Reflections on a Lifetime of Collecting the Most Beautiful Clothes
How do you put a price on a lifetime's collection of the most beautiful clothes made in the western world? I've learnt you can--I recently donated over 500 ensembles collected from the late 80s until last year to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. It gave me great pleasure to do so as it assures that my fashion story will be told. I am posting 11 photographs. Seven of the ensembles are now at the de Young. The clothes were professionally appraised, which required me to look at each garment and recall why I bought it, where I wore it, which then of course required me to go back into all the different times of my life--as a young mother and wife of a famous philosopher living on the Stanford University campus, to an Internet editor, hitting all the international fashion shows, to a serious haute couture buyer and finally, with the realisation that I had amassed an important collection, a chronicler of that collection (the book Electric Fashion with photographs by Frederic Aranda). Over three decades of memories, to be exact. The de Young will mount an exhibition in 2020 called "San Francisco Elegance" which is long overdue. If my donation has helped, then I am happy, because San Francisco is a truly elegant city. For those of you who wonder why I bought so many clothes, you are not true collectors. True collectors understand--it is an obsession to find the perfect piece to refine the story you are telling through your collection. For those of you who who wonder why I gave them away, I will tell you this: I was caring for them as though they were my children. Nadia came from Sacramento each month to assure they were all in good shape, that the temperature in the storage room was correct, the humidifier was working and that no insects existed. The clothes lived on elevated racks on padded hangers under gauze and muslin. One day I realised these children had to leave the nest and go to their next life--a more academic one to be sure--but under the care of the de Young's Curator in Charge, Jill D'Alessandro, I can be sure their new lives will be as good as their first lives with me.
For the record, photographs 1,3,4,5,6,8 and 10 are by Frederic Aranda. 7 and 9 are by Drew Altizer. The last photograph is a candid shot, taken in a limo in Washington DC with my late husband Patrick Suppes and my daughter Lexi who is now a psychologist at NYU. In this picture we were being driven to the White House, where Pat was to be given the National Medal of Science. It's been a wonderful life in fashion, and now I'm delighted to share my collection with the people of San Francisco and the world.
How do you put a price on a lifetime's collection of the most beautiful clothes made in the western world? I've learnt you can--I recently donated over 500 ensembles collected from the late 80s until last year to the Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco. It gave me great pleasure to do so as it assures that my fashion story will be told. I am posting 11 photographs. Seven of the ensembles are now at the de Young. The clothes were professionally appraised, which required me to look at each garment and recall why I bought it, where I wore it, which then of course required me to go back into all the different times of my life--as a young mother and wife of a famous philosopher living on the Stanford University campus, to an Internet editor, hitting all the international fashion shows, to a serious haute couture buyer and finally, with the realisation that I had amassed an important collection, a chronicler of that collection (the book Electric Fashion with photographs by Frederic Aranda). Over three decades of memories, to be exact. The de Young will mount an exhibition in 2020 called "San Francisco Elegance" which is long overdue. If my donation has helped, then I am happy, because San Francisco is a truly elegant city. For those of you who wonder why I bought so many clothes, you are not true collectors. True collectors understand--it is an obsession to find the perfect piece to refine the story you are telling through your collection. For those of you who who wonder why I gave them away, I will tell you this: I was caring for them as though they were my children. Nadia came from Sacramento each month to assure they were all in good shape, that the temperature in the storage room was correct, the humidifier was working and that no insects existed. The clothes lived on elevated racks on padded hangers under gauze and muslin. One day I realised these children had to leave the nest and go to their next life--a more academic one to be sure--but under the care of the de Young's Curator in Charge, Jill D'Alessandro, I can be sure their new lives will be as good as their first lives with me.
For the record, photographs 1,3,4,5,6,8 and 10 are by Frederic Aranda. 7 and 9 are by Drew Altizer. The last photograph is a candid shot, taken in a limo in Washington DC with my late husband Patrick Suppes and my daughter Lexi who is now a psychologist at NYU. In this picture we were being driven to the White House, where Pat was to be given the National Medal of Science. It's been a wonderful life in fashion, and now I'm delighted to share my collection with the people of San Francisco and the world.
Rodarte
Rodarte
Ungaro
Christian Lacroix
Commes de Garcons
Alexander McQueen
Christian Dior
Rodarte
Blackgama, Hermes, Yves Saint Laurent and Chanel
