• Some of Alexander McQueen's friends say that his suicide was not entirely unexpected. A few days before the death of his mother, he declared in a meeting that he "wasn't interested in making fashion anymore, that he hated it." [ToL]

• Model turned cookbook author Sophie Dahl is getting her own cooking show on BBC 2. Dahl says her show will cover on the "emotional" side of food. "It's cooking with an anecdotal thread, irreverent, unpredictable and not without flaw." [Sun]

When someone told me that full-time oblivious person Plum Sykes had a piece in Vogue on the back pain that comes from sitting and writing all day, I thought: Oh! Something with application to the rest of us! Sadly, no.

How is it possible to read two thousand words describing a haircut and come away with no idea what the hell Vogue's Plum Sykes is talking about? Is this some kind of weird, fashionista code?

So since our li'l economic crisis, Vogue went through some sensitivity training and decided to show us that cutting back isn't just for the huddled masses. It's also for Jessica Joffe and Plum Sykes!

• Tom Ford has spoken: eyebrow wiggling is now a sign of displeasure. "I haven't had any plastic surgery — despite what people think, this is my nose...I have had Restylane and Botox, but I don't think of that as plastic surgery any more. It's true I can't really frown, but I can move my eyebrows, so..." [Guardian]
…

Remember when we counted the number of luxury brand name mentions per page in the hateful YA series The Clique (1.8 brand mentions per page, for those of you keeping score)? Well in today's New York Times style section, Cathy Horyn takes a page out of our playbook and notes the number of products placed in the…

The closing paragraph of writer Plum Sykes' June 2008 Vogue cover story: "It's three o'clock and SJP has to run off to pick James up from school. Before she leaves she says that after SATC: TM is out, she will take the summer off to be with her son and start another film in the fall. Another perfume is in the works,…

• Clothing line Anchor Blue has signed Heidi Montag to be its new face. Because execs want to appeal to a "slightly older" demographic. No, really. [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Would you like to be Erin O'Connor's escort to a show during London Fashion Week? Well lucky for you she's holding a contest with Vogue UK. To win her hand…

Tom Sykes is the brother of New York socialites Plum and Lucy Sykes. But is he as despicable as they are? We've always thought, 'no', since he is, you know, a drunk, and drunks are more fun and less thin than Vogue 'editors.' But he is so determined to try! Today he writes in Britain's Daily Mirror that he doesn't…

Sometimes 'Vogue' runs a story so dumb it can only be responded to on its own terms, with an obsequious letter to the editor. If you thought last month's Arden Wohl profile was like that, you really mustn't miss August's piece on the sisters Poppy and Chloe Delvigne/Delvingne (either the magazine or Poppy's modeling…