The Cod is Everywhere!

Grace Coddington is appearing everywhere and nowhere as charmingly as she does here, on the iD cover. Promoting her new book, Grace: A Memoir, The Cod dishes the dirt on Anna Wintour in a few revealing moments:
Every so often I have lunch with Anna at her request. These days, though, I get worked up beforehand, usually thinking, 'This is finally the time she'll say, "You're getting on a bit. You're looking tired. I think you should take it easy,"' as a prelude to gently asking me to step down. In fact, the last time we went out, I dared to say, 'I thought you were going to tell me to leave.' At which point Anna laughed and said, 'No, as long as I'm here, you will be, too.' 

"I think (the Ben Stiller shot by Annie Leibovitz for a couture story in Paris) was decided upon, really, because Anna had a crush on Ben. She gets these occasional crushes - Ben, Puff Daddy, Roger Federer."

"In the end I think Anna gave up on my styling covers since I'm not good with famous people. We used to use the occasional model, but the sales difference was so marked between them and celebrities that it's now 100 per cent pop and movie stars. Fashion is just a part of what the magazine stands for today, which may be hard on old-timers like myself but is definitely the modern way. I'm grateful to have lived through the 10 years or so I did at American Vogue when fashion was the most important element."

Syllabubs and Jellies

"Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine,
Yet let's be merry; we'll have tea and toast;
Custards for supper, and an endless host
Of syllabubs and jellies and mince-pies,
And other such ladylike luxuries."
- Percy Bysshe Shelley

Weekend Reading List

After a proper ladies' lunch at M (soup and salad) with Ms Ong yesterday, we trundled into the Prada at Ion so I could pick up Prada: Creativity, Modernity, Innovation. The proverbial tome, it's a wonder the paper carrier didn't crack right open. And then I zipped back in the rain in a navy blue cab and have been studying the fascinating book since. This 708-page book on the nearly century-old brand is slipcased in Prada’s signature navy and divided into sections like Past, Inside, Stage and Product that catelogue the company’s output, from fashion design to runway shows, including Albert Watson and Brigitte Lacombe’s photographs of factory workers sewing, swatches of fabrics and ensembles from seasons past. The Place, Scene, Outside and Prada+ sections highlight the company’s architectural epicenters, and the art-centric Fondazione Prada. It's exhaustive, and especially useful for Prada fans, as Mrs Prada's entire ouevre is here (including, in one section, thumbnails of every outfit from every collection since the beginning of her career). Marc Jacobs should be pawing through this right now for inspiration.
I'm also reading again Fay Weldon's (1996) Worst Fears, given to me by BG on 12 June 1997. It's inscribed in a red ball-pen scrawl:

"To Tough Beauty and Sloppy Slop, I actually completed it! Not a very mean feat . All of it was done in the plane. Eva Air. Frightful, except for the seat, roomy."

On a side note: Isn't the cavernous Prada store at the Ion simply glorious (It's the store in Ion for me)? The dramatic, polished, black staircase is the last word in... steps and the assistant store manager twinkled his eyes at me and was impossibly... saucy and makes you want to buy it all. The Ion TWG is also really nice, the staff wonderfully trained, and of course the tea!