September comes in with a bang in New York every year thanks to fashion week but it’s also the best time for new exhibitions, films, shows, books, and more. Here are some of the things that should be on your radar this month.

The highlight of the Fashion Icons sale at Sotheby’s is the Warm & Wonderful Black Sheep Sweater previously owned and worn by Princess Diana. The Black Sheep sweater is one of the most iconic pieces worn by Princess Diana to ever come to market. There was a tear on the sleeve and she reached out about having it repaired or replaced. The brand sent a replacement and the original ended up forgotten in a box for 40 years. You can see it on display at Sotheby’s New York through September 13, 2023.

Ed Ruscha Now Then is on view at the Museum of Modern Art until January 13, 2024.

“I don’t have any Seine River like Monet,” Ed Ruscha once said. “I’ve just got US 66 between Oklahoma and Los Angeles.” ED RUSCHA / NOW THEN will feature over 200 works—in mediums including painting, drawing, prints, photography, artist’s books, film, and installation—that make use of everything from gunpowder to chocolate. Exploring Ruscha’s landmark contributions to postwar American art as well as lesser-known aspects of his more than six-decade career, the exhibition will offer new perspectives on a body of work that has influenced generations of artists, architects, designers, and writers.

In 1956, Ruscha left his hometown of Oklahoma City and drove along interstate highway 66 to study commercial art in Los Angeles, where he drew inspiration from the city’s architecture, colloquial speech, and popular culture. Ruscha has recorded and transformed familiar subjects—whether roadside gasoline stations or the 20th Century Fox logo—often revisiting motifs, sites, or words years later. Tracing shifts in the artist’s means and methods over time, ED RUSCHA / NOW THEN underscores the continuous reinvention that has defined his work.

I saw Manet / Degas at the Musée d’Orsay when I was in Paris in April and could barely move because there were so many people in the galleries. I’m looking forward to seeing it again at The Metropolitan Museum of Art during the press preview and member hours when it will hopefully be a little less crowded.

This exhibition examines one of the most significant artistic dialogues in modern art history: the close and sometimes tumultuous relationship between Édouard Manet and Edgar Degas. Born only two years apart, Manet (1832–1883) and Degas (1834–1917) were friends, rivals, and, at times, antagonists who worked to define modern painting in France. By examining their careers in parallel and presenting their work side by side, this exhibition investigates how their artistic objectives and approaches both overlapped and diverged.

Through more than 150 paintings and works on paper, Manet/Degas takes a fresh look at the interactions of these two artists in the context of the family relationships, friendships, and intellectual circles that influenced their artistic and professional choices, deepening our understanding of a key moment in nineteenth-century French painting.

Gabrielle Chanel. Fashion Manifesto opens at the V&A in London on September 16, 2023 and is already poised to be the hot exhibition this fall so make sure you book your tickets early. It is the first UK exhibition dedicated to the work of French couturière, Gabrielle ‘Coco’ Chanel, charting the establishment of the House of CHANEL and the evolution of her iconic design style which continues to influence the way women dress today.

Bridget Riley Drawings: From the Artist’s Studio has been on since June but it’s just come to my attention. It runs through October 8, 2023.

British artist Bridget Riley (b. 1931) is one of the most celebrated abstract painters of her generation. This exhibition—the first dedicated exclusively to her drawings in over fifty years—provides an intimate view of Riley’s studio practice, in which the making of works on paper plays a central role. The exhibition includes more than 75 studies from the artist’s collection, created between the 1940s and the 2000s. They include early figurative and landscape drawings made during her student years; black-and-white studies for Riley’s best known paintings from the 1960s, when she became closely associated with the Op art movement; and a diverse array of color compositions, which have occupied her attention since the late 1960s. Together they demonstrate Riley’s unceasing commitment to paper, pencil, ink, and gouache, as tools of exploration and innovation.

Matisse, Derain and Friends: The Paris Avantgarde 1904-1908 runs through 21 January 2024
at the Kunstmuseum Basel if you happen to be traveling to Switzerland.

At the outset of the twentieth century, a loosely affiliated group of artists centring around Henri Matisse, André Derain and Maurice de Vlaminck conducted revolutionary experiments in color. The name Fauves was bestowed on the group in 1905 by art critic Louis Vauxcelles. He first employed “fauves” in one of his articles; the term, which in English translates as “wild beasts” or “wild animals”, was intended to characterise the clique of artists who remained little known prior to 1905. It was in the group’s expressive approach to the application of color, its striking, often virulent color schemes, as well the rejection of naturalistic renderings of local colors, that Vauxcelles discerned the break with academic precedent.

The first season of The Morning Show on AppleTV was great and you all loved my posts on the fashions but season two was a sophomore slump. I look forward to seeing what season three brings when the show debuts this week on September 13th. We saw Jennifer Aniston and John Hamm filming in Soho and other places around New York and he seems like an exciting edition to the cast.

If you don’t mind subtitles, Class Act debuting on Netflix on Wednesday, September 13th looks fun. It’s about “a relentlessly ambitious working-class man becomes one of France’s most controversial public figures in this fictionalized biopic about Bernard Tapie”.

Ehrengard: The Art Of Seduction premieres on Netflix on September 14th and is based on the book Ehrengard by Karen Blixen and features set design and costumes by Queen Margrethe II. It looks a little crazy but I’m very intrigued.

In the fairytale kingdom of Babenhausen, a young, self-appointed expert on love, Mr. Cazotte (Mikkel Boe Følsgaard), is hired by the scheming Grand Duchess (Sidse Babett Knudsen)  to help her secure an heir. While searching for a suitable future Princess, Mr Cazotte teaches the timid and introverted Crown Prince Lothar (Emil Aron Dorph) the art of seduction and lovemaking. But their plan soon backfires, when an heir is conceived out of wedlock and the royal family has to seek refuge in the castle of Rosenbad. Here, as rivals within the royal family close in on their scheme, Cazotte himself falls in love with Ehrengard (Alice Esther Bier Zandén), the maid of honor, and gradually learns that in fact, he’s no expert on love at all.

The trailer for Love at First Sight looks so good. It follows Hadley (Haley Lu Richardson from White Lotus) and Oliver (Ben Hardy) who fall in love with each other on their flight from New York to London. They lose each other at customs and the possibility of ever meeting each other again seems improbable, but destiny may have a way of changing the odds. I didn’t realize the film which will air on Netfix on September 15th is based upon the 2011 novel The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer Smith.

The Super Models documentary airing on AppleTV on September 20th, travels back to the 1980s, when four women from different corners of the world united in New York. Already forces in their own right, the gravitas they achieved by coming together transcended the industry itself. Their prestige was so extraordinary that it enabled the four to supersede the brands they showcased, making the names Naomi, Cindy, Linda and Christy as prominent as the designers who styled them. Today, the four supermodels remain on the frontlines of culture through activism, philanthropy and business prowess. As the fashion industry continues to redefine itself — and women’s roles within it — this is the ultimate story of power and how four women came together to claim it, paving the way for those to follow.

I had seen all the new movies on my Delta flight back from London so I ended up watching some of the John Wick films. I enjoyed them but wished they hadn’t been so violent and gory. But I’m still interested in checking out The Continental series which highlights the chain of hotels around the world that serves as a neutral ground for members of the underworld and how the hotel workers handle the hitmen and murderers who come to stay. It airs on Peacock on September 20, 2023.

Defining Chic: Carrier and Company Interiors was released on September 5, 2023 and is the second book from “one of today’s most celebrated and influential design firms creates eclectic, inspired, and quietly virtuosic interiors across the style spectrum—from bohemian glamour to country charm, sophisticated modern, and historically informed—for clients as individual in taste as Anna Wintour and Jessica Chastain”.

Rose Uniacke at Work will be released this Tuesday, September 12, 2023. It gives an in depth look into “the work of London-based interiors and furniture designer Rose Uniacke and beautifully showcases a number of homes she has designed, boasting clean lines and calm, light-filled spaces, and showrooms defined by an effortless blend of traditional details within contemporary spaces. Whether the project is an urban townhouse, a seaside retreat, or a London villa, the approach of Uniacke is always the same—a collaboration with clients to make understated, refined sanctuaries that offer the perfect settings for everyday life. The book is sumptuously illustrated with two hundred color photographs that truly capture the serenity and timelessness of Uniacke’s hand-hewn cultivated style.”

London Living: Town and Country presents a unique look into the homes of London-based interior designers, antique dealers, musicians, and influencers, revealed by leading interior design photographer Simon Upton and will be released on September 26, 2023.

Mark your calendar for September 15th for that is when the debut collection of fashion designer Clare Waight Keller at Uniqlo will be released.

French candle brand Diptyque has a new line of refillable candles out now that smell good and help save the environment. It’s a win-win and they look like they will make lovely hostess gifts this fall.

This are busy in NYC right now and I have a lot of events on my calendar so please bear with me if I am not posting as much as I did in August when I had no distractions.

XOXO,

HC