Sneaky Peeks with Pamela Love

Being friends with a designer has real benefits—you get sneak peeks at all sorts of fun things, they give the best birthday presents, and you get to go to all sorts of fancy people events. But sometimes you've got to work for those benefits, which is what happened when Pamela Love enlisted me for labor in the days leading up to her presentation last week at Milk Studios. To be fair, she lured me in with the promise of jewelry and, being a semi-broke style whore, I will always work for trade. ALWAYS.

Disclosures aside, there are far more important things to tell you about Pamela Love other than the fact that she's my friend. This year marks her second CFDA nomination, which means she's been getting major attention from the likes of Vogue. Thankfully, despite her mainstream success, she's still the same goofy, neurotic, punk drummer chick in ripped jeans and an XL Wild Yaks shirt trying to clean up her nails, which are eternally dirty from making jewelry.

I showed up at her studio at 10 AM to play intern for a day. It was a madhouse: Model castings, last-minute jewelry production, gift bag mayhem, Fashion's Night Out preparations, showroom merchandising, hair and makeup tests, plus a camera crew.

I was sent offsite to a glamorous place called Exquisite Fabrics to find just under three yards of the perfect weight camel fabric for pants being fabricated for one of the looks. You know, because as a fashion writer I am imminently qualified to select fabrics. I guess I’m more qualified to do that than to wield a small torch, which was another task at hand. Thankfully, I did a good job. At least that's what I was told, but maybe they just felt sorry for me because I got caught in the rain.

The lights, the camera, the boom mic, the makeup artist, the hairdresser, the entire staff, plus myself made the 1,000-square-foot studio feel about as big as a dorm room. I was totally unaware that being on-camera was part of the deal. I had a giant rip in the ass of my jeans, my hair was still wet from my fabric excursion, and in general was dressed like a weird boy in camouflage high-tops and a White Lung shirt. Basically shit was hectic and I tried to hide from the cameras and stay out of the way.

I also spent a good amount of time (OK, an inappropriate amount of time) ogling and pawing her new collection at her showroom. The past few seasons Love has abandoned the literal figural style that makes up her Classics Collection and her jewelry has morphed into a far more abstract, yet still earthy form. This season’s official inspiration is the work and traditions of Moroccan artisans.

A lot of the collection also seemed to hearken to sands closer to home, as there was definitely a mash-up between Sahara and the Mojave, very much in line with the desert world-beat vibes I saw elsewhere. This collection also marks the introduction of gemstones to her normally color-shy line and nothing gets a desert doll’s heart palpitating like turquoise, jasper, and malachite. There’s a hand-piece that I want, a green malachite pill-shaped ring that I need, and a double triple triangle bracelet that I hope to own.

By presentation day everything pretty much came together. The only crisis was a model whose dainty size seven feet were too petite to fit in the size ten shoes selected for her look. Seriously, that's like the smallest crisis ever in the history of Fashion Week presentations. Important people showed up, the sets looked amazing, the live music was incredible, and the floor was piled high with enough Persian rugs to pay my rent into the next decade.

The girls wore turbans and Stetsons and had a single line painted down the middle of their lower lip in a traditional Moroccan fashion. My secret favorite part of the night was listening to people tell Pam how much they were into the lip rings. Get over the 90s revival already, people, and stop pretending you want facial piercings to come back.

Important necklace note: This is made of laser-cut wood panels and I want it.

Important beauty note: I think that it will take a few seasons for girls to get over the fishtail braid simply because most of us can’t do one on ourselves.

Important people note: Anna Wintour was there, along with a bunch of other super important editorial people who looked vaguely familiar. I didn’t photograph them because I wasn’t exactly sure who most of them were and I was kind of scared of them. Truth be told, I only caught a brief glimpse of Wintour from behind and the only thing I can really say about her is that her calves are very slim.

Unimportant people note: Aliana Lohan was there (that’s Lindsay’s little sister). I didn’t recognize her, so I didn’t take a picture. I bet you care as much as or possibly even less than I do.

And with the untwist of a turban, it was over.