Suzy Menkes is grateful for one accessories trend this season.
“You’re talking to someone with a broken toe,” the Paris-based International Herald Tribune fashion editor said. “How disastrous is this? Thank God that this is the season of the square wide toe.”
Her toe, broken en route to a London fashion show, has also granted Menkes one more hot accessory: a silver-topped, ebony wood cane.
Menkes, easily recognized in the front row at shows by her distinctive pompadour, previously demonstrated her accessories obsession with her best-selling 1985 book, “The Royal Jewels,” which exhaustively researched monarchic baubles. She’s also ruffled her share of feathers in the field. When she wrote, perhaps prematurely, that the classic Chanel bag was over, the company bought a full-page ad in her paper to express its displeasure and refute her claims.
“I think that Coco is having the last laugh,” Menkes said.
Recognized as knowledgeable, eloquent and prolific, Menkes is probably the only fashion journalist to have been named both an officer of the Order of the British Empire and a chevalier of the Legion of Honor in France.
“Of all the accessories that I have worn, is there anything more chic than a little tiny red ribbon that you get with the Légion d’honneur?” she asked.
But not everyone is intimidated. Kate Moss once told The New Yorker that Menkes was “like a slightly mad auntie…when you see her backstage, you can always just have a nice chat about shoes with her.”
Their camaraderie was shown off at a masked ball this week, when Moss and fiancé Pete Doherty grabbed Menkes to join them in karaoke, singing songs by The Beatles and The Carpenters.
“So maybe a microphone is the new accessory,” Menkes said.