SOCIAL CLIMES : Announcing a One-of-a-Kind Trend
This is the era of the creative wedding/baby/engagement announcement. While purists will go the plain engraved route every time, that just doesn’t have enough elan for some people who figure family and friends will be judging them on creativity, style and uniqueness. So they indulge in one-of-a-kind designs.
We give straight 9.9s to New York hotelier Ian Schrager and wife Rita, who gave birth in April to 6-pound, 5-ounce Sophia Blanche. Their announcement was done as a full-size blueprint with the couple listed as architects. A “General View” drawing shows that little Sophia has Dad’s feet and Mom’s looks (“hopefully”). Under “Specifications” are listed: “Color: Pink w/brown fringe on top” and “Fabrication time: 8 months, 29 days.”
It’s not surprising that Papa Schrager would choose this format: He’s no stranger to the blueprint, having built three New York hotels--the Paramount, the Royalton and the Morgans.
A resounding silence: We’re also always checking out the window of the Noteworthy stationery store in the Beverly Center to see what innovative invitations and announcements they’re coming up with. Lately we’ve noticed the store has been featuring invitations to same-sex weddings as examples of their myriad design styles. These differ little from other wedding invitations; some say “the union of” or “commitment ceremony” rather than marriage or wedding.
How has the response been?
“We really haven’t gotten any positive or negative reaction, it’s just kind of there,” manager Jeff Krueger said. “We try to show all different kinds of invitations to promote our printing because people don’t realize what we can do. But people don’t say anything about the (same sex invitations) really.”
We take that as a good sign.
I’m soooo embarrassed: Gals--are you still reeling from some horrible, humiliating experience that’s made you feel you want to crawl into a deep hole for the next 30 years? Take heart--we have something that’s sure to perk you right up. Grab any issue of YM magazine (it stands for Young & Modern and is geared toward teens, but don’t worry about that) and turn to the “Say Anything” page. It’s a monthly feature that recounts readers’ most humiliating experiences.
We wish we could tell you the best ones, but they’re a little too outre for this column. But we loved the one in a recent issue from a girl who wrote about her first day of gym at a new school. After showering, she asked another girl where the towels were and was pointed toward a door. She opened it, the door shut and locked behind her, and she found herself buck naked in the boys’ locker room.
That puts everything in perspective, doesn’t it?
