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0:04Hello and welcome to Fashion People. I'm Lauren Sherman, led with Bucks Fashion and Beauty Memo Line Sheet. And today with me on the show is Derek Blasberg, author of Fast and Loosh. We're talking about fashion in the era of indie sleaze, the couture shows, what people are wearing on the streets in Europe and New York, and so much more. Happy Tuesday, everyone. Hope you're having a great week. I was just in Copenhagen for a couple of days on vacation, and now I'm going for a week to the mountains of Austria. I love Copenhagen. I would like to come back for a couple of days for work meetings, but this trip was all about Louisiana Museum, and then I went to Tivoli yesterday with my kid.

0:45It was very fun. I did find a workout brand here called Exercer. I think it was founded in 2021 by two women who look like they're probably influencers of some sort. It looked really cute. And then I went in. And there first of all, the logo is bad. But also, there were tops that had the logo on both sides. I'm just gonna buy when I get back to LA next week, I'm just buying aloe yoga and hanging it up. Also live the process Robin Berkeley shout out, I am going to get some live the process. But I want to try it on. Like this is the issue. I didn't have a time in New York to go to the live the process studio.

1:26So maybe if you know Robin, if there's somewhere in New York, in LA where I can try it on. Anyway, Exorcere was not the answer. And I'm on a shopping fast right now where I can only buy vintage and workout clothes. And it didn't help. But anyway, this week in Line Sheet, I have a different sort of succession story than the one we usually tell. It's about Tadashi Yanai and Uniqlo and what could happen now that Yanai is close to 80. it's an interesting one when I was reporting this out I learned a bunch of stuff about kind of how they operate who's important who's not and also the businesses that are important is J.W.

2:08Anderson collaboration is a big business for them I think it would be bigger if they didn't limit it so much but I was in the airport on this trip in Europe and man there are a lot of J.W.A. jeans everywhere My husband's a big fan of it. Anyway, Malik and Rachel are also back with great stuff. And I have a little Harper's Bazaar scoop. Malik and Rachel will be managing everything when I'm out. So please ping them. I know y 'all love it when Derek comes on. So please enjoy. Derek Blasberg, welcome back to Fashion People. Lauren Sherman, I'm so happy to be here. Thank you for having me. Are you in the land of Round Swamp Farm?

2:51Lauren, can I ask, do I have your undivided attention? As you know, this isn't my first time on the podcast. And the last time I was here, I caught you texting and checking your email. I need to know, before we go any further, that you are as committed to this podcast as I am. I'm fully committed. I probably will still be texting. Show me your hands. Where's the other one? Other hand, please. Thank you. There we go. Okay. All right. I'm ready now. I might still be texting, though. I might still be texting. I remember when Mel Ottenberg was on. I remember when Mel Ottenberg was on. That's when the Debna Gucci announcement was made.

3:27So I will only indulge you for breaking news. Could we only be so lucky? I will only indulge you. Not lunch orders. Not where are you, Paris. Not dinner orders. Not cheese orders. Derek, but back to where are you? Are you in the land of Round Swamp Farm? I am in the land of Round Swamp Farm. you know, that is the primary time in the last few years I've been influenced was when your husband was on this podcast and mentioned Round Swamp Farm. And I ordered the granola and I'm not a granola person. And it's really good. Lauren, I'm so happy that I joined Fashion People today, the week after the couture shows, to talk about my book and my substack and all the projects we have going on.

4:12And you bring up Round Swamp's granola. Thank you so much. Discuss your book, Derek. Can we really call it a book? You can call it whatever you want. So tell me about the concept behind these pieces of paper. What you, I assume, are suggesting is that the book is not exactly the Great Gatsby or the all-American novel of our generation. Is that what you were alluding to? Well, it's funny because I was talking to one of your friends this week, and we were saying, they were like when is Derek going to write that I think I'm a little too young for that don't you? I think you should start writing full books we'll see this book by the way came together to your point this book was supposed to be a light fun project that sort of celebrated these columns I had in interview magazine and I've been sort of shocked or I've been pleasantly surprised, is probably a better way to put it, by the response by basically everyone except for you, by the sound of it, because people...

5:24How did the Ha Long Gone guys find it? I still haven't listened. You are, wow, the most supportive fashion industry insider I know. I think they were happy. I think the point I'm trying to make is that there are so many people that we know of our generations and generations before who have such nostalgic and strong connections to this blip in pop culture that was post-tech, post-digital revolution, when we all had our smartphones, our smarter phones, blueberries, blackberries, not blueberries. Seriously, you still got me in round swamp on the brain. Blackberries and trio phones. But just before social media, of course, changed the way that we documented our lives and the way that we had fun.

6:12So I actually thought the book was going to be sort of a fun little keepsake I'd send to my friends. But the response has been a pleasant surprise that so many people are nostalgic for that era. And I don't know if it's in the zeitgeist right now, but I'm sure you saw Madonna did all these gay concerts this weekend. Jay-Z was at Yankee Stadium with Rihanna and Beyonce. There's definitely something in the air about a different moment in pop culture. Why don't we back up a bit and explain what the column was and how the idea for the book came together? You published it with Sarah Andelman, whose post-colette life is this firm called Just an Idea, where she publishes books and she works on projects.

7:00But tell us about the interview magazine column, what the sort of concept was and why it felt like. Because I think you're totally right. It's like 15 years ago, and now we're all sort of, it was a different life for many of us. So it feels like a very reflective time. But what was sort of the concept for the column and then how it came together as a book? So I got to New York after I graduated high school in 2000, and I was so ambitious and extroverted and just around. I was, I guess you could say ubiquitous, omnipresent. Some may say annoying. Some may say impossible to get rid of. But there I was.

7:41And I really was doing so many things. At that time, I was at V Magazine. I was still doing Style.com, which I think is when we first met. and Christopher Bolin, who is a novelist, was the editor-at-large of Interview Magazine at the time. I had met him when he was at V Magazine and he commissioned me to work on this, for the lack of a better word, party page idea they had. Interview Magazine was, of course, founded by Andy Warhol and going out and taking pictures and serializing or creating diaries out of the mundane. You know, I love reading Andy's diaries when he like puts the how much you pay for a taxi every night.

8:26And so Fast and Loose was the name of the column. Stephen Wallum, who's the executive editor at Harper's Bazaar right now, was the editor in chief of Interview at the time. And we just did a Q &A for Harper's Bazaar. And he remembers how the idea came to pass. And then for the next three years, I had two or three pages on every issue and I could put anything in there I wanted. I did a lot of fashion show coverage, a lot of art openings. This was before, or maybe this was like the early days of the destination resort show. So there was a couple of those in there. I did a lot of - Chanel in Texas, maybe?

9:03It was Chanel in Saint-Tropez. I think Chanel in Texas was a couple of years later. Chanel in Saint-Tropez, the one where there was like a plane ride thing that happened? Chanel was in a couple of planes. I don't need to tell you how well Chanel's bottom line is. I think Chanel had planes to Dallas. I think Chanel had planes to Cuba. I don't know if they had Chanel planes to Saint-Tropez. That was the one that Karl Lagerfeld's bodyguard turned house model Sebastian came out at the end in a motorcycle with George Romain Jagger sitting on his lap. Do you remember that? I wasn't there, but I remember it.

9:42Anyway, and then Sarah Andelman, who you mentioned, is a friend of mine. Of course, her mother was the founder of the original Parisian concept store Colette, which is now a YSL store, the one with Sushi Park in the basement. And she remembered the column and she said, do you still have those pictures? Do you still have those images? And I said, yes, I'm a hoarder, both of magazines and a digital hoarder. And so I went into some, you know, into my storage. I got the hard drive and I found all these images. I sent them all to her and she and I whipped out this book. Easy peasy. What I will say, I was teasing you before, but I think this kind of stuff.

10:25The one question I had was, how did you get permission to use it? Did you, because this is a question a lot of freelance writers, because you've been, like people don't think of you this way, but you really are at your heart a freelance writer. And when you do contracts with companies, who owns the rights to your articles is complicated. Did you have to go to the people who own Interview Now and negotiate that? Like how did you get the rights to use the columns and the photos and things? The first people we spoke to were the folks at Interview, Mel Ottenberg, of course, friend of the pod. Friend of the pod for real.

11:04He was super enthusiastic. And Chris Bolin, who I mentioned was my editor at the time of interview, wrote the forward to the book. And the images were all mine. So I still owned all of them. So we didn't have any problems there. That's a lesson, though, for writers. That if you do something like this, if you're doing a column, especially if you have a consistent thing, make sure you understand like who owns what because this is a great example of this is a snapshot of your life it's a snapshot of culture at the time it's a snapshot of new york and it's also connected to interview but you know if mel wasn't nice or you didn't own those images it could have been a pain in the butt it's funny that you say that only because in 2009 which was 17 years ago at this point I never thought there would be a book in the timeline I never thought these images I never identified as a photographer you know it was in my head more reporting but I'm of course so uh I'm so proud of the era you know I'm so proud that I in 2009 I was you know in my late I was I was 27 I was in my mid-20s I was out there hustling it means a lot to me that something I did 17 years ago is still worth publishing now and worth talking about.

12:30So it's, yes, we should all be mindful of what we're doing now and what the future will look back on it. Well, I think that your output, when you do write your memoir, and you really give it to everybody, because I know you're going to do that. What will I say about you, Lauren Sherman? I don't want to know. Do not want to know. But I think that people, your output is pretty remarkable. Oh, wow. Thank you. You've never really stopped. And you also, you really are connected to anyone who doesn't already subscribe to Derek's Substack should. And it's fashion, art, society, culture, entertainment industry.

13:12like you kind of touch on everything and you are in the right rooms, but you also are able to like actually get people to talk to you. And it was meaningful to me to read through it. And yeah, I think we met when you were at cell.com and I was at fashionista. But I think it was nice to look back and see that world through your eyes again. Was there anything about the way the fashion industry has changed just looking at those images and the people you were photographing and what you were wearing that that you thought about while you were putting it together the the funny thing um i mean there was a there was a there's a couple things the first thing i couldn't believe is that i used to travel around with a camera the whole other device one that you had to remember to charge remember when you would uh about to take a picture maybe the flash wasn't ready so then you like, wait.

14:06And so the people you're taking a picture of are just sort of standing there, and you hear that sound like, as it charges. Then after you got home, of course, you would have to take out the memory card. This was before computers had the built-in memory card reader, so you'd have a whole other thing. I'm so impressed with how streamlined our life and our technological existence has become. I mean, I don't even carry a wallet out anymore. My credit card's on my phone. So I was impressed that I was sort of shocked that we had the bandwidth to put a whole other device. The other thing was how few people were taking pictures at that time.

14:42Of course, there were photographers. And of course, there were people doing that as a living. But now at the end of a fashion show, every single person has their phones out taking a picture. Backstage, every single person is getting a picture with the top model or their favorite bag or trying to create content. The other thing is that out of those, you know, two and a half, three years from 2009 to 2012 that this column existed, I think I pulled 400 images in total. Now I have 400 images from the Dior Shore that took place on Monday of last week. You know, like we document so much more and it counts so much less, which is a realization I made in this process.

15:28us. Yeah, that's profound, Derek. Oh, wow. It really is.

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16:10Speaking of, profundity isn't the right word though, right? Well, it's a vocab lesson. We're on fire today. Profundity does not mean profoundness. No, no it doesn't. I don't know. What did you think of the shows last week? I thought that they were much more meaningful than... Were you just texting? I was actually Googling what the textbook section of profundity is. A deep intellectual insight, wisdom, or the state of being felt very intensely. Then that is what I meant. On the subject of profundity. What did you... I felt like... I haven't gone... I've been to couture shows like on and off. The last few seasons I've gone to more shows.

16:52I felt like this season usually I see it as something that's like kind of separate from the rest of the industry and it's very specific sometimes it's a good marketing tool but it's a very specific client and they're pretty and you kind of just like let them be an island but this season I felt like this sort of story that Couture told told the story of the industry really clearly and I'm curious from your perspective like what did you think of the shows did you feel like there was more going on this season behind the scenes than there typically is? Oh, that's interesting. I never thought of couture as an island.

17:29I definitely think to your point, there's a disconnect from a couture runway and what brands put in stores. But I've always thought of couture more as a laboratory where these designers get to experiment and cook up the ideas. I definitely feel to the point you just made that the shows we saw last week were much more reflective of the designers. Obviously, Jonathan did so many incredible dresses inspired by the work of this artist he's obsessed with. Pierre Paolo was able to experiment so much more with what we consider, I think, more Pierre-Paolo-ian aesthetics, the bright colors, the dramatic dresses, feathers, feathers, feathers.

18:14Obviously, met you is is on a roll um so i definitely felt a connection to the designers and what they're doing did you see more i went to rome for fendi did you go but i but i did look at it online today really closely that was definitely i think a maria grazian total collection yeah you're right that I feel like they all did, they tried, they all tried very hard to do what they wanted to do. And Jonathan, I feel like, is doing so many collections and has so much work at this brand that he's rebuilding. And he, that collection to me, it just felt like he was like, this is what I want to experiment with and investigate in this house.

19:10And then Pierre Paolo was like, I'm not gonna try to be cool. I'm just gonna make beautiful dresses and use these amazing archives as inspiration. And I thought that was very clear. And then there's someone like Duran Lantic, which I thought was beyond. I loved it so much. That was an incredible show. And let's not forget Daniel Roseberry, who was also doing the best version of himself. Yeah. Yeah, I thought that they were overall really strong from a is the designer confident in what they're doing perspective. I love seeing Gaultier at those shows. Of course, before Duran took a full-time gig, there were these one-off collaborations.

19:54And I was told that Jean-Paul Gaultier did not go and see the collections before the runway. He saw them the same time everyone else did. I wonder if that's still the situation now yeah i don't know i wonder i i saw him backstage afterwards but yeah i mean if i were him i wouldn't go beforehand because you think it would put pressure on the designer or because yeah and i think like he clearly wants to not really be involved it's kind of like i wonder if Dries goes. I doubt it. Dries has been to most of Julian's shows, but maybe Dries goes because he still kind of works there. Think on the fragrance stuff.

20:40You know, it's interesting when we see other designers who have sold their name or exited their own brands, it was nice that Tom Ford went to Heider's first show. For sure. I remember Calvin Klein, and now I'm sure how old I am, Calvin Klein went to Francisco Costa's first Calvin Klein show, but refused to sit. He wanted to watch from backstage so he could run out afterwards before a reporter asked him any questions about it. That's awesome. So I guess there is a blueprint for what you're supposed to do when you hand off the reins. Yeah, and it's just so rare that that happens these days. Like there's either the transition is like very long, like the Mucha, Raph, their creative partners for eternity essentially or it's like the carl lagerfeld thing where it's just like you go until you go or or it's someone doesn't it's not their house so they don't get to stick around if if they are no longer wanted but um yeah there's just i'm sure valentino was at a lot of those early maria grazia pier piero paolo shows he was and john uh john carlo Giamatti was sitting near me at Fendi.

21:54Of course, Maria Grazia and Pierpaolo, when they were still a design duo, worked for a long time under Valentino and the accessories. So there's definitely a longstanding relationship with those guys. It was nice to see him there. It's nice to think of the Italian fashion community as a sort of tribe. Yeah. It's funny on the Fendi piece. I have to say the videos of it, I was like, look, I don't really judge Maria Grazia's clothes because I know there's a person who really likes them and I think they're beautifully made. And I am like, go her. I'm a very big fan of her as a person and the way she conducts herself.

22:33But on the video, I was like, this looks kind of blah. But then I looked on Vogue Runway at the images and I was like, this is beautiful. Can I be very specific? Are you talking about the video that Fendi put on their own socials? No, no, no. I don't follow Fendi on social media, Derek. But as a well-respected and renowned fashion critic, you use weird handheld iPhone videos to deduce your... Look, honestly, that's more interesting sometimes. I think I look a lot at which shows look good when you take photos of them or the editor of Vogue Arabia takes photos of them. Like when I take my own photos, like what shows can my terrible photos look decent versus looking kind of bad?

23:24Like I think that is interesting. Dior is a great example of I think that their shows look really, really good when you're in the room and you're taking photos on your iPhone. The photos are amazing. I think when you look at those collections on Vogue Runway, you can't see the movement and how dynamic they are. So the first Dior show, I wasn't there. And I was like, this kind of leaves me feeling a little flat. And then the ones that I've seen in person, I think they are more dynamic. And I think the images from the sidelines are better. So I think it just depends. sometimes very rarely i do them i love to do them for prada right uh and i've done them for i did them for the metier d 'art chanel show um yeah and sometimes i do if i am invited i will do the preview with like a group interview with people so i do those i would say like a few a season i don't i wouldn't always do that but the bigger designers who i write about constantly it's I feel like it's important but um but yeah I thought that the Maria the the recent Fendi couture I mean I thought it looked beautiful better than the sideline images gave it credit for but I'm curious what it was like in person do you ever sort of raise the bar on the reseed this year they did Prada does this too they do like installation style resees and I wonder if that becomes more prevalent with brands, especially during couture when you're looking at six-figure dresses.

25:11They did an installation with some of the dresses from the show next to the works of art that inspired them. And I thought that was an interesting take. I thought I went to the pre-interview for Dior with the pre-group interview and so essentially saw the Reesey and it was really helpful. That's a pre-see. that pre-seed. Maybe we're inventing a whole new thing. But I think that you're right that it can make a huge, it doesn't always make a huge difference, but it can make, it just makes you see these things. I'm sure you remember the book Ways of Seeing. It makes you see these things in different ways, but how was, did you have fun in Rome?

25:52Did you go to the pajama store? Like, what did you do? I love Rome. I had a great time. We went to Pierluigi for dinner, which was delicious. And Paris was so much fun. How did you feel about your talk that you did at the bookshop in the 7th? It seemed like a lot of interesting people came out. I saw my friend Lauren Collins came out to see you, who I believe is your friend also. Shout out Lauren Collins. She was on the podcast. She did an incredible deep dive New Yorker story on Uniqlo. And she came to you to talk about it. She's great. She's amazing. I'll be honest about that talk. To our earlier point, Sarah Andelman, the publisher of the book, was really pushing to do a Q &A.

26:39And I was reluctant. I thought it was self-indulgent. I know how many Q &As we both get invited to. And sometimes you're like, I just want to pop in, give a hug, buy a book, and carry on to the next. And she really pushed for it. And so we did it. And Sarah Moonves, who's a good friend of mine, the editor of W Magazine, did the Q &A with me. And I found myself unexpectedly anxious and nervous, much more anxious and nervous than I am. I should talk to my therapist about that. I think it's because I prefer to have control. I would prefer to do the Q's, not the A's. And I was so nonchalant about the whole thing.

27:21And I really didn't think it would have a lot of people in the audience. obviously I should have asked Sarah for the questions so I could have had really great answers. And there were questions that in hindsight I would have answered differently. The place where we did it was behind the 7L bookshop, which still exists, the 7L bookshop. It was a bookshop started by Karl Lagerfeld. He had his photo studio in the back. It's still there. Karl's, this incredible library slash photo studio with thousands of books, which he would always tell people he read every single one of, which I always thought was amusing.

27:56For one thing, there's multiple copies of the books in there. So do you think he read them twice? Do you think that was a gift bag situation? It was great to see so many people there. Two people who came were Daphne Guinness and Amanda Harlick. And I have this incredible memory from 2011. There are some pictures in the book of the shoot. When I worked at V Magazine, I became friendly with Carl. And he used to call me Bo Derek, but spell it B-E-A-U. which you know a little bit over here um and he would sometimes use me as i'm not a stylist i've never been a stylist but he did ask me to style a few things for him we did a shoot we did a portrait session with delphine arnault and antoine arnault and i styled that but but the big shoot that i did with him was that it was for transformations issue in v magazine and daphne who had, you know, this, she wore a lot of McQueen.

28:48She has this trademark skunk-colored bouffant hairstyle transformed into Amanda, who is much more goth, much more dark. And I styled the shoot, and it was this incredible experience. And so it was a very surreal experience to be back in the studio where we did that shoot and have those women who were there. um and it was also you know it was it was bittersweet because carl wasn't there and a lot of the people in the book are no longer with andre lontali who uh i met when i was an intern at vogue in 2003 um so the the the the talk was nerve-wracking anxiety inducing but ultimately sweet and emotionally fulfilling.

29:38How's that? I thought it was nice. I showed up late, not because I wouldn't have been there. I promise I would have. I worship Sarah Moonves even more than I worship you, Derek, and would show up to anything she asked me to show up to. But I had the 7 p.m. Armani show, so I was duty called for me to be there. But I also noticed Daphne and Amanda speaking to you at the end. And yeah, I thought it was interesting. I, Tallulah Harlick, who has been on this podcast, worked with Michael Stewart from Standing Ground this season. I had never met Amanda before and she was there because Tallulah was so involved with the show.

30:20And yeah, it was just an interesting, I thought it was a really nice season of people getting to actually talk to people. And I met Paul Sinclair for the first time because we were seated at some shows together. I had never met him. And obviously he's a legend and I'm a big fan of his work. And so it was cool to chat with him. And he just seemed so familiar to me. So I just went up to him and it was him. And so I was very excited. And then we were around each other. But I thought it was a really nice season. what did you feel how what did you think about like what people were wearing on the streets because it was quite hot everybody was talking about it but it wasn't as hot as men's so they weren't complaining as badly but did you notice anything about the street style because molly the the writer molly young um she has this books newsletter and she just published it today and she also published a new york city trend report which is very funny and i'll read it to you after this because I'm curious if you agree.