Thursday, September 5, 2024. A beautiful late summer day in New York yesterday. Lots of Sun, beautiful skies, a perfect temperature and heavy traffic all over the city.
It was also an important day on the New York Social Calendar because it was the annual luncheon of the Couture Council of the Museum at the Fashion FIT (MFIT). Held in the vast Promenade of the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center, it was attended by several hundred of the social forces and talents to open the 2024 Autumn season.
This event is annual, and marks its place on the social calendar as The First event of the Autumn Social Season. This is important. It’s a fundraiser, of course, but “heralds the arrival” of New York Fashion Week. Proceeds benefit The Museum at FIT, which is the only museum in New York dedicated exclusively to the art of fashion.
I attend because it’s essentially where the social life first comes together through the cooler months. The story is the activity about this town, and these people, and what a world it is including another view of reality.
The reception was called for 11 with luncheon served at noon. I traveled from the Upper East Side to Lincoln Center, which took a good 45 mins to an hour especially with the East Side traffic.
The Fashion business is based on change. Personally I was curious to see indications of “change” which you can already see on the street, in the fashion world and the way people in general dress. Down. Or way up. It’s fluctuating if you take in the overall “costume” of the room. The women who stood out as the “fashionable” crowd are now older and often almost lost in the crowd of varieties of individual taste.
Although many of the men were dressed more casually. For example, Pete Nordstrom, the executive head of Nordstrom the distinguished company that supports the expense of the luncheon, and who opens the speeches, was in jacket but no tie, and open shirted. There’s nothing unusual about that except, standing at the head of the formality of the room architecturally, he looked out of place. So too were the men dressed so casually in Bermuda shorts that they looked liked they’d just come in from the beach. There’s nothing wrong with any of these “differences” or “changes” but they reflect greater changes going on with us. In fact there was one woman dressed in a short pants costume and hat who it turned out was a man I – and very many others in the room – know.
The Couture Council of The Museum at FIT (MFIT) honored Simon Porte Jacquemus, founder and designer at the fashion house JACQUEMUS, with its 2024 Couture Council Award for Artistry of Fashion. He’s a young Parisian designer and you can see in his photo that his style is casual, even more casual than the tieless and pantless among us.
This is not his first award or recognition. He was recipient of the 2014 LVMH Prize (finalist), 2015 LVMH Special Jury Prize, 2024 Neiman Marcus Award for Innovation in the Field of Fashion; and most recently he was decorated as a Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters (Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres), the highest French ministerial award for cultural achievement — the youngest fashion designer to ever receive this honor.
And he started out in 2009 with no formal training. He dedicated his brand in memory of his late mother. He has a passion for art and the decorative arts which inspire him. And this is New York where he’s touching down with his version of fashion. For all.
