9 posts tagged "Harold Koda"
Catherine Martin Talks Gatsby
“We needed to find a way of translating the twenties into something that felt as new and modern and titillating as it was back in 1922,” said Catherine Martin—the designer behind the costumes for husband Baz Luhrmann’s upcoming The Great Gatsby film—during an intimate Q&A with Harold Koda at the Met yesterday evening. If there’s anything that can reignite the Jazz Age’s mystique, it’s Martin’s wares, which are at once painstakingly historically accurate (aside from a zipper here and there) and completely enchanting. The film, which opens on May 10 and stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby, Tobey Maguire as Nick Carraway, and Carey Mulligan as Daisy Buchanan, boasts such fantasies as feathered frocks worn by the Fitzgerald-penned tale’s “girls in twin yellow dresses” (the looks were inspired by an actual twenties-era vaudevillian act), hordes of boater hats by Rosie Boylan, wigs made in England, and beach pajamas (for the elusive Jordan Baker).
Luhrmann and Martin’s fondness for Schiaparelli (the pair worked on the film for the Met’s Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations exhibition), lent a surreal edge to the story’s infamous party scene. “Baz kept saying, ‘We need a lobster!’” recalled Martin. And he got one—the costumer crafted metallic crustacean headpieces for the showgirls at Gatsby’s raucous soiree (below). Continue Reading “Catherine Martin Talks Gatsby” »
Prada: Her Conversation With Elsa
The Costume Institute’s Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations show opens to the public on Thursday, following tonight’s red-carpet gala. The press preview this morning provided an early look at an exhibition that juxtaposes the fashions of two of our industry’s most provocative practitioners with videos of imagined conversations between them. Miuccia Prada plays herself and the late Elsa Schiaparelli is brought to life by the actress Judy Davis using real quotes from the designer’s autobiography, Shocking Life. The clips, which were directed by Baz Luhrmann, riff on not only Vanity Fair‘s 1930′s column “Impossible Interviews” but also Louis Malle’s 1981 film, My Dinner With Andre.
The designers are both female, Italian, and feminist, but they disagree more often that not. Schiaparelli: “Dress designing is to me not a profession, but an art.” Prada: “Fashion designers make clothes and they have to sell them. We have less creative freedom than artists. Maybe nothing is art. Who cares?”
Still, the curators Harold Koda and Andrew Bolton often make compelling connections between the designers’ work. The overlaps, for example, between Prada’s Fall 2012 Ugly Chic printed pantsuits (which, of course, reference her own 1990′s take on the 1970′s) and Schiaparelli’s circa-1930′s version are uncanny despite the nearly 80 years that separate them. The exhibition is divided into themes. In “The Surreal Body,” the show’s final section, dresses from each designer are encased in Lucite and juxtaposed with photos of the other’s work. “Schiaparelli is pulled out of the past, made more relevant, and Prada’s contemporary aesthetic is given a rich resonance,” Koda said during the preview, citing production designer Nathan Crowley’s “crisp, timeless” sets. He was nonetheless quick to point out that Prada resists the comparisons. “She was struck by the similarities between two pleated dresses, her own trompe l’oeil and Schiap’s 3-D. But she told me the eras that she looks at, that’s she’s interested in, are the fifties, sixties, and seventies. ‘I really don’t look at Schiaparelli,’ she said.”
Conflict, Malle could’ve told us, makes for good conversation.
Prada and “Schiap”: The Conversations Begin
Today in Milan, the fashion set got a glimpse of some of the Schiaparelli and Prada pieces that will be on display at the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Schiaparelli and Prada: Impossible Conversations exhibition, opening May 10. How does one make an impossible conversation between two great designers from different eras possible? Curators Harold Koda and Andrew Bolton dug through Prada’s archive, as well as the Costume Institute’s collection and private collections, and culled 90 designs and 30 accessories by the two Italian female designers to demonstrate the arresting affinities between their work (Elsa Schiaparelli from the late twenties to early fifties, Miuccia Prada from the late eighties to the present). Take note, these are the first female designers to be the centerpiece of the annual exhibition since Coco Chanel in 2005.
The “conversation” plays out in seven themes, starting with “Waist/Waist Down” (which includes a 1937 black and white Schiaparelli number worn by Madonna’s latest film subject, Wallis Simpson, sitting next to a very similar recent look from Prada). It continues with “Ugly Chic,” “Naif Chic,” “The Classical Body,” “The Exotic Body,” and finally, “The Surreal Body.” The galleries featuring iconic ensembles by the designers are paired with videos, directed by Baz Luhrmann, with made-up conversations between the two women (the idea for these “impossible conversations” was inspired by a Vanity Fair series of unimaginable exchanges in the thirties). Here, a few images from the exhibition.
Savage Beauty Comes To Tinseltown
The Costume Institute’s Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty is currently drawing thronging crowds in New York (so much so that its run has already been extended), but its reach doesn’t stop there. Last night in Los Angeles, Friends of the Costume Institute Cameron Silver and Susan Casden hosted a dinner in honor of the exhibition and its curator, Andrew Bolton. Kate and Laura Mulleavy of Rodarte, Peggy Moffitt, James Galanos, and Kimberly Brooks all came to raise a glass. So did actress Perrey Reeves, despite running on fumes after a day that began at 4 a.m. (She’s been filming the final season of Entourage.) “I can’t even begin to think about it,” she laughed. “But I adore Cameron.”
L.A. is known for its laid-back style, but the guests knew that where McQueen is concerned, casual wasn’t going to cut it. “Thank you all for dressing up for the chicest night in L.A.,” Silver said. (He, Casden, and several of their guests donned looks by the late designer.) “This is really becoming one of my favorite events of the year,” Bolton chimed in. “The exhibition has been such a heartwarming experience and I love seeing so many of the women tonight in his designs.” Those same women got their hands on a few more, thanks to the Savage Beauty exhibition catalog, and Bolton gamely signed them for any interested party.
Looking For The Local Hot Spots?
Just Text Your Concierges
Welcome to the future, St. Regis Hotel—and by the future, of course, we mean the App Store. New York’s storied hotel is the latest to debut its own PDA application, which will allow guests of the hotel (and those who wish they were) to find calendar listings and a directory of favorite places to shop, eat, drink, and sightsee in the Big Apple. (Guests will also be able to text with the staff—Champagne and hand towels, stat!) To curate the app, however, they went farther than the St. Regis’ own concierge and solicited tips from New York notables, including plenty from the fashion world. Below, a few of their picks, from a risotto not to miss from Barneys’ Simon Doonan to Met Costume Institute curator Harold Koda’s favorite shop.
“For a little risotto primavera, I am loving Il Cantinori (32 E. 10 Street, NYC, ilcantinori.com) on 10th street. The crowd is fashiony but not too fashiony.”—Simon Doonan
The Neue Galerie(1048 Fifth Avenue, NYC, neuegalerie.org) “houses an amazing selection of Wiener Werkst&228;tte’s work. It’s a perfect amount of culture and art that leaves you invigorated to design and create. Treat yourself to the café for some Hungarian goulash.”—Alexis Bittar
“Ted Muehling’s shop on Howard Street (27 Howard Street, NYC, tedmuehling.com), near my second favorite, De Vera on Crosby. Both have the idiosyncrasy of discerning collectors as well as the refined aesthetic of true creators.”—Harold Koda
“I love Narnia Vintage (161 Rivington Street, NYC) on the Lower East Side—they stock beautiful, very unique designer pieces.”—Jason Wu
“My favorite classic is at Park Avenue and 53rd Street. You have Philip Johnson’s Seagram Building, across the street is the old-school elegance of the NY Racquet Club by McKim, Mead, and White, and then catty corner you have the Lever House.”—Peter Som