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Logan's Style Watch
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FENDI AT THE BOLSHOI, A DREAM COME TRUE
by Logan Bentley Lessona
Moscow, November 4, 1999 -- "To show our collection at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow is a dream come true for us," says Carla Fendi, "When we were little girls our mother was buying furs from Russia, but we could never have imagined that one day we would present a fashion show at this temple of art."
She is radiant after the public has applauded the fall-winter 1999-2000 collections which included sables bought at the famous St. Petersburg (formerly Leningrad) fur auctions. "We were invited by the Italian minister for foreign trade Piero Frassino to participate stage a fashion show to inaugurate a week's conference of the Italian-Russian Chamber of Commerce. We knew that Versace had presented a collection at the Kremlin and we were interested but our agent said that anybody who pays can host an event there, that we should look for another venue. Of course with our love of the arts we thought immediately of the Bolshoi, the famous neoclassic theater built in 1821, but we were told that a private event had never taken place there."
To Fendi's delight, the permissions were granted, and the show was held in the large white neoclassic foyer. "We don't like to present our collection on the stage," explains Fendi, "Because the spectators can't see our creations up close. We don't even like the traditional runway, so for several years we have created a kind of labyrinth, where everybody has a front row seat, and can even reach out and touch the garments as the models pass by." That's what Fendi did in the foyer under large glass chandeliers, the white columns trimmed in gilt, to the delight of the audience of three hundred hand-picked guests.
In the olden days before fashion shows became media events, they took place in the ateliers of the designers, buyers, press, and clients sat on gilt chairs, a woman announced each outfit by number and the models carried little cards with the number printed on them. Clients were provided with little notepads and gilt pencils so they could write the numbers of clothes they wanted to buy. The clothes and not the models were the focus and it was essential to see the details up close.
Carla Fendi feels at home in Moscow. She stays at the Hotel Kempiski which overlooks Red Square and the Cathedral of St. Basil, and never misses a meal at her favorite restaurant. "I'm almost a teetolaer," she says, "But I just love vodka. And I can't resist a meal of caviar with blinis and sour cream and vodka. Even during the days of the Iron Curtain, we have been involved with Russia. When we were girls our mother Adele always told us what our agent had bought at the Leningrad fur auctions. When our sister Paola grew up she often attended them personally. She told us that once a very special lot of sables was sold after a fierce battle. Nobody knows for whom the agents are buying, but when the auctioneer banged his gavel he said that he was sure that only the company with the double FFs could have won such a magnificent lot."
At the celebratory dinner after the show offered by Italian Ambassador Giancarlo Aragona and his wife, however, Carla and her husband Candido Sperone ate Italian dishes: risotto al radicchio, braised beef, and spinach. "I felt a great emotion at the show at the Bolshoi," says Fendi. "Moscow is an important market for us, we opened a Fendi shop here in 1998 on Kutuzovsky Prospekt and because of the freezing weather furs are especially appreciated here." But Carla's travels were not over, the next morning she left for Tokyo and "Fendi Magic Box 2000," an event to celebrate the new millenium.
© 1999 Logan Bentley Lessona
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