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Fashion Diary: Lindsay Lohan’s 6126 stretches beyond leggings

2010-04-19T08:19:00.000-07:00

The fashion line, which started with leggings (and still has plenty of them), introduces mini-dresses and more in its 280-piece fall collection.

6126 Collection Available At 80spurple.com Online Clothing Boutique

Whether she's tweeting disapproval of her father's new fiancee or being caught by paparazzi with white powder in her shoes, Lindsay Lohan just can't stay out of the headlines.

But through it all, you have to admire her for continuing to pursue fashion, especially after taking such a beating from the press (me included) during her brief stint as artistic advisor to French luxury brand Ungaro. That takes courage and dedication.

For fall, she's expanding her leggings-only fashion line, 6126 by Lindsay Lohan, into a full collection of looks to take a woman from day to night. Well not quite ... more like from night to morning, and Lord knows the 23-year-old party-girl-turned-designer knows something about that.

Lohan, the brand's creative director, wasn't in her showroom to tell me about the collection during Los Angeles market week or available to chat over the phone. But she does appear in the fall look book, posing in thigh-high boots in one shot and in an outfit that could be described as a sequined jumper in another.

In a phone interview, Kristi Kaylor, president of 6126, says that Lohan is very involved in the design process, working with the five-person team to choose fabrics, trims and buttons and inspecting samples at the downtown L.A. studio. "She approves everything, down to invitations for events," Kaylor says. In two years, 6126 has gone from 200 to 500 retail outlets including Neiman Marcus, Kitson, Planet Blue and other specialty stores.

The fall collection is all about "fabric mixing — leathers mixed with laces, a hard edge with a soft," Kaylor says. It is inspired, as is the name of the brand, by Marilyn Monroe. (6126 is Monroe's birth date.) "If you study her fashion sense, she had a lot of classic pieces but with a sexy, feminine edge." That meant borrowing design elements from intimate apparel: trimming a leather corset in chiffon and lace, for example.

The bread and butter of the collection is still leggings. ("Lindsay put leggings on the map," Kaylor says.) For fall, there are 65 styles — with leather or lace insets, studded details, a dusting of black sequins and more. The coolest pair appear to have tiny rips all over, but not in a raunchy way.

Mini-dresses, the kind you might wear out clubbing in Hollywood, are also key, the best one in black crocodile embossed leather (it comes with long sleeves or sleeveless). The leathers are all pretty likable, actually, including a drapey burnished gold leather jacket (it also comes as a vest). Chunky cardigans, sequin or lace-covered hoodies (you know how Lindsay likes to rock a hood), pencil skirts, T-shirts and tank tops, fur vests and nylon puffer jackets round out the 280-piece collection, which hits stores in July, priced at about $30 to $600.

A licensing deal has been signed for 6126 handbags, which will debut for spring 2011, and shoes and cosmetics will follow. "The goal is to build the ultimate lifestyle brand based on classic glamour with a fashion twist," says Kaylor, who has had plenty of experience with both celebrities and apparel. Before 6126, she ran the junior division of Warnaco Swim Group, launched Mandy Moore's Mblem clothing line and the company 2 Love, which produces celebrity-designed items sold to benefit charities.

Despite Lohan's relentlessly negative press, including recent comments by Dr. Drew Pinsky and others that she belongs back in rehab, Kaylor isn't worried.

"In two years, she's never let me down. She's never not returned an e-mail or a phone call," Kaylor says.

As for the high-profile stint at Ungaro, Kaylor says, "Lindsay was frustrated she didn't get to be as involved as she wanted to be, and yet she got all the" criticism.

"A lot of the media — I stopped reading it. They are so hard on her," Kaylor says. "There's such another story. I work with her, and she comes to every meeting on time. She's very engaged. It's such a different thing when you sit with her. You get a sense of her passion about fashion. … I believe she will always be there for the brand. At the end of the day, she has a heart of gold. She just needs people to believe in her."

But will they?

"Lindsay Lohan doesn't have the same love and adoration from fans as Taylor Swift," says Jane Buckingham, president of L.A.-based fashion and lifestyle trend consulting firm Trendera. "But she is a lightning rod. Love her or hate her, you definitely pay attention to her."

The success of 6216 long term will depend on the clothes. "It's like Britney Spears; there is a certain set who have been wanting Lindsay Lohan to come back for some time. But she keeps falling down again," says Buckingham, whose latest book is the upcoming "A Modern Girl's Guide to Sticky Situations. "You don't keep rooting for someone if they don't give you anything to root for."

Let's hope LiLo doesn't follow too closely in the footsteps of her idol Marilyn Monroe and is able to build a future in this industry or another. After all, fashion loves a comeback almost as much as Hollywood does.

Original Story: LA Times

The Power of the Feminine Factor

2010-02-16T07:48:00.000-08:00

A mannish suit, worn with a bolero budding with roses, sent a clear message at the start of Diane von Furstenberg’s show: women can be masculine and feminine at the same time.

For the designer, the story behind this striking show was even more intriguing, because Ms. von Furstenberg is about to exchange her design director of eight years — Nathan Jenden — for another man.

“It seems right to be working with a man — even though 97 percent of my company are women,” said Ms. von Furstenberg, who has appointed Yvan Mispelaere, formerly at Gucci.

The female factor is a powerful influence in this city where fashion can still be a feminist issue. The Kiki Smith art exhibit, which opened at the Brooklyn Museum last Friday, is filled with references to fashionable embellishment, as though women are still defined by dress and adornment.

On the runways, from Victoria Beckham’s sensual, slender dresses through Behnaz Sarafpour’s easy, tailored pieces, a single thread binds women designers: They all tend to design for themselves.

“Definitely, it’s personal,” chorused Alexa Adams and Flora Gill, the duo behind the label Ohne Titel. “But we like to think that what we do is part of a feminist discussion.”

Ms. von Furstenberg seemed surprised that her collection had not turned out quite as she intended, saying, “I wanted it supermasculine, and it looked so feminine — did I overcompensate?”

The answer might be “yes” in reference to hats perched in a froth of tulle, but the general mood of the show was of a strong woman flaunting her femininity with floral dresses — but also asserting her tougher side in pinstriped pants, tweedy blazers and granddad cardigans.

Mr. Jenden has made a good job of his work for the DVF label, prising the image away from the inevitable wrap dress (although a black silk jersey dress stroking the body was a stunner). Another silver dress with a space-age gleam caught well 21st-century glamour.

At Ohne Titel, the design duo described the look as “Victorian sportswear,” referring to netting for dresses and sports mesh for hosiery. The lacy effects were interspersed with geometric forms and toughened up with leather attenuated aprons and curvy felted vests. From tailoring to soft drapes, the show was a fresh, sporty take on the male/female thing.

The Victoria Beckham collection is a projection of its founder’s spirit. Talking about dresses cut loose like oversize sweaters, a new focus on draping and the sophisticated mixes of fabrics, like liquid and ribbed jersey, Ms. Beckham admitted that she was referring to herself. That message ran through each outfit as surely as zippers dissected the cloth.

This celebrity designer is determined to hold up a mirror to her character. And since that is still bold, but now more relaxed, so were the clothes. Colors like emerald green and cobalt blue also made a statement, as did prints of pixilated cartoons that made a powerful, modern pattern on an evening gown.

Gwen Stefani’s L.A.M.B. collection is another rare celebrity success. And there was no doubt that the collection was in her image, as the models wore the sporty separates with about as much makeup, fluffy blonde hair and tough but sexy boots (not to mention visible garter belts) as the inspirational singer.

“I love the process — and I put a lot of time into this,” said Ms. Stefani. “I see the same creative struggle and pressure to get there as in music, but fashion does not have the same level of emotional stress.”

Donna Karan might say the same thing about her DKNY collection, compared with the main line. The clothes looked like what they are — cheery pieces for young women who want a camel peacoat or a plaid jacket, to be teamed with a short skirt and a gilded scarf, sparkling with crystal embroidery or lamé stripes. Flower patterns, as if taken from Japanese prints, contrasted with geometric patterns, creating a collection aimed more at the new generation of the grandchildren she embraced on the runway, rather than on Ms. Karan’s personal aesthetic.

“These are clothes I really want to wear,” said Behnaz Sarafpour, explaining how in her ninth year of working, the collection had come full circle to herself. The result was a subtle play on textures and on masculine and feminine clothes, making sportswear tactile by contrasting a charmeuse blouse with tweed trousers, a blazer with pleated pants or mohair with stretch wool.

Catherine Malandrino was in a wild and woolly world where a goat’s-hair chair, constructed from animal horns, set the tone for furry, cocooning coats and distressed leather that was on the weird side of wearable.

The high clerical collars that caressed the necks at Alberta Ferretti’s Philosophy line were just one way that the Italian designer tenderized tailoring. There was a stronger-than-usual outer shell — a protective shield — coming between the lingerie-light underthings and the firm coats. Long skirts gave a monklike quality, although for every long military coat or belted jacket, there was a wisp of filmy fabric on view. Boots laced at the back were another gesture of hidden sensuality.

Ms. Ferretti assessed the female vision, saying: “Strong, romantic and delicate — a
real woman.”

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Which Stars Sell Fashion?

2010-02-05T07:30:00.000-08:00

As Oscars Approach, Designers Vie to Dress Celebrities Who Will Inspire Viewers to Shop; When Star Power Won't Translate Into Sales

With the Academy Award nominations out this week, fashion designers are already jockeying to dress the stars for their big night. But rather than trying to pick the Oscar winners or the most fashionable celebrities, designers should be asking another question: Who will be the most effective at getting viewers to buy the clothes they see on the red carpet?
Red Carpet Best Sellers

Actress Jessica Alba has the highest click-throughs to apparel sales, according to StyleSpot.com.

Among this year's nominees, the "best seller" award is likely to go to a nominee whom few in the fashion world are discussing: Sandra Bullock. At StyleSpot.com, a Los Angeles-based Web site that links red-carpet photos to stores that sell the looks, Ms. Bullock's Vivienne Westwood dress at the People's Choice Awards ranked among the top of all red-carpet appearances this year in inspiring viewers to "click through" to retail sites.

One lesson: It isn't pure chic that moves clothes. "For the most part, celebrities that drive sales aren't necessarily the ones that get nominated" for awards, says Lily Hollander, editorial director of StyleSpot.com. The 45-year-old Ms. Bullock has a down-to-earth image that means millions of women relate to her.

By contrast, with her Best Actress Oscar nomination for "An Education" this week, Carey Mulligan has dozens of fashion designers vying to lend her baubles and gowns for the Oscars. The young actress with the pixie haircut is known as a sophisticated dresser. "Carey Mulligan will be the most watched on Vogue.com," says Hamish Bowles, Vogue's European editor at large, recalling a sparkling Prada dress the actress wore recently.

But despite Ms. Mulligan's fashion credibility, she may not be the savviest choice for product placement. At StyleSpot.com, Ms. Mulligan is not one of the stars who moves the most viewers to buy clothes. Ms. Mulligan wasn't available to comment.

Celebrity placement is more voodoo than science, but among this year's nominees, other Oscar sales influencers may include plus-sized Gabourey Sidibe and the classic Meryl Streep. Ms. Sidibe, the star of "Precious," is "an alternate paradigm for the red carpet, but she can carry these very strong colors," says Mr. Bowles. What's more, the plus-sized market is one of fashion's fastest growing.

Gabourey Sidibe, nominated for best actress for her work in 'Precious,' at the Critics' Choice Awards.

And Ms. Streep's maturity and demure style choices may appeal to women over 40, who spend more on fashion than other demographic groups.

Among top StyleSpot.com sellers who aren't current Oscar nominees, Kate Hudson and Drew Barrymore are in a sweet spot— fashionable, and young enough to inspire Internet shoppers, yet not so young that they're attracting teens or college-aged women, who don't have a lot of money for clothes.

A number of sites track what celebrities wear so that viewers can copy the styles. But red-carpet photos are at the heart of StyleSpot's strategy. The site, which launched last year, links celebrity red-carpet photos to online retail stores from Neiman Marcus and Barneys to Amazon.com. StyleSpot's database compiles images from red-carpet events and organizes them by star, event, and designer brand. The site, which estimates its unique monthly audience at around 10 million people, earns revenue as a percentage of sales when consumers click on a photo and purchase the related item.

Red carpets have become a primary marketing channel for fashion. The Academy Award nominees' photos will be plastered from Boise to Bombay after the March 7 awards show, which will be watched by something north of 35 million television viewers—and seen on a gazillion blogs. It's an irresistible advertising medium. In Los Angeles, designers employ VIP handlers, who work to get the designers' clothes on celebrities who might be photographed in them.

The fashion industry does this because it works. After Sienna Miller wore Thakoon's spring bustier jumper to the premiere of the fashion documentary "The September Issue," every store that bought the piece sold out, says a spokeswoman for designer Thakoon Panichgul.

Yet success, for a designer, is a delicate balance of star power and timing. After Jessica Alba presented an award at the People's Choice awards last month, her Burberry Prorsum knotted platform sandals generated the most click-throughs to retail sites of any red-carpet appearance this season on StyleSpot.

Burberry Check Print T-Strap Patent Leather Espadrille - Nordstrom

Burberry Check Print T-Strap Patent Leather Espadrille

Muted check print patterns a buckled strap at the base of a chic espadrille sandal crafted from glossy metallic leather.

Adjustable strap with buckle closure.
Approx. heel height: 3" with 3/4" platform.
PVC and leather upper/leather lining and sole.
Imported.
Salon Shoes.
Color: Dark Nickel.

Unfortunately for Burberry, those spring-season shoes won't be available in stores for another month. So shoppers had to settle for similar looks offered on the site by Robert Clergerie and Callisto.

Callisto Knotted Wedge Sandal - Nordstrom

Callisto Knotted Wedge Sandal

Knotted straps cut from supple nappa leather fashion a comfortable wedge-heeled sandal.

Padded footbed.
Approx. heel height: 3" with 1" platform.
Leather upper/synthetic lining/polyurethane sole.
By Callisto; imported.
BP. Shoes.
Colors: Black and Pewter.

Callisto Women's Grande Sandal - Shop Endless.com

Of course, there are ancillary benefits. High-profile fashion publicist Karla Otto, who recently opened a Los Angeles VIP office, says any appearance by an A-List actress "sells product from clothing to accessories and, if the consumer can't afford the attire, they might buy the fragrance or the beauty products."

Brands' publicists fire off press releases the minute their star steps outside. During last Sunday's Grammy Awards, Emilio Pucci announced that singer/actress Fergie appeared in its blue strapless dress, while Judith Leiber announced she carried a Leiber clutch. Each time Fergie wore Missoni in Cannes last week, the brand shot out a release. "I hope that others will be influenced by her great personal style," said designer Angela Missoni in an email.

Nothing is too minor for mention. Stylist Mark Townsend announced that he set actress January Jones's hair in a French twist for the Golden Globes, blow drying her hair "with a round brush" and securing "it with about 10 bobby pins." He also named hair products and prices: Moroccanoil Treatment, $39 for 3.4 fl. oz.

Dressing Angelina Jolie, Anne Hathaway and Kyra Sedgwick in one-of-a-kind vintage gowns has rubbed off in sales of totally unrelated clothes, says Juliana Cairone, owner of the New York vintage boutique Rare. "They are not looking for the same item," she says, "they just want something from us."

Having jealously noted these benefits, menswear labels are starting to go after male artists. At last week's Grammy's, members of Kings of Leon appeared in Burberry and John Varvatos.

So who's the Oscars' Actor Most Likely to Sell Fashion—the guy with Ms. Bullock's combination of attractive looks and guy-next-door accessibility?

No, not Jeremy Renner, the sexy star of "The Hurt Locker." The street money's on Best Supporting Actor nominee Woody Harrelson.

Original Article - Wall Street Journal

Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show Rocks New York City

2009-11-21T11:18:00.000-08:00

It’s one of the most popular fashion events of the holiday season, and earlier today (November 19) the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show was filmed in New York City.

With Heidi Klum acting as host, the latest sexy looks were on display as the world famous Victoria’s Secret Angels strutted their stuff on the runway while the audience looked on in awe.

One of the highlights of the night was when Marisa Miller showed off the $3 million Fantasy Bra, studded with over 150 carats of diamonds.

In addition, Miranda Kerr, Selita Ebanks, Alessandra Ambrosio, and other Angels added plenty of hotness to the sexy occasion, while the Black Eyed Peas performed at the catwalk show scheduled to air on CBS on December 1st.

Aviator style from 'Amelia' lands on runways, too

2009-10-26T08:51:00.000-07:00

Before they became staples of the runway, bomber jackets, flight suits and protective aviator sunglasses were born in the cockpit of an early -- and cold -- airplane.

They were necessary in drafty flying machines with metal doors that were a struggle just to keep closed. But as aviation pioneers such as Amelia Earhart brought their style around the world, they sparked fashion trends that have been with us ever since.

The leather bomber jacket shown in the new Earhart biopic "Amelia" starring Hilary Swank marries function and style in a way that finicky fashion has embraced through the years, says Franco DiCarlo, executive vice president of Belstaff USA, the brand that collaborated with the filmmakers on key wardrobe pieces.

Steve Madden Faux Leather Bomber Jacket

"A lot of the aviator jackets are timeless in style and they perform under a great variety of weather. ... They say fashion is cyclical, but this is timeless," he says.

But when the styles landed in the 1920s and '30s, it was uncharted territory, allowing for a woman like Earhart to help craft the image and vocabulary of a flyer's style, says "Amelia" costume designer Kasia Walicka Maimone.

"The whole history of aviation was really being invented and part of that was inventing the new language," she says.

At first pilots borrowed silhouettes from horseback riders, race-car drivers and motorcyclists, later adapting jodhpurs, goggles and the zip-front leather jackets, among other items.

Early on, Earhart wore these things, too, but she had a lifelong interest in fashion so many of the more stylish, more feminine adaptations came from her. At one point, she had her own clothing line -- a second career to support her flying.

"She wore clothes with a natural ease and elegance," says Maimone. "I did love her evening gowns as much as I loved the flightwear. I loved the combination of the super practical flight clothing and the elegance of the eveningwear. I loved that it was one closet for the same person."

The movie's director, Mira Nair, says time, effort and money went into capturing the right visuals of Earhart's time. "We wanted to make the costumes seems as modern as they were then. ... We didn't want it to look like a `costume movie.' We wanted wearable, practical clothes with great style."

She was a fan of a white silk charmeuse tank top and winter-white trousers Swank wore, as well as an open-back, pewter-colored gown. "So often I moved the camera to shoot the dress and the plane. The plane was horizontal but I wanted to show off the full figure of Amelia because there's such enjoyment of her silhouette."

Nair adds, "If I had the figure, I'd wear the brown-leather catsuit thing she wore." She'll still have her chance: slim jumpsuits in stores this past spring are back in designer collections for 2010.

Robert Rodriguez Studded Jumpsuit at Nordstrom.com

And Nair is still mulling a leather bomber and tie-up boots for her shopping list this season. "I'm pretty amazed to see what's happening in fashion magazines. In the last six weeks, I've seen so many with the aviator look."

The vintage bomber silhouette has a cropped length and slim sleeve -- and it looks great with boyfriend jeans (Boyfriend-Jeans.com) and heels or a maxi dress, says Belstaff's DiCarlo. The company is currently offering it in both a sleek, urban-vibe black calfskin as well as broken-in cognac. Belstaff said it is selling exceptionally well, after similar success offering a version of the leather jacket in "The Aviator," the 2004 Oscar-winning movie.

Aviator eyewear was also born of necessity for pilots who needed to be shielded from both the sun and external agents.

The Italian brand Persol has been making aviator eyewear since 1917, and some pilots still choose Persol, says brand manager Chiara Bernardi, but new lenses with photochromic and polarized lenses allow for protection without the original, more gogglelike look.

Persol Sunglasses

Of course, most people wearing contemporary aviator sunglasses, with their trademark fuller lens and flatter frame, aren't battling tough elements. "We're more on the `completing-your-outfit' part of life now," Bernardi says. "It's a fashion accessory, but the aviator shape influences the whole industry."

DiCarlo says aviator and motorcycle looks become more influential in times like this, when tastemakers and consumers have a craving for authenticity, longevity and value.

"A leather jacket is something we've done for 85 years," DiCarlo says. "It comes and goes in fashion, but it plays in our favor that it's a `trend' that kind of lasts forever."

Victoria Beckham: From Celebrity to NY Couturier

2009-09-14T07:50:00.000-07:00

Victoria Beckham goes old school during NY Fashion Week, presenting collection without fanfare

Victoria Beckham knows fashion, not just how to wear it or how to buy it but also how to make it — and that's pretty impressive.

Beckham could have staged one flashy New York Fashion Week show previewing her spring collection of dresses, which would surely be a hot ticket no matter what was on the runway. But the style star and wife of soccer player David Beckham chose to personally show her line about a dozen times Sunday to small groups of editors and retailers, explaining the construction of each piece and what she liked about it.

It was an old-fashioned couturier's presentation held in a spare art gallery, with only bowls of roses as decoration.

"This is my third collection, and I wanted to push myself, but I also wanted to be respectful of my customer," she said. "I want her to know she can rely on me."

Instead of switching gears each season to meet the trends, as many designers do, Beckham has focused on a few key silhouettes, some of which are new, and some tweaks of dresses that have already been successful.

Her signature fitted dress now has a lower neckline, stronger shoulders and capped sleeves; the fold-front dress has a shorter hemline just above the knee. There are corsets — sometimes fitted, sometimes not — built into the garments. Several dresses also feature banding, which is emerging as a trend during Fashion Week.

A flared-skirt dress, still with a very slim bodice, is something a little different, Beckham said, and she hopes it will be a permanent addition.

"The tight bodice holds you in, which is never a bad thing," she said.

Lace is new to the collection, but erase any images of anything too delicate.

"This is my way of doing lace," she declared, explaining that the spider web effect is a result of sewing together the pieces with very fine ribbon.

Although she called a black, textured gazar dress with a little sheen and a sexy zip front one of her favorites, she chose to wear a long-sleeve, strong-shoulder black dress with a peplum. She said, somewhat amazingly, that she second-guessed wearing the same outfit as a model because models have such slim figures — as if she didn't.

(In reality, you do have to look like a model — or Beckham — to wear any of these garments.)

Beckham will soon wear a rose-colored tower gown with black bands on the bodice to a big event.

"It will clash with the red carpet," she said with a laugh.

"I try on everything," she added. "I make the dresses for me."

JIMMY CHOO - MULTI COLOR STITCHED CLAUDIA SANDALS

Eco Chic: Eva Mendes

2009-09-12T14:48:00.000-07:00

Eva Wants You!

After a string of sexy roles in movies for dudes, Eva Mendes is tapping her inner girl's girl.

Every time I mention the name Eva Mendes to another guy, he gets this stupid grin on his face while, no doubt, fantasizing: Eva Mendes mowing his lawn. Eva Mendes juicing kale in his kitchen. But when I mention Eva's name to a woman, the response is almost a nonresponse. "Oh," the woman will invariably say, "she's ... really pretty." Coming from a woman, this is not necessarily a compliment, which isn't to say it's not a fact. At 33, Eva Mendes is uniquely pretty, Revlon-commercial pretty, the-new-face-of-Calvin-Klein-underwear pretty — but, as a matter of conversational reflex, one woman calling another woman "really pretty," and only that, is also a way of outright dismissing her. What these women really mean when they remark on Eva's bone structure and skin tone is that she is not an intimate in the Sarah Jessica Parker/Jennifer Aniston sense. She is that suspect thing, a guy's girl — who stars in movies for dudes, about dudes (2 Fast 2 Furious, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, Training Day, Ghost Rider), with all that implies. But if Eva has her way, this is about to change.

I meet Eva on the patio of a strip-mall Hollywood café beneath a tilted umbrella and six cypress trees doing slow-mo tai chi in the breeze. With her spine straight, her legs crossed in half-lotus, Eva looks just about ready to chant ommm in her chair. Her dress gives off an ashram-couture vibe, natural and chic. It's empire-waisted and long, white linen with brocaded burgundy arabesques and thick beaded shoulder straps. Her Missoni purse is nearly the size of a gym bag. Blocky tortoiseshell sunglasses protect her eyes from allergies, she says, and she plays with her hair almost constantly, brushing it behind her, teasing it forward and to the side, twisting until it looks like a rope. For the first of three times, Eva orders a coffee and dumps in a side of espresso. "Cubans don't drink regular coffee," she says. "We basically drink petroleum."

Eva's latest project, The Women, is her first bona fide chick-flick, in which she plays a husband stealer who works the perfume counter at Saks. So, she's the bad guy in her first girl film — but it's a girl film nonetheless. Line crossed. "There's not a man in the film," says Eva, rather proudly, popping a blueberry-muffin morsel into her mouth. Instead, the cast features Annette Bening, Meg Ryan, Debra Messing, Jada Pinkett Smith, Cloris Leachman, Candice Bergen, Bette Midler. The kind of cast that'll drill Peggy Lee's feminist anthem, "I'm a woman. W-O-M-A-N!" into your head for days on end, even if you're a man.

"Usually I work with guys," Eva understates, breaking off more muffin, "and I go to rehearsal in a summer dress or jeans or whatever. But last year, while rehearsing the movie at [writer/director] Diane English's house on Martha's Vineyard, I found myself really aware of what I was wearing, really caring about my outfits. With guys it doesn't matter. But this was with women, women who are all put-together and cute with their little dresses and their perfect earrings. Every morning I got up and thought, I'm going to see Annette today, I need to make sure she thinks I look cute. Jada's gonna be cute. Meg's gonna be cute. I'd better be cute." She pops a muffin crumb between her wide, asymmetrical lips and drops a new shot of espresso into a fresh coffee. "I'm sure I sound like a ditz saying this, but it's a girl thing. A timeless, ageless, ethnicity-less girl thing."

It's also a thing that goes beyond wardrobe approval. This is Eva Mendes looking for positive womanly support, looking for the respect of her most lauded cohorts. This is Eva wanting them to like her and wanting, in fact, to be more like them. "I don't understand women who don't like being with the girls," she says. "They say they'd rather be with the guys all the time? That it's just so much easier? I'm calling bullshit on that."

In Bening, Eva's found a true role model. "Annette's got taste and class," she says. "She reminds me of one of those women back in the '40s and '50s. She's a broad, and I want to be a broad. I mean, she's like Ava Gardner or Bette Davis or Katharine Hepburn. Those women were broads. They said it like it was. They weren't afraid to say fuck. They were in-your-face, but they were also ladies. That's a broad. Annette's like that, and I strive to be like that, too, to have femininity and a voice, to play the Hollywood game without getting pushed around."

Another thing she admires about Bening is her ability to keep her personal life, well, personal. Sure, Eva wants all of us to know the work of Eva Mendes, actress, but she deeply believes we don't need to know everything about where she lives and how long she's been with her boyfriend.

This is both her moral prerogative and, as she sees it, a shrewd professional move. "Think about what this whole culture of celebrity has done to movie stars," she says. "It's made them extinct. Actors used to carry films because people would have to actually go to the movies to see them. It was the only place. But now there's none of that mystique, and so there's less of a reason to buy a ticket."

But Eva is not a total enigma. The youngest of four children in what she calls "a big, old, loud, obnoxious Cuban family," she grew up in L.A.'s Silver Lake neighborhood before it became a hive for hipsters. Her working-class family was conservation-minded before its time: "I was raised by parents who didn't have much," she says. "We didn't use whole pieces of paper towel. We shared, or used rags. Mom didn't even want us flushing all the time."

While in college at Cal State Northridge, Eva landed her first movie role, in the fifth installment of the horror franchise Children of the Corn. The film didn't exactly resonate with Eva, but the process of acting struck a chord. "Going in, I had no plans to make a career of it," she says. "But I realized that I was a terrible actress, and it started to seem like the right kind of challenge for me to pursue. I thought I could really do something with it."

So, she enlisted esteemed acting coach Ivana Chubbuck, whom she still considers a mentor, and went from being a screamer in agrarian-themed schlock to playing opposite Denzel Washington in Training Day.

Eva has had the same boyfriend for a long, long time (by Hollywood standards, she's impossibly loyal). She owns a 70-pound Belgian Malinois named Hugo, who was born in Belgium and therefore only responds to commands in French, which she finds both adorable and pretentious. She calls George Clooney "Mr. Clooney," says we, as a society, "need him, as a filmmaker and as a person," and dreams of one day being in a movie with him. She reads Philip Roth — but she also has a self-help book by her bed at all times. Self-critical and bent on self-improvement, she thinks her eyes are too small and her mouth is too big, and being "overly emotional" is her greatest weakness, and she sees a therapist about it all once a week. Eva meditates but won't share her mantra. She prefers the term "creator" to "higher power" or "God." She says she's on a quest.

Yet when I ask whether part of this quest involved a stint at a high-altitude drug and alcohol rehab facility last winter, she politely closes off and looks at me as if I've just run over a bunny, then punched her mother in the face. "I'm not going to confirm it or deny it." So I attempt another tack, noting that recent reports have claimed she made the trip to Utah's Cirque Lodge not to start her own path to recovery, but to learn firsthand about addiction for an upcoming role in Queen of the South. "Not going there either," she says. "My mom always tells me, 'Keep 'em guessing, kid.' I love that."

Then Eva asks me whether I want to go with her to buy dog toys.

On the other side of the mall, at Tailwaggers, she gets Hugo an amorphous yellow blob that squeaks, a spiky barbell, and a bag of Greenies for his dental health. Prior to walking out the door, Eva drops to her knees to greet a miniature she-terrier. She coos and calls the happy pooch "delicious" before fishing her keys out of her purse. Both the doggy and its mommy take to Eva like magnets.

On Eva's key chain, I spot 10 or so credit-card-size things in bright colors. They look like larger versions of the discount passes big-box stores give out. Eva won't tell me where her cards are from, but I can tell they're not from Walgreens or Sam's Club. After some good-natured begging on my part, she cops to the fact that each one holds some aphorism, something to provide focus and balance for her daily quest — the kinds of affirmations that toe the line between recovery literature and the change-your-life-now chart-busters found in every airport bookstore in the country.

Gamely, Eva agrees to read one aloud.

"You're embarrassing me," she notes, turning her back and memorizing before facing me again, her giant sunglasses propped up, turned toward the sky like solar panels.

The line comes out like a confession. "How can I choose to have a good day today?" she says, and half-shrugs.

"I guess I'm just a total dork like that," she says.

Then she tells me I'm awesome as a way of forgiving my invasiveness, reaches out for a hug, and drives off before I even have a chance to tell her something — that I think she's on her way to becoming exactly the kind of headlining, badass broad she admires most.

Find this article at: http://www.marieclaire.com/celebrity-lifestyle/celebrities/interviews/eva-mendes-interview

Gap’s Piperlime Site Adds Designer Clothes to Shoe Racks

2009-09-11T14:22:00.000-07:00

More women are browsing the Web for clothes and shoes the way they used to browse the windows of high-end boutiques, and e-commerce companies want to make sure they get some of these shoppers’ dollars.

On Tuesday, Piperlime, the online-only shoe site started by Gap, began selling high-end, trendy women’s clothing from brands like Marc by Marc Jacobs (a $498 magenta trench coat) and Theory ($245 wool trousers).

This could set the stage for fierce competition between Gap and Amazon.com for these coveted shoppers. Amazon vastly expanded its shoe selection in July, when it bought Zappos.com, the big online shoe retailer. Amazon also owns Shopbop.com, which sells high-end women’s clothing, including many of the same brands now sold by Piperlime. Both Zappos and Shopbop operate as independent Web sites.

Zappos and Piperlime have been competing with one another since Gap started Piperlime in November 2006, after Zappos’s success made it clear that women were eager to buy shoes online. Piperlime started selling handbags last year. Meanwhile, Zappos has also expanded into handbags and some apparel.

Piperlime and Zappos “address different needs that the customer has,” said Jennifer Gosselin, vice president and general manager of Piperlime. Zappos suits customers searching for a particular item, she said, while Piperlime wants to resemble “a beautiful boutique” as well as a magazine with fashion features.

For example, the celebrity stylist Rachel Zoe gives fashion advice on Piperlime’s site, and the company partnered with InStyle magazine on a feature about wedding shoes.

Piperlime decided to add apparel after observing, with some surprise, that its shoppers kept spending money on fashionable and expensive brands during the sharp downturn in consumer spending. Even last fall and winter, when e-commerce sales shriveled, “we still saw that very strong response to higher-end brands,” Ms. Gosselin said. The typical customer “is much more fashion-involved than we had even anticipated.”

Though Ms. Gosselin would not disclose Piperlime’s sales, she said that sales outpaced e-commerce sales of clothing overall and of Gap’s other brands, which include The Gap, Banana Republic and Old Navy. Overall e-commerce sales of clothing and accessories were $8.8 billion in the first half of this year, according to comScore. That is down from $8.9 billion in the same period last year but up from $8.1 billion in the first half of 2007.

Another potential Piperlime competitor: The Gap itself. The Gap is in the middle of a big marketing campaign advertising its premium jeans, which sell for under $70. Jeans from other brands now for sale on Piperlime start around $125. Ms. Gosselin said that The Gap and Piperlime aim to offer a range of prices.

“Do we expect every Old Navy customer to shop Piperlime apparel? No. Do we expect some of them? Yes,” Ms. Gosselin said. For example, she expects that mothers who buy clothes for their kids at Old Navy might buy jeans made by 7 For All Mankind on Piperlime for themselves.

Story: New York Times

Ungaro, Looking for a Jolt, Hires Lindsay Lohan

2009-09-11T12:44:00.000-07:00

Early this summer, Esteban Cortazar, the fashion prodigy and, for three seasons, the designer of the Paris fashion house Ungaro, balked when his bosses presented a plan to hire the actress Lindsay Lohan as his collaborator. According to a retail executive who is friendly with Mr. Cortazar, but who spoke on condition of anonymity because she did not want to jeopardize her store’s relationship with the house, he was asked an ultimate indignity: to take a bow at the end of his runway show while holding Ms. Lohan’s hand. Mr. Cortazar quit in July.

On Wednesday, Ungaro announced that Ms. Lohan, whose public flameout was the talk of Hollywood in 2007, has indeed become its artistic adviser, working with a new chief designer, Estrella Archs. The move immediately raised eyebrows in the fashion world, because Ms. Lohan, who is not always known for her facility for keeping her clothes on, would become part of the artistic legacy of a 43-year-old label whose namesake, Emanuel Ungaro, was once a protégé of Cristobal Balenciaga, described in the Who’s Who of Fashion as “possibly the greatest couturier of all time.”

Mounir Moufarrige, the chief executive of the company, acknowledged in an interview that the move would likely create waves among French fashion purists, possibly even charges of bad taste, but he argued that the times called for a maneuver he likened to “electric shock treatment.”

Sales of the high-end Ungaro collection have dropped substantially since Mr. Ungaro sold his business in 1996, and none of the designers hired to replace him since his retirement five years ago have managed to draw much attention to the label. Mr. Moufarrige, who joined the label in 2006 and has previously turned around the fortunes of French luxury labels like Goyard and Chloé (with the controversial appointment of Stella McCartney as its designer in 1997), said it was unlikely that a single fashion designer who fits the traditional mold could rebuild Ungaro during the recession. The label, which has global sales of about $200 million, mostly from cheaper products sold in Japan and scarcely from the high-end runway collection, has been losing money for several years. Mr. Moufarrige would not say how much, only that, as a minority shareholder, he was not in the habit of throwing it away.

“A designer alone is not enough to get us back where we were, unless I had Tom Ford or Phoebe Philo,” he said. “But there are not many of those, and they are taken.”

Mr. Cortazar, who started his own label in Miami as a teenager, was also a controversial choice to design the collection, which is largely seen as a vehicle for marketing more than a profit maker for the company. Despite encouraging reviews, his work was not garnering sales or international press as the company was expanding in China and Japan. He was not available to comment on his replacements. Typically, it takes a designer, even a hot one, years to build a strong reputation, and Ungaro has been faulted for changing its creative head every couple of seasons, damaging its reputation among editors and retailers. Mr. Moufarrige said he was not afraid of shaking things up once again.

“We could spend two or three years with a designer and get a great collection again,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean people will buy it. Everybody’s got a nice collection.”

But a celebrity, that’s another story, and one who draws the spotlight just for selling a line of leggings couldn’t do worse.

“I looked at several, and they all had the same ingredients,” Mr. Moufarrige said. “If you are a celebrity, you may be controversial and prone to a lot of problems, but you attract a lot of attention.”

Ms. Lohan has not had an easy time rehabilitating her reputation among movie makers, and her last film, “Labor Pains,” went straight to cable. But Mr. Moufarrige said her notoriety was a plus, and he pointed out that she has appeared on the cover of countless fashion magazines, like Elle and Harper’s Bazaar in the United States and international editions of Vogue.

“The girl is good-looking,” he said. “If I have bad taste, then the fashion editors have bad taste.”

Ms. Lohan, in a phone interview, said she was trying not to psyche herself out by considering how the French might respond to her new role at Ungaro, or comparing herself to the designer, but she was a little nervous.

“My fashion school has just been my experience with people in fashion, working on photo shoots and creating my own style,” she said. Asked how she felt about Mr. Cortazar’s departure from the house, given her impending arrival, she said: “I’m not coming in to take over and take away from anyone. I’m just bringing insight to things.”

She has wanted to work in fashion since she was a little girl, she said, and she follows the industry closely. She did, in fact, know that Mr. Ungaro once worked for Balenciaga.

“When I say I love fashion, I really do,” she said. “I live and breath fashion and clothing. There are so many designers I really admire and look up to. It’s such a rush for me. There’s this Balmain motorcycle jacket, and when I got one of the few they made without the shoulder pads, I literally screamed. Some people might look at me like I’m crazy or like I’m psychotic, but it makes me really happy.”

More to the point, Mr. Moufarrige’s strategy reflects a change in fashion that is being driven by the recession. It no longer makes sense, he said, to pay a star designer a $3 million salary. Though he would not say how much he is paying Ms. Lohan, he does expect a higher dividend, given the inevitable attention her involvement will generate.

“She’s a very clever person,” he said. “She’s not a designer. She’s an artistic adviser. She gives ideas on what she would wear. And I needed to bring down the average age group of Ungaro. The average age right now is 60.”

Source: New York Times

The dog's Body: Elle Macpherson's labradoodle is face of new fashion brand for canines

2009-09-01T11:11:00.000-07:00

First it was the 'handbag dog' trend sparked by the likes of socialite Paris Hilton whose canine chum became her ultimate accessory.

Now, one celebrity's designer dog has been signed up to promote a new high-fashion label - for dogs.

Bella, a five-year-old labradoodle belonging to millionaire businesswoman and former model Elle Macpherson, is to star in a national advertising campaign as the face of Dogside.com, a dog fashion brand.

Bella, the labradoodle owned by former supermodel Elle Macpherson, is the star of an advertising campaign to promote a new high-fashion label for dogs

Macpherson, 46, who has her own lingerie and cosmetics ranges, has often been photographed out walking Bella near her Notting Hill home.

As Macpherson was known as The Body during her modelling days, Bella is, inevitably, being promoted as The Dog's Body.
Elle Macpherson

Branching out: Elle 'The Body' Macpherson

The brand boasts that Bella is ideal for showing off its leads, coats, scarves and bowls, for 'today's stylish urban dog'.

According to Dogside, Macpherson was apparently so keen on the idea of Bella finding fame in her own right that when they approached her, along with a number of other celebrity dog owners, she was the first to agree, ringing up in person to do so.

Macpherson is also, however, said to be receiving a substantial five-figure sum for her dog's time.

Celebrities owning labradoodles - a specially bred cross between a labrador retriever and a poodle that can cost more than £1,000 for a puppy - also include Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson and Richard Hammond and television presenter Graham Norton.

But Beverley Cuddy, editor of Dogs Today magazine, raised concerns about the move: 'When Paris Hilton took her chihuahua everywhere, there was a rush in sales of handbag dogs.

'Adopting a celebrity's hairstyle as they chop and change is fine but acquiring a dog for fashion to mirror a celebrity idol is disastrous. Lots of people chuck these dogs out after a few months.

'This also sounds like a lot of money for a dog that does not have any specific skills. Just like people who want to put their child on the stage, people may see this and imagine their dog can be a bit of an earner for them.

'But there is not much available modelling work out there.'

A spokeswoman for Macpherson refused to comment

Kimora Lee Simmons - Baby Phat

2009-08-15T08:37:00.000-07:00

Celebrity Moms - Model Mom

Kimora Lee Simmons was teased as a child because she was tall and multiracial, but things fell into place after she discovered modeling.

My friends are surprised to learn that, outgoing as I am today, I was a loner growing up. I was a mixed-race girl with a Korean-Japanese mother and an African-American father, and none of the other kids at my school were like me. I was nearly six feet tall by the time I was 11 years old. And I was an only child being raised by a single mother.

At school in the St. Louis suburb of Florissant, MO, everything about me seemed to be a source of ridicule to other kids: my face, my height, the texture of my hair, my body shape. I was a real fish out of water. And because I had so many growth spurts, it took time for me to grow into my body. The popular kids were into sports, but I was awkward and gawky. I was super clumsy—I still am. Kids can be cruel. They called me “chinky giraffe.” I cried all the time. But my mother wanted me to turn my tears into something else, something positive.

My mom, who worked for the Social Security Administration her entire life, has always been my role model. She did her best to make me feel comfortable in my own skin. She always reminded me that we’re all different and that’s to be respected. “Put on your game face,” she’d say. “Yes, it hurts, but don’t succumb to it. It will pass.”

Mom was right, of course. Even though I felt a bit like a freak in school, my unusual looks were just right somewhere else—in the world of modeling. To a camera or a catwalk, my height and exotic looks were assets instead of liabilities. Realizing this, my mother enrolled me in modeling classes when I was 11. She’d take me on “go-sees” during her lunch hour and would rush back to work. If she didn’t get back to her job on time, she’d be reported. It was stressful for her. But she did it for me because she saw how modeling seemed to be a place I could finally fit in. Almost overnight, everything the kids at school thought was weird about me was now good.

When I was 13, I was discovered by agent Marilyn Gauthier at a Model Search in St. Louis and sent to Paris. There, I was selected by Karl Lagerfeld to model his Chanel collection. It seems funny now, but at the time what I really wanted was a normal job at the grocery store like everybody else. But my mother knew that modeling offered a path with more opportunities.

She also taught me a lot about the determination of single mothers. You can’t be lazy, you can take things into your own hands, and fear can propel you. She also made it clear that working moms need to prioritize. You can’t worry about all the things on your list. You do what’s in front of you, and step-by-step, you get it all done.

Things have changed so much for career women since I was growing up. It’s accepted now that as women we work—and we’re a force to be reckoned with. But there are still obstacles, and these are universal. Every woman feels them. I’m the president of Phat Fashions, yet some people in the business world think I don’t know what I’m talking about because I’m a woman, and a woman of color. What can you do? If you speak up you’re considered bossy. You get a bad rap for knowing what you want. Through it all I try to maintain a good self-image. Now more people understand my vision.

As my mom did for me, I’m helping my own girls, Ming Lee, 9, and Aoki Lee, 7, learn about tolerance—to respect differences in culture, religion and even the way we look. I also try to set boundaries, let them know what’s expected and give them room to develop and grow. I will do the same with my infant son, Kenzo Lee Hounsou. I recently married his father, Djimon Hounsou. He’s an actor and a model, and he speaks five languages. We learn a lot from him.

I involve my kids in my work, so they can see that even though the balancing act isn’t easy, it’s possible. They also see that fashion can be a creative way to express yourself. Ming and Aoki love to sew and make their own clothes. They have a real fashion sense and inspire me creatively. I listen to their ideas and often consult them, especially for Baby Phat Girlz, one of our children’s fashion lines. Sometimes they appear with me on the runway. They love to go into my closet and pick out my clothes. Our kids help us stay youthful.

As working mothers we need clothes that are fashionable and functional. We need great basics and accessories. Every mom needs a wonderful extra large leather tote, for instance.

And we deserve respect. We’re all in the same boat. We have similar fears and hopes for our kids. We bring home the bacon, and then we enjoy it with our kids. They need us and we need them. My kids and my business make my world go ’round—they’re what I live for.

Kimora's Back to School Fashion Tips

Invest in the staples.
Buy great jeans, along with cardigans, tank tops and t-shirts for boys to layer. For girls, skirts and good pairs of leggings are musts.
Buy quality, not quantity.
Shop for value. Make sure clothes are fashionable and sturdy.

Go for dashes of color.
Rely on blacks, browns and camels— accented with red and green for boys, purples and blues for girls.

Accept who they are.
Kids express their personalities in their clothes. Allow them to be creative in how they dress.

Let them be cool.
Don’t buy them styles they don’t like, thinking they’ll come around. They won’t.

Shop For Girls Back To School Clothing at - GirlsTweenClothing.com

Baby Phat by Kimora Lee Simmons

In less than a decade, Baby Phat by Kimora Lee Simmons has positioned itself in the world of fashion as the premiere female hip-hop brand. Sassy, sexy, and stylish, Baby Phat first hit the scene as a publicity tool when tiny tees with the clever name Baby Phat were produced to electrify a Phat Farm runway show. When celebrities, supermodels and tastemakers began wearing the baby tees, a phenomenon grew, and a decision was made to launch an entire Baby Phat sportswear collection. A lifestyle brand was born.

In 1998, Kimora Lee Simmons was the natural choice to create, direct and establish the new denim label. She knew the brand's success would rely on her ability to merge the worlds of high fashion and hip-hop. Kimora's experience as a top fashion model, her marriage to Russell, her innate sense of style and her affinity for the finer things in life, would put Baby Phat at the forefront of the urban luxury movement.

From early on, the St. Louis native seemed to have a penchant for style. During the pinnacle of the supermodel era, Kimora Lee's exotic look was already changing the face of fashion. At 13, Kimora Lee was an established model - handpicked by Karl Lagerfeld as the muse for the House of Chanel. By the time she reached 16, she had already modeled for the world's most elite designers, including Giorgio Armani, Yves St. Laurent, Gianfranco Ferre, Givenchy, Fendi, and Richard Tyler. She had graced both the international covers and pages of Vogue, Elle, and Harper's Bazaar, and had been shot by some of the world's greatest photographers, including Steven Miesel and Patrick Demarchelier. A runway staple, television personality, businesswoman, and mother, Kimora Lee represents everything a woman a can be and utilizes the high fashion elegance of all that is ghetto fabulous to empower and inspire women through the Baby Phat lifestyle.

The first of her kind, Kimora's over the top personal style radiates through the Baby Phat collection - a collection the world cannot seem to get enough of. Editorial credits and features in magazines including Bazaar, Gotham, Seventeen, Star and Vibe represent the diversity of her lifestyle brand. The celebrity-filled fashion shows have become a New York Fashion Week fixture. Her lavish designs are worn and sought by everyone from Paula Abdul to Britney Spears and Lil' Kim to Alicia Keys. Influential photographers Steven Klein, David LaChapelle and Brett Ratner have all been called upon to shoot the lifestyle ad campaigns.

Baby Phat's slinky feline logo has become an internationally recognizable fashion symbol and is synonymous with the brand. The eye-catching hip-hugging signature jeans represent everything that is feminine and fun, glitzy and glamorous, sensuous and sumptuous about the Baby Phat woman. Denim separates, leather, outerwear, handbags, shoes, lingerie, jewelry, two limited edition Motorola mobile phones and a signature fragrance are tailored for the girl about town intent on raising brows. Baby Phat by Kimora Lee Simmons continues to take fashion to new heights - more than your average urban denim company - Baby Phat is a lifestyle for the glamorous woman who is everything hip-hop and everything fashion.

Style meets Performance at U.S. Open - Introducing Caroline Wozniacki and the new adidas by Stella McCartney collection

2009-08-07T11:34:00.000-07:00

Adidas is proud to announce Danish tennis sensation Caroline Wozniacki will represent the new fall/winter 2009 adidas by Stella McCartney tennis range at the U.S. Open at Flushing Meadows. Currently ranked No. 9 on the Sony Ericsson WTA Tour, Caroline has been selected to become the exclusive new face of the tennis line and will be playing in apparel and footwear from the distinctive sport performance collection at all upcoming tournaments starting with the U.S. Open.

"For me it is essential to wear products that combine performance and style. I need to have breathable apparel and footwear that is lightweight, stable and well cushioned. With the adidas by Stella McCartney tennis line I feel like I have everything any fashionable female tennis player always dreams about: cutting-edge adidas technologies combined with Stella's unique designs that actually perform. I always play better when I feel good, that is very important to me so I'm really excited about getting out on court in it!"says Caroline Wozniacki.

Stella McCartney comments "It's very rare for a fashion designer to dress one of the top 10 players in the world. I couldn't be more thrilled and happy to be given that opportunity. Let's hope this will enhance her performance!!"

Caroline will be wearing key styles from the new fall/winter 2009 tennis collection including the Performance Dress which features adidas CLIMALITE ® technology, the Performance Hot Pant and Bra in smoked pink and the Tennis Image Jacket in dark grape. She will also wear the Skynde tennis shoe, in seed pearl, dark grape and white, which is built on the renowned adidas Barricade V tooling therefore providing the perfect mix of midfoot stability, flexibility and cushioning for maximum comfort.

Since 2007 Caroline Wozniacki has been part of the adidas Player Development Program, a service that helps nurture young tennis talent through a unique mix of advice and support, giving an extra helping hand towards building a successful career. Together with the player's own coaching team, the adidas Player Development Program strives to complement with additional training services, advice and motivation.

The fall/winter 09 adidas by Stella McCartney tennis collection hits retail in August 2009, including high-end department stores - such as Lane Crawford, Isetan, Harrods, Holt Renfrew and Nordstrom - as well as adidas by Stella McCartney available at Shopadidas
, adidas Sport Performance stores and selected sports retailers around the world. Prices range from $175 for the Skynde shoe, $130.00 for the Performance Dress and $175.00 for the Tennis Image Jacket.

Emma Watson to launch ethical fashion line?

2009-08-05T06:40:00.000-07:00

Despite vowing she'd never dabble in the ubiquitous celebrity clothing line, the style rumour mill has gone into overdrive, with whispers that Emma Watson is set to collaborate with People Tree.

The budding fashionista is reportedly in talks the ethical fashion label to design her own collection of eco-chic garments, specifically for teens.

A source snitched to the Daily Mail, 'She's a big supporter of ethical concepts so liked the idea of this. Acting is always going to take priority, but she's keen to branch out.'

However, with the rumours remaining unconfirmed, we won't be holding our breath anytime soon.

Although the lovely Ms Watson has cemented her status as one of our favourite new style stars, she revealed to WWD just last month, 'I’m really not interested in doing it for my own ego. I’m not a designer.'

However she did add, 'If someone asked me to do something that was beneficial to a cause, then maybe I’d consider it, but not just (to be able to say) 'Look at me! I’ve got my own line!' (It's) gotten so ridiculous.'

Watson fans, keep your fingers crossed!

Story: Marie Claire

Audrey Tautou To Play Coco Chanel

2009-08-04T08:41:00.000-07:00

Coco Before Chanel: unravelling a fashion icon

"She made up things.” That’s the not entirely encouraging opener to Axel Madson’s 1990 biography of Gabrielle Chanel.

She was so vigilant about kicking over her peasant tracks that she paid off her brothers to “disappear” and went to her grave lumbered with a tombstone that referred to her as Gabrielle Chasnel, since retrieving and correcting the misspelling legally on her birth certificate would have revealed that she was born in the poorhouse.

Perhaps embellishing her history had become a reflex. Maybe she regarded the truth as a bourgeois banal convention.

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Not that Chanel’s exhaustive self-invention has ever deterred the biographers. Madson’s is one of numerous Chanel biographies, and also one of the most readable. There have been musicals, most incongruously a Broadway one starring Katharine Hepburn, whose bony frame and patrician outspokeness appealed to Chanel, but failed to engage with audiences. In the autumn, another book will add to the Chanel canon.

Written by Justine Picardie, a former features editor at Vogue, it tantalisingly promises hitherto undiscovered details of her eventful life. In the meantime, there is Coco Before Chanel, the first of several promised Chanel biopics, this one with Audrey Tautou as a — physically at least — convincing Gabrielle.

Actually Anne Fontaine, the writer and director of Coco Before Chanel, stressed that she didn’t want to produce a standard biopic. Since most biopics are plodding, one can sympathise. Presumably that’s why Fontaine focuses on a relatively small chunk of Chanel’s long (1883 to 1971) and extraordinarily eventful life — the years before she became Chanel the celebrity, grand couturier, socialite and one of the 20th century’s first successful businesswomen.

So what we get is little Gabrielle in a moodily chiaroscuro convent-orphanage where her itinerant market trader father had dumped her and her sister (the nuns’ habits imbued her with an enduring love of black minimalism); Chanel as an ambitious but not notably talented showgirl (her soubriquet Coco came from a vaudeville song about a lost dog) whose day job was working as a seamstress in Moulins, a garrison town in the middle of France; Chanel as the mistress of Étienne Balsan, a local toff who opens a door on to a gentler, more refined life.

No wonder Chanel refused to be shaken off after he’d had his way with her, following Balsan back to his château and staying there long after the two-day invitation he had reluctantly issued expired. Balsan made her hide out of sight (as she later did with her brothers) when his fashionable friends visited.

At Balsan’s Chanel learnt to ride horses like a man, eschewing the uncomfortable precariousness of the side-saddle (cue a life-long passion for androgynous, equestrian tailoring); to despise the overblown, elaborately garnished clothes of fin de siècle society with their constricting whalebone corset and feather-smothered, headache-inducing picture hats. “How can you think in one of those?” she inquires of one of Balsan’s ex-mistresses.

Cue Chanel’s uncorseted, bone-simple sack-dresses and unadorned boaters. She learnt, too, how to hold her own with the smart set, and that she needed to be independent (Balsan, having initially viewed her as a rather embarrassing leech, came to admire, adore and eventually propose to her).

But independence was a way off. In the meantime, the surest route for a poor but pretty girl intent on making her way was to sleep with men. Chanel was too modern to become a grande horizontale (the wonderful French euphemism for high-class kept women); too classy to be an out-and-out hooker. She settled for something in between.

While still with Balsan, she met Arthur (Boy) Capel, a charming Englishman who came from a wealthy coal-mining family and spoke fluent French and, for a while, she probably slept with both. Boy, however, was the one who became the love of her life, even though he married a wealthy society Englishwoman halfway through their love affair. Boy, according to the film, sparks an infatuation with jersey. “I can only get those in England,” he remonstrated with her, half-amused, half-exasperated, as she cuts up another of his shirts to make one of her increasingly commented upon, understated dresses.

Another time Boy whisks her off to a chic coastal resort — probably Deauville where, thanks to Boy’s money, in 1915 she was to open the second of her shops — for a romantic tryst. Cue scene on the beach with Chanel looking almost comically under-dressed in one of her ankle-length, checked shift dresses while the grandes horizontales have to be practically wheeled along the sand in their galleon-like costumes. Cue next scene where Chanel and Boy watch the fishermen in their Breton stripy T-shirts hauling in the morning catch. And lo, another Chanel trope is born.

If the film’s fashion-history interludes sound heavy handed that’s because they often are. Fontaine says that she didn’t want to make a film about fashion, and it’s true for a film about one of the most stylish women of the last century, the clothes, give or take the odd breathtaking black evening gown, are a little on the dour side. By ending the film shortly after Boy is killed in a motoring accident, in 1919, we don’t get to see the bouclé suits, the little black dresses, the suntans, the fake pearls and all the other wardrobe revolutionising stuff that came in the 1920s. Mind you, Chanel is wearing piped satin pyjamas when she waves Boy off on that fatal journey — you’ll want a pair.

There’s an odd little scene at the end where an aged Chanel, perched on the famous staircase in her salon on the Rue Cambon, watches a procession of contemporary models waft past her in the label’s greatest hits (many of them designed by her successor, Karl Lagerfeld) but you need some fashion knowledge to pick up on this. Arguably the film is more interested in Chanel the plucky, ultimately tragic, little anti-Edwardian than it is in Chanel the great symbol of 20th-century modernism.

After Boy, though grief stricken, she began an affair with Stravinsky. Her business, which had begun as an unassuming millinery shop, went from strength to strength. Her witty, sometimes coruscating aphorisms, impeccable, utterly original sense of chic turned her into a celebrity. A stint in Hollywood where Sam Goldwyn paid her, in the depths of the Depression, $1 million a year to make each of his stars — Ina Claire, Greta Garbo, Gloria Swanson — look like a lady (whereas, The New York Times dryly observed, most Hollywood costume designers made them look like two ladies) turned her into a very wealthy woman. She was at the heart of an artistic coterie (Cocteau, Diaghilev and Picasso were all friends) and, unprecedented for a “seamstress”, courted by society. A long affair with “Bendor”, the Duke of Westminster, had the gossip pages speculating that she would become the next Duchess of Westminster. She would have too, probably, if she had been able to have a child. Bendor was certainly keen — one night, having waved off all the other guests from his yacht, he had the anchor raised and sailed off with Chanel while a 40-strong orchestra serenaded her. But now in her forties and with a possible botched abortion or two behind her, motherhood — to her eternal chagrin — was not to be.

Through Bendor she ascended the summit of society, learnt fluent English and more importantly — in light of what later happened — befriended Winston Churchill and his wife Clemmie. By the time the Second World War broke out, Chanel had peaked. Elsa Schiaparelli, her great rival and espouser of everything she despised, was fashion’s new lodestar. The deal Chanel had struck with the Wertheimer family in the 1920s to sell perfume under her name left her feeling, as she put it, screwed. In turn, they referred to her as “that bloody woman” and had an in-house lawyer to deal exclusively with the writs that she issued against them. A strike in 1936 (by then she employed 3,000 workers) had embittered her (even though she was notoriously stingy with her models and seamstresses — she expected them to be as dedicated as she was) and in 1940 she closed the door of her salon. “At least I did that,” she would say later, when accused of collaborating with the Nazis. Schiaparelli, meanwhile, carried on selling couture throughout the war — along with Lanvin, Vionnet and the rest of the Parisdesigners. And the Wertheimers, despite being Jewish, managed to transfer their business, for the duration of the war, to an Aryan (not Chanel) and carried on making money selling flacons of Chanel No 5 to the Nazis (who, when the scent ran out, bought the display bottles).

None of Chanel’s rivals however — to public knowledge — had an affair with an SS officer. Hans Gunther von Dinklage’s mother was English, as Chanel would later point out in mitigation. And she was nearly 60 when their affair began. “At that age do you expect me to check a potential lover’s passport?” In Chanel’s mind there was nothing treacherous about their affair: indeed, incredibly, at one point she was dispatched to broker peace talks with her old friend Churchill. She failed. After the war she was arrested, released and narrowly escaped being tarred and feathered. No doubt about it, she was in disgrace and spent the rest of the decade with Von Dinklage in Switzerland.

Her comeback in 1951, wasn’t an unadulterated success either. Dior’s New Look in 1947 had changed everything, not least women’s taste for Chanel’s brand of luxurious, understated sportswear. Admirers with long memories were hopeful that Chanel, who had been off the fashion scene for 15 years, would bring about another style revolution akin to the one that she’d ignited during the First World War. What she gave them was a refined version of what she’d already done. It was a slow burn. But if the reaction to her comeback show was a politely muted indifference, within 12 months her styles were being copied around the world. This time she pioneered a form of ready-to-wear — selling patterns of her couture pieces to American department stores that allowed them to be made for more accessible prices in the US.

None of this is told in Coco Before Chanel — perhaps because the film was made with the collaboration of the house of Chanel, Fontaine was wary of going near the Nazi stuff. So it only partially shows how pivotal a part Chanel played in the liberation of women. This was a woman who spanned one era that included the tail-end of the bustle and another in which the miniskirt came and went. In between she elegantly cleared a path for women to succeed vertically, not just as horizontales. Fontaine didn’t want to make a film about fashion. Instead she’s made one about a love affair. For once, the fashion would have been more interesting.

Story: TImesOnline

Adele: The singer has moved into the fashion spotlight

2009-06-20T05:37:00.000-07:00

Adele - New Music - More Music Videos

Confidence equals style for the Grammy-winner, and her voluptuous figure is now much in demand by the A-list labels.

When Adele takes the stage at the Hollywood Bowl next Sunday alongside Etta James, it will be a dreamgirl moment. More than her stint at the famed BRIT School, the performing-arts breeding ground that also spawned Amy Winehouse, Adele credits her prodigious talent to the high priestess of soul, whose albums she listened to religiously in her bedroom as a teen.

But style, not song, first hooked Adele (born Adele Laurie Blue Adkins). At 13, she spotted an Etta James CD in a bargain bin at the HMV store in her native London. She had never heard of James but was instantly smitten. "Her blond weave and her catty eyes and her curves and her tight gold shimmery dresses, and just that attitude in her face and figure -- I was like, 'Oh my God, to die!' "

Replace the blond weave with a brushed-out beehive and the shimmery dress with a baggy "jumper," as she calls her oversize sweater, and Adele could easily be describing herself: a soul diva for the MySpace generation. Her figure, hair and liquid-lined eyes confer a retro swing that her dressed-down cool simultaneously refutes. When she thrusts out her hand to show off the 16-diamond Tiffany ring she gave herself for her recent 21st birthday, it's clear she's patrolling the border between streetwise girl and glamorous woman.

Lounging in the courtyard of the Greenwich Hotel in Manhattan, a far cry from her South London roots, Adele sips an espresso and drags on a Marlboro Light, exhibiting a poise that belies her years -- more Beyoncé than Britney. That outsized confidence is matched by outsized features: down-pillow lips, gem-green eyes, flame-red mane, rosebud complexion, heart-shaped dimpled chin. She exaggerates nature with plenty of nurture. "Oh, I love looking like a drag queen," she gushes. "Hair back-combed beyond belief, eyelashes galore, heavy contour. And I love my big, square, ghetto nails."

Her body is also big, if we're talking fashion-world metrics. Adele says she weighs 11 stone (154 pounds) and wears a British size 14 (size 12 in the U.S.) Does she feel pressure to slim down? "I've been the same since I was 15 and went on the contraceptive pill. I've got this far without looking like Britney Spears. I think I can go a bit further," she says with a satirical bite worthy of Jay McInerney.

Despite some to-be-expected snarkiness about it in the blogosphere, Adele's voluptuous figure is working in her favor. If a chance record-store encounter was her fashion awakening, her christening was landing a four-page spread in Vogue for this past May's annual "Shape" issue as the "curvy" icon. Topping that, Anna Wintour, Vogue's editor in chief, dressed her for the Grammys in a custom Barbara Tfank black satin dress belted to show off her waist, with a Stephen Russell 19th-century diamond brooch perched atop her generous décolletage.

Adele walked away from the night with two Grammys, and the event also placed her irretrievably in the fashion spotlight. Which is not entirely where she wants to be. "I'd much rather dress comfortable than become a trendsetter. I'd much rather be like this," she says, gesturing at today's outfit: a striped H&M baggy sweater over black American Apparel leggings, ankles peeking out of Chanel ballerina flats.

"I'm not that fussed about fashion," she says bluntly. But she's hardly ascetic. She raids the racks of Topshop, H&M and American Apparel for basics. She names Donna Karan, Moschino and Vivienne Westwood as beloved designers. Her London apartment is too tiny to accommodate her shoe and bag addiction -- Louis Vuitton, Gucci, tons of Manolo Blahnik and Chanel -- so she keeps stuff in storage at her dad's place. "I get bored of things after two months," she says. Yet she has an adult savvy about investment pieces, like her seven Chanel bags. "They'll be nice to have when I'm older," she says. "My favorite Chanel [a navy quilted-lambskin purse] I could probably still buy in 30 years."

Siren in waiting

Adele has come a long way since her early grunge days. More recently, she has shed kewpie bangs for the side-swept beehive that's now her signature -- "a neat housewifey one, not like Amy Winehouse's," she explains. Her go-to trapeze shapes are yielding to tailored silhouettes.

"When she walked into my studio, she reminded me of Lynn Redgrave in 'Georgy Girl,' " says Tfank, a Los Angeles designer who is creating Adele's outfit for the Hollywood Bowl. Tfank saw a '50s Hollywood siren waiting to be tapped. "She needs to show her body, not hide her body," the designer says. "She is more like Marilyn Monroe, who said, 'This is who I am.' "

For her part, Adele says, "Barbara brought out that thing of me wanting to dress up. People my age in the public eye -- a lot of them are, like, sluts." In the July issue of Nylon, she parades her newfound look: black, waist-defining dress with three-quarter length sleeves and knee-skimming skirt, black tights, vertiginous heels.

With the demands of stardom eating up her calendar -- she has spent more than a year touring her debut album, 19, which has sold more than a million copies worldwide -- Adele has enlisted a stylist, Gaelle Paul.

"The first time I met Adele she was in this incredible Ralph Lauren poncho," Paul says. "She was like, 'Can you believe my friends said this looks like a dishcloth?' I thought, 'She's rad!' "

Paul caters to the singer's classic-bohemian balance: "Very simple dresses from Prada look great. Anything Chanel fits her like a glove. Edgier labels like Isabel Marant speak to her hippie side."

These days, there's no shortage of A-list labels clamoring for a piece of Adele. Isn't that the ultimate fantasy, to be lavished with swag from the fashion gods? Adele enjoys the spoils, but is careful to maintain the rights to her image. "If they give me free stuff, I have to wear it. But I'm not into being an advertising board," she says.

She would consider a fashion campaign but has zero interest in runway posturing, à la Beth Ditto, the lead singer of the Gossip, who sat in the front row at the most elite shows of Paris fashion week this spring. And don't expect her to follow J. Lo's lead with a line of denim or fragrance. "I don't want to do 'Adele by Adele' perfume!" she wisecracks. As for singer-songwriter Duffy's star turn in a Diet Coke advertisement? "I think it's selling out," Adele says, though she's quick to praise Duffy's beauty. "I wonder if they did a Coke advert if they would do a voluptuous girl," she says with tongue in cheek.

Adele may not give a toss about fashion-industry norms, but there's no denying they remain the elephant in the room. When Ditto lands the debut cover of Conde Nast's new biannual Love, it still reads as provocation. Sure, Ditto was naked, but arguably what grabs attention are her resplendent ripples (the accompanying article put her weight at 170 pounds). Adele sloughs the whole thing off: "That cover was phenomenal. But if that's controversial, I think it's . . . lame."

She is similarly proud of her Vogue appearance, and dismisses the rumors first generated by Perez Hilton that the pictures had been Photoshopped: "Who doesn't get airbrushed? No one says anything when some skinny, blond, [busty], white-teeth girl gets airbrushed. Honestly, I've never looked that glamorous in a photograph. I was lying on a bed in a Michael Kors coat with my legs hanging out!"

To Adele, the equation is simple: Confidence equals good style. Asked who inspires her, she cites Beyoncé, because she knows how to dress her body; Sarah Jessica Parker, for pulling off gutsy clashes; Sharon Stone in the movie "Casino," Julia Roberts in "Erin Brockovich," Michelle Pfeiffer in "Scarface" -- all characters with a fearless self-possession. "The most important thing is the way that someone carries themselves. If they feel comfortable, they carry themselves differently," Adele says.

She practices what she preaches. "There is nothing apologetic about the way she looks. It's very celebratory," says Vogue's Hamish Bowles, who escorted Adele to the Grammys. "She might have reservations about showing some parts of her body, but I think she's a very healthy role model because she's sort of, 'Take me as I am.' "

Busy masterminding her second album, Adele is determined to remain honest, in her music style and her fashion style. She refused efforts to be paired with what she calls "dirty pop" producers because it doesn't suit her any more than Winehouse's cut-off jeans or Duffy's pin-up frocks do. "I'll just put my foot down and be like, 'No, I don't like that,' " she says. For her Devil Wears Prada moment, she even challenged Wintour's initial notion to put her in a tight dress. "I was like, 'I've got five bums, one extra belly. I'd rather do one that just flows over the bad parts.' "

Fans respond to that empowering stance. Heavyset girls crowd around her tour bus and praise her for helping them feel comfortable being themselves. "I think it's that I'm not trying to look 'normal,' " Adele says. "I don't feel the need to look good all the time. I want people to see me how I am."

So what will Adele wear to meet her hero at the Hollywood Bowl? She and Tfank are plotting something similar to the Grammys ensemble: a flocked black taffeta dress, this time with an open neckline and a cascading back, and likely diamonds galore.

But for the record: "I still love my leggings and jumpers," Adele says. "I would probably wear that if Barbara wasn't making my dress!"

Story - LA Times

Vogue Article

Photographed by Annie Leibovitz.

At 20, the voluptuous, Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Adele translates her passion for soulful sixties divas into a captivating style. Hamish Bowles delights in her unvarnished truth.

"I feel so proper," says Adele, laughing, as she eyes herself in the mirror of a Los Angeles hotel room while trying on the shapely black satin dress that Barbara Tfank has made for her to wear to the Grammy Awards. "From ladette to lady!" Adele's hair has been frantically teased and back-combed and looks "a little messed up," says her hairdresser, Kevin Posey, "like she could have done it," and her gray-green eyes are elaborately framed à la Dusty Springfield. "You look gorgeous!" says her manager, Jonathan Dickins. "I'm all proud!" Her product manager, Doneen Lombardi, comes in to see the effect and promptly bursts into tears.

"I feel like my nana!" Adele declares appreciatively. But with her voluptuous figure, peaches-and-cream complexion, and hair that she aptly describes as "ginger biscuit" color, there is something more period than merely old-fashioned about the way this soulful singer (who turns 21 in May) looks. She might be one of Charles II's court favorites, perhaps, or an actress painted by Reynolds or Romney, and her healthy bawdiness would certainly have been celebrated by Wycherley and Fielding.

It is this romantic quality that designer Tfank has played up. ("I'm gonna wear a big balcony bra and get me boobs up!" Adele announced when she first saw the portrait décolleté.) Tfank adapted the dress from a sleeveless model in her collection; Adele adroitly requested the just-above-mid-calf length, and sleeves to the elbow. "I don't like my arms—my upper arms," she explains. "It's the only feature I don't like about myself. I used to wear minidresses with jeans, but I get my legs out now."

Adele spins in her jive skirt. "I've got three bums, and this just sort of glides over them!" she says, laughing. She has few inhibitions about the way she looks. "Fans are encouraged that I'm not a size 0—that you don't have to look a certain way to do well.

"I like being comfy more than anything," she adds. Whether onstage or in her private life, Adele has a preference for trapeze shapes, or enveloping sweaters and cardigans in luxurious fabrics (she also likes "old vintage cardies with beads and pearls sewn into flowers"), worn with leggings and ballet pumps for a look that Posey characterizes as "Goldie Hawn on the Go-Go, or early-nineties hip-hop—but as though Chanel had done it. Really elegant but very urban and a little bit ghetto." Adele gleefully mixes high street—H&M, Miss Selfridge, Topshop—with British designer labels, including Vivienne Westwood and Aquascutum, and regrets that she no longer has time to rummage in street markets. She was delighted, during the American tour for her debut album, 19, to discover the "great vintage places in Portland, Oregon. Twenty on one block, all amazing. Better than Brick Lane."

"I'll go proper glam," Adele told Vogue when she first discussed her Grammy outfit. "Lots of diamonds!" The paste buckles on her vertiginous Manolo heels picked up the motif. She already owns a pair in blue, and another in silver—"They're the Carrie ones," explains the Sex and the City fanatic. "I buy a load of shoes, but I can't wear them!" Moments later she is bellowing, "Burns! Burns! Burns!" Johnny Cash-style as the strain of those heels begins to tell.

The following day, on the Grammy red carpet, Adele's prim look (given an edge with the "ghetto fabulous" black-on-white nails she had put on at a little place on Sunset Boulevard) sets her apart from the coruscating crowd. When she performs, standing shoeless on the darkened stage of the Staples Center, she looks oddly vulnerable and fragile—until her achingly powerful voice swirls and eddies through that vast space, revealing the force that roils within her.

Adele Laurie Blue Adkins has come a long way from the hardscrabble district of south London where she was born to an eighteen-year-old single mother. (They remain a tight-knit pair. "We've always been on our own," says Adele. "She's the most supportive mum ever. She's my best friend. Hopefully I'll sell 20 million records and she'll never have to work again.")

Last October, when the Grammys were a dream away, I visited her in London's genteel Notting Hill neighborhood, where she was installed in a rental apartment near XL, her record label (she has since bought herself a little flat nearby, which her mother is decorating for her as a present). She had recently got into a scuffle with paparazzi before realizing to her considerable amusement that their intended quarry was Elle Macpherson, who she hadn't known lived next door. "I love it around here," Adele says. "It's really civilized, really quiet at night. Where I lived in south London, if I had scaffolding in my window like I do here, there's no way it wouldn't be broken into by now." However, she ruefully admits that most of her tight-knit circle of friends, living in the farther reaches of the metropolis, "can't even afford to get here"—a challenge for someone whose "friends are my life, and being in love is my life."

Whatever her surroundings, Adele is, unregenerately, a south London girl, with the attitude, street smarts, and salty vocabulary to match. ("I'm a bit mouthy," she admits.) When she found out a boyfriend had cheated on her, she tracked him down in a local pub and punched the living daylights out of him. ("Chasing Pavements," her hit single, was written about the dissolution of that relationship.)

Adele loathed her music teacher in high school ("She wouldn't let me in the choir!") and ran with what might politely be described as a "fast crowd." "It's so weird because my friends from then all had kids at sixteen," she says. "Can you imagine if I had stayed, and I was still in that crowd and did what my friends did? It would be awful."

Luckily, when Adele was sixteen, her mother enrolled her in the Brit School, a tuition-free performing-arts school whose alums include Amy Winehouse and Leona Lewis. "I never got bored, so I was never getting in trouble. I'd always had a problem taking teachers seriously, whereas there, you wanted to listen to them because they'd all done it, practiced whatever subject they were teaching."

She went through the fashion rites of passage of a working-class London girl. "From twelve to thirteen I was a Grunger," she remembers. "Criminal Damage jeans. Dog collars. Hoodies. We used to go to Camden [the raw, style-centric North London street market] all the time because we were, like, 'so dark.' Then I really got into R&B and became a Rude Girl—in Adidas, with a spit curl! Tiny Nike backpacks. Mine was black, with a logo bigger than the bag."

However übercool her teenage tribal aesthetic, Adele admits that she would hide in her room listening to Celine Dion and is still so in awe of the Spice Girls that she'd rather not meet any of them and break the spell. "It was always pop music," Adele says. "I listened to Jeff Buckley and Joan Armatrading because of me mum, but E17 were my boy band, and I loved Backstreet Boys, Aqua, Destiny's Child, Missy Elliott." (She still loves Beyoncé, Britney Spears, Scissor Sisters, Mika, and Katy Perry.)

But Adele's musical epiphany came at fourteen. "I remember being out at the record store HMV with all my friends. Downstairs is the jazz section. They had a two-for-one deal, two CDs for a fiver, and I bought Ella Fitzgerald and Etta James. I bought them because I loved their immaculate hairdos. And Etta James's eyes—the original Amy Winehouse eyes! I loved the vintage look of it." When she listened to Etta and Ella sing, "it changed my life," she says simply. "It was so heartfelt compared with the music I'd been listening to. Etta had a proper distraught life. She was a big heroin addict; her mum was a prostitute." In tribute, Adele often covers "Fool That I Am," one of James's standards.

Following this discovery, Adele's musical tastes were radically transformed. "I kind of got into the old legends—Roberta Flack, Johnny Cash, Diana Ross and the Supremes." However, she says, "it never really occurred to me that I could write my own songs and get away with it!" Then she saw a Lionel Richie interview with the BBC's Michael Parkinson. "When he met Marvin Gaye, he said, 'How can you write? You don't read music.' 'By humming,' he said. So I'd write vocal parts at home and hum to the guitarist."

In December 2006, her friend Jack Peñate (who had just released his debut single, "Second, Minute or Hour") asked her to open for him when he played at the Troubadour, an atmospheric venue in London's Earls Court, with space for little more than 100 people.

"I went on first and I was on my own, and the whole room was packed," she remembers. "It was hot. It was disgusting." Then she began to sing. "The whole room was silent, and I saw these random girls just, like, crying. That was the time I was like, 'Oh, my God, this is amazing, can't live without it.' There's nothing more freeing than playing live, nothing."

Adele still loves the intimacy of a small venue. "I like to hear people, their glasses tinkling and all that. I'd hate to play to people I can't even see and can't even hear. That'd be horrible." At a recent performance at Manhattan's China Club, her easy rapport with the small, industry-heavy audience was delightfully unprocessed. During the Q & A session she was asked, "What are you looking for in a boyfriend?" "I like a bit of drama!" she said. "Twenty-first-birthday plans?" "I'm going out to drink at every bar!" (Adele actually gave up alcohol after Christmas. "I'm quite enjoying it," she says. "I can remember everything that I do!" She does, however, smoke Marlboro Lights ceaselessly.)

Powerful though her live performances were, Adele's talents reached a much broader audience after a friend created a MySpace site for her. Adele admits she didn't really know what this was—until Lily Allen reinvented the rules of the industry when she launched her career through her own site (to date, Allen's songs from her site have been listened to 36 million times) and "MySpace blew up."

Nick Huggett of XL Recordings contacted Adele through MySpace, assuming that she already had a record deal and a manager. When he found out that she had neither, he set her up with manager Jonathan Dickins, and suddenly she had an album deal. 19 (her age at the time) was the result.

"It didn't even occur to me that a million-plus people would hear my record," she says (the album has sold 500,000), "and that people were gonna love it and criticize it. And it kind of frightens me sometimes 'cause I think my record's really honest—there's things in it that I'd never admitted to myself, that I would never just say in conversation. But then the other side of it is that I always get people coming up to me after shows and telling me that it helped them through their relationship at the time, which is an amazing feeling."

In a stroke of serendipity last fall, Adele was booked for Saturday Night Live on the same night as Sarah Palin. Seventeen million viewers tuned in. "It had been kind of underground till then!" says Adele, laughing. "I've had a really smooth ride. KT Tunstall played empty pubs for ten years."

Back in London in early December, Adele was in bed—"Googling to see if Leona Lewis had been nominated for the Grammys"—when Perez Hilton E-mailed to break the news of her first nomination. When Adele realized that she had been nominated for four Grammy Awards, "I locked myself in the bathroom and cried for an hour!" she remembers. "Then my agent—who was crying, too—came over," she says, adding, with characteristically deadpan drollery, "He was really stingy and brought round a bottle of champagne that I'd bought him for his birthday."

In Los Angeles for the Grammy Awards, Adele is as independent as ever. She eschews the industry parties, and instead, she and her new beau (a soft-spoken London lad with the looks of Michael York in Cabaret) have gone to catch up on the movies—Doubt, The Wrestler, Milk.

Her mother is not here to see her, and Adele guiltily confesses that she hid her passport. "It would be great to have her here," she explains, "but I feel really awkward if she's around when I'm working." Instead, she rings her from the red carpet to announce that she has won her first Grammy (for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance). Her mother just screams (it would be difficult to hear anything else above the roar). By the time she performs, Adele has beaten out the Jonas Brothers and her friend Duffy for Best New Artist.

After the ceremony, she skips the Woodstock-themed official Grammy after-party and what promises to be the achingly cool after-after-party that Coldplay have told her about down in Santa Monica. Instead she repairs to an In-N-Out Burger on Venice Boulevard. Her publicist Benny Tarantini takes the order. "Maybe I should get two milkshakes," she says, laughing. "To match me Grammys!"

"Feeling Groovy" has been edited for Style.com; the complete story appears in the April 2009 issue of Vogue.

Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) - Jimmy Choo Fan

2009-06-18T07:30:00.000-07:00

Sarah Jessica Parker's Big revelation

The trailer for the Sex and the City movie is playing on a loop in the press suite on the 20th floor of the Ritz Carlton, New York, and there's no denying - it's masterly.

Four years after the hit TV series ended, the film is everything that made the show a cult: the four girlfriends in arms are even more glossy (they look younger), the fashion more fabulous, and in a clever leap forwards, the leading women have all moved on and settled with their men, or, in the case of Carrie Bradshaw, are about to marry Big.

Sarah Jessica Parker, 43, has become a worldwide name due to her role as writer Carrie Bradshaw in the seminal TV series Sex And The City. She admits to being nervous about the release of the big screen version out later this month

"I always knew she would," coos Charlotte.

"You thought that after the second break-up?" Samantha enquires dubiously.

"After the 15th?" wisecracks Miranda.

She's so flawless on screen that it's a reality check when Sarah Jessica Parker high-steps into the room like a just-tamed colt.

She's doll-small - tiny, thin as a six-year-old - with none of the screen's stardust glow.

She's weirdly both Carrie and not Carrie - she has her enthusiastic voice and crazily toned legs, barely supported on towering Brian Atwood heels, and long, loosely curled blond-brown hair.

But she's also slighter and paler, with a business-like way of chewing gum, her pinched face matt with foundation, sheer pale lipstick overflowing a rosebud mouth, grey eyeshadow above thick mascaraed black lashes.

In the movie she's a golden girl; today, on a gilt chair in a room overlooking Central Park, SJP looks like a normal 43-year-old mum, if skinnier, faint lines running round her eyes and along her forehead.

The SATC dream team: Cynthia Nixon, Kim Cattrall, Sarah Jessica and Kristen Davis

It's not really surprising. Today she's ill and barely managed to make this interview, having cancelled yesterday's after her son, James, got a stomach bug while her husband, the actor Matthew Broderick, was away.

"So I'm wearing a lot of make-up!" she exclaims wryly.

She shakes her head contritely.

"I'm so sorry about that. I would never miss work, ever.

"But I was throwing up every 20 minutes from 11 o'clock last night, round the clock.

"My son had it on Monday evening and he threw up straight through to 8am the next morning.

"By Tuesday I thought, 'Guess I dodged that!' Then at 6.30pm on Wednesday I was, like, 'Urgh!'"

She meets your eyes as she talks and uses her blue-veined hands in more down-to-earth gestures than her skittish sex columnist alter ego would have.

She's also cleverer, generous with her answers and time, if a touch more passive-aggressive than her sweet-natured alter ego - she occasionally deliberately misunderstands questions, repeating them with a perplexed air and then pulling back with a sweet, "Oh, sorry!"

Original: the actresses in a 1998 promotional image for the series

It's common knowledge that SJP wanted to make the movie right after the series ended in February 2004, but Kim Cattrall, who plays Samantha Jones, wouldn't get on board. Sarah Jessica rolls her eyes at the notion that the two fell out.

"How tired is that?" she groans.

So the film didn't go ahead then, "...because Kim didn't want to do it at the time," she finishes briskly for me.

"But the story they never tell with that is that no one ever denied her that choice.

"Were we disappointed? Yes.

"If it's about money, so be it. That's her choice."

And evidently that changed?

"Well, time passed," she says.

"And I really wanted Kim to do this movie. I didn't want to do it without her and it was important to me to get her back and to make her feel comfortable."

She admits to being nervous about it. Out later this month, the film is very much Sarah Jessica's project - she not only plays the lead but produced it as well (it was written and directed by Michael Patrick King).

'I just recognised that it was the right time, we couldn't let two more years pass, and there was an interesting story to tell, four years later,' Sarah Jessica says of the movie

"I just recognised that it was the right time, we couldn't let two more years pass, and there was an interesting story to tell, four years later," she remarks.

"And this couldn't be a movie about a bunch of girls running round New York having sex - I mean, it would just seem gratuitous, it's not where we ended the show.

"Unless you want to go back in time, and how do we do that? And I think Michael illustrates in the first few minutes of the movie how Carrie has been very successful in the past four years," she goes on.

"She's in a very successful relationship with a grown-up (ie, Chris Noth's Mr Big), she has figured things out.

"She really believes she knows this man and herself, and she's had a lot of satisfaction in work - she's had two more books published and she's working on her fourth.

"So she's a different person, just as all of us are after four years."

So the movie is deeper than the series?

Sarah Jessica nods. "Oh yeah. I hope so. It's more about grown women now."

She grins when asked if she herself would have gone for the complicated Big had she been single in real life (in the 1980s she lived with the actor Robert Downey Jr, who has struggled with drug addiction and spent time in jail, and she reportedly dated the late JFK Jr and the actor Nicolas Cage, so she has had her share of tricky men).

Sarah Jessica says of Carrie's relationship with Big (played by Chris Noth): 'I don't know if I would have stuck with a person like that. I don't know if I'd have had that fortitude'

"Umm," she ponders. "Physically? I might have been attracted to that. There's a lot that's seductive.

"I think he's a really interesting person. And the moment anyone keeps things from you it's like a magnet - you're drawn. He's a bright person and successful; if someone throws you enough bones, you go!

"But I don't know if I would have stuck with a person like that. I don't know if I'd have had that fortitude."

She seems to have chosen more wisely with Broderick, who she's been married to for 11 years.

Despite her recent confession on an American TV show that Matthew is "a complicated person" and they've had some "treacherous train rides", Sarah Jessica still thinks they have a good marriage: "It's a real privilege to be part of, but that doesn't mean I have any tips for anybody else about how to conduct theirs!

"I do think we're at an advantage living in New York, because we are in a town with other businesses and other industries, and I think that has allowed us not to be under the same sort of speculation that actors in Hollywood endure."

The couple live in a Greenwich Village townhouse with James, five. Sarah Jessica paints a down-to-earth picture of daily life, with her doing the school run and the chores.

"When I'm working we have the same nanny that James has had since he was four months old, this extraordinary lady named Myleena," she says, "and when I'm working she takes him to school, if Matthew can't. If Matthew can't pick him up she'll pick him up.

"And in the evenings, if I'm night shooting, or I have to go out, we have a lovely young lady named Kady. So he's had the same people his whole life, and they're amazing, and they're not overworked.

"I think we have really figured out how to work the house, and his needs are obviously the most important. He seems pretty content."

'Sure! I'm riddled with them (insecurities)! But as you get older you get better equipped to deal with them,' says Sarah Jessica

Six years ago she said she wanted "as many babies as is healthy" and two and a half years ago confided that she was longing for a daughter.

Now, she says, "It's a subject I don't talk about because no matter what you say, either it's, 'Poor Sarah Jessica, she wants more and hasn't had them,' or, if I say, 'No, we're quite content,' they say, 'What a cold, heartless, selfish...' So I don't talk about it."

As the youngest of eight (she has three siblings and four half-siblings), Sarah Jessica will say she is conscious that her son is growing up in extreme affluence compared to her childhood.

Her parents divorced when she was a baby and her mother Barbra got remarried to a truck driver. Sarah Jessica was raised in Cincinnati in poverty: "The problem with talking about it is that people like to put a Dickensian twist on it as if I were an orphan," she says.

"There were times when we didn't have electricity because we didn't pay the bill on time - we simply didn't have the money that month - and sometimes we relied on the government for free lunches.

"But my parents were very clever and industrious; culturally our lives were very rich, even though, in practical ways, things were kind of a mess."

Sarah Jessica has been married to actor Matthew Broderick for 11 years

She doesn't regret it, though. On the contrary, she is grateful.

Poverty gave her, she says, a work ethic.

"I started working at the age of eight (when she was the lead in a production of The Little Match Girl) and I've never borrowed a penny from anybody.

"I think it's a real privilege to grow up the way I did, and I think my son's strangely at a disadvantage because he's a child of affluence and he doesn't know what that means.

"That is a great concern to me. I almost wish we could create a false universe for him - I know this is going to be misinterpreted across the world, but I think there is something good about not having much."

I tell her Nigella Lawson recently remarked that she would not leave money to her children for the same reason.

"I understand that!" Sarah Jessica exclaims. "I think sometimes people interpret it as saying that a child of privilege has it worse than a child of nothing, and that's not at all what I'm saying.

"But I get concerned when a child's every whim is met and it's hard not to meet those whims when you have the money to do so."

She certainly does. Not long ago Sarah Jessica was named the richest woman in New York, an accolade that she maintains is not true.

She nevertheless has made millions, not from the series (the women were never paid that much), but from her best-selling fragrances, Lovely and Covet; Gap adverts; a deal with the cosmetics firm Garnier; a reputed £3.5 million fee for designing a clothing line, Bitten, for the US chain Steve & Barry's (in which everything costs under £10, in a nod towards her upbringing); her position as the face of Lux, and now the new movie.

Yet what's interesting about meeting her in the flesh is that this uber-celebrity not only looks perfectly normal but lives a normal life.

Sarah Jessica maintains that she doesn't go to Fashion Week, because, "If I had that kind of time I would be with my son, and the fashion shows are so intimidating", and insists that she only shops twice a year.

"It really doesn't happen much, so I borrow a lot and I treat it well."

Today, for instance, she is in a grey Versace jacket, beige Halston dress and Fendi clutch - far less quirky than Carrie - "and none of it mine!" (Later, Kristin Davis wanders in in pointed black stiletto boots and shiny black coat - a conversely racy and un-Charlotte-like outfit.)

My final question to this mega-star is if she has any insecurities.

This makes her stare in amazement.

"Sure! I'm riddled with them!" she exclaims.

"But as you get older you get better equipped to deal with them.

"It doesn't mean you triumph over them all the time. But I think insecurity can be a great motivator - as long as it doesn't rule the way you work in ways that are not helpful."

By now her PR is virtually tearing her hair out and brandishing her watch, so Sarah Jessica climbs gracefully on to her high heels.

"Thank you so much!" she cries and trips out of the room.

Jimmy Choo to launch H&M collection

2009-06-18T06:53:00.000-07:00

It will be stilettos at dawn. And handbags in the afternoon, until they're all sold out.

The luxury shoe brand Jimmy Choo is collaborating with high street store H&M.

Choo-in: Jimmy Choo's president Tamara Mellon says it's a 'privilege' to be designing a collection for H&M

The world-famous brand - chosen by the A-list for red carpet appearances and given mass appeal by Sarah Jessica Parker's character Carrie in Sex and The City - will be creating a line of covetable shoes and bags for H&M, as well as a line of women's clothing that will be designed to match the accessories.

The collection - expected to cause a stampede in stores when it arrives on November 14 - will start from as little as £30 for a pair of ballet pumps, with the most expensive shoe will be at £170.

Killer heels: A preview of the collection Jimmy Choo will be designing for the high street store

The collaboration is another coup for H&M, which has in the past produced collections with designers Karl Lagerfeld, Roberto Cavalli and Stella McCartney and stars Madonna and Kylie Minogue.

With Jimmy Choo shoes usually selling in excess of £400 and bags over £1,000, the more affordable H&M collection, on sale from November 14 in 200 stores across the world, is likely to create mass hysteria among shoppers.

Jimmy Choo's president Tamara Mellon said today she felt honoured to be among the fashion greats who have been affiliated with H&M.

Jimmy Choo president Tamara Mellon with a model trying on some of the pieces from the new range. A clothing line will be designed to match shoes and bags

'It's such a privilege to design a collection to appeal to fashion savvy, street smart women.

'Jimmy Choo will bring to H&M a sophisticated, fashion forward, accessible and glamorous collection - the perfect party pieces to wear out at night,' she added.

H&M's creative designer Margareta van den Bosch said: 'We adore Jimmy Choo's shoes and bags.

'I like the way we have worked with clothes to accessorise the shoes and bags rather than the other way around.

'H&M have teamed up with some of the biggest names in fashion over the last few years ... but this is seen by some as the biggest coup of them all.'

The Jimmy Choo brand has become synonymous with glamour. The label was co-founded in 1996 by Malaysian-born Choo and former Vogue accessories editor Tamara Mellon. It has since become a major global upmarket brand with stores on six continents.

But it's not just shoe-a-holic women who will benefit from Jimmy Choo's design prowess.

Long-suffering husbands and boyfriends can now find out what all the fuss is about as Jimmy Choo plan to create a men's collection of bags, shoes and clothing for H&M.

So for all the women out there who, like Carrie, spent the money they were saving up to buy a house on shoes instead, this could be the collaboration they've been waiting for.

Now they can afford the shoes and the apartment.

Story - DailyMail.co.uk

Olympic gold medalist Victoria Pendleton swaps lycra for green haute couture

2009-06-15T07:18:00.000-07:00

Victoria Pendleton, the Olympic gold medalist, is swapping cycling Lycra for recycled haute couture in a bid to encourage people to live more sustainable lives.

The design by Wayne Hemmingway is based on a green Union Flag and made entirely from recycled materials.

Pendleton will wear the creation on the first Green Britain Day, organised by EDF Energy to inspire Britons to cut the UK's carbon footprint in time for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

EDF Energy is asking people around Britain to "do something green for the team" on July 10 and sign-up to Team Green Britain a website full of ways to cut carbon emissions

Pendleton is supporting the initiative along with a number of her Olympic team mates including rowing champion James Cracknell, swimmer Eleanor Simmonds - Britain's youngest Paralympic gold medallist, rower Tom James and gymnast Louis Smith.

The day will culminate in a concert at The Eden Project in Cornwall starring musicians Paul Weller and the band Florence and the Machine.

Vincent de Rivaz, chief executive of EDF Energy, which is sponsoring the London games as sustainability partner, said: "Climate change is one of the biggest challenges facing us. As an energy company, EDF Energy has a responsibility to be at the heart of the solution to climate change and we have the expertise to help people use their energy more efficiently."

Sebastian Coe, chair of the games' organising committee, commented: "London 2012 is all about using the power of the games to inspire change and it's fantastic to see EDF Energy, the first sustainability partner of London 2012, taking this on in their activation.

"The Green Britain Day campaign is a great way for people to come together and make a difference."

Victoria's secrets

Story From Guardian.co.uk

Sprint cycling is about machismo. So how did petite, feminine Victoria Pendleton become world champion? She tells Emma John

Some years ago, when Victoria Pendleton was introduced to her new French-Canadian coach, his verdict was instantaneous. 'He looked me up and down, and said, "You're too skinny, too puny to be a sprint cyclist."' In a sport that requires explosive moments of acceleration, the men and women have always been physically imposing: short limbs, huge muscles and necks like fire hydrants. Lined up against her opponents, the now 27-year-old Pendleton - lithe, petite and unashamedly feminine - looks entirely out of place. Yet she is the world champion, and - if we dare say it out loud - Britain's surest thing at the Beijing Olympics.

When she entered track cycling's world championships in Mallorca last year, no British woman had ever won a sprint event. Pendleton competed in three of the toughest - the 200metres sprint, the team sprint (with Shanaze Reade), and the keirin (a mass sprint from a rolling start). She won them all. The Great Britain team finished with 11 medals, five ahead of their nearest rivals, Australia; triple-world champion Pendleton went on to be named Sportswoman of the Year at two separate national awards last December.

The general perception of cycling has, perhaps, never been worse; mention the sport to most people and they think of road racing, its doping scandals and tarnished Tour de France winners. But track cycling - which has none of road racing's commercial enticements - has grown into one of the UK's strongest sporting disciplines, and the one most likely to bring home golds at this summer's Games. It also has a considerably cleaner record. Pendleton - a stickler for the rules, who gives her address to the drugs testers every day - has become its charismatic icon.

'When I was a child,' Pendleton says, 'and my dad asked me, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" I never ever knew. All I wanted to do was be really, really good at something ... Once you've had a taste of that you want to do it again, to better it. I need it.'

We meet in Manchester, where Pendleton will compete in the 2008 world championships this month and which is her base for 10 months of the year - it's the only city in England with a velodrome where she and the British team can practise. 'The only problem,' she says with a laugh, 'is that all the things Manchester is great for - the clubs, the music scene - is the stuff I can't do.' Which is a shame, because you suspect chatty, sparky Pendleton would be brilliant fun on a night out.

Whatever her coach may have said, she is not puny. Her figure is a taut, compact powder keg. Her arm and leg muscles are elegantly defined; her sculpted abdominals could make a man weep into his protein shake. While endurance cyclists tend to be lean and sinewy, Pendleton relies on pure strength. 'There isn't a perfect body type,' she says, 'but as a track cyclist I just have to make sure I'm as powerful as possible compared to my body weight. You don't want to grow too much in size because that would work against you aerodynamically. My strength-to-weight ratio is very high and that's probably why I've had so much success.' She must be able to run 100m damn fast. 'I don't know,' she giggles. 'I'm not allowed to run. I'd pick up an injury instantly because my body's not used to it.'

The majority of her training, when she is not pounding her bike round a 250m track at speeds of up to 40mph, is lifting weights in the gym. We're not talking the shoulder-press and lat pulls here; no, this is the Olympic-style 'powerclean', lifting barbells over her head like a fairground strongman. She loves it, she says, because 'it's a mini-sport within my own sport'. Another opportunity to feed that gnawing competitive drive.

Sprint cycling lives on machismo. The 200m sprint - the only female discipline in this summer's Olympics - is the toughest event of them all, a one-on-one pursuit race in which two cyclists stalk each other warily around the steeply banked track until one makes a break and they race to the finish at lung-bursting speed. Reflexes must be instantaneous; muscles ready to explode; psyches unassailable. In this cat-and-mouse sport of anticipation and reaction, mental strength is just as important as physical. As Pendleton points out: 'You can be the fastest out there and make a mistake and come last, because you look over your wrong shoulder for a split second.'

Trackside, image is everything. 'How you portray yourself and how you appear, that's a very important part of the game. You make sure you seem as strong and confident as possible, you don't want to show any of your weaknesses.' Competitors act the part from the moment they enter the contest. 'You stick your chest out, keep your head high.'

As a result, the sport has tended to prize masculinity above all other traits, and even the women have buzzcuts (or, in the case of the Ukrainian team, Pendleton tells me, horrendous mullets). Body consciousness has, she believes, kept a lot of women out of the sport. 'If you show a girl a picture of a sprint cyclist, a guy all stacked up with massive muscles, they're not going to want to do that.' Until Shanaze Reade, world champion BMXer, swapped camps and joined her at the track, Pendleton trained for years without a single female colleague.

She has determined to stay different, to retain and celebrate her femininity. It has been suggested to her that her long wave of dark brown hair may be a hindrance, but defiantly it remains. The day before we meet, she had a manicure at the Lowry Hotel's spa, a little luxury that means a great deal because come competition time she won't be allowed to have nails long enough to paint. She's been around 'the guys' - veteran British cyclists such as Chris Hoy and Bradley Wiggins - long enough to cope with their teasing if she wears a dress, or says something 'ditzy'. After all, when her gears need changing, it's Pendleton who plays the mechanic.

Having to keep up with the boys is nothing new for Pendleton. Her father, Max, first put her on a bike when she was six and she grew up competing fiercely with her twin brother, Alex. She couldn't get enough of sport, whether it was tackling girls in netball or taking on the lads at mixed hockey. 'I did everything - even cross-country running, though I hated it. I always picked games up pretty fast but no one ever told me I could be an athlete. Only my dad, and you don't believe your parents, do you? They have to say that you're good.'

Her dad is mentioned a lot; she clearly holds him in a great deal of esteem and affection. It was he who spotted, and nurtured, both a natural sporting ability and a desire to win. Her elder sister Nicola, whom he also taught to ride, found the pressure too much; Alex, on the other hand, was too laid-back. 'Sometimes it was really hard,' Pendleton says. 'When we went riding when I was young, my dad would go out a long way in front and I'd have to catch him up. He wouldn't even look back. I'd think, "Does he even care if I'm here?"' She worries after telling that story; she doesn't want to make her dad sound like a pushy parent, because she's grateful for all he did. Fair enough, I say - you wouldn't have kept cycling if you didn't love it. But Pendleton shakes her head; she prefers to be honest. 'I didn't love it some of the time. Some of the time I hated it and wanted to give up. But I'm so glad I didn't, because otherwise I wouldn't have had the opportunities I have now.'

Pendleton was spotted by a national coach at the age of 16, but wanted to finish her education before concentrating on sport. After graduating from Northumbria University with a sports science degree in 2002, she was ready to take up cycling full-time; having made a very creditable debut in the Commonwealth Games that year, she was sent to the World Cycling Centre at Aigle in south-west Switzerland. For two years, she trained every day. By the time she arrived in Athens for her first Olympics in 2004 she was considered a genuine contender.

It was a disaster. 'I was totally underprepared to be in a competition at that level, psychologically and physically. I'd been basically thrown to the lions.' Even before the contest began, the Olympic village had overwhelmed her. 'Surreal is the only word to describe it. People from all over the world are interested in you. You eat in a giant dining hall. You take drinks out of cupboards and they're all free. It's just bizarre.

'All these different nations are supposedly living in harmony, but you sense the very high levels of stress, you can feel it. A lot of people hide it well, but underneath everybody is anxious about performing.' She found herself in a mental limbo. 'It was almost like I wasn't there. I wasn't fully aware of being there, concentrating and focused like I should have been.' She berated herself for her poor performances without understanding them; in the final reckoning, she finished ninth.

Pendleton admits that, unlike her twin brother, she is the kind of person who gets 'strung out'. And while she still had to improve physically, it was her mind that really needed rebuilding. Steve Peters, the British team's psychologist, worked with her, breaking down assumptions and beliefs that were causing her to tense up at crucial moments, not unlike a wheel locking up under braking. He asked her why she cycled, what drove her to succeed; gradually, he helped her gain invaluable perspective. 'In the weird environment of an athlete, your performance is the most important thing in the world: how fast you are today, whether you're going to be faster tomorrow. You feel judged on what you're going to achieve, because that's what sport's about. If someone says it's the taking part that counts, I say, "Not in my world it isn't."

'It sounds really obvious,' she adds, 'but sometimes you have to take a step back and look at sport for what it is. I have to be realistic about what I do: at the end of the day, what I do is entertainment.'

It must have worked, because only a year later, in 2005, Pendleton won her first world championship gold. A gold and a silver followed at the 2006 Commonwealth Games; then, last year in Mallorca, she achieved her treble - and became the one person that every female track cyclist now wants, and needs, to beat. Her closest rival is Natalia Tsylinskaya of Belarus, who has won eight world titles herself and is unlikely to enjoy being ousted as queen of the track. Pendleton is also keeping her eye on the Chinese: 'There are a few girls coming through who have shown a lot of improvement and are a threat because you don't know what they're capable of yet.'

We eat a Wagamama takeaway while we chat; she has ordered a yaki soba without even looking at the menu, a sure sign, I suggest, of a regular patron. She grins - when she was on a training camp in Perth, Australia, earlier in the year she and Chris Hoy could be found at the franchise most evenings. 'Food is the one indulgence I can afford myself,' she says. Ah, the life of the professional sportswoman - no alcohol, no late nights, and, I imagine, a sex ban from the coach. 'Oh no, we're allowed to do that,' she says. 'Just not with each other.'

With 10 months of her year spent on the international circuit, and the remainder spent feeling knackered, she has to live what she calls 'a very sensible existence'. When new acquaintances ask what she does in her spare time, she tells them: 'I eat and I sleep. I enjoy a nice sit-down with a cup of tea and a piece of cake.' She used to do dress-making - 'I love sewing, but you can't take a sewing machine away with you when you go to training camps' - and she still enjoys baking; her favourite recipe is a 'French cake' she learnt from her mum, a fat-free sponge layered with apricot jam and Grand Marnier and covered in dark chocolate (and if you're not salivating at the thought of that, you need your taste buds checked). She misses her girlfriends from her home in Stotfold, Bedfordshire, and doesn't like to talk about her day job in company ('My life seems quite dull - I ride around in circles').

If she sounds like an old-fashioned girl, a few minutes watching her power around the track will shake the impression. This month, she is defending her world titles at her home circuit. If she is successful, she will be Britain's most talked-of Olympic contender; and for these Games, she will be prepared. 'The experience [of 2004] will mean a lot,' she says. 'I think it will make a significant difference to how I will approach this one.' And her rivals? 'They're probably more worried about me, which is a comforting thought.'

Courtney Love to rock the fashion world with clothing line

2009-06-15T05:06:00.000-07:00

Courtney Love, trendsetter?

Well we never!

Sounds like the rumours Courtney Love is going to be designing a clothing range might indeed be spot on, according to Peaches Geldof that is.

Peaches tweeted last night that she was having a sleepover with Ms Love and said that not only were they eating chocolate cake – but also having a 'hotel-room fashion show' of her new designs.

(Could Ms Geldof be the face of the range?). So now we can exclusively reveal some details of Ms Love's ideas for the collection.

According to the lady herself some ideas include, 'cotton ribbed body suits', 'cashmere harem pants' and 'stitching a ruby into every outfit'. Hmm could be a bit pricey there, Court!

Now, a rep for the rock star has confirmed that Love is launching her own clothing line, reports People magazine.

Read The Courtney Love Article From Harper's Bazar

Following her counterfeit faux pas, Courtney Love has been granted a reprieve by Karl Lagerfeld's court. Now the iconic rock star is decidedly back in fashion

Walk into Courtney Love's Beverly Hills residence, a "guesthouse" of San Simeon proportions, and she immediately directs you to her closet. "Go check it out," she says with a wave of the arm. "All of the size 8's are gone." Thus instructed, head downstairs into Love's bedroom, a Norma Desmond–style boudoir filled with porcelain dolls, massive crystals, Helmut Newton photo books, fringed lamps, two guitars, a large television playing a quiz show on BBC America ...and wait.

A few minutes later, she barrels down the stairs and into the walk-in closet, explaining all it contains in a warp-speed monologue. "This side is sporty," she says, cigarette in hand, taking a sharp turn and pulling out all of her Rick Owens jackets, various tees and tanks, and a plethora of skinny jeans. Over a chair hangs a Giles Deacon bag covered in fist-size gold studs. "[Stylist] Katie Grand got it for me," Love says with a lucky-girl smile, opening the bag to reveal a similarly intimidating pochette. "Just try to mug me [when I've got] this. Ha." Then, off to the girly side, where a wall of shoes lives — Chanel heels, metallic Miu Mius, and rare sparkly red Salvatore Ferragamos — alongside Dolce & Gabbana dresses, tiny Azzedine Alaïas, Vivienne Westwood and Chanel suits, Lanvin ("I collect Alber"), vintage Biba, and Chloé ("my daywear, my momwear, my in-real-life favorite"). Tucked away in one corner are two exquisite Victorian lace dresses, customized in Love's rock 'n' roll Lolita style, which represent the first pieces of a new lingerie-inspired label she plans to launch next year with L.A. designer Claire La Faye. "It will be called Dirty Blondes or Never the Bride. We don't know yet," she says. And then, on the left, the big, empty rack where those size 8's used to hang.

If cleaning out the closet is an all-too-obvious metaphor for where Love, 43, is right now, it's a singularly appropriate one. She's been on a mission since she was "out sick," as she half jokes about her last stint in rehab nearly two years ago, and she's amping up for the upcoming release of her long-awaited solo album Nobody's Daughter. "It's the first time I've written sober," she says, "the first time I've written from a really deep, dark place."

Also, as any reader of tabloids and/or Love's no-holds-barred blog knows, she has lost some weight recently. She looks good — very good. Today she is wearing a silver Vanessa Bruno minidress and black camellia-embellished Chanel stilettos. Her hair is newly styled in a Julie-Christie-in-Shampoo bob. She takes a seat on her bed, hits a buzzer for a Nature's Best Isopure shake ("It's vanilla. Taste it. It's fantastic, like Dairy Queen"), lights the first of many cigarettes, and starts to talk.

We're here, ostensibly, to discuss what shall henceforth be named L'Incident de Chanel. Earlier this year, Love and her daughter, Frances Bean Cobain, attended Paris Hilton's birthday party, Love wearing a black minidress with a white fringed appliqué on the front and matching fingerless gloves that an assistant had found for her. The dress was, in fact, a knockoff of a Chanel couture piece — "a Canal Street fake" — and Love had no idea. The fallout was swift: The dress hit the press, word reached Karl Lagerfeld at the Chanel atelier, and one miffed couture client who had ordered the original promptly canceled it. Love was mortified. "I wrote Mr. Lagerfeld a letter, an in-depth apology," she explains, clearly still embarrassed. "I offered to pay for the dress, throw him a party, do whatever I needed to do to make up for this horrific thing." Mr. Lagerfeld himself is more sanguine: "Poor girl, she had never seen a real couture dress. Someone made her believe it was the real thing. It's not her fault; it's the fault of a horrible stylist!"

Their rapproc- hement, captured on these pages, was shot in Paris in Coco Chanel's apartment. So what were the differences between the knockoff and the real thing? "Oh, my God, massive," Love says, sighing. "First of all, the glovelets. Mr. Lagerfeld had made his out of eagle feathers with black elastic. Mine were spandex and marabou." She pauses for effect. "On the real Chanel, there was also a masterful and distinctive print. Oh, and there was a label in the Chanel one and not in the other." The iconoclast soon rears her head, however: "In a way, it's insanely subversive, because I don't think anyone has done fake couture before. But honest to God, I did not know. I hope it was burned." (Love's assistant, for the record, was also burned: She was promptly fired.)

Love is Lagerfeld's number-one fan. "I really connected with Karl in a way that I didn't think I was going to," she continues. "From the ponytail to the image and the persona, I didn't think we were going to click, but I ended up genuinely and sincerely liking the man." Love left the shoot for the Eurostar train wearing little but a Chanel lab coat and a black boater. Now she runs to grab the hat and models it coquettishly. "Look at this hat," she says. "Isn't it fantastic? It's literally Coco."

"She reacted in such a nice way [to the clothing]," notes Lagerfeld affectionately. "It's because of her being — her freedom, her sweet wildness — that this happened. She was the victim in this story."

The irony that Love is coming back into fashion — once again — is not lost on her. "The fashion world, they don't trust me anymore," she says with a weary sigh. "And why should they? I looked like crap for years." She laughs wryly, remembering when, in the early '90s, "I didn't know what a season was. Someone had to explain it to me. When grunge first hit, I only knew who John Galliano was because he made bias-cut dresses."

Love's first fashion moment was an entirely unexpected one. In 1992, she and husband Kurt Cobain were anointed grunge fashion icons even though they were shopping at Urban Outfitters. "We had a lot of money, but we could get only $500 out a day and we had no credit. I remember opening up The New York Times, and there's Kurt, and he's the entire style page. And then about two months later, opening up the Times, I'm the entire style page. And we didn't understand what was happening to us."

Fashion moment number two: Versace, 1997, right after Love had won praise for her role as Althea Leasure in The People vs. Larry Flynt. "The Versaces really started courting me," she recalls of her appearance in a Versace campaign and, famously, on the red carpet at the Oscars in a blinding white evening gown. She was also scheduled to model at a Versace show in Rome, which was subsequently canceled due to Gianni Versace's death. "I would have been walking down the Spanish Steps with Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell. I was thinking, I'm gonna be able to tell my daughter when she grows up that at one point in my life, I was so fabulous, I wore a see-through mauve caftan down the Spanish Steps."

Fashion moment number three: the shredded Dior couture dress from John Galliano's infamous "homeless" collection that she wore to the Golden Globes in 2000. "[Stylist] Arianne Phillips talked me into wearing that," she recalls. "I remember one day when Meryl Streep was next door at Carrie Fisher's house. I sent it to her in an Armani bag and said, ‘Meryl, this is too conservative for me.'"

Love is also aware that a large part of the reason designer clothes are currently arriving at her door is that she can now fit into them. "I've lost a lot of weight, and I have done it through being quite disciplined," she says. A few times a year, Love visits a clinic called We Care for "colonics and fasting. Some people think it's about weight loss, but it's about detoxing." On Love's new menu: two Isopure shakes a day, "then I have fish and macrobiotic food. By the way, I hate reading magazines where the actresses are saying, 'Broccoli and fish, broccoli and fish.' You liars. You bulimic liars.

"My 'rock' weight," she explains, as only a rock star can, "has always been around 150 pounds." She blames her weight gain of last year on a few factors: being "out sick," a bad breakup, but also, amusingly, eating too much macrobiotic food. "My daughter and I were kind of going for it because the dessert's fantastic," she says with a chuckle. "I put on 30 pounds, and I put on another 15 out of emotional depression. Then I finally get an Italian Vogue cover, and I'm 182 pounds." These days, she's around 139. "I looked at last year's best-dressed lists," she notes. "I didn't have a chance of getting best dressed at size 8."

Love credits friends Trudie Styler and Gwyneth Paltrow for, among many other supportive girlfriendy things, reminding her of the hard realities of the glamour business. "They were like, 'Duh, you have to walk around advertising what it is they're going to get.'" She takes another sip of her shake. "But I'm not going to become this shrill virago who's been on a diet for 12 years and hates life. I love food."

We've just been under the stairs, in a hidden closet filled with some wacky pieces — think Stevie Nicks crossed with a burlesque dancer — that Love drolly describes as having designed when "I was not well." It's a world of tulle in there, one that threatens to go up in polyester-fueled flames as she rifles through them, cigarette ash waving about. "Oh, man, these are crazy bad," she says, laughing hysterically.

Love freely uses fashion as a sign of when she has faltered. Fragile after Cobain's suicide in 1994, she agreed to be interviewed by Barbara Walters. She took herself to Nordstrom in Seattle and "bought a Mugler. A silver Thierry Mugler. I thought it was the hottest thing I'd ever owned in my life. I pulled my hair up into what I thought was a chignon, and I just had eyeliner on, basically. Did you ever see Matt Lauer and Britney Spears? Well, I was more Grand Guignol than that. More horror show."

She is also frank about her in-court wardrobe, when she was ﬁghting drug charges and for custody of Frances Bean in 2005. "Court was mostly wardrobe by Anthropologie. Nothing wrong with Anthropologie, but I had the worst hair extensions in, and that was before I had dealt with the fact I had gone a little too crazy on the lips," she says of her then-enhanced pout. She gives big props to Marc Jacobs, however, for sticking by her. "Marc has always, always had my back. Last fall, he sent me his entire collection. The problem was that I could never wear that because it would alienate people. You've seen what happens when someone looks too good for court."

A lot of people are sticking by Love this time. "You know, Michael Stipe has this whole theory that I kept stuff in for 10 years and it all just rose to the surface. I cracked. And I cracked in public, and so I lost all of my credibility," she says reflectively. "For many years, I took pills. I felt like I had this dirty secret. Other people can have glasses of wine and things like that because they're normal people who can do things like that. But if you're allergic to that stuff, you just are, and you can't."

So she won't. Instead, she's going to release the album (early reports are that it's her best yet) and tour, and then it's back to the big screen. "I have to advertise. Then, when I'm about 50, I'm going to start directing. I can do it because of my rock-star job. You can command so much, and you can lead so many people, whether it's 200 or 200,000." Love would like to get married again, too. She remembers meeting John Galliano, whom she idolized, in Paris a couple of years after Cobain's death. "I said, ‘When I get remarried, will you make my dress?' and he swore that he would."

Despite her yearning for something as conventional as a wedding gown, Love will always symbolize something very different. "Courtney is perfect for what Chanel was in the beginning," says Karl Lagerfeld. "The young Chanel was a rebel."

Miranda Kerr goes nude for Rolling Stone and Koalas

2009-06-02T06:37:00.000-07:00

IT'S a bold move but Miranda Kerr pulls it off with style.

The home-grown model has posed for her first nude photo shoot, appearing on the cover of the latest edition of Australian Rolling Stone.

She joins an exclusive club who have stripped off for the mag, including Britney Spears, Jennifer Aniston and Lady GaGa.

Another famous face to have graced its cover while keeping his clothes on was former Prime Minister Paul Keating, pictured in cool Ray-Ban sunglasses.

In the US Kerr, 26, is best known as a Victoria's Secret lingerie model and Orlando Bloom's squeeze, but back home she is also the wholesome face of David Jones.

She says she decided to go "au naturel'' to raise awareness of the environment, specifically koalas.

"I feel strongly about the need to protect our natural environment because it supports our life - it really is that simple,'' Kerr tells the magazine, in stores on Wednesday.

Kerr shot the cover for Rolling Stone's first "green issue'' in Sydney in January, with photographer Carlotta Moye behind the lens.

The day-long shoot also included a real koala named Koral, as Kerr is the face of the Australian Koala Foundation's No Tree, No Me campaign.

The campaign aims to protect koalas' natural habitat, hence Kerr's only prop for the shoot is a chain locking her to a tree.

"It's a sad thing - there are only about 100,000 koalas left in Australia,'' Kerr said.

"Something like 80 per cent of the koalas' habitat has been destroyed since Europeans arrived in Australia.''

Kerr is also set to appear in American designer Marc Jacob's new Protect The Skin You're In T-shirt campaign, joining the likes of Eva Mendes, Heidi Klum, Dita Von Teese, Naomi Campbell and Victoria Beckham to raise awareness of skin cancer.

"I'm fully covered - at least, they've covered my bits with the words,'' she laughed.

Other celebrities to have ditched their clothes for a cause include Nicollette Sheridan, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Jason Donovan and Leona Lewis. Given Kerr's high profile, these latest striking images are likely to be picked up by America's Rolling Stone magazine.

"The great thing about having people recognise you is you can try to make a positive difference - that's what I'm trying to do, especially for young women,'' Kerr said.

Rolling Stone's inaugural green issue includes other well-known Australian faces - John Butler, Ruby Rose and Xavier Rudd - talking about environmental issues close to their hearts.

"I believe every effort we make now has a reaction - if we're making positive changes, if we're all doing the simple, small things we can do to help the environment, it makes a big difference,'' said Kerr, who tries to eat only organic food.

CELEBRITY-COUTURE

Jenni Falconer - unveiled as the latest face of Ultimo lingerie

2009-06-01T14:53:00.000-07:00

Viewers are used to seeing Jenni Falconer dressed soberly on GMTV or working the red carpet in a full-length gown.
So her male fans are in for a treat when they see a lot more of the Scottish TV presenter in a racy new lingerie photoshoot.
The self-confessed 'flat-chested' blonde shows off her London Marathon-honed body as she is unveiled as the new face of the Spring/Summer Adore Moi collection by Ultimo.

The 33-year-old follows in the footsteps of previous Adore Moi faces Kimberley Stewart and Nell McAndrew and current Ultimo models Melanie Brown and Melinda Messenger.
After spending a majority of this year training for the Marathon, which she ran in an admirable 3 hours 53 minutes, Jenni is in the best shape of her life.

Jenni was unsure at first when she was first approached by Ultimo owner Michelle Mone, but changed her mind after her Marathon training made her feel more confident with her body.
She enthused: 'I never thought I'd model lingerie but, when I met Michelle, she convinced me that I'd be great.

'Michelle had spoken to me about doing it before but, because I'd been training for the marathon, I felt a little bit more confident. It's quite a big deal getting your kit off.
'I've talked about doing something like this for years but I've never quite had the nerve. Every woman has body issues, and I was too self-conscious to go through with it.'

She said: 'James loved them and he knows all about my body worries.
'He knew exactly what I was thinking about with each one and told me I looked beautiful.'

Fellow Scot, Ultimo owner Michelle said: 'I’ve always admired Jenni’s fantastic figure and loved her approach to healthy living. She has fantastic curves and bags of confidence; Jenni was the perfect person to front the new campaign for Adore Moi by Ultimo and looks utterly fabulous in the new designs for this season.'
Glaswegian Jenni hosted GMTV's Entertainment Today segment on Fridays from 2000 until it ended last July and now presents travel segments for the ITV breakfast show.

She also hosts Channel 5 game show Wordplay and the National Lottery.
In 2007, she came 85th in FHM magazine's poll of the World's Sexiest Women

Reese Witherspoon

2009-06-01T11:50:00.000-07:00

With a new look, a new man, and newfound happiness, Reese Witherspoon lives out a fashion fantasy in the City of Light.

Cut to Paris—not just any Paris but the very center, the Place de la Concorde, where Reese Witherspoon is the American of note, or at least the best-dressed American in the vast statue- and fountain-filled square. It's the day after Bastille Day, and the city is winding down from its national celebration under a blue summer sky. A small flock of tourists and the lunchtime rush of mopeds and miniature Mercedes-Benzes pass beneath the lingering lazy red, white, and blue flags. Now slowly zoom in on the Hôtel de Crillon's Marie Antoinette suite—where the queen took piano lessons until she lost her head out in the square—ornamented with beautiful tapestries and Corinthian columns. Then pan left to take in the view: the Tuileries garden, the Eiffel Tower, and, beyond the River Seine, the Palais Bourbon—an iconic vista that Reese Witherspoon slips into perfectly, first in a Nina Ricci dress that seems designed for her because it was, and then in a bustier-based Alexander McQueen concoction that makes her look like a queen. Not a let-them-eat-cake kind of queen. Quite the opposite. Reese is obsessed with the women (and men) on the Paris street, observing them as if they were the film stars. "People are so chic here!" she had said the previous day, sitting at a café before taking a stroll. "Everyone has so much personal style, I want to take pictures!"

Reese takes her spot on the Crillon's balcony, along the eighteenth-century ledge, her outstretched arm framing the view of Paris generally, and in particular the obelisk of Luxor, a 3,300-year-old gift from Egypt to France that is perfectly aligned between I. M. Pei's Pyramids at the Louvre and the Arc de Triomphe. These days, Reese's own star is in alignment, in part because of her range as an actress. After last year's thriller Rendition, she's returned to romantic comedy in Four Christmases, costarring with Vince Vaughn in a role that reminds us that Reese Witherspoon is the kind of star we like to think of as being just like us: hardworking, from a small town, with a young family, a star who considers herself lucky to be a star, as we'd like to think we would—even though, believe it or not, it's a lot of work being a star. But will she maintain her trademark humble grace even here, in Paris, striking a pose of extreme elegance, as if the idea of fashion had been dreamed up with her in mind?

The answer: yes. When she pauses for a moment to look behind her, she mentally gulps. "I'd never been to the Crillon," she says shortly afterward, "and the view is just so striking. Every once in a while you're hit with moments when you think, Really? This is my life? How lucky am I?"

When the shoot is finished, she calls over a friend who is holding a regular point-and-shoot digital camera. "Can you take a picture, please?" she asks. She wants a snapshot of her wearing this dress, in Paris, for her mom. Big smile. Click. Cut.

Near the Champs-Élysées, at a corner café on Avenue Montaigne, Reese is lunching on a plate of greens that resembles a study by Seurat hanging in the Musée d'Orsay, with a little dollop of crab that seems too elegant to eat but is too tasty not to. All around, buzzing, talking, smoking, the cafégoers notice but do not interrupt the cinema star—they are the French, who invented studied nonchalance.

"You know, the older I get—and I can only count on one hand the times I've been to Paris—I'm starting to feel like I understand the place a little better," she says. "The people just love the city, and I can really see what they love about it."

She's relaxed, as opposed to the person she plays in Four Christmases, in which she's more than a little high-strung. It's a comedy about a young San Francisco couple who think of themselves as together, modern, and protected from the baggage of family traditions. "They have their own theology in life," says Reese. "They work very hard. They live well. They eat at nice restaurants. They have all the modern amenities. They have every new technology you could have." And they swear by one rule: Never go back home.

"They kind of want to avoid going home for the holidays," says Vaughn. "They both have stuff with their parents."

But they do have families—divorced parents, at that—and now, owing to a snafu at the airport, their relaxing Christmas vacation away from family becomes a forced visit with parents and stepparents whom they fear and love. "What they discover," says Reese, "is that when you don't have that kind of connection to family, when you avoid those things, you also avoid a lot in your relationship. So they discover a lot about themselves."

For Vaughn, one of the bigger discoveries, he says, was just how easy his costar was to work with, despite what you may have read in the tabloids about their incompatibility. "She was great," he says. "She's just a great actor and can do a variety of things and do them well, whether it was physical comedy or more character-driven comedy or more dramatic stuff—she's just a very talented actress." He adds, "She's extremely in touch with herself. I don't really think there's anything she can't do."

One thing she apparently couldn't do was resist Vaughn's sense of humor—according to Reese, she was in hysterics a lot of the time. "Vince is the funniest person I've ever worked with in my entire life," she says. "There were days when we were shooting things, I would laugh so hard it would ruin the take, and I was afraid I was going to pee on myself, it was so funny."

The director, Seth Gordon, was impressed by how Reese encouraged the rest of the cast to make fun of her character—she could take it, she said—and how she pushed for an idea that helped set the tone for the film, a divorced-family group hug. "I think the message is that as quirky and complicated as family can be, at the end of the day that's what matters most," he says. "Reese was instrumental in keeping us focused on that."

To make up for the comic degradations of her role in Four Christmases, in her next film, Monsters vs. Aliens, she will star as a female superhero—one of a group of monsters who are at first shunned and then called on to save the Earth. "I am a 50-foot woman," she says. "No, wait, I'm the 49 ½-foot woman. It's me and a sort of motley crew of monsters—kind of B-movie monsters." The cast? "Dr. Cockroach—Hugh Laurie—is one, and there's a kind of amorphous blob of material called B.O.B.; that's Seth Rogen."

Naturally, she is proud of the fact that the movie is one of the first animated features starring a female superhero, though the role is in some ways a stretch for her. "I have a history," she says, "a long history of being stereotyped as a five-foot-two woman, which is very limiting." It's not a stretch at all to say that playing a female superhero touches on a theme in her career. "I've worked so hard to create characters that have dignity," she says. "And I think everybody knows that I have a very pro-woman message in my work—and in my life."

Her work for the Children's Defense Fund and, more recently, for Avon—she is the first-ever Avon Global Ambassador—concerns women's rights, as she sees it. In the case of Avon, she's supporting an entrepreneurial version of micro-loans for women building financial networks around the globe—"whether it's a woman in Texas getting a college education because she got the money to cover a baby-sitter while she goes to school," she says, "or a woman in a village in Africa who has surpassed all expectations by creating a little network of salespeople within her community. The more work I've done with children around the world, the more I realize the way to help them is by empowering women, creating financial opportunities, and that's something Avon is very dedicated to."

In the meantime, a romantic comedy about the children of divorce appeals to her for other reasons, related to her own life: She recently finalized her divorce from Ryan Phillippe, whom she met during the filming of Cruel Intentions in 1999. "There are so many dynamics that people deal with all the time, and you don't really see it in movies very much," Reese says. "You don't see the blended-family Christmas very much. And it really is a complication in a lot of people's lives now. How do you see your mother and your father and not hurt anyone's feelings? You know, I didn't grow up like that. I mean, my parents are still married, and my grandparents stayed married, but it's a situation my own children will have to deal with, so it was of interest to me."

Romantic comedy suits her fine at the moment, generally speaking, from the vantage point of a single working mom—or a single-at-the-moment mom. And when she talks about why, you start to hear the part of Reese Witherspoon that her fans identify with, the Reese who understands that life isn't just about standing in the Hôtel de Crillon. "I have to be honest with you," she says. "Comedy is what I want to see at the movies these days. Life is frickin' hard, man. I want to go to the movies and see people happy and enjoying themselves and having some fun. I've made other kinds of movies, for sure. But it's pretty apparent to me that's what people want. That's what I want. I enjoy those kinds of movies."

Reese's first visit to Paris was with her parents in the summer of 1991, when she was just fifteen. Her first film, The Man in the Moon, was featured at the American film festival in Deauville. As a teenager in Nashville, where she'd mostly grown up, she was forbidden to wear black but nevertheless hoped one day to dress like Belinda Carlisle of the Go-Go's. "I always thought she was hot—her tight black jeans and her black turtleneck," Reese says. "I remember when I made my first paycheck, I went out and bought myself a pair of black jeans—oh, living on the edge!" On her first trip to Paris, she recalls, her mother dressed her in Laura Ashley or Jessica McClintock. The next time she was in Paris, in 1996, she was 20, opening in Freeway. She wore a strapless dress and went to the top of the Eiffel Tower and the fair in the Tuileries, and had her first encounter with paparazzi. She mostly remembers the dress, not the paparazzi. "I have a good memory for certain things. And a very short memory for painful things—that's my favorite Martha Stewart quote, by the way."

On one of her more recent trips to Paris, in 2005, she arrived the day after her Oscar nomination for Walk the Line, the Johnny Cash biopic in which she starred as June Carter Cash. She needed a dress. She wanted vintage. Her stylists, Clare and Nina Hallworth, went to work, and, as if she were involved in a sensitive Cold War spy negotiation, she was driven to an out-of-the-way arrondissement, down an alley where a Christian Dior dress made in the fifties for a princess, literally, was hanging in a dressmaker's shop window.

Reese loved it. "And Nina said to me, 'OK, there's only one hitch…." At this point, we can imagine Reese looking at Nina, waiting.

"It's not for sale," Nina said.

"Are you joking?" Reese exclaimed.

The Hallworth sisters had a plan. Enter Nunzio Palamara, formerly of Versace, who in this case was like Harvey Keitel's character in Pulp Fiction, a fashion fixer. Reese was pacing in her Paris hotel room, eager to get home quickly to her kids. Nunzio flew in to Charles de Gaulle airport from Milan, drove to the same out-of-the-way alley, greeted the dressmaker, pleaded, cajoled. Nothing—the dressmaker wouldn't sell, as he, too, treasured the old jewel. For Plan B, Reese would try the dress on, in the shop, Nunzio hoping that the guy would sell it when he saw her in it, a kind of reverse Cinderella gamble.

"And then the dress," Reese says. "I mean, let's talk about this dress again—it was made in 1957, which was the year the single 'I Walk the Line' came out. I'm pretty sure it's the year the single came out, or maybe it was after 'I Walk the Line.' How does it go?"

She pauses in the story to sing to herself, trying to recall the tune: "Oh, I never got over those blue eyes…."

Yes, she can really sing—and by the way, if you say so and add that you feel she was one of the very few people born to play June Carter Cash, she does a double take, with a mock-indignant smile, and says, "I was one of the few people born to be June Carter Cash? I was the only person born to play her—I mean, me and June Carter Cash."

Back in the little Parisian dress shop, she tried the dress on. "It fit perfectly. I mean, like, it couldn't have been more amazing," she remembers, "and Nunzio is there and he's talking in French and finally the man said, 'You can have it.' " She wore it to the Oscars. She won an Oscar. "I don't mean to sound hokey pokey, but the dress has energy in it," she says. She will keep it forever. "My accountant got wind of the bill, and he called me and said, 'Um, don't you think you should auction this off?' And I'm like, 'Are you kidding me?' I will never ever ever ever ever sell it. I never thought I'd have a dress like that."

On a more recent trip to Paris, she stopped in at Rochas and met Olivier Theyskens, then its artistic director, who was about to be named head of Nina Ricci. Every Oscar winner knows that if you need perfect clothes before you win an Oscar, you need them even more so afterward—and she couldn't go through another vintage ordeal. Every newly named artistic director of a fashion house in Paris knows he needs a huge Hollywood actress. Thus a fashion match was made in Heaven—or in Paris, at least.

"When I met her at Rochas, it was not the right fit," Olivier says. "But when I started at Ricci, I had a strong feeling about her being a real Ricci girl, and I showed her some drawings and she was really willing. She has been very willing. She has been cool."

Along the Avenue Montaigne again, this time at Theyskens's atelier, where Reese is dressed in a bustier-like Nina Ricci dress that, aside from being sexy, is a work of art. The mirrors of Theyskens's office have become a spiraling prism of Reese Witherspoon in black, complemented by Olivier's long, raven-black hair. She is talking about dinner the night before, when her boyfriend, Jake Gyllenhaal (who dropped by during makeup), wrote cute remarks in the restaurant's guest book (something about French melons), which his girlfriend found charming, her smile now bubbling like champagne in a black crepe flute. "He wrote, 'Vive la France!' " she says, laughing. Ah, Paris and love!

The next dress is more than a dress: It's a gown with a skirt so architecturally structured—an autumnal red, with swanlike swoops of volume—that it won't fit through the doorway, literally. It must live in the shop or be deconstructed. The craftspeople—pattern-makers, sewers, designers—are now sneaking in to have a look. Reese loves this. "You know," she says, "I used to not understand fashion, a lot of it, but I completely understood being a playwright or a screenwriter and suddenly having an actor say your words and making them come to life. That I can understand. Finally, I'm starting to understand this."

"Some dresses I work very hard on," Olivier says, "but this was what I call a flash dress. It came to me in a flash."

The first time the two collaborated was when Reese invited Olivier to Los Angeles. "So he came to my house and sat on the floor and started sketching," she says. It was her first time having a Paris-based designer in her home. "Of course I put out tons of food and he didn't eat anything," she recalls. "He brought out two kinds of fabric—he brought out one gray and one yellow. And he said, 'I think you are like this! I think you are like a party! I think you are wearing a yellow dress!' " He showed her the Nina Ricci perfume bottle, an echo of the dress. The yellow fabric became the gown she wore to the Golden Globe Awards in 2007. "The yellow dress with the bustier—for me it was the first thing that the world would see from me at Ricci," Olivier says. "But still, I wanted it to fit with Reese. I was afraid. And it was Reese who picked that fabric. This was one of my favorite fabrics! She just fell right into it. She is very intuitive."

How do they relate—a Southern girl from Tennessee and a French guy from Belgium? On an artistic level, you might say they are both working hard to appear effortless, doing the homework so that they never break a sweat at the final exam. On the other hand, Olivier thinks it has to do with age. "We are the same age, so we have some roots," he says. "I am quite fascinated by roots of generations." He also credits his knowledge of American fashion culture; he can talk to Americans about fashion because he knows where they are coming from. "I was looking at fashion, especially on CNN, with Elsa Klensch," he says. "This was my whole youth. I systematically watched this show. I studied it."

Essentially, though, they appear to have clicked. "If I do her an elegant dress, she can dress so elegant," he says. "If I find a dress, she will find a way to be at her ease. I feel OK—I'm Olivier doing dresses! I'm superhappy about working, and everything is getting more fluid."

On Bastille Day, Reese is at another café. She has done her share of cafés in Paris. "It's the first time I've taken my kids," she says. She believes in taking the kids. "My girlfriend was saying the other day that it's like that famous Mark Twain line, about how travel is fatal to bigotry and narrow-mindedness—I'm paraphrasing, but it's something like that." Travel is also good for discovering croissants, crepes, and macaroons. Also for introducing her son to the toy boats at the Jardin du Luxembourg, or the French sewer tour. And then there's the Métro, a five-year-old boy's thrill. "He goes from one stop to another; it makes his day," Reese says, beaming. And on that very evening, as the French celebrated, she and Monsieur Gyllenhaal would take her nine-year-old daughter out late to see the fireworks—the Seine glowing, the Eiffel Tower a sparkler. Reese is so high on Paris that now she jokes about making Legally Blonde 3. "Maybe she takes a trip to Paris," she says. "Or maybe she's like James Bond, but she's Jane Blonde!"

Reese likes to talk about her kids, but she doesn't have to. People can tell how she feels. "The thing I really respect a lot about Reese is that she's a great mom," says Vince Vaughn. "She was just great with her kids when they came to the set. She'd make time for them, and you could tell by the way they acted that they were very comfortable and loving with her."

As far as the boyfriend goes, she doesn't like to talk about him so much, and it can make you feel a little tabloid about asking. Still, this is Paris, city of light and love, and if you've heard the song by Carla Bruni about French president Nicolas Sarkozy—"I give you my body, my soul, and my chrysanthemum/For I am yours/You are my lord/You're my darling/You're my orgy/You're my folly"—then you figure, what the heck, it's Paris. You ask. "He's very supportive," she says. You press her. "Suffice it to say, I'm very happy in life, and I'm very lucky to have a lot of really supportive people around me who care very much for me, and, you know, that's all you can hope for in life. I am very blessed in that way."

She will tell you that she was with the guy she'd rather not blab about some weeks earlier—in Rome, speaking of beautiful cities—and that one night they went out to see the Trevi Fountain. It was late, it was beautiful, and she threw a coin in and made a wish. What did she wish for? Come on. Do you really think she's going to tell you that? "If I tell you," she says, "it won't come true."

"Innocence Abroad" has been edited for Style.com; the complete story appears in the November 2008 issue of Vogue.

Katie Price Isn't Going to Let a Pesky Divorce Get to Her

2009-06-01T05:38:00.000-07:00

She may be in the midst of a nasty divorce, but Miss Katie Price isn't going to let emotional turmoil get in the way of her important bikini duties.

The queen of merchandising showed up to London's Clothes Show this week, shilling her line of equestrian clothing yet again. It seems that the divorce hasn't affected her signature look, either as she showed up perma-tanned and primped as always. She even walked the catwalk in a bikini and a towering pair of stripper peep-toes.

Visit Katie's New Equestrian Clothing Website

Nevermind that her soon to be ex-husband, singer Peter Andre, has reportedly been locked out of their home, with all his belongings in storage. A lady has to work!

Too chavvy or horse savvy? Clover Stroud goes riding with the irrepressible Katie Price in search of the truth

We all think we know Katie Price, and everyone seems to have an opinion on the glamour model turned devoted mother turned bestselling author turned successful entrepreneur.

For her part, Katie plays the nation’s love-hate relationship with her to great advantage. Never was there a better time to interview Ms Price than on this blustery summer day galloping across the Buckinghamshire countryside: the furore surrounding her claims that she was refused a table at the prestigious Cartier International Polo society event last month was still ringing in our ears.
The incident (which may have been a simple misunderstanding) has brought the media rallying to Katie’s defence, emphasising her credentials as a horsewoman and businesswoman. She owns six horses (recently spending ‘an absolute fortune’ on a new stallion) and occasionally takes part in charity polo matches. Proving what a clever chameleon she is, Katie is about to launch her own range of pink riding gear at the Burghley Horse Trials.

We meet in the stable yard of her publicist’s home, where Katie, 30, keeps two of her horses. Devoid of make-up, she is dressed in jodhpurs, riding boots and a faintly grubby green top. She looks like any pretty, skinny, slightly stroppy girl you might see working in a busy yard, but her riding ambitions go far beyond muckraking.

So, as an experienced rider myself, when I was offered the chance to ride with her, I seized the opportunity to put her skills to the test. The result, I would discover, was intriguing.

But before I could mount Jelly, my horse for the day, Katie has to be kitted out for our shoot in her new clothing range, which includes pink gilets and jackets with a distinctive logo and crown detail. It has been designed by her with the pony-mad tween market in mind, and they’ll adore it.

The equestrian establishment may take longer to come round to the idea of wearing kit designed by Jordan, but who knows? They could well end up falling in love with her.

It’s still only 11am on the day of our ride, but already Katie has had a trying morning: she was up at 6am with the kids, and then got stuck in traffic on the M25 driving from her home in Surrey. She has come straight from a showjumping lesson and she’s very hungry.

‘I’m not being funny, but is there a McDonald’s around here?’ she asks.

There isn’t, so someone suggests pizza.

‘Order lots,’ she tells her publicist. ‘Dips and potato wedges as well. You know what a gannet I am.’

Her frame is tiny – she looks nothing like a gannet. She complains she has to wear children’s size jodhpurs, and cannily suggests that she should add slim-fit riding gear to her new range.

‘I could have my logo across the bum,’ she giggles. ‘Or just my name. My name across my bum.’

Now that’s an idea that would have the paparazzi swarming – under the control, of course, of the publicity machine behind the Katie Price brand. Most press exposure of Katie, husband Peter Andre and their children, Harvey, six, Junior, three, and one-year-old Princess Tiaami, is now by agreement and receipt of payment – a fee that was waived for YOU magazine.

Katie relishes this sort of exposure.

‘I wouldn’t be anywhere without the public,’ she says, ‘and I absolutely love it.’

She’ll say this several times during the afternoon’s ride.

‘My life’s an open book. It’s hard work, but, boy, do I love every moment of it, and I’m not doing this equestrian line for the money – because I’m set up for life already.’ (She has an estimated fortune of £30 million from magazine deals and endorsements.) Doesn’t she get frightened by the thought of selling her life, and keeping nothing private? ‘Not really. I don’t want to keep it private anyway.’

Some of the coverage is unwelcome: there has recently been a run of gossip stories showing Katie looking ‘gaunt and stressed’, claiming that her three-year marriage to Andre is over.

‘I really don’t care about the criticism,’ she says. ‘It just drives me on to greater success.’

But there have been times when it has gone too far. The couple recently won substantial damages and a public apology from the News of the World after they sued over allegations made by a former nanny. The newspaper claimed that they were reckless parents – which really hurt.

‘I had to take action, to say enough is enough,’ she says. ‘They’ll be more careful about what they say now.’

And now a riding career, too. Although she began riding as a child, Katie only started taking dressage lessons in March this year, but gained a respectable sixth place among 27 competitors at Hickstead this June.

Dane Rawlins, show director at Hickstead, told Horse & Hound magazine that ‘she made a good impression’ and that judges and spectators were impressed. Perhaps horses provide Katie with a space where she can really be herself.

‘I just love horses. I’m cocky with everything else, like modelling, because I know I’m really good at it, but with horses, it’s different.’

It was the horses she wanted to see at the Cartier polo. She claims she wasn’t bothered about the ‘toff types’ who, the press claimed, had deemed her ‘too chavvy’ to attend.

‘I don’t care what they say, and I don’t need to hang about with people like that, I just wanted to see the polo,’ she says.

Both Cartier and the club Chinawhite, who host a lunch at the event, maintain the failure to find Price a table was down to the fact that she had applied too late and through a third party – but Katie still feels slighted.

I can understand why. Because unlike many of the people who attend such a social occasion, to catch a glimpse of royalty and celebrities and drink champagne in the sunshine, Katie’s genuine interest is in the horses and the skill of the game.

‘I was always obsessed with horses,’ she says. ‘Growing up, my walls weren’t covered with pictures of pop stars, but of horses.’

I ask her why, when she seems to have everything she could want, she still works so hard.

‘Just for my own sake, to know that I can do it.’

She claims that she is driven only by her own competitive spirit, something she inherited from her family, ‘We’re all very competitive and I always have to win.’

It was her family who were vital in helping her cope with the postnatal depression she suffered after Junior was born. ‘I’d rather talk to my family than a therapist. They’re the ones who keep my feet on the ground. Compared to most people, I suppose I do live my life in the fast lane, but I also do normal things.’

And now a riding career, too. Although she began riding as a child, Katie only started taking dressage lessons in March this year, but gained a respectable sixth place among 27 competitors at Hickstead this June.

Dane Rawlins, show director at Hickstead, told Horse & Hound magazine that ‘she made a good impression’ and that judges and spectators were impressed. Perhaps horses provide Katie with a space where she can really be herself.

‘I just love horses. I’m cocky with everything else, like modelling, because I know I’m really good at it, but with horses, it’s different.’

It was the horses she wanted to see at the Cartier polo. She claims she wasn’t bothered about the ‘toff types’ who, the press claimed, had deemed her ‘too chavvy’ to attend.

‘I don’t care what they say, and I don’t need to hang about with people like that, I just wanted to see the polo,’ she says.

Both Cartier and the club Chinawhite, who host a lunch at the event, maintain the failure to find Price a table was down to the fact that she had applied too late and through a third party – but Katie still feels slighted.

I can understand why. Because unlike many of the people who attend such a social occasion, to catch a glimpse of royalty and celebrities and drink champagne in the sunshine, Katie’s genuine interest is in the horses and the skill of the game.

‘I love being out here in the fresh air, away from anything else,’ she says.

And in that moment she becomes utterly endearing; she loses the brash-model confidence and we seem equals.

Her riding is competent, and as she concentrates on her technique her Hollywood-white smile is the only sign that she’s anything other than a country girl taking a favourite horse for a ride.

The polo toffs may scoff at Jordan, but she is much more than a hairpiece and a set of false eyelashes. It strikes me that Katie on horseback is the real deal.

Original Story - DailyMail

Rachel Zoe to Launch Clothing Line

2009-05-31T09:06:00.000-07:00

Here's news that could make even the grayest, most manic of Mondays feel like a Saturday morning stroll through the park: Rachel Zoe's working on "a full-range clothing line that won't break the bank," according to People StyleWatch. I don't think I'm alone here when I say...I DIE.

“It will be absolutely, 100% accessible fashion for sure — for everybody. There’s no reason for me to do a luxury-level design. That’s not who I am. I don’t think it’s what people want from me. I think that I would need to give people that fantasy becoming a reality. That’s my job,” Rachel told the magazine. Expect clothing, jewelry, handbags, and fragrances, all stamped with the signature Zoe fabulousness that's equal parts Blanche Devereaux and Nicole Richie.

Check out celeb-stylist Rachel Zoe's handpicked favorites at Piperlime

The gals over at The Cut did a bit more digging, and found out that the line will potentially be called, "I Die." (The lawyer of Christopher Suave, the artist Zoe sued for making that brilliant "I Die" T-shirt, thinks that was the reason behind the whole cease-and-desist thing). I won't lie, that seems a little far fetched to me. I'm still holding out for an iteration of my numero uno Zoe phrase of all time...SHUTTING IT DOWN.

COUTURE CELEBRITY

Singer Katy Perry has the fashion world abuzz

2009-05-31T08:54:00.000-07:00

Designers have taken note of the up-and-coming pop sensation's quirky, vintage-heavy style and they like what they see.

Katy Perry is squatting over a big duffel bag, rifling through printed dresses, retro rompers, hats, turquoise suede heels and other anti-wallflower accessories, deciding what to wear for the second take of her photo shoot. She holds up a red straw hat with a brim the size of a truck tire, then fishes out a beaded red purse shaped like an apple. "See," Perry says, her huge blue eyes widening. "I love anything fruit."

The pop singer's quirky style and Varga Girl-meets-Joan Jett looks are why she's been on the fashion world's radar for months, though her debut album, "One of the Boys" -- featuring the cheeky, already ubiquitous pop single "I Kissed a Girl" -- is just being released this Tuesday.

This past year, she's been busy vamping it up in fashion spreads for magazines like Nylon and Zink -- not to mention the cover of Women's Wear Daily -- and recently had her wardrobe dissected on "The Fit," a video series on MySpace Fashion.

Designers were calling before her first single even hit the Web, eager to get in early with a potential "it" girl. Perry caught the eye of Betsey Johnson after being snapped in one of the designer's dresses for WWD; soon after, Johnson was dressing the singer for various fall fashion shows in New York in February. "Betsey really likes Katy's appearance," says a spokesperson for the company. "She's very curvy and pinup looking -- a typical Betsey girl."

She's pals with zany T-shirt designer Johnny Cupcakes and dark-and-moody seamster Neil Barrett. Shoe designer Steve Madden has tapped the 23-year-old for an ad campaign in conjunction with her album release. Even Karl Lagerfeld's a fan. Perry attended Chanel's party for its new boutique in L.A. last month wearing a black cocktail dress given to her by the house (a true fashion fanatic, she breathlessly blogged about the gift on www.katyperry.com).

Though Perry's playfully sexy style is the stuff of pop culture gold, the Santa Barbara native wasn't allowed to listen to pop music throughout her childhood. Her parents -- both traveling ministers -- kept their kids on a strict diet of gospel music ("New Kids on the Block? They're still new to me," she jokes).

And she may be singing about kissing girls, but God is first in the album's liner notes, where she writes, "I recognize that my talents are God-given gifts." Perry has "Jesus" tattooed on her wrist in '50s script, but gets shy for the first and only time when it's pointed out, covering it with her hand before reluctantly flashing it again.

Plenty of pop stars have tried to straddle the line between sexy and innocent (Mariah Carey's struggled for years), but with Perry, you get the sense that it's no act.

And it's no mystery why style-watchers have been chasing her down. It's a rare pop tart who comes out of the gate boasting such a bold, distinctive look; even Christina Aguilera flirted with seat-less chaps on her journey to her screen-siren style.

"I really like to look like a history book," says Perry, who talks with her hands -- tipped with short nails painted neon rainbow with leopard spots. "I can look 1940s, I can look 1970s hippie-chic, or sometimes I'll pull that '80s Brooklyn hip-hop kid with the door-knocker earrings."

Retro à go-go

TUCKED into a chaise lounge at Bar Chloe in Santa Monica and clad in a vintage cardigan emblazoned with a bejeweled pineapple, a sunny yellow vintage onesie with a sweetheart neckline -- hair curled in fat ringlets, lips painted stop-sign red -- she resembles one of Slim Aarons' St. Tropez socialites.

"There are definitely flavors of that 1940s pinup in how I dress," Perry says. But like most fashion-forward girls in their early 20s right now, she's also nutso for anything '80s -- big bows, strapless dresses and neon, neon, neon.

Perry's biggest influences, a list of trend-setting female pop-rockers including Cyndi Lauper, Garbage's Shirley Manson, Pat Benatar and Joan Jett, also play into her style. Those women still don't care, she says: "They came out with a vengeance."

Perry gets a regular assist in the wardrobe department from celebrity stylist Johnny Wujek, who's been working with her since 2005. Wujek, who also works with Lake Bell and Kate Mara, says the relationship is pure collaboration -- the pair were good friends even before they started working together. "It just worked out perfectly that I'm a stylist and she's a rock star," Wujek says. "Katy loves to push the boundaries and be her own colorful self. She once told me she wanted to look like an ice cream cone, so I got her a Jeremy Scott dress that's actually an ice cream cone."

Perry credits Wujek with "regularly blowing my mind." For the Nylon shoot, "He made me a headband with my name spelled out in Legos," she says. Though Perry is generally up for anything, she recalls an instance when Wujek took the zaniness too far. "He showed up with a Chiquita banana headdress once, and I was like, 'That's a bit much.' "

Wujek helped pack the bag of sartorial surprises the singer lugged in for this photo shoot, but Perry put herself together that day: test-driving earrings, debating whether to wear a flower in her hair, pulling out reams of belts to pick from.

"I Kissed a Girl" was the No. 2 single on iTunes as of Tuesday, and Perry will be belting it out to thousands this summer as part of the hot-and-sweaty Vans Warped Tour, kicking off at the Fairplex Park in Pomona on Friday. While in hair and makeup for the photo shoot for this article, her publicist showed her a Fox News segment on how local mothers are scandalized by the lyrics ("I kissed a girl and I liked it / the taste of her cherry ChapStick"), prompting Perry to cry, "Yes! My dream is to take on Bill O'Reilly!"

Of course, she's already been anointed by high priestess of pop (and original right-wing instigator) Madonna, who called Perry's sendup of metrosexual men, "Ur So Gay," her favorite song in a recent interview. "I'm still floored by that," Perry says. "It's like, you're Madonna -- you don't have time to be listening to my songs!"

Celebrity Fragrance Awards

2009-05-29T06:03:00.000-07:00

Paris Hilton, Sean John among top fragrances nominated at FiFi awards.

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The sweet smell of success permeated the red carpet at The 37th annual Fragrance Foundation Awards. Hollywood A-listers including Sean "Diddy" Combs and Paris Hilton turned out sporting their favourite scents to what some call the "Oscars of fragrance."

Hilton was honoured for her perfume, Fairy Dust. She attended the event with her mother Kathy and boyfriend Doug Reinhardt.

"I've been doing the fragrance business for a very long time and mine is one of the most successful," says the socialite and reality TV vixen. "Tonight I'm winning celebrity fragrance of the year so it's such a huge honour."

Hilton’s other fragrances include Just Me, Heir, Heiress, Paris Hilton for Men and Can.

Diddy was nominated for his men's fragrance I Am King. Under his Sean John fashion label the hip-hop mogul has also created Unforgivable for men and women.

Order I am King From Perfume.com

He says designing fragrances is similar to designing clothes: it's all in the details.

"Just like you know how you feel the fabrics you have to smell the different notes," said Combs. "It's really about the details and having patience and making something that's unique. It's almost like a fit, you know making a unique fit."

Unforgivable Men EDT 2.5 oz. Spray

Designer Marc Jacobs agreed that both clothing and perfumes require a similar creative process:

"For me creation is the same no matter what it is. So it's a series of choosing, editing and trying to conjure up a mood and a spirit and trying to transmit some visual reference," says Jacobs.

Mary J. Blige was also at the event. She posed for photographs with a bottle of her signature fragrance created with Brooklyn-based beauty company ‘Carol's Daughter’.

"It's beautiful," says Blige. "It smells like me. I took a lot of time thinking about this. And everyone always asks me what I'm wearing. Everyone, so I just want all the women to wear what I'm wearing. And it smells like Mary. It smells like every woman. It's strong. It's soft. It's everything. It's beautiful."

Actor Dustin Hoffman accompanied his wife Lisa who was nominated for a FiFi Award for her skincare line.

He appeared to enjoy giving up the spotlight.

"This is wonderful," said Hoffman. "I wish they (red carpets) were all for my wife and not for me. And I'd worry less."

This year's awards were hosted by Samantha Harris. The "Dancing with the Stars" starlet wore an orange Alice and Olivia dress.

"I figure this is a really good dress for summer and being that it is the Fragrance Awards, the FiFi Awards, it reminds me of a fancy bottle of perfume.

I'm just going to pop out the top apparently," says Harris.

Professional polo player and face of Ralph Lauren's Polo-brand fragrances Ignacio "Nacho" Figueras was excited to talk sports.

Order Ralph Lauren Polo From Perfume.com

He's preparing for Prince Harry's upcoming visit to New York.

"I'm the reason that he's here - one of the reasons. I invited him," says Figueras. "And Blackwatch, my team is going to play against Sentebale, which is his charity, which is a great thing because we will be able to raise money for his charity."

The Veuve Clicquot Manhattan Polo Classic will take place on Governor's Island Saturday, 30 May.

Rachel McAdams Is an Open Book

2009-05-29T05:42:00.000-07:00

We heard the State of Play star was a smarty, so we invited her to be the Marie Claire Book Club's first-ever celebrity guest. Turns out the rumors were true.

SHE'S OUR PREEMINENT girl crush — a celebrated actress (Mean Girls, The Notebook, Wedding Crashers, Married Life) who could also be a friend. At least that's how it feels, given the smarts and normality Rachel McAdams radiates: no trashy party-girl shots in the tabloids, no attention-seeking hookups — even her breakups reek of class (hey, Ryan Gosling, we're available!). She still lives in Canada, not far from her folks, she tells us, in an "old house that's kind of falling apart, but that's just my taste" — and we can totally see ourselves hanging out with her there.

What we couldn't see was buttonholing Rachel — star of this month's political thriller State of Play, opposite Russell Crowe — for a typical celeb profile, grilling her about inner demons and her new boyfriend, the (dare we say, Gosling-esque?) actor Josh Lucas. Instead, we invited the 30-year-old to roll up her sleeves and have a go with the Marie Claire Book Club. Not only did Rachel say yes — showing up in a comfy blue button-down, skinny jeans, and strappy Ferragamos before settling in with a cup of tea — but she also chose the book: Barbara Kingsolver's earthy, sexy best seller Prodigal Summer.

THE PLOT: Set in southern Appalachia, Prodigal Summer is what you might call nature porn — something or someone is mating on nearly every page. Red-tailed hawks do it, chickadees do it, moths do it, and, of course, humans do it. First, there's Deanna, the 47-year-old park ranger who's holed up in a cabin in the woods when not tracking endangered coyotes — until the cocky, much-younger hunter Eddie Bondo upends her solitude. Then there's Lusa, an exotic, widowed city girl trying to keep the randy locals at arm's length. Finally, there's Garnett, the crotchety loner destined to connect with the pesticide-hating hippie chick one farm over. The three stories intertwine like creeping kudzu in this juicy, eco-friendly must-read.

RACHEL (GUEST BOOK-CLUBBER): I absolutely fell in love with this book. I don't think I got out of bed for three days — I was just eating it up. My favorite story line was the one between Deanna and Eddie Bondo. I found that totally hot. It was one of the hottest love stories I've ever read.

LAUREN (ARTICLES EDITOR): Agreed. In that scene when they're right in the middle of some slow sex and Eddie's asking her about her life's story and she's just concentrating on maintaining the conversation, which is totally disconnected from what their bodies are doing? Mercy.

RACHEL: There were so many great conversations in bed, and then cold-morning wake-ups, when he's cooking for her, building the fire ... I kind of fancy living in the woods for two years. Not by myself — but I do have a side of me that would just love to be stuck in the woods and have to stick it out and be really resourceful.

YAEL (ASSOCIATE EDITOR): Deanna wasn't my favorite arc in the book, but I could identify with that relationship where you know it's not going anywhere and you're just very in the moment. And it was hostile. Their relationship was very hostile.

RACHEL: Damn right! Also, when Eddie finally heads off at the end, I liked how Kingsolver leaves it kind of open-ended — will he come back?

LAUREN: I'd like to read that sequel—their hot reunion. I have to admit, I really enjoyed the sex scenes.

RACHEL: Me, too!

SARAH (ASSISTANT EDITOR): My favorite character was Lusa — I could relate to her a lot more. She's this city girl who gets married, moves to the country, and thinks she knows how things work because she's read books about it. And once she's there, she realizes she has no idea. But even though her husband is suddenly killed, she doesn't run away from it. I thought that was really brave.

RACHEL: I was a little confused about Lusa's relationship with her husband. When he was alive, he didn't sound so great. Then after he died, she was speaking so highly of him, and I couldn't tell if she was romanticizing the relationship. It just didn't sound like she was talking about the same guy.

SARAH: Well, I think the longer she stayed in the house where her husband grew up and the more she connected with his family, the more she came to understand him. He still had a presence — in the banister that he had broken as a kid and the lilacs that he'd planted in the garden. It was like she was re-creating a part of his life that she would otherwise never have known.

RACHEL: I always wish I could go back and see the people that I love as children.

YAEL: Well, I hated Lusa. I thought she was so self-righteous, coming to the country and telling everyone how they've all been doing it wrong for years. She says she doesn't want to grow tobacco, which is actually lucrative, but that she wants to grow corn, which you can't live off of.

RACHEL: [laughs] Shame on people who don't want to grow tobacco!

YAEL: Okay, I can understand why she didn't want to grow tobacco, but it was the way she approached the family members, like she knew better than them. She didn't appreciate their culture —

SARAH: But she tried ... she canned things.

LAUREN: That canning was very impressive. Would you know how to jar blackberries?

RACHEL: I wouldn't. I say I'm going to can, I'm going to freeze things, I'm really going to do that, but I never do. But yeah, Lusa was very nearsighted about his family. She made a lot of assumptions about them, which I think we all do with our extended family and in-laws. So I could understand why she was insecure. But I also think there's a commentary there about how hard it is to keep these small farms going. American farms are in a lot of trouble, because there's a generation that either doesn't know how to take care of them or doesn't have any interest. And the land is being sold off in pieces and commercialized. So I appreciated Lusa for sticking it out and finding a way.

YAEL: But would you ever want a farm life? To get up at sunrise with the rooster crowing?

RACHEL: I would try it. I would give it a good shot for a little while. I grew up in a small town, with a small backyard and raspberry bushes. My parents had a garden, but it was very basic. I think one thing that kids who grow up on farms really have going for them is they have exposure to death and birth in a totally different way. I think it takes away a little bit of the mystery and a little bit of the fear, and I do wish I had that. And I wish I was able to grow my own food.

YAEL: Do you garden?

RACHEL: I dabble. My friend has started using beer to keep slugs away. Someone had told her to use pieces of copper, and the little slugs basically paper-cut themselves to death. So that's kind of torture, even for a slug, right? So she put out beer because she read about it somewhere.

[Editor's note: It turns out slugs aren't cut to death but shocked by copper rings. Still, unpleasant.]

LAUREN: Drunk slugs! That's nicer. But going back to the book, my issue with it was that sometimes I felt like I was getting a biology lesson. There were moments where I felt a little bit like, Okay, I get it. We're destroying the earth, and everything is going extinct.

RACHEL: Yeah, she did kind of go on a rant. But I was amazed at how much more I learned about things like the hierarchy of predator versus prey.

LAUREN: That idea that if you remove one predator from the ecosystem, it messes the whole thing up.

RACHEL: And it always went back to humans. I loved the way Kingsolver linked the interconnectedness of nature with the interconnectedness of human relationships. When she writes in the beginning that "solitude is only a human presumption," I thought that was so true. I mean, we all think we're the center of the universe, but we don't exist alone. It's that ripple idea that you cannot touch one thing without affecting another.

YAEL: My problem with the book is that some of this nature stuff got a little heavy-handed. Like when Lusa was saying that all the men wanted to sleep with her because she's ovulating. Kingsolver writes: "No wonder the men were fluttering around her like moths: She was fertile." Really? As if the men wouldn't want to sleep with a gorgeous, exotic, redheaded city girl any time of the month?

RACHEL: I liked it, and I hated it. You know when you just walk into a room, and some days you're on and some days you're not? To think it all boils down to hormones and pheromones is a little disconcerting. At the same time, it's kind of interesting that we're still that primitive. It's still fairly basic nature. You're drawn to who you're drawn to.

Original Story - Marie Claire's Book Club