The good news is that the smartest of them — ranging from the almost always pitch-perfect Carolina Herrera, who sent out a spot-on collection on Monday morning, to the biggest surprise (to me, anyway), the former Posh Spice, Victoria Beckham — got it. They sent out beautifully cut, perfectly understated clothes in clean shapes or figure-flattering curves that revealed very little skin but a whole lot of style and sophistication and confidence. I can run a board meeting in Carolina’s terrific dolman-sleeve jackets and sexy (but not too sexy) pencil skirts. I can face my husband’s ex-in-laws at my stepdaughter’s wedding in one of Beckham’s well-constructed dresses. These are clothes in low-key palettes, with few subdued jewel tones thrown in, that will not date. At a time when very little else is, they are clothes for the long term.
Click here for photos from Carolina Herrera’s fall 2009 fashion show
Before I get into more specifics, let me say that I am from the Deep South, a region of the country where (out of necessity for the longest time) keeping up appearances is something of an art form.
Remember Scarlett yanking down those curtains? She might have been forced to ask for help, but she was going to look damned good doing it. There is such a thing as pride, after all, and the last thing you want to do if you are poor (or at least a whole lot poorer than you once were) is to look it.
Most of us still remember the unfortunate grunge era of the early 1990s. It was an understandable reaction to the excess of the 1980s, to the endless parade of Lacroix bubbles, Scaasi confections and new-money socialites straight out of Edith Wharton, outdoing themselves gown by gown. But the thing about grunge was that only rich people wore it. People in shaky economic circumstances or jobs that demanded the look for real aspired to clean up and look better.
Right now, most of us want to FEEL better — more secure, more confident than we actually do. No matter what else is happening (or perhaps because of it) I still have to get out every day and hustle. I have books to promote, stories to report, speeches I’m contracted to give. As board chair of a fledgling (and therefore very poor) museum in New Orleans, I have to travel around the country trying to raise some money for the place. Nobody wants to see me, either behind a podium or with hat in hand, in a sackcloth. They want to see me calm, cool and collected, projecting whatever force of personality I can muster. To do that, I need armor, even if I can only afford a well-chosen piece or two.
To that end, I have always remembered a quote from Estée Lauder, who built a still-thriving empire out of the potions she mixed and stirred from an apartment in Queens. “I’ve always told Evie,” she told a reporter, referring to her daughter-in-law Evelyn, ‘If you don’t look successful, you won’t be successful.’ You have to dress expensively even if it means selling your soul to get that one fabulous suit, which, if you have no other, you wear all the time.”
It seems to me this is a time to show an Estée kind of pluck, and fortunately there are clothes out there that are well worth saving up for even if you don’t want to sell your soul. The best so far hail from the collections of the aforementioned Herrera and Beckham; along with Prabal Gurung, the Nepal-born former design assistant at the now-defunct Bill Blass; and Jason Wu, who gained the spotlight as the designer of the First Lady’s inaugural gown. The palettes of all four were dominated by grays and blacks with Gurung and Beckham throwing in some red and off-white, and Herrera some gorgeous midnight blues, deep purples and forest greens.
Even though Beckham showed a corset that went beneath the great majority of her frocks, the va-va-voom aspect came from curvy cuts rather than an excess of skin. One of the best looks in the show was a knockout off-white, below-the-knee sheath with three-quarter sleeves, followed by a really beautiful pale-gray pencil skirt and matching cap-sleeved top with a peplum. These are clothes Grace Kelly could have worn, adorned with her ladylike pearls and gloves and no-nonsense horn-rimmed glasses. Even the evening gowns had sleeves and high necks, recalling ’40s glamour instead of ’80s excess. Likewise, the only thing Herrera bared was a single shoulder, on great-looking dresses designed to appear as though a sleeve had accidentally slipped. One of her prettiest gowns came with a long jacket; others were covered by stoles with inventive partial sleeves. And then there were a handful of well-tailored evening pantsuits, including some in subtly beautiful metallic matelasse. They are among the most versatile pieces out there for evening, and in these times, they are the kind of investment pieces people will look for: one look that can go a thousand places.
Gurung showed lots of “investment pieces,” mostly in the form of double-faced cashmere jackets and coats and well-priced jersey dresses. He signaled that he had swallowed the smartest message of the moment when he told a reporter that his looks were “for the anti-Paris Hilton.” Like the designers above, he showed well-made clothes for grown women. As for Wu, his weakest moments were marked by an abundance of Hiltonesque marabou (I cannot look at all those feathers without thinking of Fred Astaire complaining — behind the scenes — of getting a mouth and nose full of them from Ginger Rogers’s dress in "Top Hat") and evening gowns so diaphanous as to be ethereal (in these uncertain times, I prefer Herrera’s gorgeous gravitas, especially as everything else I hold dear seems to be floating away). Still, there were some great, lasting, dresses, including a stunning jewel-neck yellow silk and a belted pale-gray wool with black lace cap sleeves, as well as a camel coat I may have to buy.
At the end of Monday’s show, Herrera came out and showed herself to be the best poster girl for The Way We Should All Look in these uncertain times. The very model of a hard-working woman and a perfect lady sure of her presence, she wore her signature, perfectly cut white shirt and wide-leg black trousers with an understated necklace and white pearl earrings. Her hair was pulled back and her lipstick was red. It is a look for the ages — and an attitude as well. She took a well-deserved but modest bow and then she was gone.
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[Photo Credit: Wire Image]
