It’s Called Fashion, Brenda

A bulletin of the most smashing, dashing, Duchess of Sussex-trashing dispatches from around the fashion world…

MEGHAN MARKLE’S MAGENTA MONSTROSITY EXPLAINED

They might call her Duchess Difficult, but fashion-wise, she rarely puts a wrong foot forward. Hence, this was a head-scratcher:

Harry’s expression in this photo is priceless. It’s like he’s saying ‘don’t you dare say a word about my wife’s outfit.’ OK, fine Harry but maybe enlighten us. Why is she wearing a powersuit in a power colour to read to a class of second-graders at an underprivileged school in Harlem… on a balmy New York day no less? I’m boiling just looking at it.

Never mind. Mystery solved. Meghan Duchess of Sussex apparently has her sights set on the White House. So says her  estranged half-brother. So says Tom Bower, her biographer. 

‘Dress how you want to be addressed,’ as the saying goes. Well, Meghan would like to answer to ‘Madame President’ and the pantsuit is the unofficial uniform of women on the campaign trail. For now, presumably, she’ll settle for ‘Duchess,’ since that’s the title she uses when announcing herself on cold calls to US senators.

To be honest, I do kind of hate it. I mean, it’s OK, but the proportions are off—the jacket’s not short or long enough and doesn’t know if it wants to be tailored or ‘oversize.’ Those slacks have ‘junior executive circa 1992’ written all over them. For the record, this is how you do oversize. 

Effing politics ruins everything. It’s like an invasive species, wreaking havoc on unsuspecting ecosystems—from pro sports to award shows to pandemics—where it’s non-native and should be non-welcome. Politics has drained all the fun from the Oscars, turned friends and neighbours against each other and now has resulted in the Duchess of Sussex—with the world’s best clothes and stylists at her disposal—to appear in public wearing a pantsuit straight out of the Tabi catalogue. 

“Kate, Duchess of Cornwall, would have nailed this blindfolded,’ says my friend Jenna who is a stylist and makeup artist. Jenna also pointed out Duchess Meghan’s advantage in that she’s not constrained by royal protocols. “No need for neutral-coloured hose and she can wear whatever she wants. She should have gone with jeans and cropped-leather jacket.” 

True. But Duchess Kate also has an advantage. Her mission is singular: represent the Royal Family—a job she performs magnificently. Meghan is playing duchess while aiming for the highest office in the world. ‘Chase two hares, catch neither,’ as the Russians say. 

It’s enough to make you feel for poor Meghan. Lord knows Meghan feels for poor Meghan.

MAY THE ODDS BE EVER IN THEIR FAVOUR

Speaking of the aristocracy… artist, model and petroleum heiress Ivy Getty recently got married in this:

 

I’m not sure what to say about a wedding gown adorned with broken mirror shards other than ‘hold still. I need to touch up my lipstick.’

Otherwise, it’s a beautiful dress that will surely end up in a museum one day. The designer is John Galliano (pictured with man-bun), who designed not just the mirror dress but the bride’s multiple wardrobe changes throughout the event.

Vogue magazine’s coverage of the affair provides liberal quotes from its editor at large Hamisch Bowles, who was also on the guest list. His reviews are positively glowing. It was an occasion filled with “rather grand San Francisco society” colliding with “beautiful, free-spirit rebels being their authentic selves… all astoundingly charming and engaged and engaging. It gave one hope for the future.”

Sorry Mr. Bowles but it gave only some hope for the future. Over on Twitter, the takeaway was less hope-ish and slightly more Hunger Games-ish—IE, a world wherein servile populations exist solely to provide goods and services to the pampered, glitzy freaks of the Capitol. All I can say is, the optics were not great. 

SHADUPPA YOU FACE!

Speaking of Vogue, the British December edition features a cover and profile of Lady Gaga, just in time for the release of Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci. Based on the book House of Gucci: A sensational story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed, the film tells the true-crime story of Patrizia Reggiani hiring a hit man to take out her husband Maurizio Gucci.

Back in the day, I could get excited about a movie like House of Gucci. Any film featuring decadent, fabulously turned-out, temperamental, larger than life, husband-murdering socialites constituted a guaranteed guilty pleasure in the vein of Real Housewives. Patrizia was the primordial ‘real housewife;’ the primogenitor who makes her primogenitees look as restrained and austere as Amish school teachers. In Real Housewives, the ‘husband-murdering’ is metaphorical.

Yet the prospect of seeing this film leaves me emptier than an Italian piazza during lockdown. With unencumbered access to the Gucci archives, the wardrobes will certainly be contending for ‘Oscar.’ Though I’m not sure the Gucci of Patrizia Reggiano’s world still exists. That was the old Gucci. This is the new Gucci:

Movies are mostly underwhelming these days anyway. Movies in which American actors put on thick accents—as well as biopics and anything starring Ewan MacGregor— always underwhelm me. Non-Italian actors simply cannot pull off an authentic Italian accent and Lady Gaga’s sounds about as Italian as stuffed-crust pizza. 

Fake accents have delivered some of the cringiest moments in cinematic history. Remember Mickey Rooney’s buck-tooth portrayal of Mr. Yunioshi in Breakfast at Tiffany’s? Or Dick Van Dyke’s cockney accent in Mary Poppins, for which he formally apologized? Hollywood never learns its lessons. 

Italians must be so tired of seeing American actors who talk-a-like-a-this. Nicolas Cage’s ‘Italian’ accent in Captain Corelli’s Mandolin veers toward a provocation for war. Actually, it veers all over the map, sounding sometimes Spanish, sometimes Indian and for a brief second… Chinese. Mostly Cage’s accent sounds Transylvanian, like Sesame Street’s The Count. One! One scathing review! Two! Two scathing reviews! Three! Three scathing reviews! Ah ah ah ah!. 

WHAT FRESH HELL IS THIS?

Remember these? 

 

They’re Baa–aack!!

Stirrup pants haven’t been a thing since 1991. Apparently we just lived through roughly three blissfully stirrup pants-free decades—truly a golden era—and didn’t even know it. That’s golden eras for you. You only appreciate them in hindsight.

It’s been said that fashion trends mirror the times. Maybe whoever decides these things surveyed a landscape where a deadly virus was circulating, inflation rising, politics polarizing and a supply chain crisis burgeoning and thought ‘gee, what about stirrup pants?’ In other words, stirrup pants are exactly what this egregiously awful era deserves. 

Or maybe it was just the burgeoning supply chain crisis. The latest shipment of fresh inspiration is caught in a bottleneck on the pacific, along with delayed shipments of semiconductors and plumbing fixtures. Somewhere on that boat is a whole container of stirrup pants bound for H&M. Ideally, the trend doesn’t expire before they arrive on the shelves. I guess Oscar Wilde was right when he said “fashion is so ugly, we have to change it every six months.”

What does explain the revival of one particular trend over another? Since the simplest answer is usually the correct one, the stirrup is making a comeback for the simple reason that everything comes back, no matter how wretched. Take note aspiring fashionistas… if you’re not mining the past, you’re in the wrong game. Hammer pants, overalls—aka the ‘hillbilly tuxedo’—and high-waisted acid wash cutoffs have all experienced revivals. Believe it or not, this circa 1989 bike-shorts-and-blazer look has been one of the hottest trends of 2021:

Never underestimate the hypnotizing allure of nostalgia. It airbrushes away the blemishes of even the most reviled artifacts of the past. It’s an irresistible vortex with religion-like powers to absolve sins and bestow innocence. 

Revivals tend to improve on previous incarnations. This specimen, from a label called Marni, is cut looser around the hips, avoiding the pancake-ass effect of the 80s-era versions. The crease adds a nice formality, since stretchy stirrups sometimes look pajama-ish.  

Actually, those aren’t too bad at all! 

Oh God! It’s happening. Nostalgia has me in its Vulcan grip, like the sweet nectar of the pitcher plant, there is no escaping it. It’s too late for me. Save yourselves.  Avert your gaze. Count backwards from ten. Run!!!! 

Never mind. They’re already passé.