Because you can't have depths without surfaces.
Linda Grant, thinking about clothes, books and other matters.
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Net-a-porter UK

Saturday 7 February 2009

Simon Doonan dispenses advice


I like Simon Doonan. He used to dress the windows at Barney's and now he's the creative director. He's a rather flamboyant English queen and since Quentin Crisp, New York has always held out its arms to flamboyant English queens. Shame Oscar Wilde had to die in a hotel room in Paris:

What is your one piece of fashion or beauty advice? Wear your fab clothes every day. Keeping your best clothes for parties is the same as leaving the plastic on your lampshades. There are limitations, though; nobody wants an invasive medical procedure performed by a doctor in a Cavalli sequined unitard.

12 comments:

Susan B said...

I read his Glamourous Eccentrics book last year and loved it. I love that he pooh-poohs fashion snobbery and conformism, as it can be so easy to fall into those do/don't traps. He's one fashion industry insider who really seems to *like* women, and not just the young/skinny ones.

SnoopyTheGoon said...

If his definition of fab clothes includes that shirt... nah...

Anonymous said...

I love that shirt! - it looks like a Liberty Tana Lawn to me, and look how perfectly it fits him.

Anonymous said...

I'd like to recommend his memoir (that sounds so fancy, doesn't it?) "Nasty". Don't be put off by the hideous close-up of teeth on the cover!

His New York Observer column & videologues are fun, too.

One of the good guys. I hope Barney's survives this crunch.

Anonymous said...

That man is a hoot!

Anonymous said...

On the other hand, my first baby was scheduled to be delivered by an OB-GYN who did an exam on me when he'd just come in from the golf course. He was wearing seersucker pants, a horrible lime green knit golf shirt, loafers...and no socks.

Anonymous said...

But what advice does Simon have for those of us who don't have fab clothes? Sob.

Duchesse said...

Doonan bit the hand of his employer, Barney's, saying they do not carry sizes for women over a US 10- said he saw larger women forlornly hunched over Barney's jewelery counter, and that's wrong. I loved him for that.

The typology in the book was useful but the photos cliched and the writing flat.

Anonymous said...

I received his book Wacky Chicks as a gift a couple of years ago. It was hilarious.

It did make me wonder why my friend thought to give that particular book to me, but I got over it.

WendyB said...

Ha ha! That's my Wear What You Want...within reason...policy. Put very eloquently.

Robo said...

I laughed so hard that I almost snorted when I read that comment on jezebel.com. My bosses know I laugh at stuff anyway, and they asked what I was laughing about, but they have no clue about fashion, so the humour was lost on them. <3 Simon Doonan

Anonymous said...

I love the shirt too.