The Tents in Bryant Park. Photo: Andrew H. Walker, Getty Images
Last night's farewell-to-Bryant Park party was a bittersweet moment for Fern Mallis, the IMG senior vice president credited with bringing Fashion Week to the Tents.
She told me she was considering having the white marquis cut into squares as souvenirs for people attached to the location that Fashion Week has called home for the last 18 years.
I suggested that the canvas might make suitable material for Miguel Adrover, the young designer who attracted attention a few years ago for making a coat out of the mattress ticking discarded by the late British eccentric, Quentin Crisp.
"Well, you'd need a lot of it," she said. "It wouldn't be very comfortable."
Perhaps it would be suitable to make a corset out of? No, the expression on Fern's face indicated that she didn't think that was much of an idea either.
The party itself was, as the kids say, "off the hook." Guests drifted in from the opening of the Rodarte exhibition at the Cooper Hewitt design Museum uptown -- where Natalie Portman, Kirsten Dunst and Vogue editor Anna Wintour were among the well-wishers congratulating designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy -- and the Calvin Klein after-party downtown.
The very last show to take place in the Tent, the largest of the three venues, was Tommy Hilfiger. Attendees described an emotional finale with cheers as the show closed, everyone aware that they had witnessed the end of an era.
Backstage, the always raucously fun W Hotels Lounge was aflutter with napkins being tossed into the air like confetti, as the DJ did his thing and guests drained the last of the champagne. Next door at the more grown-up Mercedes Benz Lounge, the hosts stayed impeccably dressed as they dispensed their liquid hospitality.
And by late morning Friday, the Fashion Week tents were already mostly down in Bryant Park, never to return. Next season: Loitering in Lincoln Center!
Plus, check out our roundup of this season's highs, lows and downright crazy.