OUT OF THIS WORLD
Proving that he’s still spacey after all these years, designer Thierry
Mugler (above), whose intergalactic dominatrices invaded planet fashion in the
mid-eighties, fell back to earth in 2007 with a radically transformed
appearance, thanks to extreme body modification, and a new name: the
disappointingly terrestrial-sounding Manfred.
FASHION VIOLATIONS
In 2008, the hard-partying bicoastal designer Anand Jon (above, with models), who outfitted Lydia Hearst-Shaw and Paris and Nicky Hilton in
maxi skirts and muscle tees, was found guilty by a Los Angeles court on
one count of rape and 15 counts of sexual assault against seven women as
young as 14. Jon is currently serving a 59-year-to-life sentence in
Rikers Island jail and awaiting trial for a second campaign of sexual
molestation involving a dozen women in the New York area.
THE UGLY SIDE OF BEAUTY
If every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way, then Françoise
Bettencourt-Meyers’s tiff with her mother, Liliane Bettencourt,
the now 90-year-old heiress to the L’Oréal cosmetics fortune, earned
that clan a badge of distinction. The feud, over more than $1.32 billion
squandered on gifts—including Picassos, Matisses, and a Seychelles
island—ended when Bettencourt-Meyers declared her mother mentally unfit
and had her removed from the company board in 2012.
COVER UP
Abercrombie & Fitch has managed to offend everyone from Christian groups
to Asian Americans and the governor of West Virginia with its homoerotic
imagery, thongs for tweens, and discriminatory hiring practices. One
such gripe ended in a £9,000 settlement in 2009 for a London law student
who was banished to the stockroom for wearing, in an effort to hide her
artificial arm, a cardigan that was against the store’s “look policy.”
NO BUTTS ABOUT IT
Celebrity sot Kiefer Sutherland added a little drama to the Met’s
Costume Institute Ball in 2009 when he head-butted Jack McCollough, half
of the design duo Proenza Schouler, in the face at an afterparty.
Sutherland, who was coming off a well-documented public altercation with
a Christmas tree, had been schmoozing with Brooke Shields and took
objection to McCollough’s allegedly bumping into the actress. (Shields
later said the designer had not provoked the attack.) It’s not known if
the lads ultimately settled their differences out of court, but
McCollough now owns some very nice property.
VESTMENT INTERESTS
In 2011, after leaving his wife and three children, hedge fund manager
Pierre Lagrange (above, right), one of the richest men in England—who sold
his Kensington Palace Gardens home to Roman Abramovich for £90
million—became romantically involved with Roubi L’Roubi (above, left), a
little-known Mayfair-based couturier who was previously renowned for
creating clerical vestments for London’s St. Paul’s Cathedral.
