Turlington was invited to Moss's 2011 wedding to Jamie Hince, "but I
couldn't go because I had just gotten back from Bangladesh and I hadn't
seen my kids. Shame, because when I get really messy, I dress up in a
twinset. Next time I see Kate, I'm totally wearing one."
That is
the twist of Turlington: She has merged two disparate
worlds—supermodeldom and philanthropy—into a seamless whole. "I know now
that duality is in all of us," she says. Midway through her modeling
career she recalls realizing, "?'This isn't who I am. It's great, but I
want to do other things.' And I was able to do those things because of
it and continue doing it on my terms."
...
In model years,
Turlington's career has been an eternity. She was discovered at 14,
while horseback riding in Florida. At 15, she went to Paris, at the
suggestion of a model scout. (She'd been to Europe before, including a
trip to London at 12 with her father, a Pan Am pilot. "I got in trouble
for smoking in the loo. The alarm went off, and my dad was the, um,
pilot.") She thought she was terribly sophisticated. "I didn't know that
that's a girl's life for the rest of her days," she says, smiling,
"somewhere between a lollipop and shots."
...
"In my teen
years, I was hanging out with adults—Steven Meisel, François Nars,
Oribe, Paul Cavaco. We had so much fun! We'd go out in New York. I was
16, I was allowed to drink, not wear my shoes. They would pick me up at
Eileen Ford's house. They knew I'd get in trouble if I got home past
curfew, so they'd drop me off, then honk the horn and terrorize me."
The first independent film to gross more than $200 million, Pulp Fiction was a shot of adrenaline to Hollywood’s heart, reviving John Travolta’s career, making stars of Samuel L. Jackson and Uma Thurman, and turning Bob and Harvey Weinstein into giants. How did Quentin Tarantino, a high-school dropout and former video-store clerk, change the face of modern cinema? Mark Seal takes the director, his producers, and his cast back in time, to 1993.
By eighteen she had decamped to New York, where, after a year with the
modeling agency Elite, she decided she wasn’t moving fast enough toward
her goal: the cover of Sports Illustrated. She cold-called the front
desk at IMG—and did enough persuasive talking to arrange a meeting with a
scout, who introduced her to the agency’s senior vice president, Ivan
Bart. Upton says she was successful because she had a plan. “I always
had career goals. And I figured out a path I wanted to take to
accomplish those goals. If that meant calling the best modeling agency
in the world, that’s what it meant.”
Upton won Bart over
immediately. “She shook my hand. She looked me in the eye. She was like,
‘I really want to be with your company.’ ” He adds, “I think a lot of
her success is about her confidence and her ambition. Not to mention
charm and wit. Kate actually wanted to be known by a large audience. She
said, ‘If I’m going to make it as a model, I’ve got to be a celebrity.’
That’s what makes her a twenty-first-century model.”
...
So,
where does Kate Upton go from here? “I never set out to be on the
runway,” she says, but she would like to secure another major fashion
campaign (having recently landed one with David Yurman)
as well as a cosmetics contract. “I feel like I trust my career path,”
she says, which has already made her a face for clients like Guess,
Skullcandy, and Mercedes-Benz. And then there are the sideline
attractions: “I would love to have my own lingerie line,” she says.
Building on her fledgling movie career (she’s had small parts in The
Three Stooges and Tower Heist), she is set to join a Nick Cassavetes
comedy, The Other Woman, alongside Cameron Diaz and Leslie Mann. “Acting
I’m very interested in,” she acknowledges and laughs. “I’m
American—more is more!”
I wanted to shoot Felicity. I’m aware that my type of model that I
photograph is a kind of version of my mother: very pale skin, very
beautiful. There are no African-American women in my book. There are no
Asian women in my book. There’s one large lady, so to speak. The rest
are—well, they’re beauties. They’re a typical Western concept of beauty,
which goes back to what I grew up with: my mother’s copies of
Cosmopolitan.
When I got to a certain age, I realized that
Cosmopolitan was far more interesting than my Spiderman comics. That new
awareness of beauty coincided with my mom and dad throwing frying pans
or plates at each other across the kitchen. So there are two aspects of
women combined in my head: there’s the unhappiness, the tragic, and the
angry with the endlessly beautiful, smiling, at peace. I didn’t set out
to shoot a “fat” girl because I thought that would be funny. I was aware
that Fellini had done some amazing images with large women and I
thought that was something I could try.
...
I don’t
feel it’s my place to be responsible. I don’t at all. I don’t feel it’s
my job to kind of make everything nice and easy and say, “you know what,
everyone’s equal.” They’re not, it’s bullshit.
The greatest sign of a brand’s worth is that without any marketing, seasonal sales or special promotions it can develop and maintain a database of recurring clients. In today’s over-saturated market that has seen numerous fashion-based labels shutter their operations, Feit has, since 2005, continued to grow from a modest store in Sydney’s Darlinghurst. So small, in fact, that modest is a modest way of putting it. The leather footwear label, founded by brothers Josh and Tull Price, now reaches a global audience via online sales and, more recently, a partnership with Dover Street Market’s London and Tokyo outposts.
Feit’s difference? “The aim has always been to create high quality leather-based products,” explains Tull Price, the label’s co-founder. “Throughout the process we have learnt more and more about the materials we are using and really understand what a difference it can make for the wearer and, ultimately, the planet, too.” As is now reasonably known within the fashion industry, many leathers used by designers, particularly high street label and mass retailers, contain high levels of chrome as a result of the leather being treated and dyed, which is not only toxic for those crafting the shoes, but don’t wear as well for the customer, either. Additionally, they take longer to break down, making them bad for the environment.
JASMINE SERRURIER SFORNI: How did the idea for Behind the Mirror first come about?
DEAN
CATEN: Twenty years ago, we used to play around at being models. Now
for the Spring collection, we are looking back to the '90s, and we asked
ourselves what we were doing in those years and realized we were
pretending to be people we weren't. We saw a story and went for it. Our
motto has always been: "Free to be and do as we choose."
SERRURIER SFORNI: What kind of people were you pretending to be in the early '90s?
DAN
CATEN: We were being paid to go to clubs so there would be something
exciting for the other guests to look at. We would dance and get up on
stage and make the night interesting. Our "images" were always "twins."
We had different names for different characters. There was Lisa and
Leslie—they were the most slutty ones. And Delta and Dakota—they were
redheads and the most chic. And Amber and Ashley . . . We always made
our costumes from scratch. That was the fun part. We had all week to
make our outfits for Saturday night. We'd sit there behind the sewing
machine, à la Paris Is Burning [1990], waiting for the next ball.
You’ve almost certainly never heard of Peter Belanger, but you’ve
definitely seen his photographs. In fact, you may even see his work
every day, and it’s likely that you own some of his most famous
subjects. Belanger is the man behind some of Apple’s most iconic product
images, a San Francisco-based product photographer at the top of his
field. Apple is but one of his clients — he’s done work for everyone
from eBay and Nike to Pixar and Square — and we sat down with Peter to
talk about his work, his background, and some very, very expensive gear.
...
The
technical details behind your photographs seem to vacillate between
deceptively simple and incredibly complex. Sometimes it’s tough to see
the product from outside of the lighting rig. Can you describe in
general how you plan and execute a shoot?
The biggest factor is
how many photos need to be accomplished in a day. I try to keep the shot
list reasonable so there’s time for me to light each product uniquely.
Ideally, I consider the material of the product and how best to light
it. Sometimes it’s easier to light the materials without a surface
getting in the way (since it can be added later). When I’ve had
ridiculously complex sets around a product it is a result of needing to
light something very precisely and be able to control each highlight and
shadow independently.
How did “Escapes from Paradise” start? What made you decide to use a website as your platform? I
actually love the online medium. Even as a photographer, I hate seeing
my work printed in magazines. I spent two days retouching each image,
and it looks so amazing on the computer screen, and that’s how I see it
and understand it. The website happened quite organically. As I was on
the road, I started writing this diary, which I then had adapted to
fiction by my friend Anne [B. Kelley]. I would send her an entry and she
would send it back to me, and it would include my story and a lot of
the stories from her life. And that would inspire me for my next images.
It was kind of like a chain. Simultaneously, the composer Superflux
contacted me. He had just done a short film with support by Yohji
Yamamoto. So I thought, Ok, let me check him out. I listened to his work
and it was really serendipitous. The sounds, the whole vibe of his
work, it was exactly what I was hearing on the trip: the birds, the sky,
the ocean, the wind blowing through the sand. So, as I was taking
pictures and writing, I was working with him over the phone to create
sounds.
I came back to New York and I had all this material, and I
wanted to make this online little world that it could all live in. I
wanted it to resemble a book, because to me, reading is the most
intimate. The moments in my life that blew my mind have always been
contained on a piece of paper or in a book. The greatest things can be
condensed in the small space of a text. I showed the work to art
director and graphic designer Jacob Wildschiødtz and said, ‘Would you
help me to lay it out?’ and he said, ‘Of course! I love it!’ It was the
greatest validation because I had never really thought of the work as
this whole body.
Their partnership would mark the end of the days when J.Crew's product
design was dictated by corporate strategy. Together, they would make and
sell only what they loved. The love would not be unconditional; they
would adjust their product line always, trying new ideas, assessing, and
quickly getting rid of anything that didn't work. Under Drexler and
Lyons, J.Crew would become a company of constant and freewheeling
experimentation, iteration, adaptation.
...
After
two days of reviewing the entire product line, Drexler told Lyons to get
on a plane to Hong Kong and design new pieces to fill all the holes. He
also asked her where she wanted to source the company’s cashmere. A
more expensive mill, she said. He told her to call them. This move
marked the beginning of Drexler’s turnaround strategy — a bet on
quality. “You cannot copy high quality, and it takes a long time to get a
reputation for quality,” he says. Lyons credits this first encounter as
both formative and telling of their future together. “Honestly, I think
it was because I didn’t bullshit him,” says Lyons. “His bullshit-dar is
insane.”
After months of silence, Nicolas Ghesquiere has finally spoken out.
Today, BoF brings you the global exclusive excerpt of his interview with
System magazine where he reveals the circumstances surrounding his
abrupt departure from Balenciaga.
When was the first time you felt your ambitions for the house were no longer compatible with Balenciaga’s management?
NG:
It was all the time, but especially over the last two or three years it
became one frustration after another. It was really that lack of
culture which bothered me in the end. The strongest pieces that we made
for the catwalk got ignored by the business people. They forgot that in
order to get to that easily sellable biker jacket, it had to go via a
technically mastered piece that had been shown on the catwalk. I started
to become unhappy when I realised that there was no esteem, interest,
or recognition for the research that I’d done; they only cared about
what the merchandisable result would look like. This accelerated desire
meant they ignored the fact that all the pieces that remain the most
popular today are from collections we made ten years ago. They have
become classics and will carry on being so. Although the catwalk was
extremely rich in ideas and products, there was no follow-up
merchandising. With just one jacket we could have triggered whole
commercial strategies. It’s what I wanted to do, but I couldn’t do
everything. I was switching between the designs for the catwalk and the
merchandisable pieces – I became Mr Merchandiser. There was never a
merchandiser at Balenciaga, which I regret terribly.
Designer Rick Owens moved from California to Paris a decade ago, bringing his signature blend of glamour and grunge to the namesake fashion and furniture lines he launched there—and inspiring legions of fans and imitators. An exclusive look inside his Paris home.
...
"The building was empty for 20 years before we got it in 2004. It was hideous: office cubicles, insulation tiles, a real rat warren. I think it was too daunting for most people to take on—not too many people would do it the way we did," Owens says, explaining that he "just ripped things out, but left the concrete floors and some of the other stuff—the bare bones are good."
However, it’s unclear whether anyone can tell the difference between a
$2,000 Lafite Bordeaux and a $3 table wine. In fact, most wine
economists consider the matter settled. Blind tastings and academic
studies robustly show that neither amateur consumers nor expert judges
can consistently differentiate between fine wines and cheap wines, nor
identify the flavors within them.
So, what’s going on in the
wine industry? If a $10, $100, and $1,000 bottle all roughly taste the
same in a blind taste test, how do you explain their different price
tags?
...
Numerous experiments have shown that people will
enjoy a table wine and a fine wine equally if they believe that they
are both fine wine. Knowing that a wine is supposed to be good does
literally make it taste better. The drinkers could be lying about
enjoying the “bad” wine due to social pressure. However, an experiment
involving a Stanford wine tasting group, a group of identical wines
presented under fake price tags from $5 to $90, and a fMRI machine
measuring activity in areas of the brain correlated with pleasure
suggests otherwise. Drinking the same wine with a higher price tag did
increase pleasure.
In “The Future Will Last a Very Long Time,” Jebb shows us the site where an extraordinary amount of fashion history lives—hung in sheaths, laid in drawer after drawer—and Swinton paces the place, interacting with the mechanics of storage (the rolling shelving, the coldly lit corridors) as well as with some of their contents. These include a ceremonial dress coat that belonged to Napoleon (circa 1810) and an ethereal evening coat by Gustav Beer (circa 1910), also part of the live performance. Swinton’s frock is a replica of what Yves Saint Laurent’s house models wore between fittings; it is made of the same cotton as the garment bags in which the Galliera’s holdings are stored. In the final long take of the video, Jebb overwrites her with projected images of illustrious past wearers and makers whose clothes were part of “The Impossible Wardrobe,” including Schiaparelli, Isadora Duncan, and Sarah Bernhardt. The emotion on Swinton’s face, bathed in this light, is muted but intense. Something difficult is happening. It remains a question.
WWD: You have been in the forefront of fashion for years, yet you retain a mystique that fascinates people. Can you explain it? Miuccia
Prada: I just work. I really don’t know because it’s not done on
purpose. It’s not that I have a system. Basically, it’s the liking of
fashion. It goes back to that. Fashion. And what is good for fashion are
changes. I am becoming the biggest supporter of fashion.
WWD: What do you mean? M.P.:
Fashion expresses—it’s not my idea; I read it, I don’t know
where—people want to change. This will to change is a deep human desire
or wish.
WWD: How do you apply that? M.P.: The change is what
drives me. Part of fashion is a process. After something, you do
something new. You want to create. I usually start with fashion and
after, I introduce all the rest.
...
WWD: When designing a collection, do you think about the customer as you are designing? M.P.:
No, never. You have to be in contact with people indirectly. You can’t
study. It has to be completely instinctive, but of course, your instinct
is an accumulation of all of your knowledge.
I [James Lim] spoke to several of the industry's top casting directors about why runway shows are so persistently white.
Casting Directors for Burberry, Marchesa, Gucci, Emilio Pucci, Armani Privé & Saint Laurent
Nicoli:
I think, personally, I like a model if she's a beauty. Sometimes what I
disagree with is putting a black girl [in a show] just because you need
diversity. I love black girls. I'm a big fan of Joan Smalls. I would
really like to put her in every casting, but sometimes she's not right
for some castings and she's much better in others. This kind of
diversity is fair and good, but it's also true that sometimes I notice
with other casts, it's like they were forced to put someone in because
they have to. For example, I love Asian girls, but there was a moment
when designers decided to put a lot of Asian girls in just because the
Asian market was strong and they gave a lot of money to designers.
I
don't like to talk in terms of white, Asian, black, etc., because a
model is a model and that's it. To me, if we want to talk about
diversity, it's about the model and not the color of their skin. It's
more about the body, the face, and the attitude. I think the designer
has to decide who is good for their collection, and the role of the
casting director is to suggest appropriate models. We have to make a
proper selection for our clients. You don't want to waste the designer's
time with millions of models in town for fashion week. We had some
seasons with beautiful, amazing Asian girls, and we would like to use
all of them — and some seasons there are less. Same goes with black
girls. I don't think it can be more or less politically correct to put a
certain percentage of black girls just because they are black and [not
to think about] their body, shape, or beauty.
Turlington was invited to Moss's 2011 wedding to Jamie Hince, "but I couldn't go because I had just gotten back from Bangladesh and I hadn't seen my kids. Shame, because when I get really messy, I dress up in a twinset. Next time I see Kate, I'm totally wearing one."
