Thursday: On Instagram, a friend shares that meme of a can that says—and I paraphrase here—“Some of you would go to an opening of a can, and thank the can.” I would, and I would write about it! (I'd say something like, “I went to the opening of a can??”) If I ever manage to actually open a can myself, maybe you’ll be invited. I stand in front of my closet and think stoically about accessorizing. It’s Fashion Week in New York, baby.
First stop is the Miu Miu Vinyl Club. I see many beautiful and brilliant women are in attendance—like Lauren Fern and Ella Snyder and Gabrielle Richardson and Lukita Maxwell and Madeleine Olson and Cierra O’day Johnson and Jessica Menuck and Morgan Maher. Morgan scolds me for my phone case, which I admit to having ordered on Amazon (the first hit when I searched “leopard print”). Everyone wears pencil skirts and tiny glasses. As a writer, I love what Miu Miu is doing for girls with bad eyesight.
I admire the iPhod Nano that Willa Bennett, who's leaving Highsnobiety for Cosmopolitan and Seventeen, has used to clip her hair back. I wonder which drawer my own iPod Nano is stuffed in, and am reminded of the girl at the Ozarks veterinary camp I attended for one allergic summer who helpd me download Fiona Apple onto the bite-sized tech. I sip a Miu Miu margarita and stand in line for disposable cameras. Half the party is in line for disposable cameras, and they don’t even realize it. They’re having too much fun.
Tipsy, I Citi Bike hazardously to the Women's History Museum show at the Church of the Village near Union Square. Artist Amalia Ulman carries a clear bag she designed for her production company, Holga’s Meow Pictures. Inside, you can see a half-eaten container of olives and a newspaper peeping out—devastatingly glamourous. She tells me her new puppy is at a training camp—aka “finding himself upstate.” While in line, writer Whitney Mallett and director Maya Margolina make a strong case for Flava Flave's dating show, The Flavor of Love. A lot of us in this line, I believe, would benefit from finding ourselves upstate.
Inside, I sit next to stylist Marissa Baklayan. When a bra with birds bursting from the breast comes down the runway, and Mar whispers, “I can see the photo now.” As I bike home, I ruminate. Fashion, if it’s not going to be good, should at least be fun, and if it’s not going to be good or fun it should have substance. I believe in a combination of these three pillars. Anything less is athleisure.
Should I go out? Inviting a writer to a party is like inviting a voyeur to an orgy. It’s inherently perverted and makes a lot of people uncomfortable. I decide not to.
Friday: I check in for the Susan Alexandra x Rachel Antonoff Dog Show and run into the gorgeous chef Romilly Newman. Romilly and I went to preschool together, and she reminds me of the time I applied nail polish to my lips. Paige Kozak runs around inside with beaded Susan Alexandra X Starface lipbalm holders. I like when accessories have their own accessories. Liana Satenstein tells me I’m not allowed to babysit because she thinks I’ll drop her future child on the head.
Thankfully the lights go up and Kate Berlant and Jacqueline Novak walk out in matching cupcake cardigan sets. The brainchild of camp extraordinaires Susan and Rachel, New York’s fines wrangled unruly dogs in a Best in Show-inspired runway-performance-comedy show like no other. Naomi Fry’s runway debut? Bridget Everett inspecting dog anuses while wearing Crocs? Tavi Gevinson in a towering beehive? Catherine Cohen walking an empty rose-studded collar around the ring because her dog escaped? I watch the girl sitting in front of me open up the pet adoption link on the back of the show notes.
The styling was dog-walk couture, those meaningless hours when you inadvertently look amazing: puffers over dresses with Crocs, shorts under trench coats, the chic ease of a bathrobe snatched taut at the waist, a jangle of massive totes (looking at you For Schlepping tote) or little beaded bags. I could’ve watched a million hours of this; it lulled me into a trance. I laughed. I teared up.
From there, I hustle to Gauntlett Cheng’s 10-year anniversary show for some strange-girl glamor. My favorite dress had a totally sheer top, sequins developing like scales before halting abruptly at the knee. I want it bad. Nancy Kote, who styled the show, does exceptional work. At the risk of sounding like a Millennial (I’m not), she’s One of My Favorite Fashion Instagram Accounts to Follow.
Side note: I’m noticing a lot of writer/editors on the runway. Between Naomi Fry at Susan x Rachel, Interview’s Taylore Scarabelli at Shame, The Paris Review’s Olivia Kan-Sperling at Gauntlett Cheng, it feels like we are watching something happen here…
Do I go out tonight?? I don’t. If I had, I would have gone to the Gauntlett Cheng/Thistles after-party at Lips which was apparently massive fun… My friend Carol Li, who worked the door, told me: “I was the most powerful woman on 56th street last night and no one even knew.” I have fantasies of that kind of power. When parties at my college apartment became too crowded, I would bounce people. I was no fun in college.
Saturday: I’m dog-sitting for my parents at Chez Chelsea Hotel. Their dog looks like an animated version of my hair. Like all things my parents raised, he is extremely neurotic. He has a fear of grates and stairs, and pounces on passing skateboarders—thankfully I grew out of that one.
I head to Dover Street Market to see the chicest PR girl Sabina Habib. Each floor has a different flavor. Olivia Ghantous and I pop to the Vaquera passport photo station before trying the specialty Marc Jacobs mochi donut. On the seventh floor, Marc Jacobs nail techs press on bejeweled talons. There, I meet a dominatrix who runs a magazine. The dominatrix, who performs online anonymously, tells me she mostly does fetish content: “nails, heels, and toes." Before I can ask what differentiates heel content from her toe content she evaporates—but not before saying the word creamy thrice and the word savage twice.
Next, off to Gabe Gordon’s Williamsburg studio to pick up something beautiful to wear to the show. Models run around being photographed. Everything on his wall of inspiration is hot and horsey.
At B’s Beauty Salon in Chinatown I run into Lauren Fern—who, apparently has been going to Tony for years. Tony does an exceptional $30 blowout that I will resent myself for writing about. I don’t know how to do my own hair. My grandmother never ever washed her own hair—she made a weekly salon pilgrimage for a perfect helmet-shaped blowout. By the end of her life, decades worth of hairspray rendered her hair nearly immovable.
Next, I head to the soft opening of the Sake Bar Asoko. Created by Shintaro Cho and Issey Miyake collector Arianna Cho, the new spot down in Dimes Square was a perfect place to stop for a glass of Sochu and some mushroom rice. The bar's interior is covered in nostalgic objects from the owners’ lives, from old FRUiTS magazines to Issey Miyake lamps.
Do I go out? I text my friend, writer Maya Kotomori, to see if she was invited to a certain party. She says, “I was invited…to my bed.”
Sunday: It’s Sandy Liang day, the best day of the year. I visited to the Orchard Street store earlier in the week to play dress-up with the genius Sarah Brown, so I’m wearing a perfect pink suit set. I mean business! I, the luckiest girl in the world, got to see the collection earlier in the week because I wrote the show notes. It’s inspired by Totally Spies! and has all these incredible matching sets and metallics. The collection is feminine and a little grown up without losing the classic Sandy magic. At the show, everybody in the audience raises their phone in unison when a tailored gray jacket styled with tiny shorts emerges. I spot musician Harmony Tividad in the crowd in an amazing icey look by Frostie Delight.
At Gabe Gordon’s “Horseplay,” I meet up with Harmony again (she’s DJing the afters). Kim Nguyen is wearing such a great outfit I feel SICK. Gabe was inspired by “horse racing, horror films, and homo erotica.” Models looked like they got drunk at a house party and slept in a field. It was even better than the sneak peek I got earlier. The teased hair! Hay stuck in the curls! A skirt slit sideways on the thigh was made by assistant designer Timothy Gibbons, who has a rich costume background. A knit jockey with shoulder pads. I was weirdly reminded of the Taylor Swift “You Belong With Me” video—the only thing I’ve ever enjoyed from her. Gabe is a CLASS ACT and one to watch.
Some friends and I decamp to Superiority Burger. We share a cataclysmically delicious date milkshake: one glass, five straws.
Fashion week is so busy. The pleasure of busy-ness is that you don’t have to deal with small things: a dirty floor, or finally hanging a painting that’s been leaning against the wall for so long that it’s housing a community of spiders behind it. I lie on my bed doing nothing and think about how busy I am.
Monday: I stop by Anna Sui’s studio for a walk-through. Hearing Anna talk about her references is a thrilling experience. “Sally Go’ Round the Roses” is inspired by Andy Warhol and his pre-Pop work. The collection, which feels vacation gothic, is named after a song by The Jaynetts that Warhol apparently listened to while painting.
Anna’s showroom, which is in the Garment District (because she tries to preserve Garment District contracts), is filled with memorabilia from her old stores, Rococo-inspired furniture she told she plucked from the Chelsea Flea Market in the '90s and painted black, and cheekily winking doll heads.
In the evening, I wobble over to Tory Burch at the old Domino Sugar Factory in Brooklyn. The collection tastes like a glass of cold green tea. There were red sparkling racer back speedo moments. Paloma Elsesser in a cobalt coat with a lethal walk. The slutty toe ring from last season on a bag, and even sluttier ballet flats with one tiny peep-hole exposing a sliver of toe.
I sat with my friends, musician Diva Smith and her boyfriend Lucas Ansel. Afterward, I spoke to a TikToker (@claudiacampanaa) who wore a headband made of flashing iPhones. I asked how she liked the show, and she told me she was too short to see anything. Hopefully she caught it on camera.
Afterward, I stop by Sophia Wilson’s and Callie Reiff’s party at Jean’s, where I wave to Sophia like a groupie from in front of the DJ booth. When a pillow fight starts up on the bed that occupies the middle of the room, I’m reminded of my own bed and head home.
Tuesday: Sam Hine and I pop into the Tribeca Bode store to listen to a talk about birds. We then cab up to 30 Rock where Luar cordoned off basically all of Rockefeller Plaza (an insane moment for the brand). Madonna and Ice Spice sit next to each other in frosty silence while Gabbriette vapes in the front row. But I was most starstruck (per usual) by Rachel Tashjian, a phantom on the black carpet in post Labor Day white.
As the show unfolds, I watch Madonna gasp at a sand-colored dress with a hole in the hood. I gasped at a bag carried by one of the Clermont Twins—part briefcase part shoulder bag, all freak. From across the runway, a friend texts to tell me its Topping Tuesday at Van Leeuwen’s. I didn’t even realize it was Tuesday.
Wednesday: Zoe Gustavia Anna Whalen has a dinner party. Like everything Zoe does, it’s part art, part fashion, and totally delicious. I make the mistake of wearing a pair of horrifyingly tight boots that mold to my ankles as I sweat. As I approach the building, I see models in knit panniers smoking off the fire escape. Daniel Arnold photographs the entire thing as his beautiful girlfriend Kay roams the space (“I go where Kay goes”). Satchels of vegan cheese hang over our heads—a server comes around with scissors and snips pieces of them onto a bed of arugula. In the front of the room, Zoe fabricates a bustier out of papier mache onto Rowan Blanchard, and then all the models walk the tables.
Given how difficult it is to stay aloft as a small designer, this New York Fashion Week felt tighter and more precious. I heard about more dinners than shows. Events like Zoe’s were dedicated to the people wearing the clothes as much as the people creating them. Community emerges where community is encouraged: Runways like Susan Alexandra x Rachel Antonoff or Gauntlett Cheng or Gabe Gordon were similar in their mixed attendance of family and fans.
At home, like a gouty aristocrat, I cut one of my boots off my foot because I can’t wiggle it off. I think of the things I want from fall: an IV of caffeine, crimped hair, mutton-sleeves from Sandy Liang, pervy little peep shoes, to read a book in one sitting (preferably Secrets of a Fashion Therapist or Sabbath’s Theater), to light a candle in a silver holder, to sweat at the Russian baths, and to slice a very good apple. Thank you to the can!
See you next season.
