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Bravo’s Queer Eye for the Straight Guy’s
Carson Kressley was immaculately turned out in Louis Vuitton
with black velvet evening slippers. He was the very essence of class
and good taste. His fellow cast member, Thom Filicia was
a bit more casual in his no-tie, dining-on-the-beach attire, but
it works for him, so no fashion violation tickets were issued to
him. Vogue’s André Léon Talley and Hamish Bowles
stood out: both were the peacocks of the walk that night. Mr Talley
wore a voluminous 18th-century-style ivory silk great coat, designed
especially for him by Karl Lagerfeld, which made for a quite the
contrast as he stood next to Ms Zellweger at the arrivals area.
Talk about two opposite ends coming together! Other well turned-out
male guests include handsome Timothy Shifter (husband of
budding socialite Helen Lee Shifter and owner of the Le SportSac
handbag and accessories’ company), the always delicious-looking
Tom Ford in Gucci, Hamish Bowles and Harpers Bazaar’s
Stephen Gan in Christian Dior Homme, designer Peter Som,
the CFDA’s Stan Herman, and actor Benjamin Bratt (with
wife Talisa Soto in Dolce & Gabbana).
Other guests attending the benefit gala included
designers Diane von Furstenberg in DVF
(with husband, Barry Diller), 2004 CFDA
Fashion Award winner Carolina Herrera (in Carolina Herrera),
Vera Wang (with her husband), Stella McCartney (by
her lonesome but looking fabulous just the same), and handbag and
accessories’ queen Kate Spade in John Anthony Couture. Representatives
from the magazine world included Kate Betts (formerly of
Harper’s Bazaar and now with Time Style & Design),
Bergdorf Blondes author Plum Sykes (in Alexander McQueen),
the International Herald–Tribune’s Suzy Menkes in
a lilac coloured design from Paris-based designer Mina Poe,
the always gracious Mary Lou Luther and Neiman–Marcus’s Joan
Kaner in Chado Ralph Rucci and stylist extraordinaire, Vogue’s
Grace Coddington, in Heidi Slimane.
The Trump family was out in full force, proving
yet again that divorce doesn’t have to be fatal and time really
heals most wounds. The Donald (Trump, Mr ‘You’re Fired’
himself) looked rather dignified next to his fiancée, Melanie
Knauss. The first Mrs Trump, Ivana, has only improved
with age (and periodical touch-ups, if you get my drift), and she
looked positively ravishing in her coat and gown outfit by Zang
Toi. Ivanka Trump, the most social of all their children,
held her own against all others in a pretty Behnaz Sarafpour lingerie-inspired
cocktail slip dress.
’Seventies’ supermodel Patti Hansen has
lost none of the beauty that took her to the top of her profession
and kept her there for more years than she care to count. Ms Hansen
attended the event with her daughters, budding models Theodora
and Alexandra Richards (both in Stephen Burrows). Tennis
star Serena Williams (in Versace), won over the photographers
by patiently standing as long as it took for them all to take her
picture, an act Tom Ford never bothered to do as he virtually flew—à
la Marc Anthony—up the stairs into the Museum.
As for the exhibition itself, it beautifully illustrates
the smouldering cauldron of sexuality bubbling under the barely
contained veneer of eighteenth-century sophisticated high society.
‘The eighteenth century seems so chilly and remote,’ says Harold
Koda, curator in charge of the Costume Institute; therefore, this
was an opportunity to show people the idea of men and women in eighteenth-century
France ‘leading interesting lives.’
Set in seven riveting scenarios, one doesn’t need
to have an overly active imagination to get caught up in the sexual
and social undercurrents emanating from each tableau. In the first,
The Portrait in the Tesse Room, a mannequin representing
the prototype of the court portraitist is a witness to marriage
in flux and infidelity at play. No amount of beautiful clothing
or wealth can prevent the aristocratic woman being painted from
feeling anger at her husband blatantly flirting with her friend.
In the Cabris Room (The Toilette),
the sexual tension comes from a woman having her hair upholstered
by an Italian coiffeur while her lover ogles her. Wearing only a
white négligée trimmed with flounces, she shamelessly
eggs him on. Apparently even back then, there is nothing more erotic
than voyeuristic public sex—even if you are fully clothed.
One of the livelier tableaux was conceived in
the Varengeville Room. During the Ball showed a group
of women in spectacularly gorgeous court gowns momentarily relaxing
from the constant whirl of the party going on in the next room.
One of them, overcome with excitement—from playing footsies with
the gentleman across from her at the table, or maybe her corset
is drawn too tightly, who knows?—has fainted; and no one, spare the
two women closest to her, seemed all that concerned.
Every room has an interesting and arresting story—seen
and unseen—to tell; and one simply cannot get the whole story from
one viewing. The Accident in the Sevres Room is a
modern-day tale of the excitable second trophy wife, who fails to
realize that just because the mountain is there, you don’t have
to climb it. While her husband was preoccupied with examining a
piece of furniture, she responded to the flattering advances of
the marchand mercier or antiques’ dealer, upsetting her dogs and knocking over a Sevres vase in the process. Sex and lust can
surely make us do some very foolish things indeed. •
Phillip D. Johnson is features’ editor of Lucire.
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Serena Williams won over the photographers by standing as long as it took for them all to take her picture, an act Tom Ford never bothered to do
 
     
LEFT COLUMN: Patti
Hansen. ABOVE, FROM TOP, LEFT TO RIGHT:
Linda Evangelista and Angela Lindvall. Queer Eye’s Thom
Filicia. Fellow Fab Five cast member Carson Kressley. The CFDA’s
Stan Herman and Peter Arnold. Fashion editor Mary Alice Stephenson.
Melania Knauss and Donald Trump. Ivana Trump and guest. Ivanka Trump
and Behnaz Sarafpour. BELOW, LEFT TO
RIGHT: The Tesse Room’s The Portrait. Lady in
the Doorway. The Ball, in the Varengeville Room. The
Card Game, in the Bordeaux Room. The Accident, in the
Sevres Room.
   
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