Tongue in Chic

by Kirstie Clements

  Suddenly, the lights dimmed, and the familiar feeling of happy anticipation came over me. The wondrous element of the fashion shows is that even if a designer’s collection leaves you cold one season, there is always the possibility that it will completely transport you the next. When clothes are in the hands of the masters, it doesn’t matter if they are not to your personal taste; whether or not you would actually wear them is irrelevant. The importance of a great collection was that it challenged your thinking, that it combined historical and contemporary references and stirred the imagination. Professionally, a major show would also define how we would approach the next six issues of the magazine—the locations, models and photographers we would choose. I may have left the Prada show without feeling particularly compelled to dress like an Art Nouveau hobgoblin, but I certainly knew it was time to locate an enchanted forest to shoot in for the next September issue. I understood that, on seeing some of the more radical looks, many in the general public would consider the world of high fashion an idiotic load of self-serving nonsense, which it often was. Even the droll concierge in our Paris hotel used to hand over my invitations, roll his eyes and smilingly say: ‘Ahh, faaaasrshion’. But the great runway shows were, and are explorations and statements—and for those of us lucky enough to be receiving a salary to witness them, a gift.

  The scale and expense were often extraordinary. For one incredible autumn/winter Chanel show at the Grand Palais, a gigantic iceberg was carted in from Sweden—much to the horror of many environmentalists. It weighed 265 tons, was twenty-eight feet high and required thirty-five ice sculptors from around the globe and six days to get it ready for its close-up. The enormous Palais was then air-conditioned to remain at four degrees Celsius in order that the iceberg did not melt. Afterwards, I asked the PR what the budget was for a Chanel show.

  ‘Budget?’ he replied, slightly puzzled. ‘We don’t have budgets.’

  The same extravagance applied to Louis Vuitton or Dior, who would build working steam trains, hotel elevators, carousels and fountains—for a twenty-minute show.

  I loved that while we might like different collections more than others for reasons of individual taste, my editors and I always agreed on whether a show was seminal. A great collection was like a great piece of music or a great fragrance—it was when everything came together in a beautiful and cohesive whole: the clothes, the models, the hair and makeup, the soundtrack, the setting, all of it delivering a message with no jarring notes. I had a weakness for the forties and fifties, so if a collection had an underpinning of these periods, I was generally in heaven.

  ‘I absolutely adored that,’ I recall saying to Marie after a Dolce & Gabbana show that had featured pin-spot silk pyjamas, brocade dressing-gown coats, black velvet wedge sandals, ankle socks and paste jewels. It was Katharine Hepburn/Judy Garland-era Hollywood at its most decadent. Marie was more of a neon-plastic-strip shift á la Helmut Lang, neoprene Balenciaga girl, but she readily agreed.

  ‘Oh, I know, that was so you,’ she noted. ‘But it was primo.’ (It was lucky she was on the same page because I had to skip the following show season for budget reasons, which meant that in between appointments she had to comb every Dolce & Gabbana store in Europe in order to buy the aforementioned pyjamas for me.)

  * * *

  ‘I need a cup of tea,’ I said to Marie as we headed back to our car after the show, which, while masterful, had not fired our imaginations.

  We passed Ladureé, the pâtisserie famous for its macarons, which were elegantly presented in pale green boxes. Not having an especially sweet tooth, I was immune to their charms. I could not distinguish any difference in taste whether they were labelled pistachio, strawberry or chocolate, but they were all sickly sweet and gooey. A prettily arranged macaron had become the most ubiquitous and kitsch emblem of fashion bloggers, followed by the peony and the Christian Louboutin pump. If all of these things could be combined in one photo—on location in Positano—they’d struck gold.

  My phone shrilled. It was Geoffrey, a freelancer who would call wanting to have a drink and a ‘catch-up’ whenever he knew I was in town. He would never propose we meet at a cheap and cheerful bar; it was at always some grand hotel where drinks were thirty euros each. I empathised with freelancers though. I’d been one in Paris for a few years, and I knew just how tough it was.

  ‘Feel like a Kir Royale instead of tea?’ I asked Marie, who nodded. Her new shoes were killing her and she was relieved she would have a chance to rest for a moment, and put her iPhone down.

  Aside from the numerous dinners with PRs, hundreds of showroom appointments, re-sees and shows to attend, these days there was now the pressure to record every moment on social media. In previous times, all that we saw stayed under wraps for the next six months. But our management—and our readers—wanted digital content and they wanted it immediately. The day after the Prada show we politely asked the PR if we could take shots of the divine jewellery collection and post them. The answer was no, but ultimately, no house could control, confine or target its subsequent coverage—unless they followed the Tom Ford example of banning all cameras and prohibiting any reviews. So, as well as our other duties we were expected to act like maniacal ornithologists, snapping amateur-quality photos on our phones of anything and everything that was bright and shiny—and able to be hashtagged #parisrtw.

  We walked into the Four Seasons hotel, admiring the astonishing floral displays in the foyer and nodding at the comely pianist in a strapless dress who was playing reasonably awful lounge music. Geoffrey was already there, with what I took to be a tomato juice in front of him, and a hamburger. We each had a Kir Royale, and discussed the shows, what was the standout so far, and how the season was shaping up. He pitched a couple of fairly good ideas, and I suggested I get back to him after we had digested everything we had seen and were planning the upcoming issues. He left, dispensing double kisses and telling us he would see us on the rounds tomorrow.

  I asked for the cheque, noting with some anxiety that we were late for the next show. When the bill appeared, I discovered that Geoffrey had ordered three Bloody Marys before we arrived. With a sick feeling, I placed the credit card in the dainty silver tray. Two-hundred and sixty-five euros for afternoon tea. All I could think about was the CFO’s reaction. Marie’s idea of skipping every second dinner suddenly sounded even better.

  2

  This Year’s Model

  Later that week, we dined with two models we intended to book for Chic , who arrived with their mutual agent and who were both at different stages of their fledgling careers.

  Laura, a willowy brunette with sensational legs, had, at the age of seventeen and on her first trip to Europe, been booked for most of the shows, and even opened a couple of the bigger ones such as Marc Jacobs and Louis Vuitton. In her naivety, she had assumed that she was going to retain that position, and so returned home after the shows, and resumed eating, drinking and partying as normal. She gained a little weight, in areas such as her jawline and hips, went back to Europe two seasons later and wasn’t cast for a single show. The ‘look’ had changed anyway; a sort of transgender cool vibe that she didn’t have had replaced her slightly sexy schoolgirl appeal. So, her agency had suggested that she cut her hair short and dye it blonde (which didn’t suit her), drop the weight, and get new test shots to reinvent her and rejuvenate her career. Here she was at the ripe old age of nineteen, shy and quiet and smoking like a train at our sidewalk table. She was wearing the usual grungy/sexy model uniform of black jeans, an oversized grey Wang sweater over a Rick Owens singlet and Chanel biker boots.

  Jade had just turned eighteen, and had the enormous genetic good fortune of having the exact look of the moment: androgynous, flat chested, ice-pick thin, with a long, regal nose and a pallor so deathly she seemed to have been exsanguinated. She, too, was smoking, grinding out cigarette after cigarette, which only heightened her air of grungy glamour, and would put her in the running to be the next face of YSL and a poten
tial covergirl for Paris Vogue. Laura and Jade had obviously become friends, but I did wonder about the rivalry they might feel. Although their agents would have been reiterating to them that they were being chosen for their looks only, and not to feel personally judged if they didn’t get booked for a particular job, it must have been hard to deal with. I could sense the fragility under the surface.

  Given that Jade had in the last three weeks or so become number two on the highly influential and hallowed ‘Hot List’ on models.com, she caused a noticeable flurry of attention from observant fashionistas as they entered the restaurant. She, too, was carelessly chic in her androgynous Acne jeans, T-shirt, leather bomber jacket and Doc Martens. People always expected that models would be dressed in head-to-toe designer labels, and they often were, but the look was coolly casual, the intended impression to show the world they didn’t really give a shit. Landing on the ‘Hot List’ generally meant that a famous casting agent had either noticed or discovered a girl; that one of the revered design houses, such as Givenchy or Prada, liked her; a top photographer and magazine stylist thought she was amaaaazing; and that she was going to make a hell of a lot of money for all of them, if they just conspired to keep her exclusive. That is, her agency would only make her available to those in that inner sanctum, all of them hiring each other, and, as a consequence, she would became the industry’s most wanted, be booked for all the best advertising campaigns and command top dollar.

  A few fawning restaurant patrons began to drop by our outdoor table, inviting the girls to various insiders’ fashion parties. There were more parties during the ready-to-wear season than there were uneaten desserts. The big houses traditionally threw lavish dinners and other events, awash with Ruinart champagne and fine food, and filled with editors and journalists from around the globe. More recently, though, if a celebrity, sports star or ‘it’ girl was in attendance, they were most likely on the payroll for hundreds of thousands of dollars, so these affairs often felt forced and stagey. The hottest parties were much more underground, for the super-cool few who were in the know and on the guest list, held in small clubs or private residences, with performances from some new alternative music act from the UK, or with a surprise appearance from Lady Gaga or Prince.

  Although I loved a good time, I generally found the fashion parties rather dreary, especially in Milan—huge, impersonal affairs with deafening club music that were largely attended by buff homosexual men in black Dolce & Gabbana jackets. I didn’t go to nightclubs and store openings at home if I could help it, and there was even less reason for me to do it overseas, where I essentially knew no one outside of the PRs. I much preferred private dinners with industry friends or clients, in restaurants such as Bice in Milan or La Société in Paris, where you could talk and gossip, and play spot the celebrity, whether a designer, an actress or a top model.

  I always found it more interesting to look at a celebrity from afar than actually to meet them. In my experience, celebrities were so used to being courted for their fame and beauty that they could barely muster the enthusiasm to engage in a two-way conversation and were always wary that you wanted something from them. Being seated next to one for an entire dinner was often an exhausting experience, as, in order to avoid a deafening and embarrassing silence, I would have to keep thinking madly of another scintillating question to ask before they’d finished answering my last.

  There were, of course, some lovely exceptions. I was once seated opposite Elizabeth Hurley at a business dinner where she and I were the only women at a table of twelve men. I had watched her walk into the room, and swiftly charm every man at the table, all of whom were immediately smitten by her indisputable beauty. I sat there, mentally preparing myself for an evening of one-sided (mine) dialogue when, suddenly, she smiled, asked some intelligent questions and then chatted easily to me for the rest of the evening. I, too, was smitten.

  I had a similar experience with the supermodel Naomi Campbell, at a dinner in Athens at the foot of the Parthenon. Naomi’s supposedly ‘difficult’ reputation preceded her, and I was somewhat nervous when I checked the place cards at the table and saw she would be seated to my right. When she arrived, she was breathtaking: a gleaming goddess in a pleated silk evening dress, her hair swept up in intricate weaves. She introduced herself very sweetly and we talked non-stop for almost all of what proved to be a very delightful night. Designers were in a different celebrity category; because this was business, and we both wanted something from one another, it was easy to find some touch points to talk about. Many young designers were often slightly shy and seemed shadowed by self-doubt, which suggested to me that they were the real deal as artists. The bigger the braggart, the less talent they have, I had always thought. Of course, great designers like Karl Lagerfeld, Giorgio Armani, Valentino and Marc Jacobs were in a different, and less anxious, place, as befitted their incredible accomplishments, and I was always thrilled be anywhere near their orbit. But, in general, most famous people I could take or leave.

  But as for Laura and Jade, I always felt a pang of sympathy for models. More often than not, the men who wanted to date models were god-awful, which is why you would find so many of the girls sticking with their sweet hometown boyfriends, even though they were out-earning them by gazillions of dollars. During our dinner, Katerina entered the room and glided past our table. She was one of the top five models in the world, a statuesque Australian who looked not unlike a young Ava Gardner. She could make most men go weak at the knees, with her glamorous, slightly feline features; the delicious irony was that she was a committed lesbian, with no interest whatsoever in the opposite sex. She and I had once both been at a dinner in Paris, and I had watched with wry amusement when a Euro-trash businessman, complete with cigar, bowl haircut and Versace jeans, crashed our table, and made slimy innuendos at her. Katerina was polite for a while, but then, fed up, she tossed back a double Grey Goose, no ice, said firmly, ‘Piss off, you’re a dickhead,’ and then kissed her girlfriend—a retort and behaviour that I admired no end.

  As poor Laura and Jade nodded and smiled as various fashion people dropped by the table, half-heartedly making plans to go to a hole-in-the-wall nightclub on the outskirts of Paris, I decided it was the right moment to say goodnight. Given the time difference, I knew I would be able to make it back to my hotel just in time to receive a phone call from my husband, complaining that while I was in Europe partying, the kids were sick; an email from the magazine’s advertising team basically insinuating it was my fault that they were $300 000 off-budget, because I was jetsetting at the collections and wasn’t there help them sell ads; and an aggressive memo from my publisher, informing me that the circulation figures were down and that when I was ‘back from holidays’, we would need to sit down and brainstorm what I was doing wrong. I tapped Marie on the shoulder, and called for the bill.

  ‘Just to be clear, Laura and Jade are exclusive to Chic,’ I reiterated to their agent, who couldn’t lie straight in bed and who hadn’t taken his sunglasses off during dinner. He probably didn’t want to make too much direct eye contact, in case Faux, the next night, asked to strike a similar deal; options were weighed on an hourly basis.

  A huge percentage of my time was spent making sure that we trumped the other magazines, on models, photographers, press racks and stories. If it wasn’t exclusive to us, we didn’t want it. It was a tough stance to take, and it caused the agents and PRs all sorts of headaches, but it was imperative that we secure all the top talent if Chic were to maintain an edge. We had a tentative cover shoot booked with both Laura and Jade later that week, once the shows had finished. I hoped that they would be able to stay the distance—both of them looked far too tired and wan to have a huge night, and neither one of them had eaten more than a tomato salad and half a grissini. Actually, Laura had eaten half a pizza, but she was in the bathroom for about twenty minutes afterwards, so I figured it didn’t really count.

  No one ever really talked about anorexia or bulimia around models. Even
if you suspected that a girl was suffering from either of these, it was left unsaid. If a girl suddenly dropped weight, her agent would tell you she’d been working out a lot, as if jutting shoulderblades, emaciated arms and prominent ribs were the result of long hours spent at a SoulCycle spin class. I recall an incident when I was at a very posh restaurant in London, having been seated with a hedge-fund trader—who resembled George Costanza—and his ‘model’ girlfriend. She was one of those prettyish blondes in her late twenties who had a portfolio containing two amateur shots, including one of her wearing lingerie, and called herself a part-time model. Rich heterosexual guys fell for it all the time. If a genuine of-the-moment super-cool model had presented herself to them, they would have thought she looked like a half-starved alien. After dessert, the ‘model’ excused herself and headed for the restroom.

  ‘I don’t why I spend all this money on expensive dinners,’ said George exasperatedly, shaking his head. ‘She just throws it all up.’

  It was the first time I had ever heard someone talk about bulimia so unconcernedly. I just stared at him as he reached for his phone and checked his emails.

  * * *

  The morning after the dinner with Laura and Jade was one of the big shows, a highlight of the whole season. It had become a tradition that the PR and marketing manager of the house, Erica, would take Marie and me to Le Meurice for lunch after the show, to debrief on what we had just seen and make some initial choices about which looks we would like to request for Chic. Erica and I had become great friends over the years. She was a tasteful, elegant person with a keen sense of the absurd, which was a prerequisite when you worked in fashion PR. The client stories she would tell me were jaw dropping. It is said that with great power comes great responsibility; in the world of luxury fashion, with great wealth comes a bizarre sense of entitlement and an almost bottomless pit of petulant lunacy.