After the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund show in Los Angeles, finalists, judges, and a few close friends, exhausted yet exhilarated, came together for a celebratory dinner at Thomas Keller’s Bouchon in Beverly Hills, hosted by Kate Spade New York’s Deborah Lloyd. Vogue’s West Coast Director, Lisa Love, welcomed guests, including Derek Blasberg and Michele Ouellet, fresh off the runway with windswept beehive fully in tact, along with former Fashion Funders Juan Carlos Obando, Aurora James, Jennifer Meyer, and Irene Neuwirth.
At the dinner table, lit with soft candlelight and covered with white roses in green copper vases, Alex Harrington caught up with Morgan Lane muse Langley Fox Hemingway, while Ethan Peck and Greg Chait discussed their latest mountain-climbing exploits. Katy Perry, who celebrated her birthday the previous day, wore one-time Fashion Fund finalist Ryan Roche and confided the secret she’d picked up from Fashion Fund judge Jenna Lyons—“Get everything tailored, even a plain white T-shirt. It will look so much better.”
The 2016 finalists were able to take a much-needed sigh of relief knowing that their challenges are behind them, and all that lies ahead is the final awards dinner in New York, now just a few weeks away. Chait, the 2012 Fashion Fund winner, advised the current group to “just enjoy it.” Noting that this is an opportunity to meet people who genuinely want to help them succeed.
As dinner drew to a close, there were more celebrations in store. Perry’s song “Birthday” filled the room, and waiters presented her with a large sparkler-bedecked chocolate birthday cake, trimmed in pink sugar. Then as she blew out the candles, a mariachi band burst into the room to serenade the birthday girl, who gamely proceeded to the front of the room to dance, with a white rose between her teeth. “Something good to celebrate” indeed!