Could this be the 21st century version of the cola wars? The botulinum toxin type A injectable known as Dysport (manufactured by Medicis) was FDA-approved for cosmetic use today. It's the first wrinkle relaxer to be OK'd since Allergan's Botox was given the green light in 2002.

Now that Dysport (which was test-named Reloxin and has been used in the UK since 1991) will soon be available in doctors' offices, we're curious to see which one will come out on top. The two formulas employ the same mechanism and are, say physicians, nearly indistinguishable. Medicis and Allergan already make competing hyaluronic acid wrinkle fillers (Restylane and Juvederm, respectively). Can we expect a price war between the two wrinkle busters?  Devotees of the creaseless look can only hope.

Read our October 2008 story about  Medicis and its feng shui-loving CEO, Jonah Shacknai, here.

Photo by Kyle Ericksen

For nearly a decade, renegade Brit painter Jane Gang has been parking herself at the side of the stage in strip clubs like New York's Pussycat Lounge, a bullwhip's length from the main attraction. There in semi-darkness, she sets up her trusty sketchpad and watercolors and starts dabbing. Later, at home, she re-works the best of the bunch in oil paints and sells them for a tidy profit, frequently for north of $10,000.

"My overall painting M.O. is the emotional dynamics between two or three people in any given space, whether it's a restaurant or a nightclub or on the street," says Gang, who is represented by Chelsea's Nicholas Robinson Gallery and lives in Gotham with a new baby named—wait for it—Boulevard. ("As in `Boulevard of Dreams'," Gang explains. Riiiiight.) "And at some point I started to think about the most powerful dynamic that exists, historically. And then it clicked: Strippers. You've got the male. You've got the female. It's sex. It's money."

Now Gang's cheekily risque images are popping up on a capsule collection of tees, tunics, hoodies and scarves for Members Only. "They provide an important component that I felt was missing from the collection—a graphic tee," says company president Kelli Delaney. "Paired with our leggings and leather jacket, it's just total glam-rock sexy girl."

Delaney says she's itching to get the sexy stripper fare into the hands of Member's Only celebrity fans. And guess who's first on her list? Pam Anderson. Now there's a surprise.

Both paintings: Pussycat Lounge, 2003. Watercolor. Photo: courtesy of Members Only.

Last night Salon 94's Freeman Alley space came alive for the opening of Green Pink Caviar, artist Marilyn Minter's newest collection of ethereal paintings and photographs. SVA students packed the show in support of Minter, who also teaches at the school.

Based on stills from her film of the same name, Green Pink Caviar's works capture close-ups of bright, candy-filled mouths and painted lips smeared against glass plates. The film is also on view to the public at Times Square (on a giant screen above the Foot Locker and the MTV store), courtesy of Creative Time.

Marilyn Minter



Photos by Ryan James MacFarland; Times Square image courtesy of Creative Time.

See all our previous Gallery Go-Round photos HERE.

Just as we were getting over the death of actress Bea Arthur of The Golden Girls, an email arrived from auction house Bonhams & Butterfields alerting us to the sale of property from the estate of Golden Girl Estelle Getty. [Recommended reading: NYT magazine story from 2002 about why gay men all secretly love the show.]

Perhaps our very favorite of the four ladies, Getty played the little ornery one known as Sophia, she of the pit bull remarks and saucer-sized glasses.

The immortal handbag (est. $1,000-$1,500) and glasses (est. $400-$600)

Aside from Getty's Emmy and Golden Globe statuettes (estimated at $4,000-6,000 and $3,000-5,000, respectively), her character's trademark straw handbag and eyeglasses will be on the block. Reached on the phone, Margaret Barrett, the director of Bonhams's Entertainment Memorabilia Department, reassured us that the double Golden Girls news whammy was purely coincidental. However, she acknowledged that the timing might be good news for the sale, which takes place on June 14 in Los Angeles.
For more info, click here.

The other day in the locker room at the Exhale Spa on Central Park South in New York, I noticed that I was not the only one furtively sipping a bottle of forest green liquid while hurrying to change for my 6:15pm Core Fusion exercise class. It seems many women have already signed up for the joint program, launched recently, between Exhale and Blueprint Cleanse. (It's a three-day cleanse, three exercise classes at Exhale, and one spa treatment for $295.)

I was skeptical of how useful such a package would be, considering that three hardcore Exhale exercise classes in three days is more than I can bear even on my normal diet. (You aren't obligated to take the three classes during the cleanse period, though that's sort of the idea.)  I was certain I'd pass out halfway through the first plank series.

Turns out, the best exercise to do while on a cleanse--or undergoing some other bodily experiment that carries the risk of lower energy levels--is one that brings out the competitive spirit. On my own, on the treadmill, I would have been sunk, but surrounded by 20 lithe bodies determined to show each other up (many of whom were operating only on juice themselves) and a stern instructor, I managed to have three good workouts on three consecutive days (plus a fourth this morning at my gym before breaking the cleanse) despite a lack of solid food.

[Read another W staffer's account of her Blueprint experience HERE]

But just because I didn't get carted away in an ambulance doesn't mean there weren't side effects. Mine came in the form of ersatz celebrity sightings. I could have sworn the tall, high-energy woman with the million-dollar smile I commiserated about green juice with one evening in the Exhale locker room was Hilary Swank. But would Swank really admit to perfect stranger that she was hoping to shed a couple of last-minute pounds before a trip to Miami
next week? Was the lack of chewing affecting my brain? And another morning, I was certain the hunk who entered my gym in big black sunglasses and hopped on an elliptical trainer was Jon Bon Jovi. But does JBJ actually work out with the masses at New York Sports Club? A WWD colleague I ran into at the gym cased the scene after I left and sent me an email moments later, saying: "It looked a lot like him, but surely this gym is too populist for a big star. Then again, he is from Jersey." 

After a hard day of sightseeing, our intrepid band of journalists trouped off to the opening party of the Transformer.  Miuccia ran the show in her black Gladiator outift, while Rem was understated in a gray Prada suit and black turtleneck.  Seoul's finest came mainly dressed "in the brand," my favorite being a woman wearing the white dress from the spring/summer collection that gathers in layers and then splits in the middle to reveal not cleavage, but a small line of flesh running down the middle of the torso.  (I was off-message in a Miyake suit.)  Afterwards, we repaired to the basement lounge of the Park Hyatt to celebrate with sushi.

See if you can spot Rem at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

This morning almost everyone wends their weary way back to Europe.

See Betsky's previous post from the unveiling of Rem Koolhaas's Prada project in Seoul HERE. See our 2008 story about Betsky HERE.

As Rem Koolhaas prepared to unveil his highly anticipated "Prada Transformer" in Seoul on Thursday, Cincinnati Art Museum director Aaron Betsky, architecture's ultimate insider, got an advance peek of the starchitect's latest showcase for Prada on the grounds of a 500-year-old palace. Here, Betsky (curator of the most recent Venice architecture biennale) gives W an inside look.  

You can spot the fashionistas in the lobby of the Grand Hyatt Seoul, in the lounge, in the elevator, but definitely not at the pool. Once we get going, however, we are strictly segregated:  Italians, Anglo-Americans, French and Chinese all have their own program. I am the only American journalist; three are from the UK, six or so each from Italy and France, and a lot come from China and other parts of Asia.  The Grand Hyatt is your standard businessman's hotel though Rem and Miuccia are staying at the really fancy hotel, the Shilla. 

We first head off to the shopping area of Garosu-Gil (above)—galleries, trinkets and fashion all mixed in a collage abstracted in the wood, concrete and glass compositions of the newer buildings.  Tea with birds flying over our heads and cooing sweet nothings at us, except that some of the ladies became a bit frightened by so much uncontrolled color and style.  Lunch of raw crab marinated in soy sauce. Some needed twenty minutes of beauty rest before the actual walk- through of the Transformer, which is the sole reason we are here.

Once we get to the Transformer, Miuccia and Rem lurk in the background briefly, Rem tall and thin, and dressed in his usual uniform of black, but unusually, with a smile on his face. He says hello, then departs, leaving it to Alexander Reichert, his deputy at OMO to do the tour. The Transformer is essentially a tent, stretched almost beyond recognition.  It sits on the grounds of one of Seoul's palaces, its forms somewhere between the blocky buildings that make up the city's urban landscape and the jagged peaks of the mountains to the North.  The amorphous whiteness of it makes it difficult to grab hold of it, or even to figure how to enter.

Behind it, an array of shipping containers on a wood platform provide the backdrop and the services.

Walk in and you are in a space defined by a confusing array of gray steel beams.  Facing you is a rectangle with diagonal beams sticking out along the side.  Here's the trick:  in three weeks, cranes will perform what Reichert calls an "orchestra"—they will pick up the whole structure and rotate it to the side so that the steel grid you see when you walk in becomes the floor, and those diagonals will support sloping seats.  Then it will become a cinema.  A few weeks later it will rotate again and the cross shape that dominates the wall to the right will become the floor of an art exhibition space.  One more rotation and the giant circle on the wall to the left will become a theater for a "domestic scale" catwalk for Prada's clothes.  

For now, the floor is a hexagon, covered with black-painted plywood.  It provides the scene for the fifth installment of curator Kayo Ota's exhibition of Prada's skirts, "Waist Down."

The whole Transformer is covered with a membrane that stretches over all these permutations and structures to give it a strange unity.  For all the geometries at work, what you are left with is unformed, deformed, distorted and distended space.  A spatial equivalent of the fashion, perhaps, but more than that, a modernist answer to the pavilions used for tent revivals, circuses or other shows.

Later, I spoke to Rem briefly and asked him to say something quotable. He smirked.  Spent more time talking to his daughter, Charlie, a photographer who lives in China.  At least I found out that Pa approves of her new husband.
 
See our profile of Aaron Betsky from September 2008.

Has it come to this? After last night's posh Fishermen's Ball in Manhattan (tickets start at $1,000 a pop), shameless recessionista guests pilfered the tulip centerpieces, using Earth Day as an excuse. (VF Daily)

Along the same vein, Billy Norwich says that Park Avenue ladies are going a bit darker -- i.e. less Ruth-Madoff blonde -- in order to project a more restrained image. (Wowowow)

In other news: The billionaire Peltz family in Bedford, NY is evidently the worst family in America to work for. Nelson's wife, Claudia, made their butler clean a toilet seat four times in a row, and then fired him -- on Easter Sunday! (CityFile)

There was a missed opportunity for a first lady fashion faceoff when Queen Rania didn't accompany King Abdullah to DC. (Huff Po)

Whitney Port's fashion collection: not nearly as embarassing as it coulda been. (The Cut)

Karl Lagerfeld revelations: he wears a ponytail because his hair is curly, and when he wakes up every morning he looks like a madman. He also dismisses Heidi Klum as "an advertising PR person." (Fashionologie)

And those (like us) who care, Kate Moss will be wearing a turban to the upcoming Met Costume gala. (Fashionista)

On a recent trip to Southern California, I checked out two spas, one a hip, brand-spanking new spa, the other, a time-tested, Old-world style getaway. And I can't lie: at both places I had the best of times.

First up: the new Ciel Spa at the Philippe Starck-designed SLS Hotel in Beverly Hills. While the SLS is the hot hotel of the moment, with a daunting waiting list for its Bazaar restaurant and a crowd that, in my opinion, had far too many smokers (this is California, people -- you're supposed to know better!), Ciel, only one flight above the scene, feels worlds away. 

The spa is ultra-modern, mostly white (white curtains, white carpeting), and very serene, with the exception of the disembodied ceramic hands sprouting from the walls. In the waiting lounge the expected healthy almonds and berries are on offer, as well as a refreshing agua fresca, whose flavor changes daily. (On my day, it was peach).  

The treatment I tried is one of its signature offerings, called Revive. The 90-minute session includes a body scrub, body massage, mini facial and scalp massage ($375), and it left me feeling deliciously relaxed and limber. If I have any criticism at all, it would be that I left feeling less "revived" than ready for a good, long nap.
 
Next up: Cal-a-Vie in Vista (left), about 90 miles south of LA. A destination spa, Cal-a-Vie has been around since the late 80s, but it somehow doesn't feel dated. The whole resort feels like a little bit of Provence, with stucco and terracotta architecture, lavender fields and an imported 17th century chapel on the grounds.

The rooms are decorated in chintz, with reclaimed gray wood floorboards and four-foot high cushiony beds. After a virtuous (but delicious) lunch of unsweetened lemonade and chicken salad, I had an aromatherapy massage that was so good, I started fantasizing about winning the jackpot and hiring the therapist, Julia, full-time.

We also took an aquatic class that was the first one I've seen that wasn't geared toward the 65-and-over-crowd. Called Hydro Rider, it's basically spinning under water, using a bike specifically designed for pool use. The resistance from the water obviously makes the pedaling somewhat slow going, but it was a great workout and I definitely felt it in my legs the next day.

The minimum stay at Cal-a-Vie is a half-week "La Petite Session," which starts at $3,795. Weekly rates start at $7,295. 

The young men and women in "Performance," the May portfolio by David Sims, are dressed in jewels and tatters, dripping in glitter and soot, striking poses that are variously exuberant, tragic and disturbing. These unlikely models are the Theo Adams Company, a troupe of dancers, singers, and other theatrical types led by 19-year-old London-based performance artist Theo Adams. The group has drawn a cult following for their raw and dramatic performances, usually conducted late at night in some eerie or overlooked corner of their city.  As the mind-boggling photos (and accompanying video) are bound to raise a few questions, we thought it was worth asking Adams for some elaboration.

Is there a story you were trying to tell with the W project?
The performance was, like all my work, an amalgamation of all the different inspirations and visions that spin around in my head. The choreography was driven by a New York Times article from 1904 titled "Woman Danced To Death" [about a woman who succumbed to heart disease during a dance competition at a masquerade ball]. It may sound bleak but to me, it's also an example of joyous, passionate expression. I had two hugely inspirational guest performers join my company for the shoot. Lorna Luft was there, singing songs that her mother, Judy Garland, had taught her as a child, and Frances Ruffelle came to reprise her Tony-winning performance of "On My Own" from Les Miserables. Mixing these incredible show-stopping performances with the idea of the ultimate showstopper—the woman who danced herself to death—is the core of the W performance. The message: Give it your all.

You are totally vulnerable and naked in your performances. How do you achieve that lack of inhibition?
The stage is the only place I feel comfortable being completely honest. Performance for me is an exorcism of the soul. I always feel a great sense of catharsis afterwards.

Aside from uninhibited, how else would you describe your performances?
All my performances are passionate, celebratory, unhinged, explosive, optimistic and, hopefully, entertaining. Oh—and they usually contain about a ton of glitter.

Where did you find the members of your company?
We are the most twisted family in the world. Some I knew personally before, others are friends of friends. We have people from Japan, Brazil, Poland, Sweden, Ireland... everyone is a huge character but we all gel. Nobody is afraid to bare their souls or dance till they bleed! The bigger the company gets the more we seem to be in rooms together, painting walls with lipstick.  

Adams, left, with his sister, Andrea.

And your sister works with your company too?
My sister Andrea helps out behind the scenes at my performances. She is a Cambridge graduate and training to be a lawyer. She's incredibly organized and unbelievably bossy. I can completely trust her to make sure everything runs smoothly on show days while I have a nervous breakdown on stage.

 What's the deal with your braces?
I got my braces at 14 and decided they were part of me. I was supposed to have them removed years ago. They are no longer moving my teeth but they are here to stay, for the near future anyway.  I seem to be drawn to things that are conventionally seen as ugly.

What other elements of your appearance do you consider signature?
Everyday when you wake up you have a choice to make regarding what you wear. It is a creative process. I like things that sparkle and move. I have always been attracted to theatricality. People seem to think I have a gothic aesthetic but I see my image as more Liza Minnelli than Marilyn Manson.

Is there such a thing as a typical day in the life of Theo Adams?
There doesn't really seem to be a typical day. Although all my days involve a few power ballads and a show tune.

What upcoming projects do you have in the works?
Though I have the most gifted team (incredible performers and musicians, plus the best set designer in the world, David White, who did all the sets for the W project), and though there seems to be interest in what we are doing, I have absolutely no money. I have gotten to this point with no funding, no management—nothing except fantastically supportive friends. There are talks about a world tour of our last show, a film, an album and more, but without backing it gets more difficult as the productions grow bigger.

Are your parents fans of your work?
My parents have never seen any of my performances and don't really understand what it is that I do. Nothing shocks them though, I was wearing lipstick at 3.

Any current cultural obsessions you'd like to give a shout out to?
It's not something new—it's actually over 50 years old: the Eurovision Song Contest, airing next month. It is the most important day of the year for me. You Americans really are deprived of something incredibly magical. YouTube is the answer!

See the complete portfolio of images by David Sims; watch the exclusive W video.