IN CELEBRATION OF WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH: BELLA ABZUG, A POWER WHO EMPOWERED WOMEN

Bella nicknamed "Battling Bella", was a lawyer, Congresswoman, social activist and a leader of the Women's Movement. – Wikipedia A powerful orator, Abzug mobilized women:  “I always try to get my message across, but in different ways, with reason:  with emotion and with humor.” — Bella Abzug in “Particular Passions: Talks with Women who Shaped our Times”

Like all great orators she honed her skill although not like Churchill who was known to practice with pebbles in his mouth.

Winston Churchill © Yousuf Karsh [1941]

Read the moving chapter of a woman of passionate temperament who effected change for women and generations of women to come.

- Amazon  - Apple  A good read and bargain at $.99

One of “Particular Passion’s” numerous reviews:

"A forceful inspiration—a revelation of woman’s courage, spirit, and strength.” — Sey Chassler, Editor in Chief, Redbook.

FASHION WEEK & BETTY FREIDAN EACH DELIVER A POWERFUL MESSAGE

“We had to break through the whole image of woman and we had to define ourselves as people; and then we had to begin a process that’s still not finished, of restructuring institutions so that women could be people.” - Betty Friedan in “Particular Passions: Talks with Women Who Shaped our Times.”

Betty Friedan launched the contemporary modern women’s movement when her book, The Feminine Mystique, published fifty years ago exploded the myth of the happy homemaker. This one book galvanized women to mobilize at a grass roots level to help women become what they had the potential to be.

Fashion Week on the other hand, delivers an equally powerful message: how women should look. Fashion Week is a road show produced twice yearly that utterly dazzles with a series of hourly blockbuster events. The stunning and not so stunning designs, the excitement, the buzz, the anticipation, the frenzy is broadcast by the media around the world.

What one see are gorgeous clothes, on lanky young models, so tall, so young and so beautiful. They have neither breasts, nor hips, or backsides, and their skin is flawless. They look and move like zombies, staring out from vacant eyes. What you are meant to see, is just the clothes and you do. I was there for the first time and I was spellbound. The pull to look as these young models do is powerful not rational.

Can we integrate how we are told to look with who we can be? Two messages: one delivered to the eye, one delivered to the mind. Can they ever be integrated?

Particular Passions: Betty Friedan is available on Amazon and Apple.

GLORIA STEINEM SEEN THROUGH THE KEYHOLE OF TIME

During the photo shoot of this portrait of Gloria Steinem in the late 70's she was gracious and inspiring.

The intimate portrait in her home is reflected in a revealing interview available at Amazon or Apple for just $0.99.

FASHION WEEK – THAT MOST GRATIFYING ADDICTION

“When I start a show, I’m very timid and nervous for weeks and months… You start with an idea and you believe in it... Some days are big days. You jump. You get a whole excitable, marvelous… wonderful it-doesn’t-balance, what-the-hell-are we going-to-do feeling.” –Diana Vreeland, in "Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Have Shaped our Times"  talking about her exhibitions for the Costume Institute that she established at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Fashion comes down through an attenuated twisting funnel propelled by an idea that has been percolating in the “air.” Fashion takes shape through multiple paths at the hands of designers and stylists. Buyers and the media determine what the public sees.  Throw in a dollop of some celebrity wearing a particular style and history is in the making. But ultimately the judge is the buying public. To be a part of the lexicon of style that goes down through the ages, it’s the vision of a woman like Diana Vreeland who picked, promoted and established what was worthy of being remembered with stunning blockbuster exhibits at the Met.  

Who can determine whether the shoe in the photograph will “endure.” It should, just because this "look" will go out of style faster than it came in. After resting in a closet for 40 years these shoes will “endure” because they’ll still be new.

Could the style-maker Diana Vreeland make a fashion like these shoes “stick?” Read a brief chapter, the oral biography Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at The Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art.

Available at Amazon and Apple.

Shoes like these probably cost a mint while the chapter is only $0.99. Enjoy, it's fun reading just like the shoes are fun to admire.

FRIEDAN: 50 YEARS, THE IMPACT OF TIME

Betty Friedan turned the world topsy-turvy, with her landmark book “The Feminine Mystique. Women viewed themselves from a new perspective setting in motion changes for themselves and between the sexes that were unthinkable. Fifty years has seen more radical changes in women’s identity, how women function, women’s relationship with men, than going back to the beginning of time. We haven’t achieved complete success in our goals which are constantly changing, but the massive machinery Friedan set in motion has great staying power and will help us get there... wherever "there" is.

As she said in my book, Particular Passions: Talks With Women Who Have Shaped our Times “The way... you can have children now, when you've already started on your work, and know what you can do, you are not subject to the guilts. That was the worst, the guilts, the conflicts... That put negative valences on one's own enjoyment of motherhood. It's such a short period. I wish I'd felt free to concentrate on them more.”

To put our lives in historical perspective read Friedan in her own words in a chapter from Particular Passions. You'll find things like the guilt about motherhood remains the same, but others that have changed dramatically… for the better.

Available at Amazon or Apple for only $0.99. It's a treat and a bargain. As good as a caffe latte and cheaper.

"Every woman owes it to herself to look up Particular Passions—borrow the volume from your public library. Or, better still, buy it and put it with your favorite novel or poetry collection to sustain you. Every story in the book is an inspiration. This book is a joy and a tonic." — Pioneer Press and Dispatch.

NEW YORK CITY FASHION WEEK VERSUS TIMELESS ELEGANCE

"Style is a wonderful thing to have because it maintains you through the way you behave, the literature you read, your life with friends, with children and with your family. Style is always growing and changing..."

— Diana Vreeland in  "Particular Passions: Talks with Women who Shaped our Times"

Embroidered velvet coat, Marshall & Snelgrove Ltd (retailers), 1895-1900, via Victoria and Albert Museum

The coat above, represents some of the types of clothes from another era that Diana Vreeland brought to the attention of the audience at the Met.

Read a brief chapter, an oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose seminal exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to fine art, a bite sized "taste" of  an inspiring book. Better yet, buy the complete book of 46 women who opened doors for women in many disciplines around the world. It is available at Amazon and Apple. Chapters are $0.99, the book $7.95. It's a bargain.

As one reviewer said of the book - "One of those rare, rare books that pick your life up, turn it around and point it in the right direction." — K.T. Maclay.

Fashion Week brings buyers flocking from all over the country to see what fashions are next on the horizon.   But we all know that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and it's not necessarily what is new that is more beautiful. The old and timeless can be equally exciting. At least in the arena of fashion we can be a tolerant society and recoginize there is room for both points of view.

I think I'm somewhat of the old school, because what was fashionable or beautiful fades quickly as new styles and trends rapidly replace each other. They quicken the heart of the potential buyer who sees "a must have" and keeps the economy running at a clip. There are designs though, that transcend time. The coat above, is one of them. I hope you enjoy the timeless and subtle elegance of this regal design from an earlier century.

If you enjoy these blogs, I have no doubt you will enjoy the book.  It's chock full of wonderful stories, history, inspiring tales. Try it, you wont be disappointed.

NEW YORK CITY FASHION WEEK & ALL THE PIZAZZ

"I hope I’m giving people pleasure, something to look at, to think about, something that fills their imagination or evokes a few thoughts."

Diana Vreeland in “Particular Passions: Talks with Women who Have Shaped our Times”

Charles Frederick Worth, dress for Empress Elisabeth of Austria, by Franz Xaver Winterhalter circa 1865

Charles Frederick Worth (1825-1895), is widely considered the Father of Haute couture, while Diana Vreeland is most likely considered the Mother of Fashion as Fine Art.

Vreeland who introduced the seminal and blockbuster exhibitions of fashion at the Metropolitan Museum, linked the commercial world of fashion with the blue blood institution of the Met. A step forward into new territory for both.

The chapter of Vreeland available for all e-readers at Amazon and  Apple. is probably the only purchase you’ll find during  Fashion Week that is a true bargain and will give you pleasure at $.99.

You can read Diana Vreeland's chapter, or better yet, buy the whole book. Try it you'll really like it.  As one reviewer said: "One of those rare, rare books that pick your life up, turn it around and point it in the right direction." — K.T. Maclay.

Particular Passions: available for all e-reading devices at Amazon and Apple.

The book is $7.99, and 12 chapters are available for $0.99 each.

SAVOR THE “THRILL” Of NEW YORK CITY FASHION WEEK

“Of course, people have grown up from under a stone and have come up with plenty of style. We’re all born to have it, we just need to get on to our own thing.” - Diana Vreeland in "Particular Passions: Talks With Women who Have Shaped our Times”

Broccoli Purse by Fulvio Bonavia

Enjoy the imagination, vision, sass and style of Diana Vreeland, in a brief oral biography  in Particular Passions.  It was Diana Vreeland's seminal and blockbuster exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art that elevated fashion to fine art.

The bag above represents for me the creativity and courage that Ms Vreeland brought to her life's work.

The chapter available for all e-readers at Amazon and Apple. is probably the only purchase you'll find during  Fashion Week that is a true bargain and will give you pleasure at $.99.

"This is a wonderful book. . .The book is recommended reading for anyone—no matter what political or sociological background—who wants to know more about living history.        - Santa Cruz Sentine

Particular Passions: is available for all e-reading devices at Apple  and Amazon.  The book is $7.99, and 12 chapters are available for $.99 each.

One of many glowing reviews:

"This is a wonderful book. . .The book is recommended reading for anyone—no matter what political or sociological background—who wants to know more about living history." — Santa Cruz Sentinel.

NEW YORK CITY FASHION WEEK TAKES ON THE WORLD

“People have always loved to look at fairy princesses, queens, beautiful objects, buildings, and gardens. Looking at beauty is a natural part of life." - Diana Vreeland, "Particular Passions: Talks with Women who Have Shaped our Times"

Read a brief oral biography of Diana Vreeland from "Particular Passions,"  whose seminal exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to fine art.

Available for all e-readers at Amazon and Apple for $.99.

"Particular Passions" profiles forty-six American women who forged successful careers in fields that had traditionally been open only to men. The women were pioneers in the arts and sciences, athletics and law, mathematics and politics, among other disciplines. They overcame countless obstacles to build fulfilling lives for themselves, and in so doing opened doors for new generations of women in America and around the world.

"Every woman owes it to herself to look up Particular Passions—borrow the volume from your public library. Or, better still, buy it and put it with your favorite novel or poetry collection to sustain you. Every story in the book is an inspiration. This book is a joy and a tonic." —Pioneer Press and Dispatch

Particular Passions, the complete book, is available for $7.99 at Apple  and Amazon.

DIANA VREELAND - ADDICTED TO FASHION

"Fashion is made to become unfashionable"  - Coco Chanel Layers of petticoats, ribbons, and ruffles, Now we wear flip flops in which we can shuffle.

Marquise de Pompadour by François Boucher 1756

Do yourself a favor and buy a brief chapter from "Particular Passions: Talks with Women Who Have Shaped our Times" - the oral biography of Diana Vreeland, whose pioneering exhibitions at the Metropolitan Museum of Art elevated fashion to a fine art - a bargain at $.99  Available at  Amazon  and Apple.

"One of those rare, rare books that pick your life up, turn it around and point it in the right direction." — K.T. Maclay