Spring Couture 2010: Chanel and Dior — Jewels of Sighs

January 30th, 2010

Sorry about the no-show on Thurs­day and Fri­day — I’m back down from the clouds, rested, and feet planted firmly on the ground. Thank you for your patience.

Chanel Spring 2010
Chanel Spring 2010

In review­ing the images from the Chanel and Chris­t­ian Dior Spring Cou­ture 2010 shows, the most appar­ent design schematic for jew­elry was pro­por­tion. It seemed that Karl Lager­feld saw the nineteenth-century cor­sage brooch, a large, impos­ing orna­ment, as hav­ing con­tem­po­rary rel­e­vance in a more real­is­tic, some­what smaller, inter­pre­ta­tion. The beaded details, pastes, and embroi­deries in his designs were placed higher, closer to the face; a flat­ter­ing idea based on the turn of the twentieth-century way of styling jew­elry. The top of one dress was cre­ated from chains of glit­ter­ing white crys­tals. This was the col­lier, a choker length jewel, as both neck­line and adorn­ment. The effi­ciency of the idea read as the kind of bril­liant short­hand, which Larg­er­feld does masterfully.

Chanel Spring 2010

How charm­ing are these fil­a­ment insecta scat­ter pins? There is an ease, a ver­sa­til­ity, to the con­cept of sug­gested form rather than a lit­eral one. These pins would float equally well on a softly printed dress or casual coat with­out ref­er­ence to sea­son, or even to species. Mod­ernist jew­elry design­ers of the 1940s and ‘50s took this con­cept and turned it into an art form.
Christian Dior Spring 2010

John Gal­liano for Chris­t­ian Dior pushed the ele­va­tor but­ton and took us to the pent­house of romance. The clothes, small waisted with cas­cad­ing skirts and crisply nipped jack­ets, were paired with antique-inspired jew­els of grand-grander-grandest pro­por­tions. The enor­mity of the paste drops and marquise-shaped crys­tals served as the tongue-in-cheek punc­tu­a­tion to the whole. Irony is a uni­ver­sal motif, and when done with wit, trans­verses our col­lec­tive imag­i­na­tion as smoothly as water on glass. You could almost cast the jew­els in Tim Burton’s Alice In Won­der­land. All the gor­geous exag­ger­a­tions apply, so back into the ele­va­tor, and down the rabbit-hole we go…

Chris­t­ian Dior Spring 2010

Just Finished Taping…

January 27th, 2010

My seg­ment on MARTHA today. I just got back from doing the show. It was won­der­ful. Martha is a con­sum­mate pro­fes­sional, and every­one who works on the show is amaz­ing beyond words!! There is a real treat in store for MARTHA fans for Valentine’s Day, and I encour­age all of you to tune in (you couldn’t pos­si­bly just watch me…the show is too good!) Please for­give me for being so brief as I am utterly exhausted and I have been MIA for my fam­ily for the last few days. I will back on the blog tomor­row with a new post so I hope you will please join me then. xo

Very Happy News…

January 22nd, 2010

Here is an announce­ment from Rizzoli’s pub­lic­ity depart­ment today:

We are pleased to announce that Lori Ettlinger Gross, author of Brooches: Time­less Adorn­ment, will be on MARTHA on Feb­ru­ary 8th.

In NYC, MARTHA airs on WNBC/Channel 4 at 11am ET. Check other local list­ings for times and stations.

Protected: The Friendship Bracelet: The Circle Cracks

January 20th, 2010

This post is pass­word pro­tected. To view it please enter your pass­word below:


Golden Globes 2010 Jewels: A Show of Restraint

January 18th, 2010

It was clear from the sparingly-applied orna­men­ta­tion that the peo­ple of Haiti were on the minds of Golden Globe atten­dees last night. And if you haven’t yet given what­ever you can to the Red Cross or any one of the emergency-relief orga­ni­za­tions seek­ing imme­di­ate fund­ing, please do! They need it most urgently now. Make this a life les­son for your chil­dren. When each of our three teenage boys heard that their par­ents had given money to these efforts, they inde­pen­dently and vol­un­tar­ily (and with­out inform­ing us until after­ward) donated from their own hard-earned sav­ings. A very proud moment in the Gross household.

Ok, and now for the show…
Jennifer Aniston at the 2010 Golden Globes
Kristen Bell at the 2010 Golden Globe Awards

Given the dis­play of restraint, there were still a few bright spots, many of which would trans­late nicely to us civil­ians. Hands down Julia Roberts won the evening jewel-wise. She wore an absolutely incred­i­ble 1972 Van Cleef & Arpels eighteen-carat yel­low gold and cit­rine neck­lace with a sexy, petite-noir YSL dress. The look appeared effort­less, nat­ural, yet respect­fully appro­pri­ate given the zeit­geist of the evening. Loved the fact that Halle Berry, Jane Krakowski and direc­tor, Kathryn Bigelow were wear­ing pieces by geode-splicing Kim­berly McDon­ald; her work is very well exe­cuted and has an edgy indi­vid­u­al­ity rarely seen on the red car­pet. Courteney Cox played to her strengths in an extremely flat­ter­ing Vic­to­ria Beck­ham gown and deep brown Lor­raine Schwartz drop ear­rings. Carey Mulligan’s bril­liant head­band read refined ingenue; a nice touch that placed the focus on her adorable short do. Cal­ista Flock­hart made a defin­i­tive case for pearls — who­ever chose the color of the strand she wore had a superla­tive eye for sub­tlety — they under­scored the creami­ness of her skin to per­fec­tion and in a way the cam­era could cel­e­brate. Two understated-but-smouldering awards should go to Jen­nifer Anis­ton and Kris­ten Bell. Bell’s for her fit­ted VCA Folie de Pres neck­lace and her short, daz­zling white Jas­mine Di Milo dress, and Anis­ton in gold jew­elry and a black Valentino gown, a slightly less for­mal look, that proved the sen­su­ous­ness of yel­low metal. Tina Fey, one of my writ­ing heros, gets kudos for keep­ing real and wear­ing what suited her per­sonal style — a plucky Zac Posen with a Dior’s New Look vibe, and fit­ted yet gen­er­ous dia­mond earrings.

As for those who needed tweak­ing, well, I’ve been called to the mat recently for my can­dor so I’ll keep it as tact­ful I can here. The gor­geous Amy Adams should have rethought the brooch from Car­olina Herrera’s per­sonal col­lec­tion. I com­pletely under­stand what she was attempt­ing with the jabot pin, and I com­mend the effort. How­ever, the place­ment was off. When she turned side­ways it made it look as though a part of her anatomy was tipped in gold — a kind of Janet Jack­son wardrobe mal­func­tion with­out the dis­garded wardrobe. I would have rec­om­mended that the orna­ment be placed sim­i­larly, just higher up towards the shoulder.

All the asym­met­ri­cal neck­lines were lovely but why every­one felt the need to com­pletely divert the atten­tion to the wrist (far too many bracelets and/or ban­gles) or wear no jew­elry at all, was dis­ap­point­ing. Mag­gie Gyl­len­haal, who could not have worn that sculpted vision of pink bet­ter, went fairly bare; the sin­gle bracelet too tame for such inven­tive­ness. I also greatly admired Juliana Mar­gulies in her well-chosen Nar­ciso Rodriguez, and as she stated she kept the jew­elry sim­ple with a, “less as more” approach. Ok, but… small and slight is not nec­es­sar­ily less on the red car­pet, and it cer­tainly wasn’t more with the strong archi­tec­ture of the gown. She could have done a fab­u­lous, fit­ted ear­ring with­out upturn­ing her stream­lined look. Last but not least, Mariah Carey, whose jewel style I have admired here in pre­vi­ous sea­sons. That reveal of décolletage deserved far more elab­o­rate jew­els. If you are going to dress diva, then please go the whole way, not half. May West’s style as a buxom beauty included a slather­ing of dia­monds, opera singers have always dressed their dra­matic tal­ent in a show of gems, both fine and faux. Carey’s cur­va­ceous attrib­utes would have been bet­ter framed with jew­els of pro­por­tion­ate pres­ence. The lack of bal­ance is what brought her look to a halt­ing objection.

On another note: The folks at Philip Stein sent over one of their new Fruitz watches for me to try out their “nat­ural fre­quency tech­nol­ogy” which accord­ing to the com­pany, “… encom­passes the chief res­o­nant fre­quency of the nat­ural earth and is a fre­quency that is har­mo­nious and ground­ing to life… and con­sumers have reported bet­ter sleep, less stress, clearer focus and bet­ter con­cen­tra­tion when wear­ing Philip Stein watches…” The com­pany intro­duced it “elec­tro­mag­netic tech­nol­ogy” watches in 2003, and devel­oped their “nat­ural fre­quency tech­nol­ogy” in 2008. I’m wear­ing the white peach ver­sion for the first time today. Style-wise the watch is really cute, if not stream­lined (sporty would be a bet­ter word). It has a Japan­ese made quartz move­ment, comes in deli­cious col­ors with coor­di­nat­ing rub­ber bands, dis­plays a large, easy-to-read round face and lays com­fort­ably on the wrist. The all-white watch I’ve got on my wrist right now is equally attrac­tive, if not a lit­tle chic. I can­not tell if the “nat­ural fre­quency tech­nol­ogy” is work­ing yet — or at all. I’ll give it another day or two before I decide. I’m sure stress will find me by Wednes­day. I was won­der­ing, though, in order to get a bet­ter night’s sleep, do I have to wear the watch overnight? Hmmm… that would be a deal breaker. I am very selec­tive as to my bejew­eled bed part­ners. What kind of girl do you think I am anyway?

Golden Globes Pre-Game

January 13th, 2010

Gear­ing up for the Golden Globe Awards this Sun­day night, jew­el­ers, such as the haute house of Cartier, are cater­ing to Hollywood’s A-list. Up In The Air’s Anna Kendrick was get­ting the star treat­ment and try­ing on a
num­ber of rock-em/sock-em gems that would eas­ily knock-out the com­pe­ti­tion (and let’s not fool our­selves into think­ing that these events aren’t about scene steal­ing among the nom­i­nees). I hope that Ms. Kendrick made choices that played up her petite frame and per­sonal style. On the video, there was one neck­lace that looked truly beau­ti­ful on her. That par­tic­u­lar exam­ple would make an excel­lent choice. Not every­one goes with what suits them as much as what is trend-itiorial. In fact, try­ing too hard has become pan­demic at the GG’s — too much of even a great jewel is still too much.

I once was watch­ing an old 1930s news­reel of a Hol­ly­wood pre­mier. The actresses, whom I couldn’t iden­tify, seemed so relaxed and nat­ural, and yet, so ele­gant and refined at the same time. Their jew­elry was equally appro­pri­ate — gor­geous too — but it didn’t seem to bog them down in impor­tance. In fact, I would describe the look as not quite dowdy with an uplift­ing note of naive exu­ber­ance. Almost as if they were debu­tants wear­ing their grandmother’s heir­looms to their first social and didn’t know how to wear them with atti­tude. Ignor­ing the bauble on your arm as if were your own skin. That is the way to wear almost any type of jew­elry, and cer­tainly the way it appears most nat­ural. Just fyi…

Thomas Jefferson Watch Key (Containing Hair of Martha Wayles Jefferson) On The Auction Block At Christies

January 7th, 2010
Thomas Jefferson's watch key containing the plaited hair of his deceased wife, Martha Wayles Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson’s watch key con­tain­ing the plaited hair of his deceased wife, Martha Wayles Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson's watch key containing the plaited hair of his wife, Martha Wayles Jefferson

Thomas Jefferson’s watch key con­tain­ing the plaited hair of his wife, Martha Wayles Jefferson

On Jan­u­ary 22, 2010, Thomas Jefferson’s watch key will be sold by Christies. Watches in the eigh­teenth cen­tury were wound by hand using a key-shaped device; they had to be wound each and every day. This par­tic­u­larly remark­able exam­ple con­tains the plaited auburn hair of his deceased wife, Martha Wayles Jef­fer­son, who was thirty-three at the time of her death. Note the ele­gant engrav­ing on the front explain­ing its con­tents. Jef­fer­son was utterly dev­as­tated by the loss; Martha died shortly after giv­ing birth to their sixth child. The front of the key lists Mrs. Jefferson’s day of her birth as well as the day of her pass­ing: Sep­tem­ber 6, 1782.

Funny? Definitely. Fashion? Hmmmm…

January 4th, 2010

Happy new year to all! I’ve just returned from the land of grand­par­ents and far too many good restau­rants: Palm Beach, Florida. So in my relaxed and rested state off I go to the gym to rid of my sins. In truth, I don’t really care. Togeth­er­ness can’t be counted in calo­ries. Um, well, actually…it prob­a­bly can. How­ever, for the first time in a very long while, I went on hol­i­day, and it was won­der­ful. No jew­elry, no gems, no anti­quar­i­ans, no haute houses. Just the beach, some shells, my hus­band, the sun, and our sons — who needed a state­ment necklace?

And now I’m back and ready to roll with the new year. Hope­fully I will have some excit­ing news to share in the not too dis­tant future. Too soon to dis­cuss still. Fin­gers’ crossed!

Michael Kors Spring 2010

Michael Kors Spring 2010

In the 1973 futur­is­tic com­edy, Sleeper, Woody Allen is trans­fixed by “The Orb of Ecstasy,” a large metal ball that sup­plies him with a drug fix with­out actu­ally ingest­ing a nar­cotic. Such clas­sic Woody Allen sight gags have become the stuff of fash­ion fod­der, at least for Michael Kors and Alexis Bit­tar who teamed up for Spring 2010 to cre­ate a col­lec­tion of Lucite jew­elry inspired the film. How does the Kors/Bittar col­lab com­pare to Allen’s wit and socio-comedic wis­dom? It’s tough act to fol­low. As main char­ac­ter Miles Mon­roe states mem­o­rably, and with­out a hint of irony, “My brain…that’s my sec­ond favorite organ!”

Year’s End: Looking Back, Just A Bit Further, Before Leaping Ahead…

December 18th, 2009
Emily Blunt and Rupert Friend in "The Young Victoria"

theyoungvictoria4

As this year comes to a close, my last post is about look­ing back. No…not at 2009 — I should like this year with its finan­cial woes and pro­fes­sional fits-and-starts behind me. Instead, today, we are going back, oh, about one hun­dred and seventy-four years to the begin­ning of the reign of Queen Vic­to­ria. She ruled Great Britain for sixty-four years (1837−1901), and was the most influ­en­tial taste-maker of her time and for a cen­tury or more, after­ward. Dior’s mid-twentieth-century fem­i­nine New Look was accom­pa­nied by the flora, fauna, and ribbon-bow bounty of neo-Victorian jewelry.

We still feel the affects of how the Queen chose to express her mood. The mourn­ing jew­els she wore in wid­ow­hood are today’s street-wise Vic­to­ri­ana (a ref­er­ence term we might not have oth­er­wise). The recent return in the pop­u­lar­ity of the snake as a orna­men­tal motif is largely inspired by the jew­elry in her per­sonal col­lec­tion, and in par­tic­u­lar, the gifts from her beloved Prince Albert.

When you view these images, please keep in mind that the pieces worn by Emily Blunt in the film are not squarely Vic­to­rian, remem­ber the film takes place around 1837, her jew­els are tran­si­tional, or still retain the tra­di­tional expanse and for­mal­ity of decades prior. Prince Albert’s later con­tri­bu­tions to what we have come to know as Vic­to­rian jew­elry is not to be under­es­ti­mated. Here, a quote from the Queen, after his passing,

He did every­thing — every­where! Noth­ing did I do with­out him, from the great­est to the small­est, from State Affairs, from Polit­i­cal Ques­tions to the arrang­ing (of) our Albums, our lit­tle pho­tographs, the design­ing and order­ing of Jew­elry, the buy­ing of a dress or a bon­net … all was done together; my first word was ‘I must ask Albert.’”

Best wishes to all of you who have spent time with me — thank you, and happy and healthy hol­i­days! Meet you back here in 2010…xo, LEG

The Young Victoria, movie poster

The Young Vic­to­ria, movie poster

The Young Victoria

The Young Victoria

Gellner at Aaron Faber Gallery 12÷16−18

December 15th, 2009
Gellner pearls and clasp

Gell­ner pearls and clasp

Aaron Faber Gallery is host­ing a Gell­ner trunk show that begins tomor­row and runs through Fri­day. Gell­ner is a com­pany that sources won­der­ful pearls and is known for a unique clasp­ing device that is both dec­o­ra­tive, and seam­less. The clasps are inter­change­able, offer­ing ver­sa­til­ity, and they may be worn sep­a­rately. The com­pany will also Gellner-ize a client’s already exist­ing strand of pearls so that it can accom­mo­date one of their clasps. Aaron Faber Gallery will be offer­ing an exclu­sive range, many designed by arti­san Michael Zobel. The con­cept is fun and orig­i­nal; the myr­iad of looks one can achieve by sim­ply chang­ing the clasp is out­stand­ing — I would highly rec­om­mend that you carve out time of your pre-holiday sched­ule to stop by and see the collection.

There will be one more post this week before we say adieu to 2009. Prob­a­bly Fri­day, or Thurs­day, if I can get every­thing else off my desk.

« Previous - Next »