Soar, Little Bird

I return to the theme of watching my now adult children flying on their own, triggered to write by the crazy success my daughter is currently experiencing.
In case you have not heard me shouting from the rooftops, my daughter, Zana Bayne , is getting a great deal of attention for her leather designs currently being worn (again and again!) by Lady Gaga and her dancers - on tour, on television, in the New York Times, and now on Gaga's latest video released this week!

With her success, I am asked repeatedly how she did it and how I did it, and the answers are pretty simple. She, Zana, did it by working her tail off, by having an idea and pursuing it, by treating her ideas and her work and her career as if they were important and persisting in being herself unabashedly. (This is, after all, the same person who at age 8 put a yellow post-it on our home mirror saying "be yourself".)

What did I do as a parent? I gave her the room to be herself, encouraged her creativity, answered her questions when asked, gave her a role model of a working woman confident in her own roles as professional and mom. I never pushed her toward a particular calling, but watched and nurtured what she wanted.

I believe strongly that our job as parents is to not screw up our precious little progeny. Watching Zana soar right now only strengthens that belief. The world of leather and Gaga is foreign to me; it is Zana's world, not mine, with styles I can admire without them being mine, representatives of a younger generation and our future.

Millennials and Boomers: Parallel Lives

One of the topics at this week's TEDxSF conference was the Millennials and their effect on contemporary society. This population, made up of the children of Boomers, is forging such a new path through our world, and I think many Boomers have a mixture of Millennial-envy and a funny kind of identity with them. I know I do.

I found myself thinking about this as I recalled the uncannily parallel paths my daughter and I are on, though I am well aware that she will shortly overtake me and go on to much greater heights in her career. I trained as a fashion designer 35 years ago; she is a rising fashion star at age 22. Just this past week, she and I were both at our respective photoshoots, she shooting images of the Fall 2011 collection of her eponymous Zana Bayne line of edgy contemporary leather accessories, me shooting images of artful clothing for a more mature audience, for my contemporaries. Parallel lives, similar paths, you might say. In fact, Zana used to describe us as “Apple and Tree”.

But the reality is that how she is doing what she is doing is so wonderfully Millennial. Here is a business which was born through a blog (garbagedress.com), born through the magic of social media and Zana’s creating a personal style, a following, an international network of interested parties who converted to customers once she launched e-commerce. No backers, no advertising, no hype, just the power of a smart talented entrepreneurial young woman using the tools of her time to create zanabayneleather.com and landing with her work on Lady Gaga’s dancers just a few weeks ago.

My business at artfulhome.com is far more traditional. While it is an online business born in the first bubble with an interesting non-traditional model, it is fueled by more traditional direct marketing techniques and vendor relationships. The clothing part of the business is reaching out to boomer women with styles that celebrate all that a mature woman is: gutsy, unique, experienced, but maybe a little thicker around the middle than she once was. And it is hitting a chord with my contemporaries as much as Zana’s business is with hers.


I often think that were I to start a business today I might do it quite differently, but I suspect that is better done by Zana and her generation. Her generation makes up the consumer group that responds so differently from my peers, and therefore will continue to explore and change, and I, Boomer that I am, must admit that it is her time.

Should I Be Wearing These? (Reprise)

A few things happened today which returned me to musing about style and aging. In the Sunday New York Times, two very different style icons, Dominique Browning and Keith Richards, commented on their unique personal styles and the issue of age- appropriateness. And, in addition, I whipped out my swashbuckler boots, only to wonder whether I might be too old for them.

Browning dealt with the issue of long hair and older women. We all know those television commercials showing sexy desirable women with long, swinging, shiny hair, the kind that is promised to us if only we use the right products. Yet, the target audience with the most disposable income for self pampering, “mature” 50+ women, is told(as Browning noted) that it is inappropriate to hang on to this symbol of desirability, that it is inappropriate for successful or established or – let’s just face it – older women to flaunt their tresses. Is it the association of sexuality with long hair that is supposed to be quashed or the association of witches with long grey tresses which is to be avoided? Either way, I don’t get the taboo, and wholeheartedly support Browning in her determination not to go the “sensible” route (even though I, personally, can never achieve that long swinging hair, given my birth gift of a mop of curls).

And as for my boots? They are a few years old, radical when I purchased them, and interestingly are very much in style this fall. With the advent of the first fall rain, I pulled them out for a jaunt around San Francisco, wondering if now that young women were wearing similar styles, might I be perceived as too old for these? It’s a curious thing about fashion, how once a style is adopted by the young it appears to be young. And what are we “mature” women of style to do? Ignore the trend? Move on? Or embrace the notion that as long as we are comfortable with ourselves, we can and should wear what we choose? That flaunting style and sexuality is actually OK for a woman over 50?

I would like to believe that in some small way I am giving other women who see me the courage to dress as they want, not as they think they have to. The number of “great boots” and “where did you get them?”comments from women young and old which I received today certainly let me know both my boots and I were noticed and admired. I don’t expect to be the fashion icon my 22 year old daughter is; frankly, I am no longer that interested in fashion. But I also do not expect to be banished to some preordained style for the mature, a dry, uninteresting , and unnoticed place.

Leather Girls

When I was a teenager, one of the most emblematic clothing symbols of my burgeoning generation was sandals, leather sandals handmade by an artist from Greenwich Village. Think Fred Braun, think water buffalo sandals. Compared to the uptight Mad Men-like accessories that my parents wore, hand-made and hand-tooled leather offered a possibility of a brave new world.

So imagine my delight this week when I got to introduce two different generations of handmade leather artists. In this case, those two artists included my daughter, Zana Bayne, creator of high-fashion, slightly kinky leather accessories and Jutta Neuman, designer of marvelously sensual and colorful handbags. I needed to visit Jutta's studio in NYC, and the opportunity presented itself to bring Zana along.

Jutta's story is fascinating. She left a successful career as a social worker in order to pursue a far more financially challenging career as a fashion designer and, ultimately, leather designer. Jutta carries out her craft in her studio now as she had for the past several decades, sometimes with assistants, sometimes alone, spinning out elegantly simple pieces in the juiciest of colors. Her commitment to handmade creates financial challenges, but satisfies Jutta's desire for connection and creativity. She has shunned all offers to go mass.




Zana is at the beginning of her career. Through her creative vision and online marketing savvy, at age 22 she is crafting a very different business of her own of handmade leather goods. Like Jutta, she is committed to making everything herself by hand in spite of leading a digital life. While her designs are extreme and fashion-forward, the connection to handmade is equally important to her thousands of customers who follow her designs and lifestyle through her blog.

It is the connection to handmade, whether to flower-child boomers or digital millenials which fascinates me. Maker, designer, artist: who cares what the job title is? The urge to create and use our hands to do so is one of those driving forces of being human, knowing neither generational nor national boundaries.

My Own Private Classic

I love it when events come together to make a punctuation point in life as happened earlier this week.

Years ago, 11 years to be precise, I saw a photo in Vogue of this outfit, a photo pretty similar to this runway shot, and immediately identified with the look. Head to toe, jacket to boots, this look by Ann Demeulemeester seemed to be absolutely me. It was as if Cupid had touched me with his arrow, and I rapidly went on a hunt to see about purchasing the leather jacket. Since the magazine indicated Barneys would carry the jacket, I called, only to learn that the buyer had actually purchased a different item, and my perfect jacket was not to be had.

Having moved on from this quest, a few months later on a business trip in Europe , what should appear before my eyes in London but none other than "my" jacket, waiting for me in the most expensive foreign currency possible. After hesitating for about a half second, I bought the jacket on the spot, my first ever 4-figure apparel purchase. I've worn the jacket ever since, retiring it briefly for a few seasons and then resurrecting it and loving it just as much today as 11 years ago.

When my 21 year old uber fashion-forward daughter came to town this week, she hit a week of San Francisco summer, otherwise known as 50 degree foggy weather. Her response? My Ann D jacket, of course, wearing it her own way, making it her own as much as I continue to do.

This all occurred the same week as the New York Times published an article about putting yourself on a shopping diet, limiting your wardrobe to just 6 pieces for one month. While I find 6 pieces to be extreme, I can pare mine to an indispensable core of 10 which can pretty much take me anywhere, anytime for a month or two. Clearly, Ann D is among those 10, my version of a classic, marrying function and self-expression in one. That this jacket speaks equally well to a 21 year old woman as to a 57 year old one makes me smile and strengthens its case as a classic. A case of 50/50, as a matter of fact.

That Mother-Daughter Connection

My daughter and I met together for the first time in too many months yesterday for a 5-day visit at our hometown of San Francisco. She no longer lives here, and I am here only part-time, so it is interesting to meet up, call this home, and yet establish a new version of home at this exciting and changing time in both of our lives.

I am fortunate to have a very close relationship with Susannah (Zana to most, Sus to me) and this has been the case for all of her life. Now that we are both independent adults, the nuances to this close relationship continue to evolve, built on the strength we have established over the past 21 years. A wise friend once advised that I develop a relationship of trust with my kids long before they hit the teenage years, as that foundation needed to be in place before the rockiness of adolescence shook things up. That was one of the most valuable pieces of childrearing advice I ever received, and I believe it is such an important component of the relationship that Susannah and I have today.

I never had the chance to know my own mother once I reached adulthood, and I doubt that even if I had we would have ever achieved a relationship like Susannah and I have. At the core is honesty and truth, belief in each other and allowing each other to be our true selves with one another, and trust in our bond and our independence. Over the last year when I have leaned on Susannah for support and friendship at a time when she has been establishing her life in NYC, she's been there, wise beyond her years. And over this same year when she has leaned on me for different types of advice and support, I've been able to be there for her, too.

At dinner last night, Susannah's best friend told me that I was her role model, that if she ever had kids she would want to take lessons from me in hope of ending up with a child like mine. I say, take lessons from both of us. It goes both ways!

A Spectator to Her Life

I must admit it: I have raised a full-blown fashionista. At 21, my daughter, Zana Bayne http://zanabayne.com/collection/ is at the beginning of her career in the world of fashion, and it is an absolute trip and pleasure to be a spectator to her life.

From the time she was quite young, Susannah (as I still call her) had a distinct sense of style, one which would often make me shudder and joke that she had to promise never to tell anyone that her mommy worked in fashion. Yet this young child could walk into a store and instantly point out the poor color choices, the bad design, and offer up ways to improve styles. When I used to bring her in to work with me, people would at first begrudgingly let the boss' daughter hang out, and rapidly figure out that she could be quite an asset in the design room or with catalog spreads, asking for her to return to help out as frequently as possible.

I never wanted Susannah to enter the same business as I, as she had such strong artistic talent and was so smart that I wanted her to soar higher than I ever had or could. And yet, she is a natural in the business. With her eponymous accessories business, her blog http://garbagedress.com, her day-job, and her extraordinary networking skills, this young woman is blazing a path on her own. Now that her designs are being used in international magazines and her profile has been written up in numerous fashion blogs, I am beginning to get used to being referred to as "Zana's mom" - a label I wear proudly.