Christmas partying in NYC & Why we love the Beatrice Inn

gI sometimes wonder if I will ever attain proper grown-up status. Most of my friends in London are married, sprogged up and have vaguely sensible jobs. Me, I'm still behaving as I did in my twenties, and see no agenda for change in the near future.

Last night we had our Big Christmas Night Out. The four of us dressed up (frocking around the Christmas tree as BA put it), feeling all Manhattan sparkly & glam. The English contingent (BA, M & me) have a collective obsession with guacamole, which means that we tend to always eat Mexican food when we go out. (We eat Indian instead of Mexican in the UK: there is one national chain of terrible Mexican resturants - Chiquitos - and that's pretty much it.)

We love Rosa Mexicano because they wheel over a huge guac trolley to your table and make it fresh in a huge pestle & mortar in front of your very eyes. Dos Caminos have a guac station and La Palapa do a pretty good version too, & that's where we went last night. They also do pomegranate and blood orange margaritas. In fact the margaritas are so good that we were singing Christmas carols by the end of the meal last night.

We had lots of parties to go to after supper, but ended up hailing a white stretch limo (I know, I know, but ridiculous fun, & five don't fit in a cab here) to the Crash Mansion on The Bowery to see my great friend Julian (known as Shah), in town briefly to play a gig with hotly-tipped LA band Piel.

Unfortunately they weren't on 'till 1am, so we contented ourselves with a lot of dancing to the bands on beforehand. We were definitely the most over-dressed women in the room - and the only ones on the dance floor for most of the time - but hey, we like making a spectacle of ourselves occasionally.

And then we high tailed it to Beatrice again for more shenanigans. I woke up this morning with The Cure's Boys Don't Cry in my head and remembered doing rather a lot of air punching on the dance floor. Which probably isn't an enormously good idea in a very short mini tunic.

Lovely Doctor Who

I ADORE Doctor Who. It's by far and away my favourite-est ever telly prog. I love it more than CSI AND House put together. I love David Tennant quite a lot too. Yum. And I lust after the Daleks in Forbidden Planet up at Union Square, but can't quite bring myself to buy one. They are a little bit expensive for a very self-indulgent, self-gifted present. (It's not like shoes: at least you can wear them, even if I have been known to display a particularly beautous pair on my living room shelves.)

I am rather unhappy at present as I fly back tomorrow at 8am, very much against my will, for an op on Tuesday and, instead of spending next week being festive in Manhattan will be flat on my back in darkest North London unable to walk for a week. Therefore I am very happy to discover that there is an hour long Doctor Who Christmas special on the Beeb, with special guest Kylie. Bliss. There are always chinks in the darkness.

And this fabulous piece by the lovely Caitlin Moran in today's Times tells you all about it.

BFC announces NewGen Sponsorhip for SS08

The BFC has announced the Topshop New Gen sponsorship for next season. It's a timely reminder that critical adulation doesn't mean pots of money: young designers like Chirs Kane wouldn't be able to show without this funding.

Catwalk sponsorship: Christopher Kane, Duro Olowu, Erdem, Krystof Strozyna, Louise Goldin, Marios Schwab, MeadhamKirchhoff, Todd Lynn

Exhibition sponsorship: Anna Vince, Borba Margo, Charlotte Olympia, David David, Emilio de la Morena, Felder•Felder, Hannah Marshall, House of Holland, Justin Smith, Nicholas Kirkwood, Peter Pilotto and Poltock & Walsh.

I'm particulary pleased to see lovely Nicholas Kirkwood on this list. I've been a supporter of his since the get go. After he left Cordwainers, he worked for Philip Treacy, all the while planning setting up his own label in 2005. He is way in the vanguard of shoe design, setting the agenda for footwear design way before any of his competitors. This summer he won the prestigious AltaRoma Vogue Italia award for accessories design.

Shoes by Nicholas Kirkwood

Janet Collin Vivienne bag

This is the Vivienne bag from the wonderful Janet Collin, and my Christmas present to myself.Actually, my one will be in black, but I won't get it 'till I return to London for Christmas. Janet has a background in product design, and has worked on handbag collaborations with Louis Vuitton, Matthew Williamson and US brand Banana Republic.

Most famously she created some of Mulberry's most iconic bags, including the famous Jaquetta, Kiera and Cassidy styles. She has her own label, based in Newcastle upon Tyne England. Although I'm not a big fan of the 'C' word, celebrities like Madonna carry her handbags too.You can see more of her bags here.

Buggy Blogger

Having ISSUES with Blogger. My title picture has gone on a diet, & is a tenth its usual size, and a photo I sent as a test for Blogger mobile has, so far, failed to load. Thing is, I have no idea what the photo is... so apologies if any random photo has appeared overnight!

LLG xx

La Grande Bouffe

I have to stop eating. So far this week, I've eaten three courses for supper on Monday night at Waverly Inn, had hot dogs from Crif, Thai from Why Curry in the East Village, dumplings from the Dumpling Man, lunched through three courses at Gotham Bar & Grill, eaten supper at Teany, Moby's restaurant in the Lower East Side and finished off with cupcakes from the Sugar Sweet Sunshine Bakery.

Diet

Diet

Diet

Sod it.

I'll just wear Spanx

Adorable eBay bargain ($14.99!)

Trolling around on eBay I just came across this dress which I adore. It just says party to me - and I loathe the festive prediliction for acres of bare flesh, and bosoms spilling out of strapless tops: so much sexier to cover up with a suggestion. Unfortunately, Mother Nature saw fit to bless me with a very, very generous bust (perched on flamingo legs - dressing myself is problematic), and so it's never going to fit me. Please someone buy it! (And tell me if you do)

Close to the Bone jewellery collection launches

This is the beautiful Julio necklace from new London jewellery designers Close to the Bone. Set up by Angela Gosnell & Ila de Mello Kamath, they design unique jewellery using unusual combinations of semi-precious stones, seeds, knitting and crochet.

Everything comes beautifully packaged and they offer free delivery on Christmas orders within the UK, as well as the option to order customised variations of their pieces.

Karl Lagerfeld & Amy Wino

Oh for crying out loud. I am so fed up with Karl Lagerfeld's muse bandwagon. It seems like every other month he announces that some high profile female celebrity is his new muse. WGSN ran this quote today, "She is a style icon. She is a beautiful, gifted artist. And I very much like her hairdo. I took it as an inspiration. Because, in fact, it was also Brigitte Bardot's hairdo in the late Fifties and Sixties. And now Amy has made it her own style. So, when I saw her, I knew it was the right moment. Amy... she is the new Brigitte."

ACK. As I have said before, dear Karl would appoint Princess Fiona as his new muse if he thought it politic.

A Manhattan birthday

If I had to plan my perfect birthday party, then Thursday would probably have been it. I’ve never, ever been a fan of the restaurant/dancing model in London. It’s expensive: at least £150/$300 by the time you’ve paid for dinner, drinks & taxis, and the scene is so fragmented that any feeling of an intimate evening slides away, especially once you’ve had to engage with travelling half way across the city to get from a good restaurant to a half way decent club, one that isn't filled with drunk Royals, trustafarians, City boys, vomiting teens or sleezebag men.

Here it’s a completely different story. Manhattan is so tiny that you can walk from place to place, at worst hop in a $10 cab for a fifteen minute journey. Venues have a better mix of customers, as it’s cheaper to eat out, so good, stylish restaurants don't have that curiously London clientele: Russians, hedge funders and your parents' contemporaries. Frankly, Manhattan is just more fun, younger, hipper & cheaper(so long as you avoid the weekends).

I postponed my partying as L flew in from London the day after my birthday and I wanted to celebrate with her. So I invited fifteen friends to Soho House in Meatpacking on Thursday for pre-supper drinks from 7-9pm. L & I managed to arrive on time, & bagged the three over-sized squishy velvet sofas under the Ron Arad anglepoise installation in the middle of the Drawing Room, ordered Champagne for all, and hoped people would turn up. (Hipsters may raise a sardonic eyebrow at SH, but hell, there's plenty of room, the drinks are good, and you don't HAVE to talk to the i-bankers.)

And, thank goodness, everyone came. The boys looked a little over-whelmed at the sheer volume of ravishing females in stunning frocks. Then again, not unexpected as it was a fashion heavy gathering, including the beautiful designer Francoise Olivas (check out her wonderful collection here), and the girls behind Heidi Klein, in town to meet editors.

Seven bottles later, I staggered off with five girlfriends to Morandi in the West Village for supper at 10pm. Part of the usually dismal McNally stable (Pastis, Balthazar), the food here is actually good, and the wine list better than. There was a snapper in from New York Mag who cldn't keep his lenses away from the girls all through the meal.

We ate bruschetta with super fresh mozzarella di bufala, & a dish of fried olives. Nearly everybody had the special: a chicken liver risotto and I had a double order of the appetizer special: artichokes, peppers, more of that creamy mozzarella, tomatoes. Simple food, perfectly done, washed down with quite a lot of a very good Dolcetta d'Alba.

Half way through my gorgeous friend Christina arrived with a stupendous present for me: a wonderful, light as a feather, cream cash-llama scarf from her latest Oxenberg collection.

After blowing out the birthday candle on my chocolate hazelnut torta (thank you girls) we bundled up (did I mention it was snowing?) and walked through the narrow, tree-lined streets of the Victorian West Village to the Beatrice Inn for very naughty shenanigans.

Hidden away between some brownstones, at the top of the metal stairway to the basement entrance, the bouncers gave us the usual Beatrice line, “Whose party are you here for?”. The only obvious answer was, ‘mine’. After a beat they waved the five of us downstairs, where we found a large china greyhound to stash the coats & presents behind.

Beatrice, owned by Chloe Sevigny’s brother Paul, is a down & dirty dive bar & club with just two rooms filled with furniture & pictures seemingly scavenged from a carboot sale by a blind man, a tiny bar, and a pocket handkerchief dance floor & DJ booth in a grubby back room.

The hangers out are models, rockers, actors, film makers, hedge funders pretending to be rockers, and generally creative people pretending they aren’t enormously successful. There’s just one loo (with a useful-looking wooden table in the corner), everyone smokes like chimneys, and the music is a just-up-my-street mix of Pulp, The Clash, classics like Spirit in the Sky, and the dance music we jumped around to in the early 90s.

After flirting, smoking, drinking and a lot of dancing (flailing?), we tumbled out into the cold at 4.30am when the place closed. M was wobbling like a new-born foal on her super high heels so we found a nice boy to prop her up and we all walked back through the narrow streets to Perry to see her safely home.

In between dropping M & then CA off on W10th, I managed to get thoroughly kissed on a street corner by J, a very tipsy boy we had met earlier in Beatrice, who insisted on walking L & I back to the East Village. It’s always good to have a sherpa to carry one’s birthday presents, even if one does shut the door in his face on arrival with no, um, tip. (He so knew that was going to happen).

And oh dear, the hangovers the next day. (Lola, darling, however did you manage to get to work?)

I wore: the shortest ever black washed silk V neck, cropped sleeve tunic, with black matt 80 denier opaque Wolfords & my vertiginous black patent dominatrix Pierre Hardy platforms heels (so comfy I danced for three hours and then walked home in them), and a huge Giles gold studded black plastic bracelet. Bright pink lipstick and lots of messy blonde hair.

A short break...

Thank you blog-ettes for all the wonderful birthday greetings! There has been some bug with Blogspot and today I have discovered 19 unapproved comments in my moderation box which hadn't been emailed to me. But, worst of all, my laptop died on Wednesday and, busy like a bee, have not been able to get to a cafe to blog, write or file copy. Thank goodness tho for Blackberries, remote Facebook and, now, my flatmate's second laptop.

Blog-sploitation*

When I started writing this blog at the beginning of March 07, it was only ever intended to be a record of my time in Manhattan. Since then I have picked up an entirely unexpected constituency and am thrilled by the sheer volume of readers each day. Month on month both my page views & unique visitors double. With this rise in exposure have come emails from potential advertisers: both Agent Provocateur & Net a Porter have approached me in the last month and, today, a blog syndication company asked me to join their network.

I am still in two minds about advertising: I'm not sure that my volume of traffic would generate enough income to make it worth losing my independence. This is because, as a commentator also reminded me, internet advertising for the small, but high quality (!) blog is a somewhat one-sided: the advertiser gets a permanent presence for basically jack, but I get very little recompense.

However, where blog syndication is concerned, forget it. The business model is that they ask you to sign a very wide-ranging licence allowing them to freely edit and then to syndicate your work, royalty-free, in return for the added exposure your blog would receive. The blogger has no control over which parts of the blog they syndicate or to where it will be syndicated.

Whilst I am not, in principle, against the idea of reaching out to new readers in this way, what offends enormously is that the syndication company is paid for the blog content they provide to external media sources, without in turn paying the bloggers.

Of course, I understand that there are 60 million or so blogs out there, and that many people would be ecstatic to be picked out in this way. I am indeed flattered but, dislike the way that bloggers are supposed to be SO grateful at the exposure that they will relinquish their rights - and payment.

I am not in the habit of letting other people make money off the back of my own labours without recompensing me accordingly. (I should make it clear that there is a very small amount of money that can be made through this company, but it is truly, truly negligable). Ethically, I believe that their offer is unacceptable and I will not be taking up their offer to join their network.*

*(Of course, added traffic would make advertising more lucrative, but this is a side effect and still does not address the matter of the blog syndication company making money off the bloggers copy.

*ps I have changed the title of this post at the genius suggestion of the wonderful Nonsense on Stilettos

IT'S MY BIRTHDAY!

It is my birthday today and I am feeling very weepily happy as I hadn't expected many people to remember as I am so far from home. But, of course, technology has made 'far' a relative concept, and Facebook means it is difficult to forget a birthday (unless, like me, your notifications are at the bottom of a page and you end up forgetting your best friend's birthday last month - of which I am very ashamed).

So I have been innundated with an extraordinary amount of Facebook messages & emails, and received two splendid bunches of flowers. Best of all my two year old goddaughter Amelia sang me Happy Birthday. I am feeling very blessed right now at having so many thoughtful and funny people in my life.

Still, my lovely ex-boyfriend R summed up the age in which we live rather brilliantly:

"How I hate Facebook. It has in an instant degraded the kudos of people like me, who always remember friends' birthdays, by automating that once meaningful feat of recall. Have a wonderful day."

Normally I thrown the mother of all cocktail parties chez moi for 100 or so people, with my patent martinis made by lovely barpeople, and all my girlfriends in fabulous frocks looking delightful. This year I have invited twenty or so New York friends to drink some pre-supper Champagne with me at Soho House. It will certainly be more civilised than my London parties but, I am sure, given the brilliant friends I have made over here, no less enjoyable.

And ooh hoo I have a GREAT party frock to wear too. (Thank you CA for coming shopping on Bleecker today!)

Liberty at Dover Street Market

These Liberty of London evening bags are fantastic: I think a shot of colour looks fabulous against black and, even better, clashing against this season's colourful cocktail dresses. I didn't pick on these Liberty pieces because they match the name of my blog*, but because I admire the way that they are moving the brand into the 21st century without losing sight of their identity (Hello Jaeger).

Blowing up the iconic art nouveau Ianthe print from the Liberty archives in this way looks fresh and avoids the feeling of cutesy that haunted Liberty for so long. It's also particularly clever to make these brilliant colourways available exclusively at Dover Street Market.

Without a doubt, DSM is London, & possibly Europe's most exciting retail space now. Nominated for Best Retail Concept at the British Fashion Awards last week, they was robbed by Marc Jacobs (woo hoo - opening a store. Really innovative), as I have complained at length already, both on this blog & in the real, bylined world.

*(The name of my blog has nothing to do with the Liberty of London store)

Guilty Pleasure: Gossip Girl

If you are female, under 35 and live in Manhattan, chances are that you watch television's newest vice: Gossip Girl. It's a sherbet light froth, more believable than The OC, & as addictive as 90210 in its heyday. (Now I'm showing my age), Set on in the world of private schools, & millionaire parents, these High School-ers exist on cocktails & thin air, shag for, well, Manhattan, & party for America. It's no wonder it's become so popular: it's executive producer is Josh Schwartz, who conceived The OC.

I may be (sometimes) a proper grown up with a serious job in the fashion world, but this is my weekly dose of escapism. All my girlfriends here are equally obsessed - and we are in our 30's and, I suppose, could be said to know better. But sod it, I like fluff as much as I do more cerebral pursuits, and I'm happy to say so.

Gossip Girl is based on the popular novel series of the same name written by Cecily von Ziegesar, which shines a spotlight on the lives of six teenagers attending private school on Manhattan's Upper East Side.


Blair and sidekicks.

Serena van der Woodsen (Blake Lively) and best friend Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester) are the two key female leads, and slated to be the Mischa Bartons of their generation. Blair's boyfriend Nate Archibald (Chace Crawford), trust funder Chuck Bass -(played by you'd-never-guess-it-but-he's-English Ed Westwick) and the outsider Humphrey siblings from hipster Williamsburg Dan (Penn Badgley) and Jenny (Taylor Momsen) complete the key characters. The series is narrated by "Gossip Girl" (the voice of Kristen Bell), who writes an onlooker's blog which continually stirs up trouble.



Serena, Dan, Nate & Chuck.

The costumes rock too, less costume-y than Sex & The City, which went beyond parody in the last couple of series, generally making guys of the actresses. The designer is Eric Daman, who was an assistant designer on SATC, and also styles for i-D. Although I've yet to meet a schoolgirl who wears $900 Clergerie boots or $500 sequin Tory Burch frocks, they look hot enough on Blake Lively aka Serena van der Woodsen to make me seriously consider some copy-cat retail.

And it's not just the clothes that rock, the music does too. In the same way that she broke niche bands on The OC to a wider audience (Death Cab for Cutie, the Shins), Gossip Girl's music supervisor Alexandra Patsavas, has picked up on new NYC bands like The Virgins, who she mixes in with acts like The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Amy Winehouse, Feist, Air & The Bravery.

It certainly has its ridiculous side: all the mothers look about five years older than their daughters, which isn't surprising considering that Serena & Blair both look 25 rather than seventeen. All the teens drinks like fishes, and have no problems getting into bars & clubs where they suck down martinis like Kool-Aid.



Serena: Seventeen, going on thirty.

Rumour has it that Gossip Girl's been bought by ITV2. Every time I try to describe it to my London-based girlfriends, all I have to do is say , "better than 90210" and I have instant converts: I predict the next UK cult show. (Let's just hope the Writers' Strike is resolved soon - they've only shot 12 out of the 22 episodes slated for this season.)

Christmas presents

I am feeling super smug as I had actually bought all my Christmas presents by the 1st December. This is unprecedented: I am more of a desperate rush on Christmas Eve type of girl, but living 3741 miles from home means I need to be a little more efficient this year. It also helped that I had a massive deadline to meet last week, which meant I royally procrastinated and got a lot of admin done instead of writing. C'est la vie.

I have ten children & babies to buy Christmas presents for, and four of them have birthdays near Christmas too. For the adults, 75% of people are getting books because they can be ordered on-line and delivered to my sister in London, so I don't have to schlep them across the Atlantic, but I do have some genius American presents: I'm particularly pleased with a leather baseball glove and ball for Miss P's stepson and a whole family of Little Red Riding Hood fingerbobs for his sister from Dinosaur Hill, a teeny toy shop in the East Village. I've bought my godson a Tiffany piggy bank with blue spots. They aren't expensive over here, (& I'm staying with his parents for a week). I think it's a perfect godmother-ly present: it'll (hopefully) teach him thrift and his mama will appreciate the Tiffany gesture.

Hokum

January is a pretty dull month. If you happen to find yourself in London, then may I suggest that you relieve the pre-fashion week boredom by booking yourself a ticket to Hokum, master magician Pete Firman's show at The Bloomsbury Theatre on Friday 25 January 2008.

Thank you.

Sunday brunch

Well, Mr W was beyond charming, and we had a delightful - and delicious - lunch at Café Cluny in the West Village. I worked my way through asparagus with chanterelles, hollandaise and a poached egg, with a huge pile of French fries on the side to mop it up. There may have been some frisée & leaves for texture, but I wasn't so interested in the salad component...

Cluny is only three blocks from here but I nearly went arse over tit every other step on the icy pavements. Mr W insisted on walking me home, so I clung onto his arm, but I am afraid there was zero chemistry on my side. Thing is, he's a proper grown-up, in his forties, whilst what I really need are some bad, naughty going-out male friends who want to paint the town red and misbehave, regardless of age. And, whether a boyfriend or a friend, I need a boy who can throw snowballs, chuckle at nothing, eat a lot, and jump around at gigs. I don't think Mr W is one of them.

Romantic Manhattan

Oh it's snowing! There are big fat snowflakes drifting past my top floor flat. All I can see from my bed are snow laden branches and the grey, snow-filled sky. I was woken up by the sound of the neighbours scraping the pavements. I'm staying on Perry in the West Village for five nights at my friend M's beautiful and very grown-up apartment whilst she is on business in London. The rooms have cornicing, architraves and wide sash windows and there is a working fireplace. I feel as though I have been teleported into the New York of Edith Wharton.

It's minus four outside (or 24F - I do love that you can choose between 'English' or 'Metric' on weather.com to get either farenheit or centrigrade readings), and the snow storm is predicted to last until Tuesday. Meanwhile I have a lunch date with Mr W. I'm not sure exactly what kind of lunch date it is: a friend in London asked if I was single and then introduced us to each other in an email, so I am presuming this is a kind of unspoken blind date. Although whether Mr W knows this is another matter. Still, Sunday brunch in the Victorian haven of the Village with an interesting man in a snow storm. That sounds fun.

I'm hungry now tho, so I'm going to make a huge pile of eggy bread )French toast w/out the sugar & syrup) and eat it in bed with the papers, whilst listening to my new music.

Saturday occupation

I had a perfect Saturday, which ended up in the Union Square cinema with a bag of popcorn watching the sugar-sweet new Disney romance-fest, Enchanted, starring MacDreamy & Amy Adams, and a hamming it up Susan Sarandon & Timothy Spall.

I spent the day writing, checked out Project Runway for the first time on TV (so much better then the English one), and then popped on my heels and cabbed it to Sushi Samba (made famous by Sex & the City) on Park Avenue & 20th for girls' supper. Friday & Saturday nights in the city are flooded with weekend warriors. Everywhere is rammed, and the streets, especially in the East Village, are filled with drunk twenty years olds. So, a quiet, healthy, alcohol-free supper is exactly the way forward.

The girls were on their way home by nine fifteen, so I trotted down to Union Square to Virgin and bought the new Killers & The Cribs albums (both excellent), plus some My Bloody Valentine and Louder Than Bombs - The Smiths' 1987 America-only album, both of which I have on cassette. Does that show my age? After the movie, I marched home to the West Village in the sub-zero temperatures, dancing along to Editors and The Pixies.