She really doesn’t wake up looking this good.Photo: Patrick McMullan
In honor of its Style Issue, the latest New Yorker has a big profile of Donatella Versace — and we couldn’t be more thrilled. We’ve been in love with D.V. ever since she was busted for cocaine and someone described the amount of coke in her fridge as resembling “blocks of Feta cheese.” That’s moxie, you know? And like everyone else, what we really love about Donatella is her heavily crafted Look. Forgive us for being blunt, but Donatella is not naturally attractive. If she had been born in, say, Ireland circa 1845, and spent her life eating potatoes on a farm, with no access to collagen or tanning beds, it’s safe to say she’d be less than fetching. But through modern technology, discipline, and piles of money, she has bronzed and blonded herself into one big piece of plasticine fabulousness. And you can too! After the jump, we present you with Donatella’s Guide to Style, as culled from the gems found in the aforementioned New Yorker profile and, just for good measure, New York’s own profile of Donatella from last year. Rest assured, Tim Gunn’s got nothing on this lady.
1. According to the New Yorker, to keep active, Donatella jogs on a treadmill and lifts free weights. “But very, very low, because If I do too much my muscles get bigger,” Donatella tells Lauren Collins. And it works! “Donatella’s own ass absolutely does not move,” wrote Ariel Levy in New York last year. “It is [as] taut as a water balloon.
2. Dress to play down your flaws. “Donatella thinks her legs are short, so she wears towering Lucite heels and bold, monochromatic ensembles,” Collins observes in The New Yorker.
3. For statement hair, nothing beats regular old hairspray, and lots of it. According to Collins, Donatella’s hairstylist, Dean “spritzed her head for four seconds with a large can of hair spray.”
4. Never be seen without lip gloss, and apply your lacquer with great care. “Donatella reapplied her lip gloss, squeezing the pink goo with the slow concentration of a baker icing a cake,” writes Collins.
5. Don’t underestimate the importance of a good moisturizer. According to The New Yorker, Donatella once reacted to a Los Angeles earthquake by screaming, “My creams! My creams!”
6. Diamonds are a girl’s best friend, but never the fake kind. “I’m allergic” to fake jewelry, Donatella tells The New Yorker. “I get a rash all over my body.”
7. Don’t limit your accessorizing to jewelry. As Levy noted in New York, “platform shoes, a pink pedicure, a skintight side-zipped orange top, and false eyelashes” can all give an outfit an extra something.
8. Also, customize everything. Collins reports that Donatella’s staff is instructed to cover the “Smoking Kills” warning on her Marlboro Reds with a monogrammed label; according to Levy, she also possesses a “Zippo encrusted in black crystals and the golden Versace–Medusa-head insignia.”
9. Be confusing and confounding, say one thing but do another, hate your Bedazzler yet refuse to give it up. For example: “I’m over glitz,” The D tells The New Yorker.
10. And always take time out to relax. “Donatella, no matter what time she gets home, has an evening soak,” reports Collins.
Mondo Donatella [NYer (not online)]
Summer for the Sun Queen [NYM]
