11it can also be a museum of treasures;
those of us unable to ‘‘shop’’ our closets as
though they were luxury stores can do so
vicariously in Rockmore’s. Her wardrobe
also has the other appeal of a museum: It
feels archival, historical, not amassed but
curated. Combining its contents in new
ways involves sharing her expertise with
the youthful cohort on social media — the
kind of fashion mentorship that used to be
mediated through things like magazines,
for which unseen adult editors might dic-
tate the styling of teenage models.
Now, social media allows anyone to dig
into her wardrobe and explain an intimate
self to a public. There is, accordingly, no
dearth of women and girls making jump-
cut videos of their outfi ts. If Rockmore’s
years set her apart, it’s not because she
looks good ‘‘for her age,’’ whatever that
means; it is because, at 54, she is very much
dressing for fun and self-expression. This
puts her in a category traditionally left out
of narratives about what makes a woman
fashionable — a category that has pro-
duced some of the most remarked-upon
fashion infl uencers of recent years.
As Rockmore has said in interviews,
50-year-old women tend to know who
they are and what they want. They are
not alien to their own lives, roaming
around confused about how everything
got to be the way it is now, as if freshly
emerged from cryogenic chambers. This
is a vision of middle age that the inex-
plicable new ‘‘Sex and the City’’ reboot,‘‘And Just Like That.. .,’’ leans into with
surprising malice: Its characters spend
the fi rst few episodes being baff led by
how the world has changed. In the origi-
nal series, the fi ctional Carrie Bradshaw’s
closet and wardrobe were major motifs
— symbolizing her innermost self and her
gutsy public persona. In the new series,
a 55-year-old Carrie sorts through those
same garments with the aid of her friend
Charlotte’s teenage daughter, for whom
they represent possible future identities.
When Carrie meets a neighbor much like
her younger self, she is initially intimidat-
ed, desperate not to seem old and square.
But after the neighbor opens up to her,
Carrie has an awkward revelation, put-
ting on an Atelier Versace gown valued atAmong the amenities
in Rockmore’s
closet: UV-treated
windows and
humidity controls.Among her previous
design work:
Disney children’s
sleepwear, produced
in Pakistan.