After a Fashion

THE CIRCUIT Party, party, party. Sounds glam, right? It's not. It's work – a drudgery involving far too much preparation (45 minutes for jewelry application alone) and far too many one-of-a-kind outfits. Of course the big parties are great but offer far more opportunities for public embarrassment, even if you haven't been ... uh ... overserved. A simple step back sent me tumbling backward down a couple of stairs in a heap of embarrassment at a large club; fortunately there was not a cocktail in my hand, or I would have been a wet heap of embarrassment. But not as embarrassed as the young woman perched on a railing at another party who threw her head back to do a shot and went over the railing, making sure everyone knew she had a new Brazilian wax job. At another affair, an inebriated guest spilled so much red wine on the carpet that it looked like the aftermath in the LaBianca mansion. More charming and less dramatic was The Austin Chronicle's holiday party – great food, great spirits, great company. And yes, I bawled like a baby when my sister Margaret, Barbara Chisholm, and Kate Messer did a karaoke version of "To Sir With Love" and dedicated it to me. The Broken Spoke party was the one I loved best. Owner James White and I compared glittery Western shirts – his was much more fabulous than mine, and James' tough-as-nails but sweet-as-a-pussycat wife, Annetta, made sure everyone was relaxed and well taken care of in the Broken Spoke's old-fashioned and always-hospitable style.

DIVOON I wound up at Vicci on Friday for a fashion show. Now, you may remember me railing against Vicci a few weeks ago, when we felt like we were being treated like criminals simply for being there. However, on this occasion we were treated very cordially by several staff members who remembered me from the last time. The guard at the VIP entrance was courteous and let us through without too much drama, and by the time we left through Vicci's red-carpet back-alley exit, the recent rain had washed away all the smells of vomit and urine. So indeed, I was much happier with Vicci this time around. And especially happy with the fashion show, which, as you know, is not one of my primary reactions to fashion shows. OK, the dirt. The company is called Dévushka (www.devushkadesign.com), owned by Kimberly Jaques and Jenny Howe. Perhaps more stylists than designers at this point (neither have professional apparel-design training), they do have an eye for style and glamour. To be fair, we did not see a wide range of styles, but what we did see was a simple, Forties-style dress à la Dorothy Lamour reinterpreted a dozen different ways, utilizing diverse fabrics and patterns to create varying looks. Great hair and make-up, some very good models, but the best thing? The best thing was the restraint the designers employed to keep the show short, sweet, and simple. That, boys and girls, is a rare gift: no mall-bred hip-hop dancers, no jugglers, fire-eaters, no trampy models yanking up their dresses to show everything the clothes are supposed to cover. An excellent debut of some very promising talent.