Fashion Week notes from the editorial director of Dazed & Confused.

Background Photo: Ramon Duran

The first full day of shows in Paris had its ups and downs. The up, in my opinion, was Christophe Decarnin’s Balmain show. On a runway atop the Ritz’s pool, he showed an entire disco of the brightest, shiniest, big-shoulder-est cocktail dresses—a crystal dream. Or as one editor put it, a “crystal meth” dream, because [...]

According to Alice Temperley, the two big pros to having a party in your Soho loft and showroom are that, for one, you can stay as long as you’d like, and two, there’s enough room to have a real dance floor. While I can’t attest to the former (it’s called beauty sleep), I did receive [...]

We were trying to avoid the Valentine/Valentina allusions; but—cross
our heart—Kohle Yohannan’s new glossy tome from Rizzoli on the Russian émigré designer (and lover of Greta Garbo) is a great gift for lovers of fashion—and not only on the 14th of February. The book accompanies a retrospective at the Museum of the City of New York, [...]

Agyness Deyn was one of the hottest attractions last week at Saõ Paulo fashion week. In town to walk for the elegantly sporty mass-market brand Ellus, she’s also the star of their new campaign, joining a previous roster of superstars like Chloë Sevigny, Kate Moss, and Milla Jovovich. Backstage, the press was in a frenzy [...]

“Get yourself down to Bulgari now, fab party!” was the text one rather taken-aback journalist received yesterday evening from a fellow writer already knocking back Champagne at the jeweler’s store opening on Avenue George V (store openings do have a habit of veering toward the bland, hence the surprise). So get down there I did. [...]

Thoughts of economic doom melted away once I touched down in Paris yesterday—a fantasy that was further fed by my first stop of the week, the stone-washed, peak-shouldered, sparkly Balmain show. It opened with a poppy bang—Madonna’s “Holiday.” By the time the file of cocktail dress-clad models was making its way backstage, even Michael Roberts [...]