FASHION Magazine

See pics from the Toronto premiere of If I Loved You »

If you were anywhere near the Sony Centre on Saturday night, you’d have witnessed the collective swoon from virtually every guy, gal and gay in the vicinity. As one of the final events during the Luminato Festival, “If I Loved You” welcomed a troupe of babely troubadours to the city including David Byrne, Boy George, Josh Groban, Brent Carver, Steven Page, Brennan Hall and Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig for a one-night-only performance of Broadway duets sung exclusively by men. Orchestrated by resident showman (and husband of Luminato creative director Jörn Weisbrodt) Rufus Wainwright alongside musical director Steven Oremus, the show brought songs from classics like Guys and Dolls, Porgy and Bess and West Side Story to the stage with as many modern day flourishes as were, really, there hidden all along. Case in point: a kiss between Wainwright and Koenig at the end of “We Kiss in a Shadow,” a mid-performance birthday cake for Boy George (the icon turned 53 that day) and a sing-along finale featuring Grease’s “Summer Nights.”

See the photos from Luminato 2014 Opening Gala »

A festival is never complete without an impressive party to kick it off, and last night’s Luminato art festival opening party was nothing but. Toronto’s elite, bloggers and artsy attendees joined co-chairs Rupert Duchesne, Joseph Mimran and Kimberley Newport-Mimran to mark the launch of the 10-day art festival with creative director Jörn Weisbrodt and hubby Rufus Wainwright at the helm of the festivities. Besides drawing Canadian notables like Toronto mayoral candidate Olivia Chow and celebrated stage director Atom Egoyan, Isabella Rossellini was there to promote her upcoming on-stage debut, Green Porno. In tune with the night’s theme, Berlin Underground, the opening party was held in the outskirts of downtown Toronto (Toronto Port Lands to be exact) at the Hearn Generating Station where the abandoned industrial space was transformed into a one-of-a-kind venue for a 450-deep dinner and party. Complete with leather-clad dancers/artists lounging in corners, 1930s German propaganda on projected screens and neon lights bouncing off the exposed industrial interior, the party could not have taken place in a more suitable location. Well-dressed guests (ranging from black-tie attire to jumpsuits and much-coveted crop tops) had the chance to not only get their makeup retouched by on-site YSL makeup artists in super glam vanity stations. From a hopping DJ and buzzy dance floor to a flipbook station and 3D printers, it’s safe to say that last night was nothing short of extraordinary.

See the Centre Stage gala photos »

Last Tuesday night, the Canadian Opera Company held its first annual Centre Stage gala at the Four Seasons Centre in Toronto. The event focused around the company’s Ensemble Studio, a training program for emerging opera talents. Part benefit, part performance audition, Centre Stage pit nine hopefuls against one another in the battle for entry into the ensemble as well as a few hella generous cash prizes. And because no singing competition can do without some showmanship, Rufus Wainwright lent his skills, playing the host role for the night in a sparkling Moschino suit. He even surprised the crowd by performing a few of this favourite songs including “Les feux d’artifice t’appellent” from his opera Prima Donna.

After each finalist performed a piece from the likes of Verdi, Bizet and Mozart, soprano Karine Boucher was crowned winner of the judges’ award as well as the night’s audience award. She won the fashion award too, in a floor-length gown covered in gold sequins and featuring a diva apropos plunging neckline. Tenor Jean-Philippe Fortier-Lazure and bass-baritone Iain MacNeil place second and third respectively.

See Luminato opening party photos »

On Friday night, Toronto’s arts elite flooded the sprawling canopied lobby of Brookfield Place for the opening of the Luminato arts festival. The event was activity-stacked, with Yves Saint Laurent handing out engraved Touche Eclat pens and branded cigars and a gigantic claw arcade machine in the centre of the room. The machine, entitled Stockpile, is actually one big performance art piece, with the part of the claw being acted out by nine different artists and the curious items in the cage being donated by the community. Naturally.

Fresh off the debut performance of The Life and Death of Marina Abramovic, Marina Abramović and Willem Dafoe joined in on the festivities alongside Luminato creative director Jörn Weisbrodt and husband Rufus Wainwright, who wore a custom made Jean-Charles de Castelbajac cloud-print suit. Elsewhere, Knot PR’s Amy Burtsyn-Fritz was making her own festive statement in a shimmering 3.1 Phillip Lim cocktail dress alongside freshly minted husband, Graham Smith.

See Big Bang Bash Viktor & Rolf Dolls Luminato photos »

Last Saturday night, the arty A-list gathered to celebrate the opening of the Viktor & Rolf Dolls exhibit at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. As the pre-emptive kick-off to the Luminato arts festival, which officially begins today, patrons, planners and performers came out en masse including the formidable foreign trio of Marina Abramović, Willem Dafoe and creative director Jörn Weisbrodt. To match the quirky aesthetic of the night’s satellite guests of honour (the designers were unable to repeat their May visit to Toronto), the ROM’s crystal lobby was tricked out with curiously interactive decorations like a sky-high mannequin whose dress gave out jewellery when guests placed their hands inside, a conveyor belt of treats and a literal piano bar which thrilled with its makeshift Prohibition vibe. Everything about the event seemed as if part of a surreal dream, which culminated in the fabulously fringed navy coat belonging to a one Suzanne Boyd catching on fire. With a few ceremonious pats, the fire was extinguished, leaving the glitzy gossipers with something especially titillating to talk about.

See The Room’s Viktor & Rolf party photos »

Viktor & Rolf’s love affair with Toronto began last night with a fittingly springy fête at Toronto’s Hudson’s Bay Queen Street flagship. In town to celebrate their recent collections as well as to do press spots for their upcoming Dolls retrospective exhibit with Luminato this summer, designers Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren sported matching embroidered jeans (Horsting’s featured sunglasses while Snoeren’s featured moustaches) and matching thick rimmed frames, making them the ideal models for Toronto’s new eyewear-specific blog, The Spectacled.

In keeping with the Dutch duo’s eccentricities, The Room was transformed with newly papered walls featuring the Fall 2013 runway room’s eerie black and white floral print, a string quartet playing instrumental takes on pop music and strapping waiters, who passed many a prettily-decorated Perrier-Jouët champagne flute while wearing V&R-esque (and maybe even a little Denis Gagnon) glasses.

Check out all the images from the Gap holiday 2012 campaign »

It isn’t a true holiday season until you’re bundled in cozy knit mittens, toques and layered sweaters. Or at least, that’s what the latest Gap holiday campaign 2012 proves to us. In keeping with the tradition of having A+ holiday ads (remember the year of Love Train?) the American company has taken portraits of celebrities in colourful knitted goods.

The campaign is titled “Love Comes in Every Shade” and aims to show a-typical relationships and the many forms of love ranging from puppy love, best friend love and even regular ole romantic love. From rapper Nas in a puffy vest with his dad showing off fatherly love to Rufus Wainwright in khakis alongside his husband Jörn Weisbrodt being the example of wedded bliss.

View the party photos »

The 6th annual Luminato festival kicked off with major buzz on Friday night, as word spread through the opening night party that Nelly Furtado had joined K’Naan at his free concert at David Pecaut Square.

The swishy event at 25 York St. had its own surprises. Martha Wainwright jumped onstage for a sultry take on “Stormy Weather,” and spin duties were handled by Koala Kid (who must have ended the evening a few pounds lighter after sweltering in his faux fur koala costume). Yves Saint Laurent hosted the party, offering makeup touch-ups, samples of Opium and the new L’Homme Libre fragrances and the opportunity to write messages on an iPad that were then projected on a wall.

It’s not every day that you get to play host to a living, breathing masterpiece! The Canadian Art Foundation was lucky enough to showcase Yugoslavian performance artist Marina Abramovic, who was in Toronto for the Canadian premiere of The Artist is Present at the Reel Artists Film Festival. The new documentary film chronicles her prolific and often painful career and follows the preparation for her 2010 retrospective show at the MoMA—she spent more than 700 hours over the course of three months staring into the eyes of museum visitors. Beyond her lifelong love affair with performance art, Abramovic is a designer devotee (having discovered fashion after a particularly nasty breakup); in the film, she’s shown shopping at Givenchy with none other than Riccardo Tisci. It’s no surprise then that the 65-year-old wore head-to-toe Costume National to the premiere, or that she counts Fashion Television’s Jeanne Beker as a fan. At the a swank soiree, held at the TIFF Bell Lightbox and bookended by not one but two cocktail parties, we spotted a smattering of guests from Canada’s creative set including Luminato’s Jörn Weisbrodt (who also made an appearance in the film), the Beckerman clan, and gallery owner Daniel Faria.

View the photo gallery »

There’s some new blood in the building! And by that, we mean our building. Our office neighbours over at Luminato announced this morning the welcoming of a new creative director: Jorn Weisbrodt. Why is this especially exciting? Having worked with The Watermill Center, La Scala di Milano, the Spoleto Festival, the Barbican Centre in London, the Bolshoi Theatre (!!!), the Lincoln Centre Festival, and the Manchester International Festival, the German-born and currently New York–based director brings lots of new blood to the festival. Why is this even more exciting? Well, selfishly speaking, we (as in I) are huge fans (we/I mean huge!) of Weisbrodt’s husband, Rufus Wainwright. The two became involved with Luminato after Wainwright’s opera, Prima Donna, made its North American debut during last year’s festival. As a career stalker of the Ruf (ah yes, I was a card carrying fan club member of his internet fan group during high school, once waited in the cold for him to sign my purse… really), having him almost next door means our love affair might just continue… whether he likes it or not!