The Chiffon Trenches

by André Leon Talley

  At Chanel’s haute couture show in January 1998, inspired by Misia Sert, a true friend of Mademoiselle Chanel, I said to Anna: “We must stand up and applaud Karl.”

  Karl had returned to the famous rue Cambon salon and we were packed in like sardines.

  I bolted to my feet and Anna Wintour sat there, as she was expected to do, as editor in chief of Vogue.

  Culturally, Vogue is an institution with unspoken rules and unspoken mannerisms.

  The Devil Wears Prada inaccurately portrayed a lot of things that never would happen at Vogue. For instance, Anna Wintour would never throw down her bags and coats. And girls didn’t run up and down the halls in high heels. People did not carry on like that.

  Vogue was a culture of deportment, a culture of manners. This was all unspoken, yet it was crystal clear. Flowers were sent and thank-you notes were handwritten. You established relationships and you adhered to them. You were meticulously groomed.

  There was no vulgar language, you did not walk into the office drunk or hungover, and you certainly did not bed designers.

  We embraced the fashion world and they in turn embraced us. Vogue has the highest standards of excellence in publishing journalism. It stood for that in the day of Diana Vreeland and the day of Grace Mirabella, and it certainly stands for that in the day of Anna Wintour. When one is aligned with Vogue, one is aligned with the best team in the world of fashion. A designer wants to be associated with Vogue. A designer wants to have Anna Wintour endorse them, embrace them. It’s a culture.

  It must be said that my role at Vogue was no doubt secured by my relationship with Karl Lagerfeld. His importance in my life and career is without parallel. When Anna wore Chanel to her wedding, she had to go through Joan Juliet Buck to gain access to the dresses. Otherwise she purchased her Chanel at Bergdorf Goodman. My friendship with Karl was already poured and molded solid, like gold bricks. This closeness gave me an inside take as well as leverage: A lot of people wanted to get to Karl Lagerfeld.

  Karl would listen to me. He would sit for hours and look at the fittings, at Chanel, at Lagerfeld. He’d turn to me: “What do you think, darling? What do you think?” He’d say, “Oh, change it. Change it. What do you think?”

  I was always incorporated into conversations about him at Vogue. It wasn’t like Anna would ask me to get Karl Lagerfeld on the phone for her, but when we were looking at his dresses, she’d ask me what I thought, knowing I would also know what Karl thought. Whenever Anna and I were in Paris, we’d go up to see him together at Chanel, to see what the collection was like. Anna prefers to see clothes in previews before any other editor, of any magazine. That is her power. I was there as a valued ambassador; it was where my opinion mattered. I know that she and Karl felt I had something special, a keen talent to see the magic in the moment, of the creative process of refined dressmaking.

  VII

  Now that I was high up the masthead at Vogue, I wasn’t surprised to get a call from Pierre Bergé. He wanted to meet at his avenue Marceau office, the grand Second Empire salon and headquarters of the couture house, where everything was conceived.

  We sat in his office and got to business quickly. “I want to give you the opportunity to write the definitive biography on Yves,” he said.

  In true French fashion, I was out of favor with Pierre Bergé one moment, and the next he was offering me a huge sum of money. What a total turnaround, a volte-face!

  Here was the powerful man who once loathed me so much he had me shipped back to New York, shrouded in a false scandal, and now he was handing me a gilded laurel leaf.

  He realized I had staying power and was still a force, a fierce force, so he was sincere in offering me this most extraordinary opportunity of a lifetime. He also knew, instinctively, that Yves adored me and that Yves knew I passionately understood his genius, his crafting of clothes that danced with the wearer, of clothes that spoke volumes of romance and luxury and refinement.

  I enthusiastically accepted; despite all, it was such an honor. To write a book about Yves Saint Laurent, with his cooperation, would be a career highlight. A financial advance on the book was sent to me via the publishing house, Knopf.

  That’s Liz Tilberis sitting in front of Bob Colacello, and behind him is Franca Sozzani, Irene Silvagni, Colombe Pringle, and Anna Wintour, sexy as ever in a short sundress. I am wearing a bespoke seersucker suit, Chanel sunglasses, and a straw newsboy cap by Jean Paul Gaultier. Marina Schiano took this photo, circa 1989.

  It was a heavy workload, a major time commitment, on top of my demanding job at Vogue. Anna supported my doing it, but I was naïve as to how consuming it would be and failed to properly navigate those waters. Looking back, I realize now that I should have quit my job, or gone on sabbatical from Vogue, and spent a year or two researching and writing the book. Instead, I was still at Vogue running around with Gianni Versace and covering the shows and all, assuming I could just do the book on the side.

  When I sat down to start writing, I realized I did not have the capacity to see chronologically the magnitude of what YSL was. I felt like a fish caught and thrown in a boat, flopping around.

  I was in the south of France on assignment for Vogue, doing a story on antique shops in a small village, and I called Pierre back in Paris. I was taking too long to do the book, and we both knew it, but I didn’t want to admit it. He asked when I expected to have a manuscript. Not a word had been submitted to him.

  I said, “Pierre, the Bible was not written in speed time. It takes time!”

  Pierre just laughed. When I arrived back in New York, I heard through the grapevine that a French lawyer, Alain Coblence, a friend of the house of YSL, was busy finding another writer.

  During my marathon daily phone call with Karl, he tried superficially to console me.

  “Poor boy!” he chirped over the phone. I am sure deep down, Karl was thrilled it had gone like this. When it had been announced I would be doing the book, he never said a word; he just shrugged his shoulders and went quickly to the next moment in his day.

  “Don’t give that terrible man the advance money back,” Karl said now.

  I hadn’t even thought of that. So much of the money had already been spent. Years later, I wrote a check to the Pierre Bergé–Yves Saint Laurent Foundation for half the amount, along with a personal note to Pierre that I would pay the rest as soon as I was able. I never got a thank-you note, but the check was definitely cashed.

  Not writing Yves’s book is one of my greatest regrets in life. I had a tremendous opportunity, but I was too naïve to see what a gift Pierre had offered me. They got a great writer, Laurence Benaïm, from Le Monde, to do the book, and it is an extraordinary biography, published recently in English by Rizzoli. It doesn’t mention me at all. I recommend it anyway.

  —

  After a decade and a half of friendship with Karl, I began to see a pattern emerge: He had a tendency to dismiss people he loved from his life.

  Frances Patiky Stein, a favorite American Vogue editor, moved to Paris, worked on accessories for Chanel, and had a fight with Karl, and Karl never spoke to her again.

  Inès de la Fressange infuriated Karl when she modeled for a bust of Marianne, an iconic symbol of France. Why should she be the Marianne when she was supposed to represent Chanel? He dropped Inès with terrible innuendos in the press. Somehow, she got back in favor with Karl before he died.

  Patrick Hourcade, who worked for French Vogue under Francine Crescent, hunted for valuable French and European antiques on Karl’s behalf for years. He found one of the original Aubusson rugs in Versailles. One year, Karl found out Patrick had moved in with a partner. He was dropped.

  Kitty D’Alessio, who got Karl the job at Chanel, was on the list. She changed the history of Chanel by hiring Karl, and perhaps she said so too loudly and too often. As a result, Kitty was not only fired, she was banned from ever attending a Chanel fashion show again.

  As was Antonio Lopez, the fashion illustrator, one of Karl’s closes
t friends in the early years. Antonio’s fashion sketches had been a major inspiration for Karl when he was first designing for Chloé. In the seventies, Karl included the Puerto Rican artist and his best friend, Juan, in everything.

  Karl gleaned all he could from Antonio and Juan, and they bathed in the luxury that comes with being in Karl’s inner circle. Entire apartments were furnished with lavish art deco antiques for Antonio and Juan. In return, they introduced Karl to the inside characters of the Warhol Factory, like Donna Jordan and Corey Tippin. There are wonderful photos of Antonio and Donna Jordan on the beach in Saint-Tropez, guests for the entire season at Karl’s villa. All the best models knew and loved Antonio. He taught them how to pose!

  When I first sat down with Karl for Interview, it was Antonio and Juan who had arranged the entire thing. And then one day Karl had had his fill. He asked them to return all the art deco furniture in their Paris apartments to him. And then he simply never spoke to them again.

  This demanding back of presented gifts was nothing new for Karl. He once sent me (from his storage) a rare eighteenth-century French canapé for my drawing room. One day, abruptly, he asked for it back. So my drawing room went without a canapé. He probably wanted to sell it. Jerry Hall once warned me that Karl always took back precious gifts, and he did. Any fine antiques he gave others were considered to be loans.

  Why Antonio and Juan were suddenly expunged from the inner sanctum, who knows? I’m sure Karl had his reasons. Very likely they were simply no longer useful to him or his career. Plenty of others suffered the same fate, and I always knew in the back of my mind that at any given moment I could be next on the chopping block. Karl resented people for being close to him.

  The only one who seemed to avoid this fate was the one true love of Karl’s life, the handsome Jacques de Bascher.

  Jacques never went to an office, never really worked at all, which meant he could devote himself to being attentive to Karl. Jacques did not wake up until midafternoon.

  All he had to do was get up at some point in the day and look elegant. He was from a noble French family—a bit down on their luck, but a good name in Paris counts for a lot, nonetheless, especially to someone like Karl. It’s all very European, very French.

  I went to Jacques’s family manor one summer; Jacques and I stopped by and had lunch. I met his mother and his sister. Then we moved on by car to Karl’s sumptuous eighteenth-century château in Brittany. The de Bascher family had (and still owns) a vineyard, and Karl always had their white wine on hand.

  In many ways, Jacques was the ideal love for a person like Karl Lagerfeld. Jacques was truly handsome and he dressed with style. Everyone adored him. He was friends with Loulou as well as Kenzo, the Japanese designer. He wasn’t just a stud; he could have a conversation. He was complicit in Karl’s obsession with the eighteenth century and the French kings Louis XIV, Louis XV, and Louis XVI. He lived in beautiful decorated rooms, heavily researched, organized, and paid for by Karl.

  Karl invented the world he wanted to have, and that meant everyone around him had to play their part. More important, they had to dress their part, and Jacques was a perfectly willing and stunningly attractive mannequin to dress. Karl styled him like an extravagant eighteenth-century dandy, and he did not skimp on the fur coats from Fendi.

  If you were in Karl’s life, he dressed you. When he gave me those shirts the first day I met him, that was his way of inviting me into his world. Paloma Picasso and Inès de la Fressange were dressed free of charge at Chanel and Fendi. As was Tina Chow, one of his favorite friends and muses.

  Paloma, Inès, and Tina would all find themselves cut off from Karl, eventually. Tina went first, and I played an unwilling role in her banishment. She had come to me seeking Karl’s help, on behalf of Antonio Lopez, who was dying of AIDS.

  “Antonio needs money,” Tina said to me. “Can you ask Karl to help him? He’ll listen to you.”

  I told her that I would ask. What’s the harm in asking? Karl and I had dinner later that night on the Left Bank and I broached the subject.

  “Karl, Antonio is now ill and he needs money, you know. Tina Chow is concerned, she asked if you could help….”

  “What are you talking about?” He was angry that I had put such thoughts into his mind. And he never spoke to Tina Chow again.

  Antonio had given Karl so much inspiration when they were younger, but Karl did not like being asked for help, as I would come to learn over the years. The generosity had to come from his own mind. It was peculiar, as I personally knew how generous a man Karl could be. But it had to be on his terms.

  Bill Cunningham stepped in to provide help, purchasing one of Antonio’s drawings to help pay his medical bills. He paid for it in cash, then resold it for an extraordinary sum, and that money was given to Antonio as well.

  Perhaps the influx of cash helped Antonio die more comfortably, but there was simply no working treatment for his illness. He died in 1987, of complications from AIDS.

  No one understood what was happening at first, this so-called gay cancer that was tearing into the fashion industry. Of course it wasn’t really a gay cancer; Tina Chow herself soon passed away from AIDS-related illness.

  Joe McDonald, a successful male model, was one of the first to die of AIDS. Peter Lester, of Interview, died. Fabrice Simon, a wonderful Haitian designer, died. Designer Ronald Kolodzie. Scott Barrie, one of the most successful black designers ever in America. Barrie lived in an elegant art deco brownstone, furnished with banquettes covered in flawless, and expensive, ivory satin. I often think about what the world would be like if Scott Barrie had lived.

  —

  I’m not belittling myself to say my strength was in my ability to be beside a small, great, powerful white woman and encourage her vision. In exchange, Diana Vreeland always showed me unconditional love, and Anna Wintour and I became extremely close. To be clear, however, neither of them ever felt like small women to me.

  Except when it came to clothes fittings.

  Anna treated me like family and she was there for me when I needed her most.

  When I wanted to buy a house for my grandmother in Durham in 1988, Anna went to S.

  I. Newhouse and got me an interest-free loan. I was so happy to do this for my grandmother but she was not able to enjoy it for long. A year later, my grandmother, Bennie Frances Davis, died. In August of that same year, Diana Vreeland passed away as well.

  These two women shaped me into the man I am today. Mama radiated true unconditional love, and I thrived in the safety and security she provided. Diana Vreeland gave me the confidence and the grandeur and the boldness to be who I was, just by example. Losing them both, back-to-back, was devastating.

  After burying my grandmother and attending Mrs. Vreeland’s very private family funeral mass in the small chapel in Saint Thomas Episcopal church, I found that my grief was overwhelming. I turned to food for comfort. I went into a major binge-addled diet. Some take to drink; I took to eating two packs of Fig Newtons every night. I binged and then suffered all the shame, self-loathing, and misery associated with overeating.

  The pounds soon started to find their way onto what had up until that time always been a slender frame.

  I didn’t tell anyone the depth of the depression I was going through. I put on a brave face during the day, keeping up the veneer of presentation, my sartorial armor, but at home I was alone and lonely and missed these two important women in my life.

  My light shined because of the man my grandmother raised and the example she set forth in front of me. I walked with dignity, the way she did, although she was not afforded the pleasure of advancing because of her lack of education and the culture of Southernness. She did achieve the impossible later in her life, becoming chairwoman of the church deacon board. To mark the occasion I donated a communion room at her church, in her honor.

  Upon my grandmother’s death, I joined the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem.

  Church had always been a part of my l
ife, though I kept it private. My friends knew I went to church every Sunday, but I didn’t talk about it at work. My work life and church life were two separate worlds.

  Through the sanctuary of the church, I gird myself in spiritual armor. The tradition of churchgoing is like new fresh oxygen to my blood. It is renewed every seven days. For so long I was absent. I had issues not with the church but with myself; I told myself that church was inside of me. To reject the routine of formal churchgoing, which I was brought up in from the age of eight, causes peril in my emotional stability. Somehow, I always return, to be reminded through the ministry of song, prayer, and communion that there is sanctuary and love in the black church.

  As part of an extended family, I find it heartwarming when the deacons at Abyssinian greet me with comforting smiles before the commencement of the morning service. And when fellow congregant Cicely Tyson says, “You’re back. Where have you been for so long?” it also warms my heart. Strangers—yes, strangers—in the Sunday morning church service manifest sincere respect and love for me. I depend so much on my faith and churchgoing. I just sit there, rolling back and forth in my pew, and thanking God for how I got over.

  After my grandmother’s death, my mother and I grew estranged. I simply refused to speak to her. It was the culmination of so many moments when my mother was verbally abusive, to me and to her mother, my grandmother. They had such a terrible relationship, because my grandmother did what my mother did not want to do: take care of me. My mother resented her for it, but I was better off. My grandmother instilled in me the values of family, love, and tradition. And yet there were a handful of moments where I was able to connect with my mother, often through clothes. Like when she took me to buy my first custom suit, navy blue wool serge, double-breasted, made by the best tailor in Washington, D.C. I told him I wanted it to be stovepipe skinny like the Beatles’