Loose Threads

• André Leon Talley on celebrities who complain about their
Vogue covers: “You gotta cover, you eat it, you say it's fabulous. You don't like your twitch or your twisted lip, it's fine. You're on the Vogue cover."

• Target’s profits are up 28.5 percent, thanks to apparel sales.

• Costello Tagliapietra for Uniqlo launched Friday.

• Spice Girl Geri Halliwell’s Union Jack dress topped a list of the top ten most iconic dresses of the past 50 years, as determined by an online poll. Hummmmmmmmm.

• Banana Republic and Chan Luu collaborated on a collection of thread and leather bracelets with stone, gold, and silver inlays. The line is available now at Edition, Banana Republic’s accessories-only San Francisco shop, and it will be sold in other BR locations and online in August.

• The health department of San Antonio, Texas, is forcing a local lingerie boutique to obtain a food license and have regular health inspections because it sells edible panties.

• Lucky Brand chief executive officer David DeMattei is attempting to turn the company around by reducing the number of graphic T-shirts and focusing on denim, woven tops, sweaters, dresses, skirts, and jackets.

• Many of the watercolor prints in stores now were created digitally with tools as common as iPhones and printers.

• iVillage is launching a redesigned fashion website called Beauty & Style.

United Nude Bows on Bond

Sculptural shoe brand United Nude launched its New York flagship on Bond Street Thursday. The brand was founded by Dutch architect Rem D Koolhaas (nephew of starchitect Rem Koolhaas, who designed the Prada flagship in New York), resulting in some towering, precariously artsy heels. The moodily lit, so-called “dark-shop” is a replica of the company’s Amsterdam flagship, with the shoes displayed around the perimeter of the space in glowing, back-lit frames. Though United Nude has an existing franchise store on Elizabeth Street, the new digs stock nine exclusive styles. One other feature worth ogling: the gleaming, Batmobile-like Lamborghini, shipped from China and parked in the middle of the store.

Beauty Marks

MAKEUP
• Nars is pairing with Sephora to produce a new line of lip glosses inspired by the brand’s most popular blush palettes. Five Nars blushes — Albatross, Angelika, Oasis, Super Orgasm, and Luster — will be available in gloss form in Sephora stores starting July 29.

HAIR
• Janet Jackson chopped off her long, curly hair and slicked it back with gel.

• Living Proof just released Restyling Spray, which promises to reduce static, add shine, and fight the humidity-induced frizz that summer will soon bestow upon us.

NAILS
• To celebrate the brand’s tenth anniversary, Nubar is releasing a special-edition polish called Nubar 2010. The new hue is a clear polish filled with iridescent glitter, perfect for an extra-sparkly topcoat.

FRAGRANCE
• Stella McCartney reportedly bought an entire “harvest of organic roses from an Ecocert-awarded cooperative in the Persian mountains” to breathe new life into her Stella Sheer scent, which is back with another limited-edition bottle this summer.

Loose Threads

• NBC’s Today show caught Marshall's, Wal-Mart, Bloomingdale's, and Gap selling returned, dirty underwear. Wash before you wear!

• British designer Joanna Sykes was named the new creative director of Aquascutum.

• Cate Blanchett wears a bouffant on the June cover of W.

• Diane von Furstenberg received Savannah College of Art and Design’s André Leon Talley Lifetime Achievement Award. Students paid tribute to Talley and the award by designing ten caftans inspired by the work of the recipients, and showcasing them on male models in a runway show.

• Maria Cornejo will debut her color-block swimwear line this week.

• Jean Paul Gaultier held his couture show in a Moscow train station.

• Gap Inc. plans to open the first Gap and Banana Republic stores in Italy this year.

• Kelly Cutrone lives with “a 28-year-old New York version of Kato Kaelin.” She says, “He’s not my lover. But he is a jujitsu expert.”

• Vena Cava is hosting an online garage sale, and wares include birth certificates, mix CDs, and eighties paperbacks.

• Patrick Demarchelier snapped his son Victor’s girlfriend, Caroline Trentini, near Grand Central Terminal for Express’ fall ad campaign.

• Vanessa Paradis channels Edie Sedgwick and Karl Lagerfeld channels himself for the cover shoot of this month’s Madame Figaro.

ALT Speaks

Since the show ended, Vogue editor André Leon Talley hasn't spoken to the winner of the last season of America's Next Top Model, to which he lent his extraordinary commentary each week on the judging panel. "I’m sure we’ll see her soon," Talley said at the '21' Club, where he gave a lecture framed around Paris fashion Sunday morning. Talley usually gets up at 6 and had already had his morning smoothie, so this wasn't too early for him. On ANTM he worked mostly in the afternoon, since "it's very rare that Tyra has a 9:30 wake-up call."

He said people have expressed interest in putting on the one-man show he's been working on in his downtime. "I don’t have the like, long-range agenda," he added. "I don’t know what I’m doing in 2011 or 2012." He hadn't even planned what he'd say to his audience this morning. "I’m choosing to speak about many things, I don’t know what I’m talking about," he said. "I don’t even know if I have a moderator. I’m not going to just talk about Paris, I’ll talk about whatever comes to mind." The nearly hour-long freestyle talk consisted of ALT's tips for making it in fashion, and thus, life. Highlights:

He suggests learning French.
I went to Brown to be a French professor, and I didn’t know what I was doing except that I loved French. When I got to Paris and I could speak French, I know how much it helped me to establish relationships with Karl Lagerfeld, with the late Yves St. Laurent. French, it just helps you if you’re in fashion. The French people started style. Marie Antoinette was a fashion victim, and look what happened to her, but she had the first great couturier. When I got to Paris I had something to talk about when I went to lunch and dinner, and people knew. And I think people respected me because I wasn’t just a tall person in fashion, I was a tall person in fashion with something to say and a bit of knowledge.

Good etiquette is essential.
[ANTM winner, Krista] had a sense of etiquette — she wasn’t a potty mouth. There were some girls that were just, I don’t know where they grew up! Someone should tell them how to talk, or how to respond to other people in a stressful environment. She just expressed to me the kind of tools you need to be a successful model: punctuality, grace, manners, speaking properly to people, looking well-groomed, focused.

Don't humiliate yourself on reality TV.
Reality TV, although I’m a part of it, I think reality TV is a terrible thing. I am a victim of having watched Dancing With the Stars this season. I was watching and I realized, you know, I would never put myself in the position that these people do, of humiliation, to be rejected. When I’m on ANTM, I try to be very honest, but very supportive. The only time I use the word "drecktitude" is when I think they have hideously put themselves together to come in front of us ... And the crying — I feel bad when people are on America’s Next Top Model and they’re crying and say "I don’t want to go home" and you’re like, "Okay, well maybe you won’t got home this week, but you’re going home! For your potty mouth!"

Overdress when you visit Karl Lagerfeld.
I personally go to the airport looking like a homeless person, because I think people will leave me alone. But I dress myself with my luggage — all my luggage matches. But it's so humiliating to be searched and strip-searched, and they take away your lotions — you just bought a $15 bottle of Kiehl’s, and it’s too big; you just never know what you’re going to get. So it’s better to just go as an anonymous person from Dallas … Now if I were going on a plane with Karl Lagerfeld, I would be dressed to the nines. There are people who have such high standards you don’t put yourself in front of them dressed how you’d dress to go down the road to get yourself a smoothie.

Handwrite.
When I have interns, I always say handwritten thank-you notes can make a difference. People remember that — not an e-mail, a handwritten note in an envelope. When we have interns, I always say, don’t be afraid to make a Starbucks run. People have started their careers picking up pens on the floor for great designers, interning for designers, and having menial tasks. When I worked at Interview magazine for 50 dollars a week for Andy Warhol, I went to work at twelve o’clock in the daytime. My job was to be the receptionist — take messages, answer the phone, get the staff machine reprocessed, go pick up Andy Warhol’s lunch, and then at night I’d go out and meet the most glamorous people, because with Andy you went out every night; he took you to every party. And that’s how my life began.

ICFF 2010

Where was I Saturday????? I was at ICFF for the second time in the past three days and just got back. I did pretty well, casing the whole joint in two visits. AND I tucked in a visit to the Finnish Design showcase at the Chelsea Market on Friday morning. I saw EVERYONE. I met Patricia Urquiola, had Jonathan Adler chide me for "dressing like a grownup" (it was true), and chatted with a half dozen young designers that I'd never seen before who had great stuff. To kick it off, here are my top six picks.

So here are four designs/designers who really, really caught my eye and had something that hit my sweetspot for being both totally unique and possibly classic at the same time. These were my emotional showstoppers and I can't really explain much about how that happens. It just happens.

Oshibe by Tomomi Sayuda - Never seen this before: when you put eggs on stamens, Oshibe plays tender ambient sounds and lights up.

Liquid Lamp by Obovo of Japan - Wow. These little lights were total showstoppers. They win the Provocative Award previously held by Suck UK's upside-down revolver flower vase.

Sheet Seat by Ufuk Keskin & Efecem Kutuk - Each seat is made out of exactly 1/5 of a piece of plywood. There is almost no waste. This seems like a perfect solution for extra chairs in the small space apartment.

Lamps by John Astbury, Bengt Brümmer and Karin Wallenbäck of Whatswhat Collective - Just love the simplicity and humor of these designs.

Beauty Marks

FRAGRANCE
• The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics recently found that many popular perfumes, colognes, and body sprays fail to name all of the ingredients in the product, simply listing “fragrance” rather than the specific chemicals. Companies aren’t required to reveal what chemicals are used to create their scents, but some contain chemicals that can cause asthma, wheezing, and headaches.

MAKEUP
• Kim Kardashian jumps on the barefaced bandwagon, posing for a shoot in Life & Style without makeup and looking uncharacteristically un-done-up, in a plain white tank.

• The ladies of the Today show decided to try out the makeup-free trend as well this morning. NBC’s female anchors, as well as some of the audience members, went sans makeup for the cameras during the show.

• The “smart, confident, vivacious” Kate Hudson was named Almay’s newest brand ambassador.

HAIR
• Kate Beckinsale wore her hair in a Snooki-esque bouffant yesterday for the Robin Hood premiere at the Cannes Film Festival.

What's New

Pass Abercrombie a fork so they can stab their eyes out, because the hottest cargo pants on the market right now seem to be the Houlihan by J Brand. And it gets worse, Abercrombie: They're $230! When was the last time Abercrombie sold a pair that cost $80? The Houlihan cargos are so fantastic that Cathy Horyn devoted an entire article to them in the Times.

“In 33 years I’ve never shipped anything like this,” Jeff Rudes, the founder and chief executive of J Brand, said this week, noting that some customers have offered to prepay for the $230 style. Bloomingdale’s has sold thousands, according to Mr. Doroff, who wants more. Barneys New York has 1,000 pairs of Houlihans on reorder, with waiting lists at its stores. The Intermix chain said it has sold 2,000 pairs.

The pants apparently have magical fitting abilities. Horyn writes, "Although their skinny line appears unforgiving, they are very flattering." We're just excited that people are excited about pants again! Enjoy it while it lasts, because soon everyone will realize they're all wearing the same thing and take them off.

Loose Threads

• Urban Outfitters Inc.’s profits soared to a 72 percent increase in the first quarter. The CEO says he is toying with the idea of opening stand-alone shoe and accessory stores.

• Vera Wang on Jennifer Lopez's wedding dress: "It took eight months and we made three dresses. It pushed me out of my own box and comfort zone." Apparently J.Lo was difficult about the whole thing. Hummmmmmm.

• Beyoncé and her mom will design bedsheets and furniture under their House of Deréon label. Fitting since she's worn tapestries before.

• The Selby shot Ruben Toledo, André Balazs, and Waris Ahluwalia for Louis Vuitton’s latest ad campaign.

• Lady Gaga wore a custom black Calvin Klein Collection dress to a fund-raiser this week. WWD calls the gown "elaborate" but notes "her gray hair and round sunglasses did little to liven up the look."

• Coach commissioned fashion bloggers to design a line of limited-edition handbags, called Coach Collectibles.

Beauty Marks

PLASTIC SURGERY
• Botox may create wrinkles in strange places, since paralyzing some facial muscles causes others to work harder.

FRAGRANCE
• Fragrance maven Jo Malone is filming a reality show in which business hopefuls pitch products to her.

HAIR
• After years of pixie cuts, Victoria Beckham has returned to her signature angled bob.

• Michelle Williams debuted a shorter, platinum-blonde haircut this weekend.

MAKEUP
• Shiseido plans to buy out one of its former partners in China in a deal that will cost $64.3 million.

• Prince of Persia star Gemma Arterton paired bright-red lips with a sleek, low ponytail at the premiere. Apparently she loves these sorts of updos.

Aretha Franklin’s Milliner Sues Knockoff Milliners

Luke Song, the milliner who made Aretha's famous Inauguration hat, is suing competitors that ripped off his design. Song claims in a complaint filed Friday in U.S. District Court that his "lavish and ornate" hat "gained instantaneous fame and notoriety, attracting much more media attention than even Aretha Franklin's performance itself." The complaint also includes a handy illustrated guide of the knockoffs.

Loose Threads

• Georgia May Jagger and Crystal Renn are rumored to be walking in Chanel’s resort show today.

• Karl Lagerfeld makes a cameo in his new seventeen-minute short film for Chanel. He enters the party after it has raged all night and says to hostess Heidi Mount, “I vaguely remember you asked me for lunch at one o’clock." She replies, “Yes, but this is Saint-Tropez." HAR.

• In case you missed it, the Crocs store opened on Saturday in Soho. A review: "They've got Crocs in all shapes and sizes, Crocs in every color of the rainbow, Crocs so patently un-Croc-like that we could almost (almost!) see New Yorkers wearing them."

• Bruno Pieters's spring campaign starring Iekeliene Stange is worth a perusal.

• Giorgio Armani is expanding its travel retail business by opening six Emporio Armani stores and five Armani Jeans shop-in-shops in the world’s most important airports.

• For its tenth anniversary, 10 magazine shot ten designers, including Tom Ford, Donatella Versace, Helmut Lang, and John Galliano for ten separate covers.

• Jil Sander wants to do a book. “[It’s] going to be some kind of résumé of my work in the past and the ideals that stand behind it,” she said.

• Bottega Veneta is taking its customization atelier on the road, allowing clients in Chicago, New York, Beverly Hills, and Costa Mesa the chance to select the shape, color, skin, and treatment of their handbag. Hooray for money!

• Karolina Kurkova went to a swanky party at Kastel restaurant in the new Trump Soho and was told her 6-month-old baby Tobin wasn't allowed inside. Maybe it's time for a fake I.D.

• On May 30, Lady Gaga will answer fan questions on ShowStudio as part of its "In Camera" series. Alexander McQueen and Kate Moss are among the series' previous subjects.

• As the face of Bugaboo's partnership with (RED), the initiative to help eliminate AIDS in Africa, Natalia Vodianova posed wrapped in a red sheet and surrounded by babies.

Latest American Apparel Vandalism Is Not a Guerrilla Ad Campaign

On Saturday, vandals smashed the windows of the American Apparel store on Broadway, moving on to take out windows of the neighboring GNC and other stores. American Apparel sent around this photo of the group in action. Police arrested several involved in the attacks, which caused one American Apparel employee to break her arm. Following a similar attack on the Williamsburg American Apparel, Gothamist wonders if the window smashing is just an elaborate marketing campaign.

With so many anarchist attacks on the store lately, this latest by some marketable teen$, we wonder if this is just their new ad campaign. They told us the busted out windows will cost around $3,000 to replace ... which has got to be cheaper than a billboard on Houston Street.

An American Apparel spokesman confirmed they are not putting employees, shoppers, and bystanders in harm's way for the pure sake of exposure. He wrote in an e-mail statement:

Obviously American Apparel isn't a stranger to this kind of vandalism, we went through it last year in DC for somewhat related reasons. So unfortunately this is very real and not an ad campaign - as the broken windows and broken arm of our employee can attest to.

The attacks in D.C. were a response to the "Legalize Gay" T-shirts on display in the store windows. And American Apparel, with their best-ass contest and everything, is probably the last store that needs to arrange for crazy new methods — like violence — of getting attention.

Loose Threads

• Former Hermès chief executive officer Jean-Louis Dumas died on Saturday in Paris at the age of 72. 

• Britney Spears tweeted that she designed a capsule collection of shoes for Candie's. 

• Nick Knight is reportedly shooting Lady Gaga for the cover of Vanity Fair's September style issue. 

• Matthew Williams shot Polaroids of Lady Gaga for the new issue of V magazine. You know, to plug her gig as creative director of Polaroid. 

• Helmut Lang is splitting up his archives and donating them to fashion institutions throughout the world. 

• Jones Apparel Group is working on a deal to acquire a stake in Stuart Weitzman. 

• Lingerie company Cosabella is expanding its line and will launch jeggings on May 15. The collection is named Cosabella Jeans. 

• Jewelry designer and Phil Collins's ex-wife Orianne Collins will open a store on Madison Avenue in September, the first for the company in the United States. 

• Madonna sports an eye patch — just like a pirate! — in the new issue of Interview. 

Beauty Marks

HAIR • Those who bypass doctors to get their hands on the lash-enhancing treatment Latisse may suffer side effects, such as permanent eye discoloration and cheek hair. MAKEUP • Cover Girl signed Taylor Swift as its latest celebrity face. When it comes to makeup, Swift says she reaches for “anything sparkly or bright colored or shiny,” which is not surprising coming from a girl with an endless supply of sequined dresses. FRAGRANCE • Calvin Klein signed Diane Kruger to be the face of its newest fragrance, Calvin Klein Beauty, due out this fall. CK womenswear designer Francisco Costa will take Kruger to the Met Ball tonight. • Penélope Cruz is the newest face of Lancôme’s Tresor fragrance. The campaign will debut this fall. NAILS • British beauty company Nails Inc. opened a pop-up salon at Henri Bendel that will remain open until May 10. The brand is famous for manicures that last three weeks.

Loose Threads

• Marc Jacobs is the only fashion designer who landed on Time magazine's Time 100 list of influential people, which comes out tomorrow. Victoria Beckham interviewed him for the issue. Model Liya Kebede made the list, too, and Tom Ford interviewed her.

• Yohji Yamamoto will show his menswear collection on the runway in Paris during men's Fashion Week. The designer showed in his Paris headquarters for the past two seasons.

• Gilt Groupe launched a new sale site: Gilt City, which offers deals on restaurants, salons, and other lifestyle businesses in New York.

• Molly Sims's new jewelry collection, Grayce by Molly Sims, is now available.

• See Laetitia Casta dressed up as Brigitte Bardot. Casta plays Bardot in the upcoming movie Serge Gainsbourg, Vie Heroique.

• Naomi Campbell announced that she's planning another event, named Neon, in May for charity. Money raised will be donated to the Iris Foundation and Northern Crown, two charities dedicated to helping children in Russia.

• RG/JB, the collaboration between John Bartlett and Rogues Gallery's Alex Carleton, will continue with another capsule collection that will be released this summer exclusively at Bartlett's store in Greenwich Village.

• Saks enlisted Prabal Gurung, Doo.Ri, Aquilano.Rimondi, Christian Cota, Erdem, and Marios Schwab to create two or three exclusive styles for the store. Ten percent of the proceeds will be donated to the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Gap Is Dressing Met Gala Guests After All

Turns out the Gap, which is sponsoring the Met ball this year, is dressing famous attendees, as rumored. Well, sort of. CFDA darlings Alexander Wang, Rodarte, Sophie Theallet, and Thakoon will collaborate with the Gap and its designer, Patrick Robinson, on gowns for the Gala on Monday night. God forbid a famous person just wear the Gap not prefaced by a designer name. M.I.A. and Zoë Kravitz will wear Alexander Wang for Gap; Kirsten Dunst and Jamie Bochert will wear Rodarte for Gap; Kerry Washington and Riley Keough will wear Thakoon for Gap; and Jessica Alba and Vera Farmiga will wear Sophie Theallet. The dresses will be auctioned the day after the Gala, with proceeds going to the Costume Institute.

Other celebrities who are not expected to wear Gap include Taylor Swift, who is rumored to be a guest of Ralph Lauren along with Jessica Biel and Justin Timberlake. Emmy Rossum, Stanley Tucci, and Glee's Matthew Morrison will go with Kenneth Cole. And Michael Kors will bring Brooke Shields, Diane Lane, Carolyn Murphy, Natasha Poly, and Chanel Iman. And gobs of other famous people are still sorting out what high-fashion frocks they'll wear.

Fashion Week's New Home

New York is in for an all-new Fashion Week come September. The event has a new location (Lincoln Center) and a new chief planner (ex-Vogue staffer Stephanie Winston Wolkoff), but more importantly, the spirit of inclusiveness. "I want to welcome you to a whole new era, and we're starting here today," said CFDA president Diane Von Furstenberg at the announcement of the new Fashion Week layout this morning at Lincoln Center's David Rubenstein Atrium. "We want to make New York Fashion Week the absolute most styling Fashion Week. And we will make it happen. We made a commitment. It won't be immediately perfect. But we definitely will [make it happen]. I think it's going to be a lot of fun."

The campus will be much bigger than Bryant Park, from the lobby to the runway spaces, explained Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, Director of Fashion for Lincoln Center, or essentially the new face of Fashion Week. Attendees will enter on a red carpet and enjoy a larger lobby, which will also include a schedule of the day's events projected on the walls. The runway venues are comparable in size to those in Bryant Park. What was the Tent at Bryant Park is now the Theatre at Lincoln Center, a 969-seat venue with a larger backstage area. It will also be the only venue to house a video wall, so designers can play videos during the runway show. The new Promenade is called the Stage, a 740-seat space. And the new Salon is named the Studio, a 396-seat space. Lincoln Center will also house one 125-person venue for presentations — Fashion Week's first presentation-only space — named the Box. (Other presentation spaces will also be available around the city, but this one is being built specifically for Fashion Week.)

IMG vice-president Zach Eichman announced a partnership with Fashion GPS to centralize invitations, RSVPs, and check-in. If designers so choose, they can have a bar code attached to invitations, and guests can check themselves in. So long check-in lines could be a thing of the past! Lisa Holladay, national manager of experiential marketing for Mercedes-Benz, confirmed that the company will stay on as the sponsor until 2013.

Beyond the largest public fashion show in New York history scheduled for Fashion's Night Out on September 10, non-industry folk can view collections in special presentations. "We're also going to have presentation centers outside the tents," Wolkoff told us after the presentation. "It will allow people to have flexibility so they can be inside the tents for the trade but also outside the tents with the consumer." Also expect to see thirteen poster-size television screens along 65th Street. Designers can live-stream their shows onto these, if they so choose, interspersed with photographs from the day's events. Wolkoff also hinted at the possibility of pop-up shops, designer lectures, and other opportunities for the public to engage in Fashion Week.

Wolkoff ideally would like every designer to show at Lincoln Center. "Ultimately, I think Lincoln Center is able to facilitate the need to hold all of these other shows," Wolkoff explained. "Whether it be all of them, I'm not really saying that, because there are a lot. But I think that we can definitely bring many more under one umbrella and one destination so that all the editors and press are not running all over to different places and it's more centralized."

Fern Mallis, who stepped down from her position as IMG senior vice-president yesterday, told me that today's announcement marks "a whole new ballgame" for Fashion Week. Mallis will stay on as a consultant, but not indefinitely. "You know, it's all contractual. But we'll see. If they continue to need me and I want to do it, then great, we'll go on longer than what we agreed to now."

In the meantime, Mallis also explained plans for her new consulting business, which will include more than just fashion clients. "I have long experience in interior furnishings and the design world of style and architecture and design and I love that," she explained. "I do a lot of things internationally. I'm back and forth to India a gazillion times. And there are books, media. There's all sorts of things." And just because Mallis isn't running Fashion Week doesn't mean that she won't be there. "I'll be at the shows in September. They absolutely want me to be there and I want to be there," she said. "And I'm assuming the designers are still going to invite me to their shows."