, and now deeply covetable, design pieces from the 1970s offer a welcome mix of louche styling and refined luxury—and are a slick counterpoint to almost any room

By jEn REnzi

With its shag carpeting, macramé curtains and con-

versation pits, ’70s interior design has suffered a bad ) rap, much the same way as have many of that decade’s RE Tu

offerings, ephemera and ideas. However, the era was, ni in fact, an especially fertile and inventive one for

furniture design, with experimental exercises in high- any (fuR MP concept craftsmanship sweeping the globe. The best pieces of decorative arts and furniture

from that time are a curious mix of aggressive and E PuRy & co d

neutral, showy and shy. Even the most PS radical, exuberant flights of fancy have

a hint of formal restraint—clean lines, y Philli

elemental geometries, spare expanses RTES

of glass and metal. Today, with the dis- ); cou tance of time and the style for mixing M oo pieces from different periods, much of the furniture from the ’70s feels like just ing R the thing to give a room a little kick. RESS E (d At the time, political upheaval, chiv such as the May 1968 youth protests R R a

in France and the leftist agitations io throughout Italy, had liberating con- TER

sequences for designers. The strain of ThE in

social emancipation, though, did not on/ result in democratic, affordable-for- PT the-people product, as was the case SiMon u

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REV2THO155-14-105602-1.indd 1 7/19/12 11:40 AM PLACES & THINGS DESIGN

with mid-century modernism. Rather, a concurrent rebellion against industrial production meant that designers were able to envision one-offs that verged on fine art. In France, Maria Pergay rendered sculptural forms in painstakingly handworked stainless steel, drawing out metal’s liquid quality. Pierre Paulin cre- ated elegantly voluptuous seating for the Palais de L’Elysée. In Milan, Gabriella Crespi experi- mented with architectural, unadorned shapes such as her Z desk, a zigzag of brass-sheathed wood. Italian collaboratives, like Archizoom and Superstudio, made witty one-liners that verged on pranks (the palm-tree-shaped floor lamp) alongside more refined riffs on modernism.

Americans like Paul Evans and Wendell Castle, ch T danan iS

meanwhile, focused on giving the craft a decid- EM edly organic and upscale spin. In turn, collectors began to be receptive to y of d RTES the idea of mixing aggressive contemporary design pierre pauliN , cou with more classical pieces. Henri Samuel, decora- From top: The Face E a Face sofa from tor to society fixtures like the Rothschilds and the agn

the late ’60s; the EP

Vanderbilts, audaciously paired Philippe Hiquily’s designer’s Elysée y d

brass and plexiglass armchairs and daring creations Palace sitting ERR room for Georges hi by short-lived collective Atelier A alongside 18th- Pompidou; a 1973

century antiques and Persian carpets. In his Rue de Groovy chair. To By T ho E); P

od T) y MM unk unk ET on TR EM d/ Soci R

TS MARIA PERGAY oug

ANANT (COMMODE); BY PHOTO THIERRY COURTESY DEPAGNE, OF DEMISCH DANANT Clockwise from top: HALARD/TRUNK HALARD/TRUNK D D ROUGEMONT) RIGHTS SOCIETY S hala Righ A 1968 stainless-steel ch ch T danan (co STS iS i and copper triple-tier gay and R ancoi EM

aRT table; an amethyst PER y d Flying Carpet daybed;

RiS ( a stainless-steel RTES

R) © 2012 commode from 1972. P, Pa Paulin Rdi; fR adag E chai nick, cou

ERRE GUY DE Babylone duplex, Yves Saint Laurent commingled Art

RuP ROUGEMONT R/Pi Deco masterpieces with surrealist commissions from M (dov B k

w yoRk / Left: Cloud table .co nE in plexiglass and husband-wife design duo François-Xavier and Claude y jaco EcT

RS), brushed aluminum, Lalanne. Zoomorphic seating brought whimsy to his oj oovy oovy chai R

To To B circa 1971, in PR y (a

/g library, while an installation of botanical-inspired ET

ho Delphine and Reed ing RT Krakoff’s living mirrors blossomed across his music room. ifo EnS Soci room (also, below). TS lic

aRT The period’s streamlined style also made it easy E);

/ThE for decorators to assign pieces to satisfy functional Righ ER STS alac i

P needs. “Henri Samuel used ’70s furnishings to fill valli iS ( aRT

any (cloud TaBlE); P in gaps, things like large coffee tables and light- RB

MP ing—accoutrements for our modern lives,” says a/co Scal chE M 20th-century furniture dealer Liz O’Brien, who notes M); © 2012 yg S ); Pa

oo that prices have been slowly rising over the last oR au/ E PuRy & co RR RE d decade. Today, a Pergay one-armed Banquet day- PS bed can fetch $120,000 at auction and E (living R hilli EnRi Bu

y P a Crespi coffee table, $35,000. This chiv R

RTES notion of the practical avant-garde E) ES lTd. 2012 (Mi ofa); ofa); ©h ag

unk unk a hints at the decade’s most intrigu- ); cou FraNÇois-Xavier TR ign (S ing legacy: a blend of fantasy and iE’S iM ES aND clauDe an/ ST TaBlE RiS (lalann pragmatism that celebrated both the lalaNNe Ri & d & ER Ti ch RT RiEdM From left: Yves P, Pa handcrafted and the industrial without a T ( Saint Laurent’s living S f nT); igh room includes a adag quite kowtowing to either extreme. The k/ METER i Lalanne bar and RTME most buzzed-about designs embody Pa PER

sheep; a bronze and ); dougla y y of wR w yoR R myriad contradictions and conceptual E (a io

copper mirror from nE RTES RTES fixations while still being wonderful to

1974; a marble dove TER chiv RS), couCOURTESY PERIMETER ART & DESIGN (SOFA); ©HENRI ARCHIVEBUREAU/SYGMA/CORBIS (APARTMENT); CHRISTIE’S(PALACE); ARTIFORT/GROOVY CHAIR/PIERRE IMAGES PAULIN LTD. RDI; 2012 FRANCOIS(MIRROR); PASCAL CHEVALLIER/THELICENSINGPROJECT.COM (DOVE CHAIR) © 2012 ARTISTS (ARS), NEW YORK/ADAGP, PARIS (LALANNE) (INTERIOR); DOUGLAS FRIEDMAN/TRUNK ARCHIVE (LIVING ROOM); © 2012 ARTISTS RIGHTS SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK /ADAGP, PARIS (PERGAY AN COURTESY OF WRIGHT (TIER TABLE); COURTESY PHILLIPS DE PURY & COMPANY (CLOUD TABLE); PHOTO BY JACOB KRUPNICK, COURTESY DEMISCH D aR cou (a chair, also from ’74. (in live with. How very radical.

78 SEPTEMBER 2012 79

0912_WSJ_70sDesign_02.indd 78 7/23/12 2:50 PM 0912_WSJ_70sDesign_02.indd 79 7/23/12 4:54 PM 07232012135122  PLACES & THINGS

FASHION

THE NEXT BIG THING GIRLS WILL IS HERE. BE BOYS Still subversive after all these years, borrowing from the opposite sex is sometimes the most radical, carefree and confident approach to getting dressed

By Katie Roiphe photogRaphy By Julia hetta Styling By hanneS hetta

“This is The besT advenTure!” the scandalous writer Vita Sackville-West wrote about the exhilaration of dressing as a boy she called “Julian” in 1920. “I never appreciated anything so much as living like that with my tongue perpetually in my cheek.” Dressing like a man is the refusal of obvious sexiness for a potentially more potent other kind of sexiness. Think, for instance, of Jean Seberg in Breathless, with her cropped blond hair and oversize man’s button- down shirt—her lanky boyishness holds its own kind of sexual fascination. In other moments, with long hair and a glamorous dress, Seberg may be more classically pretty, but she is less alluring. “What is most beauti- ful in virile men is something feminine,” Susan Sontag says. “What is most beautiful in feminine women is something masculine.” Even in our pleasantly postfeminist era, in which pretty much everyone wears jeans, the predominant image of a fashionable, dressed-up woman is still a fem- inine one: heels, dresses, makeup. A fully elaborated tomboy aesthetic is still noticeable, still a thing, still, in © 2012 Samsung Electronics America, Inc. Samsung and Galaxy S III are trademarks of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. Screen image simulated. certain contexts, a statement of some kind. Part of the charisma of this aesthetic is that it draws attention to the ways in which the tomboy is not mas- culine. The playfulness, the theater of it, lies in the not-boyness of the tomboy. It’s also a statement of confidence. The style is a rebel- lion against trying too hard—the usual effort, the more blatant forms of man-pleasing. Tomboyism involves not courting male attention in the obvious ways, but, rather, assuming it, knowing it’s there and doing whatever you want: It telegraphs independence, seriousness and free- dom. It projects the idea or illusion that you are dressing for yourself. ® There is also the idea in tomboyism that you have Fendi jacket The Samsung Galaxy S III chosen comfort over flirtation, ease over fussiness, a Charvet shirt button-down shirt you’ve grabbed off the floor over a Cerruti tie and Céline pants skirt you can’t sit on the grass in. One always knows with a tomboy: She is wearing shoes she can run away in. /SamsungMobileUSA

80 SepteMBeR 2012

0912_WSJ_Tomboys_04.indd 80 7/23/12 3:27 PM 07232012142803 PLACES & THINGS FASHION

Chloé coat MaxMara jacket MaxMara sweater Chloé sweater Alaïa leggings and shoes Reed Krakoff pants Wolford socks and Cole Haan shoes and Devi Kroell clutch Alaïa gloves

82 SepteMBeR 2012 83

0912_WSJ_Tomboys_03.indd 82 7/20/12 5:58 PM 0912_WSJ_Tomboys_03.indd 83 7/20/12 5:58 PM 07202012165919 07202012165919 SPECIAL ADVERTISING FEATURE

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d d Model Both Pinot Grigio and Moscato have deep first arrived in America in 1996, is now the R roots in Italy. In fact, Moscato is believed to number one Pinot Grigio served in restaurants be among the oldest grape varieties in the throughout the nation. With its floral and aiane/Fo d world. Moscato-based wines have been tropical fruit aromas, elegant flavor and crisp enjoyed for literally thousands of years, acidity, it makes a most refreshing libation. and the varietal’s heady aromatics — Like Moscato, a glass of chilled Pinot Grigio

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hiRoM Much later, Moscato was also transported to in the grapes. This balance of fruit and y B the New World. freshness is what makes Italian Pinot Grigio eup K True to its origins, Moscato is now grown and Moscato so enjoyable.

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ent+ eye as much as the wine pleases your palate. trendsetting designers in Milan would say, it’s all about M Pinot Grigio, a relative of the red Pinot Noir grape, style. Bright, fresh flavors on your plate pair well with Valentino coat Bottega Veneta sweater doesn’t have quite the ancient ancestry of Moscato. But it bright, fresh flavors in your glass. What could be more the vibrant, fruity notes found in both Moscato and Pinot and pants has been grown in Italy’s northeast “Tre Venezie” region simple? The natural acidity in both Moscato and Pinot Grigio. It’s a perfect match! (For pairings and recipes, visit hi @ Manage Charvet shirt S

ha for more than a century and enjoyed by generations Grigio balance the natural oils in savory dishes as well. www.eccodomani.com.)

Wolford socks and o

o of Italians who value its fresh fruitiness and bright This same acidity refreshes the palate and invites us to This fall, treat yourself to a feast of flavors. Every great

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ohi acidity. Sometimes Pinot Grigio grapes are light blue have another bite of the food we are enjoying. And dishes meal calls out for a great wine — one that complements For details see

toM in color and sometimes they are a delicate pink. During with a touch of heat and sweetness are complemented by both the food and the setting.

Sources, page 130. y R R B ai

h Italian Table Wine, ©2012 Ecco Domani USA, Healdsburg, CA. All rights reserved facebook.com/eccodomani CAMPAIGN FINANCED ACCORDING TO EU REGULATION 1234/07. 84 SepteMBeR 2012

0912_WSJ_Tomboys_03.indd 84 7/20/12 5:58 PM 07202012165919 SEPTEMBER 28

the FAShION eFFect NEWYORK 88 our gilded age ISTANBUL 94 christian louboutin in the garden SEOUL istanbul at a crossroads

Ph: katja rahlwes 104 PARIS 112 high-volume coats

Photogra 120 the clubbiest home; the homiest club

0912_WSJ_WellOpener_03.indd 87 7/20/12 4:34 PM 07202012153527 FASHIONABLY LOUD

AND INCREDIBLY After seasons of stark minimalism, BAROQUE there’s an unapologetic exuberance in the air, including gilded gold, jewel-tone brocades, black lace, capelets of feather and an endless stream of silk scarves Previous page: Tom Ford dress, La Bagagerie Paris gloves and stylist’s own scarf. This page: Oscar de la Renta gown, Viktor & Rolf cape, Vivienne Westwood gloves and earrings and Moschino bag. Opposite page: Jason Wu blazer, Barbara Bui shirt, Dolce & Gabbana earrings, Salvatore Ferragamo clutch and stylist’s own scarf

PhOTOGRa Phy B y K aTJa R ahLWES ST y LING By Sa BINa S chREDER 89

0912_WSJ_Baroque_03.indd 88 7/23/12 4:13 PM 0912_WSJ_Baroque_02.indd 89 7/20/12 5:36 PM 07232012151358 07202012163711 Lanvin dress and gloves, chanel necklace, Dolce & Gabbana cape, blouse, shorts and earrings J. Mendel cape, Bottega Veneta bag and Mykita & Kostas Murkudis sunglasses and chanel Fine Jewelry watch

91

0912_WSJ_Baroque_02.indd 90 7/20/12 5:36 PM 0912_WSJ_Baroque_02.indd 91 7/20/12 5:36 PM 07202012163711 07202012163712 iS PAR e D tion ine DUC S: AL nt iStA tion: PRo SS DUC iSt A YL i; PRo VHY; St VHY; URRA ie M YA iLe B RG i nt: A iStA nt: V SS A iStA SS UP e MAK oto A iS; PH PAR in MAG @ i @ in & nAtASHA DeVeReUX; LA HMAnn e L ne iA CiAn: JeReMY Pi ni CH & JUL iRe & te AL it AUCLA G Di Be

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Model: Daphne Groeneveld/Supreme Management, Hair: Alessandro Rebecchi at ArtList Makeup: Kirstin Piggott at Julian Watson Agency, using Rimmel, Casting: daniel van skye @ artform group

For details see Sources, page 130.

Ralph Lauren collection feather cape and pants, Dries Van Noten blouse, chanel necklace and earrings, Sonia Boyajian necklace and chanel Fine Jewelry watch

93

0912_WSJ_Baroque_02.indd 92 7/20/12 5:36 PM 0912_WSJ_Baroque_02.indd 93 7/20/12 5:36 PM 07202012163712 07202012163712 Christian Louboutin’s home in the French countryside is an exotic showcaseTHE for his far-flung treasures—bearded iris, Egyptian furniture, Persian remnants and now a vast archive of his prized shoe designs housed in a rustic barn in his garden COLLECTOR

the shoes Fit Louboutin in his archive, decorated with pressed flowers from the garden. Opposite: An alley lined with iris and fruit trees leads to a fountain in the walled garden.

by dana thomas PhotograP hy by alexandre b ailhache Produced by c arolina i rving

0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 94 7/23/12 3:45 PM 0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 95 7/23/12 3:45 PM 07232012144701 07232012144702 rench shoe designer Christian Louboutin is a scavenger. During his constant globe- trotting adventures, he collects, well, every- thing: Egyptian sofas, English farm chairs, Ffeathers from the Amazon, African masks, Brazilian mid-century anything, Damascene tiles and so on. He squirrels these away in a warehouse in Paris, which he visits regularly, like going to see old friends. When it’s time to decorate yet another resi- dence—he has five now, in Paris, Portugal, Egypt, Los Angeles and the French countryside—he rummages through his treasures, looking for just the right pieces.

Nearly all of the decorative pieces in Louboutin’s home were purchased on impulse. “I prefer buying things and figuring out where to put them later than regretting not buying them.”

Nowhere is this approach more apparent than in the shoe archive the designer completed this spring at his home in the Vendée region of France. Housed in an oak barn on the grounds of the Château de Champgillon—the regal 13th-century manor he shares with his longtime friend and original co-backer Bruno Chambelland—8,000 pairs of his vertiginously heeled creations, spanning his 20 years as a designer, fill row upon row of shelves. To frame the collection, Louboutin has placed searchlights from the Suez Canal (picked up in Cairo and at the Paris flea markets), Syrian col- umns purchased at auction, two Aztec-like totem poles from Mexico City and a pair of Indian rococo columns found in a Paris antiques shop. Each of these decorative flourishes was purchased on impulse. “I was thinking to myself, I can use them somewhere,” he says. “I prefer buying things and figuring out where to put them later than regretting not buying them.” The shelving in the archive is decorated with botani- cals from his garden that have been pressed by a local artisan. The walls are lined with photographs, includ- ing a collaboration with his friend David Lynch of nudes wearing extreme fetish shoes that Louboutin designed and Lynch shot. He plans to hire a curator to run the place and wants the collection to be available to stu- dents and researchers; eventually, it may open to the public. There is space for 14,000 pairs of shoes, which means 100 more a season for the next 10 years. “Then I will add more buildings,” he says, “or I will retire.” Louboutin, who is 48, knew he wanted to design shoes since he was a boy growing up in the 12th arrondissement in Paris. He doodled them in his books, ogled them at the Folies Bergère (where he worked as an intern) and boldly responded to any nosy adult who asked what he wanted

rustic charms The sofa, chairs and table in the orangerie are from 1910 and were found in Cairo.

96 97

0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 96 7/23/12 3:45 PM 0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 97 7/23/12 3:45 PM 07232012144703 07232012144703 Louboutin’s garden is a constant source of design ideas. “It allows me to see blends of colors, juxtapositions of gloss and matte surfaces.”

Paradise Found Topiary towers over hanging wisteria in the garden. Below: The house as seen from the front lawn. Opposite: The curved stairwell in the entry hall.

to be: “A shoe designer!” When he received a book of legendary shoe man Roger Vivier’s work, Louboutin was bowled over: “How amazing,” he thought to himself. “You really can make a living designing shoes!” Louboutin dropped out of school at 16, traveled to Egypt and India, hung out at the famed Paris nightclub Le Palace and put together a portfolio of designs, which he took to various couture houses, looking for a job. He landed an entry-level spot at Charles Jourdan, which produced shoes for Dior. In 1988, he met Vivier and helped put together a ret- rospective of his work at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris. Louboutin so loved working for Vivier that once it was over he felt he could never work for anyone else except himself. He launched his company rather hap- hazardly in 1992, when his friend, the antiques dealer Eric Philippe, mentioned that a neighboring shop in the Passage Véro-Dodat was available for rent. Louboutin took the space, then designed and produced shoes to fill it. Two months in, a fashion writer was in the shop and overheard Princess Caroline of Monaco gushing about the shoes. After an article appeared mentioning this, Louboutin was on the fashion map. Over the years, Louboutin’s designs have triggered a near mania for his shoes: has sung about them; despite her Sex and the City character’s love of ’s shoes, Sarah Jessica Parker chose Louboutins for her wedding; wore a towering pair of Louboutin platforms, while very preg- nant, to Prince William and Kate Middleton’s wedding;

0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 98 7/23/12 3:45 PM 0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 99 7/23/12 3:45 PM 07232012144704 07232012144704 afterglow Sunset in the garden casts a golden light on a Judas tree in bloom. Below: Peonies about to bloom share the shade of an apple tree and Euphorbia characias.

“There are few plants that onstage, Dita Von Teese wears only his stilettos—“I tell him my shoe fantasies,” she says, “and I let him sketch”; are ugly. It’s how you use and romance novelist Danielle Steel is said to own 6,000 pairs and has been known to buy 80 at a time. “The thing them that may not be pretty.” I always try to remember is that feet are attached to the leg, and that you must prolong the silhouette,” he explains. “The shoe elongates the leg and does it dis- creetly. The goal is to get people to look at a woman’s legs. It’s all about the leg.” He pauses. “No, it’s not about the leg. It’s about the woman.”

ouboutin’s hallmark—the red sole that winks with each step—came to him in a sud- den burst of inspiration as he was designing his third collection: Seeing an assistant paint- Ling her nails red, he took the polish, applied it to the sole of a shoe and instantly fell in love. (Next year, he will launch a cosmetics line, a project inspired by the phenomenon of “Louboutin manicures”— black on the top, red on the underside—a style popularized by the pop star Adele.) Lately, he has been mired in a lawsuit over his sig- nature look: Louboutin is suing the Yves Saint Laurent company, which is owned by PPR Group, for copyright infringement for producing red soles. Of the ongoing case, he says, “It’s my trademark. For two months I said, ‘Fix it,’ ” and nothing happened. Then they tried to kill me by saying I can’t own a color. But they own colors for their makeup and the red-and-green stripe for Gucci.

gilded glory It’s very much a double standard.” (Representatives In the living room, from YSL declined to comment.) the Louis XV mirror Louboutin’s design ideas often come in sudden and marble-topped table were bought bursts and, as with his interiors, they come from at auction. everywhere: sari ribbons picked up in India; macramé

0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 100 7/23/12 3:45 PM 0912_WSJ_Louboutin_04.indd 101 7/24/12 3:28 PM 07232012144705 07242012142912 well-heeled sandals inspired by African handicrafts; motifs sparked Left: Examples of Louboutin’s signature by Egyptian Coptic crosses, the architecture of Oscar red-soled heels. Niemeyer or details in Lucio Fontana’s paintings. The Below: In the archive, inspiration for his famous toe cleavage—or décolleté— the mirrored “basin” on the floor shoes came to him when he saw an old photo of Princess was modeled on the Diana dancing with John Travolta at the White House. Canopus pool “She was wearing these really bad English shoes and in Hadrian’s Villa, near Rome. they showed half her toes,” he told British Vogue. “It looked tacky, but so good somehow. She had that naugh- tiness and it was appearing subconsciously.” A constant source of ideas is his garden in the French countryside. He learned about botany during the roam- ing years of his youth, when he worked as a self-taught freelance landscaper. “The garden allowed me to see colors, blends of colors and materials, juxtapositions of gloss and matte surfaces—it was highly instructive,” he says in Christian Louboutin, a book celebrating his 20th anniversary, published by Rizzoli. “Still today, if I close my eyes I don’t see satin combined with velvet; I see the thickness of a pansy, which is deep purple bordered with white, set against the texture of another plant, and this combination gives me my colors.” Even the shoe archive was unplanned; the idea for it came serendipitously when a business acquaintance “who loves fashion” came to his office on the Right Bank and asked to see his inventory. The designer escorted the man to the basement to have a look. “The first box I opened was a Chinese brocade shoe trimmed with

mink,” Louboutin recalls. “And the shoe was completely greener Pastures eaten. The man started screaming at me: ‘You have to Feathered visitors strutting in the be responsible! All this work is beautiful, and yes, it garden. Above: A view belongs to you, but it also belongs to fashion history. into the barn housing It means something. So protect it properly!’ the archive. “It suddenly became evident,” Louboutin explains. “Necessity creates everything in my life. It was neces- sary to protect the work of a great part of my life.” Louboutin spends spring and fall weekends and the month of August at his home in the Vendée, puttering about in his garden—it’s become his haven, a place his mind can wander for design ideas as he pulls weeds. “The magnolia leaf is like patent leather,” he notes, “and it always looks beautiful with a deep purple, like prunus purple. There are few plants that are ugly. It’s how you use them that may not be pretty.” “When we got this house 25 years ago, there was nothing,” he says. “Bruno and I decided to put in a central alley and discovered a fountain under a pile of overgrowth.” Eventually the sweeping fields behind the archive will undergo a major intervention by Louboutin’s boyfriend of 14 years, celebrated French landscape designer Louis Benech. Today Louboutin’s company is a global corporation with 55 stores world-wide and five new men’s stores on the way—in London, New York, Los Angeles, Dubai and Tokyo. In May, he was honored with a retrospec- next day, not even the next season.” you go into the grain, you have beauty. If you go against tive of his work at the Design Museum in London—a It’s all part of what Louboutin calls “growing organ- it, you have splinters—it breaks,’ ” he says. “And I took two-month-long show that broke the museum’s atten- ically”: never forcing things, just following one project that as my view of life. You have to follow the grain— dance records, with 38,000 visitors by mid-June. to the next and on and on—a philosophy instilled in to be sensitive to the direction of life. I never had the “Never did I think that I’d be celebrating 20 years in him by his father when he was a boy. “My father, who dream to be a great designer. My focus was just to do business,” he says. “I was always thinking about the was a cabinetmaker, told me, ‘Wood has a grain and if beautiful things.”

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0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 102 7/23/12 3:45 PM 0912_WSJ_Louboutin_03.indd 103 7/23/12 3:45 PM 07232012144706 07232012144706 DREAMING in OTTOMAN call to prayer Poised between East and West, the modern and Right: The interior of the Sakirin mosque, which opened in 2009. the ancient, secular elitism and Islam, Opposite: A view of the Bosphorus from the Istanbul is nurturing a thriving international arts Bebek neighborhood. “If the Earth was a single scene, a growing prosperity and a newfound cultural state,” Napoleon once said, Istanbul “would be awareness that taps into its storied past its capital.”

by laWrence osborne p hotography by andres g onzalez 104

0912_WSJ_Istanbul_03.indd 104 7/23/12 2:22 PM 0912_WSJ_Istanbul_03.indd 105 7/23/12 12:23 PM 07232012132313 07232012112412 never acted on: “If the Earth was a single state,” he said, Istanbul “would be its capital.” The Romans, apparently, thought likewise. The mood of the city that the Ottomans called “The “We are bored of bloodless Abode of Happiness” today feels quite Napoleonic in that sense (gone, too, are the loathsome tan- internationalism, neries). Walking into the historic neighborhood of of imitating the West in Bebek on a warm night, struggling through lanes jammed with girls in fringed boots and convertible everything. We are BMWs, past the outdoor frolics of the restaurant finally, dare I say, going Kitchenette, one passes the billboards on Arnavutköy Caddesi upon which the latest soap operas are adver- back to our roots.” tised. They are often historical costume dramas—a bit like The Tudors but in Ottoman garb. The big- gest so far is the garish Osmanli (the Turkish name for the Ottomans) and the extraordinarily terrible Magnificent Century, about the life of Suleiman the Magnificent. Hugely popular, these series are little more than national propaganda. The smash movie hit of the winter was Fetih: 1453, a celebration of Mehmet II’s conquest of Constantinople. Fetih is Turkish for “conquest,” and the film has become something of an international hit—incredibly, it was showing in Paris this summer. Magnificent Century’s décor, meanwhile, is unde- niably brilliant. The textures, the color scheme of the Ottoman heyday, are rendered perfectly, as they are in Gülgün’s house, and this meticulous re-creation of the moment of Ottoman supremacy feels like a perfect judgment of the national mood by the show’s produc- ers. You will often hear from citizens that in the 1970s the country was backward and insignificant, whereas now it is the fastest-growing economy in both Europe EATIME IN ISTANBUL IS NoT ofTEN a woodwork inside the walls is Ottoman in technique. and the Middle East—the pride simmers just under Proustian moment. It is hardly Proustian But, in fact, it is typically contemporary. Twenty years the surface, a paradoxical pride in the defunct empire at all, in fact. But in the palatial home of ago, no one in Istanbul restored anything. This kind spawned by the sometimes brutish, reckless race to Serdar Gülgün in Cengelköy, on the Asian of house—it’s entirely of the present moment. We are development. During a recent dinner party on the side of the Bosphorus, that precious bored of bloodless internationalism, of imitating the island of Büyükada, we looked over at the glaring adjective earns its keep. The slender, West in everything. We are finally, dare I say, going city of skyscrapers spread across the far horizon boyishly elegant Gülgün arrives at the door of his house back to our roots.” of dark waters and one of the youngish guests, who onT the fancifully named Feyzullah Street dressed in blue- The sofa was in a crucifix formation, while its ceil- had grown up on the island, said that when he was velvet tasseled slippers and matching socks. The street’s ing was shaped like a yurt, a nomadic Turkish tent. 10 years old that same horizon had been completely name, he explains at once, is almost a joke—his house Thus the Ottomans, Gülgün explains, liked to combine dark. “They built it just as quickly as the Ottomans was built by an exiled Hungarian officer in the 1850s, a Christian and nomadic influences. Sitting there with built their Istanbul.” man who took on the pseudo-Oriental name of Feyzullah. glasses of tea and tahini cookies, among mounted tor- “It’s a perfect symbol of our dear Istanbul, is it not? East toiseshells and 18th-century Murano chandeliers with is a curious city, a bit of a playground, a paradise for gilt trip and West and back again—ah, but not quite!” the original chipped glass violets, one might think that foreigners like yourself. You can pick and choose what Above: An antique lantern hangs in one of Gülgün switches from English to French to Turkish, the Ottoman spirit of playful syncretism has returned you want. It’s a string of villages, and you can live Gülgün’s sitting rooms. twirling a perfect, almost Dalinian moustache and at long last—yet in a knowing arch form that suits the in whatever village you like. Some villages are reli- The dome ceiling of the adjacent living room, pointing out that the stuffed lion upstairs wears a tiara city’s current mercurial mood. giously conservative; others are wild. That is what I visible through the “just for fun.” He is an interior designer who consults When we think of Istanbul, we think of two things love about this city. You have the choice.” doorway, is shaped like for the Turkish fashion house Vakko and is well-known that are, in theory, glaringly incompatible: There is Although I’d been coming to the city on the a yurt, a reference to the Ottomans’ nomadic among Istanbul’s glittering social elites. He guides me the rejuvenated metropolis of art festivals and sceney Bosphorus for years with my parents, the metropo- past. Right: A view past the pool house and summerhouse and garden into galleries, the world of wealthy art patrons and of lis to which I moved about a year ago bore almost of Istanbul’s historic the ground floor of the restored mansion, which has Vakko itself, which helps sponsor the yearly Istancool no resemblance to the one I had known back then. In Galata neighborhood, once home to the been his labor of love for more than 10 years. Here one arts and culture festival—attended this May by the the far-off 1980s, the stench of the city’s tanneries financial center of the finds the traditional Ottoman layout of nine rooms on likes of filmmakers Zoe Cassavetes, Chiara Clemente could reach the inside of an approaching aircraft’s Ottoman Empire. either side of a vestibule—this one resplendent with and Mark Romanek—and then there is the growing cabin as it passed over Bulgaria. There wasn’t an art the enormous mother-of-pearl Syrian mirrors that the Islamization incarnated by Prime Minister Recep turkish revival installation or an international menu in sight. And Istanbul upper class loves. Tayyip Erdogan, with its purported reactionary desire The living room—or yet wandering with sweaty guidebooks among the sofa—top left, of “You may think,” he says as we climb to the second- to turn away from the West and its evil ways and back interior designer monuments of Fatih and Sultanahmet—lost inside floor sofa (“living room” in English, though we have toward the Middle East, which dominated for Serdar Gülgün’s home the Sunken Palace—the sublime Sokollu Mehmet adjoins a bathroom, borrowed the word for its most typical furniture), centuries. Do these two disturbingly opposing tenden- top, and a sitting Pasha mosque and the blue dreaminess of the Rüstem “that this is a rather old-fashioned project of mine. cies, I ask Gülgün, collide in contemporary Istanbul? room, in which Pasha, I was always aware of the strange Napoleon I have re-created an Ottoman-era house. Even the “Yes and no. It’s not quite as simple as that. Istanbul Gülgün is pictured. quote, which the Emperor had, for some reason,

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0912_WSJ_Istanbul_03.indd 106 7/23/12 12:23 PM 0912_WSJ_Istanbul_03.indd 107 7/23/12 12:23 PM 07232012112412 07232012112412 URKEY WAS VIoLENTLY SECULARIZED link in the great chain of European self- art lovers by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk after the abo- amusement, which is what it was in the Left: The founders of the arts and lition of the Ottoman Empire in 1922. late 19th century. Its luminous beauty, and culture organization Arabic script was effectively banned, its equally luminous cuisine, has helped Istanbul ’74, Demet Muftuoglu-Eseli and which means that when a Turk goes to that image. It would be hard to imag- her husband, Alphan the beautiful cemetery at Eyüp he or she ine subtle new restaurants like KarakÖy Eseli, at home. cannot read what is written on a great-grandparent’s Lokantasi or Mikla in the city I knew as tomb.T Until 1829 graves were topped by a figure of the a juvenile tourist, eating little more than dead person’s turban—between then and 1925, his fez. kebap and ayran. New places open every But after 1925, the graves had no headgear at all. Ataturk year, making Istanbul a gourmand’s play- required Turks to wear brimmed hats, and this rule ground as well, a place where the art extended to gravestones—no Arabic, no turbans, no fez. of eating, while not cosmopolitan, has It’s a small example of the way the country was reached a kind of everyday perfection. forced to renounce its own past. In the last decade, The preeminent platform connect- Istanbul has become cool, hip and international—with ing Istanbul to the wider world in recent new museums like the Istanbul Modern and the con- years has been the international arts version of the Tophane, Selim III’s armory building, and culture organization Istanbul ’74, into an art space—but it has not solved the underlying founded in 2009 by Demet Muftuoglu- unease of its relationship to the past. Ezgi Esma Kurklu, Eseli and her husband, Alphan Eseli, who a young Turkish friend who is a screenwriter for the also created Istancool. One night in late satirical TV show Heberler, puts it this way: “When we May I went with the Istancool crowd on import foreign culture we festivalize it—we put it in a a cruise from the Four Seasons Bosphorus ghetto. But what really grips us is ourselves. The coun- to the Asian village of Kandilli. I noticed, try is moving back to its Ottoman subconscious—we among the Cassavetes and the Romaneks, have been schizophrenic for far too long.” we living up to it?” the Turkish actresses Meltem Cumbul and Pelin Batu, That subconscious is palpable in subtle, hard- “Hasn’t the population,” I offer, “grown from 4.5 the latter wearing an outrageous hat that looked like a to-describe ways. One could find it in one of the million to 15 million in the space of 30 years?” botanical experiment. now-revived Sufi dervish lodges, or tekkes (such as “Exactly the problem,” Ertug responds. “And it’s On the windswept top deck, meanwhile, I fell the Nureddin Cerrahi Tekkesi, the dervish school of grown rich.” into delightful conversation with Ayse Kulin, one of the 18th-century saint Pir Mehmed Nureddin, located Owing to Turkey’s thriving economy, with 8.5 per- Turkey’s best-selling novelists, and as we sailed past in a gritty corner of Karagümrük), which were banned cent annual growth (at least until last year), Istanbul Arnavutköy and the Rumeli Hisari castle built by the until recently and are now flourishing all over the city. now boasts almost as many billionaires as London or Fatih Sultan Mehmet, then passing under the sweeping Or one could, at the other end of society, find it in a Moscow, and many more than Paris. Hence the vast bridge named after him, Kulin observed that this magi- magnificently restored mansion owned by the great shopping malls, like Akmerkez and Kanyon, the luxury cal view—presumably familiar to both Alexander the Istanbul photographer Ahmet Ertug, whose studio gym culture and the obsession with status. Indeed, for Great and Byron—was not the whole picture. is in one of the old backstreets of Beyoglu (the house all the city’s historical gravitas—its melancholy, its deli- “The developers are destroying this city as fast as once belonged to three Levantine sisters cately haunted quality—it feels once again like a showy they can,” she said. “You would not believe how much frame by frame Above: The gallery whose ghostly faces adorn the stair- space in photographer well). Ertug’s grandiose photography Ahmet Ertug’s studio, explores both the Greco-Roman and the where his own work hangs on the wall. Right: Ottoman past and his photographs are Ertug in his studio. the ones you see inside Hagia Sophia. He was also the head of a committee in the ’70s that oversaw the rejuvenation of the old city—it pedestrianized Istiklal Caddesi, Istanbul’s Oxford Street—and paved the way for the city’s current renaissance. He has seen it grow from a grimy, provincial tourist city in the ’70s to what it is now: a metropolis swinging giddily between brash new wealth and a revived but ancient cultural awareness. “Istanbul is at a crossroads,” remarks Ertug, sitting among his antiques, carpets and immense collection of hand- bound books. “We’ve modernized but now we suffer, like so many others, from amnesia.” He looks slightly sad but also curiously determined. “And yet there’s spinning on air this yearning among people for some- Above: Istanbul’s thing deeper—something more than vast Kanyon Mall, a symbol of the city’s conceptualist installations and art par- new prosperity. Left: ties. This is an unimaginably great city, Whirling dervishes performing at the maybe the greatest of all the cities of the Hodjapasha Culture past. But what are we doing with it? Are Center in Sirkeci.

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0912_WSJ_Istanbul_03.indd 108 7/23/12 12:23 PM 0912_WSJ_Istanbul_03.indd 109 7/23/12 12:23 PM 07232012112412 07232012112412 reflected glory designing Left: The living Woman room of Zeynep and Zeynep Fadillioglu, Metin Fadillioglu’s left, designed the home. Metin, below, interior of the Sakirin owns the restaurant mosque, below, the Ulus 29, opposite. first ever conceived by a woman.

tension, but we’ll overcome it.” A few days later I had dinner at one of the city’s most desirable nightspots, Ulus 29, on top of the Ulus hill overlooking the Bosphorus. The restaurant is owned by entrepreneur Metin Fadillioglu, who is married to one of Istanbul’s most promi- nent architects, Zeynep Fadillioglu. Zeynep created Les Ottomans hotel and was the first woman in history to design a mosque: the Sakirin in Istanbul. They are one of Istanbul’s unmissable couples. Metin, or so he says, has tried to cre- ate a new kind of restaurant with Ulus 29. Zeynep designed it and it has a proper wine list (the French sommelier came over and quietly explained, in grieved tones, how hard it was to get decent for- eign wine because of the Islamic-inspired alcohol taxes). We drank a bottle of the same name. It was, to my surprise, much less insipid Rioja Alta—astonishing to see a top than the book, perhaps because the idea behind it was Spanish wine in an Istanbul restaurant— “Turkey has done everything right: so megalomaniacal and so interestingly obsessive. In and Zeynep says that, in her mind, the We made democracy work; the novel, the protagonist, Kemal, collects everything tensions between the urban elite and that his adored Fusun touches—a thousand everyday their plush lifestyles and the Islamic-led we made a modern economy; objects that are assembled here. But the museum is they have obliterated already. I suppose we are all ask- government (and, for that matter, the mostly devout we liberated women; not just a personal endeavor; it is supported by the ing ourselves how we can hold on to what is precious. masses) could not be brushed under the carpet. Istanbul 2010 European Capital of Culture Agency. It But that is always the dark side of economic success: “Urban elitism was always the problem in this we even have one of the world’s is, therefore, a part of Istanbul’s official cultural fabric. the vandalism.” country. Istanbul is not a bridge between East and As two elderly women from the neighborhood in zip- Indeed. Whenever I take a taxi home from the city West—it’s a bridge between two versions of the East. top biennials. There is up boots wandered around the exhibition—staring at the center to Etiler, I pass along the otobahn through an The secular Kemalist elite lorded it over everyone else, tension, but we’ll overcome it.” walls covered with text and thousands of cigarette ends Alphaville landscape of Trump Towers, kiddy-neon and that could not go on. So the Islamic element had to displayed behind plexiglass (Fusun is an avid smoker )—I malls and Carrefour Express supermarkets. It is vast be admitted into the picture eventually. It’s an inevi- overheard them remark about having never been inside in scale. And this mall-city is ever expanding. All over table process. But we have evolved too far to become a museum before. The old soda bottles, lottery tickets the city, historic buildings are either being demol- some kind of Islamic state now. It’s too late. Look and newspaper clippings had them sourly perplexed. ished or turned into supermarkets and condos. And, around you.” “It’s amazing,” one of them said in a whisper. “It yet, a few streets down from the tourist icon of Galata Indeed, the gilded youth of Istanbul in their Italian looks just like the inside of any old house. It’s no Tower, ancient alleys tumble down to the Golden Horn clothes were sitting under huge windows through big deal.” in a decayed and unlit grandiosity, untouched, it would which the lights of Asia and the Bosphorus shone, “So that’s what museums are like,” the other said, seem, since about 1840—such is Istanbul’s gift for mad drinking, like us, bottles of Rioja Alta. This is not Egypt, and they nodded together in grave satisfaction and dis- contradiction. A vandalism of neglect vies with a van- nor even Lebanon. appointment, not to mention a whiff of contempt. dalism of obsessive development. “What we are seeing, really, is the inevitable converg- And yet it seemed apt. Pamuk’s love story is about From the Suna’nin Yeri restaurant in Kandilli, how- ing of two Turkish societies: rural, Muslim Anatolia and upper-class Turks in the ’70s caught between their ever, not much vandalism could be seen. The waters elite, intellectual, secular Istanbul,” Zeynep says. “It’ll Western lifestyles and a culture that they rule but to flowed past the tables and their carafes of raki, the lilacs be a bit tense for a while.” A new kind of city is emerg- which they do not entirely belong. In Istanbul today, were in bloom and the mosques were in full song with ing: Muslim and global at the same time, but without that struggle—emotional, cultural and political—has the adhan, the call to prayer. The old life of the Asian the Disney quality of Dubai. Wasn’t that exactly what only grown larger in scale, more irresolvable and yet Bosphorus—with its ramshackle palaces and gardens the Ottoman city was like? more fruitful. It’s a city whose brilliance is strangely and rose nurseries—its slow riverine pace, seemed “Yes. But back in the ’80s I understood this only by provincial, and whose fussy introspection is set in a alive and well. In contrast to Kulin, Muftuoglu-Eseli’s going to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. I landscape of matchless imperial openness and gran- attitude about Istanbul’s ever-changing landscape was saw all the Iznik tiles, and I thought, This is what we deur. “What city is more beautiful?” I always think as I sweetly confident: “I think Turkey has done everything have to go back to. And we are.” cross the Bosphorus Bridge late at night—the Topkapi right: We made democracy work in the Middle East; we But who knows what all of this means to ordi- and Hagia Sophia lit in gold on the horizon, the palaces made a modern economy work in the Middle East; we nary Istanbul people. Yet another night I went to The of the late sultans strung out along the shore. And yet liberated women; we even have one of the world’s top Museum of Innocence in Cukurcuma—Orhan Pamuk’s what city is more exquisitely inscrutable even to its biennials, along with Venice and São Paulo. There is delightfully demented monument to his own novel of own people?

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0912_WSJ_Coats_04.indd 118 7/23/12 3:41 PM 0912_WSJ_Coats_03.indd 119 7/20/12 6:31 PM 07232012144154 07202012173235 Since the 1960s, LIKEthe Birley name has been HOME synonymous with the most atmospheric and exclusive clubs in London. Now, Robin Birley is bringing his family’s exquisite personal taste to a OnLy new members-only establishment. Here, his haunt and home BETTEr

hat is just a blaze of glory, Tom. I think we should over his collection of pictures hanging cheek by jowl, the comfort- in the Club have that. It’s like an English bedouin tent!” able sofas and soft lighting—is to witness what makes a Birley club Left: Robin and Lucy Birley in one of Robin Birley is standing in his new club, 5 Hertford a place people flock to: an impossibly chic home away from home. the dining rooms at Street. He’s surrounded by overlapping Oushak rugs It’s been five years since Mark Birley, Robin’s father, sold his Loulou’s, decorated by Rifat Ozbek. that are being unrolled by porters wearing navy- empire for $200 million to Richard Caring—the billionaire business- Above: The club’s and-white-striped aprons. Tom is Tom Bell, one of man who has been acquiring most of London’s leading restaurants entrance hall. London’s most low-key and highly talented interior and set design- and clubs. The group included the world-famous Annabel’s, Mark’s T ers. He’s recently returned home after having spent the last 10 years Club, George, Harry’s Bar and The Bath & Racquets Club, a gentle- living in New York working on ad campaigns for Hermès and Jil men’s gym. When Birley Sr. first opened Annabel’s in 1963, named Sander, as well as on photo shoots for a number of Vogues. The two after his then-wife, Lady Annabel Birley, no one expected the extraor- are choosing rugs for the various bars and sitting rooms on the sec- dinary success that lay ahead. For one, the members-only establish- ond floor of the club. Watching Robin’s distinct eye at work—casting ment was created in the basement of the Clermont Club on Berkeley

by rita konig Photogra Ph y by james merrell (Club) and r oland b eaufre (h ome) 121

0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 120 7/23/12 5:12 PM 0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 121 7/23/12 5:12 PM 07232012161340 07232012161340 Square, which was owned by a friend of the Birleys, John Aspinall. “It was a huge, empty space like an air-raid shelter with kitchens at the back,” says Lady Annabel, who remarried the late Jimmy Goldsmith. But from the outset, the club was a hit. “Everyone was there, from the Kennedys to the royals,” she says. “Teddy, Jackie and Bobby— Birley’s Knightsbridge apartment there were actors, singers, Shirley Bassey, Frank Sinatra. Mark and I gave a big party on opening night; everyone gate-crashed—the is jam-packed with art. American ambassador brought Peter O’Toole. It was jammed. I just When the walls are too full thought, Oh my god, this is the greatest disaster! People, like Drue Heinz, were squashed to the floor! Once the crowds melted away, the to hang another, the art is stacked, actors and actresses gone, the last people on the dance floor were me, Mark, Jimmy [Goldsmith] and Sally [who later married Aga Khan]— sometimes three deep, on the floor. strangely.” The key to Mark’s ongoing success was his innate ability to create the most effortlessly glamorous environments. He would travel to France and bring back delicious chocolates to serve after dinner. The glasses were bought on shopping trips in Venice. He cov- ered the walls of Harry’s Bar with Fortuny fabric and thought little of the cost. Mark, who died in 2007, had that rare skill of combining traditional good taste with the unexpected. None of his clubs ever fell prey to the run-of-the-mill propriety that bogs down so many other establishments.

obin has inherited his father’s keen eye. Buying and hanging pictures is one of the things the Birleys do best. Robin’s own apartment in Knightsbridge is jam- packed with art. When the walls are too full to hang another, the art is stacked, sometimes three deep, on the floor or even against, say, a drinks tray. Now that he has Hertford Street, Robin has taken many of his pictures over to ther club and has hung them there. An enormous drawing of his dogs by his sister, India Jane, used to hang over his bed, but that has since moved to one of the small dining rooms in Mayfair. At home,

Chaos theory Left: The drawing room at Robin’s Knightsbridge apartment. A self-portrait by his grandfather, , hangs among vintage Italian photographs and other Birley family portraits. The self-portrait is now in the entrance hall at the club. Right: Robin with one of his whippets, Chester.

0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 122 7/23/12 5:12 PM 0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 123 7/23/12 5:12 PM 07232012161340 07232012161356 of Art Deco–East Village graffiti. Robin recalls realizing Ozbek was the right man for the job when the two were flipping through Tony Duquette books at the designer’s apartment. “He showed me all these fabrics and I loved his flat, I loved him, I loved the way he loves color—that he hadn’t decorated before and he’s a party animal!” Robin says. Ozbek describes the bar as Afro-Deco. The walls are hung with a beige, rather tribal Fortuny fabric, and the Bagués wall lights that line the room have feathered headdresses wedged behind them. The bar itself has an under-lit agate counter that’s flanked by a pair of Casa Pupo porcelain leopards—a late 1970s byword in bad taste and a complete triumph in this room. Lucy serves as the musical direc- tor of Loulou’s, which has a highly lacquered, glittered dance floor. “I wanted music that you would dance with your father or son to, as well as your own generation,” she says. “If my boys and their friends are there, it needs to have music that they will want to dance to.” (She has four handsome sons from her previous marriage to Bryan Ferry.) One of the dining rooms, painted blue with enormous swags and tassels, is inspired by the 19th-century Russian painter Leon Bakst. Beyond that lies an arched corridor, old coalholes that are now a row of cozy booths designed to resemble Romany caravans. The arches are painted with wide stripes in hot, spicy colors that Ozbek describes as a circus stripe. One of the dining rooms is inspired by

the sitting room feels slightly Russian. A pair of paisley cotton cur- tains at the window hangs from brass rods with lawn under-curtains. The whole place is calm and extremely comfortable. When a visitor arrives, Robin’s housekeeper brings in a tray with coffee and fresh orange juice. The oranges, Robin explains, are kept in the refrigera- tor so the juice will be cold when squeezed. This small indulgence will be repeated at the club. “It’s a business fueled by emotion and will be a work in progress for many years,” Robin says of Hertford Street and its downstairs nightclub, Loulou’s. The project has included many friends and family members, including Rifat Ozbek, Jane Ormsby-Gore, Isabel and Julian Bannerman and Robin’s own wife, Lucy Birley, who collaborated with him on the art collection. The club is comprised of 10 Georgian town houses that span an entire block of Shepherd Market, a beautiful and quiet quarter in the middle of Mayfair. The narrow streets feel rather secret and, for years, have been best known for their brothels: Part the Marchesa Casati. Interiors, and particularly those of restau- family room of Hertford Street was previously a well-known establishment called rants, have become so self-consciously designed that to be in such a Above: Robin and Lucy often share their Tiddy Dols—one of the “girls” is still rumored to be living upstairs. flamboyant, fin de siècle, decadent space is strangely liberating. One bed with their seven all things Loulou’s, named after Robin’s glamorous cousin, the Yves Saint can’t help envision Gigi sashaying through the tables, the whole of dogs. The drawing Considered of his whippets, Clockwise from top Laurent muse , is the sparkling jewel of the whole Maxim’s falling silent. by Robin’s sister, India left: A detail of the place. Like Annabel’s, it takes up most of the basement, which has Upstairs, and throughout the two floors that make up Hertford Jane, now hangs in mantelpiece, with been transformed into a theatrical fantasy by Ozbek, the Turkish Street, the mood is decidedly calmer and lighter. What one notices the club. Framed seed a photograph of packets run along the Margaret Thatcher fashion designer and an old friend of Lucy’s. After walking through a immediately is the utter professionalism with which the place is ceiling. Left: Robin’s that Robin asked glossy oxblood front door, members and their guests descend a spiral run. Many of the 50-person staff have known Robin for more than nightstand with a picture her to sign, a puffer staircase with a velvet-bound banister rail. The walls are lined in dark 20 years. “Whether you are changing a lightbulb or making a soufflé, of his grandmother, fish and a taxidermy Rhoda Birley, propped rabbit, which was a mirrors hung with antique brass sconces in the shape of magnolias. A everything must be done by professionals,” Robin says. behind a lamp. gift from his wife; chandelier from a 1930s casino hangs in the well of the staircase. Though he has, undoubtedly, led a life of privilege, Robin has seen The cartoon behind a drinks tray, with a the photos was picture of a huntsman Ozbek was given free rein downstairs—which is rare in the Birley his fair share of adversity. When he was 12, he suffered an unimagi- bought at auction. that now hangs at world—and the result is a singular vision of madcap originality. In nable accident. During a weekend trip to Howletts—the animal park Hertford Street; the bar’s seating area, patrons are rather eccentrically greeted by a owned by Aspinall who, along with running his own businesses, was Robin’s bedroom, with a large oil painting— stuffed giraffe in one corner and a pair of Manolo Blahniks, mounted a well-known private zookeeper—Robin and his brother, Rupert, the artist is unknown. like a hunting trophy in a glass box. The walls are painted in a sort were allowed into one of the tiger’s cages. The tigress attacked Robin

125

0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 124 7/23/12 5:12 PM 0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 125 7/23/12 5:12 PM 07232012161356 07232012161356 “I loved his flat, I loved the way he loves color, that he hadn’t decorated before and that he’s a party animal!” Robin says of Rifat Ozbek.

1527

members only Clockwise from top left: The portrait over the fireplace, off the courtyard at Hertford Street, is of Robin’s aunt, Maxine de la Falaise, as a girl; a sneak peek at the gents, with toilets by Thomas Crapper; the screening room at the club; images of Oswald’s as his mother looked on in horror. Despite his terrible injuries and night life with her Oscar-winning documentary film producer boyfriend, portraits of kings, Gandhi, the 50 or so operations that followed to rebuild his face, Robin has Left: Ozbek in the John Battsek; a smattering of London’s increasingly international courtyard, which Churchill and other never given in to self-pity. He started working at a very young age, set of well-dressed Mayfair hedge-fund managers and art dealers prominent subjects line a was designed by corridor—the whisky bar entering the hospitality business at 21, when he opened his first Isabel and Julian at another; or perhaps a clutch of those terribly chic ladies who is in the distance. Bannerman. Right: Birley Sandwiches in London’s financial district. Now 54, there are A detail of the used to lunch at Harry’s Bar or George—fabulous legs, Louboutins, soft 12 shops and 15 more are expected to open over the next two years. Ozbek-designed bar power suits and Kelly bags—and now find themselves at Hertford Street. Robin joined his father in 2003, when he took over operations at The at Loulou’s, which is While sitting with Robin in the library having lunch, there is flanked by Casa Annabel’s Group. He ran the clubs with his sister until shortly before Pupo leopards. The a constant stream of friends passing through. Dave Ker, one of St they were sold in 2007. top of the bar is back- James’s leading art dealers, plunks down. He is full of excitement lit agate and the about the club, having just left a lunch with David Tang, owner of front is stamped t’s not until someone sits down in one of Hertford Street’s leather. Every stool The China Club in Hong Kong and considered by many to be the deep armchairs and orders a cocktail that one realizes how is a different velvet Chinese incarnation of Mark Birley. “Tang said one word about this or woven silk. relaxing the place is. Order anything on the menu and it will place: ‘Faultless!’ ” Ker says. The two then enter into a serious con- be delicious. There is no such thing as social Siberia at a Birley versation about dogs. Robin hardly ever parts from his five whip- club, since they don’t let anyone in that they don’t like. Robin pets, and Lucy has her own pair of border terriers. When asked if will not give away any members’ names, as discretion is one of members are allowed to bring their dogs to the club, Robin says, the cornerstones of any Birley establishment. But one can’t help but “Yes, they can, but I’d like to have a look at the dog first. I don’t Iimagine decorator Nicky Haslam having a gossipy lunch with Lee want a whole load of golden retrievers in here. They are frightfully Radziwill or Mick Jagger, depending on his mood; Robin’s half- annoying dogs.” It’s reassuring to know the membership vetting sister, Jemima Khan, might be sitting at another table, quite possibly extends to animals.

127

0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 126 7/23/12 5:12 PM 0912_WSJ_Birley_04.indd 127 7/23/12 5:12 PM 07232012161357 07232012161357 so surreal The central seating area at Loulou’s. The walls are painted with a Basquiat–meets– Art Deco graffiti.

he heart of the club, which is laid out like the most comfortable home, is a large sarcophagus fireplace in the courtyard. It was created by the Bannermans—Brit- ain’s “It” gardeners. The courtyard was inspired by the Soane Museum, with patchworks of ancient artifacts on the walls and two colossal hanging baskets filled with Jurassic geraniums overhead. There are café tables for lunch on T sunny days, but the real draw is for those who want to enjoy a drink and a cigarette—or, more likely, a cigar—at the same time, which is quite a rarity these days. Off the courtyard is the Ladies Bar, where Marco is in charge. He was the head barman at Harry’s Bar for 26 years and makes the best Bellini in London. The room is very feminine, as its name might suggest. The walls are oyster grey and the front of the bar itself is encrusted with shells. The bar leads to the dining room, which was decorated by interior designer Jane Ormsby-Gore. (Another one of Robin and Lucy’s old friends, she is also reputed to be the subject of the Rolling Stones song “Lady Jane.”) A mixture of soft watercolors, pictures of dogs and some old St. Moritz advertising posters from the ’30s hang on the pale-grey-paneled walls. An Oswald Birley portrait of Robin’s aunt, Maxine de la Falaise, as a girl rests over the fireplace. The room is bathed in soft light and has the feel of a Henry James novel. Because Shepherd Market is set back from the clatter and toot-toot of London traffic, it gives Hertford Street the feel of being somewhere far from the brashness of everyday life. While the pictures at Hertford Street are quite different to those at Annabel’s and Mark’s Club—which were mostly portraits of the family and their dogs—it is the arrangement of the pictures and the fireplaces in almost every room that make this place feel so incredibly welcoming. Across the hall from the Ladies Bar is its masculine coun- terpart, the whisky bar. Paneled in oak, the room has the feel of the Hemingway Bar at the Ritz Paris combined with some chic refuge in the mountains. From this bar you can see into the courtyard straight out toward the open fireplace. Off the courtyard is the sampling room, devoted to selling and smoking cigars. On the first floor, there is another bar; this one has a counter cut from a very thick slab of tumbled grey marble. Brian Silva, who manages all the bars, has 18 recipes just for Negronis. The chef himself presses the tomato juice for the Bloody Marys, and the ice comes from a 32-kilo block that’s brought to the club in tremendous chunks, as needed. Toward the end of Mark’s life, around the time of the sale of his clubs, father and son fell out over a financial misunderstanding. Robin was largely cut out of Mark’s will and subsequent contention ensued between Robin and his sister, India Jane. It leaves one wondering why he would want to take up Mark’s legacy and follow so closely in his father’s footsteps. Robin’s response is simple: “I missed everything about it—the food, the pictures, the people, every one of Pup’s clubs was like a home.” This is precisely what Hertford Street feels like: a homecoming, not just for Robin but for the people he missed—both the members and the staff. It’s a place where one can sit under a pleasing painting, on something very comfortable—a roaring fire nearby, a delicious drink in hand. As Tom Bell says, “It is everything you can’t get anymore.”

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LL'WREN WREN SCOTT Fashion Designer, LonDon

Objects Of MY AffectiOn: (from left) these chocolates from my Mogul bangle, probably made for a man, which i wear high up on the local shop in the Loire Valley remind me of the ones my mother made; arm; an 18th-century coco de Mer nut; a pair of 2,670-year-old Greek a shawl that elizabeth taylor gave me while we were deep in discussion earrings—a birthday gift from someone with a keen eye; my favorite about which jewels she should wear in cannes to match a dress i had pink french opaline vase; my father’s Ray-bans, found in a drawer after made for her; a headmistress doll i bought in a Paris flea market when his death; a Georgian-era portrait ring—it was love at first sight wheni i was 18 that inspired the signature dress i later designed; a painting of saw this beautiful lady sitting in a case at fred Leighton one afternoon. my boyfriend, Mick jagger, by ; a pink-enamel-jeweled i could not let her live there. now she has a nice home.

132 sePTemBer 2012 PhoTograPhY BY anDers gramer sTYLing BY Laura FuLmine

0912_WSJ_StillLife_02.indd 132 7/20/12 5:50 PM 07202012165140 A single journey can change the course of a life. Cambodia, May 2011.

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