In today's booming market for vintage clothes, some of the most sought after items are by Halston, the fashion genius who personified 1970s disco chic. It was a time when Manhattan was edgy and cool, and designers were the pilot fish of sex and glamour and a new kind of fame that was available to all - even if it lasted only fifteen minutes. Halston was the biggest of them all -- handsome, erratic, brilliant and decadent, a pop culture superstar who became as famous for partying at Studio 54 with Liza and Bianca, as for his stunning, streamlined clothes. When a Halston purple caftan, once owned by the designer's friend, Liz Taylor, recently turned up at Decades, the Los Angeles vintage boutique, it generated more interest than any other item in the store's history, according to The Chicago Tribune, and sold to a celebrity. The lucky buyer got not only a caftan, but also a piece of a fascinating and lost time.
It's one I lived through as a young journalist in New York who was married in a Halston dress. My wedding in 1980, in a private club overlooking Gramercy Park, was small and quiet - like many weddings up to that year, the last of nuptial sanity before Princess Diana's 1981 doomed union spawned the monster Wedding-Industrial Complex and a generation of Bridezillas, those crazed creatures prone to fits of rage over seating charts and other matters of dire consequence. My fiancé and I had no wedding planner, no video recording, no save-the-date cards and no gift registry. Nor did we have bridesmaids, groomsmen, a flower girl, a ring bearer, or formal invitations of any kind - the 40 guests, all close family and friends, were invited by phone.
Both my parents had died the previous year, and I could not bear the thought of a traditional church wedding without them. Nor was my fiancé interested in a big to-do, so we decided on a catered dinner at the Player's Club, the Greek Revival townhouse that had been established in the 19th century as a gentlemen's club for actors by Edwin Booth, the brother of Lincoln's assassin. We engaged a string quartet from Julliard to play during the cocktail hour. A judge who was the father of a friend agreed to marry us, and my brother-in-law, a photographer, signed on to take pictures.
I visited the bridal salons at the major department stores: Bergdorf Goodman, Lord & Taylor, Macy's and Saks. The gowns were beautiful, but it seemed silly to wear a huge white satin pouf and a tiara frothing tulle to a small party, even if it was my own wedding. I wavered over a white silk gown cut on the bias with a short train. I probably would have bought it if my father had been alive to walk me down the aisle, but Dad was gone, and, anyway, there was no aisle at the Player's Club.
Instead, I decided to treat myself to a Halston, one I could wear again and again. My search sent me to the designer's boutique on Madison Avenue. I walked over on a sunny, late summer afternoon, opened the door and stepped into a cool, minimalist space, painted oyster white. Display cases held scarves and sweaters; the clothing racks cashmere pajamas, ultrasuede coat dresses, simple wool skirts and jackets. I took the staircase to the second floor, where my eye immediately fell on a group of slinky dresses in pale silk jersey. These were goddess gowns, elegant and classic and reminiscent of those made in the 1930s by Parisienne couturiérè Madeleine Vionnet. I tried on several, settling on a floor-length, lunar white column with a dramatic slit on the side and a spray of silver paillettes on the bodice. A few days later I bought a pair of silver stilettos at Bergdorfs and a sparkly barette at Bendel's to hold the front curtain of my hair in place. It was two weeks before my September 13 wedding. The flowers had been ordered and the menu set. Everything was in place.
On the morning of my big day, a Saturday, I awoke early and went for a run, while my fiancé visited with his family who'd arrived from Chicago. Around noon, I decided to go through a dress rehearsal to make sure my outfit was perfect. I donned the new lingerie I'd bought for the occasion and the silver shoes. As I slipped the dress over my head, I heard a soft, clattering sound like pebbles scattering on the floor. With horror, I saw that the threads holding several rows of the paillettes had broken, leaving a large, empty patch on the front of the dress!
I gathered up as many of the paillettes as I could find and stuffed them into an envelope. With my dress in a garment bag slung over my arm, I dashed outside for a cab. At the Halston boutique, I mounted the steps to the second floor in three leaps. I'd held my tears back on the way over, but now they erupted in a single burst. "My dress is falling apart, and I'm getting married in a few hours!" I wailed in a classic Bridezilla moment.
A sales associate, not the one who'd sold me the dress, dropped the cashmere sweater she'd been folding and rushed to my side. "Look!" I screeched, pointing to the bodice.
She was a thin woman of about 50 with a blonde page boy and blue eyes that narrowed to slits as she scrutinized my dress. "I'm afraid there's nothing we can do until Monday," she said. "The fitter isn't here."
"What about my wedding?" I shrieked.
"Please, keep your voice down. Mr. Halston is upstairs," she snapped.
"Then, let him fix it!" I was sobbing now. The unmoored paillettes seemed like a bad omen. What chance did the marriage have if my dress couldn't survive the day?
With a violent jerk of her arm, the sales woman grabbed the dress and disappeared through a door in the back of the boutique. An hour went by, during which I sat on the carpeted floor, trying to stay calm. I had a vision of Halston in a black turtleneck, sitting at a vast lacquered desk surrounded by pots of white orchids. With a cigarette held vertically aloft in his left hand, he sewed paillettes on my dress with his right. Then he picked up the phone and fired the sales woman who'd sold me damaged goods.
Finally, the middle-aged blonde reappeared with my gown on a padded hanger, restored to its original glory. Had Halston himself fixed it? Unlikely -- I doubt he was even in the building -- though it's a nice fantasy.
The wedding went off without a hitch. That was almost 29 years ago, and I still have the dress. I'm sorry auction houses of the world, you can't have it. I plan to wear it next year on my thirtieth anniversary.
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