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FICKLE FASHION: If Tara Subkoff is so bitter about the fashion industry, why is she still working in it? That's what audience members were wondering at The New Yorker Festival's "Generation X Fashion" panel on Saturday, when Subkoff took swipes at nearly every aspect of the fashion business, including her fellow panelists, the designers Behnaz Sarafpour and Alice Roi. The first words out of her mouth were to correct the panel's moderator, Judith Thurman, a staff writer for The New Yorker, for her pronunciation of Subkoff's surname. The Imitation of Christ designer went on to chide:
- "American Vogue dominates. It's politics. [Success depends] on how much you advertise in publications."
- "[Vogue editor in chief] Anna Wintour only supports young, gay men." In response, Thurman said to Sarafpour, "[Wintour] supported you, didn't she?" Sarafpour: "Yes." Subkoff: "Maybe Behnaz's approach is more masculine."
- After an audience member asked if the designers would advise their own children to go into the fashion industry, Subkoff said: "I'm not having children. Ever."
- When a model walked out wearing one of Subkoff's creations, a red suede minidress with a hood, Thurman asked her why she chose to show that look for the panel. Subkoff: "I didn't choose this. I think someone from my press office did. This is one of the reasons I fired my press person." Subkoff then said of the outfit: "I think it's really good for a modern-day Muslim." Sarafpour, who emigrated from Iran to the U.S. with her family as a child, didn't respond.
- Subkoff also said she wouldn't have chosen to show that look because it was too racy for the size 16-plus average American woman. The zaftig Roi, who sells plus-size clothes on the home shopping channel QVC, then quipped, "I think this could work in a 22."
- Subkoff said of her early training, "In the Nineties, I was...