Grace Kelly exhibition features famous battered handbag

A V&A exhibition celebrating the fashion icon and Hollywood star Grace Kelly includes a battered handbag once used to hide an early pregnancy bump in 1956.   

An employee poses in front of outfits worn by Grace Kelly that form part of an exhibition of her wardrobe at the V&A in London. It also includes her famous handbag. Photograph: Luke MacGregor/Reuters.  




A Van Cleef & Arpels diamond tiara, a Chanel suit, an Yves Saint Laurent dress, a Balenciaga jacket and several pairs of Christian Dior sunglasses all feature in the exhibition Grace Kelly: Style Icon, which opens at the Victoria & Albert museum tomorrow. But the star exhibit is a battered brown leather handbag.

On loan from the palace archives in Monaco is the original Hermès handbag with which Princess Grace tried to shield her early pregnancy bump from photographers in 1956. One photograph made the cover of Life magazine – and by holding the bag prominently Princess Grace made it so famous that the style, which had been known since 1935 as the Sac à Dépêches was renamed "the Kelly" in her honour.

The scuffs and marks on the handbag are evidence that, despite her high-maintenance image, Grace Kelly was surprisingly thrifty with her wardrobe. The signs of wear and tear make it clear she continued to carry the same handbag for many years – a sharp contrast to the habits of modern celebrities, who avoid wearing the same outfit twice. Victoria Beckham is believed to own more than 100 Hermès Birkin handbags in different sizes, styles and colours, a collection with a retail value of over $2m (£1.3m).

Kelly became sentimental about clothes she associated with good memories, and the exhibition includes several more examples of the surprisingly hard-working wardrobe which underpinned the Grace Kelly fairytale. A pale blue gown made for Kelly to wear to a 1954 premiere by Edith Head, the legendary Paramount studios costume designer, is the very same dress which Kelly wore to collect her Oscar for The Country Girl the following year, and then again for a cover of Life magazine. Jenny Lister, the V&A curator of fashion who has worked for 18 months to put the exhibition together, admitted she "thought very carefully" about giving the title of "Style Icon" to the show. "It's an overused phrase. There are very few people who really deserve to be called a style icon – but Grace Kelly is one of them."

The exhibition is already attracting international attention, a testament to the enduring appeal of Kelly's classic, feminine style of dressing. Lister predicts visitors will be surprised by some of Kelly's later wardrobe, which includes a brightly coloured Yves Saint Laurent "Mondrian" dress from 1965 and flowing, bohemian-era gowns by Christian Dior. "The look which Kelly fixed in the public imagination in the mid-1950s, the era of Rear Window and High Society and of her spectacular wedding, was so strong she will always be remembered looking the way she did at that moment," notes Lister.

From: http://www.guardian.co.uk/

Kylie Minogue sells halter dress for AIDS charity

PARIS – Kylie Minogue proved that in the name of charity, she's capable of selling the shirt off her back.

The petite Australian pop star auctioned off her black halter dress at a swanky AIDS benefit Friday night on the margins of Paris' menswear week. The Jean Paul Gaultier number, which bristled with little plissed spikes, fetched (EURO)20,000 ($24,770).

Other lots included a lambskin vest by California-born designer Rick Owens and a 1980 photograph by Robert Mapplethorpe titled "Leather Crotch."

The soiree raised $180,000 for the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR), a nonprofit organization that supports HIV/AIDS research.

Held in Chez Maxim's restaurant and club in central Paris, the dinner auction attracted top names in the French fashion scene, including underwear designer Chantal Thomass, model Mark Vanderloo andGaultier — the one-time enfant terrible who gave the world Madonna's pointy cone bra.

From: http://www.amfar.org/

Record label worried about rift between Beyonce, dad Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/pagesix/suits_sweat_beyonce_dad_rift_drfYNsMbnmJjnaTyoPyg7J#ixzz0ryaiiwwb

Beyonce Knowles is still refusing to speak to her dad and manager, Matthew Knowles, after he fathered a love child with a woman 20 years his junior -- and suits at her record label fear the rift could damage her career.
The superstar singer was horrified when it was alleged last year that Matthew had an 18-month affair with 38-year-old Alexsandra Wright and DNA tests confirmed he'd fathered her son, Nixon, while still married to Beyoncé's mother, Tina Knowles.
Now, sources tell Page Six that relations between Beyoncé, who is very close to her mom, and her father have reached such a low point that executives at her label, Columbia, are worried.

Matthew guided Beyoncé's career through her days with Destiny's Child and is still her manager.
But one music industry insider said, "Beyoncé was horrified to find out her dad cheated on her mom. She always looked up to him, and she is very close to her mom, so this has hit her really hard. She is refusing to speak to him, which is making things difficult where it comes to managing her career. Some people at Columbia now think it would be better to move him aside."
Former "Scrubs" actress Wright filed a paternity suit last October, and a DNA test taken in March confirmed that Knowles was the father of Nixon, who was born on Feb. 4. A judge ordered him to pay $8,200 a month in child support on an interim basis.
Wright, a Los Angeles-based branding executive, claimed that Matthew Knowles, who was married to Tina for 29 years, had an affair with her for a year and a half. Tina filed for divorce last November. Wright and Matthew are now in the final stages of negotiating a child support settlement.
A rep for Beyoncé said: "There is no merit to this. This is absolutely false." Matthew Knowles didn't get back to us.

From: http://www.nypost.com/

US teen sailor reunited with brother after ordeal

SAINT-DENIS, Reunion – Sixteen-year-old Californian sailor Abby Sunderland got a big hug from her older brother Saturday on the appropriately named Reunion Island, and again defended her family for letting her try to sail around the world alone.

Though saddened by the loss of her boat in an Indian Ocean storm,Sunderland said she isn't giving up sailing.

"I'm really disappointed that things didn't go as planned," Sunderland told reporters after coming to shore early Saturday on the remote French island of Reunion, located off the southern tip of Africa.

Massive waves snapped her boat's mast June 10, and she was rescued in a remote area of the southern Indian Ocean two days later by a French fishing boat. It took two weeks more at sea to reach Reunion, from which she plans to fly home Sunday.

"Any sailor that goes out to the water knows that being hit by a rogue wave is a risk, no matter where you are," said Sunderland, flanked by her 18-year-old brother Zac, who flew to Reunion to meet her. "That was a risk that I was willing to take."

Sunderland said she was as well-prepared as she could have been.

"You can't eliminate risk, you can do a lot to minimize it but it's always there," Sunderland said.

Australia and France worked together to rescue the American teenager — and they footed the hefty bills for chartering jets to find her and diverting boats to her location.

Both countries have brushed off questions about the price tag for the American teenager's solo adventure and say they have no plans to seek compensation for the maritime search and rescue operation.

Sunderland thanked everyone who helped in her rescue and acknowledged "the public debate about the cost of rescues."

"I know that the USA would do the same for a citizen of any other country as these countries did for me," she said.

Sounding composed and lucid, she choked up only once, when thanking Zac — who at 17 briefly held the record for being the youngest person to sail solo around the world — for "inspiring my dreams."

Her brother met the French patrol boat as it sailed into the harbor of Reunion's capital, Saint-Denis, climbing aboard and embracing her as Abby teared up.

The accident "ended my trip but it didn't end my dream," Sunderland said. But she blanched and didn't answer, however, when asked whether she would try another solo circumnavigation anytime soon.

Her parents stayed in California, where her mother is soon to give birth to her eighth child.

Sunderland, whose father is a shipwright and has a yacht management company, set sail from Los Angeles County's Marina del Rey in her 40-foot (12-meter) boat, Wild Eyes, on Jan. 23. In April she had to give up hope of breaking the record for being the youngest when she was forced to stop for repairs.

Then three-story-high waves broke her boat's mast and cut off her satellite communications. She was rescued June 12 by a French fishing boat 2,000 miles (3,200 kilometers) west of Australia.

She described her surprise when an Australian airplane finally spotted her and her relief some 40 hours later when she first caught sight of a French fishing boat.

"The past few months have been the best of my life," she said. "I was on an adventure. You can only plan so far."

Sunderland said criticism of her family for letting her undertake the expedition "is ungrounded."

"They have put up with a ton of stuff to help me follow my dream," she said.

Some observers have wondered if the family isn't pandering to media attention with both Zac and Abby seeking records.

Her father Laurence, reached by phone late Friday at his home in Thousand Oaks, California, told The Associated Press the family was thrilled that Abby had arrived safely on Reunion Island.

"I am absolutely totally over the moon with how quickly the plane and boat reached Abigail. I think the guys did a fantastic job with the rescue and we are so grateful to them," he said.

Sunderland said she wants to write a book eventually and definitely wants to keep sailing, but for now she's most looking forward to getting home.

"I hope to have a new brother soon," she said. "And I look forward to seeing my dog."

Sunderland had spent the past 10 days on the French patrol boat Osiris as it returned from the Kerguelen Islands, a remote and barren patch of rocks north of Antarctica, where she was taken briefly after the rescue.

___From: www.yahoo.com

Associated Press Writer Yoann Guilloux in Saint-Denis, Reunion, and Denise Petski in Los Angelescontributed to this report. 

Rock star Bono's fashion wife on an 'Out of Africa' mission

Bono's wife and co-founder of Edun, Ali Hewson, at the Bidii school in Nairobi, Kenya Photo: NEIL STEWART

Ali Hewson, the co-founder of the eco fashion label, Edun - a for profit business with a social agenda - is a woman on an ‘Out of Africa’ mission. She and her rock star husband, Bono, launched the men’s and womenswear brand five years ago with a remarkable agenda: trade for aid, the creation of jobs to alleviate poverty, to raise awareness of the possibilities in Africa, and to encourage the fashion community to do business there.

The acquisition of a 49% stake, by the luxury conglomerate, LVMH, in May last year, has brought Edun into a world-renowned fashion family, in a position to work for good and to achieve global awareness on a scale never-before envisaged. “It’s given us more muscle,” says Ali.

Edun’s latest collection, launched this week at the London department store, Liberty, demonstrated just how far-reaching the all-embracing mission has become and the breadth of the sustainable, community-based projects in Uganda, Tanzania, Tunisia and Kenya which have been initiated and which focus on the environment, health care and education.

The pre-fall collection on sale at Liberty, for example, includes a capsule range of T-shirts designed by the children of the Bidii School, in Nairobi, Kenya. The designs include giraffes, zebras, village life, rastas, dancers, flowers and market scenes and cost £45 each.

Ali visited the school in February and described for me the grim conditions. “The school is in Kibera, one of the worst slums in Nairobi, with over a million people living in less than one square mile. The teachers do not get paid, and there are 90 children, 35 of whom are orphans, in one classroom. We were introduced to the school by Cristina Cisilino, the founder of MADE (the unique, FairTrade jewellery collection made in Nairobi), who now has some of the Kibera people working for her. The proceeds from the sale of the T-shirts will go back to the school. It’s another way Edun can get involved; not just in manufacture, but in creativity that has a lasting impact. We’re planning to do more T-shirts with the children for next season.”

A second set of T-shirts represent the output from Edun’s Grow To Sew organic farming project, established last year, in Northern Uganda, in conjunction with the Wildlife Conservation Society, and 800 farmers, displaced by civil war. “Here, Edun is involved in the most elementary way, starting with the growing of cotton. We guaranteed to buy the first year’s production, enough to make 70,000 T-shirts, and now we’re in year two, with 2,300 farmers, so we’ll be able to use some cotton for Edun T-shirts and then sell the rest. 100% of the proceeds go to the Conservation Cotton Initiative (CCI) Uganda CCI.”

To celebrate these projects, Edun has launched another T-shirt design competition with pupils from the Homeleigh School in East London, with entries currently on display in Liberty to be judged by the public. The winning T-shirt design will go on sale at Liberty in November.

“It’s taken five years to get where we are, but now we have a strong team, creative vision and each year we seek to grow more in Africa and make more in Africa.” Ali says. “There’s a lot of complications, a lot of corruption. But we are establishing the aesthetic of Edun and little by little we are getting there. This summer’s collection for example, has a lot of beading and leather details from Africa. When we started we were so naive; we thought we could do more. But we were on the road alone. Now, with LVMH, it has given us more muscle. We can see we will achieve our missions. To have everything made there would be a dream. It’s not impossible, it is just going to take time”.

In line with Edun’s objectives, the pre-fall collection proper, takes its inspiration from Africa and the effortless style it evokes of travellers on a journey through the Sahara Desert. In sand tones, in a mix of cotton, hemp, denim and linen, the collection is available from Liberty, from £44 - £635.

The recent appointment of the Paris-based, Irish designer, Sharon Wauchob, as Edun’s creative director, is intended to further broaden the brand’s fashion offering and to make more use of the African connection. Wauchob, who has made several visits to Africa, will show her first Edun collection at the forthcoming New York Fashion Week in September - coincidentally also the first time Edun has ever staged a catwalk show. Included on the runway will be some of the Bidii School T-shirts. Out of Africa indeed!

from: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/fashion/

Yea, Nay, Or Eh? Madonna Suits Up

Diane von Furstenberg was in London last night toasting the addition of hotelier to her long list of credentials. She was on hand to open the suite of rooms she designed at Claridge’s hotel, and the London contingent came out in full force to celebrate, including Victoria Beckham (who was rumored to have changed her vacation plans so as not to miss the fête), Gwyneth Paltrow, and Madonna. The Material Girl went Material Gent for the evening in a wide-legged black suit, paired with a structured blouse and navy fedora. She threw in a few femme touches to keep her just this side of drag—namely, red lips and a belt to accentuate her waist. Maybe she’s got menswear on the brain with the European shows going on now—her friends Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana just celebrated their 20th anniversary in menswear in Milan, after all—but whatever the cause, we’re feeling her for-the-boys look. What do you think? Do you like how she expressed herself, or was her look over the borderline?










from: http://www.style.com/stylefile/2010/06/yea-nay-or-eh-madonna-suits-up/