Spring 2000
Fashion Safari
This
show will feature African-inspired color, exotic fabrics,
African drumming, and the premiere of new clothing line
Ocelot (not to mention wine and hors d'oeuvres).
Art à
la Carte,
1103 SW Alder St.,
221-0431. 5:30-7:30 pm Friday, April 14.
The Links
42nd Annual Ebony Fashion Fair Show
Judging
from last year's show, you'll find some of the best-dressed
women in Portland here--and that's just the audience. The
show is a fund-raiser
for the Links Educational Scholarship Fund and local charities.
Oregon Convention
Center, 777 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 235-7575. Friday,
April 14. Call for ticket info.
Plus-sized
Spring Fashion Show
Check
out spring sportswear, career wear and dresses at this runway
show.
Nordstorm,
Encore Department,
1001 Lloyd Center, 287-2444.
Doors open 10 am, show 10:30 am Saturday, April 15. Free.
Sometimes fashion turns up in unlikely places. Take my
recent adventure at the Elks Club Lodge, for example. My
friend Joe and I were heading south on Southeast McLoughlin
Boulevard on a recent Saturday afternoon thrift-store outing,
talking about how fun it would be to crash the nearby Elks
lodge. It appeared off to the right seconds later, beckoning
us with a marquee declaring simply "Fashion Show."
I slammed on the brakes and steered into the lot. We couldn't
pass this up. It was fate. It was fashion. And it would
be fun, no doubt.
My cohort Joe and I had arrived just in time to get in
on the pre-show luncheon. We lined up at the door among
throngs of senior ladies, signed our name in the guest book
and nabbed seats with a view of the runway at a long table
in the auditorium. Joe ran to the 7-Eleven to buy a cardboard
camera, and soon we were chatting it up with a group of
smartly dressed Elkettes, sipping champagne from plastic
cups and nibbling on croissanwiches and M&Ms. We talked
about Arizona winters, dance lessons at the lodge, how much
Sellwood has changed in recent years and our favorite tofu
recipes. This already beat the pants off of any fashion
show I'd attended in the past, and it hadn't even really
started.
The plates were cleared and the cups refilled, and then
"2000 Fashions in Flight" (complete with a butterfly motif)
began. "Mature" models worked the stage, one by one, while
the slightly confused MC read descriptions of each getup
from note cards as a pianist hammered out indecipherable
tunes. The smiling women paraded down the runway in cuffed,
dark denim with elastic waists; red microfiber tunics; turquoise
travel wear; cheetah-print accessories; hooded, lilac sweatshirts.
Essentially, these fashions were grandma versions of current
trends. The Boulevard Shop (4521 SE Woodstock Blvd., 777-3555)
and Catherine's of Ross Center (11211 SE 82nd Ave.,786-8982)
provided the clothes.
The sheer novelty of being there gave way to serious contemplation
(OK, half-serious) as I watched chivalrous Elks assist each
model down the runway stairs. I started to think about the
day when I'll trade in my hip-hugging button-fly jeans for
more generous, elastic-waist denim (this will probably coincide
with an increase in frequency of buffet dining). What else
will I wear when I'm a card-carrying AARP member? The gold-threaded
windbreaker I saw before me? Or an entire windbreaker suit,
the kind I always poke fun at? What about the cruise wear
covered with shells and fish? I couldn't reconcile the images
in my head. But I took comfort in the fact that not all
of the styles got thumbs-up from our new Elkette pals, either.
There's a good chance that lighthouse embroidery won't necessarily
appeal to me when I hit 60, after all.
On the other hand, some of the pieces on show had a drastically
higher style quotient than the polyester pants my grandma
couldn't get enough of years ago, especially a sage pants
and jacket combo. Speaking of polyester, I won't have to
worry about that transition: I already wear plenty of it,
and the new polyesters in the show were of the high-tech,
better-draping and less-tacky variety. Most of the outfits
flaunted on the runway were machine-washable, too. When
I get old, I sure as hell am not going to be hauling piles
of high-maintenance garments to the dry cleaners. That's
time I could be parked in a lawn chair on my porch among
the red rocks of Sedona, sipping a cactus (or prune) juice
cocktail and reading National Geographic.
Joe volunteered as a runner for the raffle and passed out
tote bags and flower arrangements to the winners, breaking
my reverie. The Elkettes asked me who was driving, having
noticed Joe's enthusiasm for bubbly and, curiously, senior
citizen fashion shows. I assured them that I would be taking
the wheel. I was still on a thrift-store mission, in search
of a pair of low-riding, black Levi's, and I wanted to wear
the hell out of them before my thoughts turned to elastic
waistbands.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Willamette Week | originally
published April 12,
2000
|
