Art, I suppose

One must remember that to be in the art world is to be pretty (gorgeous is even better- but not too gorgeous, otherwise you are regulated to the zoo of models). I made this observation when I was looking at photos my agents in Venice dredged up, from this Venice art fair that goes on there. Everybody looked exactly the same- as if they were transplants from the hair of the fashion world, and everybody knows that fashion has no heir, so everything is particularly stark and boring. There is a reason Anna only attends fashion world parties for 15 minutes- they are simply insufferably boring events filled with so many patting each other on the back that one begins to suspect one is in some sort of modern dance instillation (the most terrifying aspect of this being that you're surrounded by all these modern dancers, slapping each other on the back- not too hard as to damage their finely-sculpted skin, and that getting out means moving around them and through them).

I said to my assistant, "you know, the problem with art today is that there's too many pretty people, and they all look so similar, so the art they produce is so similar and everything's boring. Andy Warhol was never pretty. It's his mistake, though, probably- the Edie mistake. Now everyone wants to be an Edie and nobody wants to be an Andy".

"Oh."

"And that's the problem- nobody wants to be ugly anymore. Too many good looking people. Make a note of that. I only want to hire conjoined twins and circus freaks from now on- hire the entire Diane Arbus range of people. Is there a place that sells them? Buy them in bulk. Staff them in the stores. Give a few stickers that they can stick on themselves and say "artist".

"Is that what makes an artist?"

"Of course. I have a label sewn into this suit that says "dressmaker".

A bit later, when the assistant was gone, I started talking to myself.

"The collectors used to be odd looking too, you know- bulbous New York men in Italian suits and women wearing colours that'd make Matisse blush. The collectors are boring looking as well, now. Is it because of boring looking art? Does boring looking art breed boring looking people?" I started throwing some Picassos out the window, in the hope that some women would look at the painting and give birth to an interesting-looking, interesting-thinking child. I put the Jeff Koons I was sent as a gift into the deepest darkest depths of my closest, hoping nobody would be able to see it ever- dull art is a dangerous thing, you know. I threw several Cartier-Bressons out the window beside the first window, and out the third window I threw several volumes of a Lee Friedlander book, in the hope that somebody would give birth to a child who doesn't follow the terrors of the Düsseldorf school of photography, and those hideous Becher people- I met them once and they made their cups of tea exactly the same way, every time. I asked them if they ever got bored and they smiled tightly.

Magical Fashion Island

A lot of people have been asking me why The Magical Fashion Island in Dubai isn't going ahead. "Lack of funds", I said. "People aren't made of money these days."

"They were before?" said the people.

"Some of them. The Rothschilds were- that's why that had umbrellas, to stop themselves getting soggy. They always had umbrellas, those Rothschilds. Now they use plastic money."

"Does Bill Gates use plastic money?"

"Ah, well, he's not the sort to have a melting cesspool of credit cards all over him- he uses imaginary money. It works just the same, if everybody believes in it. It's like that Tinkerbell person, you know."

"-Off Peter Pan."

"Quite. If you believe in anything enough it'll be true. That's why I'm still alive- because I don't believe in death."

"Oh?"

"I don't "do" death. It is not for me. Other people, maybe- if they're into that sort of thing. The problem with death is that it's very hard to undo once one has done it, and what if death goes out of fashion?"
"..."

"Well, then one would be demode. You can't reinvent yourself either. Elvis did- he lost weight. I didn't have to die to lose weight. In any case, why The Magical Fashion Island didn't work is because people didn't believe in it hard enough."

At this point the people were escorted outside by my butler, and I sat down to read the newspapers. In The Guardian there was an article with the words "Are women hard-wired to enjoy cupcakes?"

"Stunning journalism", I muttered to myself. I called Anna. "Do you like cupcakes?"

"No," she replied. I called Diana. She did not like cupcakes. I called Carine and she vomited on the mere premise of cupcakes. Finally, I talked to my friend Gertrude Stein, who pointed out that the article was as ridiculous as saying "are men hard-wired to enjoy meat?"

"The article asks that probing question too", I said. Gertrude rolled her eyes. I wondered how on earth anybody would come up with the assumption that Women Enjoy Cupcakes. What about staplers, hm? Are office-workers hard-wired to enjoy staplers? Are pizza-makers hard-wired to enjoy pizza-slicers? Why is there so much wiring, anyway?

I threw The Guardian on the floor and stomped on it with my one-size-too-small shoes. Hard hitting journalism indeed. I asked Helmut if he wanted to take a photo, and I asked him how death was working out. He mentioned an orgy.

Above: Artist's rendering of Magical Fashion Island.

Some People Say I've Got The Blood Of The Land In My Voice

I am still trying to work out why I ended up in New York for a few days. Anna told me there would be a whole roomful of fingerless leather gloves for me if I came, and another a whole ballroom of collars. I, of course, jumped at the chance. I didn't really jump- I perched on my tip-toes, looked down condescendingly at whatever was below me, and what was below me was a fax machine and sheets of paper, so I glared condescendingly at the fax and sheets of paper then said "yes" to Anna. When I got to New York I found out that this was a set-up to get me to attend an event they call "Fashion's Night Out". I said to nobody in particular- "but every night is a night out for fashion, no?" Nobody in particular replied- "yes, but not for the proles. Think of it like this, Karl- it is fashion's V for Victory".

"Is there a war going on?" I said.

"Uh...well", said nobody in particular. "People are losing their jobs and uh.."

"They're definitely losing their jobs" said someone else.

"Definitely" said nobody in particular. I said I'd find it more interesting if say, Paris was attacking New York with giant bottles of wine and cheese, and fashion's night out was a sort of defence.

"It can be, if you want it to be" said nobody in particular.

So I went around this "fashion's night out" giving the V for Victory sign with my hands. Somebody asked if I knew Klingon.

"Klingon?" I said.

"You know, Star Trek-"

"Ah, yes. My favourite television series. If I watched television."

"Your favourite television series if you watched television?"

"Well you see, I don't. But I'm sure it would be a favourite. I'm a big fan of men in tights."

"Sir, you are thinking of Batman" said an annoying PR lackey from my office.

"No, definitely Star Trek" I said. "Do they have Star Trek here?"

"Let me ask Anna.."

I probably attended some dinner, though I attend so many dinners it's hard to keep track. Do you know that most people eat at least three times a day? That's 21 dinners a week. I don't know how some people do it, frankly. I try to attend at least one dinner a day, but often these things are so boring, you know- "oh Karl! Karl! Karl!", and hideous sycophantic people who, I believe, inject themselves with preservatives every morning. You can tell if they inject themselves with preservatives or not- if you leave them out in the kitchen for a few days and they're not growing mold, they have preservatives in them. We keep Chanel staff in the fridge over night. Actually, that's why I'm not showing the "Karl Lagerfeld" line at Paris fashion week- our fridges broke down and all the staff grew moldy and out of date. Demode, you could say.

Homeage

A lot of you thought I was joking when I claimed, several months ago, that Anna and I go around the city stencilling various things onto walls, ceilings, ipods and such. Generally it's the Chanel logo, but here you see an assistant of Anna's attempt at an homage to me. It's not bad. If you're looking for Chanel logos, you need look any further than streetlights in London. Or the offices of Dior, of course.

Hello? Hello?

Is this thing on?

All of you people are bloody incompetent. Turn the bloody recorder on, Karl is angry that I haven't posted in a while and you know how he gets. I expect an edited markup of this rant in precisely half-an-hour ago.

THAT'S NOT IMPOSSIBLE. YOU'RE FIRED.

Ahem.

Hello lovely admirers,

I wish to say hello and prompt you to not go see that movie called 'The September Issue.' It is now demode, as that was a number of eons ago. You see, in our beautiful and luxurious world full of beauty and luxury, years = eons. One shouldn't be documented in fashion that is eons ago, hm? This is why we here at Vogue are working on taking over the world's media and erasing all footage of myself and Karl previous to exactly this moment. Now, this moment. Now. Now.

You see, this is an arduous task and I have fired exactly 13 assistants since thirty-five minutes from Tuesday; so I really must be going.

Oh, I nearly forgot. I think I might do a 'tip' or something at the end of each blog, you know, so you can remember to perform some small task in my honor every day. So, Anna's tip for today: DON'T WATCH THAT DAMN MOVIE.

God, I am beautiful. Hand me that Chanel lipstick. Is Karl here yet? Yes, you blithering twat, turn off the record-

Grandma Anna (or: The September Issue)

Grandma got run over by a reindeer,
It wore a Prada nose, I do believe,
You can say there's no such thing as fatties,
But as for me and Alber, we believe

She'd been drinking too much vodka,
And we'd begged her not to go,
But she'd left her sunglasses,
So she stumbled out the door into the snow

When they found her September mornin',
At the scene of the attack,
There were hoof prints on her forehead,
And fattie hand-prints on her back

Grandma got run over by a reindeer,
Walkin' home from our house September eve,
You can say there's no such thing as fatties,
But as for me and Alber, we believe

Now we're all so proud of Alber,
He's been takin' this so well,
See him in there sewing dresses,
Drinkin' beer and playin' cards with cousin Belle

It's just not September without Grandma,
All the family's dressed in Coco's black,
And we just can't help but wonder,
Should we bury her with vodka or without?

Grandma got run over by a reindeer,
Walkin' home from our house September eve,
You can say there's no such thing as fatties,
But as for me and Alber, we believe

Now the goose is on the table,
Alber's gonna eat it all,
I'm drinking diet coca-cola,
That would've matched the colour of dear ol' Grandma's soul

I've warned all my friends and neighbours,
Better watch out for yourselves,
They should never give a licence,
To a man who weighs more than the sleigh,

Grandma got run over by a reindeer,
Walkin' home from our house September eve,
You can say there's no such thing as fatties,
But as for me and Alber, we believe

The World's Longest Dinner (or, be careful of your waitress at the Tate Modern, she just might be an EEL)

I just came back from the World's Longest Dinner Party. It lasted for 8 days. These things do- they're either very long or very short. I try and make them about 10 minutes, people are rarely interesting after that. But this dinner party ended up being...an interesting social experiment.

The party itself was one of those social events that involve food and people and people wearing clothes. There's also "small talk" at these social events- the conversation generally goes like:
Person one: Mutter mutter OH YES mutter.
Person two: Flatter flatter flatter DON'T YOU LOOK GOOD flatter.
And so on.

If Donatella, Coco bless her plastic soul, is involved in the party it will go something like this:
Person one: Honour honour flatter flatter ITALIAN FOOD flatter
Donatella: Mutter LOOK AT MY MEDUSA LIPS mutter mutter

Meanwhile, if Anna is involved in a the party conversation with her would sound something like this:
Person one: Fear idol fear loathing fear honour-to-meet-you fear.
Anna: Hello.
20 minutes later.
Anna: BLERGddhdDSHSSIEYRDnhcsjcfscnscjscDDJDAcfbsjfbafbsjfbsoaiddhdbJCJNJNCSCA.

Which is why Anna does not go to many parties. She really can enunciate tha many letters than fast. It's something of a party trick. By 2 hours later, Anna will have mistaken most of the guests for deer and start shooting them. It's all that time she's spent at my place in Vermont.

If I were to sum up the dinner party I went to mathematically, we could say that it was 80% "You DO look good" and so on, 5% Donatella and 7.5% Anna- the rest being the people Anna shot at the party, with a tiny dash of Tom Ford attempting to direct a movie with his Sony camera.

The press clippings from the party probably would read something like this:
"Anna Wintour shot 12 people at a party recently, held by the fabulous Mr. and Mrs. So and so. When interviewed by the police about the incident, she claims that she mistook several guests of the party as deer, and proceeded to shoot them as she would do on Karl Lagerfeld's Vermont property. The people were not eaten, and are now in the good care of graveyards. Chef to the stars, Mr. Somesuch, worries about the waste of food: "Well in this resseccion, you've gotta take everything you can for food. When I was a little boy growing up in Scotland, we had to eat food out of newspapers. Nay, we had to eat it off the ground! Nay, we had to eat it at sea level!
Meanwhile, Ms. Wintour has entered into a plea bargain with the police about the unfortunate incident. She will make gun safety commericals to screen in September- "a faaaabulous tie-in to the "September Issue", Large Editor of American Vogue, Andre Leon Talley said. Ms. Wintour also said that she did not intend on shooting anyone else, although she believes guns will be a big accessory in summer 09. More on this exciting accessory story as it happens."

Of course, that story will never be published because here at Chanel, we have a certain power over the elite. It isn't good publicity to have editors going around killing people, you know. Deer or not deer. The fabulous Mr. and Mrs. So and So ended up holding everyone hostage for 8 days, where there was much chit-chat that went around the lines of "prison uniform is SO not chic," and "flatter DON'T YOU LOOK GOOD," as the fabulously well-to-do guests were not so much air heads as helium heads, unaware that Mr. So and So were holding them hostage. Eventually, everyone signed the criminal equivalent of a post-nup (a post-shoot?) and they were allowed to leave, air-kissing everyone until the only things left to kiss were themselves, which they did with remarkable dexterity. And that was dinner.

Transcript

Karl asked me to post this transcript. Regards, Brad II.

Bob Dylan: Cathy Horyn saw Karl in the kitchen/can't say nothing, but nothing didn't happen
Karl: Boys who wear cowboy hats end up lying on the mat.
Bob: Cathy wore her beanie/And her knee highs too/Someone said "girl, you look like a hag"/She gave them them the evil eye
Karl: How do you even know who Cathy Horyn is? She's just some hockey mom.
Bob: Karl saw his models/All in a line/Cathy said "Karl, why don't you grab something off the shelf?"
Karl: Models don't go in lines. They go in gaggles. Actually, I'm not sure if there's a proper term for a group of models. What's the term for a jar of toothpicks?
Anna: A pickery.
Karl: Oh! There you are. I wondered where you'd gone.
Bob: And Anna's getting some medicine and gin/in the infirmary.
Anna: For once he's right. "Voice of a generation", ptf. That generation was so stoned up a rock could've been the spokesman for it.
Karl: Or a pen.
Allen Ginsberg: What, you don't like Bob?
Anna: Dirty American. It takes a lot of effort to work at American Vogue, you know. But nobody reads British Vogue. God. Coco. Pynchon. You might as well work at Cat Fancier's Weekly.
Spokesman for Cat Fancier's Weekly: Hey now! Look here, we at Cat Fancier's Weekly have been getting a lot of flak- since about the beginning of time. Even Jesus used us as a joke.
Karl: How'd the joke go?
Spokesman: Erm..um..
Jesus: Oh man, I remember. It was like- "I could hardly be God's son if he worked at Cat Fancier's Weekly."
John Lennon: Oh yeah! That was a good one! Bigger than Jesus, that joke.
Jesus: Bigger than Jesus.
Spokesman: It's just not fair. We've been going as long as Christianity! Surely we're doing something right if we're still going. Right?
Sir Edward Elgar: Surely sir, you realize that you're only in existence because of the continuity of this joke? In fact, this conversation right now is keeping your alive.
Spokesman: So..?
Karl: So you would not exist if Anna hadn't made that joke about you.
Spokesman: Am I supposed to pop out of existence at the appearance of logic here?
Anthropomorphic Panda Bear: No.

Live in Bars and Danced on Tables

Most of you will have seen Anna's bit on 60 minutes by now. If your name is Cathy "Ohio" Horyn, you are probably flabbergasted by the fact that Mr. 60 Minutes dared call me a vampire; or the fact that he suggested John Galliano needs a better tailor. I imagine Cathy sitting at home, eating yet another one of her chicken pot-pies and wearing her hockey hats and lumberjack jackets- writing her post with a dirty pencil and yelling at the neighbours: "WHY AREN'T YOU LIKE MY SYCOPHANTIC COMMENTORS?" she screams, going back to her CRT computer screen to eat her 2nd chicken pot-pie of the day and read her commentors (all of whom are in their 40's and out of work). I do wonder whether Cathy possess a sense of humor, or that too, like her fashion sense, is long gone. It's the truth that I'm a vampire- I told everybody that in the 70's and they thought I was joking.

If you are the possibly-once-alright fashionista dot com, you would've written a post in where you call the delightful (if in need of skincare) Mr. 60 Minutes "snarky". Children, let's have a think about what it means when an industry where to be snarky is valued as highly as being able to breath- let us think about what it means when a fashion site calls somebody out on being snarky. Just let that sink in for a bit. Mm. This is what happens when you get college girls with frizzy hair writing posts, hmm?

The other thing making all the news stands at the moment is a book written by a so-called former assistant of mine. He was never an assistant of mine- assistants of mine do not survive once they are fired. They're like some endangered animal that's under protection by the horrible environmentalists, that if they are released they cannot survive in the wild. My assistants do not survive in the wild; simply because I kill them first. Given that we're on a National Geographic kind of slant here, we'll say that I eat them, as a large worm with eyes might. Of course, I do not really eat them. I just decapitate them. I stole one of those Chanel guillotines this artist created, and I use that. The artist sent a telegraph to me regarding the fact that it the guillotine in question is "art" and "not for use". I replied saying it's a demonstration of art ending life. That's rather philosophical, isn't it? "Art ending life." Someone should write a thesis on that.

Let me tell you this, Fashion people: nothing in this book is true. For one, I drink diet Coke, not Pepsi. What sort of book gets an important plot-point like this wrong, hmm? Can you really imagine I, Karl Otto Lagerfeld, drinking Pepsi? It defies the imagination, frankly. This fraud of a writer alleges other things- I'm egotistic, I have no understanding of the human mind; I designed the H&M collection in two and half days. I designed it in half an hour, not two and a half days. What sort of slob do they think I am? As for my ego, I think my nieces and daughter will testify that I am not egotistic in the slightest. Yes, I am brilliant and the greatest genius ever; yes, I, by myself- moi and only moi- revived Chanel; yes, I designed every collection worth a damn ever. That's no reason to call me an egotist. I'm just brilliant.

Anna Wintour has a wine (or two), or: the Met Gala

This terribly demode Met Gala was held once again, a couple of days ago. It's Anna's little party, though I overheard a little bird wondering whether Anna has gone lesbian; what with the model as muse theme and all. Of course, that's if we define "model" and "muse" by excluding those more unconventional muses- Rebecca Alperin, those of Yohji, Rei, and so on- eventually we end up with a very glamorous...barn of sticks who appear to be impersonating drag queens. So it's unfair to say Anna is a lesbian- she obviously has a thing for drag queens, which is fine. Very J.G Ballardian.

I did not go to the Gala because I don't like parties as a rule. I am not a party person. I am more of a by-myself person. However, I feel that the Gala has outstayed the welcome fashion throws out to it: it is becoming the Fondue Party of this decade. Frankly, the only interesting thing about this ball was mon amour, Jules- she wore a dress by me. Fendi, spring/summer, 2009- look 35 I believe. I got the telegram from her around last month requesting a dress. I tried to convince her that maybe it wouldn't be the best idea; that these balls and galas are terribly demode now; it's incredibly vulgar to stage something like this when people are losing jobs, no? Not just any jobs, but the jobs of seamstresses! If there's anybody almost as important as a designer, it's a seamstress. I was just outside the Chanel headquarters the other day as a seamstress sat homeless on the street, her dress like rags and her eyes a vortex of blazing desperation. I laughed at her, because it was I that fired her. I'm only worried about the good seamstresses.

My driver drove me past the gala, once. We were going out for a late night high-collar feast and people stalking session anyway. Now if this was Yves, we'd be hearing about "Oh how I regret not going to this ball of balls!" I, on the other hand, was stuck by the circus that appeared to be congregating outside- what appeared to be a large yellow bird was smoking a cigarette. I heard snippets of conversation: "Where do you insert a tampon?", "Do you think he's straight?", "I heard Alaia had an affair with Anna."

Oh yes, Alaia! Readers of other media will note that Mr. Alaia pulled out of this little ball. Commentors on say, Cathy Horyn's blog have been positvly enraged by this! Yes, because a designer pulling out of a meaningless ball is very enraging! My Chanel, I feel my ice cold blood rising a degree. Nevermind that our Mr. Alaia is a noted prima-donna (much more than Nigel Barker is a noted fashion photographer) , and what probably happened was someone insulted his shoes. You know, a lot of people praise Alaia, calling him a genius and such. Nevermind most of them haven't seen Alaia's work; he's, like, a totally important designer! It's mostly the critics who like him, of course, because He Has Wine.

I had to go to the gala in the end anyway, Anna passed out. By the time I arrived half the guests had passed out, actually- it reminded me of a gas chamber, but with pretty dresses.

Vineland

"Karl, we're in code K" says my assistant, in his whites pressed so much that they appear to invade personal space.
"Code K?" the voice of Anna shouts, in the other room indulging in...oh, do I even need to tell you?
"Code K. It appears there's a demode one in our presecne."
"A demode one, hmm?" I let off- a mere wisp of refrigerated air from between my lips. My trademark "hmm?" sends shivers throughout the entire fashion world. Down their shoulderblades and into their soulless little bodies.
"Yep."
"Yep?"
"Yep."
"Fire this man, Anna."

Oh dear, it appears we have solved who the demode one is in the first paragraph of this post! Oh no! And now I'm going all post-modern on you. I feel like Martin Amis. Maybe I am Martin Amis. Maybe, I have a split personality which does not remember a thing about the other. So during the day I am Karl Lagerfeld, genius. And during the night I am Martin Amis, writer. How ridiculous, hmm? Gosh- we'd better joke about the anorexics now. To loosen up the mood.

Knock Knock. Who's there? An anorexic!

Anna: Uh. You're meant to say "anorexic who?"
Karl: But anorexics don't have a last name. Well, they do but they're all different. It's not as if all anorexics are from the same family. So what I'm trying to say is, is that there's really no possibility for a "who" to go in there."
Anna: You just don't get it, do you..
Karl: Get what?
Anna: I'll try one on you: Knock knock.
Karl: Who's there?
Anna: Anna.
Karl: Anna who?
Anna: No, Anna Wintour.
Karl: I don't get it.
Anna: If I explain it it won't be funny.
Karl: I think we should just go back to being bitches.

As I was saying, there was this assistant that declared "Code K", which as everybody will know is the Most Serious code in the entire arsenal of codes that I've developed over the years. I did it all in one night, actually. I got home from work- and this was when boys threw themselves at me. So there was this boy- all toned, his chest a masterpiece, his lips full of ambition...you, dear reader, may imagine the rest. He was on my couch, as this was in the 60's where locks had not been invented yet. Sprawled out on there like he expected me to make love to him or something.
"Now look here, young man. I have no love to give you! I have no soul! I eat souls!"
"You have no love to give me? Sounds like Leonard Cohen."
Ah, a boy who knows something.
"Nothing like Cohen. So long, Marianne."
"Oh come on now! That was a pointed reference towards Cohen if nothing else!"
"Yeah. The fact is: I'm just not interested in sex."
"What about your lover?"
"He comes into the picture in the 70's, really. I haven't met Jacques yet!"
"You know his name is going to be Jacques?"
"I've read the history books!"
"So no sex?"
"Non, no sex tonight."

Now- the reason young men don't throw themselves at me anymore is because so many young men have done this the governments of the world had to create a breeding programme to repopulate the world with Attractive Young Men. Once a man has thrown himself at me, it is as good as suicide. After all, if you don't catch them, they simply continue falling! And eventually they go splat, which in my mind is a very vulgar way to go. Anyway, now I have rations of Attractive Young Men: a Brad there, a Brad here, a Brad over there. They're all called Brad- I simply can't be bothered remembering names. (Yes, I do realize I am not with Brad anymore. And you sure realize it, don't you Brad! Slut. Whore. Chanelface. But I can't be bothered remembering the name of the new one.)

In any case, I let the boy outside where he proceeded to climb the building Batman-and-Robin style without the benefit of the building being on the horizontal. And of course, I heard that very vulgar splat not long after. Oh dear. I went back into my castle, and started to draw up the Karl Code list. Sounds like a bad novel, no? "The Karl Code." Imagine what other sort of novels you could create with that, hmm? "The Nabokov Code", "The Klimt Code", "The Da Vinci Code." I'm sure the last one would be hilarious- some half baked conspiracy book. "The Klimt Code" on the other hand would be made up of text made to resemble images by him; which are only fully viewable by those with Synesthesia. The text itself would be written by Thomas Pynchon.
"The Nabokov Code" has already been written. It's not called that, of course.

What the Karl Code serves as is a sort of defence plan for fashion. For example, last night I was at a restaurant with a few others at Pastis. Kate Winslet, Kevin Spacey (is that man famous? I'm not sure why he was there), Isaac Mizrahi and so on. A waiter came over and asked Anna if she wanted food. I'll repeat that in caps: "IF SHE WANTED FOOD." Anna "freaked" out, as the youth say, and rightly so. I was in the corner taking photos of everybody- all those disgusting fatties eating their food. It's kind of like a perverse sort of porn. Anna started shrieking: "CODE F! CODE EFF! CODE EFFF!"
And the team went into action: two assistants apprehended the culprit (ie. the waiter) and dragged him out back, for a little lesson. A waitress who looked very thin herself- she may have been going to a Halloween party with those bones- gave Anna an avocado, because Anna was shrieking "AVOCADO! AVOCADO! AVOCADO!". The chef made the avocado look nice, and less like food. Anna looked it the rest of the night: her eyes boring into the very fabric of the avocado. I took more photos. The night was saved, thanks to the Karl code, hm?

Ratched

I don't know how other designers live with themselves between collections. Most designers, you see, don't do as much work as I and only have collections to design. I just don't understand that. Don't they get bored?

Anyway, today was April fools in some parts of the world. I designed an entire collection and gave it to the seamstresses, who diligently made it. I then said "April fools!" once they had made sufficient progress. I laughed. "Ha ha ha."

Anna and I- we haven't talked for a while, actually. I've got a new replacement for Brad, you see, and I've been trying to learn his name. Well, not really. I'll learn it one day. For now he answers to "Brad."
As for Brad, he went into real estate. Because that's what people do when they become fat and ugly; ISN'T IT BRAD.
So Brad does not exist anymore. Does anybody remember Trotsky? Not in Soviet Russia! Because Trotsky never existed. I do love Stalin's system of airbrushing people out of history. Who knew they had photoshop then?

But as I was saying, Anna and I haven't talked for a while. For April fools, we decided to go into the Prada store and order 100 of those wader things Cathy (Horyn) is so fond of.
The Prada store works like any other fast food outlet- KFC, Taco Bell, and so on. The product is prepared when purchased. There's a sweatshop full of Indian and Chinese children behind the facade of clothes and shoes. Behind those paper thin walls, Mrs. Prada cracks a whip as she stalks the sweat-stained wooden room; kicking the chains of the little children that prepare Anna and I's waders. A fisherman stands in the corner, cackling evilly on his pipe and dressed in fish skin. He's Mrs. Prada's new lover, and he gave her the idea of waders.
Once the waders were prepared, Anna said "Oh...no. I don't think we want those now."
We walked out. There is now a large pile of one hundred waders sitting in the New York Prada flagship store. No doubt they'll sell them to stupid people tomorrow.

In other news, happy birthday to Jules, my most favourite bunny of every bunny ever.

The Best Damn Magazine Ever

I've been getting a lot of whiny letters from a lot of you lately complaining about Vogue magazine. American Vogue. AKA Anna's magazine.
I go out to my mailbox, everyday (yes, I personally check my mail), and there's a bunch of letters- maybe 20 of them- all complaining about Vogue.
"What is this shit?" you tell me. "Why is it so demode?", "Why is it not cutting edge???"

First of all, I don't know why the hell you're sending letters to me anyway. Do I look like Vogue magazine, hmm? Am I even an employee there? Are the Conde Nast head offices located at my little house? Did they relocate?
I'm not too interested in your letters, and most of you are boring. I know I'm a genius, I know I'm the best designer in the world-even-better-than-your-friend-who-goes-to-Fashion-School.
Tell me something I don't know, hmm? Be interesting, for a change. Stop being little snivelling toady tools who wouldn't know an insult from a Margiela boot.

I have a theory to why you lot hate American Vogue: The Best Damn Magazine Ever. You hate it because it's too good!

Month after month, Anna faithfully produces the greatest magazine ever created. I don't know how she does it! Fantastic issue after fantastic issue- each one better than the last!
What I'm proposing is that Vogue has gotten so good that you ungrateful little sods can't handle it anymore. It's gotten to this point where it blows your mind- like a child on a swing that's swung right over it, onto the next level. It's like that swing in that most people aren't aware that it's swung right over the top- they didn't see it; so how do they know? They simply believe what the newspapers tell them. What their bitchy little friends who can afford one Miu Miu shoe but not two, tell them.

The amount of depth that goes into the photographs is simply spectacular. Yet in your letters you write "Every month Vogue is the same! It's just people jumping! Jumping! Jumping!"
Again, why do I care about this? I am not your father. I am not your sweet, rosy cheeked mother. Yet you insist on sending me letters. I don't do prayers, hmm?

So, please, stop whining about Vogue. Actually- take out the please there. It just makes you seem very childish, hmm? I mean- has American Vogue caused any deaths?
-No?! Goodness me. And let's look at Paris Vogue- how many deaths-related-to-bludgeoning-with-fashion-magazine has it caused, hmmm?
-100% of deaths-related-to-bludgeoning-with-fashion-magazine?! Goodness me. That's quite a few. So not only is American Vogue better, it is safer too!

The Electric Karl Test

I woke up this morning in Milan and the specially made hotel that I designed for myself and Brad to find these human-like creatures gawking into my imported-from-France windows. And there I was thinking I'd drawn the curtains last night. I rubbed my eyes with my black fingerless gloves; all leather but no bondage (quite the absence of bondage, rather), and starred back at these creatures through my dark sunglasses, which I had not removed from the previous night- you never know when you might have to run off to a fitting!

I was starring at these creatures; their funny noses and red lips, and it struck me as they glared through my window that all these creatures were women. Of the female persuasion. You know- a bunch of Eves. I put my glasses down my nose a little- like bank tellers do in movies- and I furrowed my brow- these ladies were throwing their underwear at me!
The ones that wore underwear anyway.
I shook Brad's shoulder and slapped him around the face- just a little slap, mind you. A little of that never hurt anyone; why, my mother used to do that to me all the time! And it never did me any harm, hm?

Brad woke up- "OH DON'T HURT ME UNCLE KARL!" he yells at me; and I give him a gentle push and ask him what in Coco's name all those women are doing outside my hotel.
-At this point they're taking off their bras. The things that sort of, uh, support their breasts. They're like sort of half-cups made of fabric that they attach to their chest...or something. Models don't tend to wear them so I'm not too familiar.
Brad has no idea, of course. He shrugs and says: "Well Karl, you're simply incredibly attractive."
-"You mean really really good looking?" I say.
-"Oh, the Zoonlander reference. It had to come some time or later", says Anna who just happens to be coming out of the bathroom- underwear model in tow.
-"Not only that Karl, you're insanely sexy. It's the gloves.."

Here I look down at my ugly hands that could never hold a cigarette, and the leather that covers them. As I do this, I see one lady faint outside the window.
She simply topples over, like a very thin tree.
I then open my hands up, like a five year old might. Like, they're in a fist and then-- they're open!
I hear screaming from outside. Gosh, have I killed someone? What is all this commotion?
I glance around at these women- who are all now naked, by the way. I wonder where their rib-cages are-- and those things protruding from their chests- they're far, far too big. Is this some sort of practical joke?
I move my hand up and down- a kind of queenly wave. Mass screaming.
What have you done, Karl? I ask myself. What on Earth have you done?

I hate myself and want to die

Today I was eating a pesto-smeared bagel, when Karl, the omnipresent demi-god that he is, give me his signature look of disapproval--- so smug. Why should he judge me for eating? not everybody can be an android. A chic android, but a literal android none the less. Besides, I think I saw him sneaking some diet-coke chex-mix the other day, but before I could confront him, he sternly swatted a nearby assistant like a step-child in need of a good slap, the assistant immediately began sobbing. If there is one thing I've learned about the starched-collared monster that is Karl Lagerfeld, it is that he does not like sobbing. I don't think he even acknowledges sadness as a real emotion. He is always telling me, "Why so glum my little Yves'ey (yes, he calls me Yves'ey, it's humiliating)"

Regardless, the assistant was not fired, she quit. Reason for leaving.

"I am not worthy"


Fourth one today....

On another topic, the worst part about being dead, is apparently dead people cannot legally own things. As such, my entire estate was AUCTIONED! A lifetime of things, beautiful, wonderful, melancholic things, gone. Sold to... the fatties. I didn't even get any of the money. Kruelty-Karl will not let it down for one second of course.

"Yves"

"what?"

"oh Yves-ey!"

"WHAT?"

"how are you going to pay the rent? mmm?"

"huh?"

"you can hardly stay here for free you know"

"uh..."

"aw, are you poor now?"

"STOP IT KARL I DON'T LIKE IT"

"Maybe you should get a job"

"....Karl...?!"

"like maybe work as a toilet cleaner, no?"

(Anna chimes in)

"or Marc Jacobs!"

(Karl has just informed me that this morning he premoted himself from "demi-god" to "Kaiser H. "Coco" Lagerfeld ", a bit redundant, would you say?-- well I wouldn't... don't feel like getting slapped)

Transcript

Karl: Hmm
Anna: What?
Karl: What'll I dictate in the blog today, hmm?
Yohji: Ooh! Write about me passing out!
Karl: But you always pass out.
Yohji: But the girls love me.
Karl: Rei sure did..
Rei: [coughs]
Karl: Rei! Didn't notice you were here, hm?
Rei: I am always here. Lurking in the background. I am behind all you fashion boys and girls, making sure you're buying my clothes.
Yohji: That probably explains..
Rei: Enough! [bangs on gong]
Anna: I don't know Karl. It's New York Fashion week again. Such a boor.
Yohji: "Ooh hello I'm Jason Wu! Pretty party dresses! Pretty pretty pretty!"
Rei: [glares]
Yohji: [glares back]
Karl: I don't know why they bother, honestly.
Anna: Who?
Karl: The fashion week people. Don't they know that they're simply going to be outmoded by Paris?
Anna: It's all so commercial.
Karl: Like that stupid magazine where all those people jump in it. Up and down, up and down!
Anna: Haven't heard of it.
Karl: What's it called? Models Jumping Behind a Bland Background Monthly?
Yohji: I heard it was: "Oh Look! We've got the First Lady on the Cover! Maybe we're Slightly Better Than Models Jumping Behind a Bland Background Now?"
Anna: Sounds like a very demode magazine.
Yohji: You have a magazine, don't you, Anna?
Anna: Oh, I think I do...commercial
Karl: "Vogue".
Anna: God, so that's what the office is for!

You were talking so brave

One must be able to cut off from people like Rei cuts the limbs off mannequins. (It's a little know fact that Rei is a trained Ninja. Don't tell anybody, though.) I've never understood this "relationship" business, and I don't think I ever will. (Actually, I understand how to do things perfectly. Some would call this sociopathic. I call it efficient). So somebody thinks they're getting on like fire on a house with me, and then snap. I cut the cord. It may be 10 years down the line; it may be 2 decades down the line. But I don't tolerate disrespect. Coco Chanel was the one who provided dresses to the leaders of the Italian Mafia, after all. I operate Chanel like the fashion Mafia. Apart from we're a lot more dangerous than any old Al Capone, hmm? The drugs we sell are legal. We prostitute clothes. A woman never really owns a Chanel dress-- she is only renting it out. She may lick it, she may masturbate to it; she may bite it; she may do unspeakable things to it-- but she never owns it. We are not slave traders, after all. We are simply pimps. And I am the biggest pimp. No-- I'm a prostitute myself. I'm a whore, children. I'm a whore to Chanel, to Fendi, to the Lagerfeld Bear; to my own label, to this blog. But I'm a high class one.

So, I'm really both a whore and a pimp. The great thing about a Chanel dress or jacket, of course; is that it acts as a drug as well. We've done studies. Proper studies, with doctors in white coats and everything. When a woman sees a Chanel jacket, her brain reacts the same way it might to Cocaine or somesuch-- I'm not sure about the drugs. They're all letters these days, aren't they? P, Q, R, S...etc. They were much better in the 60's. Better names. Not that I took them. Yves didn't really either, to be honest. He thought he did. He was rather like that young girl having her first glass of wine, who then tells her friends about the bottles of wine she had when she really had half a glass. And Yves only took hash and opium, mostly. Stuck in the past, I told him.
"You should be trying these new drugs if you're going to do them at all!", I said. And he just sniffed his nose and punched his cigarette. Very old school, Yves. He wouldn't admit to being a pimp. Non, Yves pretended to be an artist. He would do a little ballet dance and say "Look! I am making ART!". Poor thing was never aware that they were seller mugs with the "YSL" logo on it, and flesh coloured Christs too (don't ask.)

I've never understood normal human emotions such as "love" and "affection" and so on. For instance, one of my assistants committed suicide via blasting himself into space and crashing into a large statue of Richard-Bloody-Branson. I didn't know how to feel. I looked up in this book I've got-- it's called "The Dictionary", and it didn't tell me how to react. In some books I've got, specifically books written by 16th century Spanish authors, the women cry a lot when their men commit suicide. So I played the Madame Butterfly theme (you know the one where she commits suicide? I can't remember the story. Something to do with men, doubtless. It's always to do with men, or underwear models. This is some sort of rule of the universe, I think. And then I saw how I felt. And I didn't feel anything.
After that I called up Anna:

Karl: Hi Anna
Anna: Hi Karl
Karl: One of my assistants committed suicide the other day.
Anna: Ok.

She obviously didn't know how to react either. It was very annoying, because nobody knew how to react. I went back to sketching.

A response

I was planning on having uh spiked diet Coke all night, but my Niece Tavi sent me this link.
WHO DO THEY THINK THEY ARE, HMMM? THESE PEOPLE...WHO WEAR THEIR JUICY COUTURE SWEATSUITS AND THEIR RALPH LAUREN SWEATERS AND GUESS PURSES AND THEIR BRITNEY PERFUME WITH THEIR SIGNED JONAS BROTHERS POSTERS ON THEIR WALLS.

Britney perfume! One might as well bottle head shavings and vomit; coupled with the Jonas brothers virginal sweat (I suspect they're as virginal as Madonna as a Catholic schoolgirl). And "Guess" is a brand worn by teenage girls desperate for attention with no taste, hmm? It is a brand worn by the anti-christ herself!

And who is this anti-christ, you ask? It is the woman who wrote the "Time" article. Scroll down if you want to see her; she's too demode for I to post. She is the anti-chirst. Call up the churches, call the Pope, call Obama, call Ron Paul, call the polygamists, call Xenu, call Tom Cruise. Strike that. Don't call Tom Cruise. Call Suri, call Elton John, call Warren Buffet, call every single person in this god damned earth apart from Tom Cruise.
Hell (ooh, burning reference there), even call Rachel Zoe. She'll be happy because she won't have to pay her massive credit card debt for buying that dress. Call the Spanish Inquisition!

...NOT THE SPANISH INQUISITION.

Ahem.

This woman is the anti-chirst, with a vendetta against Anna and I. Next she'll be targeting the sacred estate of Coco Chanel; telling everyone to wear scrunchies and metallic hotpants.

Evil I tell you. And not the good evil. The bad evil. The bad bad evil. The non-fashionable evil.
This woman is probably paid by PETA. She is probably one of the animal-actors in their videos.
NOW, I will have my diet Coke. On the rocks, Anna; on the rocks.

Night, II

I sit out here, and I am waiting for something. I can feel it. The wind whips my face, and the newspaper I was carrying is starting to get hit by drops of rain. Yet I still sit here, undaunted. I'm waiting for someone, I believe.

Rei: Oh, silly man. Who are you waiting for?

I have no idea, I tell her. But I know that I have to wait. Desire pangs my heart like the way an old truck feels being left at the junkyard; the junkheap. Left on the junkheap in search of another cup of Coffee.

Rei: Really now.

To be honest, I'm just sitting here because I have nowhere else to go. In this meta-universe, there is no houses, because houses are demode. Instead there's simply I on a bench, and Rei standing over there wi..

Rei: I can hear you, you know.
Colonel: Oh god, just stop it at once man! You're showing personal feelings! This isn't even funny! Who cares if you miss someone! I DO NOT. Now go write another book, there's a good fellow. Do you think anybody will care about your entry if you're all weepy like that? Where's the mention of fatties???
Audience member: Yes! Bring in the fatties! Bring in the fatties!

I tell him I have no idea what he's on about. What does he mean by "entry"? What does he mean by fatties? Japanese Women do not get fat. It's a fact. It's the title of a book. So it's fact.

Audience members: FATTIE RUMBLE! FATTIE RUMBLE! FATTIE RUMBLE!!

I see large, fat people come in. They have fat and grease dripping from their flesh, and in their hands are whole chickens, who have been deep fried.

Karl: STOP THIS AT ONCE!
Rei: Karl?!
Audience members: Karl!!!! [swoon]
Karl: This is getting to be like some vulgar American reality show. It is vulgar! It is vulgar!
Audience member 1: She started it!
Audience member 2: No, SHE started it!
Audience member 3: He started it! Him! Over there! The fellow dressed like a bat!

INTERMISSION WHILST YOHJI RUNS AWAY. PLEASE DANCE LIKE A BAT.

Prince - Batdance

A man dressed all in black, flapping his arms and shouting in Japanese, runs his way past the audience and out into a bat shaped plane. As Prince plays, the audience grooves along to the music.

INTERMISSION OVER. PLEASE FINISH YOUR GROOVE.

Audience member 1: He's gone!
Audience member 2: Is it a bird? Is it a plane?
Audience member 4: It's a plane.
Audience member 2: Oh.

Unspecified Villian: That darn Yohji. If it wasn't for you crazy kids...
Audience member 5: Excuse me, we are fashionistas.
Audience member 6: Excuse me, I am also a brain surgeon/photographer/creative director/designer/bongo player AND a fashion de-zine-er.
Audience member 7: Well excuse me! But I'm an Artiste/ipod nanny/computer designer/composer/coffee maker/song-and-dance man AND a wanker!
Audience member 8: Well I'm a bitch!
[audience gasp]

I sigh, walking off into the sunset. Heart burnin', still yearin'. How am I meant to be melodramatic and emotional when all this is around me?

Rei: You can't. Just, don't worry about it. You're wonderful anyway.

Yeah, I'm wonderful anyway. I'm a wonderful person! I AM A WON-DER-FUL PERSON.

Anna: Thahhst's the spirrrt. Youuu wannt a drinwnkkk??

Machine

It's well known that fashion has a MACHINE, hmm?
But I think this machine is not literal enough-- it's very metaphorical. I mean, it's not really a machine.
At Chanel we're changing this. We're building a real machine; will gears and flashing lights and all that sort of thing. And a lever to pull it with. So instead of people having to go through this very human process of becoming a tool-- becoming one of Anna's photoshopped darlings who never speaks; we're just going to put people through the machine.
So somebody just steps onto the machine, goes down the conveyor belt and in about 5 minutes they are a total tool! They are ready to be totally used for the evil purposes of fashion. They will do anything we say. They are ready to be a snob. They are ready to be VOGUE COVER DARLINGS.

Bwhahahahahahahahaah. Mwhahahahahahah. Mwhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!
(I have been practicing my evil laugh. It's very Germanic and good. I'm quite happy with it. Don't even mention the Chanel pre-fall collection to me. It's the fault of Yves. He pretended to be me and designed it. So there.)