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Take that same piece of paper, and an assignment from your teacher at Pratt and voila! You get extraordinary fashion filling the windows of Macy’s Herald Square in this winter of 2011. New York City, snowed, snowy, and white windows: what better?
The series of white paper gowns, ensembles, skirts, and accessories are able interpretations of garments usually seen turned out in silks and warmer surfaces than paper. But paper gives another dimension to the fashion. It allows pure line to emerge. In the Macy’s windows, the designers have used the paper dressed mannequins along side the fashion flashing ones, and create an active, rather than a passive, backdrop for the designs being showcased. Look at both together, and perception becomes a natural flow, taking the eye from design, into appreciation, and back to design. It’s art for the masses, taken from the galleries of museums into the street level point of view of the common man.

Christmas windows are a spectator sport in New York City, but after Christmas, we usually have nothing but white sales. With the white paper backdrops of fantasy fashion in Macy’s windows, we have something to see. It’s a concept. No, it’s a dress. No, it’s a hood. After all, Paco Rabanne made his collection from metal rings. Fabric is sometimes an afterthought. Sometimes it’s the inspiration.
Showing fashion as thought, and the development of that thought, opens up the industry to the public. Some of those people may see fashion and especially haute couture as something to be afraid of. Looking at fashion as process, not unlike planning a meal for your family, or plotting that football play in the locker room, allows everyone to see what the fuss is all about. The planning, the magic, and then, the reveal, is all.
The magic of store windows in New York City brings a dialogue between the public, consumers all at the end of the day, and designer. Sometimes that designer isn’t designing specifically for that public, but it’s all part of the big picture. And the big picture windows.

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Last night, with Stephanie Seymour, and Hugh Jackman in attendance, the people who frequent such affairs could feel justified in venturing out for the fete. Fashion watchers throughout the week can see celebrities, the Mayor, Martha Stewart, politicians, and rap singers alike on any given day.  They come to shop in an environment that is museum-like, in an environment that is world-renowned for it’s architectural treasures. (The Tiffany designed rooms MUST be seen).

Whether you come to see an extraordinarily vetted selection of antiques from every facet of collecting heaven, or to do some serious shopping for a St. Valentine’s gift, (the jewelry!) this show is the place to be and to be seen.

Often shot by Bill Cunningham for the New York Times, the show is a benefit for the East Side House Settlement.  With a $20 entry fee, you collect an armful of glossy magazines, and the sought-after catalogue of this, the 57th show.

On Thursday, the Young Collector’s Night will be the hot ticket for the sons and daughters of the powers-that-be here in town.  We’re all getting ready for Fashion Week, so one never knows who will show for the party.  Last year, Maggie Rizer bowled us all over in a devastating blue evening gown.

This is a milieu where you can come from out of town, hear a lecture, cruise the aisles, and breathe in the un-haughty air of old.  It’s a place to sport that strange embroidered jacket in the back of your closet.  It’s a place to wear a fabulous hat!  No dress code required, don’t get me wrong, but how to pass up the opportunity to be a bit outré in your ensemble?

Photographer: Amanda Gordon/Bloomberg

If you didn’t make it to the opening party last night, and you can’t make it to the Young Collector’s happening on Thursday, please be sure you check out the show at least once during your stay in town.   It’s one chance to get into the armory for the building itself, but at the same time, the show lays before your eyes marvels! By the way, it’s not far from the Balenciaga exhibit just down the road apiece.

Live, love and enjoy the antiques!

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Now, until the 19^th of February, the Queen Sofia  Spanish Institute of New York opens it’s doors to the public for a conceptual curated exhibit of the master’s works.

Conceived by Oscar de la Renta, and executed by Hamish Bowles, Vogue’s European Editor at large, the panoply of intrinsic Balenciaga pieces teach us his vocabulary by showcasing more than 70 items of clothing and accessories.

Photograph by: Mary Hillard. Curator Hamish Bowles and Chairman Oscar de la Renta lead Her Majesty Queen Sofía of Spain through the exhibition galleries.

Balenciaga Paris has opened it’s archives , and lent historically significant (and iconic) garments.  Masterpieces include Balenciaga’s Infanta gown, and walks us through costumes from the 1940’s,  produced at the height of Paris occupation in WWII , to the silk abstractions of the 1960’s.  For those in costume, art history, design, even architecture, the exhibit allows a span never seen before of Balenciaga’s inspiration, and interpretation.  For lovers of gorgeous silk gowns, this show is a must-see.  From flamenco polka dots, to embroidery reminciscent of the Spanish court of the 1600’s, Balenciaga’s en pointe design technique never faltered.  As an older member of fashion’s hierarchy, he never stopped, and worked well into his retirement in 1968.

Photograph by: Kenny Komer

Come and see the Trajes de luces, authentic bull-fighter’s costumes, and fashion’s twist on a thematic indulgence…the bolero jacket, which became a staple in the 1950’s, worn with cocktail dresses and poodle skirts alike.  Who didn’t take from this man of much vision? Bonnie Cashin, Cardin, Givenchy, Claude Montana…seen via a period video, celebrating several collections of the House of Balenciaga, the pieces evoke other times, and works.

The video itself is a delight, with mincing models and atmospheric lighting, quite obviously done in the salon, with the gilt chairs in evidence.  Space helmets alight atop the models heads…in a figure of speech, of course, because they’re all perfectly blocked felt hats.  Do you see Couregges in there, too?

In M. Balenciaga’s later years, modern art becomes his language, as the influence of Miro, Chagall, Braque, took hold.  A gentleman named Gustave Zumsteag invented a fabric just for Balenciaga at this point: silk gazar.  It allowed his architectural compositions to achieve a control not before seen with another fabric.

Come and see this exhibit, and enjoy Park Avenue, and it’s architecture.  Fashion at it’s finest hour…way before Fashion Week!