Shots of Australian supermodel Abbey Lee Kershaw in Tom Ford's new eyewear campaign are all over the net. But who knew she was also in his first womenswear campaign? Behold a supersite billboard of Kershaw not just in a sequined sheath from Ford's debut womenswear collection, but locked in a staged passionate embrace with Ford himself, that has just gone up in Beverly Hills, California, coincidentally a few days ahead of the 2011 Golden Globes. According to Kershaw's US agent, Next, it's part of the womenswear campaign. More images to come presumably. Kershaw was among the very select cast of Ford's intimate runway presentation at New York Fashion Week in September last year.
Well Tom Ford certainly got off to a cracking start in 2011, uploading images of his new eyewear campaign which co-stars Abbey Lee Kershaw. Evidently Ford is another client who didn’t mind Kershaw’s new platinum blonde do – even apparently adding hair extensions. Now (viaHomotography) comes a video of that top-secret debut Tom Ford womenswear show which was presented to a tightly-edited throng of just 100 at New York Fashion Week in September, with highly restricted camera access. Ford has spent a lot of time talking down the new digital news domain, telling US Vogue, "I do not understand everyone's need to see everything online the day after the show". Now that it’s crunch time for Ford's collection to hit stores, frockwriter has little doubt he is thrilled that social media is spreading the buzz.
These shots were just slipped to frockwriter (and no doubt many other blogs, but at this stage we think it may be a first look). It's a preview of V Magazine's issue #69, a spread starring Julia Restoin-Roitfeld modelling Tom Ford's debut womenswear collection - described as "self portraits" so we have to assume she took the shots. And an excerpt from an interview conducted with Ford, by Restoin-Roitfeld, the face of Ford's Black Orchid fragrance campaign. This would have been in the pipeline for some time, but interesting that it falls hot on the heels of last Friday's abrupt resignation by Restoin-Roitfeld's mother, Carine Roitfeld, from Vogue Paris after a 10 year tenure. The official version is that Roitfeld wants to pursue "personal projects". In reality, however, noone leaves a position like that with several weeks notice. Few, if any, have voluntarily resigned from Vogue. There has been much speculation that Roitfeld was pushed by Condé Nast after problems vis-à-vis her ongoing consulting to fashion brands. Yes fashion editors (even in Australia) do paid work on outside ad campaigns and that's bad enough. It is verging on the ludicrous for an editor-in-chief to do so. There has also been speculation that the December issue of Vogue Paris, as edited by Ford, was poorly received by some Vogue advertisers and may have proven the final straw.
JULIA RESTOIN ROITFELD What made you decide that this was the season to return to fashion? TOM FORD I told myself that I would not come back to women’s fashion until I felt I had something new to say. I feel that fashion has become too serious and that the actual customer’s needs have not really been addressed. Fashion needs to make one happy. It is a luxury and should enhance one’s quality of life.
JRR What inspired your collection? TF Real clothes for real women. I want to concentrate on my real customer. That’s why I showed idealized versions of her—different women of different ages. It was about individuality, different body types, women who have their own style.
JRR What do you think fashion needs more of right now?
TF Spontaneity. Fashion needs to be more fun.
JRR What personality traits does the Tom Ford woman possess?
TF My customer has her own sense of style and knows herself well. My goal is to help women become the best version of themselves.
JRR What is your favorite piece from the collection?
TF I love every piece. That is like asking someone which one of their children is their favorite.
JRR Outside fashion, what are you looking forward to this spring?
TF I have to say more fashion. I love what I am doing right now and can’t wait to start the next collection.
JRR What was the last thing that made you laugh?
TF I laugh a good bit so that is a hard question. I suppose a phone call I just had with Richard [Buckley] five minutes ago made me laugh pretty hard. He has a wicked sense of humor
JRR What’s your New Year’s resolution? TF I don’t have one. I believe in living life the way that you want to live it every day, and if you do that you don’t really need to have New Year’s resolutions.
all materials: supplied to frockwriter by V magazine
So after editorial spreads showcasing cosmetic surgery, loved up old folks and Ali McGraw et al, what other subjects did Tom Ford explore during his editorial stewardship of the Christmas edition of Vogue Paris? Tarted-up six year-olds. Photographed by Sharif Hamza and styled by Melanie Huynh, the 15-page 'Cadeaux' gift spread features a gaggle of little girls kitted out in designer gear. Yes, most kids love playing dressups and some images are no different to spreads you might find in childrens' fashion magazines such as Vogue Bambini, Vogue Enfants or our Studio Bambini. Save for the fact, of course, that the latter are all childrens' fashion magazines, marketing childrens' clothing to parents. As distinct from an adult's fashion magazine that is using children to advertise grownup merchandise to adults - and which happens to include several simulated sex scenes elsewhere in the edition. However the inclusion of several shots of heavily made-up children draped seductively over chairs, daybeds and an animal skin rug, with their legs and décolletages bared, like child prostitutes in a brothel, illustrates just how untouchable Ford and Vogue Paris editor-in-chief Carine Roitfeld believe themselves to be. Ditto the alarmingly ambiguous image of the child brushing her teeth. ***UPDATE 18/12/10: Today's surprise announcement that Roitfeld will be leaving Vogue Paris in January after 10 years at the magazine's helm, to pursue "personal projects", will no doubt prompt some speculation that she might not have been quite as untouchable as she thought.***
No, thankfully their great mate Terry Richardson was apparently nowhere near this shoot, even though he does feature elsewhere in the issue.
But we all know exactly what that toothbrush image would mean in the hands of Richardson and with an adult model. The trouble with putting the nudge-nudge-wink-wink into fashion is that everything has the potential to be a dirty joke.
Ah the Tom Ford issue of Vogue Paris. It just keeps on giving. Following the 'Forever Young' editorial in which a blinged-up grey-haired couple is caught by Ford's camera in flagrante delicto - and Ford's proclamation that he has had it with the cult of youth, the stigmatization of wrinkles and all those who "cheat" time - comes an editorial spread starring some of the women who modelled the new Tom Ford womenswear collection at his exclusive media launch at New York Fashion Week in September. And a couple of ringins, including Ali McGraw. (In order below) Betty Catroux, Marisa Berenson and Lauren Hutton look like ultra glamorous 60+ women - although any thinner and Berenson would have been at grave risk of being mistaken for a light stand in Vogue's studio. The Love Story star, however, doesn't look a day over 45. Which is fascinating, since McGraw is in fact 72. Granted, she has been practicing yoga for the past 20 years, but considering that this is what McGraw looked like in 2006 and here she is in an interview with Oprah Winfrey several months ago - looking absolutely fantastic, we must say - is it just a question of good lighting or has she in fact been Photoshopped by Vogue to within an inch of her life? Given Ford's vigorous stance on ageing in the 'Forever Young' editorial, the latter scenario would seem more than a little inconsistent.
As it happens, McGraw has quite strong views on images of women in the media.
Here she is in another video interview, below. Uploaded by the reporter in 2009, it's unclear whether it was recorded that year, or perhaps several years earlier.
On the issue of the celebrity-driven pressure to be thin, McGraw notes:
“I have a raging fury against the media. Whether it’s a fashion magazine showing that this skinny 14 year-old is the way a grown-up woman is meant to look or this scared, tiny, starving herself pop star is the model against which our teenage and 20 year old and 30 year old women are meant to look. And I think it has to start with the media. And I'm just in a rage about it because I have watched a whole generation of kids behind.... You know, it’s always about fear... 'Am I enough?', 'Am I attractive enough?', 'Am I cool?' Because that’s the special word. And until we have images out there at the checkout counter that show what cool really looks like and it doesn’t look like an anorexic, cutting yourself girl, we’re going to have a population of kids looking like this. Because they’re so uncomfortable anyway with themselves, that they think a certain dress or certain bones showing, makes them OK and it doesn’t”.
Just out of interest, which model did Ford pick for the Vogue Paris December cover? New Dutch face Daphne Groeneveld. Who is 14.
Following the Crystal Renn editorial in which the world's most famous plus size model receives a gamut of cosmetic surgery procedures - and some oral pleasure - yet more images of the Tom Ford-edited December 2010 edition of Vogue Paris have surfaced. In an editorial spread entitled 'Forever Love', this time Ford tackles the subject of old age, shooting two apparently septuaganarian models groping each other while showcasing the latest in fine jewellery. In a post-script, Ford, who also photographed the editorial, notes:“I am tired of the cult of youth. The cultural rejection of old age, the stigmatization of wrinkles, grey hair, of bodies furrowed by the years. I am fascinated by Diana Vreeland, Georgia O’Keeffe and Louise Bourgeois, women who have let time embrace them without ever cheating. Society today condems this, me, I celebrate it. For this session of fine jewellery, I imagined a man and a woman who had been together for a long time, faithful to each other and always incandescent with desire”.
And that's all fine and dandy and at the end of the day an opportunity for some older models to make it into the "hot" issue of one of the world's most prestigious fashion titles.
But there's just something a little gratuitous about a couple of these images.
And it's well worth noting that when it comes to his own ageing, you won't find a single grey hair or wrinkle on babyfaced 49 year-old Ford, who told The Advocate in December last year, “I’m a firm believer in Botox and Restylane. Absolutely.”
In the much-hyped, Tom Ford-edited December 2010 edition of Vogue Paris, which is out tomorrow, Ford tackles the subject of cosmetic surgery with an eight page editorial called La Panthère ose (which translates as “the panther dares” - a play on the French version of the film title The Pink Panther). Starring the world’s most high profile plus size model Crystal Renn, the editorial was shot by Ford and styled by editor in chief Carine Roitfeld. Yes, cosmetic surgery makes an interesting editorial backdrop for any fashion magazine, considering that such magazines stand accused of only ever showcasing unrealistic – and frequently digitally enhanced – images of female “perfection” that prompt feelings of inadequacy in “normal” women and lead them to eating disorders and cosmetic surgery. But it is not the first time this has been done. The July 2005 edition of Vogue Italia featured an 80-page cover story by Steven Meisel called Makeover Madness. Shot inside a medical equipment rental facility and a suite at the St Regis, the story depicted Linda Evangelista and eight other models before, "during" and after staged procedures (complete with fake blood). It's interesting to compare the two editorials.
The 2005 story (here) depicts nose jobs, breast augmentations, liposuction and blepharoplasty or eyelid surgery, male doctors and female nurses.
The 2010 version (above and below) depicts exactly the same procedures, minus liposuction - and two male attendants in the place of the doctors and nurses.
One could speculate that Vogue Paris deliberately omitted liposuction from this story because of the body image debate that has been raging since 2006, following the deaths of several models from eating disorder-related conditions. And it would defeat the purpose, surely, of having a plus-size model in the editorial? Unless that's a shadow on Renn's leg in image four, however, we would put money on her thigh having been airbrushed by the magazine.
Renn has revealed that she wore a prosthetic mask in some pictures – presumably those showing her with grotesquely overinflated lips and acutely chiselled cheekbones. The kind of cheekbones frockwriter has spotted on more than one high profile twentysomething model.
There is one interesting addition to Ford’s cosmetic surgery story: sex.
In one shot, Renn's character appears to be on the receiving end of some oral pleasure from one model - with her left arm dangled around a second male model, who looks barely legal - while casually sipping Coke from a straw in one hand and channel surfing with the other.
Many will no doubt find Ford’s post-op cunnilingus proposition - which all looks very consensual, save for the fact that the patient requires assistance to walk and shower and would most likely be on heavy duty painkillers - funny. The score of women who claim to have been indecently assaulted by cosmetic/plastic surgeons while under sedation probably won't be amongst those laughing. Nor indeed, any date rape victims.
Another image in the series (second from the end) is ambiguous. Renn is lying in the lap of one model, who is holding an ice pack to her forehead, while the other leans over her suggestively. The latter is holding her waist with one hand, while "administering" Chanel No 5 - either orally or perhaps as a substitute for an Amyl Nitrate "popper", a hugely popular drug in the gay mens' scene. Ford aims to be controversial. After all, he is in the process of making his big comeback in women’s fashion. Besides, he has never shied from controversy, either with the advertising imagery for Gucci or more recently, through the advertising campaigns for his own brand, notably the mens’ fragrance campaign shot by mate Terry Richardson. The duo team up again in this issue of Vogue Paris in a western-themed editorial called (what else?) Pussy Western, starring Renn once again, opposite Abbey Lee Kershaw and Eniko Mihalik.
They include skin resurfacing machines that some claim have eliminated the need for upper and lower eyelid surgery and fillers that have reportedly proven to be so effective they are replacing some nose jobs and the traditional facelift – with one plastic surgeon describing the latter as “an outdated insane operation”.
On Tuesday, Tom Ford’s directorial debut, A Single Man, was released on DVD. Although critically-acclaimed, the film made just US$9million at the domestic box office – and, seemed virtually impossible to find on download at the time of release, due to an apparent lack of geek interest. Miramax hopes it will now find its audience. To celebrate the DVD launch, yesterday NPR radio re-broadcast an interview Ford did with NPR’s Fresh Air host Terry Gross back on December 14 last year. Perhaps the original became subsumed by the deluge of publicity Ford did at the time of the film's theatrical release, because this iv does not appear to have travelled far afield. Below is an MP3 of the full 20 minute interview.
In Ford's own words:
* His critical fashion eye first manifested itself at age seven/eight when he started noticing his shoes were "the wrong shape".
* His earliest Gucci collections in 1995 and 1996 were the most influential, but his last few collections for Gucci and for Yves Saint Laurent, from 2003-2004, were more interesting, thanks in large part to his exposure to the ateliers at Gucci and YSL. “I had learned at that point how to make more complex clothes, both cerebrally as well as technically”
On the 1970s ambiance of the velvet hiphuggers etc in his breakthrough 1995 Gucci collection vs contemporary fashion:
“They were a throwback to a period in the 1970s when fashion was more touchable. Today, you know, fashion is not - our beauty standard today is harder. It's beautiful but it's off-putting. It's like, don't touch me, I'm hard”.
On beautiful women and ageing:
“If you're a beautiful woman, you're incredibly powerful within our culture. The world operates differently for you. Then, at a moment in time, and it has nothing to do with you, it's like the carpet is just ripped out from under you, and the way that you've operated in the world no longer works. So Julianne's character is struggling”.
Ford also spends quite some time discussing women’s breasts:
“Cars look like someone took an air pump and pumped them up. They look engorged. Lips pumped up, breasts pumped up, everything is pumped up. And it's also kind of off-putting. It's sexual but in such a hard way that it's, for me, not sexual at all, whereas the 1970s, breasts were smaller. People were not wearing bras. Farrah Fawcett's sexuality and sensuality was a very touchable sexuality. She was kissable. She was friendly. I don't understand all these breasts right now, and they don't look like breasts. They look like someone's taken a grapefruit half and inserted it under your skin. I mean it's - it doesn't even bear any resemblance to what a natural breast looks like. But we're starting to think that this is what women should like. And young girls are looking at these breasts and thinking, oh, I need to go have my breasts done because they've lost touch with what a real breast actually looks like. I find it fascinating. I find it disturbing. I mean, you could consider it more fascinating because we're becoming post-human”.
Judging by this interview with Ford, conducted by GQ magazine earlier this year - in which Ford volunteers “I could really improve breast implants” - he spent quite some time on A Single Man’s promo trail talking breasts. Which is interesting, because there are none in the film. Instead, lots of long, lingering, homoerotic slow-mos of semi-clad and naked men, as you might expect from a gay male love story (and indeed, much contemporary fashion imagery).
Of course, Ford is entitled to an opinion about breasts. But given criticism that Miramax deliberately “de-gayed” the marketing of A Single Man, by playing up the (strictly platonic) relationship between Colin Firth’s and Julianne Moore’s characters in the trailer and posters to give the film more mainstream appeal – with even the film's lead actor Colin Firth weighing into the brouhaha, calling it "deceptive" – a cynic might well ask if there was a deliberate strategy on Ford's part to pump up the breast talk and play down the cock?
Here's the trailer for anyone who missed it:
It’s not like Ford has never deliberately marketed to straight men before.
The following ads lensed by Terry ‘King of sleaze’ Richardson for the Tom Ford for Men fragrance campaign hardly seem to be pitching to the gays (although one other shot in the campaign, of the same bottle nestled in a man's buttocks, did).
Curiously, when it came to flogging his men's perfume, Ford appeared to overcome his personal distaste for the “post-human” breast shape which he believes looks “like someone's taken a grapefruit half and inserted it under your skin” and hired a model with the fruitiest boobs he could find.
