Thought Music

I found a Walkman, not an ipod, or iphone, but an old-fashioned Walkman from the late 80s. It was a yellow “sports” Walkman, with waterproof seals and dark grey plugs for all of the holes. Inside there was a cassette. Contained on the tape was a composition labeled THOUGHT-MUSIC. No mention of the composer.

It caught me by surprise; what was the Walkman doing on my little section of beach, at the head of the trail right near my back door?

It was wrapped in banana leaves and resting on a little pedestal made from carved coconuts. It was as if some impish cat had caught a mouse and proudly offered it to her owner by leaving the carcass on the doormat—but instead this was some gift for me (I suppose?) possibly to be inspiration for one of my shows for a new mood or a new direction. I normally listen to the most difficult, unpleasant styles of classical music: the kind of music that feels like mathematics rendered through a rainstorm that occasionally breaks into a melodic phrase of clarity that feels so refreshing that the entire struggle seems worth it. I had studied composition in my youth, and ever since listening to difficult music has remained an indulgence.

This cassette was indeed classical music, but of a different kind. It was a special type of intellectual statement—less about the bombastic tinkering of a shouting poet and more about the clarity of thought that comes from having something to say. Parts of it were dark, but other parts were lighthearted and even funny—when the music seemed to drop away all concerns and pretense and began to display a sense of humor—not silly humor, but more like the droll humor of a great wit—before turning its attention to shapes and thoughts of intense beauty.

The line was melodic, but also structural, without being too pedantic or literal. Sometimes several phrases would play at once—like a thoroughly entertaining cocktail party, where you overhear conversations that lay atop of one another— the resulting tonal lines (sometimes even simultaneously in different keys!) were complimentary and unique, as if to say although we are all having different conversations, we are all at the same party. It reminded me of the type of music I would have like to have written had I gone on with composition instead of switching to fashion when I found the musical world too remote.

I showed the Walkman to Tako, and she just smiled and said Happy Anniversary. I asked her who the composer was, and she told me to go look in the mirror. The music, she claimed, came from a pile of scores she had found in a box at my mother’s house. She had sent the score to some friends of hers at Julliard, who had cleaned it up a bit (but not too much she promised), recorded it and sent it back as a CD. She had dubbed it to cassette and left it for me to find.

Tako gives the best gifts. She gave me a piece of my old self. Do you see now why I love this woman so?

Artisanal Lace

This much I do remember: Jebez Jr. and I had gone shopping for costumes for an afternoon tea party where we wanted to dress like people other than ourselves. We were having a great time not taking life too seriously. At one point he grabbed a piece of cardboard off the street and held it to his face like a mask; three people leaned out of a window and waved to us from a party until they were pulled back to the dance floor. I felt a bit like I used to feel in college—like I knew a little something secretive and special about the world and given a chance I would find a way to share it. The shopping proved futile, but we were in such a fine mood that we didn’t want the afternoon to end. We ended up drinking cà phê sữa đá by the bucket in a stuffy shop that sold used books. The iced coffee was strong and invigorating, but also I think tainted with some other toxin, because what happened next was not at all expected.

I got up from my seat and pulled J.J. with me by the front of his jacket. My hearing wrapped around itself and my vision degraded in long blue smears until it turned into the after burn of flash bulbs popping like rain drops in a puddle. My consciousness failed as I passed out. What happened next remains a mystery to me.

Schifffahrt...

I woke up asleep inside of a boat. Not my yacht, but a fishing boat no bigger than a floating coffin, nothing more than a skiff. I tried to piece together what had happened, but found my memory frozen with the shock of self-disapprobation; I do not like to be out of control, even if it is not my fault. My face was against the floor of the boat. My nose was flattened by my own weight. I did not want to get up, but as always, inaction was no recourse; I rolled over and sat up. The boat was floating aimlessly down a river. No one else was in the skiff. I was wearing four thousand dollar shoes, dirty denim trousers and a black fisherman’s sweater. These were not the clothes I remember last wearing. There was a brass key taped to the inside of the boat’s hull but no label attached to the key and no other item in the boat. I did not know if it was dawn or dusk. Floating like Moses in his basket, I knew nothing about my journey. I put the key in my pocket and unlatched the one remaining oar and set the boat towards the bank of the river. I chose the port side bank, if for no other reason than I thought it made for a more cinematic landing, with the low cross light of the sun just hitting my cheek, filling all dimpled hollows and time-worn valleys of my face; etched in golden light, I rowed to the port side shore.

Running aground, I had to hop out of the boat to keep it from turning downstream. The maneuver soaked my shoes and pant legs up to the knee. I pulled the skiff ashore, as I felt some need to secure it for future use if my more or less fortuitous landing spot proved an unfortunate draw. All rivers occupy low ground, so I had to hike upwards a bit to get a sense of where I was.

Waiting for me at the top of the embankment was the vast, thrilling, chasm of nothingness: no idea, no plan, no guide, no reference, only the openness of opportunity. The bank gave way to land, which gave way to a road, which lead to a wood, which I followed like a detective musicologist chasing the sound of a clarinet’s melody in the middle of a rising jazz cacophony. My feet slapped forward with my curiosity alternating between wonder and disorientation like the clapping hands of an enthusiastic listener who can't quite follow the beat.

The road lead to a grand country estate. I felt an uncanny certainty that the key in my pocket would open the front door, and of course, it did.

Inside, the estate was lit only with candles and large fireplaces burning what smelled like a combination of Cedar and Scots Pine. I had seen neither of these trees on my walk to the estate, and wondered if the wood had been brought in just for the wonderful smell. There was a long table set with marzipan and cut fruit that had clearly been arranged within the last few hours. Down the hall I heard music and I followed it not knowing what I would find.

The hall gave way to a grand ballroom. Inside people were dancing and drinking and swinging in each other’s arms. A man ran up to me and clasped me on either shoulder and exclaimed how happy he was that I had made it back. Women were wearing gowns cut across their bodies to both conceal and reveal their inner architecture. Several were wearing pieces that included artisanal lace and embroidery—hallmarks of truly expensive couture. The music was courtly and drifted through the bodies of people dancing, so that it was louder in the gaps and muffled across the shifting masses of people turning and whirling through the open room.

Enlivened by the presence of other people, my senses domed around me forming the fuzz of a personal ecosphere. I was moving through the crowd while still completely in my own world. Glimpsing from across the heads of dancers, I spied Tako turning and leaving the room. My heart leaped and I followed quickly to find her. Did she see me? Where was she going?

The Deluge

Each hallway ended in another room, which lead to another hall or chamber. Although large from the outside, the estate proved enormous when you were in the thick of it. When I caught up to Tako, she was moving quickly, but not running. She took my hand and led me first through the library and then abruptly through a steaming copper kitchen. Out the other side, we crossed a music room, replete with a harpsichord, celesta, and piano (was it only keyboard instruments?) until we arrived at a side entrance to the estate. J.J. pulled around in a matte grey 1962 Jaguar convertible with a right-hand drive. Tako and I climbed in and J.J. wheeled the car around the driveway, nearly clipping a stone statue of Venus. We were about to leave the estate behind when I realized the car wasn’t made of metal, but instead was carved from a single block of ice. It started to crumble and fall apart and the road itself began to loosen and suddenly the three of us were neck deep in a river mud. The river cleansed itself as more water rushed forward and the whole party from the estate was now floating around us with chairs, serving platters, masked patrons, chefs, band members, women in cocktail dresses still swilling their drinks, men in tuxedos playing cards while floating on their backs, dogs with diamond collars and eager young lovers kissing on couches, which were floating half-submerged and collecting frogs and sticks and debris from the river in the cushions; lampshades floated past tables floating past silver trays of salmon canapés; river animals crawled up on chairs and ate straight from the plates; Tako held me close as we watched the deluge churn; J.J. picked up a violin and started playing the birdsongs one would expect in these woods; I saw items from my youth tucked inside little gift bags floating past and treasured designs I had created but forgotten amid the muck and the mud; a photographer from my first collection sailed by on a Louis XVI chair and snapped our picture with a Polaroid, he reached over to give it to me but then took it back at the last second, saying it was a keepsake; snakes slithered past with jewels in their mouths; a woman in courtly dress found a salamander lodged in her décolletage; Tako held onto my side as we floated on, she leaned her mouth close to my ear and whispered in a way that made all other sound disappear, “Après nous?”

Sandscape

In my dreams I am returning to the same swimsuit, unable to fix certain problems of drape and contour. The body changes as I stitch, the shape morphs into another form, and my ability to be precise becomes as elusive as the Elysian Fields. My fingers turn to butter and I cannot hold my needle and thread. The model grows enormous and then shrinks beneath my touch only to return again to normal size. I am searching for the solution and attempting to see an answer, but the shape and structure drift. When I grip the fabric it turns to sand.

Anxiety dreams come every night. The only cure is to get back in the Atelier and get to work. My mind clearly wants to work, and invents problems where there are none.

The dream returns. In the distant sand I can see a figure. It is feminine, walking with each foot exactly in line with the last so that the hips swing like the rolling waves of the sea. The figure is carrying something. It is a long rope. She drags the rope this way and that, making some sort of arrangement in the sand. She comes closer but gets more blurry and indistinct. I cannot see her clearly, but I am sure she is a messenger.

I take off my glasses to get a better view. I cannot see at all. Blowing sand is everywhere.

Alone now in the desert, looking down on myself, there's a message in the sand. The rope carried by the figure spells out something poetic, short, but certain. I can barely read it. I start tracing the letters one at a time.

T-A-K-O

Style Ballast

Standing taller than her, looking down her forehead while holding her close, her face becomes a landscape. I can see the lovely shape of her eyebrows, and the delicate rise of her upper eyelids, the fanned elongation of her eyelashes, the peak of her nose, and the flowering of her lips that fades to the valley of her neck just past the curve of her chin. In love with Tako more than ever, I hold her close and keep staring. She looks up, and I melt.

The interstitial space between the fabric and the woman is the essence of drape. In cutting a dress, you construct this space and nothing more. The rest is decoration.

Faint, faint, if any
Eyebrows.

Said Vreeland to her assistant.

Watching a woman walk is to evaluate the placement of potential drape. How much swing, and where are the points off which to hang the cavalcade? When she stops walking, how will it settle? When she stands, with one hip slightly higher than the other, the interstitial space should feel expressly manifest as a static form as well as ripe with the potential for the polymorphism of movement.

As King Lear said, "Ripeness is all."

Speeding at night towards an unmoving deer that has been stunned by your headlights, you can sense this ripeness for movement. The deer will jump, but which way?

Ballast in a boat provides stability but can decrease your speed. There is a perfect weight for optimal speed and maneuverability. Ballast in taste is a lightweight affair, but it needs to be there. How much baggage do you bring with you to ensure your judgement is meaningful, and how much baggage is just too much extra weight, slowing you down and causing you to make long wide turns? With no ballast at all, you just skip across the top, but can easily flip and sink.

Why does anyone care about clothes? There is no larger meaning to apparel, but there are limitless smaller ones.

Back on the street, watching a figure walk towards you, calculating the length of her stride and the off-set tilting of her hips, so that a traveling ellipse could be created in space that wobbles to the side as it tracks the peaks of her hips, pivoting on a disembodied sacrum that moves forward with each step, and slides slightly to each side when it pivots, so that it sea-saws like the profile view of a canoe travelling over rolling waves of river water; you can sense a virtual representation of this particular woman's style ballast. She carries it in her hips. She dips it side to side while moving it forward. Tracing the path of this virtual flow would yield a graceful wake of movement, like when you drag a gentle finger zig-zagging through the icing on a cake.

I cut clothes in my mind. Is this unreasonable? I doubt I'll stop thinking about drape, about the interstitial space, or about the tracking of someone's style ballast.

Watching someone sitting there, I often imagine the slight adjustments I might make to their shirt or trousers. Often it is a small change, such as raising the shoulder break, or more usually a shoulder strap, by just one or two centimeters. Sometimes it is a larger change, but for that I have to imagine something of his or her frame, such as the line of the clavicles, so that my hopes for an alteration are based on something essential about that particular body. But mostly, alterations are just after-thoughts, easy things to do in your mind when you glance over in someone's direction but don't wish to have a conversation. A harder thing is to design from scratch. Everything else is wordplay.

Calling out after her as she walks down the hall, not because you have anything more to say, but only for the reason that if you call with just the right tone in your voice, she will half-turn back towards you while continuing to walk forward, and this elongated twist, this sloping S-curve that not only rocks forward and back, but also right to left, is the essence of all sculpture - she is moving in space, but connected back to you. She coming and going, locked in, yet leaving, a part of the current moment, and moving toward something else. The transition of the figure is the teleos of drape.

Where were we when we first realized that we were on the edge of no longer being very young, and then that edge extended, and kept broadening, and then started to slip away in an asymptotic gloaming? Youth is everlasting only as a constant glimmering fade.

Near the surface of the water, the trout flashes its silver body and shakes free the hook. In the boat, we reel in the line, and re-bait the hook.

Is there any more compelling argument for the existence of poetics than the natural body of a woman? What is more beautiful? What is more elegant or more hypnotic? Watching the woman you love look over at you and smile is to draw an invisible chord between the ends of the arc that starts in her mind and ends somewhere deep within your chest - at a location that is near your perceived center of gravity, somewhere between your gut and your heart.

How high should the armhole ride on a woman's blouse? If it is too high, it can bind and cause difficult pulling across the front panels. If it is too low, the entire torso lacks any will to exist. The answer seems to be to place the armhole as high as you can without looking like you are trying too hard to get it there. The armhole should feel unforced, but also superior - just a little higher than normal - and just a little bit better placed - but not in a way that calls attention to itself. The woman will simply look better and no one knows why. Her arms are just a little more elegantly connected than expected, due to the subtle placement of the armhole.

When is it best to show your neck and when is it best to hide it? The elongated neck of a woman is the twisting tree trunk of beauty. It rises from her bosom and extends to her eyes before being carried by her hair to the atmosphere. If her hair is down, the neck curves around in the shadows, if her hair is up, it is both brave and vulnerable. An exposed neck should be worn fearlessly - delicately, elegantly, but fearlessly.

Contempt

Like a glass cloche placed over a cake to keep it moist once taken out of the oven, Brigitte Bardot’s hair in Jean-Luc Godard’s 1963 film, Contempt, sits atop her head protecting her beauty and drawing us in with it’s tempting curves and shaggy flip. I’ve always loved the structure of her hair design in this film, but I’ve always had a problem with the color: it is simply too blonde. She was a natural brunette – and I wish she had been styled that way.

We were hard at work planning a teaser campaign for the swimwear line and I had the idea to re-create scenes from Godard’s Contempt, but instead of a bottle-blonde Bardot, we would use an unknown brunette we would somehow find on the web. We stopped what we had been scripting (a terrible idea that was more or less an uninspired rip-off of A-ha’s Take on Me music video) and started preparing the new concept.

It didn’t take much searching to find our model. There are so many great faces on the internet. Three days later, our model was booked and we were on set shooting. She was a complete amateur, but acted like a total professional. She never faked her way through anything – if she didn’t understand something she simply asked, and if she had an idea that could help makes things go more smoothly, she spoke up. It was great working with her.

For the script, I took Contempt as a starting point, and then threw away everything but the hair and wrote a completely new story. It grew into a 22-minute film.

The plot is simple – an intelligent woman is deep at work on a literary project when she stumbles upon some research left by her late great uncle in the family library. The research seems to be some type of cure for a rare form of cancer. Right before she can bring the discovery to the Swiss Institute of Medical Research, the family mansion is burglarized and the research is stolen. She follows a trail of clues to a villa over looking the sea, and goes undercover as an aspiring bikini model to track down the research and recover the cure. Along the way, she falls in love with the son of the thief, and must reconcile her heart and her mind. Is there any way out for our hero?

The scene we were shooting was similar in set-up to the “roll around on the rug” scene from Contempt, but instead of shag carpet, we were in a park on the grass, and instead of being nude, our actress was in a strapless wrap dress that unwrapped as she rolled around to reveal her Serg Riva swim wear underneath. It was quite a scene, and very technically difficult to get the dress to unwrap in just the right way as not to appear too burlesque.

Everything was going just fine and we were all wrapped and watching the footage back at the atelier and when I realized that a dog had visited our set without us knowing it and had deposited a particular piece of set-dressing that I had not intended to have placed in that specific scene. I couldn’t have our star rolling around in that and was furious. How had we missed this on set? We were all so focused on the dress and the hair and the unwrapping reveal of the swim suit that we totally over looked the grass and the present from our dear dog friend.

We had to re-shoot the scene – this time with no dog droppings – in the middle of the night with rented lights. I woke everyone up and dragged the entire team out to the grassy lawn. Our star was a good sport about it – and to be honest, looked even better with her hair slightly crushed in the way that only bed-head can achieve. The harsh shadows of the lights added an extra feeling of subterfuge to the shoot. I was so happy with the end result that I didn’t even flinch when the sprinklers came on and soaked everyone right after we cut from shooting the final take. Tired, soaking wet, and filled with excited screams, the crew squealed their way out of the park and ran back to the prep area. Our star stayed a little longer dancing in the sprinklers, and Tako walked out in a white silk evening gown and slipped her hand around my shoulder. She had been filming this whole time too, it seems, and was happy with the final shot.

We Are Designing Dreams...

“We are not designing swimwear,” I declare to the sleepy-eyed beauties stitching together hand-made gold lamé bikinis on my floating atelier, “we are designing dreams!”

We have been working hard. The whole team is pushing late enough each night to watch the stars visibly rotate in the sky. I am thrilled to be working again, making great pieces and finding new answers to old questions that come drifting to me in the night like the distant echo of a siren’s song; I am seduced by design, that much is certain.

You can only push a team so far before the mood starts to crack. I knew I had to do something if I was going to keep working the team as hard as I was, so I arranged for a little team-building relaxation event.

The girls on the team are die-hard fans of a certain famous fashion designer. I have never let on to the team that he is a friend, but instead called him in secret and arranged for him to send a few things. He sent samples from the last few seasons, including a few dresses from Spring 2009 – as he knew these were my favorites – and I happily hid them on the boat while I got everything ready. As I thank you, I sent a small group of fake resort wear to him that included a pair of swim trunks with his face silk screened on the front with the nose right where the nose ought to be. I also included a ridiculously luxurious swim wrap. In addition I sent two cases of his favorite champagne, just in case he didn’t appreciate the swim trunks, and a very nice vintage rolex watch with pink gold accents and the numbers rearranged by a jeweler to be in the "wrong" order (my standard thank you gift).

The team is crazy for some show called Gossip Girl, so I had the sailing crew adjust the main rigging so that I could use the sail as a giant screen. I caught the team staying up late at night watching the last two seasons in preperation for the season premiere, which is still a few weeks away. I called my friends from Brown who work for College Hill Pictures and somehow managed to get a copy of the season premiere a little more than a month early. The only part of the deal is that I had to fly out a member of the studio to the yacht who would monitor everything to make sure that no one copied it, as well as take notes on the crowd reaction – which I guess means that my crew is now some sort of focus group? This is standard practice in Hollywood for films, so I’m not surprised that TV does the same thing. It was adorable seeing the studio guy try to dress “upscale resort” for the party. I knew this was what he was trying to do, because that’s how he answered when I asked him about his outfit. He was actually a nice guy, particularly once he saw how much it meant to the team that they got to see the premiere early. BTW – don’t even think of asking me about the show – I signed a stack of Non-Disclosure documents and you won’t get a word out of me.

We have a helicopter landing port on the boat – which sounds like an extravagance, but is actually the only way to keep everyone safe – how else could we get to a hospital if someone got hurt? So in addition to flying in the dresses and food and drinks and studio execs, I used the heliport to bring in friends. First on the list was JJ. Jabez Jr. flew in to do the music and brought a new DJ he was promoting. He awkwardly brought his own helicopter, however, which was a real problem because there really isn't room for two. So we had to push all of the life boats into the water and tow them behind the boat so that his helicopter had somewhere to perch.

I worked everyone especially hard in the morning. Getting everyone up early and pushing through with only the slightest lunch break imaginable. I then kept demanding more and more changes and fittings and drawings. The team was started to get agitated, but I knew that they were also starting to catch on, because the kitchen crew was working overtime and we had had three extra shipments of “supplies” that morning. Just before sun down, I sent the two helicopters out for the guests and everyone freaked out when their friends started to arrive. At that point the team knew exactly what was about to happen. I flew in boyfriends and girlfriends of the team, and brought a few extra former models and up-and-coming artists, musicians and literary scholars for those without significant others. Inside his or her closet on the boat, each team member found a dress or a suit designed and a hand written thank you note for all of their hard work.

Tako surprised me by showing up (she had originally said that she couldn’t make it – but then flew in at the last minute with the College Hill exec). I was so happy to see her that I slipped and fell on deck running to embrace her.

With the golden light of the sun just sliding into the open mouth of the ocean, JJ started in on the music, as an official call to start the party. We served food and drinks and danced and laughed until I called everyone onto the center of the deck and announced that although the party was fun, we still had some work to do, and that we had some required research still left for the evening.

In the middle of everyone's groans, the projector flipped on and blasted video up onto the mainsail while the theme song to the GG season premiere played over the speaker system. The response was enthusiastic to say the least.

While the show played, Tako and I slipped away to the back. I was so happy to see her. Why do we spend so much time apart?

She had tons of news: she had been kicked off of a medical drama for fighting with the director (this makes sense, as Tako, in addition to being a talented actress and a stunning beauty, also went to medical school – my guess is that she made one too many corrections on set…). She also asked if I’d be willing to hear an idea. She wanted to propose something to me. I wonder what she’s cooked up now?

Jabez Jr.

After several days at sea, we stopped in port for a party. It was a weekend of sand, sun, old friends, and new acquaintances. One surprise was seeing Jabez Jr., a childhood friend. He had always been like a younger brother to me, but I hadn’t seen him in a long time.

My father had taught agriculture on a humanitarian mission in Tunisia years ago, and his favorite student had been Jabez Sr., a former a star footballer in Tunisia who had played for the national training team before his knee was destroyed and he went back to school to learn agricultural science. I remember as a child being delighted by the tricks he could do (flipping the ball backwards over his head at a full run, or balancing the ball on his forehead while tying his shoes, etc.). His son was also named Jabez, and as kids, we called him JJ, for Jabez Jr. I know this sounds like a glamourous time, but it was actually quite hard for everyone involved. Jabez Sr. was not wealthy, but struggling, and the agricultural needs of his community were severe. My own father was equal parts cowboy and educator, and so although I make him sound a little like an ambassador, he was more like a farmer with a passport, struggling to understand a culture different than his own. It did inspire me as a child to think of the world as a global community, rather than a series of countries. And Jabez Sr. did have a lot of style, even if he didn't have a lot of money.

When we arrived at the party in a castle in the hills by the shore, I was delighted to find out that the host wasn't the up-and-coming band playing in the yard, but was JJ, who was now evidently, a rather successful music producer. Although we weren’t anywhere near Tunsia, I recognized him the second we walked in.

Jabez Jr. was standing near an antique pool table, not playing pool, but talking to at least three people at once, and while everyone else was drinking Grey Goose or champagne, he instead choose to drink tea from an heirloom cup and saucer that he undoubtably had borrowed from some cabinet he'd found in another room. He handed the cup to the nearly nude model who was approaching him for music-career advice, asked her to hold on to it for a moment, and then tried to sneak over to my side to surprise me. I, of course, had seen him coming, but was pretending I hadn't, playing it cool, so that when he turned to tackle me (acting like the little brother he always was), I ducked out of the way and he ended up tackling an ex-VC banker turned environmentalist who was just drunk enough not to feel the fall. JJ laughed at the mistake, and asked the man if he could get him another drink and then turned to me at last for conversation.

His father had died two years ago, and JJ had been producing music for the last five years. His dad got to see him get his first song declared "gold" and had officially accepted his career choice, as long as he “stayed true to himself.”

We couldn’t just sit there and reminisce forever, so one thing lead to another and pretty soon we had a full scale soccer match staged in the garden. JJ and I were on one team, with the band as our backfield, against the bankers, some guy who owned an airlines, a “fashion exec” and what looked like to be actual athletes who appeared from nowhere once the game began. The band members were skinny, but fierce.

My second assistant was a descent mid-field man, I worked the left striker position and JJ was on the right. Several statues were destroyed (cheap copies, assured JJ) and one goal was scored when the keeper wandered off with one of the more attractive wait staff. One of the bankers laid down and took a nap. The airlines guy dribbled off with the ball into another part of the garden. The band started playing while playing their instruments. No broken bones or lost teeth – not a bad match.

The night ended with a call from Tako. (If you are new to this blog, learn more about Tako here, here and here). Nothing was sweeter than the sound of her voice.

A move to men's wear...

Tako never quits. Keeping up with her is a full time job. I love the sport of love, but occasionally I have to rely on cunning to succeed, because I'm too tired or lazy to battle it out any other way. So I stopped making women's wear for a few months and concentrated on expanding the Serg Riva line to include men. Did it work? Judge for yourself. Here is Tako smiling at me again.

Working rope

Went to a party in LA. I’ve done a little costume work in my time, so I still have a few friends in television and movies, even though I don’t officially live there anymore. A friend showed me the new swimwear for the 90210 re-make. We had a good time tracing the references. I’m no longer in show business, so now when I work in LA, it is to create custom swimwear for people who spend more time poolside than anywhere else. Lounging by the pool is more than just relaxation in LA, it is a way to conduct business, dream up partnerships, learn bad news, build trust, expose uncertainties, and in general, re-pane the fragile glass house of fame.

As for LA fashion, this summer the look was white-hot trainers. White canvas or leather high-tops all around, from the men who worked the valet to the woman to worked the sidewalks wearing white caps twisted to the side, to the men wearing matching white summer suits in the dark and ridiculous VIP sections of summer dance clubs to the women wearing vintage Thierry Mugler dresses while driving immaculate 1981 white Cadillac convertibles down Melrose avenue. A white high-top matched every outfit.



The swimsuits were white as well: white with gold fasteners. I had several clients request miniature gold lions as fasteners, although I still believe my octopus clasp was the best of the bunch, and I’m sure someone, somewhere is working to beat it. Black and gold was also hot this summer. I actually liked the black better. Full color (such as my octopus print), I still think is the best, but if you are going achromatic, why not noir? So white with gold, or black with gold dominated the imagination of the poolside set - basically, anything that looked like it was stolen from the wardrobe of a Dynasty-era adult film. I saw more than one vintage Norma Kamali suit in the cabana section. Norma Kamali I love, even if her best looks are a rather blatant re-visitation of Madame Gres.

Speaking of the octopus clasp, I was at a hotel pool with the same friend for whom I made the octopus dress. Let’s call her Tako. It was a long hot day in the sun; I no longer have the stamina for such endurance lounging.

The day was uneventful at first, the closest thing to a highlight was that we saw Scott Schuman shooting for GQ, but we didn’t say hi. I didn’t want to get caught on the Sartorialist site, and have my identity revealed to every bikini-crazed beach-head that reads the Internet. It’s nice to have at least some partial anonymity, especially when you deal with luxury items with price tags that make even the jaded blush.



Tako ran into her contact working on the girl-detectives show. It made me realize that this was the reason we were at this particular pool in the first place. As a happy group, we had several rounds of drinks. We ordered French 75s (gin/champagne/lemon juice).

We went with the girl-detectives guy to a house in the hills for a party. This was all normal enough, except that the party was sponsored by a vodka company. I hadn’t seen a private party have a vodka sponsor before. At corporate events it makes sense, but at a private party this felt new. We live in a very mediated age, but is it really worth the time and effort of a vodka company to set up shop at a small private party? I kept wondering what the back-deal was; was there a product placement deal in the works for the detective show? I spoke to the vodka folks, (not the servers, who were models, but the one guy in the back who kept “arranging” everything) he denied any deal in the works, but he looked at me squarely and asked – “Why? Do you think they are talking to other spirits companies about a placement deal?” And then more aggressively, “Who else are they talking to?” He then flipped open his phone and started pounding the keys with his little stubby fingers.



I felt bad for causing trouble. After a while, the no-deal deal started to make sense. It was a part of a viral/sneak attack, and a pretty good one at that. Let me explain: not everyone at the party was famous, and eventually the non-famous guests would get up the courage to snap a picture or pose for a picture, usually with a camera phone, of a famous person. Non-famous people cannot help but to try to capture the strange crossover reality of our mediated existence by photographing themselves with a media illusion, such as a big star. The easiest place the corner a famous person for a picture is at the bar. After snapping a photo, the non-famous person would almost always immediately start tinkering with his or her phone, and I’m sure the results were then instantly blogged and facebooked around the globe. These photos usually had a non-famous person, a famous person, and the bar in the background. Celebrities are trained to put down their drink for a photo, or to hide it behind the other person's back, but there is no escaping an elaborate bar in the background. So from the spirits company’s point of view, placing one’s product in these images makes a lot of sense. It was viral, celebrity-endorsed and it was word-of-mouth all in one gesture. It was genius.

The vodka company had gone all out. There was an ice sculpture carved to look like an arching whale’s tail. The ice sculpture had a groove carved into it, so the drink could be poured down the tail and “cooled” as it went down. A little section at the bottom, carved like Ahab’s Pequod, held the martini glass or tumbler to catch the drink. At one point, a drunken C-lister ran right up to the ice-sculpture and put her face directly on the end of the boat, hoping a drink would flow directly into her mouth. It is a trick she learned in college, she explained. Needless to say, after that, I did not drink from the whale’s tail.

Back at the party, Tako was well on her way to convincing one of the writers to re-write a certain section of the pilot. Her literary abilities are beyond that of most people, even professional writers. This catches people off guard, as they expect someone so model-beautiful to read nothing at all or at best flip through the pictures of Variety and Vogue.

I got cornered by the wife of the show’s producer. It turns out someone at the party knew I was a couture swimwear designer. Once it was leaked how much my suits cost, the producer’s wife had to have one. The dance of the potential client began.



I knew I was in trouble when she asked to show me a pair of shoes only I could appreciate. Looking around at the party, she was probably right, with the exception of Tako, would anyone else really know that those particular shoes had been designed by Roger Vivier for Belle du Jour? They were a nice pair, in completely mint condition. I was impressed. When I looked up from the shoes, Mrs. Producer pulled the clasp at the back of her neck and let her Bob Mackie gown fall to the floor. I was shocked, not that she had disrobed, but that she still wore Bob Mackie. I know this sounds cold, but being a couture swim wear designer carries with it certain burdens, one of which is dealing with clients who cannot separate the mythic glamour and sensuality of your garments from the reality of you as person. I am interested in making people look fantastic; I am not interested in becoming a client’s lover. Women in LA can never get this straight. They throw themselves at me in the same way women in NY used to throw themselves at Frédéric Fekkai: shamelessly, brazenly, and theatrically. It is the stuff of gossip columns.



One nice thing about working with the wealthy is the quality of their undergarments. Mrs. Producer stood there in bespoke La Perla that must have cost the equivalent of a 2009 Honda Prius. It was her little way of letting me know she would commission a swimsuit well worth making. I was in a pickle. At this point to refuse Mrs. Producer would be the coffin nail in a chance to make a truly superb piece of swimwear, and yet to give in to her seduction would lead to trouble, from Mr. Producer, from other clients expecting the same treatment, and from myself – lost self-respect is a hard button to sew back on the blouse of life. I smiled beautifully to Mrs. Producer and reached into my pocket and pulled out my phone. I called Tako, and asked her to send in my assistant, as Mrs. Producer wanted to get measured. With my other hand I slowly pulled out a tailor’s measuring tape. Mrs. Producer started to smile. Tako, of course, had been through this a million times with me before, which is why, in part, I believe I love her. She tracked down the most attractive waiter she could find from the bar and sent him in with two martinis. I took the drinks form him, gave one to Mrs. Producer, set the other one down, and then walked back to the waiter. His nametag said “Kenton.” I removed his nametag, gave him a long hard look, placed 100 dollars in his right hand then slowly handed him my measuring tape. I then turned back to Mrs. Producer and said, “This is my assistant Kenton. He will take your measurements with, I trust, the most exquisite care.” Kenton knelt before Mrs. Producer and started to measure her. He was a bit haphazard, but at least he was measuring something. Mrs. Producer closed her eyes, and I quietly walked out of the room.

Back at the party I found my costume and prop friends from my old days in Hollywood. Jake had a lariat with him that he had just sourced for a “western” sequence in a sci-fi show. I took the lariat in my hands. Having grown up on horseback, I held it in a way which explained my background; one cannot fake familiarity with a working rope. Mr. Producer walked over and started giving me a hard time about it, asking if I was some kind of cowboy. We jawed about it for what seemed like an hour. Mr. Producer was pretty drunk, so the conversation took a while. He also spoke in a way that demanded your full attention. I would have walked away immediately, but I knew Tako wanted to work on his show, and so I didn’t want to do anything to make him too mad. I explained a little about my youth, and that yes, I did used to work cattle as a matter of course growing up the way I did. But that now I am a designer, and haven’t been on a ranch in a long time.

Mrs. Producer walked over about then. She was flushed and slightly dazed. Mr. Producer looked up with a sense of immediate recognition and asked her what had happened to her. She explained that she had just been “fitted” for one of my bikinis, and then she laughed a little laugh to herself. It was a very uncomfortable scene. Mr. Producer was stumped, but angry. He knew his wife had likely cheated on him, but since he had been talking to me the whole time, he couldn’t figure out exactly what had happened. He blamed me however, that much was clear. He pointed at me with a sweaty fat finger and then swaggered over to the side of the house near the pool and shouted in a slurred and angry bark, “If you’re such a cowboy, then rope this!”



At this point, he flung open a gate and sent a gorgeous German Shepard charging for me. The dog was a trained attack dog: a guard dog of the highest pedigree. If I had been attacked on the ranch, by, say, a coyote or a wolf, I would have simply shot the animal. Here, however, I had no gun, just the rope. Roping cattle happens from horseback, and usually with the cowboy chasing the cattle, not the other way around. It is a much different thing to rope an animal that is running towards you than it is to rope a steer from the rear. I didn’t have much time to react. This dog was beautiful, and I didn’t want to hurt it. Also, I didn’t want any of the other guests to get hurt. I laid the rope to my side and then whipped it up again in a single arching, looping motion. I made two turns of the loop above my head and then whipped it around a third time much faster in a single tight circle. I threw the rope hard and fast over the neck and right foreleg of the dog. I pulled back tight and cinched the loop snug across the animal’s chest just as the dog leaped to attack. I heaved to my right as hard as I could and swung the dog tumbling across the slate stone deck and into the pool. The animal crashed with a huge splash into the water and started swimming, unharmed, toward the edge. I handed the lariat to the producer on my way out the door.

Tako was waiting for me at the car. “You just can’t help it but play the cowboy, can you?” she asked. I did not respond, but instead slid into the driver's seat of my pristine, silver 1973 BMW 3.0 csi and turned over the engine.

“Can I take you home?”

“That depends. Are you going to rope me?”

We both laughed and drove down off the hillside.

(thanks for reading such a long post. Leave a comment if you made it all the way through without giving up...)

013 From the pool to the velvet rope...

I am constantly asked to design something to wear over a swimsuit. Usually I come up with some type of robe: an easy-tie-in-front-easy-to-put-on-easy-to-take-off type of covering. Sometimes I'll make a variant of a wrap-dress. Once I made a towel/halter terry-robe combo. It really is depends on the client.
Recently I had a client (I love LA!) who insisted I design something so she could wear straight from the pool to a night out. This sounds strange, but makes sense in LA. You are at a hotel, by the pool, you run into an old friend/new acquaintance who is casting a new Nancy Drew-esque mini-series, which takes place in LA and stars five women in their early 20s who are smart, sexy, single and excellent crime-fighters... You hit it off and get invited to a party at some other place than the pool by which you are currently lounging. The party invitation is fleeting; there is no time to go home and change. Your career moves at the speed of your wardrobe, so you need some sort of over-dress you can just throw on and go...

Evidently, this type of fashion situation happens every day in LA. After it was explained to me, it all made sense. I immediately thought octopus! Under the octopus dress she has on a strapless bikini top and a low-profile (nothing that would stick out or cause bumps) bikini bottom. The shoes were her choice (yes - I would have done something slightly different... more gold, less tan, but her choice also works...)

You can't see it, but I also designed a mini-clutch with the same fabric, gold octopus clasp, and bright pink/fuchsia silk interior. It's in her left hand, hidden behind her body.