Oct 2, 2007

Colette Party—How Do You Say 'Celeb' in French?

It turns out I had two misses last night: I did not get to meet The Sartorialist and give him my pitch on Chicago style,* and I did not get to see the Yohji show (no cabs, merci rainy Paris weather!).  

It worked out okay, though. I still got to attend the coolest party of the week, at the coolest store in the world, Colette. The soirée was to fête street photographers and bloggers. Making an appearance was a high-fashion, hipster mix, including model-of-the-moment Agyness Dean, Cory Kennedy, Olivier Zahm, the Misshapes, Hamish Bowles, Carine Roitfeld and Karl Lagerfeld. It was one of those parties where there were so many cool people that nobody talked about the cool people there (I will herein stop using the word "cool."). I didn't know until I read on style.com the next morning that Charlotte Gainsbourg and Lisa Eisner were there, too.

To get away from it all, we enjoyed the artwork on the walls (featured were Jeremey Kost, The Sartorialist, Facehunter, and Cobrasnake, among others). We also were treated to installations of shoes and clusters of mannequins. Everything looks nifty in multiples, non?

I explained to an American friend that when the French want to say "celebrity," they say "people" (it sounds like "pee-paul" when they say it).

"Oh, like People magazine?" she asked.

A French friend piped in, "I don't think so. I think it comes from party pictures—just pictures of people, you know?"

Fittingly enough for a party honoring nightlife photographers, everybody spent the evening snapping pictures of everybody else. I've included some "tres people" shots, taken either by myself or my friend Cassi.

"I feel badly asking so many people for their picture sometimes," Cassi said.

To which an editor friend made the wise comment, "If there's ever a party where people are okay with having their picture taken, it's this one."

Some of these people were born ready.

It seems fitting to end this post with a picture of photographer Jeremey Kost eating a marzipan hors d'oeuvre with a skull on it.  If there were ever a metaphor for Colette, it's the skull/marzipan combo: a little bit street, a little bit lux.

*(This is kind of fun: watch the bottom video clip on my blog buddy Susan's site. Look very closely. Just after the redhead (that's me) stands to take a picture of Yvan, aka "Facehunter," a man walks in on stage right. This man is none other than… The Sartorialist! Such a narrow miss! Chicagoans, I won't let him get away next time).

Posted at 05:01 PM in Paris Fashion Week | Permalink

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