Posts Tagged ‘Oscar’

t’s nice to know when an L.A. based designer – even if they used to live in N.Y. and still shows there – is working with a big celebrity on her clothing.

English songbird Adele wore a beautiful black satin Barbara Tfank dress and green satin coat to the Grammys, and was hooked up with L.A. based designer via Vogue Magazine’s Hamish Bowles. It’s been a great collaboration, and when Adele was prepping her big Hollywood Bowl show this past Sunday night, she went to Tfank to create her new look – a beautiful black taffeta flocke three-quarter length sleeved dress, with a deep deep neckline.

 

Fashionrules caught up with Barbara Tfank – known for her collection of dresses made from vintage fabrics, and for design consulting on Uma Thurman’s famous violet Prada Oscar gown -  to find out how she created Adele’s look.

 

FR: How did you come up with this silhouette for Adele for the Hollywood Bowl?

 

BT: It was about an open neckline, and a three quarter sleeves – Adele uses her arms from her elbow down. So I made the dress with tight black sleeves to the elbow. And to accentuate her beautiful face and neck and decollete, I made it very low cut. She looked very hourglass 1960’s va va voom.

 

FR: Adele told the L.A. Times she’s not much of a fashion girl – and it seems, before she met you, she didn’t ever show her waist.

 

BT: When I first met her, she  told me she’s never worn a belt. I said, “Let’s go Marilyn Monroe/ Mae West!!” – and she’s got an hourglass figure. In my clothes and silhouette – low neck, tight sleeve, tight waist – she look like  Lynn Redgrave in “Georgy Girl”- that mid sixties heavy-eyeliner look that I LOVE! It all works.

 

FR: Tell me about the fabric choice.

 

BF: It’s a gunmetal black taffeta flocke, very light. I wanted Adele to wear color, but she loves her black – she said, “this show’s such a big deal for me,” she wanted to stick to what’s comfortable. So we really worked on the silhouette, tried the dress on her a lot, so that we could go as low on the shoulder as we could go without it slipping off. I approached it more like costume design than fashion. I even put a diamond brooch from the 1860’s  on the belt – she loves antiques. When the camera hit her on the big screen, you could see the sparkle. She wore Louboutin shoes, a patent peep toe – then she apologized to me after show for for taking her shoes off!

 

FR: And apparently, she mentioned you on stage!!

 

BT: Yes, she thanked me in front of the whole crowd! THat’s something I’m never going to forget!

This is how Variety began their “Bruno” review today:

”There are 61 laughs, three dildos, one gyrating, talking penis, an anal bleaching and one very pissed-off politician in “Bruno,” which should be enough to make any movie fly. But there is also a pronounced nasty streak to the innumerable provocations staged by the title character that curdles the laughs and wears out the flamboyant Austrian fashionista’s welcome within the picture’s brief 82-minute running time. Undeniably funny, outrageous and boundary-pushing, this further documentation of Sacha Baron Cohen’s sheer nerve will draw an abundant share of “Borat” fans, gross-out seekers and the culturally curious, making for some potent B.O. figures, at least at first. But the content will turn off some (no doubt including some gays), as will the sourness and ill will triggered by the picture’s cumulative misanthropy.”

It compares “Bruno” to the big grossing “Borat,” saying that Borat did convince real people he wasn’t an actor – but Bruno can’t always pull it off. Too many people know Sacha Baran Cohen now – with Oscar noms, etc.

There is also a Michael Jackson fracas in the movie – which Universal Pictures has already removed. It involves Bruno chasing around LaToya Jackson for her brother Michael’s phone number. Since Jackson’s death, the sequence has been pulled, luckily. Paula Abdul is also “punked” by Bruno, and so, in a way, is Harrison Ford. Those visual jokes are not going on the cutting room floor. Vatriety DOES say the production quality of this movie is better than “Borat.”

In any case, we’ll all be lining up soon enough. On July 8th, the biggest story in the fashion community will be, not, “What do you think of Chanel couture in Paris?” – but – “Have you seen “Bruno” yet???”

Mary Norton started her original line “Moo Roo” in the south, where she’s from – feathered handbags and shoes that she got on the Oscar red carpet in the luxe heydey of the 1990’s, and that’s how she launched her line. She changed the name of her accessories brand to Mary Norton, got big NY investors, and opened a store on Melrose Place – right between Oscar and Sergio Rossi.

We saw what happened to Sergio Rossi. They shut down this past Christmas, 2008.

Now Mary Norton will close the doors of her boutique on Tuesday June 30th, and Melrose Place will be the quieter – and the emptier. Apparently, everything in the store is eighty percent off now, before the shuttering, if you want to check it out.

We got an email in our inbox today with this photo of Farrah Fawcell wearing a Stephen Burrows original liquidy-gold to the Oscars in 1978. It was certainly one of her more golden fashion/beauty moments, and she had many. Burrows made the dress specifically for Farrah, and she was one of the first stars not to wear a stiff gown and up do to the Oscars – but her own amazing winged frosted hair and a slip of a dress in a color to match her skin. It could even have been the magical Mr. Burrows himself to sent the email!

There’s another bit of a photo of it at imdb.com. Check it out. It’s nice to take a moment to remember Farrah in a great America designer’s clothing. It was one of both of their finest’s moments.

 

One of the ladies we’re most looking forward to watching this awards season is, of course, Anne Hathaway – who in the midst of being nominated for a Golden Globe, a SAG Award and probably an Oscar (we’ll find that out in two weeks, on January 22), has “Bride Wars” opening this weekend. She’s clearly at the top of her game right now – and also, at the top of her fashion game.

 

At the Palm Springs Film Festival opening night gala, Ms. Hathaway sported a black strapless slim cut sheath with beaded encrusted obi belt by Balmain for spring 09, and Cartier jewels. Balmain’s spring collection in Paris in October was heralded as a new start for the old brand, because young designer Christophe Decarnin rocked up the looks, and made the silhouettes much younger. As you can see from our photo montage here, Hathaway’s stylist Rachel Zoe didn’t alter a hair of the dress – not the length, the cut, the color  - Hathaway wore it exactly as it was shown on the Paris runway – and yet, carried the dress without the dress carrying her. She gave it the personal flair it deserved. Well done! It’s not easy making Paris chic your own.

 

Well, Mortons is gone, so where was Vanity Fair going to throw their momentus Oscar party this year? Last year, the party was going to be held at the Kraft restaurant in Century City when the Writer’s Guild put a large crowd over everything, and the party was cancelled. This year, the economy has put a pall over everything – but it’s the damn Oscars! Graydon Carter, editor of Vanity Fair, announced the mag will hold the venerable affair at the Sunset Tower Hotel this year, and will cut their list from 1200 to 800 – ouch!! As if it wasn’t hard enough to get into!! All the more reason to launch a killer Oscar campaign! Turns out Carter is partners with Sunset Tower owner Jeff Klein in NY’s Monkey Bar, so it just makes sense – and makes the Sunset Strip hotel wars of coolness – the Chateau Marmont vs. The Sunset Tower – turn in the Tower’s favor.

 

Since the fall collections for 09 are a few months away – they’ll be shown in February in New York, and March in Milan and Paris – it’s hard to say now what the influences will be. But we have an inkling that the fashions from the movie “Australia” will be amongst them: director Baz Luhrman’s wife Catherine Martin won an Oscar for her costume designs for “Moulin Rouge,” and those costumes wound up influencing fashion in so many ways – corsets, tulle, lace up boots, bowler hats, tight jackets – for so many years afterwards.

 

Since the movie takes place on the brink of World War II, and Nicole Kidman plays an aristocratic Englishwoman who relocates to the wilds of Australia after inheriting property there – her clothes are proper cottons for the climate: tight blouses in ecru cotton, skirts made out of heavy cotton khaki and olive drab – she even sports a dust colored man’s fedora in one scene. It’s all very “Out of Africa” without the long skirts – although Nicole does sport a Chinese satin blouse with a flower in her hair in one scene. It’s all very Ralph Lauren looking, circa 1940.

 

But look to designers to emulate the earth tones – particularly since we’ve seen such bright colors in the last few years – and the fitted rugged but ladylike looks when fall 09 comes around.

 

The Melrose Place family has a gem of a new neighbor: Neil Lane. The Diamond Man finally opened his La Cienega boutique, right above Monigue L’hulier’s store, just slightly north of Melrose Place, on Wednesday night. And it shows just what rocks can buy, with his turnout: Kate Walsh, Rachel Griffiths (in an American flag shirt for the election, even though she’s Australian), Debi Mazar, Tori Spelling, Carmen Elektra, Dana Delaney, Nicky Hilton – it had a high density of celebs for a store opening, but then, Lane has surpassed Martin Katz as the king of Hollywood award shows and diamonds. Lane was in a tiny antiquary mall on Beverly Boulevard for many years, where he created birthday gifts for Annette Bening and Goldie Hawn, but when a fire ravaged the building, he decided to get serious about a real boutique that befits his celebrity clientele. No recession visible here. There were diamonds and gowns galore, just in time for November sweeps and the tv ratings blitz – and time to start planning those Golden Globe and Oscar jewels.