……………………The Versailles fashion show in Paris without a doubt was and is to this day the most important fashion show that ever took place…..Elanor Lambert, who was an American publiscist, came up with the idea to have a fashion show pitting five American designers against the leading five French designers. The French really didn’t know that much about the Americans and considered them copyists and second rate. She had meetings with the French and they decided it should be a benefit to repair the Place of Versailles which had fallen into a horrible condition. This would assure the turnout they wanted. There is a documentary that explains what happened [The Battle of Versailles], but my story is about Jac. She was just starting in the business. She went to Paris once and worked for Givenchy among others, and came back to the US. Her agency immediately sent her out on go sees with the understanding she was new and already a hit in Paris. She quickly got bookings to do shows….Bill Blass, Steven Borrows, and Anne Klein being just three of them. She heard that models were being booked for this enormous event in Paris, but had no idea if she was one of the models. She was at a booking with another model, and the subject of Versailles came up. The model asked Jac if she were booked and Jac replied she didn’t know. The model said, “well you must call your agent and find out”, but Jac was too shy and embarrassed to call and find out. What if she wasn’t and had to tell this model she wasn’t booked! The model insisted she call her agent Gilles McGill and ask her. Jac was shaking when she made the call. She asked to speak to Gilles [a tough broad who was once a well known model herself]. In a very low self deprecating voice she asked Gilles if she was booked for the Versailles show. There was a moment of silence on the other end, and Gilles said to Jac, “you stupid girl, each model needed three votes out of the five designers to get accepted, you got FOUR votes, you’re going!”. She was so excited to be going back to Paris, and to Versailles! Little did she know what a horrible time it would be……..however with all of the terrible conditions the American segment was a huge success. They out shown the French ten fold. The French segment was 2 1/2 hours of over produced boredom. It looked old and it was old. There is nothing worse in the fashion industry to be boring and OLD!. The American show with all five designers was 35 minutes of sensational, fast past gorgeous clothes on beautiful models with fantastic American 70s music….”Love Unlimited”…..Jac was in FOUR of the Five segments. The only one she didn’t do was Steven Borrows who she was working with in NYC, but the way it was planned she couldn’t do it. Ocsar was the last to show and needed one more model. He wanted Jac, but Jac was in the Bill Blass segment so he had to ask Bill if it was alright for Jac to do his segment! You wouldn’t believe the cat fights and screaming that was going on before the show, but Bill said yes. The two pictures above are to the left, Jac in an Oscar chiffon white gown. and tow the left Jac in a white Bill Blass very fitted suit with a long skirt and a hat with a veil. She carried a walking stick and was supposed to be very haughty. She opened the segment with model Carol Brant on an empty stage. She was supposed to play an uppity aristocrat and left Carol standing alone who then walked off….Jac walked to the center stage, and with a hand jester brought out the other models and then she walked off the stage. Bill Blass fell in love with her from that moment on, and had a huge larger than life hard poster of Jac standing alone at the front of the stage with her walking stick planted in the floor. He kept this poster there for years. Jac soon became his fitting model. He called her his Carol Lombard.
So glad that anorexia was exposed and explored as a demon in the fashion industry. So cruel to pressure young women to emaciate themselves into poor health.
I often wondered, where do these trends come from.
Lots of women literally looked like skeletons. In what way is this glamorous??? Or healthy?????
What a fantastic life Jac must have lived. I always fantasized about models N.Y. as a teen but didn’t have the height. It seemed so glamorous to me. Jac was a beautiful woman!
Wow! What a fab story, Louis! I felt as if I was right there!
I have to say Beverly…it’s a difficult life. One would think it’s so glamorous, but there are so many hours spent working before the shows it can be exhausting. After one tour of modeling in Europe…Italy and then Paris…Jac came home 95 lbs. Her mother was horrified and took her to the doctor who intern told Jac and her mother she couldn’t model again until she was at least 125 lbs. That was a gain of 20 lbs which scared Jac, because she knew the models who did the couture had to be super thin. She gained the weight and still did the couture….but…..she remembered her first fitting at Valentino. When they took her measurements the head sample maker said, “oh you’re bigger than your last visit”, but they kept booking her even at her “larger size!”. It’s a lot of pressure for a young girl, and this all happened before I even met Jac.
Louis,
Tell us the story of how you met Fabulous JAC, please.
Dear Cela…..I met Jac at the Anne Klein show room. She was booked for fashion week when all of the stores came in to write the orders after the show. It was late in the day and Jac was asked to stay to show the clothes to the last buyer. I was in my windowless studio the whole day and needed to get out. I happen to walk passed the models dressing room and Jac was sitting there. We hadn’t really spoken. She had done the show, but we never really talked. I had a coffee and we introduced ourselves. Of course she knew who I was, but I didn’t remember her name. We use 30 models and it was all a blur. We talked, and talked, and talked, and then I had to go back to work. She later told me of her recollections of our first meeting. She had just tuned 18, I was older….LOL…..She said I was wearing a chambray blue button down cotton shirt, sleeves rolled up. I had on my khaki British pants with the double side buckles [oh to be that size again]. She remembers my thick black hair always falling down into my eyes and me pushing it back….She told me it was “love at first sight”. She was supposed to catch a train to Larchmont, NY where she lived with her mother, but she missed it because she wanted to stay and talk to me. I thought she was a beauty, but way too young for me….that all changed when she turned 21. That was our real first meeting. I remember it like it was yesterday.