Welcome to the late review, wherein I review a book long after you’ve all had the chance to read it.

If You Have to Cry, Go Outside (and other things your mother never told you) is the longest, cheesiest title for what is really a very punchy book by a woman who knows how to get to the point. That said, a long title definitely benefits from greater Googleability, and so Cutrone may have a method to her madness. She demonstrates a lot of that kind of canny counter-intuition in Go Outside.

Straight up: I loved this book. There aren’t many books I would characterize as a must-read for any would-be or die-hard fashion careerist. This is one, for sure. I think this is the first time I’ve read a real-talk rationalization of how the so-called superficial world of fashion is aligned with a sense of female divinity… and dignity. It is a uniquely feminine industry, and Cutrone addresses young women directly, without condescension or cliches.

Cutrone’s character as a publicist and celebrity provokes a lot of mixed feelings in me. Before she was on MTV, she didn’t endear herself to bloggers. I loved the way she balanced The City, but found the episodes I saw of Kell on Earth to be claustrophobic and chaotic, in a way that was fascinating but not inspiring. When it comes to her practical advice, I can take some of it and leave some of it. Go Outside really hits home when Cutrone articulates the airier stuff – philosophy, mysticism, self-discovery, and ambition.

I do think that this book is the very best of Kelly Cutrone. Her story is compelling and she provides a much needed, strong counterweight to the mainstream majority of shopaholics and fashionistas. Cutrone is using her celebrity to its best advantage. I appreciate that.

While I often scoff at astrology, it is because almost all astrology seems to either get it all wrong or merely offer vague advice which could apply to anyone no matter when they were born.  Despite that, I picked up Greg Polkosnik’s book Cosmically Chic: Discovering Your Fashion Style Through Astrology a few months ago, because he is a friend of the inimitable Auntie Fashion, who has an astute ability to pick remarkable friends. It appears to be no longer in print, though copies are still available on Amazon, and that is why this category is called the Late Review.

Astrology is one of the few genres where the author can get away with second person singular, which I am not used to reading pages and pages of – it can be a bit unnerving to be addressed so directly by a book.  I focused on the Libra chapter, because that is the one which is supposed to be talking to me.

To my surprise, Polkosnik nails me in the first paragraph:

… your taste for the finer things in life is somewhat extrinsic: You truly appreciate the beauty that surrounds you, yet you often neglect to consider the role you play in your environment. … You might be the most tasteful girl in the zodiac, Libra, but what good is good taste when you’re too lazy to exercise it?

If you’ve been reading the blog for a while, you already know.  I love everything about fashion as long as it has nothing to do with shopping for clothes or dressing up for fun.

Polkosnik goes on to offer a prescription for the Libran in need of style advice.  Some of the more specific advice I am less likely to take, such as:

The one garment every Libra woman should put to use in her wardrobe is the bodysuit.

And some advice has inspired me to seek out things I have not considered before but can easily picture myself loving:

… buy yourself a classic beige trench coat.  Choose a style that is lean, and avoid large shoulder pads. A beautiful trench coat is a quintessential Libra garment.

The rest of the chapter offers recommendations for designers to seek out (Donna Karan) or avoid, makeup tips, shopping tips, suggestions for working wardrobes and special occasions, and also spotlights a few notable fashionable Librans.  Over all it is fun, and the lightness balances occasional lapses into preachy fashion dictation. Like the best of astrology, the spirit of it is genuinely helpful.  If a skeptic like me can enjoy it, I am sure devoted checkers of horoscopes will really love getting into it.

Not to sound like an old fogey, but I’ve been fashion blogging since 2005… and among my fellow veteran fashion bloggers from those days who have stuck with it, Daddy Likey is like the class clown who is now a full fledged author.  This book deal couldn’t have happened to a nicer fashion blogger.  I love Winona’s blog because she know the secret to finding the fun in fashion is all about finding the funny in fashion, a subject that is never short of absurdity.

Her book, Closet Confidential: Style Secrets Learned the Hard Way is a wonderfully portable way to have more Winona in your life.  I read it while taking a cross-city subway trip and not only did I get stares for the number of LOLs I was having, I even saw a fellow commuter write down the title of the book.  Besides the laughs, Winona shares her hard-won style tips which are a refreshing refresher for any fellow fashion-o-phile and down-to-earth straight talk for any fashion-o-phobe.

The cute illustrations are by Sam Trout and totally fit with the book’s vibe.  If I may be a picky professional for a moment, some garment details (like the collar on the trench coat) look awkward. So I am fussy about construction details and proportions when it comes to illustrating clothes.

BONUS – I have a copy of this book which I get to give away to a lucky Final Fashion reader.  To win, just leave a comment on this post with your own “style secret learned the hard way”.  I’ll select the winner randomly on November 20th.

Thanks to FASHION Magazine, I had the opportunity to see a preview of Valentino, The Last Emperor including a terrific Q&A after the show with director Matt Tyrnauer.  It is a documentary about Valentino’s partnership with Giancarlo Giammetti and the production of his famous 45 year retrospective.  This film is well worth seeing. It is a very candid peek into one of the last couturiers who shot to vast wealth with licensing in the seventies and eighties – a tremendously opulent world that is facing extinction.  Its also a very sensitive and sharp portrait of an intuitive and mercurial creator, the staff who support him, and above all the close relationship between Valentino and Giammetti that made it all possible.

There are two screenings tonight (July 10) in Toronto where Tyrnauer will also be taking questions.  Check the theatres and showtimes here.

Regent Releasing kindly sent me a copy of Eleven Minutes for review, it has just been released on DVD.  Do you all like the late review?  These posts never seem to generate much discussion.  But regardless, I am going to keep doing them because I love looking at stuff and writing about stuff.

Eleven Minutes is my kind of movie.  I am a huge Jay fan, a devoted viewer of all things Project Runway, and adore watching anything that gets under the hood of the fashion industry.  This is Unzipped for us 21st century types, and a must-watch for anyone with designer dreams.  I know already, because I saw it in the theatre when it came to Toronto.

Why should this be required course material for every fashion student?  It is both an ode to ambition and a cautionary tale, a love/hate story about fashion that anyone who has held on to the ride for more than one season can identify with.  The main arc of the story is about the tension between Jay’s heart and his mind.  He wants to design intuitively but he allows his logical mind to restrict him.  There are consequences to his self-editing when it comes time to make sales – but not in the way Jay expects.

The supporting cast is terrific; from the interns/assistants, to the models, to the accessory designers, the documentary does a good job of showing that any emerging designer is supported by a very loose team of independents, herded like cats towards an inflexible deadline.  Best – Kelly Cutrone shows a more genuine side.  She is a compelling personality to watch, and on The Hills or The City, you only get a veiled glimpse.  Here there is less control over the editing and you get a sense of how she really works.

Behind the glamour of appearances is the logistical challenge of selling a physical product.  Jay McCarroll does us a great service sharing the reality behind the “reality” – I hope that more designers will be inspired to be this candid.

Ignore the fact that this time, the late review is only one day late.  It was part of the deal – my first ever pre-screening!  So today, I get to play movie reviewer for Confessions of a Shopaholic.

“The clothes are ugly,” one contrary fashion writer said after the movie, and I had to wonder if Rebecca’s affliction would have been funnier if she wore sublime Yves St. Laurent and darkest Rick Owens instead of Fozzie Bear boleros and giant pendant necklaces.  Perhaps this movie should have been made by Sofia Coppola.

Maybe.

But that’s not the movie Patricia Field styled.  This movie is unashamed, 2 dimensional technicolour fairy fluff and the worst thing you could do to it is watch it as a political critique on why our economy sucks so hard for so many.  Or judge it on its success as a character study of an addict.

Instead, pay attention to how earnestly and whole-heartedly the actors deliver their archytypal roles.  Allow yourself to be distracted by the “look at me” clothes.  Become thoroughly absorbed in how amazing Isla Fisher’s hair is.  Forget how a credit card works.  Laugh at the goofy gags!

If you can’t do that, you’re not going to enjoy this movie.

After listening to Derek McCormack criticize Valerie Steele’s Gothic: Dark Glamour in person at ILORI and then on Q, the radio show, I was prepared to tear apart his book, The Show that Smells, and avenge my fashion hero.  I am kidding.  He is a professional contrarion so it is his job to turn discussions into debates – and I am just a dilettante who likes talking about dresses.

Fact is, I am way too busy right now to be doing a review, plus its way to early to do The Late Review.  He has not even had his book launch yet – it is happening on October 2.  Yet I read it already despite myself.

Thanks to Nathalie Atkinson (who is enabling my fashion book habit these days), I had an advance copy of McCormack’s book in my hands at Louisa McCormack‘s launch event for her new book The Catch.  (That event is going to get its own post soon.)  I forgot to ask if the two authors are related.  They certainly are both clever characters with a talent for radio show-worthy repartee.

The Show that Smells is a lean little book which I was able to read on a couple slow trips on the Queen streetcar.   I do not know what genre it is.  It is like a Busby Berkeley dance routine of a book, full of palindromes, punctuation, and perfumery ephemera.

Whatever it is, I liked it.  This is flash for fashion nerds – all obscure jargon, fashion history factoids, and literary conceits telling an absurd, macabre carnival kitsch story.  Delightful.

Grace Mirabella’s memoir In and Out of Vogue came to me courtesy of Nathalie Atkinson. Have a book you would like to see on the late review? Lend me a copy and I will get to it eventually.

Mirabella was the Editor in Chief of American Vogue in the 1970s – sandwiched between icons Vreeland and Wintour, her own contributions are somewhat overshadowed in the modern memory. Yet it is exactly this transitional position which makes this memoir a fascinating read.

Mirabella’s experiences offer a sense of how a leading fashion magazine struggles to maintain its position. Editors come and go – sometimes you are in, sometimes you are out. The insider’s view on Vogue’s daily business in the 50′s, 60′s, and 70′s is fascinating. Beyond the changing attitudes and the editorial personalities, Mirabella also describes the daily tasks involved in producing a fashion magazine. With a retail garmento background, Mirabella’s unique take on Vogue comes from the perspective of a working woman who thinks of herself as straightforward and practical.

As a memoir it is clearly intended to satisfy Mirabella’s need to have her side of the story on the record. Hirings, firings, and rumours are rife in the world of magazines. While Mirabella does her best to justify her own decisions, in the end she seems less like a heroine than an ordinary woman.

Her two greatest positions both ended in a disappointing way – being fired from Vogue and then watching as her eponymous magazine slipped away from her original vision. Mirabella sometimes hesitates to trust her intuition – she adopts a “wait and see” attitude, and leans on others to make decisions. Eventually this unraveled her ambitions. That said, her great qualities are a strong vision of modern women, humility, a sense of caring and respect for her readers, and a healthy work ethic. Her story offers lessons for all women with careers – both what not to do, and what to do.

The Beautiful Fall. Amazing book! Anita just finished it and loved it, and she lent it to me. This was a page turner – I could not put it down.

The subject is two of the greatest designers of the past 50 years, Yves Saint Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld. These two contemporaries were friends and rivals, and the timeline of their struggles and successes juxtapose two very different men inhabiting the same scene.

As is customary with the late review, my review follows the reviews of many others. Susie Bubble found Saint Laurent easy to identify with, and percieved a bias against Lagerfeld. I don’t think that the book was particularly biased one way or another, if anything Drake takes great effort to show both the talents and torments of both men equally. They both have enormous talent and great legends, and Drake shows the reader a hint of the humanity they both try to hide.

Saint Laurent and Lagerfeld are both polarizing figures in fashion. Saint Laurent represents the intuitive and emotional – fire and water. Lagerfeld represents the intellect and ambition – air and earth. How you read The Beautiful Fall might say something about your own attitude towards fashion – in my case I finished the book identifying more closely with Lagerfeld.

Saint Laurent’s career could certainly be described as a Beautiful Fall… starting from the very top at the beginning of his career, and by the end he was burnt out. By contrast, Lagerfeld’s career built slowly, and his great accomplishments have been achieved in the last decade. Saint Laurent glorified the past; Lagerfeld rejects it.

The other aspect of the book I found fascinating was the scenario. So many great moments in fashion that still echo today were produced by small cliques of very influential, talented, and creative people. The characters are important. The parties are critical to understanding fashion’s ever-shifting focal point. They say it is who you know – it also seems that it is where you are, and your own innate ability to adapt to the zeitgeist that wins you a niche in history.

Have you read the book? Did it change your attitude towards the designers or reveal an insight on the nature of fashion? I’m up for a discussion if you feel like it.

I had the great luck to discover Louisa McCormack’s work in a roundabout way. I had recently discovered Auntie Fashion and of course was fascinated by her glamour and wanted to learn more. I googled around for recent interviews with Simon Doonan and discovered this one by McCormack.

However, when I asked Auntie Fashion if she was in fact Louisa McCormack, Auntie corrected me. She is Prunella Crudsworth, fashion’s most enduring muse. That was that.

I was still curious about McCormack… and my curiousity turned to fascination upon the discovery of her website. I love authors who blog, and Louisa’s Latest is both candid and clever.

This led me to her novel, Six Weeks to Toxic which I purchased new on Amazon.ca.

I liked the cover, which promised risky fashion. Is the girl in the pink tights and mules wearing what appears to be a laser cut ultrasuede skirt? Wow. The book itself was like nothing I’ve ever read. It is not Weisbergerish fashiony chick lit. Nor is it an Atwoodian Toronto fem-literary. McCormack describes it as “chick literary” but you can be sure that all references to Baudelaire fly over my fashion-schooled head.

The descriptions of the outfits, and the beauty products, that these women wear does hit home with me. Critics with literary pretensions may scoff, but I am the kind of reader for which the words “Happy and Herbal Essences” do in fact tell me exactly what kind of woman Bess Grover thinks she is.

The women in the novel are adventurous dressers. I wonder if the novel is a bit of a time capsule for 2001 – I can’t remember, was there really that much velvet being worn back then? I can’t help but think that Auntie Fashion would approve of all the outrageous outfits. McCormack and Auntie Fashion also share a penchant for the word “soupçon”. I had to look it up. It means “a dash” as in a very small amount. Again, McCormack and Auntie Fashion are not the same person. There is a whole continent of separation between their many coincidences.

I think my lack of experience being 30-something and single kept me from identifying with the characters too closely. All the banter – often witty – made it hard to extract the character’s real feelings from their ironic chatter… a lot like real life in the city I think. We all develop a superficial skin to survive socially and McCormack does a good job of showing that. It takes sensitivity to tone to read the increasing tension between the two leads… and it makes the ending seem very abrupt. Given the excruciating nature of best-friend-breakups, I would have found it satisfying to dig deeper into the character’s discomforts, beyond the dialogue.

Also, sex scenes. I have never read a book with so many detailed sex scenes – and deftly done. Also, Toronto. Yes its snowy streets do play a role in the story without being intrusive or exclusive.

The review? Six Weeks to Toxic is an enjoyable long-weekend read, and you will get extra kicks from it if you have lost a best friend, love your novels liberally peppered with fashion and sex, or have lived in Toronto.