Gio’s Journal
Giovanna Battaglia, W’s intrepid new style maven, sees inspiration wherever her globe-trotting life takes her. From her secret to making a dress stay put to the coolest new slippers, here is a month’s worth of her fashionable finds.
“I wore a Stephen Sprouse dress with two separate bra cups to the amfAR dinner at Cannes with my boyfriend [Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld], and everybody kept saying, ‘Oh, my God, they’re going to fall!’ And I was like, ‘Guys, there’s no way.’ My assistant got the best adhesive ever, Topstick. It was so strong that I felt like I was waxing my chest when I took them off at the end of the night!”
“This is my younger sister, Sara. We don’t look alike at all. People think she had her nose and mouth done! She’s like a diva, modeling for her own handbag collection. She is impersonating a medieval queen, Teodelinda, who is the inspiration for her fall line.”
“Tatiana Santo Domingo has a new website: muzungusisters .com. She loves traveling, so everywhere she goes she finds a product specific to that place and sells it online. This is a typical Sicilian bag style called coffa. I once had one like this. My family is originally from Sicily, and every summer we used to go there. And of course Dolce & Gabbana did this exact bag years ago.”
“I’m in love with Bergdorf Goodman senior vice president Linda Fargo. For me she is the epitome of New York. We were at the Charlotte Olympia showroom in Paris and went crazy over this hat with embroidered lips. I wanted to steal it.”
“I always wonder, Why do only men get to wear slippers? These are supercute—they’re from Charles Philip Pozzi’s first collection. He lives in Shanghai. They’re better than ballerina flats, which are a bit tired, no?”
“I thought Eugenie Niarchos was so cute with her Tom Ford glasses and that little bag from Dior. We were at lunch at Hôtel du Cap. The paper bracelet [below] is the napkin ring from the same restaurant— I always wear souvenirs from weird places. The gold one is Lalaounis; Vlad gave it to me as a present.”
“This is [designer] Noor Fares wearing big Maison Michel lace ears and hiding behind her Chanel bag. I love that bag. It’s like a ball, but up close it has facets like a diamond. Noor is doing very well with her jewelry line [left]. These bracelets are ebony and gold-plate ebony. You can wear them with khaki—it’s the best safari look.”
“I really liked this dress at Cannes—it’s Alaïa couture. The wedding dress Azzedine [Alaïa] did for [stylist] Charlotte Stockdale had a similar embroidery.”
“When packing for Cannes, I ended up with three bags in my hand and realized, Oh, my God, it’s the Italian flag! In the end, I brought the green Fendi and the white Dolce & Gabbana. The red is Ralph Lauren’s Ricky bag. That one is more New York.”
