Yearly Archives: 2025

………………….”DINNER WITH ROBYN”……….Last night I had dinner with one of my dearest friends…….ROBYN COSIO………..Robyn had just flown in from LA the night before, and we made plans to meet for dinner at a sweet little French restaurant, COGNAC…..at 7 the Ave and 58th Street…..Robyn and I realized we will have been friends for 48 YEARS!…In two years we will celebrate knowing each other for 50 YEARS!!!!!……I met Robyn when we were in our early 20s…eons ago….I had hired Robyn to do the makeup on the models for my Anne Klein show…..and she did them until I left Anne Klein in 1994……She had left NY and moved to LA, but always made the trip back to do my shows…..She married an incredible man named Armando Cosio, who was also a hair and make up artist….to the stars……He did Linda Evans hair and makeup all of the years she was on “DYNASTY”. He later joined Robyn to also do the makeup for my shows…..I remember the first time they came together….The models were hesitant about letting a makeup artist they didn’t know do them….but after they saw the first few models he did the makeup for….they all started to line up for him to do theirs! He was truly a genius, and one of the best makeup artists I ever worked with….and I worked with almost all of them…….Robyn has transitioned from makeup to BROWS!……She has clients lined up on both coasts waiting for an appointment to shape their brows….she even wrote a book….called “THE BROW”…It shows how brows have changes through the centuries…..from shaved off, a la Elizabeth the First, to a thin line a la Jean Harlow…. t0 thick arched brows….a la Joan Crawford………It was Robyn’s birthday last week, so I came to dinner bearing LOTS of presents…..I asked for a booth in the back of the restaurant so Robyn could go through her loot uninterrupted…..For years she has been asking me for something of Jac’s….they were extremely close, and Jac would fly out to LA to visit Armando and Robyn. Jac adored Armando, one of the sweetest people to have ever walked on this planet….Unfortunately, both Jac and Armando left us….both the loves of our lives………..First, I gave Robyn one of Jac’s PRADA  nylon “mail bags”. It was the only bag Jac carried….Prada doesn’t even make that style anymore….They SHOULD, it was one of their most popular bags, and they should bring it back….Jac had a few of them, and I gave Robyn one of her black bags that was practically new…..She freaked, and said that was going to be the bag she always carries from then on……I gave Robyn an assortment of Jac’s things…all from our days at Anne Klein, and Robyn knew them all, and even which shows I did them for…..There was a soft muted pink cashmere/wool men’s oversized style blazer [so in right now], a gaberdine olive drab shirt/jacket….a 6 ply thick ribbed black cashmere pullover with a funnel neck….a Bottega Veneta black satin woven evening bag with a huge silk tassel, a black crocodile “dagger belt”…..scarves and many other things….Then she started to open another brown bag filled to the top with jewelry! One after the other she open the black drawstring bags to exclaim over another wonderful piece….She was overwhelmed……well it was her BIRTHDAY!…….After three and a half hours, eating a delicious meal, and going through her bag of goodies….it was time to leave….She had her first client early in the morning, and I had to drive back to Connecticut……Parting with Robyn is never easy……who knows when the next time will be that we meet again?

…………………This photo brings back so many memories….I was about 22 or 23…..I was so young….so wet behind the ears! I was designing at my very first design job as head designer for the new Designer Sportswear division, of which there were six separate divisions…..The company was called GIORGINI, a division of ORIGINALA….It was only me designing the collection….I didn’t have any assistants….. I guess this was why I never had the need to have a slew of assistants like many designers did……This was before I started designing for Anne Klein….so I hadn’t met Jac yet!……In this photo I was staying with dear friends at their home in Pawling NY….Patti and Laurence Taylor…..Our dear friend Maurice Antaya was also a guest. Patti and Maurice went to school together at RISD [Rhode Island School of Design]…..Laurence was Vidal Sassoon’s right arm and came to America from London with Vidal……When I look at this picture all I can think of is WOW…..I was so thin, I had full head of thick black hair, full dark eyebrows, and a great full beard. The hair eventually went, along with the eyebrows, and the beard was shaved off when I started going out with Jac………..she didn’t like it at all!…..Everyone remembers a time in their lives when they think they looked their best….This was a period of my life that I would like to look like again…..but knowing what I know NOW!

………………….I have often mentioned and posted many pictures of my trips to PRAIANO, ITALY,I went there for over 15 years, twice a year…..Praiano is the next town south from the famous POSITIANO……I would go to Andrea Pfister and Jean Pierre Dupre’s villa to work. Andrea was a brilliant shoe designer, and made very high end shoes and bags for women. He was hired to collaborate with me on the Anne Klein Couture shoe collection…..The photo is off Andrea and Magda Ferrari on the left, and Jean Pierre and me on the right…..We decided to give Jean Pierre a break from cooking….a marvelous cook…..and walked up the 250 STEPS to get to the top where the “la brace ristorante” is. It’s a tiny restaurant, one flight up from the street, with a terrace. We knew the owner and all of the waiters, which makes it so much more fun…..Sometimes they brought dinner down to the villa, which gave another night off for JP……Magda, worked for a wonderful fabric company that I did a lot of business with. Season after season they created exclusive fabrics for my collections….She came all the way from northern Italy to Praiano to show me the new developments, and stayed for the weekend……We always had a great time…..laughed a lot and ATE WELL!….la brace made incredible simple food…..If they are still there I highly recommend visiting the ristorante….If you’re ever in Positano….visit Praiano….it’s a short drive!!….The movie, “Under the Tuscan Sun” was shot there too!

……………………….HAPPY SUNDAY!………….If you’re in the mood to do some on line shopping…..take a look at my…..LINEA JEWELRY….on my QVC SITE……………EVERYTHING IS FREE SHIPPING & HANDLING…..plus……5 EZ PAYS on ALL!!….YES, every single item has this special offer…..TODAY ONLY!

………………….With the official start of AUTUMN only a few DAYS from now……I’m enjoying all the SUMMER I can get!……I am so blessed to be living in a peaceful, calm, heavenly place…….I thank Jac for that!……Jac loved to go for drives, and to open houses….me….not so much……At the time we were living in a beautiful big stone country house in Darien Ct……Even thought the house and the large property, with a pool, were beautiful…..I was BORED out of my head…..There were two places I wanted to be…in NYC and somewhere by the water….When Jac found this house in 1992 the stock market was about to crash and we were at the start of a recession……….so I certainly wasn’t looking for a third property!!…..but Jac had her own ideas….She knew me too well!…..She knew the second I saw the 250 feet of water front property I would melt!…and I did…..I actually didn’t care what the house looked like, but the view was everything….You can always fix a house…..Lucky for me the house was beautiful too…It was on the market for less than a week….and I bought it!!!….Just what I didn’t want…to own two houses and an apartment in the city….It took almost two years to sell our Darien house….that’s how bad the market was! We lived in the Darien house while I did renovations on the new house…..After a year I said enough of this let’s move into our new home even thought our realtor was against us moving everything out…..I didn’t care….so we moved into the “new house”, built in 1906, and finally the old house sold….It was a decision I never regretted………….In this crazy, megalomaniac world we live in today…..my home is my respite from the real world…..A place where I have peace and quiet…where all of the tensions of the world can be blocked out….so…….I’m taking advantage of these beautiful last days of summer before winter is upon us…..I hope where you live is peaceful and calm, and a place where you too can enjoy a somewhat peaceful life too…..the best we can.