Blog – Page 7 – Mary Jane Denzer

September 13, 2019

A gift from the fashion gods: Debra O’Shea meets the charmed and charming Angela Caputi, whose designs live up to their branding and her nickname, Giuggiù.

What do fashion icon Iris Apfel, Queen Mathilde of Belgium and Queen Máxima of the Netherlands have in common with us at Mary Jane Denzer?

We’re all fans of Angela Caputi and her fabulous jewelry, whose designs in rich, lacquered resin bridge the figurative and the abstract, the classical and the modern and, most important of all, the fine and the faux in haute couture costume jewelry.

Ropes of beads as big as red seedless grapes held together by a curling crocodile clasp; abstract floral earrings that evoke the legendary cities of Samarkand and Istanbul; pendants that feature a bust of Michelangelo’s “David” – a signature work of her hometown of Florence – turquoise Buddhas or crabs and scarabs that conjure pre-Columbian and Egyptian designs: Caputi’s pieces live up to their branding and her nickname, Giuggiù, which can be loosely translated, she has said, as playful.

Our selections include chunky bracelets and long necklaces with tassles and beading, which marry the curving and the angular in dark, jeweled colors.

Giuggiù jewelry has been designed from the company’s beginning in 1975 by Caputi herself in a workshop in the 17^th-century Palazzetto Medici on Via Santo Spirito – a stone’s throw from the Ponte Vecchio, the bridge that figures so dramatically in “O mio babbino caro,” a signature soprano aria from Giacomo Puccini’s “Gianni Schicchi.” Working with synthetic Italian materials alongside a small group that includes family, Caputi creates pieces inspired by American films of the first half of the 20^th century that are popularly priced and yet have been showcased in such august spaces as The Metropolitan Museum of Art in Manhattan and the Costume Gallery in Florence.

A champion of women, Caputi designs for the independent, sophisticated woman that is her client but shrewdly also keeps their men in mind.

“Men appreciate the materials I use and find the jewelry designs very interesting,” she told The Florentine in 2007. “They fall in love with the pieces almost immediately and give Giuggiù pieces as gifts. It is a personal and intimate line, because the pieces are one of a kind.”

We can’t but agree. The pieces make a major fashion statement yet are incredibly lightweight – another fascinating seeming contradiction. Perhaps that’s why whenever MJD owners Anastasia Cucinella and Debra O’Shea are in Paris during Fashion Week, their first stop is the Premiere Classe accessories trade show in the Jardin des Tuileries to see what new treasures Caputi has created for the season.

During a trip to Florence last October, O’Shea had a Caputi treat of a more personal nature. While out shopping, she came across the Caputi boutique. (There are two Angela Caputi Giuggiù boutiques in Florence, along with one each in Milan, Forte dei Marmi, Rome and Paris.) Of course, O’Shea went inside to say hello as well as to take pictures for MJD’s Instagram account. That evening, she and her husband celebrated her birthday by dining al fresco at the Hotel Savoy. Just at the moment she was posting the pictures, she noticed Caputi at an adjoining table. It was such a coincidence – or kismet? – that she couldn’t resist saying “Hello” and showing her the photographs. Caputi was charmed and charming as she posed for a photo with O’Shea – a birthday gift from the fashion gods.

August 21, 2019

Who among us doesn’t love handbags and may perhaps even have a whole closet devoted to the little seducers?

If you love to “bag” it, then you will love Tyler Ellis designs. Ellis is the creator of clutches, handbags and totes of such quality that they are a must for any purse aficionado, including such celebrities as Julia Roberts, Princess Beatrice, Sutton Foster, Lucy Liu, Marisa Tomei and Naomi Watts.

What makes an Ellis handbag exquisite? Luxurious materials, including alligator and lizard, though she doesn’t use the skin of any animal on the U.S. Fish and Wildlife’s endangered species list. For Ellis, the divine is also in the details and includes hidden and zippered pockets, cross-body and guitar straps and zipper pulls with the company’s signature pinecone pulls. There is also the cobalt blue lining in every bag – in the manner of Christian Louboutin’s red soles – the better to see your car keys, compact, wallet, lipstick and cell, my dear. This serves as another signature as the handbags contain no logos. Rather Ellis likes their “purse”onalities to speak for themselves.

Ellis’ own personality has a sunniness that reflects her native Los Angeles, where she still lives with husband Ben and their three pooches, as well as the engaging nature of her father, designer Perry Ellis, who brought a breezy elegance to the sometimes stuffy world of menswear in the 1970s. Ellis has known her father – who died when she was 18 months old – only through the memories of her mother, TV writer-producer Barbara Gallagher, and family and friends. Despite her pride in being his daughter, Ellis has said she didn’t want to appear to be trading on his name, and so she christened her first brand – a limited collection of purses launched in New York City in 2011 after college and a stint at Michael Kors – with her first and middle names. With the establishment of her second company six years later, she not only used her surname but also shifted production of her designs from Paris to a father-and-son atelier outside Florence. Why handbags?

As Ellis notes on her website: “I have always been an accessories girl, but what really pushed me into the handbag world was traveling. I kept noticing that women all over the globe, from London to Delhi, were carrying the same luxury handbag brands. So, I decided to embark on creating a brand of the same quality as the big houses but with bespoke charm.”

She sends the Florentine team a sketch of each design and receives a sample back in a bonded leather material that she can draw corrections on, which is then turned into a finished product she can try out with her friends.

The result are designs like no others – who else would create a vertical evening bag, big enough for an iPhone? – handbags like no others and price tags like no other (ranging from $1,200 to $14,000).

But then, the handbag closet is hungry for another addition….

For more, visit also tylerellis.com.

July 9, 2019

JBKJFKMalraux — All eyes are on Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy as she stuns in this shimmering pink Oleg Cassini at a 1962 White House dinner with the French minister of culture, André Malraux (left) and her husband, President John F. Kennedy (right). Courtesy the White House.

Sheaths and shifts. Ropes of pearls. Pillbox hats atop a brunet bouffant. Large, dark glasses and and long, white gloves.

Such was the power of Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis’ wardrobe that the mere mention of a few articles of clothing or accessories is enough to conjure a woman who transformed American culture in part by transforming American fashion. Indeed, the book cover for Steven Rowley’s new novel, “The Editor,” features only the famed oversize sunglasses on a desk with the Manhattan skyline as a backdrop while the bubblegum pink cover of Eve Pollard’s novel “Jack’s Widow” depicts the bouffant hairdo, a strand of pearls and white gloves. The mind fills in the rest.

This is a big year for Jackie and her admirers. July 28 marks the 90th anniversary of her birth. (The 25th anniversary of her death was commemorated May 19.) This year is also the 20th anniversary of the death of her son, John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, the former Greenwich resident Carolyn Bessette; and her sister, Lauren Bessette, in a plane crash off Martha’s Vineyard July 16.

“Age cannot wither her,” Shakespeare wrote of his Cleopatra, “nor custom stale her infinite variety.” The same could be said of Jackie, who continues to influence the influencers. Long before Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge wowed the Canadians with a red outfit that paid tribute to the scarlet of their flag and the Royal Mounties, Jackie donned a nubby red suit with a high collar, three-quarter sleeves and a matching pillbox hat for a 1961 visit that electrified Ottawa. The Jackie effect – the subject of a commemorative issue by People magazine – can be seen in Kate’s double-breasted coats and matching hats; her sister-in-law Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex’s white cape dress; first lady Melania Trump’s wide-belted outfits; Amal Clooney’s black T and white jeans; and Jennifer Lopez’s and Gwyneth Paltrow’s goddess gowns.

But few today remember that Jackie wasn’t always a style icon. A bookish equestrian whose introverted nature gave her a certain mystique as it shielded her from a prying public, a controlling mother, Janet Lee Auchincloss, and the Bouviers’ lack of wealth relative to her Auchincloss’ step-family, the coltish young Jackie was more apt to adapt the gamin look of a 1950s Audrey Hepburn than develop one of her own. It was her younger sister Lee, considered the more traditional beauty, who was the fashion and design trendsetter as well as a lover of the ancient Greeks (and one ancient Greek in particular, Aristotle Onassis) and the Italian Renaissance.

But if Lee was the more adventurous sister, Jackie had more stick-to-itiveness. With Oleg Cassini, the Paris-born couture and film costume designer, curating a wardrobe designed to read across the world stage, Kenneth devising a longer, bouffant hairdo to frame her wide-set bone structure and Halston creating pillbox hats that would just crown her large head, Jackie picked up the ball and ran with it. In both fashion and interior design, she indulged the love of France that was inspired both by her Bouvier blood and her junior year in Paris – “the happiest of my life,” she later recalled. It enabled her to mix French couture (Balenciaga, Dior, Givenchy) with domestic ensembles and to bring the White House into the present by looking to its refined Federal (early 19th century) past, which corresponded to the neoclassical period in France.

But interior design and fashion were always means to an end for Jackie, who saw them in service of creating a standard of excellence for the nation and an atmosphere of comfort for her husband, President John F. Kennedy, and their children, her number one priority.

With her children grown, she focused on historic preservation, championing Grand Central Terminal, and, as an editor encouraging a host of memoirists from Michael Jackson to Martha Graham.

Jackie remains the queen of style in part because she was always about so much more than that.

June 25, 2019

Alessandra Vicedomini had us at “hello.” The designer and former model – who inherited the sleek mantle of the House of Vicedomini from her father, Giuseppe – has an almond-eyed beauty that immediately recalls Sophia Loren. She has a Loren-style warmth as well, engaging with clients here at Mary Jane Denzer during a recent trunk show as if they were longtime friends rather than customers. For Alessandra, couture is about relationships.

“The way (MJD owners Anastasia Cucinella and Debra O’Shea) treat the clients is the way my dad did and I do in my atelier in Geneva,” she said. “It’s a shopping experience. It’s not about making a sale.” Sadly, she added, that personalization is becoming rare in retail.

Alessandra’s approach to designing for the Vicedomini brand, which her father founded in their native Milan in 1962, is altogether different from what he offered. Instead of tweeds, she said, she works with knitwear.

“Women today are looking for ease in what they wear. They’re looking for fabric with more stretch, something casual.”

And yet, she added, there is a common thread in the House of Vicedomini, then and now – “timeless elegance.”

Many designers are turning to more forgiving fabrics to accommodate today’s peripatetic lifestyle and emphasize the trend in curvaceous figures. What makes Alessandra’s work stand out is its creation of the illusion of nudity. (Small wonder as some of her bikinis have been featured in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue.)

A bit of nylon here at the knee, a bit of mesh there on the neckline and voilà – something that’s a touch naughty but oh-so-nice on such celebrities as Czech model and philanthropist Petra Němcová. Cool shoulders, side peplum, leafy appliqué and diamond-shaped pockets add to the flirty silhouette of the spring-summer collection.

Knitwear can sport another, wintry face in the House of Vicedomini, which can be seen in its classic double-ply cashmere gilet with a special trim of handcuff and ribbed cashmere that we swear looks like chinchilla.

Knits are what inspired Alessandra to step off the runway and magazine covers and into the atelier. A gifted student and linguist, she studied law at the University of Milan and initially intended to have a career in criminal law. But her beauty and couture pedigree would not be denied and at 14 she began modeling for the likes of Dolce & Gabbana, Jean Paul Gautlier, Valentino and Versace. Marriage would take her to London where she used to run into the former Kate Middleton – now Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge – at Starbuck’s. (Alessandra said the simply elegant Kate remains the one woman she would like to dress.) And then it was on to Geneva, which is a little too staid for Alessandra’s taste.

The mother of two golf-loving sons said she needs a place to indulge her love of water and horses on these shores. Bucolic Bedford or Greenwich perhaps?

How lucky we would be to have Alessandra spreading her charm and talent among us.

May 14, 2019

We at Mary Jane Denzer recently had an opportunity to view The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute’s 2019 show, “Camp: Notes on Fashion.” And while the new exhibit is characterized by much funky couture, there is plenty for the MJD client to love.

That’s because “Camp” – which takes its title and inspiration from Susan Sontag’s influential 1964 essay “Notes on ‘Camp’” – defines its subject so broadly (as paramount style laced with humor and artfulness) that the clothing and accessories in it range from the playfully quirky to the eminently, elegantly wearable. A case in point is a strapless Yves Saint Laurent gown from his autumn/winter 1983-84 collection that features a columnar black skirt, slightly slit; and a hot pink ruched bodice that’s all tied up in a matching bow in the back. Talk about a knockout fashion statement.

But there’s more: Jean Paul Gaultier’s strapless emerald green mermaid gown, with its winged neckline, creates a curvaceous silhouette, as does Jeremy Scott’s shimmering scallop-patterned salmon dress from his spring/summer 2011 collection. Bob Mackie’s 2008 mesh gown, defined by sequined leaves, echoes aspects of Neil Bieff’s shapely, textured gowns in our collection and the peekaboo knit dresses by Italian designer Alessandra Vicedomini, a new addition to MJD whom you’ll be reading more about in our June post.

Cristobal Balenciaga’s tiered, feathery pink gown for decorative arts collector Jayne Wrightsman during the 1965-66 season offers the sine qua non in ladylike appeal, while a Fendi ensemble and dress by Karl Lagerfeld from its autumn/winter 2016-17 collection makes unusual use of pattern with its subtle evocation of medieval manuscripts and tapestries.

But as one fashion editor noted, you needn’t go full-camp. Heatherette’s short, triangular Hello Kitty-patterned dress (original design, 2013-14) not for you? Perhaps you might accent a cocktail dress or an evening gown with a Hello Kitty rhinestone bracelet. Or go Audrey Hepburn with a Gucci head scarf, pearl choker and rhinestone-dotted sunglasses, as displayed on a mannequin head in a vitrine in the stunning final gallery, which explodes with a profusion of black-framed display windows offsetting bold colors and patterns.

If you caught any of the exhibit’s May 6 kickoff gala extravaganza, https://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2019/05/06/style/met-gala-photos/s/met-gala-nina-2405-regina-king.html then you know that the ensembles that succeeded best on the red carpet were those in which the stars shone but not too brightly. Co-chair and Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour was a vision of spring in a floral-studded columnar gown – topped by a matching pink-feathered jacket – by Lagerfeld for Chanel, the last gown he created for her before his death. Katie Holmes reigned in purple in form-fitting Zac Posen with a fan-shaped train and feathery choker neckline. Regina King scintillated in metallic Oscar de la Renta with a huge gold ruffle on its one shoulder.

What the exhibit and the gala fashions both demonstrate is that camp is like spice: A little goes a long way.

“Camp” runs through Sept. 9. For tickets, go to metmuseum.org.

Angela Caputi Giuggiù’s playful designs

A woman of ‘purse’onality

Still queen of style

Knitwear, Italian style

A ‘Camp’ with something for everyone