{"id":3264,"date":"2010-01-17T03:13:20","date_gmt":"2010-01-17T08:13:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wendybrandes.com\/blog\/?p=3264"},"modified":"2010-04-05T21:45:55","modified_gmt":"2010-04-06T01:45:55","slug":"kenneth-jay-lane-made-me-do-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/2010\/01\/kenneth-jay-lane-made-me-do-it\/","title":{"rendered":"Put the Blame on Kenneth Jay Lane"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1986 — when I was an undergraduate at Columbia College<\/a> and some of you weren’t born — I got the book that made the long-forgotten Edie Sedgwick an icon. It was then called Edie: An American Biography (it has since been retitled Edie: American Girl<\/a>) and it had been out for a few years, so a hard-cover copy was on sale for $1.99 at the bookstore. I read that book from cover-to-cover, beginning to end, backwards and forwards and every other way you can possibly read a book. I fantasized about being glamorous and tragically fucked-up like Edie. But I wasn’t rich and didn’t do drugs (my parents would have yelled at me, for God’s sake!), so I settled for wearing black leggings for years. Edie often wore a black leotard and\/or black tights.<\/p>\n

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WendyB wearing leggings in Amsterdam in 1989. Click to enlarge.<\/p><\/div>\n

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Edie wearing a leotard and tights in August 1965 Vogue.<\/p><\/div>\n

Edie is an oral history<\/a> and one of the interviewees is costume jewelry designer Kenneth Jay Lane<\/a>. In the book’s afterword, Lane said of himself:<\/p>\n

“… In 1963 I invented costume jewelry for the beautiful people — was lionized by them and became one of the most splendidly beautiful of them — a genuine Sixties character! Handsome, tall, thin … sitting in the back of my vintage Rolls (and matching driver) wearing either my floor-length leopard — or monkey — or unicorn, coat — all of which have disappeared. ….”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I was enthralled by this image. (Lane was named to the International Best-Dressed List Hall of Fame in 1974.<\/a> Click here <\/a>to see him with Diana Vreeland in 1976.) I also knew that leopard fur<\/a> was legal in the ’60s (it was banned by the U.S. in 1973<\/a>) and that unicorns<\/a> don’t exist (right?!?).<\/p>\n

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Jackie Kennedy created a craze for leopard. Photo from Blue Velvet Vintage. Click for more info.<\/p><\/div>\n

But in those pre-Google days, I wasn’t sure whether monkey fur was like leopard — something people wore back in the day — or if it was imaginary like unicorn. It stayed in my mind as a symbol of a fascinating, decadent era. So,\u00a0 last March<\/a>, when I stumbled across a 1960s-era monkey-fur coat by the fascinating, decadent designer Jacques Tiffeau<\/a>, I had to get it.<\/p>\n

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Fascinating, decadent model Donyale Luna and her fiance had matching monkey-fur coats. Click for photo source.<\/p><\/div>\n

However, when the coat arrived, I thought it was a little scary in a hairy way. I also remembered that I detest monkeys.<\/p>\n

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I hate baboons even more than I hate monkeys.<\/p><\/div>\n

I left the coat in the package it came in and pursued my newfound interest in Tiffeau in other ways.<\/p>\n

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I wore this Tiffeau dress at my pop-up shop in November. Click!<\/p><\/div>\n

I finally wore the coat in December. I was going out with a couple of designing friends and figured they would appreciate an unusual fashion artifact. We had so much fun<\/a> that we forgot to take a picture of it! So I wore it again a few days later for happy hour at Lure<\/a> with a group including my photographically talented friend Tina<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Coat by Tiffeau, photo by Tina.<\/p><\/div>\n

I highly recommend Lure’s happy hour: oysters are $1 each! We got 20 for four of us.<\/p>\n

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Tina, WendyB and Jacob at Lure. Photograph by Stacy.<\/p><\/div>\n

If you like the look of my coat but detest monkeys … or fur in general (I don’t give a fuck what you think of my Tiffeau, thanks very much) … you can get a ’70s faux-fur-sleeved jacket by Giorgio Sant’ Angelo<\/a>, another vintage designer I love, on 1stdibs.com.<\/p>\n

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Click to shop.<\/p><\/div>\n

Speaking of Edie, back in 2007, Sienna Miller portrayed the Casey-Johnson<\/a>-of-the’60s in Factory Girl<\/a>. Sienna went to the after-party of the New York premiere dressed Edie-style in a black leotard and tights. (I was more conservative and wore black tights with a vintage Ossie Clark dress<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

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Another photo of the real Edie in a leotard.<\/p><\/div>\n

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Sienna partied Edie-style, but without the amphetamine. I hope.<\/p><\/div>\n

People everywhere went all fashion-police on Sienna’s ass, making fun of her<\/a> about what they should have known was a cool tribute to Edie. Now the no-pants look is all the rage.<\/p>\n

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Lady Gaga<\/p><\/div>\n

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Beyonce<\/p><\/div>\n

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French Vogue editor Carine Roitfeld<\/p><\/div>\n

Sienna, in copying someone from 40 years ago, was way ahead of her time. Who’s laughing now, bitches?<\/p>\n

UPDATED TO ADD: Miss Cavendish had Kenneth Jay Lane sign her copy of Edie! Check it out here<\/a>. <\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1986 — when I was an undergraduate at Columbia College and some of you weren’t born — I got the book that made the long-forgotten Edie Sedgwick an icon. It was then called Edie: An American Biography (it has since been retitled Edie: American Girl) and it had been out for a few years,…<\/p>\n

Read More »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3849,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10,75,65,23,83,41,40],"tags":[372],"class_list":{"0":"post-3264","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"category-coats","9":"category-designers","10":"category-fashion-trends","11":"category-gorgeous-friends","12":"category-pictures-of-me","13":"category-vintage","14":"tag-jacques-tiffeau","15":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3264","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3264"}],"version-history":[{"count":52,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3264\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3902,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3264\/revisions\/3902"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wendybrandes.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}