The Devil Wears Prada

by Lauren Weisberger

  Not quite. “Calling in” the skirts was my very first lesson in Runway ridiculousness, although I do have to say that the process was as efficient as a military operation. Either Emily or myself would notify the fashion assistants—about eight in all, who each maintained contacts within a specified list of designers and stores. The assistants would immediately begin calling all of their public relations contacts at the various design houses and, if appropriate, at upscale Manhattan stores and tell them that Miranda Priestly—yes, Miranda Priestly, and yes, it was indeed for her personal use—was looking for a particular item. Within minutes, every PR account exec and assistant working at Michael Kors, Gucci, Prada, Versace, Fendi, Armani, Chanel, Barney’s, Chloé, Calvin Klein, Bergdorf, Roberto Cavalli, and Saks would be messengering over (or, in some cases, hand-delivering) every skirt they had in stock that Miranda Priestly could conceivably find attractive. I watched the process unfold like a highly choreographed ballet, each player knowing exactly where and when and how their next step would occur. While this near-daily activity unfolded, Emily sent me to pick up a few other things that we’d need to send with the skirt that night.

  “Your car will be waiting for you on Fifty-eighth Street,” she said while working two phone lines and scribbling instructions for me on a piece of Runway stationery. She paused briefly to toss me a cell phone and said, “Here, take this in case I need to reach you or you have any questions. Never turn it off. Always answer it.” I took the phone and the paper and headed down to the 58th Street side of the building, wondering how I was ever going to find “my car.” Or even, really, what that meant. I had barely stepped on the sidewalk and looked meekly around before a squat, gray-haired man gumming a pipe approached.

  “You Priestly’s new girl?” he croaked through tobacco-stained lips, never removing the mahogany-colored pipe. I nodded. “I’m Rich. The dispatcher. You wanna car, you talka to me. Got it, blondie?” I nodded again and ducked into the backseat of a black Cadillac sedan. He slammed the door shut and waved.

  “Where you going, miss?” the driver asked, pulling me back to the present. I realized I had no idea and pulled the piece of paper from my pocket.

  First stop: Tommy Hilfiger’s studio at 355 West 57th St., 6th Floor. Ask for Leanne. She’ll give you everything we need.

  I gave the driver the address and stared out the window. It was one o’clock on a frigid winter afternoon, I was twenty-three years old, and I was riding in the backseat of a chauffeured sedan, on my way to Tommy Hilfiger’s studio. And I was positively starving. It took nearly forty-five minutes to go the fifteen blocks during the midtown lunch hour, my first glimpse of real city gridlock. The driver told me he’d circle the block until I came out again, and off I went to Tommy’s studio. When I asked for Leanne at the receptionist’s desk on the sixth floor, an adorable girl not a day older than eighteen came bounding down the stairs.

  “Hi!” she called, stretching out the “I” sound for a few seconds. “You must be Andrea, Miranda’s new assistant. We sure do love her around here, so welcome to the team!” She grinned. I grinned. She pulled a massive plastic bag out from underneath a table and immediately spilled its contents on the floor. “Here we have Caroline’s favorite jeans in three colors, and we threw in some baby T’s, too. And Cassidy just adores Tommy’s khaki skirts—we gave them to her in olive and stone.” Jean skirts, denim jackets, even a few pair of socks came flying out of the bag, and all I could do was stare: there were enough clothes to constitute four or more total preteen wardrobes. Who the hell are Cassidy and Caroline? I wondered, staring at the loot. What self-respecting person wears Tommy Hilfiger jeans—in three different colors, no less?

  I must’ve looked thoroughly confused, because Leanne quite purposely turned her back while repacking the clothes and said, “I just know Miranda’s daughters will love this stuff. We’ve been dressing them for years, and Tommy insists on picking the clothes out for them himself.” I shot her a grateful look and threw the bag over my shoulder.

  “Good luck!” she called as the elevator doors closed, a genuine smile taking up most of her face. “You’re lucky to have such an awesome job!” Before she could say it, I found myself mentally finishing the sentence—a million girls would die for it. And for that moment, having just seen a famous designer’s studio and in possession of thousands of dollars worth of clothes, I thought she was right.

  Once I got the hang of things, the rest of the day flew. I debated for a few minutes whether anyone would be mad if I took a minute to pick up a sandwich, but I had no choice. I hadn’t eaten anything since my croissant at seven this morning, and it was nearly two. I asked the driver to pull over at a deli and decided at the last minute to get him one, too. His jaw dropped when I handed him the turkey and honey mustard, and I wondered if I had made him uncomfortable.

  “I just figured you were hungry, too,” I said. “You know, driving around all day, you probably don’t have much time for lunch.”

  “Thank you, miss, I appreciate it. It’s just that I’ve been driving around Elias-Clark girls for twelve years, and they are not so nice. You are very nice,” he said in a thick but indeterminate accent, looking at me in the rearview mirror. I smiled at him and felt a momentary flash of foreboding. But then the moment passed and we each munched our turkey wraps while sitting in gridlock and listening to his favorite CD, which sounded to me like little more than a woman shrieking the same thing over and over in an unknown language, the whole thing set to sitar music.

  Emily’s next written instruction was to pick up a pair of white shorts that Miranda desperately needed for tennis. I figured we’d be headed to Polo, but she had written Chanel. Chanel made white tennis shorts? The driver took me to the private salon, where an older saleswoman whose facelift had left her eyes looking like slits handed me a pair of white cotton-Lycra hot pants, size zero, pinned to a silk hanger and draped in a velvet garment bag. I looked at the shorts, which appeared as though they wouldn’t fit a six-year-old, and looked back to the woman.

  “Um, do you really think Miranda will wear these?” I asked tentatively, convinced the woman could open that pit-bull mouth of hers and consume me whole. She glared at me.

  “Well, I should hope so, miss, considering they’re custom measured and cut, according to her exact specifications,” she snarled as she handed the minishorts over. “Tell her Mr. Kopelman sends his best.” Sure, lady. Whoever that is.

  My next stop was what Emily wrote as “way downtown,” J&R Computer World near City Hall. Seemed it was the only store in the entire city that sold Warriors of the West, a computer game that Miranda wanted to purchase for Oscar and Annette de la Renta’s son, Moises. By the time I made it downtown an hour later, I’d realized that the cell phone could make long-distance calls, and I was happily dialing my parents and telling them how great the job was.

  “Um, Dad? Hi, it’s Andy. Guess where I am now? Yes, of course I’m at work, but that happens to be in the backseat of a chauffeured car cruising around Manhattan. I’ve already been to Tommy Hilfiger and Chanel, and after I buy this computer game, I’m on my way to Oscar de la Renta’s apartment on Park Avenue to drop all the stuff off. No, it’s not for him! Miranda’s in the DR and Annette’s flying there to meet them all tonight. On a private plane, yes! Dad! It stands for the Dominican Republic, of course!”

  He sounded wary but pleased that I was so happy, and I came to decide that I was hired as college-educated messenger. Which was absolutely fine with me. After leaving the bag of Tommy clothes, the hot pants, and the computer game with a very distinguished-looking doorman in a very plush Park Avenue lobby (so this is what people mean when they talk about Park Avenue!), I headed back to the Elias-Clark building. When I walked into my office area, Emily was sitting Indian-style on the floor, wrapping presents in plain white paper with white ribbons. She was surrounded by mountains of red-and-white boxes, all identical in shape, hundreds, perhaps thousands, scattered between our desks and overflowing into Miranda’s
office. Emily was unaware that I was watching her, and I saw that it took her only two minutes to wrap each individual box perfectly and an additional fifteen seconds to tie on a white satin ribbon. She moved efficiently, not wasting a single second, piling the wrapped white boxes in new mountains behind her. The wrapped pile grew and grew, but the unwrapped pile didn’t shrink. I estimated that she could be at it for the next four days and still not finish.

  I called her name over the eighties CD she had playing from her computer. “Um, Emily? Hi, I’m back.”

  She turned toward me and for a brief moment appeared to have no idea who I was. Completely blank. But then my new-girl status came rushing back. “How’d it go?” she asked quickly. “Did you get everything on the list?”

  I nodded.

  “Even the video game? When I called, there was only one copy left. It was there?”

  I nodded again.

  “And you gave it all to the de la Rentas’ doorman on Park? The clothes, the shorts, everything?”

  “Yep. No problem. It went very smoothly, and I dropped it all off a few minutes ago. I was wondering, will Miranda actually wear those—”

  “Listen, I need to run to the bathroom and I’ve been waiting for you to get back. Just sit by the phone for a minute, OK?”

  “You haven’t gone to the bathroom since I left?” I asked incredulously. It had been five hours. “Why not?”

  Emily finished tying the ribbon on the box she had just wrapped and looked at me coolly. “Miranda doesn’t tolerate anyone except her assistants answering her phone, so since you weren’t here, I didn’t want to go. I suppose I could have run out for a minute, but I know she’s having a hectic day, and I want to make sure that I’m always available to her. So no, we do not go to the bathroom—or anywhere else—without clearing it with each other. We need to work together to make sure that we are doing the best job possible for her. OK?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Go ahead. I’ll be right here.” She turned and walked away, and I put my hand on the desk to steady myself. No going to the bathroom without a coordinated war plan? Did she really sit in that office for the past five hours willing her bladder to behave because she worried that a woman across the Atlantic may call in the two and a half minutes it would take to run to the ladies’ room? Apparently so. It seemed a little dramatic, but I assumed that was just Emily being overly enthusiastic. There was no way that Miranda actually demanded that of her assistants. I was sure of it. Or did she?

  I picked up a few sheets of paper from the printer and saw that it was titled “X-Mas Presents Received.” One, two, three, four, five, six single-spaced pages of gifts, with sender and item on one line each. Two hundred and fifty-six presents in all. It looked like a wedding registry for the Queen of England, and I couldn’t take it in fast enough. There was a Bobby Brown makeup set from Bobby Brown herself, a one-of-a-kind leather Kate Spade handbag from Kate and Andy Spade, a Smythson of Bond Street burgundy leather organizer from Graydon Carter, a mink-lined sleeping bag from Miuccia Prada, a multistrand beaded Verdura bracelet from Aerin Lauder, a diamond-encrusted watch from Donatella Versace, a case of champagne from Cynthia Rowley, a matching beaded tank top and evening bag from Mark Badgley and James Mischka, a collection of Cartier pens from Irv Ravitz, a chinchilla muffler from Vera Wang, a zebra-print jacket from Alberto Ferretti, a Burberry cashmere blanket from Rosemarie Bravo. And that was just the start. There were handbags in every shape and size from everyone: Herb Ritts, Bruce Weber, Giselle Bundchen, Hillary Clinton, Tom Ford, Calvin Klein, Annie Leibovitz, Nicole Miller, Adrienne Vittadini, Michael Kors, Helmut Lang, Giorgio Armani, John Sahag, Bruno Magli, Mario Testino, and Narcisco Rodriguez, to name a few. There were dozens of donations made in Miranda’s name to various charities, what must have been a hundred bottles of wine and champagne, eight or ten Dior bags, a couple dozen scented candles, a few pieces of Oriental pottery, silk pajamas, leather-bound books, bath products, chocolates, bracelets, caviar, cashmere sweaters, framed photographs, and enough flower arrangements and/or potted plants to decorate one of those five-hundred-couple mass weddings they have in soccer stadiums in China. Ohmigod! Was this reality? Was this actually happening? Was I now working for a woman who received 256 presents at Christmas from some of the world’s most famous people? Or not so famous? I wasn’t sure. I recognized a few of the really obvious celebrities and designers, but didn’t know then that the others comprised some of the most sought-after photographers, makeup artists, models, socialites, and a whole slew of Elias-Clark executives. Just as I was wondering if Emily actually knew who all the people were, she walked back in. I tried to pretend I wasn’t reading the list, but she didn’t mind at all.

  “Crazy, isn’t it? She is the coolest woman ever,” she gushed, snatching the sheets off her desk and gazing at them with what can only be described as lust. “Have you ever seen more amazing things in your life? This is last year’s list. I just pulled it out so we know what to expect since the gifts have begun coming in already. That’s definitely one of the best parts of the job—opening all her presents.” I was confused. We opened her presents? Why wouldn’t she open them herself? I asked as much.

  “Are you out of your mind? Miranda won’t like ninety percent of the stuff people send. Some of it is downright insulting, things I won’t even show her. Like this,” she said, picking up a small box. It was a Bang and Olufsen portable phone in their signature sleek silver with all rounded edges and the capability to remain clear for something like 2,000 miles. I had been in the store just a couple weeks earlier, watching Alex salivate over their stereo systems, and I knew the phone cost upward of five hundred dollars and could do everything short of holding a conversation for you. “A phone? Do you believe someone had the nerve to send Miranda Priestly a phone?” She tossed it to me. “Keep it if you want it: I would never even let her see this. She’d be annoyed that someone sent something electronic.” She pronounced the word “electronic” as though it were synonymous with “covered in bodily fluids.”

  I tucked the phone box under my desk and tried to keep the smile off my face. It was too perfect! A portable phone was on my list of stuff that I still needed for my new room, and I’d just gotten a five-hundred-dollar one for free.

  “Actually,” she continued, flopping down again on the floor of Miranda’s office, Indian-style, “let’s put in a few hours wrapping some more of these wine bottles, and then you can open the presents that came in today. They’re over there.” She pointed behind her desk to a smaller mountain of boxes and bags and baskets in a multitude of colors.

  “So, these are gifts that we’re sending out from Miranda, right?” I asked her as I picked up a box and began wrapping it in the thick white paper.

  “Yep. Every year, it’s the same deal. Top-tier people get bottles of Dom. This would include Elias execs, and the big designers who aren’t also personal friends. Her lawyer and accountant. Midlevel people get Veuve, and this is just about everyone—the twins’ teachers, the hair stylists, Uri, et cetera. The nobodies get a bottle of the Ruffino Chianti—usually they go to the PR people who send small, general gifts that aren’t personalized for her. She’ll have us send Chianti to the vet, some of the babysitters who fill in for Cara, the people who wait on her in stores she goes to often, and all the caretakers associated with the summer house in Connecticut. Anyway, I order about twenty-five thousand dollars’ worth of this stuff at the beginning of November, Sherry-Lehman delivers it, and it usually takes nearly a month to do all the wrapping. It’s good she’s out of the office now or we’d be taking this stuff home with us to wrap. Pretty good deal, because Elias picks up the tab.”

  “I guess it would cost double that to have the Sherry-Lehman place wrap them, huh?” I wondered, still trying to process the hierarchy of the gift-giving.

  “What the hell do we care?” she snorted. “Trust me, you’ll learn quickly that cost is no issue around here. It’s just that Miranda doesn’t like the wrapping paper they use. I gave
them this white paper last year, but they just didn’t look as nice as when we do it.” She looked proud.

  We wrapped like that until close to six, with Emily telling me how things worked as I tried to wrap my mind around this strange and exciting world. Just as she was describing exactly how Miranda likes her coffee (tall latte with two raw sugars), a breathless blond girl I remembered as one of the many fashion assistants walked in carrying a wicker basket the size of a baby carriage. She hovered just outside Miranda’s office, looking as though she thought the soft gray carpeting might turn to quicksand under her Jimmy Choos if she dared to cross the threshold.

  “Hi, Em. I’ve got the skirts right here. Sorry that took so long, but no one’s around since it’s that weird time right before Thanksgiving. Anyway, hopefully you’ll find something she’ll like.” She looked down at her basket full of folded skirts.

  Emily looked up at her with barely disguised scorn. “Just leave them on my desk. I’ll return the ones that won’t work. Which I imagine will be most of them, considering your taste.” The last part was under her breath, just loud enough for me to hear.

  The blond girl looked bewildered. Definitely not the brightest star in the sky, but she seemed nice enough. I wondered why Emily so obviously hated her. It’d been a long day already, what with the running commentary and errands all over the city and hundreds of names and faces to try to remember, so I didn’t even ask.

  Emily placed the large basket on her desk and looked down on it, hands on her hips. From what I could see from Miranda’s office floor, there were perhaps twenty-five different skirts in an incredible assortment of fabrics, colors, and sizes. Had she really not specified what she wanted at all? Did she really not bother to inform Emily whether she’d be needing something appropriate for a black-tie dinner or a mixed-doubles match or perhaps to use as a bathing suit cover-up? Did she want denim, or would something chiffon work better? How exactly were we supposed to predict what might please her?