I bet you think this blog is about you….

Posted by Isabel Dexter at 01:31 on 12 Mar 2010

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So Paris Fashion Week again and despite the furore around the cold weather being just the tip of the iceberg at Chanel (ha ha!  Mon Dieu how worrying is this? I have to laugh at my own lame jokes nowadays) it completely reignited three of my previously held, and then dismissed, ideas about the capital of fashion.

1. If you work in fashion you have to be skinny. If you live in Paris you have to be skinny. If you work in fashion and live in Paris you should apparently be weighed everyday to ensure your total kilo-count is less than the Fendi Peekaboo bag (when it's empty). Otherwise you're not coming in.

2. If you don't personally know the PRs at the door to the shows then you may as well skulk behind the hustle of photographers, so slim to none is the chance that you will get a good seat. Knowing the PR means making the obligatory eye contact, doing the double cheek bises (kisses), remembering their name and preferably adding an "Oh I haven't seen you since we had a drink at Au Petit Fer a Cheval that time. So how is Patrice?" Otherwise you're not coming in.

3. As well as wearing head-to-toe black you should be subtly channelling this season's trends, whilst giving the impression you couldn't care less about anything as pedestrian as actually being snapped for The Sartorialist because you are channelling this season's trends. So currently Paris is awash with les fashionistas coming over all "Artemis doing low key luxe" . For modern goddesses of the hunt this involves wearing a real fur coat (preferably snapped up from one of Paris' amazing flea markets or otherwise a hand-me-down from your White Russian aristo grandmother), Barbara Bui leather jodhpur trousers in black (or in tan leather if you are securely working idea number one), studded Isabel Marant ankle boots cut low on the foot and your hair swept into an Alexander Wang side plait. Otherwise you're not coming in.

"They're all just freaks" said the Australian, after being pushed aside and called Italian for the hundredth time.  "And the bloggers are the worst!"  I tried to hide the fact I'd been pretending my Zara boots were Isabel Marant and that I'd actually said "Mais oui, c'est Yves Saint Laurent" about my bag to a rather spoilt looking Spanish euro trash princess taking notes outside Sonia Rykiel.

 The Australian was right though, if all anyone saw of Paris was Fashion Week they'd think it was a city full of posers and preeners. And perhaps they wouldn't be far off. Pot, kettle, black..... Hmmm well perhaps this is why I love it here. Where else in the world can you pout, swank and fluff up your hair in the street without feeling like a complete plonker? I'd like to see them try that in Derby....

Photos courtesy of Janelle Mentesana

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