New York Fashion Week, Dinner with Anna & One Missing Jumper
From the Duchess
There are certain weeks of the year when New York becomes completely irresistible.
Fashion Week is one of them.
Everyone is late. Nobody eats. Entire restaurants are occupied by people wearing sunglasses after dark.
Naturally, I adore it.
I arrived on Tuesday with my “OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW BETTER” JUMPER, three dresses, six pairs of shoes, one completely unnecessary evening coat.
More on that later.
Dinner with Anna
Dinner that evening was with Anna Wintour.
I had been told the restaurant was “very relaxed”, which in Fashion Week language means everyone has spent approximately four hours deciding how to look as though they have made no effort whatsoever.
I chose black.
One should never attempt to out-fashion Fashion Week.
There was champagne.
There were people whose faces I recognised but whose names I absolutely did not.
And there were several conversations conducted entirely through raised eyebrows.
Anna, naturally, missed nothing.
Neither did I.
Although I pretended to.
It is an extremely useful social skill.
The Missing Jumper
The following morning I discovered that my OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW BETTER jumper had disappeared.
This particular jumper has always seemed rather appropriate for me.
Not because I behave especially badly.
I simply believe that once you are old enough to know better, you are also old enough to decide whether knowing better is remotely interesting.
I telephoned the House.
No jumper.
I checked my suitcase again.
Still nothing.
At which point the Daughter sent me a message.
“Don’t be cross.”
A phrase which, in my experience, guarantees that one is about to become extremely cross.
It transpired that somebody had borrowed it.
For J.Press.
For the catwalk.
Without mentioning this small detail to me.
There it was.
My jumper.
Walking down a New York runway as though it had a career of its own.
OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW BETTER.
Quite.
There is something pleasing about a piece of very English knitwear finding itself surrounded by the polished chaos of New York Fashion Week.
Scottish lambswool.
Knitted in England.
An impertinent message embroidered across the front.
And suddenly, Manhattan.
The Duchess Approves
The House has never been particularly interested in fashion for fashion’s sake.
Trends are exhausting.
Good knitwear is not.
Nor, thankfully, is a sense of humour.
From the Duchess’s Wardrobe
The OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW BETTER jumper is knitted in England from pure Scottish lambswool and embroidered with a statement that becomes increasingly useful with age.
OLD ENOUGH TO KNOW BETTER
Eccentric English knitwear. Made in England.
Worn in New York.
Borrowed without permission.
Sent down a J.Press catwalk.
And eventually returned to the Duchess.
Which, frankly, was the important part.