Month: August 2016

The September Luxury Fashion Magazines Have Arrived!

It may be the ultimate in old-school publishing and fashion, and the last gasp of the media business as we have known it, but for me the arrival of the September issues of the big fashion magazines is still a thrilling moment. I still feel a jolt of excitement when I see them on the newsstand, as if a bell has just been rung and something wonderful is about to commence. Arriving long before the kids are actually back in school, and well before leather jacket weather, the September issues are one of my favorite harbingers of autumn.

The Splendor of Luxury Collides with Ordinariness Online

The brick-and-mortar world of luxury is a truly delightful place – gorgeous stores and showrooms, discreet and informed sales people, and highly attentive service. Retail locations and their front windows are the best possible advertisements for these brands. Fashion and lifestyle magazines are also brilliant showcases for luxury brands. Their ads are part of the editorial for publications like Vogue, Elle and Town & Country, and readers actually look forward to seeing them because they’re so compelling.

Can True Luxury Actually Involve Sharing?

I will never forget the first time someone asked me the question (it was circa 1990). My husband and I had just arrived on Martha’s Vineyard, and we ran into a fellow Harvard Law School grad. After the usual air kisses and humble brags about work, she asked when we had arrived on the island. And where we were staying. Then came “The Question”: Do you rent or own?

Over-distribution as a Killer of Luxury Brands

Prognosis: negative. I have been mourning the loss of one of the great luxury brands in my closet: Michael Kors. It used to be one of my go-to ready-to-wear brands: I loved the mash-up of classic Americana and jet-set European sensibilities, the use of color and texture, and those shrugs! I loved those cute little fine-gauge knit shrugs. I still have approximately fifteen of them in multiple colors, and they have saved me many times from the horror of exposing my upper arms. We adore you, Michelle Obama, but you have raised the upper-arm bar so high that when we consider going to the gym to pump iron, it seems futile, so we just shrug and put on a shrug instead.