In April, I did a video about a vintage Stephen Burrows toga-type garment that I had never worn. I didn’t want to give it up because Burrows is an important designer, and whenever I considered selling the piece online or at a consignment store, I imagined it eventually landing on a thrift-store rack, forlorn and…
slow fashion
What Wendy Wore: Columbia Spectator Slow Fashion
The Columbia Daily Spectator — the undergraduate news organization of Columbia University in New York — had its annual fundraiser last Friday. This was a pleasant change, because the dinner has been held in January or February for ages. Last year, the students told the board of alumni trustees, of which I’m a member, that…
Going Wide With Frame Jeans and Diane Keaton
I need to do a YouTube video about my whole history with jeans. I’ve realized that since my teenage years, I’ve always been searching for a style that’s not readily available. Over the past decade, I’ve been bedeviled by the persistence of skinny jeans/jeggings, which was a style I loved in the 1980s — when…
What Wendy Wore: Double-Vintage Ossie Clark
On Tuesday, MrB and I attended the Awards for Excellence dinner for the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. Dick Tofel, our friend and the president of ProPublica, was among the honorees. Four recent alumni were also recognized and I was absolutely blown away by their work: I…
Throwback Thursday: Ossie Clark in 2005, 2011, 2019
In my tribute to my late friend Al Radley, I posted a photo taken in his house in 2005. The long sweater I’m trying on belonged to him, but I was wearing my own vintage Ossie Clark dress. In 2011, I took a photo that showed the dress clearly. And last Friday, I randomly wore…
Throwback Thursday: 2014 Oscars, 2019 GEM Awards
In 2014, I wore a Zang Toi trench gown to the Vanity Fair Oscar party. Last week, I wore the same dress to the GEM Awards — aka “the Academy Awards of the fine jewelry industry” — where I posed for a photo with Monica Stephenson, the founder of ANZA Gems. What Wendy WoreDress: Zang…
What Wendy Wore: New Year’s Eve 2019
I hope you had a fantastic New Year’s Eve! I had a wonderful dinner at Balthazar with MrB; my stepson, William; my designing friend Stacy; and talented journalist siblings Jesse and Abby. View this post on Instagram New Year’s Eve at Balthazar #nye2019 #happynewyear #friendandfamily #newyearseveparty A post shared by Wendy Brandes (@wendybrandes) on Dec…
Year in Review: What Wendy Wore in 2018
For 2017, I was proud to be able to do a “What Wendy Wore” year in review post featuring 12 slow-fashion outfits. In 2018 — despite Henry David Thoreau’s famous “… beware of all enterprises that require new clothes” — some of my most notable looks did require something new. I mean, I normally don’t…
MrB Is the Cat’s Pyjamas, Plus What Wendy Wore
MrB had been asking me for a while what I wanted for my birthday — which was yesterday — as well as the holidays. I kept saying nothing, and that was before we tried to save Purrkoy the kitten’s life last week. After that, I wasn’t in a particularly celebratory mood, and I figured those…
What Wendy Wore: Double-Vintage Clovis Ruffin
I declare a garment to be “double vintage” when it’s vintage by nature and vintage in terms of how long I’ve owned it. Here’s the double-vintage Clovis Ruffin dress I wore last week to The Acting Company’s fall gala, which honored my friends Barbaralee Diamonstein-Spielvogel and Carl Spielvogel. What Wendy Wore Dress: Clovis Ruffin (purchased…