The question on everyone's lips: did Daphne deliver? Oh, hell yes.


Hey, if, like Selita Ebanks, I were one of the most beautiful women in the world, I'd use my powers to pull off highly risky numbers too.


Amber Valletta is well on her way to another slot on the highly prestigious "year's best getups" list.


Fabiola Beracasa joins the Miuccia Prada school of enlightened frumpiness. Dig the Stevie Smith frock.


Model Heather Marks is apparently a fan of Fair Warning-era Van Halen.


Model Anja Rubik channels one of those handcrafted fairy dolls from the pages of Doll Reader.


Dayle Haddon represents old-schools socialites everywhere.


Waris Ahluwalia is a jewelry designer, man-about-town and regular in Wes Anderson films. That's why he can dress like he's guesting on an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.


Cassie: the Camel with the Wrinkled Knees called. He wants his wrinkled knees back.


Lisa Marie Smith's tights are really...I mean, that gathering is strikingly...I'm sorry, I can't take my eyes off the guy vogueing in the corner.


Far be it from me to argue with someone who's had a guest spot on Gossip Girl, but Lydia Hearst's mod nightgown looks like a mod nightgown. Not that there's anything wrong with that.


Erin Fetherston has the knowing, power-mad look of one who's skinned a bunch of snakes and is hoping to gain their powers through wearing their skins. You know, that look.


Simon Doonan, in classic Simon Doonan costume.


Amanda Lepore, a famed NYC drag diva, adds glamour to any occasion.


Men of the hour: Marc Jacobs and Lorenzo Martone. And maybe I'm just really used to the kilt, but it's the shadow-fade jeans that are grabbing my attention.

[Images via Getty]

• And now, the cold, hard, retail reality sets in: Neiman Marcus and Net-A-Porter are dropping Ungaro for Spring. Barneys and Saks also aren't ordering. Lindsay Lohan and Mounir Moufarrige, what have you wrought! [Style.com]

• Ashley Tisdale does not yearn for a clothing line. "I've started a production company; I guess that's kind of my clothing line," says the actress. [WWD]
• The incredible Alexander McQueen shoes — both the bulbous hoof ones, and the ones that look like some piece of anthropomorphic weaponry out of eXistenZ, which Lady Gaga wore in the video for "Bad Romance" — are apparently a hit. The designer says he's been inundated with calls from women wanting to buy the so-called "Alien" shoes, albeit some who are interested in them as art pieces. The process by which the shoes are made is protected by copyright, says a spokesperson for the brand. No word on whether a commercial version will be produced for wide sale; McQueen is mulling a charity auction for the runway samples. [Grazia]
• Carlos Falchi's line of handbags for Target is in stores now through December 27th. The designer says, if he didn't have his current job, "I'd like to be a Brazilian cowboy." [TFI]
• Victoria Beckham's people are denying the rumors she is planning, with Simon Fuller, to open a modeling agency — perhaps a U.S. branch of Storm, in which Fuller holds a controlling stake — in New York. "There is absolutely no truth in the story regarding Victoria Beckham and Simon Fuller opening a modeling agency in New York," says her spokesman. "Victoria is concentrating all her efforts on her fashion line and her family." [Vogue UK]
• Daniel Lalonde, president of Louis Vuitton, basically confirmed Lara Stone will be the face of the spring campaign. [The Cut]
• Betsey Johnson is redesigning her stores. Gone will be the hot-pink walls, replaced with white walls and checkerboard floors, to better display the clothes. [Racked]
• Dooney & Bourke co-founder Frederic Bourke has been sentenced to 366 days in prison and a $1 million fine for his role in a failed scheme to bribe Azeri officials into privatizing Azerbaijan's oil company, which would have essentially deprived the country of profits from its greatest national resource. Bourke is appealing. [WWD]
• Model Karmen Pedaru spent a year as goalie on an Estonian national soccer team. [W]
• Funny, the only item this list of How To Look Like Gisele Bundchen is missing is: being born to look like Gisele Bundchen. (OK, so Nars Orgasm is bog standard by now, but $475 moisturizer? Come on.) [Blackbook]
• The BHV — pretty much the most awesome department store in Paris — is getting Beth Ditto and Jean-Charles de Castelbajac to do its holiday windows. Meanwhile, stately old Printemps has Natalia Vodianova. [WWD]
• The British Fashion Council will give an award to the winner of a public vote on who best "embodies the spirit of London." Nominees include Alexa Chung, Kate Moss, and Vivienne Westwood. [BFC]
• Jeffrey Monteiro might be taking over as head designer at Bill Blass. [WWD]
• Liz Lange is launching a lifestyle shopping site, apparently kind of like Gilt crossed with Daily Candy. [Crains]
• People are trying to save Luella on the Internet. [Fashionista]
• The Gossip Girl timeline is apparently now forever divided by the caesura of the Threesome; say Before The Threesome or After The Threesome, and everyone immediately knows what you mean. The boys on the show have been wearing a lot of Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen's line, Elizabeth & James, People notes. [People]
• Jason Wu is doing a capsule collection for Tse this spring. [WWD]
• Anthropologie is the most profitable of the three Urban Outfitters brands, quarterly results reveal. [TS]
• Marie Osmond is licensing her name to a fashion and home decor line. Every last piece in the Marie Lifestyle Collection will retail for under $100. Expect to see it in stores later this month. [UPI]
• Donna Karan's West Indies home is currently making us cry bitter tears of envy from our very black souls. [SB]

• Move over, David Beckham: Cristiano Ronaldo is posing in the spring Armani underwear campaign. [AP]
• Beckham, who says he decided not to renew his Armani contract, is said to be looking to launch an underwear line of his own. [WWD]

• A fit model who worked at Guess? for three years is suing the company for sexual harassment. She alleges that founder Paul Marciano made unwanted sexual advances, and cut her work hours after she resisted. [WWD]
• Yohji Yamamoto announced this morning it was filing for bankruptcy. [NYTimes]
• Meanwhile, Giorgio Armani launched a cell phone that costs $1,032. [Reuters]
• Grace Coddington's face on a t-shirt is definitely something we want. [Refinery29]
• Model Agyness Deyn abstained from booze at a party for a movie. Allegedly, it's because her boyfriend, Albert Hammond, Jr., of the Strokes, is in rehab. [P6]
• Naomi Campbell picked a bag from the Louis Vuitton spring collection to sell to benefit the White Ribbon Appeal, which works to reduce deaths in childbirth. The bag will cost 1,900 Euros; no word yet on what percentage of the proceeds will go to the charity. [Elle UK]
• Looking so nervous you'd have sworn she was about to have a heart attack, Katy Perry interviewed Karl Lagerfeld after his show in Paris. After asking him about the prevalence of metal trim in the collection, the Kaiser said it was actually metallicized leather. The look on the pop star's face when Lagerfeld tells her the one song that sums him up is Lily Allen's "It's Not Me, It's You," is priceless. Then the designer says, "I'm addressing what others do, or have done, but have never wanted to be somebody else." And Perry asks to borrow one of the "metal" dresses for the EMAs. [People]
• Mario Sorrenti is shooting Nicole Kidman in the next Omega watch campaign. "I love diamonds," says the star. [WWD]
• Project Runway is to become a Wii game. We hope that there will be secret levels you can pass into, where the designers will all start singing, "Daniel Franco, Where Did You Go." Or maybe, if you unlock a special sewing box, you look through it and see Tim Gunn and Andrae eating at Red Lobster. [MSNBC]
• Chanel Iman and Iman: Iman and Chanel Iman. These two beautiful ladies did a video for Modelinia, wherein they talked about diversity in fashion. "With the diversity on the runway, it's getting better. But we need more diversity in the campaigns," says Chanel. "The first couple of pages in the magazine is not, you know, ethnic girls." "It's amazing at this age, 2009, almost 2010, with Obama as President, that e should be even talking about this," adds Iman. Iman sums up her life advice thusly: "Just be true to yourself. And don't embarrass your parents. Please." [Modelinia]
• A Portuguese eBay user put a bag from the Jimmy Choo for H&M collection up for auction. The collection doesn't go on sale until November 14. The bag, allegedly from a photo shoot, didn't sell. [Racked]
• Dina Lohan told Access Hollywood not to believe everything you read about Lindsay's fancy new job in fashion, and how that's going. "She's just a little girl and God gave her this gift. She's just trying to create. She did great in Paris, don't believe what you read. She's genius at fashion." Meanwhile, she would like us to buy something called "Shoe-Hans." She herself will continue wearing footwear by Yves Saint Laurent and Gucci, thank you very much. [The Cut]
• Rachel Roy says moving to the East Coast for university after growing up in the Bay Area was a shock, because the former could be "quite segregated, and I wasn't into that. I'm only 35 — so it's not like we're talking many years ago — but I wasn't used to it because I grew up around Samoans, African-Americans, and Filipinos. You go to a club based on the music you like, not based on the kind of people you want to be around. I kind of went into a culture shock when I moved to the East Coast. I try to bring back that laid-back, hippie-chic attitude that the Bay Area has to my business because I've interned at so many places in fashion where it can be quite anal. But I also love New York. I love that it's the closest city we have to Europe, so that's a part of me, but thank God I'm from an area that keeps me out of it." [FabSugar]
• Yesterday in Japan, a suit went on sale that claims to offer some protection against swine flu to its wearer. The $580 suit is coated with titanium dioxide, a chemical that can break down viruses that come into contact with it. To put it mildly: this seems unlikely to work. Why not get the swine flu vaccine instead? [Telegraph]
• Nars is celebrating its 15th year in business with a book featuring photographs of fashion celebrities like Daphne Guinness and Marc Jacobs wearing its products. François Nars did both the makeup and the photography. [WWD]
• Kate Moss met her longtime hairdresser, James Brown, when she was 14. She went to a party at his house, and his sister threw her out. "She thought her boyfriend was flirting with me," explains the supermodel. "So that was that, really," adds Brown. "It started with a fight." Also relevant to this video: HOLY ACCENTS. [Elle UK]
• James Mischka and Mark Badgley live in a 546 sq. ft. studio apartment in Midtown. How relatable! Which they moved into because they were spending too much time in their weekend home, a Lexington, Kentucky, horse farm, to justify the expense of a Greenwich Village duplex. Sigh. [WSJ]
• Philip Treacy designed footwear for the first time ever for the Valentino show. The renowned milliner says working for the foot was like "a whole other dimension." [Elle]
• Again, the article about Crocs, what they mean, whether or not they can make it as a going concern, and what that means. [Time]
• Lost in the news of Liz Claiborne's reshuffle yesterday — the Liz Claiborne line will be sold exclusively at J.C. Penney's, and Isaac Mizrahi's Liz Claiborne New York line will go to QVC — was the fate of Claiborne by John Bartlett, the men's wear line. It will cease to exist. Sorry, guys. [Racked]
• Uniqlo's parent company posted a record profit for the year, of $1.2 billion. [AdAge]
• Levi's profits fell 41% in the third quarter. [WSJ]

• Kate Moss' line for TopShop sells out in 15 minutes! "Crowds of young women, who started queuing at 7.45am, scooped up the must have designer gear without even trying it on. " [Daily Mail]
• Rachel Weisz on method acting:"We were talking about the character of Penelope when I suddenly ran upstairs and brought down these old boots. They’re basically a cross between a clown boot and a Victorian lace-up boot....They suit Penelope because they don’t go with anything, they’re really clumpy and they gave me a funny walk. The character came entirely out of those boots — I wear them in every single scene!" If shleppy shoes equal verite, color me Stella Adler! [ElleUK]
• Piaf-impersonator Marion Cotillard signed by Dior. [WWD]
• Lagerfeld descends upon the Green Mountain State. He'll be the cadaverous one in the high collar who calls you "demode." [Fashionista]

• Peter Som leaves Bill Blass. “This was an extremely difficult decision for me...At this time, however, I have chosen to focus on my own namesake collection and the development of the Peter Som brand.” [WWD]
• NARS sells condoms. With Orgasm blush, natch. They also hedge their bets with a "ways to say no" package which, yes, also comes with the blush. As long as you have Orgasm! Sales benefit Amfar programs to promote global safe sex education initiatives. [BeautyAddict]
• Louboutin ups the ante with an 8" heel. The truly fashion-forward amongst us sigh up for stiltwalking, purchase matching Uncle Sam outfits. [Guardian]
• Way to de-sexy underwear moddles: "According to Make Me A Supermodel stylist Tiana Wallace, just one slice (of bread) wedged in the front of a pair of briefs is the secret ingredient to achieving the sought-after "smooth look.'' The crumb potential sounds uncomfy! [News.com.au]
• As elections approach, American Apparel amps up its "Legalize LA" campaign. [Reuters]
• Bluefly.com introduces shop-by-character Gossip Girl pages. Best part? You can skip the tedious "say-you-love-me-first" plotline! [Extra]
• Want to see something weird? Warning: there's music. [Live Science]
• Levi's introduces the new "Ultimate Lift 544 jeans." To wear with the new ass bras, perhaps? [WWD]
• Estee Lauder is up, but cautious. [Reuters]
• Did Paul Smith plagiarize this artist's work? [Flight404]
• Just in time for the recession, Tom Ford introduces $9,240 fur boots "calculated to appeal to wealthy glam junkies and luxury ski freaks in places like Aspen and Gstaad." Barf. [Luxist via New York]
• Even Rachel Roy can't find anything in picked-over NYC thrift stores! [FabSugar]
• Just in time for Halloween, Beyonce grotesque distorted by Armani photoshoppers! [Photoshop Disasters]
• U.S. retailers cut orders, unsurprisingly; designers worry. [WWD]

• PETA apparently can't get over Armani's betrayal. Their latest devastating riposte? They've made these posters of Giorgio with a Pinocchio nose. [Towelroad]
• And in case that was over your head, that's "the puppet whose nose would grow when he told lies." [UPI]
• They should be happy with Henri Bendel; the department store's no longer carrying fur! [Nylon]
• Karl Lagerfeld cares about animals, too. Or at least that freaky teddy bear. “I was instantly seduced by the idea. I very much like animals. Above all when they are stuffed with cotton or plastic!” [Fashion Week Daily]
• Sean Connery looks super silver-foxy in his new LV ads. [Telegraph]

• The honeymoon's over: Narciso Rodriguez and Liz Claiborne officially part ways. [WWD]
• The "antiques buyer" from Anthropologie's getting his own show. Which is, I'm sure, very exciting for those of you who watch the Sundance Channel. [Fashionista]
• And if that sounds fun, you might be fascinated by the knowledge John Galliano's going to be speaking at some gala next month. [WWD]
• Avon forced to yank ads that claim its creams stop aging or something completely reasonable. [Daily Mail]
• Apparently in the current economic climate, women "plan" to spend less. Mice, men etc. [Reuters]
• Charlotte Ronson's doing a line for J.C. Penney. This in addition to, at last count, her eponymous line, her stuff for Urban, the collaboration with Shoshanna, and, you know, being a socialite. [WWD]
• Old Navy finally chooses an ad agency. We hope they'll make them bizarre again — I miss Carrie Donovan. [BrandWeek]
• Thanks to a new backer, Rochas pulls (another) Lazarus. [WWD]
• Marco Zanini may design for them. [ElleUK]
• The Pussycat Dolls are looking for a wardrobe assistant. Those with vinyl allergies need not apply. [The Sun]
• Nina Garcia's neuroses: "I wasn’t nervous about being in front of the camera, but I was nervous about seeing myself on camera. My husband makes me watch the show. I cringe the whole time." [Babble]
• Everybody's used to "Orgasm' blush. So Nars ups the ante: Super Orgasm Blush! Take That! [Nylon]

How gross are the testers? Which ones are safe to try?

Well, testers in general are always sort of borderline gross. This is why you should get a sample from a Sephora cast member whenever possible. We have drawers and drawers full of them, and every client is supposed to leave the store with three samples. Lately we've all been living in fear of being "shopped," which is when someone working for the company poses as a client and then reports back to corporate about how the cast member did. If someone won't give you samples, that's really fucked up of them first of all, but it's also a big company no-no. This gets tricky with Color World. Makeup samples are harder to give out, but we have a few, so you should always ask. But the testers are always going to be the testers and people are always going to do what they do with them no matter where you are. I've seen people do some really gnarly things with the testers. The best is when they stick their dirty fingers right into the pots of face cream and rub it all over their faces in huge amounts in the middle of the store. Sometimes the jar is getting kind of empty and they're all in there trying to dig it out. People who are sort of possibly homeless-ish play with all the testers. I've seen tons of people pick lipsticks up off the displays and put them directly on their lips. When we see this, we're supposed to discreetly get rid of the sample and put out a fresh one, but you can't be everywhere at once so we miss things. We're also supposed to direct everyone to one of the hygiene stations with all the disposable applicators, but they don't always listen. That's also sort of why the hygiene station is there—so you can personally do something to avoid getting in on other people's nasty shit.

When will Fort Wayne, Indiana get a Sephora store?

How the fuck am I supposed to know? I am extremely busy working a register and stocking shelves and putting Prevage in my mouth. I have no idea. Call 1-877-SEPHORA. It'll get you somewhere, although I don't know where that somewhere would be.

What's the best way to get the cast members to actually help you instead of standing around talking to each other?

Ooh, they call that a "black cloud." Because we all wear black, you know, and if too many of us are standing around together, it's like we're going to rain on people's shopping experience. You shouldn't be having a hard time getting a cast member's attention or getting them to help you, and there aren't supposed to be black clouds out on the stage. Obviously black clouds happen, customer service is not perfect, blah blah blah. If you call a store and ask for Leadership, someone will very patiently listen to you complain, be really nice about it, and then probably hang up the phone and talk shit on you. Also, you're complaining about someone who is probably going to leave the company within six months anyway. This job is for children who like eye shadow. You might be able to kind of get some of them in trouble by doing this, but probably not.

What do you think about the Sephora brand eye shadows?

I like them. I use them. They have really pretty colors, and I like the texture of the creamier ones a lot. I think that sometimes, people expect them to be more highly pigmented than they are. They look like they're going to be these really bold colors, but then they go on a little more sheerly. If you want a more pigmented eye shadow, look for companies that are making those. MAC is sort of the gold standard for highly pigmented eye shadows... but I mean, MAC is no joke. Drag queens and movie sets use it. Highly pigmented is what they do. Definitely try stuff out on your hand before you buy it if you're not sure what it does. Or just return it. Sephora brand everything is kind of "meh." The brushes and stuff are cool, but the products are all really middle-of-the-line and not that exciting, especially compared to the other lines we carry.

Why are you so eager to stay at this job, get the training, and learn more? Are you an esthetician or just between jobs, or what?

Okay, what you don't understand is this: I got home from work a few hours ago and I feel like I just mainlined $3000 worth of the best drug imaginable straight into my brain. You would have to love products as much as I do to be able to stand working here. I give myself a facial every night. Ask me about my Kinerase collection. It's sick. No, I'm not an esthetician, yes, I am perfectly capable of holding down a better job. I just like my kind of crack. It's my shit. I'm working here to fuel my fancy skin care addiction. I just realized everyone who works here is eighteen. I asked them, "how can you afford to work here?" And they said, "I live with my parents." Even this woman who works here who is forty and divorced — she lives with her mom. We are all here for the same reason.

Have you always been addicted to beauty products?

Ever since I came down with adult-onset cystic acne about ten years ago. I am a very vain person, the type of person who will stay inside my house and not go into work and refuse to see my closest friends if I have a bad breakout. It is sick. But there is something so sad and homeless about acne. It just looks like something is wrong. That's why I love helping someone who comes in and looks like shit. There is a feminine joy I get from being able to say, here, I know a lot about this and I can help you. Because I can. I have dabbled in everything. I am hardcore. I will try your homeopathic aspirin-raw honey mask. I will take your supplements; I will spend hundreds of dollars on credit on fancy products and I will let you stick your acupuncture needles in me. I also don't pussyfoot around; I believe it's gonna look worse before it looks better. And I do not let obstacles stand in my way: at my lowest point — I can't believe I did this but at my lowest point I would routinely go to a dermatologist and get cortisone shots in my cystic acne. And I would watch where he stuck the needles and when he left the room I would steal a bunch of syringes and do it on myself at night.

Why does corporate Sephora call insults "gifts?" How do they get away with it?

Most of the people who work here are teenagers and they are happy to not be working at McDonald's. This is how they get away with it. As to the why of this issue, my best guess is that it's called a "gift" in an attempt to put a positive spin on what could be construed—let's face it, by anyone functioning normally as a human being—as negative feedback. They mask it with this new-agey shit like, "this is a gift for you to take to the future." Like we should be very glad that now we know our makeup looks like shit or that our shoes are fug, so that we can correct the situation and do a better job. Oh, also, Sephora is what we call a "values-based" company, which to my understanding means that we are not allowed to even say words like steal, shoplift, took, take, thief, what have you. Instead of loss prevention, we have "excellent client servicing." This means that we follow clients around, talking to them, helping them, basically watching them like hawks under the guise of customer service to ensure that the bad thing we're not supposed to say does not happen. So there isn't a security guard, no tags, nothing like that. Instead it's us, and I mean... our costumes don't have pockets for a reason, too. But yeah, we don't use negative terms at Sephora and "gift" is another example of that.

How quickly does stock move at your store? Do any of the items sit around on the shelves for a long time?

People are not feeling the Decleor skincare line. They don't buy the Bliss home waxing kit ever, either. We sell a lot of Perricone, but people seem to be kind of confused about the other cosmeceuticals unless I am here to enable them. Those are my favorite things to sell, but the names have gotten so technical for some of these products that people literally do not understand that oh, this is face cream. The department store brands don't sell... Clinique, Lancome, Shiseido, all of those. People can get those in other places so they tend not to care so much about them. Sometimes someone will come in and request a certain Lancome product or something, but for the most part, people are interested in the fun, new stuff. These products all have preservatives enough so that we can keep them on the shelf for years if they don't sell. Also, I'm not there all the time so it's hard for me to know exactly how much is moving in terms of a gross net. This isn't the kind of thing staff members are routinely consulted about, we're just told how much the store made and how much we are expected to sell for the day.

What's up with your fearless Leader, Cunty Claus? Did she do anything cunty this week?

She does some kind of cunty something every week, pretty much. This week I was at the store on a Sunday before it opened, and I mean, cast members use the front door just like everyone else so if that's locked, you're shit out of luck until someone opens it for you. So we're waiting outside in the cold, and by the time anyone remembered to open the door for us, we were all a grand total of three minutes late. I was the last one to clock in, and I was only three minutes late. Anyway, Cunty Claus took this opportunity to give all of us this terrible lecture at Touch Base, which is our opening meeting, and it's all about how she doesn't understand why we didn't call the store if we were going to be late, what are our excuses, we're late all the time, just a bunch of bullshit like that. I explained to her that we were only three minutes late according to the time clock and she launches into this whole big thing about how the time clock and the clock on the stage are different or something bullshitty. Basically she was just pissed we didn't hop to it in a big hurry freaking out over our jobs even though it wasn't even our faults in the first place that no one opened the doors sooner. She's on this extremely creepy power trip. Once she found me leaning against a display for what, a second, and she says, "We don't lean here. We stand at Sephora." What the fuck? Who says that? She's really into intimidating the cast members so that she seems more authoritative. I think she lives in a world where she has no power and any time she's not at Sephora, working, people like take their dicks out and wipe them on her face. But I guess Sephora is the place where she can avoid the Dirty Sanchez and so we're all three minutes late on Cunty Claus' beat.

How did you finally get rid of your acne?

Oh, that is a long story I will save for next time. But I literally know everything about anything having to do with your skin, so bring on the skin care queries. I am fired up and ready to fight your glands with you.