>> Now this sounds like my kind of thrift store.  (Twenty five storage crates of Nan Kempner's clothing -- the entire contents of her closets -- await future sale here.   Even if you can't afford the severely discounted prices, it would still be a sight to see.)

>> She's a Vicky's Secret model by day, but by night, the high-fashion model in her comes back out.  Pictures recently surfaced verifying that Gisele Bundchen shot the YSL Fall 2007 campaign with Inez and Vinoodh -- you can see Inez, trusty camera in hand, at left in the green parka.

>>  April 30: mark it down now -- you have a date with the telly.  "Helmut by June," a portrait of Helmut Newton as seen through the lens of his wife June, premieres at 7 pm ET/PT on CINEMAX.  You get the unique experience of viewing what goes on behind the scenes at a Newton shoot in the nineties -- what a privilege.  The trailer can be seen here (and features one of my favorite Newton images, a nude woman half-eaten by a stuffed alligator). 

>>  When copyright infringement occurs in fashion, the guilty consciences typically belong to high street chains like Forever 21 or Canal Street handbag peddlers, not a high fashion designer.  They're usually more careful, and use phrases like "emulate" or "inspired by" when using other people's ideas.  Unfortunately for John Galliano, the Spring/Summer 2007 ad campaign for his eponymous line were a little too inspired by William Klein's series of Paris photographs. 
Galliano's company was ordered on March 28  to pay 200,000 euros to Klein for "unauthorized use of his atmospheric imagery in an advertising campaign" -- and I have to say, rightly so.  Above, Galliano's spring ad strikingly resembles the layout of Klein's 1995 photograph of French high school students protesting on the streets of Paris, right.  Galliano's lawyer has appealed the decision, in an attempt to lower the fine, arguing that the images in the ads were different, and therefore not plagiarized. 

Whatever happens, at least John can have bragging rights -- the man who seems to so enjoy dressing as a pirate has had a true piracy encounter. 

>>  ...although the dress Chanel Iman wears as part of the May Vogue models feature makes you look twice -- the way Meisel shot it, it looks 3-D at first.  And then you just want to stare.  Okay, I'm focused now.  The editorial preview is up over at style.com, and the girls -- Lily, Hilary, Doutzen, Sasha, Caroline, Raquel, Chanel, Stam, Coco, and Agyness -- all ten of them -- are showered in bright colors.  There are accompanying little tidbits of information on each -- for instance, Sasha embraces her Russian roots with her current read: War and Peace.  But my favorite of it all: the fact that Vogue managed to stay true to its commercial roots even when putting models instead of celebrities on the cover -- those white shirts each girl is wearing on the cover?  They're from Gap.

On that note, you'll be interested to know, Internet, that the Vogue article accompanying all this model madness speaks to the issue of clashing art and business in fashion:

Fashion is, obviously, one part art, one part commerce, though there are plenty of people out there who see it merely as clothes for sale. But the one thing that everyone understands about fashion is that it is entertainment. It is show business. And you can't have show business without stars. Fashion needs supermodels. To reject that idea may very well be the best example I've ever encountered of cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.

So suddenly fashion needs supermodels, eh, Vogue?  I feel like this stance is a one-time thing -- conveniently appropriate to match with the issue.  But what about next month -- will June have a model on the cover?   Or will supermodels not be so necessary anymore...

>>  In case the model-laden May 2007 Vogue cover wasn't enough for you, fret not.  The June 2007 cover of Vanity Fair's African-themed issue will be fronted by Liya Kebede.

>> Forget it bags -- this spring/summer seems to be the season of it dresses.  First the 3.1 Phillip Lim rosette dress elicited some major gushing (and buying), and now the yellow tiered Zara dress has sent shoppers into a tizzy.  Now there are some pros and cons in order for this daffodil dress -- pro: it's much less expensive than the Phillip Lim dress, pro: it's bright and summery; con: yellow doesn't necessarily flatter every skin tone, BIG CON: it's not sold on the internet.  So, either you can hoof it to your neighborhood Zara and check out the dress in person (the rest of the summer collection looks great, but admittedly this dress is the standout piece), or you can click over to Style Bubble to live vicariously through Susie, who just purchased the yellow confection. 

>>  Natalia Vodianova is pregnant again (with her third child).

>>  I was under the impression that we would have to wait until Marilyn Manson's Phantamagoria finally comes out to see Lily Cole on the silver screen, but not so much.  Her first major movie role is in a remake of St. Trinian's, which stars Rupert Everett and Colin Firth.   She plays the part of a preppy schoolgirl who along with her rabblerousing schoolmates will save their school from bankruptcy by engaging in a heist. 

>>  He passed away two years ago, leaving behind a legacy of fantastic fashion photography from the sixties and seventies.  Unfortunately, he destroyed or lost most of his work during his later years, when he was homeless. 
He was notorious for being impossible to work with.  But when he did work, what he produced -- well, it was hardly fodder for destruction.  In fact, it was beautiful, powerful, and every photo I see gives me an insatiable hunger to see more.  I hope Terry keeps the promise that he made upon Bob's death, to produce a monograph and an autobiography of his father and his pictures -- I can't wait to see more like this one  Bob took in 1972 of Angelica Huston, his muse and girlfriend of the time, for Italian Vogue, posing with model Lipp Jens as her Nazi lover.
UPDATE:  It looks like Terry did keep his promise after all --
the book is being published in September of the year.  Fantastic.