Tina Fey rebounded from her Golden Globes Zac Posen sartorial disaster with a stunning black, one-shoulder, sequined Michael Kors gown that really flattered her figure. Tina accessorized with an onyx and diamond ring and onyx and diamond drop earrings by Stephen Russell. She carried a clutch by Kotur and wore Jimmy Choo heels. This was a great night for Project Runway: Chris March designed Meryl Streep's gown and Michael Kors rescued Tina Fey from the Golden Globes worst dressed list. Well, he and the editors of Vogue, who styled Tina for the red carpet.
Michael Kors said that his fall 2010 ready to wear collection was "quintessential American sportswear." What that translates to: wearable, classic separates for fall in camel, grey and black. Kors does pants in a number of different incarnations: we especially loved the slouchy, low-waisted ones. The knits and oversized anorack are must buys.
The only jarring note in the collection was the appearance of leg warmers. He sneaked them in by using a grey, tasteful knit, but they were there. Yes, leg warmers were back -- and not only at Michael Kors. They were all over the place. On the other hand, if you get cold legs, this fall is going to make you very happy. Take a look:
Michael Kors to Launch Makeup Collection With Estee Lauder
WWD reports that Michael Kors has inked a deal with Estee Lauder to launch a new cosmetics collection called Very Hollywood. The collection will hit stores in January and will have a three to four month run. If it sells, it will pave the way for an expansion of the collection. The collection is focused on the colors pink, beige and coral and shimmer is key.
"I'm very Hollywood in modern terms," said Kors, sitting in his Beverly Hills store with passers-by shooting pictures through the windows. "I don't think I am old-fashioned Hollywood glamour. I am definitely not Cary Grant. I am still very low-key. When I run into Ellen Pompeo and her husband at the Beverly Hills Hotel, we are in flip-flops eating grilled cheese."
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"I am every bit as intrigued by seeing Reese [Witherspoon] with her kids or Angelina [Jolie] with her groceries looking great as I am seeing them on the red carpet," said Kors. "When you put this makeup on, suddenly you feel attainable glamour. You walk into the office, and no one would say, 'Is that a new lipstick?' You look glamorous without looking painted. That would be your Hollywood moment."
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Kors' approach to the collection is set apart by his desire for sheerness, even in the lipsticks, which are called sheens. "That's something that was really new for Estee Lauder," said Lauder. "It is an interesting way for us to look at color. In the past, we have done thicker, more opaque colors on the lip."
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There are three complementary products that Lauder considers standouts of the collection: $32 shimmering loose powder, $22 lip sheen in a subtle pink shade with gold flecks dubbed Hollywood Gold and $20 lip gloss in Hollywood Gold. She compared these products with a great camel coat or black dress in a Michael Kors collection that she described as "the bare essentials that you need."
Hilary Rhoda will be the face of the ad campaign for the collection. Hilary will be wearing a Michael Kors gown and will be photographed by Craig McDean.
If the collection sells well, Michael has lots of plans for the future, including bronzer and Sophia Loren style liquid eyeliner that would be easy to apply.
Heidi Klum Wears Key To The Cure Tee Designed by Michael Kors
Two Project Runway judges are working together on project supporting the fight against breast cancer. Heidi Klum is pictured above wearing a Michael Kors cotton tee called the Key To The Cure Tee. The special tee is sold exclusively at Saks Fifth Avenue, which will donate 2% of sales up to $250,000 over the shopping weekend (10/15/09-10/18/09) to local and national women's cancer charity partners.
Michael Kors declared that he has never worked with pastels in his entire life: he has always found them insipid. But this year he said he was inspired to take on pastels in a spring, urban setting. The color palette is a mix of lovely pale blues, violets and mint greens, with some harder edged black pieces. It's a gorgeous, youthful and yet elegant collection. The dresses are very architectural, with interesting shoulders and details. A fabulous black shift with zippers and clear plastic windows neatly referenced Courreges yet seemed very modern in this season of bare midriffs and miniskirts.
The cashmere sweaters and fun skirts are just adorable. It's a fantastic collection. Take a look:
Designer Michael Kors' Very Hollywood collection of fragrances will debut in department stores in September. A website has launched for the new fragrances at veryhollywood.com that includes some promotional Hollywood tie-ins.
The new website includes two contests. A contest running now offers visitors a chance to receive a red carpet treatment, which includes the opportunity to attend InStyle's Oscar Viewing Party. The second contest, launching this fall, is the Hollywood Correspondents Contest.
The new site also has a Starring You application that features your photos in a magazine-style layout. Photos can be emailed or posted on a Facebook wall and tagged.
Michelle Obama Wears Moschino, Kors to Meet the Pope
President and Mrs. Obama visited with Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican on Friday, after the president and Pope Benedict had a private meeting. For the papal visit, Michelle wore a black top, skirt and veil by Moschino and a coat by Michael Kors. She looked lovely. Michelle, Malia and Sacha were given a private tour of St. Peter's Basilica and the Sistine Chapel.
Fashion designers and celebs walked the red carpet for the CFDA Awards, the Oscars of the fashion world. Blake Lively wore a fuschia dress by Michael Kors and accessorized with nude Christian Louboutin peeptoe heels (the same ones Megan Fox wore to great effect at the Berlin premiere of Transformers 2). Heidi Klum also wore Michael Kors: he created a fab silver metallic maternity cocktail dress for her. She accessorized with Louboutin heels and some amazing statement earrings. Diane Von Furstenberg wore a white cocktail, darling gold sandals and some fabulously large earrings. Take a look:
Michael Kors Talks Celebs, Obsessions and His Worst Fashion Faux Pas
In this very interesting clip, Michael Kors talks about the connection between Hollywood and the fashion industry, how women can use photos of celebrities to help them put together their own look, his fashion obsessions and his greatest fashion faux pas. He explains how when he was very young he ended up on the cover of Women's Wear Daily wearing three pairs of leg warmers and skintight jeans. We love Michael. Take a look:
Michael Kors is launching
his third major fragrance this September. The new fragrance is called Very Hollywood.
"Hollywood glamour is the ultimate escape," said the designer during an interview at his Manhattan showroom Tuesday. "It is an emotional pull, no matter what your age — which gave us the idea for this fragrance. Everyone needs a little escape these days."
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The designer likens his first, Michael, to "the little black dress — it has classic, universal appeal," he said of the fragrance, launched in 2000. (A bridge scent called Kors launched in 2003 and is no longer sold.) His second major franchise, Island — which has included a handful of flankers since the original's 2005 launch — he compared with "a cool collection of crisp white shirts."
As for Very Hollywood, "this is the indulgence. This is the gold dress!" But, he hastens to add, it's not necessarily a nighttime fragrance. "It's more of a mood," he said. "This is definitely not the customer's sporty moment."
Very Hollywood, concocted by Kors and the Estee Lauder Cos. Inc.'s Evelyn Lauder and Trudi Loren in cooperation with International Flavors & Fragrances, is a sophisticated floral. Top notes are of mandarin and iced bergamot; the heart is of wet jasmine, ylang-ylang, raspberry and gardenia, and the drydown is of Italian orris, creamy amber, soft white moss and vetiver. "This is the most glamorous, indulgent scent we've ever done," said Kors, adding that he thinks the sunny Southern California landscape adds optimism to the mix.
The fragrance bottle is made of glass that has been molded to look like the flashbulbs from, the 50s and 60s. The eau de parfum comes in three sizes, 1 oz., 1.7 oz. and 3.4 oz., and will retail for for $45, $65 and $85. There will also be a $300 version of the perfume that comes in a one ounce size.
The collection has some unusual and interesting ancillary products, such a s a pen with ink that is scented with the fragrance, a cocktail ring with a solid perfume, scented lotion, and some gift sets for the holidays that will include false eyelashes or a gold clutch.
Amy Adams wears a Michael Kors red and navy silk and linen dress in this photograph from a photo shooto and feature for W magazine. In the Winterview, Amy Adams revealed that she used to make fake Guess jeans and that she worked at the Gap.
On Making Guess Jeans: "If I didn't get things on clearance, I wasn't getting them," she says. "I would make fake Guess jeans by buying a cheaper brand with a triangle label and then cutting it off so you could still see the triangle outline. It's so sad that I did that! But I really wanted to be one of those girls."
On Working at the Gap: Scoring the job was, she says, "a huge deal, because with the 40-percent-off discount I could finally buy things that weren't on sale!"
Amy Adams also says that "What if I never left the Gap?" is a game she often plays with herself. She says it was a Gap co-worker who encouraged her to try acting: "I had taken an acting class, but I was so dorky, with hair down to there, looking like Little House on the Prairie. I was painfully insecure. But he made me audition for something. I'm sure I was awful, but he planted that idea in me."
You can find the feature here on W and the photo gallery here.
Fashion Industry Hopes Michelle Obama Will Broaden Fashion Choices
Women's Wear Daily discusses openly what the American fashion designers have been discussing for months: the lack of mainstream American designers in the first lady's wardrobe. No one seems critical of Michelle Obama, but there is a sense that the American First Lady is in a unique position to help out the American industry. She has worn quite a bit J.Crew, and that certainly has helped sparked renewed interest in American brands. But so far of all the major American designers, only Michael Kors has dressed the first lady. He provided a lovely dress for her official White House portrait.
Who cares about one woman’s wardrobe choices in this time of turmoil? A lot of people. London fawning has officially crossed over from gushing to silly, The Daily Telegraph proclaiming Obama “the mint-green queen of fashion,” while The Guardian said “Mrs. O has all but obliterated last year’s Carlamania from the fashion history books, with an outfit that draws a direct bloodline between her look and the wardrobe with which Jackie Kennedy wowed Europe in 1961.”
To a large extent, the fashion ship sails on such hyperbole — and on human product placement. Especially now, the kind of worldwide attention Obama and her labels are getting can boost an entire corporate psyche from designer to ground floor. It can boost sales as well. Obama's now famous J. Crew beaded cardigan reportedly sold out by midmorning on Wednesday. Similarly, might not a chic sighting of the First Lady in Ralph Lauren or Donna Karan prod some women to stroll through Saks Fifth Avenue or Neiman Marcus? As Calvin Klein's Francisco Costa puts it, "We'd be thrilled to dress the First Lady, of course. She has the power to influence consumers."
Within the major fashion houses, there is a growing desire for Obama to broaden her choices to include their wares. "American fashion right now is struggling," says Oscar de la Renta. "I think I understand what [Obama and her advisers] are doing, but I don’t think that is the right message at this particular point....I don’t object to the fact that Mrs. Obama is wearing J. Crew to whatever because the diversity of America is what makes this country great. But there are a lot of great designers out there. I think it’s wrong to go in one direction only."
Tommy Hilfiger takes a more temperate view, applauding Obama for not focusing only on the high end. "I'm happy that she's wearing young designers and not only wearing [American] couture, which puts her more in touch with real people," he says.
Oscar de la Renta understands what's going on here. It's a recession and the White House is wary of looking too glamorous or insensitive to Americans' financial troubles by wearing expensive designer gowns and clothing all the time. And clearly her tastes runs more to youthful, younger designers such as Jason Wu. Our sense is that as time goes on, Michelle will most likely cycle her way through all the major American design houses and give those designers a chance to show off their American style on the world stage.
Bloomingdale's is taking new steps to lure in the designer customer to its stores. The event brings customers and designers together for a fashion show, discussion and giveaways.
On Tuesday, the department store held its first Designer Collections Signature event — an all-afternoon happening to lure shoppers to the fourth floor of its 59th Street flagship and get them to dig into their wallets. Brian Reyes, Charles Chang-Lima and Lisa Perry made appearances; there were vendor reps for Donna Karan, Sonia Rykiel, Michael Kors, Herve Leger and Giorgio Armani's Collezioni and Black Label, and models informally presented key pieces from the new collections.
Bloomingdale's also offered a $1,000 "bMoney" gift card for every purchase of over $2,000, and customers filled out ballots for a copy of the $200 La Femme Rykiel book.
"We are approaching a transformation in retail and I think we are all reevaluating our events," said Stephanie Solomon, vice president and fashion director for women's ready-to-wear and accessories at Bloomingdale's.
Bloomingdale's had invited its key new designers and merchandised its collections in a way that the clothing racks were positioned in the middle of the floor. "The idea that the customer was able to get the look now without having to search for it was a big success," Solomon said, adding shoppers had the chance to try on clothes, come out of the dressing room and meet the designer — all while enjoying food and wine and DJ'd music. "These are ingredients that make for exciting retail," she said.
The personal touch and small scale of the event seemed to work well for the retail chain. Clearly there are some good minds tackling the challenges that face retailers as the recession drags on.
Michelle Obama and Oprah Grace the Cover of O Magazine
Michelle Obama shares the cover of O magazine with Oprah Winfrey for the April issue. This is the first time Oprah has shared the cover of her magazine with anyone. Michelle is wearing a bright orange Michael Kors sheath with a Dear cashmere cardigan. Oprah is wearing a dress by Rachel Roy New York. We love the Michael Kors dress, but we don't think it needed a clear plastic belt. The bright spring colors are fun and both women look very pretty, but there is something that's off to us. Famed photographer Bruce Weber took the cover shot and we don't know what happened in post-production, but it looks odd, like the two women weren't together for the shot, then the images were sliced together afterwards.
Oprah said this about the cover: "Say what you will about books -- people do judge a magazine by its cover, which is why it's important to me keep the cover of this one looking fresh. And right now nothing -- and I mean nothing -- is fresher than the family that moved into the White House in January, sparking a national spirit of renewal the likes of which I've never seen."
Here's a sneek peak from the feature interview:
For all the majesty of the White House, the First Lady has already infused it with a palpable ease; her presence makes the place feel open and approachable. When we sit down to talk, she seems as relaxed as she did when I first interviewed her and her husband in their Chicago apartment in 2004. "This room has the best light in the house," she tells me as we settle in, shoes off, on a comfortable sofa. "And there's pie here, too. The pie in the White House is dangerously good." -- Oprah
Oprah: So after the inauguration, what was your first weekend in the White House like?
Michelle Obama: Well, we still had family here, so it was almost like a wedding. A huge, very complicated wedding. The last visitors didn't leave until Sunday. And then the first Monday was kind of weird. You know: Now we live here, and Barack is getting up and going to work, and it's just us. This is our home now.
Oprah: I had heart palpitations coming through the White House gate, recognizing that this really is now your home. It's the White House, and it's your home.
Michelle Obama: And it's a beautiful home. When you go out and come back, especially at night, with all the white lights on--it's just beautiful. We feel privileged, and we feel a responsibility to make it feel like the people's house. We have the good fortune of being able to sleep here, but this house belongs to America.
Oprah: How will the decorating style change?
Michelle Obama: It will reflect our family. I want comfortable sofas, I want art that reflects contemporary and traditional, I want to bring
in new American artisans.
Oprah: You want more than just a few plates on the walls. You want pieces that are inclusive of American culture.
Michelle Obama: Right. And we want approachable comfort.
Oprah: So you can take off your shoes.
Michelle Obama: And you've got to be able to make a fort with the sofa pillows! Everything must be fort-worthy.
Oprah: And the kids know he's home when they hear his helicopter landing.
Michelle Obama: Once someone on my staff e-mailed to tell me that the president was on his way. But you could already hear the helicopter, so it
was like, well, no kidding.
Oprah: "Dad's home!"
Michelle Obama: The girls don't move. I'm like, "You want to see Daddy landing in the helicopter?" "No, that's okay. We already saw it."
Oprah: So what do you know for sure, Michelle Obama?
Michelle Obama: I know that all I can do is be the best me that I can. And live life with some gusto. Giving back is a big part of that. How am
I going to share this experience with the American people? I'm always thinking about that.
First lady Michelle Obama wears a black, sleeveless dress designed by Michael Kors with white pearls in her official portrait. The photo was unveiled at the White House today. It was taken by White House photographer Joyce N. Boghosian in the Blue Room of the White House. Michelle Obama's official bio can be found here on firstlady.gov. Barack Obama's official portrait was taken in January by White House photographer Pete Souza.
Bloomingdale's is taking new 
