Kicking off New York fashion week

In the days before the shows start under the tents in Bryant Park, Manhattan’s hair salons and ubiquitous nail salons (one conservative estimate says there are 338 in this thirteen-mile-long island) are jampacked with people buffing, polishing and highlighting in anticipation of the fashion face-off of the upcoming week. The eyes at New York City Fashion Week aren't only the catwalk

Packed with editors, subeditors, writers and staff of fashion glossies, not to mention buyers and merchandisers of luxury retailers worldwide, the sea of folding chairs are where the latest must-have items, and cutting edge clothes are sported. They speak fashionese and are able to define words like “peplum” (that’s a flounce below the waist) and “aglet” (that’s the plastic bit at the end of a shoelace). They are also the people whose opinions can make or break a designer’s career, and they are the people who determine the trends you will be wearing each season.

It is a universe populated by people who don’t leave home without at least a trio of designer items on their bodies and a bag costing a month’s rent on their arms. These are the men and women who use the hundred pound face creams their magazines hawk.

Seated among their peers under the tents at New York’s Bryant Park where fashion week is held, they are in intense competition for the most stylish and in-the-know; this week they turn up the fashion heat.  Accordingly the spectators break out their Sunday best, they are impossibly beautiful, impeccably groomed and chicly outfitted because it is an essential part of their profession: Like a builder in a hard hat and tool belt, they are in a sense, in uniform, sporting the tools of their trade.

Here's a great FAQ from a former Donna Karan designer about the shows in New York

Also, check out the official New York Fashion Week site

-- Sarah