Fashion parties usually go something like this: walk in, grab champagne, stare the crowd up and down, check out whose who and what covetable new designer they're wearing. This party, the one for Ari Seth Cohen's new book based on his blog "Advanced Style," was a little different.
Instead of young up-and-comers, this event (hosted by Nowness) was filled with something very different: well-dressed, even avant garde and over the top women aged 60-90 that Ari has been photographing for his blog throughout the last several years, two of which he's spent creating a documentary about the fascinating lives and unforgettable style of his subjects.
When we spoke to Ari briefly at the event, all he told us was that the night was "really about the ladies." And indeed it was. From the gorgeous and tall Beatrix who makes her own structured ensembles and refers to her personal style as, "very personal," to Illona Smith who has bright orange hair (with matching eyebrows cut from said hair) and a fun, quippy voice that often belts our the song "Whatever Will Be, Will Be", the women of "Advanced Style" were the ones who stole the spotlight.
During the screening of the film (which Ari plans to promote for the big screen in the coming months), ladies in floral fascinators, bug-eye spectacles and floor-length gowns were snapping pictures of themselves on film and laughing at lines like, "If someone asks me my age, I tell them I'm between fifty and death." They are proud of their pictures in the book, running around the party asking people if they'd like to see the pages they're featured on and frankly, they should be proud. It's not often in this business you find someone so enamored with fashion but so in love with living in the now and not worrying what's to come tomorrow.
The book and the film both tell a story about an unending love for fashion, one where clothes exist as "an exercise in creativity," as one sixty-plus woman with rainbow hair noted. They wear what they want and what makes them feel good, and as another one of Ari's dames pointed out, "If people don't like what I'm wearing well, I don't give a s**t."
Click through the gallery below to get a sneak peek at the new book.
