Holy Hemlines, Batman, it's Fashion Week Month again!

Sheesh.  I haven't finished looking at the Fall 2010 collections yet (not to mention Pre-Fall, Cruise and Resort), and New York's Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week starts tomorrow.  Given that I'm not getting ready to go to Italy this season (alas! alack!) I'll try to pay attention, but dayum, there's a whole lot of fashion going on. 

Anyone watching The Rachel Zoe project this season?  Dayum, Rodger (Mr. Zoe) is being a whiney bitch.  And really, all that drama over that Marchesa dress:  OF COURSE the designer is going to save it for the odds-on favorite for the Best Actress award (Sandra Bullock), instead of lending it to a mere presenter (has Demi Moore even been in anything lately?).  Get over it, already.

Sparkly, definitely sparkly

Trashy Diva Fireworks of Love dress

So, I innocently clicked on the Mod Cloth advertisement posted at Tom and Lorenzo's site, and I saw that the store was having a Last Hurrah sale, and then I saw this dress, which combines everything I love in a dress: it's by Trashy Diva, it's marked way down, it's retro, it's longer, it's 100% silk and it's in a VERY LOUD PRINT.  There were only two left, and now one is mine.  Wah ha ha ha haaaaaaa!!!!

There's lots of other wonderful stuff on sale over there.  Go.  Shop.  Have a happy Labor Day! 

And I forgot . . .

Elizabeth Moss in Donna Karan

Eva Longoria in Robert Rodriguez

Another item in my list of red carpet pet peeves -- trains.  Trains work on women getting married in a cathedral or being presented to the Queen.  Trains do not work on women who are dragging them up a filthy red carpet crowded with people and video equipment, (I saw film of Wanda Sykes stomping on someone's train, and I'm certain that wasn't the only train-related crisis) and who have a one-in-five chance of having to drag the damn thing up a steep flight of steps to accept an award.  Dresses with trains look downright ridiculous photographed outside on a hot sunny Los Angeles afternoon in front of a backdrop studded with commercial logos.

Now I actually think Elizabeth Moss, wearing her pink Donna Karan, looks terrific (although I not a fan of flesh-colored fabric), but she'd look just as good if she weren't dragging that extraneous hunk of fabric around.  Eva Longoria looks good too, and she'd look just as good if the gown were simply floor-length.  The occassion simply doesn't call for a cathedral-worth garment.

And that leads to yet another pet peeve -- occasion inappropriate dresses.

 Dianna Angron in Carolina Herrera

Dianna Angron is a beautiful girl wearing a beautiful dress that is totally wasted in the commercial glare of the Emmys red carpet.  All that romance should be saved for a New Year's eve gala in Vienna, or some other occasion where the skirts will swirl during the dancing and the pink lace won't clash with the background.  Red carpets need something with edge and contrast, and princess moments should be saved for princess venues.  (Sorry Rachel Zoe!  And a princess moment on Cameron Diaz?  No.  Just, no.)

So, let's see, my expanded list of red carpet no-nos includes: trains, flesh-colored (aka nude), navy, or bridal-white fabric, strapless or one-shouldered bodices, mermaid or flamenco silhouettes, occasion- or age- inappropriate dresses and Christina Hendrick's and Heidi Klum's poitrines.  If this were a drinking game I'd be out cold half-way through the next red carpet extravaganza.

In the Navy.

Jayma Mays in Burberry

Jaimie Alexander in Nicole Miller

Kathy Griffin in Oscar de la Renta

Padma Lakshmi in Carolina Herrera

Jane Krakowski in Escada

Lea Michele in Oscar de la Renta

Ariel Winter

Here's the ladies in Navy arranged, more or less, in order of volume and in order of preference.  My favorite dress is Jaimie Alexander's (I had to look her up on IMDB, and I still don't know why she was at the Emmys) because (1) it's not strapless, (2) it's not a mermaid gown, (3) she couldn't do the flamenco in it, and (4) LESS. IS. MORE.  Dayum.

I also like Jayma Mays look because it's simple, and I have to give props to Kathy Griffin for buying her own dress.  Bless.  The rest of the ladies in this row need to reconsider.  And there's nothing new about navy blue on the red carpet -- it was all over the Oscars, also in distressingly similar-looking dresses.

Well, I've got something else to add to my list of things I don't want to see on the red carpet again: navy blue.  To go along with strapless, one-shoulder, mermaid, white, and flamenco dresses.  Good luck to me, eh?