June 9, 2011 |
FROM THE VOLT (SUMMER 2008)
Candy Pratts Price: Creative Director, Vogue.com
Here’s what I know about Candy Pratts Price, or The CPP to those of you who don’t know that if you called her that to her face, she would beat you down with a Manolo heel:
1) She was married to the artist Chuck Price in Cairo, Egypt, while wearing jodhpurs.
2) She was the fashion director of accessories at Vogue for eight years before taking over the VH1/Vogue Fashion Awards in the late 1990s (which I recorded – on tape – and was then forced to grapple with what I realised was an alternative lifestyle). Now she is the executive fashion director of Style.com
3) She can work a camera like no one’s business – I’ve seen her on the Today Show, Good Morning America and even Fashion Television.
4) Her voice is a husky feminine baritone that the wonderful Billy Norwich once described as, “not unlike Diana Vreeland channelling the impresario Mike Todd”.
5) Queen Elizabeth II asked for an audience with The CPP in 1976 after touring the windows at Bloomingdale’s, which Price had directed.
6) She has a Birkin that was made especially for her that reads Candida on the bottom.
7) She inspired a film called Lady Beware, about a fab lady who does fab store windows, which starred Diane Lane.
8) She is the only person you want to sit next to at one of those boring socialite dinners or fashion galas. She is also the type of person who’s bad side you never want to be on.
9) Candy is fierce…
Please allow me to expound on these last two points referring to Ms Price’s ability to entertain, judge and criticise. At a Marchesa presentation in New York last season, I watched her tell someone to quit talking to her because she didn’t know them. (Okay, fine, that was me. And I think she was kidding. Maybe.) I was seated near her at yet another one of those sit-down dinners at a place where the waiters have to wear a bow tie. The service and decor were not to her liking, so Candy wasn’t having it. This is a woman who knows an Hermès ashtray from an improvised teacup saucer. The chairs were draped in cheap cloth, the chandelier was temporary, the flowers were all wrong and the dinner was cold and served late. In that lovely gravelly voice she told a publicist just exactly how she felt, and then took pictures on her mobile for proof and left. Don’t mess with Candy.
At another dinner I heard her telling people about a Louis Vuitton trunk show; and then she told the person on the other side how to store her diamonds, and how big is too big when it comes to statement jewellery (once an accessories editor… ).
She has the quick wit and sense of humour that one needs in an industry that changes every six months. Basically, Candy knows what’s up. So what if I once saw her light a ciggie in the middle of a museum, or sneak a roadie out of the Frick gala? Some geniuses need their vices to work – so if Candy wants a smoke, give her a damn cigarette. Quit being so serious, people. Fashion, like Candy Pratts Price, is fun.
And oh, to hear that voice and to experience that genius, you simply must check out her podcasts (www.style.com/trends/candy).
by Derek Blasberg
