Kitten Head Fashion Freak

Two themes dominate my fashion predilections for fall: Avant-garde and Lady.

The Avant-garde impulse began in May with a trip to Barney’s. The sales associates had to mop up the puddle of duel I left in front of the, spring collection. Thanks to my darling husband, I am now the owner of two pieces from the cacophony collection.

Comme des Garçons navy blazer, Spring 2008

And I just nabbed full-length Anita Karthaus overcoat in black cotton yesterday. Pictures are forthcoming and this item is on lay-away. If anyone has a sense of how this Polish/German designer plays on the other side of the Atlantic, please let me know.

The Lady look, of course, is inspired by Princess Diana and by my late grandmother, and by the vibe I am getting as I look at the fall RTW collections.

To pull the two themes together, I am saving my pennies for an Hermes cape cod watch with the double Martin Margiela band. I have a little savings account set aside for this baby. Twenty dollars here, fifty dollars there, and by my birthday I should be ready.

Today we fly to Florida for my grandmother’s funeral. She passed away at home, still in complete possession of all her faculties. She was simply worn out by taking care of my grandfather, who has been slowly slipping away for years.

On July 4, after a visit to my grandfather’s nursing home, she drove home to her Daytona Beach condominium, got ready for bed, and then, literally, dropped dead.

My father and uncle, my grandmother’s priest, and other people around her encouraged her, even pleaded with her to let someone else take over the job of caring for her husband. Her response was always, “What meaning would my life have if I were to do that”?

My grandmother was a Bronx girl, born, raised and married in Fordham. She spent most of her early life within a block or two of St. James Park. She studied opera, worked for the telephone company, spoke in perfectly polished paragraphs, and dressed, almost every day, in Leslie Fay.

None of these details tells the complete story, but they give a sense of her amazing style, which was a mix of glamour, modesty, refinement, and a ferocious strength.

I thought she would live forever.

I took a vacation day today to make a skirt from this wonderful cotton. The chocolate and red stripes are woven into the fabric. The red dots are printed. I love it when conventional modes of introducing patterns into textiles are merged, or better yet, turned on their head. When I was in the Comme des Garçons shop on West 25th Street last week, the sales associate pointed me toward a darling pleaded shirt. The skirt was a polyester print based on a cotton or wool Guatemalan weaving pattern. When I pointed that out he told me that I was the first customizer to notice that. Don’t you think that there should be a prize for that?

As for my skirt of red, white and chocolate, it looks like I will only have time to cut out the first piece; I just made the stupid mistake of checking my work email. I have just enough time to extinguish a small fire and get to my 2:30 hair appointment on time.

At about 5:00 PM I will step out onto Park Avenue with the amazing Jolanta’s interpretation of the Princess Diana c. 1997. It looks fab on me, and, because I have dark hair, dose not register as a Dianado.