In today’s New York Times, Eric Wilson’s article on designer Eric Gaskins and his blog The Emperor’s Old Clothes (emperorsoldclothes.blogspot.com) is sure to have everyone talking. Gaskins is one of those names you’ve heard over the years but you may not be familiar with his designs or identity. Several months ago Gaskins has taken to writing under the nom de plume Fluff Chance on his blog that has a tag line “a cold blooded, no holds bar, unapologetic take on the glamorous underbelly of fashion,” which as you may suspect skewers several names in the industry. Now that Gaskins business has folded, he has taken the bold step to reveal his identity which has opened a Pandora’s box.

I wasn’t aware of the Gaskins’ blog but I quickly brushed up by checking out some of his postings and what I can say is that fashion needs more like him to challenge this incestuous system whose gatekeepers create rules not unlike that of the pecking order you’d find in high school.
A few quotes from Gaskins:

On the recent CFDA awards: “alexander wang just flies right over my head or past it. it’s the most flagrant , grandiose mediocrity.”

On Bravo’s Fashion Show: “Isaac, Kelly (whoever you are) and Fern, you should all apologize to the viewing audience. One cannot squeeze caviar from a slug. This menu are slugs served 10 different ways, and none are palatable or remotely yummy.

On the recent MET gala:
“BIG BOO BOO. This of course was mentioned in the New York Times blog” On The Runway” by Cathy Horyn. It’s not like they forgot to include Zac Posen or Proenza Schouler, but the giant of design Alaia. Well there will be hell to pay and this debt will take some time to work off. What could Ms. Wintour and her minions, especially her Go-To Girl Alexandra Kotur NOT have been thinking? With the air so thin on Mount Olympus where they frolic, someone must have had a brain fart. I can safely say that an unpleasant odor will settle on this town for some time to come.” He continues, “Perhaps it’s because Alaia doesn’t buy ad pages in Vogue….Maybe LVMH, the exhibition’s sponsor has a bone to pick, though I doubt it. I’d say it’s early senility on the part of Conde Nast , it’s irreproachable Editor and a support staff that only knows the words Brilliant and Yes.
A new phrase they should add to their lexicon should be ” S***, did we ever F*** Up…..”

Whether or not you agree with Gaskins and his take on the industry, it’s hard to ignore that he’s criticizing things other are too fearful to tackle. Call it sour grapes, or “a little box of bitterness,” as Gaskins refers to himself. But no doubt he’s saying a lot of the things others will only mumble under their breaths.

It’s been a relatively easy transition into the social swing of Los Angeles. I’ve been living a super active social life comprising dinners, soirees, and Malibu beach days. In the last week, Sonia and Ari, the lovely ladies from Mameg, one of my favorite LA stores had me over to Sonia’s Brentwood home for a Middle Eastern style BBQ. These ladies are incredibly chic and in attendance was a tightly edited crew of architects, and fashion folks, most of them wearing Margiela. On Thurs, it was dinner at the Sunset Tower Hotel, one of those highly recommended restaurants in town. I went with a gaggle of plugged in lesbians sharing a dishy evening of gossip and oodles of oysters. The oysters were great and the food was good. The restaurant itself had an air of the geriatric. Fittingly Lionel Richie and Jane Fonda were perched at the two prominent center tables. It was then on to Jetsetter (just across the street from The Abbey on Robertson). Jetsetter is Briana Stockton’s brand new girl party spanning two floors and a big outdoor space. The Paradiso Girls, who are being touted as the next Pussy Cat Girls performed, and while the girls were super hotties, they sounded suspiciously like the Pussy Cat Girls–a bit of a letdown.

There were other outings to Shits and Giggles in Koreatown where I got a taste of gay LA underground and to Loteria Grill and Barbrick, the former a super tasty Hollywood Mexican restaurant, the latter in Silver Lake for Italian food and good wine.

For the coming week I’m mulling a trip to Las Vegas and headed to Santa Barbara on Sunday to check out that seaside town. It’s definitely not a Hamptons summer this year.

Last year Vogue Italia’s Black Issue was a watershed moment in publishing. Celebrating blacks in fashion was long overdue and it made us proud to be black and working in fashion. The intent as expressed in a Vogue Italia’s press release was to send “a strong message about the importance of diversity to the fashion world.” Check.

This year however, Vogue Italia’s editor-in-chief Franca Sozzani took a wrong turn by celebrating Barbie as part of the black issue, putting a Barbie image on the cover of the supplement in the mag to boot. I’m still scratching my head on this one, what the hell does Barbie have to do with black people? Apparently more than I thought as outlined in the press release I just received about black and Barbie history. ?”The first black doll from Barbie was introduced in 1967 as Black Francie, joined by Christie and Julia dolls in 1967 (friends of Barbie), and ultimately the first “Black Barbie” doll introduced in 1980. Barbie continues the legacy this year with the Fall 2009 launch of a new collection of black Barbie dolls called So In Style dolls, which are designed with more authentic-looking black features, including a new facial sculpt that has fuller lips, a wider nose, more distinctive cheek bones and curlier hair.”

Ok, I concede that there’s more of a link than I had suppose but as a black individual I know that Barbie is not at the cornerstone of black culture. So for a white editor to level a historically white iconic image in black face onto us seems a strange choice. It seems like one of those decisions that editors make without sufficiently understanding the cultural implications. Sozzani is afforded a little slack because she’s Italian, but still. As one friend who lives in Italy and has combed through the edition noted, “incidentally the July issue that accompanies this supplement has no editorials of women of color with the exception of Naomi Campbell in the super model story. There is also a story on Toni Morrison with no photo.” Why aren’t actual black people consulted when these decisions are being made? We’re not short on opinion.

Yesterday on Imeanwhat.com, I picked up on a discussion surrounding a New York Observer article on the celebrity stylist backlash, No to Rachel Zoe: Budgets and Patience Shrinking, Stars Jettison Fame-Grabbing Stylists. The gist of the piece is that celebrity stylists such as Rachel Zoe, Stacy London and Philip Bloch are becoming too big for their britches, ogling for their own screen time while neglecting clients along the way. Additionally, during these economic times, according to NYO {celebrities} “are increasingly going directly to designers, visiting showrooms and runway shows, borrowing clothes and thereby cutting out the people who used to broker such deals.”

This discussion falls directly on my doorstep. I also work as a stylist for major Hollywood names. And while my clients are not the young starlets whose style choices are chronicled in the weekly rags, I do know the power of a good stylist. A good stylist has an instinctive sense for the right pitch: the lines, the theme, and the message. The ultimate collaboration is when you leave a client feeling confident, current and not like her look has been pieced together by a stylist.

Let’s face it; your average star’s gift is not an instinctive sense of style. And we’ve seen the tragic choices several celebs have made over the years (Imeanwhat.com shows a funny list of the style wrongness we’ve endured). With the stylist taken out of the mix, we could only expect an avalanche of even worst style coming out of Hollywood. I’m not speaking specifically about Rachel, Stacy, or Philip’s styling per se, but from my firsthand experience I do know how clueless some clients can be without the guidance of a tastemaker. One of the oft mentioned refrain I hear from clients is ‘I never would have thought to put that together,’ responding to a chic unexpected combination I suggest. ‘Well, no you wouldn’t have, that’s why I’m the stylist.

I met the allusive Jennifer Mary of the exquisite J. Mary line yesterday. She’s the Los Angeles based designer who has been selling her demi-couture at Maxfields for several years with little tops going for north of $10k and dresses for over $20k and so forth—absolutely absurd. Maybe that’s why no one knows this talent who has a place on my list of top 5 designers working in America today. I always melted when I came across her designs for how perfectly executed and detailed they were however I’ve always thought it strange to be able to paw at these delicate, couture quality items hanging nondescriptly on a corner rack in a boutique. I never purchased pieces for my clients at Maxfields because they were overpriced but now that Church boutique is stocking a lovely selection and tweaking the marketing strategy, J. Mary is now accessible and more affordable(but not cheap).

I’m buying loads for a handful of clients and they are stunned that they’ve never heard of this designer working at a level on par with Chanel. I’ve always perceived J Mary as this uber cool girl who knows her way around Lesage lace and Madame Gres construction. Yesterday, we spoke briefly about her earlier works being made without patterns (which explains some of the exorbitant pricing) and the collectors that ensued. I didn’t want to lay it on too thick on this first meeting but I plan to request a video interview with her sometime this month. Look out for it.

Since I returned from South Africa, I’ve been trying to get my energy back. It’s been depleted from one month of non-stop travel to different time zones and while I don’t usually have problems bouncing back, this last round of LA, NY, Buenos Aires, Rio and Johannesburg wrecked me. For the next couple months, I will resist all travel invitations to stay in Los Angeles till the New York collections in September. Part of acclimating to the LA involves taking regular hikes to Runyon canyon, which I managed to do 3 times in the last few days. You really get a sense of how important fitness (and nature) is to Los Angelenos by the teeming number of people you see at any given time, huffing and puffing up and down the mountain. But even on the trails where it really is not about fashion; the alarming number of shirtless men, showing of their navel piercings, violates my senses. That’s one of those trends, that when it ended (and it did), the world (men specifically) should have ceremoniously, unplugged their little nuggets and moved on. Anyway, the Runyon hike isn’t about bithcy musings, it’s emerged as one of the clear benefits of living in LA.

One of the profiles I’m currently working is a series of interviews with Los Angeles based designers to gather their impression about living and working here. On Friday, I went to Jerome Rousseau’s studio in Beachwood canyon. I love the idea of discussing fashion with the cactus and canyon as backdrop. For the next month, the series will take me all over the city and I look forward to assessing how different or alike the work set up is here from elsewhere. One of the other benefits of staying in LA is the proximity of the beach to the city. For July 4th, I headed to Malibu to my friend Ann’s house for a beachside day, watching the power lesbians play touch football and sipping on margaritas with salt.

News on my trip last week to South Africa is embargo-ed. What I can say it that it involved charity and it was one of the most profound weeks of my life.

There wasn’t time to explore much outside of the Henley-on-Klip suburbs of Johannesburg where I stayed but I did make it town one night to get a visual on the city. That was a disappointment. I told my driver to take me to a semi-busy street lined with boutiques, restaurants and a few bars. Instead he took me to strip malls and sports bar in Melrose Arch and Rosebank.

When told about the Nelson Mandela statue at Nelson Mandela Square I wanted to take a look but there was nothing remotely town square about this location. The statue was erected at a square like area inside a mall and while I understand the security value in centralizing the shopping to malls, this does little for the identity of a city. For the entire visit I felt like I was always on the outskirts of town, which turned me into a whiny backseat driver demanding to be shown somewhere African an urban. This never happened.

On the tail end of my trip, I spent a day at The Saxon Hotel, said to be Johannesburg’s best hotel where I decompressed with a leisurely lunch and repose by the outdoor infinity pool. I loved the Afrikan chic décor, soft lighting and cushy nooks all over the lobby area.
The Confederations Cup was on and traffic was worse than usual so I had to cut my hanging out short to get to the airport in time for the 26-hour journey to Los Angeles.
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I always have a major time time in Rio. I haven’t experienced one of those horror stories you hear about that can take place in the city. Though while walking with Raphael Mendonca yesterday from Fasano Hotel back to Ipanema Plaza, these street urchins were cleverly trying create a web around us surely to rob or harm us. My guard is never down in Rio (or any other city for that matter) and being acutely aware of what was going on I shook a finger at one of the would be culprits signaling to him that this was not going to happen—they scattered.

Anyway, my last couple days in Rio were a mix of full days at the shows, and late evenings at restaurants near the hotel having a drink or grabbing a late night meal. Of course Zaza was on the menu and gang of us descended on the kitschy dining spot for apres show drinks. Boodah is a new cool sushi spot on Rua Texeira de Melo, 30 that opened just a block off the beach and the sushi is really good, the crowd super trendy and the owner is a laid back Paulista who when I asked if this is the beginning of a franchise, said no, he wants that anything he touches to have a soul–i guess no franchise. Lenny Neimeyer didn’t have her usual blowout at her Lagoa compound, instead she opted for an intimate gathering at Londra Bar, I took a pass. That’s because the night before on Monday, Victor Dzenk’s party (see Party Page photos) at the new Copa Bar at The Copa Copacabana Palace Hotel thoroughly did me in. Not because I drank myself to the ground like a college student but because it’s been a wild three weeks of traveling, sleeping little and working loads. So much so that I had to consult a doctor about my worn out self, and the diagnosis was indeed exhaustion from little rest.

I spent my last day in Rio with a short trip to the beach to say goodbye to the editors who were staying on a day longer and then headed straight to the Fasano rooftop where Paula Mello, Fasano’s press doyenne is always kind to hook up my rooftop access if I’m not staying at the hotel. It was a lovely repose. I’m now filing this dispatch en route to Los Angeles via Miami only to turn around to go to Johanesburg at the crack of dawn tomorrow. I pray the beds on South African Airways are as soft as the clouds in the skies.

I’ve been to Rio so many times, it now feels like a second home. I arrived last Thursday and I immediately got into my routine. One of the first things I like to do after checking into the Ipanema Plaza Hotel (when im not staying at the preferred Fasano Hotel) is to get a mani/pedi at a not far away hole in the wall nail spot. Brazilians are known for doing the best bikini wax (I can’t say first hand) but for me they do the best mani/pedi. They triple coat the clear varnish which I quite like though im told that only the favela boys gets their nails done like that.

In January I went to Lapa on Friday night for the first time and I was totally taken by the energy. It felt like the authentic carioca experience, all sorts of people drinking and partying in the streets while hopping in and out of neighborhood bars. I was determined to go back so I headed there with my friend Alexandre Federic, who had escaped from Paris to spend a few weeks in Rio. Lapa was just fun the second time around. We drank caipirhinias till 4am in the morning while meeting people along the way who took us under their wings and showed us some of their secret spots. Mind you, it felt semi dangerous, as though we could lose our lives at any moment, but that only heightened the adventure.

On Saturday after lunch at New Natural (one of my favorite Rio dining spots), we hit Ipanema beach to sleep off the hangover and gawk at the boys. Thank god you can still do the beach in the wintertime in Rio. Saturday night was about checking out something new and Kyoko Masunari from Gap Press and I decided to go to Salgueiro samba school after the fashion shows. That was to be an unforgettable experience. We were whisked in by one of the coordinators who recognized us as journalists attending Fashion Rio and we got the royal treatment–we samba-ed till 5am. We capped off the night at Dama de Ferro, a seedy after hour spot at the edge of Ipanema.

After a short nap, it was brunch at Sergio Cabral, the mayor of Rio’s house near Gavea high up in the jungle. A shortlist of journalists were invited for a meet and greet which turned out to be charming affair with Paulo Borges ( the new owner of Fashion Rio), the private equity guys from InBrands, local journalists such as Lilian Pace and Gloria Kalil. Sleep is gonna have to happen on the plane ride back.

I’ve been to Rio so many times that it now feels like a second home. So after arriving last Thursday, I immediately got into my routine. One of the first things I like to do after checking into the Ipanema Plaza Hotel (when I’m not at the preferred Fasano Hotel) is to get a mani pedi at a not far away hole in the wall nail spot. While Brazilians are known for doing the best bikini wax (I don’t know first-hand), I would argue they actually do the best mani/pedi. They triple coat the clear varnish, which I quite like—though im told only the favela boys get their nails done like that.

In January I went to Lapa on a Friday night for the first time and was totally taken by the energy. It felt like the real carioca experience, with all sorts of people partying in the streets and hopping in and out of neighborhood bars. I was determined to go back, so I headed there with my friend Alexandre Federic, who had escaped from Paris to spend a few weeks in Rio as well. Lapa was as fun the second time around. We drank caipirhinias until 4am, while meeting people who took us under their wings and showed us some of their secret spots. Mind you, it felt semi-dangerous, as though we could lose our lives at any moment, but that only heightened the adventure.

On Saturday after lunch at New Natural (one of my favorite Rio dining spots), we hit Ipanema beach to sleep off the hangover and gawk at the boys. Thank god you can still do the beach in the wintertime in Rio! Saturday night was about checking out something new, so Kyoko and I decided to go to Salgueiro samba school after the fashion shows. It turned out to be an unforgettable experience. We were whisked in by one of the coordinators who recognized us as journalists attending Fashion Rio and we got the royal treatment—and sambaed until 5am. We capped off the night at a seedy after hour spoton the edge of Ipanema.

After a short nap, it was brunch at the mayor’s house near Gavea high up in the jungle. A shortlist of journalists were invited for a meet and greet, which turned out to be a charming affair with Paulo Borges (the new owner of Fashion Rio), the private equity guys from InterBrand as well as local journalist such as Lilian Pace and Gloria Kalil. Sleep is going have to happen of the plane ride back.