How I Save the World

So there I was all togged up in my vintage chocolate and maroon corduroy outfit waiting to get into the 3.1 Philip Lim show. But all in vain. They said there were too many people in the tiny hallway in the NYPL on 42nd street, so they were not going to let anyone in. Bummer. So we went to have a drink on the Lower East Side. Nice place that had all sorts of European beer. I asked for the sweetest one they had – and it still tasted bitter. I’ll never understand why beer is popular.

Monday and I get an email asking if I want to attend Luca Luca in the main tent. The Main Tent! OMG! Of course, it means I have to (a) play hooky form work and (b) show up in my gym trainers. I hesitate, but since I’ll be sitting down (yes I had reserved seating – who’d have thought!) I couldn’t care less. Trainers be damned. Would I pass up the chance to get into the tent because of trainers? Uh- no.

So I get to the entrance. The melee around me is gawking as I’m led up the stairs into the tent by my beautifully dressed accomplice. People must have been wondering what this guy in trainers was doing with this gorgeous Asian chic. So we got right in passed the hulking security people who didn’t stop me! Inside, I did hurried mwa-mwah’s with my friend so that I could go straight to my seat and sit down.

I’m looking for the entrance to the space with an expression on my face that’s a cross between bored exasperation and determination. I figure the best way to handle not being dressed is to not make eye contact with anyone, to not stare, or gawk at the beautiful people around me. I look like a worker, so let me act like one. So with this glazed-determined look, I go passed people who don’t have assigned seating, but who are nevertheless trying to see if they can get in. “Assigned seating”, I say, pretending to be casual, to yet more hulking security, and I wave my large invitation at them.

I enter the show space, there’s crowds all around, cameras, lights, God, I try not to look at anything and anyone – I just want to sit down and hide! I find my seat and sink thankfully into it. I don’t dare stare and look around, although there’s tonnes to see – Carmen Elektra, some guy from Backstreet Boys, Padma Lakshmi, Nigel Barker… I take out my cell phone and start pretending to text – like quite a number of people. I’m a bit more relaxed, but it’s nerve-wracking going to these things under-dressed AND alone…

But it’s all good – the show’s great save for the one hideously thin model who closed it – Olga Sherer, I think. Someone I never want to see again. One of my fav models, Oluchi, was also walking. Turns out she’s married to the designer. Didn’t know that until now.With the show over, I bolt from my seat, again heading determinedly to the exit acting like I had somewhere important to go to (my office, of course). All around me people are talking loudly and doing mwa-mwah’s, cameras are flashing, interviews are taking place. I exit the main doors and walk down intothe anonymity of the street, cameras flashing all the way….

I got to see Farah Angsana couture the next day. Front row, no less. The models were much healthier looking and the clothes I thought were beautiful.

Not bad for my first time at Fashion Week, eh?