18 THE CUT | MARCH 2–15, 2020a few years ago,before Matthew Schneier
worked at the Cut, we were colleagues on the
fashion circuit. One bleak February after-
noon, we were walking along 52nd Street between
shows and found ourselves in front of one of mid-
century New York’s dining temples, La Grenouille.
“Let’s have a power lunch!,” I suggested—half-joke,
half-dare—knowing it was a bit reckless to enter the
golden, floral glow of the bar area, where for more
than five decades the rich and influential (not to
mention the rich and idle) have closed deals over
pike quenelles and white Burgundy. Luckily for our
credit cards and our deadlines, the restaurant was
closed for a private event that day. But I always
wanted to go back, and when Matthew suggested it
as the place to shoot New York’s rising power players
for our fashion portfolio, I was happy we’d invented
an excuse. At the Cut, we try to show off seasonal
fashion in unexpected ways. “Let’s just take the
money and throw a party and photograph that” has
been my perennial suggestion for every “FashionEDITOR’S LETTERFollow the PartyOn Kuan:MIU
MIUvest and shirt,
at 11 E. 57th St.;MAX
MARApolka-dot
vest,at 813 Madison
Ave.;OMEGAwatch,
at omegawatches
.com.;FERNANDO
JORGEearrings,at
Bergdorf Goodman,
754 Fifth Ave.Issue” we’ve ever made. I’m happy
to say we finally achieved it, over
lunch, in midtown.
The power lunch these days is
more often than not a to-go salad
from Pret or Juice Press hoovered at
your desk. But even if power—and
the people who earn and wield it—
looks different in 2020, what would
a mix of the Establishment and the
rookies look like? We brought in the
new and kept the regulars, and sud-
denly Jeremy O. Harris was swap-
ping faux fur and war stories with
the horse breeder and pizza doyenne
Joan Sbarro as Ralph Rucci and Ali-
son Roman looked on. Set the stage,
and a place at the table, and connec-
tions get made in every direction.
Whenever young people ask me
what they can do to get ahead in
fashion, I give them the same
advice: Follow the party. Find the
people you like to have a good time
with, because eventually those will
be your comrades and collabora-
tors, and the best scenes always
start there. This issue is full of New
York institutions that perpetually
seem up for a good time. The crew
of Opening Ceremony gives a look
back at the store on the brink of its
closing—a space they christened
with a blowout so big it became a
demolition. Our fair cover lady,
Fran Drescher, is a one-woman
Fellini movie. Molly Fischer lays into the bright orgy
of pink and brass that defines “millennial aesthetics,”
only to discover an insidious commercialism under
all the cheerful neon mantras that took over the
world. And if mantras aren’t your thing, there’s
always the option of bathing naked in infrared light,
which, as Melissa Dahl explains, might cure ...
almost everything?
If that’s too advanced woo-woo wellness for you,
try one of the candles we commissioned from artist
Janie Korn, based on fashion director Rebecca
Ramsey’s favorite picks from some of spring’s best
collections. Somehow, the wax figures, in their lumpy
finery, capture that feeling of being face-meltingly
drunk on fashion. And if you can’t be at the big party,
you can always make your own by slipping into a
place you don’t quite belong with someone equally
mischievous. A scene is born.
—Stella BugbeePhotographs by PARI DUKOVICSTYLING BY DORA FUNG; FASHION ASSISTANCE BY BECKY AKINYODE, JOEL PARADA, NATALIE MATSUDA; HAIR BY NEAL PITTMAN USING ORIBE AND LISA RAQUEL USING RENÉ FURTERER AT SEE MANAGEMENT; MAKEUP BY MARYGENE WALKER USING CHANEL AND ASHLEIGH CIUCCI USING MAC COSMETICS AT SEE MANAGEMENT; TAILORING BY LUCY PAYNEOn Bodmer-Turner:
CHANEL jacket,
at 15 E. 57th St.;
EILEEN FISHER
shirt, at eileenfisher
.co
HE
neimanmarcus.com;
STUART WEITZMAN
shoes, at saks.com.Simone Bodmer-Turner (right)
and Gia Kuan (below)
at La Grenouille.