Paris Fashion, Euro-Disney Style
by Talia Soghomonian
The editors of Vague, Harper's Bizarre and other monthly fashion bibles all boast of having front row seats at the Paris fashion shows. What they don't know is that the real shows take place out on the streets and inside cafes, shops and various other public Parisian places.
Paris is twice the capital of most other cities. It not only is the capital of France but also the fashion capital of the world, much to the envy of Milan, London and New York. London had even attempted a coup de mode (fashion version of coup d'état) back in the 70's by inventing punk, but Paris was not overthrown!
To fully understand what a giant-of-Guinness-world-record-breaking-proportions catwalk and showroom the city is, one must reside in Paris. Or simply read about this resident's very average day.
Strolling down the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore, the most fashionable street in Paris, I feel out of place in this haven specially conceived for (rich) fashion victims. After all, my clothes cost less than their make-up. Richly perfumed, heavily made-up and expensively dressed women have taken an early start to their daily Haute Couture shopping ritual, before the clotheshorse Japanese come and buy everything! A group of three such women, all donning Chanel handbags, meet in front of the Salvatore Ferragamo boutique to spend ridiculous amounts of money together. The salesgirl's irises take the shape of the dollar sign...
A fashion designer's dream client just walks (no, pushes. I'm not carrying a Hermes handbag, therefore I don't have the right of way) past me. Dressed in total look Yves Saint Laurent - a bluish-grey leather pantsuit with fuschia fur trimmings - she has come to update her poor wardrobe. She's the type of woman who never has anything to wear. She has a pashmina in very color. Her walk-in (more like drive through) closet is like a couture warehouse, and to enable her to concoct an outfit at a moment's notice, everything is color-coded. For example, in the shoes section, the shoe boxes bear a number and the color of the clothes items to which they correspond. For example, shoes Number 75 and 89 correspond to the Dress Shade of grey, Rainy Day In Cannes, not to be mistaken with Rainy Day In Nice, which is bluish-grey. In fact, there are so many color tones in her closet, that she has invented (or copied from lipstick tubes) sub-colors. These include Majorca Mud Bath (brown), Smog (grey) and Paint The Town (red). This is a woman who knows the difference between ivory, cream and off-white. And insists that there is one.
Ugh, it starts to rain, but getting wet is preferable to being hit in the face by pashminas as their owners flick them over their haute couture shoulders. Taking quick glances the shops - no, excuse me, boutiques - I notice that some designers have really gotten creative this season. They've had the novel idea of getting their five-year-old nieces and nephews to cut up pieces of fabric and voila! An outfit! Across the street is the Herve Leger boutique, where you really need to be legere (light) and content yourself with half a meal every two days to fit in the breath-restricting dresses. At least they're elegant. I stop to take a look at Versace's um...colorful window. Tourists take pictures of it. Also present is one specimen which is quite common in fashion-conscious Paris - it is the model wannabe (more like willnotbe or cannotbe). Dressed in white capri pants (to show off her VTL - Visible Thong Line), a tank top and balance-challenging high-heeled mules under the pouring rain, she's prancing in front of the Versace boutique, where a fashion show is taking place, waiting to be discovered. As a matter of fact, she's moments away from it. She'll soon be discovered in her little wonderland and will be sharing jokes, backstage gossip and shopping tips with her supermodel friends. And she'll be able to buy the entire Versace (which she pronounces Ver-says) collection!
The Roberto Cavalli boutique next door is, well, horrifically colorful. Very suitable for eccentric rich ladies, who, the more money they have, the more eccentric their clothes are. Take, for example, the (sexy) grandmother dressed in a red leather skirt, black lace top revealing a wonderbra, black opaque pantyhose, eight-inch platform sandals and a black hat. She's dressed a bit warmly for the 70 degrees of the day. Actually, her outfit has a couple of seasons in it... Rain or shine, the rage of the season is the kitten-heeled snakeskin (imitation for the rest of us) mule. It's okay if they slip off and fly halfway down the street. It's all part of The Importance of Being Fashionable.
Suddenly, my heart leaps! The heartless Fashion Police is patrolling the street, on the lookout for unfashionables. I try to get away, but they're everywhere. It's Fashion Week, so they're especially strict, handing out tickets right and left. Luckily, I'm not deemed unfashionable enough. I don't even get a warning requiring me to subscribe to Vague so as to correct my fashion booboos, not even a single remark on the absence of the ultimate fashion accessory - the mobile phone.
Nevertheless, I decide to take refuge from the brigade and the rain and step into what looks like an ordinary cafe. While it's the Olympics in all the pubs and cafes and for the rest of the world, it is Couture Week for the customers here. The Olympic spirit is still present, however, as models are seen strutting the designers' stuff on the catwalk on a large screen TV (Incidentally, shopping was rejected as an alternative sport by the Alternative Sports Club Association. The Couture Shoppers' Association has decided to sue, claiming that shopping includes walking, running, the occasional tug-of-war and the rivalry race to see who's better dressed). A young fashion victim, wearing The Latest In trainers and sitting at the next table, is giving her absent friend, via cellphone, a detailed account of each outfit and which supermodel is wearing it and how she looks. Her French sentences are intercepted with English words and phrases, such as "too much." This is a great place to learn a new language, namely Frenglish (see glossary). It is the official language of French fashion victims, as opposed to Engrench for their Anglo-Saxon counterparts.
Oh no, more nostalgia! Sitting at another table are two young women dressed in two of history's most elegant decades - the 70's and 80's Y2K Revisited (so they don't look like has beens). The former looks like the polyester offspring of a Disco Shoes-Wearing Diva and a Woodstocker, while the latter, bearing bruises from Dynasty shoulder pads, has opted for the off-the-shoulder Flashdance look today. They are soon joined by a fashionably lean person who has arrived, you guessed it, fashionably late. Dressed in the season's must outfit - an aubergine leather biker jacket, a dernier cri knee-length purple suede skirt, purple snakeskin knee-high boots and matching shoulder bag - she makes Madonna not look like a fashion victim. One must admit, though, that she looks great. She thinks she's doing couturiers a favor by wearing their clothes, and soon starts making remarks about other people's wardrobe flaws. "I can't believe there are still people out there who dress like that," she says with a shocked look. "That hasn't been in fashion for ages...since April 1999! Sooo out." Some people...Tsk, tsk. Other favorite topics of conversation include the next edition of Vague, which will feature highlights from Couture Week and in which they can consult their Fashion Horoscopes for the month; the opening of the new Prada boutique; some more fashion-oriented gossip ("I've seen her wear that dress at least three times!"); which supermodel they would like to look like this season. All this while simultaneously watching and commenting the fashion shows. Regular oohs and aahs can be heard as the UFO's (Unidentified Fashion Objects) appear on the screen. But who would wear...that...whatever?
I don't care how fashionable some UFO's are; if I don't like it, I won't wear it. These clothes, along with some others (anything 80's, white/colorful pantyhose, black pantyhose with white shoes and Dynasty shoulder pads), should come with a warning label: The Fashion General warns that these items may be hazardous to your intellect and may result in the loss of personality. Wearers of UFO's risk being stared and/or pointed at; wearers risk being arrested by the Fashion Police. Some clothes should even come with age restrictions - "Risk of arrest by Fashion Police if legal ID proves that wearer's age is over 29". Instead of persecuting poor souls who are wearing - gasp! - stone-washed jeans in lieu of the sooo "in" dark blue, the Fashion Police should go about lecturing fashion addicts about the dangers of conformism and congratulating those who wear whatever they want.
Like me. Well, I have to go and unpack my shopping. I don't want my new triangle-cut snake-print skirt to get wrinkled.
Talia's Mini Fashion Glossary (future dictionary?)
dernier cri: The latest fad.
Engrench : Language derived from the incorporation of French words or phrases into the English language, spoken by Anglo-Saxon fashion victims.
fashion victim: One who, through lack of individuality and weakness of character, has fallen prey to the dictates of a fashion designer.
Frenglish: 1. Language derived from the incorporation of English words and phrases into the French language, and spoken by hip Parisians; 2. The English language weighed down with a heavy French accent.
has been (as bin): A garment, accessory or person who is living in the past fashion-wise.
in (short i): A garment or accessory which is the latest fashion.
must (forget the u): A fashion garment or accessory that a fashion victim simply cannot be seen without.
out : A garment or accessory that is no longer in fashion.
shoes (short o): Frenglish slang term signifying platform shoes.
too much (forget the u) : Something or someone who overdoes it but in a good, fashion-wise way.
total look (toe-tal, look w/short o): Frenglish term depicting an outfit consisting of only one particular designer's clothes.
Talia Soghomonian lives in Paris where fashion is both life blood and entertainment.
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