Fashion-able

Thanks to a recommendation by Une Nouvelle Vie de Boheme, Miss Bee and I headed over to the Christian Lacroix show at the Musée de la Mode just before New Year's. It was her last day in Paris, and we wanted to do a girls' day of activities: first, returning unneeded purchases to H&M, then wandering along boutiques on rue de Rennes, determined not to spend any more money that we didn't have.

Toward the end of the afternoon we arrived to the museum entrance on rue de Rivoli. Damn. There was a sizable line outside. Normally, I don't do lines. But we really wanted to see the exhibit, so we sucked it in and persevered. The father in front of us (with wife and two daughters) in line seemed to need to prove a guy point by casually puffing on a very slow but extremely billowy cigar for the duration of the wait. And behind us, to complete the sensory overload, were three gum-snapping, oxygen-deprived twenty-boppers sharing the intimate details of their most recent dragueurs, petits-amis, phone calls -- and tawdry hygiene adventures -- with everyone in a 25-foot radius. It was such blessed relief to enter the bustling calm of the museum.

We loved the exhibit, not so much for the Lacroix pieces but for the sheer fashion extravaganza. Poiret, Schiaparelli, Givenchy. One favorite was an exhibit with a mirror on the floor, so you could see up the skirts -- in all fairness, because there were great petticoats to view. Some might find the notion more titillating.

We spent most of the time guessing what era each piece was from, and deciding on our favorites. Every time I scored a Schiaparelli or a Givenchy.

To complete the Paris fashion day, we headed home and watched the DVD of Charade with Audrey Hepburn and Cary Grant. When the credits start rolling at the beginning of the film and you see the words "Miss Hepburn's clothes by Givenchy," you know you're in for a treat. One classic Givenchy outfit after another. And the scenes of Paris in the early 1960s are almost as fetching as the lovely Miss Hepburn.