Mary McFadden Is Having the Time of Her Life

Mary McFadden looks as if she has just stepped out of the ‘60s. Her jet black hair is severely bobbed and center-parted. Her skin is stark white. Her lips are lightly glossed with a pale shade of orange. She is wearing an ornate silk miniskirt and matching bolero and her tiny legs are encased in opaque black hose.

The petite, 51-year-old designer of everything from ball gowns to bath towels has just stepped out of an elevator at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel.

McFadden, two-time winner of the prestigious Coty Award for fashion excellence, is in Los Angeles to deliver a lecture to the Costume Council of the L. A. County Museum of Art. But she is perfectly willing to discuss another topic: her recently ended, seven-month marriage to Kohle Yohannan, a Columbia University student 29 years her junior.

“Basically, it’s the story of an older lady married to a younger man,” says McFadden in her clipped cadence. “I feel there’s nothing wrong with that. In this case, mine failed.

“Fifteen to 20 years ago (she calls that “ancient times”), women were told they should look 40 or 60 and behave as such. Now we have women who are movie stars who have to perpetually look young. So it’s a whole different ball game.

“I do think it’s important to dress young. And I have a short skirt on today. Now, If I had lousy legs, I wouldn’t wear short skirts.” And she has no intention of settling down with a man anywhere near her age or older: “I can’t imagine being with someone who is Santa Claus.”

She keeps her attitude positive (“Age is not important; it’s the ideas that are important”) and her body girlish with a daily hour of tennis followed by an hour of aerobics, running or free weights.

“Right now, I’m having a really good time. It’s an extraordinary period in my life,” McFadden enthuses. She has a number of new business projects, including the Studio Collection, a line of silk dresses and separates priced at $700 to $1,000, “one step below Mary McFadden Couture.” It will reach such stores as Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus in August.

In the meantime, she is off to India to design the costumes and sets for “Zoonie, The Last Chak Empress of Kashmir,” a feature film that she promises will look like Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Last Emperor.”