Everybody here at the magazine pitched in with great ideas and a lot of hard work for our March/April fashion issue, but I want to single out four. Under Style Editor Stellene Volandes’s watch, they played to perfection. Photo Editor Jessica Dimson, with help from cool West Coast parents like Wolfgang Puck and Lara Shriftman, pulled off a sort of Home Alone in L.A., photographed by our favorite Tierney Gearon; Deputy Photo Editor Michael Shome orchestrated LA ZEGNA VITA; and Associate Editor Nandita Khanna traveled to Dallas to see how those real women really shop. It’s a great issue full of cool—and very useful—people, places, and things. Alas, to be honest, there’s always so much more that ends up on the cutting-room floor. So I’d like to share a few of my own personal favorites:
1. In New York, as much as I love Fried Chicken Fridays at Patroon (160 E. 46th St.; 212-883-7373;patroonrestaurant.com), right now my thoughts are on diet and fitness, and I’m besotted bythe new Casa Lever (390 Park Ave.; 212-888-2700; casalever.com). Ask for a table near the back ofthe power-happy room that’s serviced by Luigi.
2. That said, who doesn’t occasionallyfall off the wagon with a good dessert? And what better way to fall than with the lemon icebox pie,one of the terrific recipes in DamGoodSweet (Taunton Press, $25) by that prince of New Orleanspastries, David Guas.
3. Harvey Weinstein, are you reading this? On the basis of the chilling firsttwo pages alone! Genius on the Edge: The Bizarre Double Life of Dr. William Stewart Halsted (KaplanPublishing, $26) is the compelling biography of one weird genius of modern surgery by Dr. GeraldImber, a contributor to this magazine.
4. Shimano biking shoes from Japan made even me feel likeLance Armstrong. The look! The bounce! They’re magic. From $80; shimano.com.
5. KimberlyPerrone of Bloom, the classy New York florist at 541 Lexington (212-832-8094), does everythingwell—from teeny-weeny bouquets for the bedside table to the most voluptuous terrariums. Forthose not in the neighborhood, check out her Web site (bloomflowers.com).
6. Sartorialists areeagerly awaiting the first line of Caruso (and its made-to-measure sibling, called Uman), fromformer Brioni CEO Umberto Angeloni, at Barneys and Saks.
7. If you still love wonderful stationery,I recommend lush, beautifully textured note cards (and everything else) from Thornwillow(845-569-8883; thornwillow.com) and calling cards from Dempsey & Carroll (877-750-1878;dempseyandcarroll.com), which, to my way of thinking, are about as chic as it gets.
8. LaCaravelle’s Cuvée Niña, Rosé, Blanc de Blancs Champagnes were created by Ritaand André Jammet as a way to carry on the grand tradition of their very grand, eponymousrestaurant. Alas, the restaurant is no longer with us, but, hallelujah, its bubbly good liferemains (212-517-9122; lacaravelle.com).
