Stevie & Sui

[michelej1]

Style.com 4/15/09

http://www.style.com/stylefile/2009/...-sui-rocks-on/

What was the impetus for Anna Sui’s career? “I wanted to dress rock stars and people who go to rock concerts,” said the designer at last night’s Friends of the Costume Institute event, which drew the likes of Baby Jane Holzer, Stephen Burrows, and artist and longtime Sui collaborator Hiroshi Tanabe. Sui, who will receive the CFDA’s Lifetime Achievement Award this June, shared amusing anecdotes about how she achieved her dream. Dave Navarro, for one, walked for the designer after meeting her on an elevator, and Stevie Nicks invited Sui to come backstage at a concert after she had dissed Fleetwood Mac in print. Musicians aren’t the only ones drawn to Sui’s colorful, evocative clothing: Her entertaining, accessory-laden shows always feature stellar castings. How does she manage it? “I was in a unique position. I knew a lot of the girls socially and it’s no secret that one of my best friends is Steven Meisel,” she said.

[michelej1]

I didn't know Sui had said anything negative about FM or Stevie. Most of the time I'm reading how Stevie's style inspired the designer.

Michele

[michelej1]

http://www.wwd.com/fashion-news/fash...justin=2106304

Womens' Wear Daily, by WWD Staff
Posted Wednesday April 15, 2009
From WWD.COM


Anna Sui is receiving this year's CFDA Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award, which prompted the Friends of The Costume Institute to get the designer to muse on her career and views on fashion in a conversation with curator Andrew Bolton.

And so, on a rainy Tuesday evening, a troupe of loyal fashion lovers trekked to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Jane Holzer, Lauren Santo Domingo, Michelle Gerber Klein and Stephen Burrows sipped Champagne, and settled into the museum's Uris Center, where Sui and Bolton chatted about everything from her Carnaby Street-inspired first collection to her long-standing love affair with music and rock concert culture. "I think I am really a product of pop culture," Sui said.

Reminiscing about a collection inspired by Stevie Nicks, Sui recalled voicing her disdain for Fleetwood Mac at a time when she favored punk rock. Little did she know Nicks would personally pick up the phone and dial her
digits — though not to give her the expected tongue-lashing. "She loved that I said that I hated them," Sui recalled. "She said, 'why don't you come to the concert?'"

Nicks wasn't the only musician who showed her affection for the designer. In her 1994 grunge collection, Dave Navarro modeled a skimpy women's wear top.

"How did you get Dave Navarro into a camisole?" Bolton queried. Turns out, Sui had run into the guitarist in an elevator. Never missing a beat, she suggested he model in her show. "He asked me, 'will there be lingerie
involved?'"

With the Costume Institute's forthcoming exhibit on "The Model as Muse: Embodying Fashion,” it was only natural that the talk turned to famed supermodels — an era Sui is all too familiar with. "It's no secret that one of my best friends is Steven Meisel," she said, explaining how she became close friends with supes like Linda Evangelista and Naomi Campbell. They were assets when it came to planning her first runway show in 1991.

"Naomi and Linda said, 'we'll get all the girls for you,'" Sui recalled.