Not all European designers in New York this week came for the Costume Institute fete. Alexis Mabille, one of the bright young lights of Paris fashion, is in town to celebrate a friend's birthday. His Gotham sojourn provided a break from working on the collection he will show during the July haute couture season, the follow-up to his breakthrough effort in January in which he turned his fancy for fanciful bowties into a fabulous lineup of young, alluring clothes. While Mabille hopes to retain the chic factor next time out, he won't show at Angelina's tearoom again, and not only because the venue is too small to accommodate his growing guest list. It seems that Mabille has transferred his allegiance to another famed Parisian sweets emporium, Laduree, for which he has designed a bowtie cake, to hit the menu in June in several delectable flavors including citrus, strawberry and pistachio. "It's interesting to do something completely new," he said. Speaking of which, while his New York exploits typically center on downtown, this trip has taken Mabille off the beaten path of hip. On Wednesday a friend took him to the Frederick Law Olmstead Awards luncheon in Central Park's Conservatory Garden, named for the park's great landscape architect. There, he marveled at "all these ladies dressed in pastels." And one evening he found himself at Swifty's. "It wasn't young," he said, gallantly ignoring the occasionally indiscreet nips and tucks one might notice in such a venue. Rather, Mabille gauged the crowd by its accoutrements: "So many JAR earrings! So many Cartier necklaces!"

Top: A look from Alexis Mabille's January couture show. Bottom: Mabille with a model.

Now that Valentino has retired from the fashion house he founded, he's spending more and more time in New York. The city that never sleeps seems to be agreeing with the legendary designer, who is exhibiting a stamina that much younger party boys would envy. In the past ten days we're seen him at the New York City Ballet gala; at designer Adam Lippes' apartment for writer Bob Colacello's 61st birthday party; and at the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Insitute gala with Claudia Schiffer on his arm. Tonight, socialite-turned-actress Alison Sarofim will host a fete celebrating Valentino's 76th birthday party at her West Village townhouse.

Aside from the social scene, it may be the designer's new Jacques Grange-designed apartment that has made the Big Apple so alluring to Val. Unlike his more over-the-top residences in Capri, Rome, Gstaad and London (not to mention his Louis XIII-era chateau outside Paris) his Manhattan apartment is much more understated, according to Grange.  "He wanted it to be more modern and light. He wanted a change," Grange told me recently. One
impetus for the shift is Valentino's extensive collection of contemporary and modern art, for which he wanted a more neutral background. 

After last night's Broadway premiere of Top Girls—the star-studded cast includes Marisa Tomei, Martha Plimpton and Elizabeth Marvel—revelers headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for an after-party of schmoozing, boozing and a buffet of the restaurant's fine cuisine (think extra-drippy Caesar salad). I asked Plimpton what she thought of the party's venue. "It fits in with the theme of the play, I guess," said the actress. "How so?" I asked, trying to surmise the connection between Caryl Churchill's cerebral work and the neon-lit 43rd Street tourist destination. "Well, the 80's! For maybe 30 seconds in 1983, [this place] was really cool," she quipped.

Dressed in a sleek, sheer belted wool number, Plimpton herself looked anything but dated. Turns out that the ensemble was custom designed for her by Malan Breton, best known for his appearance on season three of Project Runway. The designer, who was also at the party, told me the two met via an unlikely and thoroughly modern channel: Myspace.com. "We had mutual friends," says Breton.

"Myspace is better than Facebook," Plimpton declared. "Facebook takes over your life!"

Above: Martha Plimpton with Malan Breton. Photo: Bennett Raglin/Wireimage

Last week, I ran into Liz Goldwyn at the opening night gala of the Metropolitan Opera's new production of Donizetti's "La Fille du Regiment." The Los Angeles heiress and filmmaker, who owns a near-legendary collection of vintage clothing—that night she was wearing a pale blue couture Yves Saint Laurent gown from 1979—has been designing fine jewelry over the past several years. (Her pieces go for prices up to $6,500). Goldwyn told me about her newest fashion world venture, a gently-priced accessories collection that is being sold at Opening Ceremony. The line, called Springtime Romance, consists of vintage headpieces and sweater guards (the bejeweled clips that girls used to wear to hold their cardigans in place) from the 1940s and 1950s that Goldwyn found at estate sales and flea markets. (Because the items, priced between $150 and $350, aren't actually reworked in any way, she served as more of the line's curator than designer.)

"I'm so excited because Kylie Minogue bought one of the headband hats," she told me giddily. "I'm going to look for photos of her to see if she wears it!"

Photo of Goldwyn by Steve Eichner

Kloe, left, and Justin

Until recently, ASmallWorld.net seemed to have the "exclusive" (a.k.a. invite-only) social networking category locked up. But in New York at least, a new contender is gaining traction.

The signature feature of APrivateClub.com, a social networking website aimed at elite New York City twentysomethings, is its feature allowing members to recommend favorite local haunts—restaurants, bars, spas, etc.—and rank them on a scale of 1 to 10. Most of the members are pals of the site's young founders, Kloe Korby and Justin Belmont. The idea is that the best answer to the inevitable "where to go tonight?" question comes from friends—and friends of friends.  "If you can see the profile of a person behind a recommendation, and see who they're friends with and what their interests are, you can quickly find a place that's right for you," says Belmont, a Manhattan native whose friendship with Korby dates to their years at the Trinity School. The club also holds member events, like a recent benefit for the New Museum held at the penthouse suite at the Hotel on Rivington, and, this past February a book party for Tom Dolby's preppy tome The Sixth Form.

Currently the club has only 600 members. Good luck getting in, however: not all members even have invite privileges.

With so many charity benefits, store openings and brand-sponsored evenings clogging up the New York social calendar, it's rare to celebrate an actual person for doing nothing more than existing. But such was the case this past Thursday night when man-about-town Euan Rellie celebrated his 40th birthday at Bar Milano, the soon-to-be opened restaurant from Lupa owner Jason Denton and his brother Joe. (For more on the Denton brothers, check out the upcoming May issue of W). The event, of course, did have a host: The Supper Club New York, a dinner and social club run by Brit transplant Tamsin Lonsdale.

After downing cocktails in the bar (where the windows were still covered with brown paper), the crowd, including Rellie's wife, designer Lucy Sykes, Thom Browne, Rufus Albemarle, Luigi Tadini and Kelly Bensimon, moved into the dining room. According to etiquette, couples had been seated separately, which led to a fair amount of surreptitious place-card swapping and table hopping. "Please, Euan asks that everyone being seated," chirped the ubiquitous 17-year-old actress Leven Rambin, jumping up and down on the banquette and giggling at her garbled grammar.

Soon after, the exuberant birthday boy stood up on the banquette himself. "Listen, I could have invited my closest friends," Rellie announced. "But instead, I chose to invite all you fashion journalists." The crowd, which did include a fair number of industry types, took the ribbing well, perhaps because they were feasting on the restaurant's Northern Italian fare, including seared scallops with celery root and caviar, trout with potatoes and chard, pork chops with escarole and borsetti alla pizzocheri (whole wheat raviolis shaped liked little sacks). For dessert, the waiters wheeled out a giant cake, out of which popped a girl who warbled "Happy Birthday" before Rellie covered her with kisses. "Lucy, don't look," he shouted.

I recently got a rare peek into what has got to be one of the city's most visually stimulating apartments: the home of Manuela and Iwan Wirth directly above Zwirner & Wirth Gallery on East 69th Street. The occasion was a dinner that Hauser & Wirth and 303 Gallery were hosting in honor of artist Mary Heilmann.

Narrow Lane #2

The five-story townhouse, renovated by Annabelle Selldorf, has been outfitted to the hilt by the art world decorating guru Ricky Clifton. The inimitable Ricky, who was there that night, told me that the whole place was inspired by Mary's work. Flanking the patio's French doors were colorful horizontally striped drapes that recalled Mary's 2002 "Serape Panel." Feeling a chill, I wanted nothing more than to throw the fabric over my head, cut a hole in the top and wear it as a Mexican-styled poncho (Mary, a child of the Sixties and fashion plate herself would surely approve). The whole place had a strong Seventies vibe, like a cross between Greg Brady's attic bedroom and the home of Austina Powers, International Woman of Mystery.

The apartment, naturally, is filled with major contemporary art pieces. Aside from the handful of Mary's paintings, I spied two slick John McCracken wall reliefs (one black, one white), a Paul McCarthy "Santa With Butt Plug" sculpture and a Jason Rhoades chandelier, which spiraled down the center of the main staircase, painted a show-stopping Heilmann chartreuse.

Read W's article on Paul McCarthy from the November 2007 issue.

Some friends and I headed to MoMA on Saturday night anticipating the usual chardonnay, crudités and museum crowd that accompany most of its events. We didn't get the memo that the fête—celebrating the new Color Chart exhibition—would be a raging dance party.

After talking our way in (the soiree sold out on Tuesday and Craigslist did brisk trade in tickets the day of) we entered a museum transformed. There wasn't a carrot stick in sight as throngs of twentysomething partygoers clad in primary colors and wild makeup broke it down to the music pouring through speakers lining the main hall. (The DJs, all signed to the dance-punk indie label DFA Records, had set up shop beneath Rodin's statue of Balzac.) One flight up, gaggles of hipsters fueled by pink rum concoctions were playing Twister.

A few of the 1,500 guests even managed to gaze at the Warhols and Richters on display—the exhibition stayed open until the party ended at 1 a.m. The party was part of PopRally, an event series aimed at MoMA and PS1's younger patrons. The next PopRally event is on March 14 at PS1. For details, see http://moma.org/calendar/poprally/

Photos by Fred Benenson / www.fredbenenson.com

It's lovely to share art with the public—but what, really, is an opening bash sans velvet rope? Especially when Yvonne Force Villareal is involved. At last week's debut of Tim Noble and Sue Webster's "Electric Fountain," a giant light sculpture at Rock Center, her Art Production Fund team made sure barriers separated the fur-bedecked A-listers from the hoi polloi.

Yvonne Force Villareal

The list-worthy few clutched their plastic cups of hot cider as they admired the British artist team's neon blue and white apparition. Villareal beamed at her handiwork like a proud mama, remarking on the beauty of the light reflecting off the faces of her friends, many of whom were slow to arrive to the event, presumably due to the freezing temperatures. Most of the VIPs showed up closer to 7:30, right before a private reception at the nearby 620 Loft and Garden. There, the entrance was marked by a Union Jack created out of 1,500 candles designed by Michelle Rago, and waiters served warm meat pies and fish n'chips.

Thursday in Los Angeles was a miserable day for a pool party—overcast and chilly—but the poolside patio at Robert Evans's legendary Beverly Hills estate, Woodland, was packed nonetheless. Evans, the producer behind Chinatown, Marathon Man and The Two Jakes, has now produced a signature line of eyeglasses for Oliver Peoples, and the outdoor lunch gave the company a chance to trumpet its relationship with Hollywood's most famous four-eyes.

The crowd included many types who would never otherwise be invited to Woodland: reporters, for instance, and guys like the one who wore lime-green pants and a yellow rain hat. There were also a few friends of Evans on hand, such as director Brett Ratner, who used to live in Evans's guesthouse.

Ratner bragged that he's making a biopic about Helmut Newton—the late photographer was perhaps Evans's closest friend—if, that is, he can secure the rights from Newton's indomitable widow, June. "I'm wresting with June," said Ratner, adding that he also wants to do a sequel to the documentary Helmut by June, which aired on HBO last year.

Then Ratner was peeled away by Lady Victoria White, who cut a rather chic figure as Evans's seventh wife, and the two joined a knot of conversation around Evans's longtime English butler, Alan Selka.

"Bob," as most people called him, was nowhere to be seen.

Turns out he was in his bedroom, the inner sanctum from which he often conducts business, and select guests were escorted in, either singly or in small groups, for a private audience. Behind a set of heavy wooden doors, Evans was perched on his velvet-upholstered bed like a pasha upon a pillow. He wore one pair of Oliver Peoples glasses and held a second in his left hand; occasionally he switched for effect.

"When I was growing up, glasses were medicinal," he said. "Now they're cosmetical."

Evans seemed to enjoy his visitors, especially the female ones, and he was attentive to them. His talk was very subtly funny, and he turned several phrases to particular effect, as if dialing down his humor to the lowest pitch at which it could still be perceived.

"Everyone should wear glasses," he said. "You'll see people you've never seen before."

Soon, a group of young men came in for their chance to kiss the ring, and they fell agog before a huge black-and-white Helmut Newton photograph on the wall. It showed two nude women sprawled under a sycamore tree at Woodland, not a stone's throw from where they stood that moment.

Evans noticed their gaze.

"They're not here," he said to the lads.

Or was the old rake speaking to himself, remembering happy days long gone?

Ah, Bob! Sic transit gloria mundi.