Friday, August 28, 2015

TZAIMS LUKSUS & YVES SAINT LAURENT - TZ.L & YSL

Tzaims Luksus TZL Logo created (1963) 
inspired Yves Saint Laurent to create his own Y.S.L  Logo (c.1966)
similarly but slanted it.

I met Yves Saint Laurent at Le Coq D'Or in Paris during the summer of 1968.  He would have been about 32 and I would have been 36 years old.  We both were in the limelight of International Fashion and I had just shown my own couture collection in Paris that same February and had returned to Paris to work on silk prints at Bianchini-Ferier who had a location both in Paris and Lyon, France.  Although we didn't discuss my fabrics over dinner at Le Coq d'Or some of them were selected by him the next season.  Summer was his Autumn collection which he was showing the next day so what I was working on would be available for his Spring collection.
TZ.L ET Y.S.L
 I had followed his career when he first emerged at the House of Dior and read about him in the news when he left that fashion house to go into the French Army.  Later he emerged under his own name as Y.S.L.  I never planned to go into the fashion profession but at that time felt being a couturier was as enigmatic a profession as one could take up.  It was my success, first as a fabric artist and then as a couturier, that brought us together.  He began at Dior in 1952 when I was entering the U.S.Navy and left Dior in 1958 but didn't open his own couture house in Paris until 1962 the same year I became fashion news in NYC and then in 1965 I won the Coty and Neiman Marcus Awards.  There is a lot to consider in what Yves says in his documentary films made after his death from footage taken over the years.  (Teboul's: Yves Saint Laurent. His Life & Times and also Teboul's: Yves Saint Laurent. 5 Avenue Marceau, 75116, Paris) 

Much of what Yves says is egocentric and therefore his own opinion concerning other fashion designers, couturiers and fashion in general and although he felt he was the last couturier with his own style as Balenciaga and Chanel developed Yves style was not so well defined as he may have thought and much of what is said about his influence is exaggerated.  He was certainly pampered and well celebrated in his life by the French Government and the French Couture and perfume Syndicate.  His most notable statement in his early interviews is that America has no fashion sense and no great couturiers or fashion designers but that is generally a French attitude not taken seriously by most of the world and during the 1960s New York and California fashion designers were the head of fashion in the world and Yves was copying American clothes and life style as a hippy/beatnik as fast as he could to keep up with us.  

Yves collections were at most very eclectic and mixed in style to suit a large number, 200 models each season, of interests, store buyers, press and clients.  We all got excited when Fashion Week came along in Paris but looking behind the scenes at the atelier of Yves Saint Laurent it doesn't look any different then my own in New York and Paris.  I don't think Yves ever actually defined his style to one cut as did Chanel but this was to his advantage since Chanel is so dated even to this day under the knife of Karl Lagerfeld.  

Yves at least was more creative and versatile then Chanel.  A couturier has to be flexible in order to suit the people he is designing for and a couturier cannot afford to do one style and satisfy his clientele.  There is much that could be discussed concerning his comments which at times are contradictory with some information confusing and not very accurate.  One finds out that there isn't any real mystery in designing or constructing clothes. The real mystery is in the fabric designs and how the fabric dominates the design of the clothes.  That comes full front in Yves' documentary film.  It is a fine in depth look into his life and work.  


Tuesday, June 10, 2014

TZAIMS LUKSUS & INTERNATIONAL BEL CANTO OPERA SOCIETY

ROBIN J. NEWTON
CONDUCTOR
&
ARTISTIC DIRECTOR
International Bel Canto Opera Society
The latest news in opera is the creation of the International Bel Canto Opera Society with Robin Newton conducting the Bel Canto Opera Orchestra ...dates and locations of performances to be announced.

MERCADANTE: 
ORAZI E CURIAZI
First Premier: Teatro San Carlo, Naples - 10 November1846 

HISTORY OF THE OPERA
For a history of the opera go to Wikipedia of Mercadante, Orazi e Curiazi, The Oath of the Horatii, Horatii and Alba Longa on the Internet
Principal Cast
Principal Bel Canto opera singers will be selected from the best worldwide by Robin Newton

Those selected for consideration are:
Camilla: 
Sister of Orazio and betrothed to Curiazio
Orazio: 
 Brother in law to Curizio
Curiazio:
Brother in law to Orazio
Vecchio Orazii, 
Father of the Orazii:
Sabina 
Sister of Curiazio and wife of Orazio
and 
Il Gran Sacerdote:
High Priest of the Temple of Venus

Robin Newton and the Bel Canto Opera Orchestra
Robin Newton, a renowned conductor from the UK who has conducted many opera orchestras in the UK including the Garsington Festival Opera and many recordings for Opera Rara in London and received two Ricordi Awards for opera conducting has accepted becoming the conductor and artistic director of the International Bel Canto Opera Society and conductor of the Palm Beach Bel Canto Orchestra.  

Auditions for Chorus 
A cast of approximately 125 members will be selected through auditions for the a chorus which includes 60 for the citizens, senators, temple maidens (women's chorus) a children's chorus and 50 soldiers for the Roman and Alban Armies (men's chorus), with an additional 45 extras including several children for the production which promises to be one of the largest casts ever seen on the opera stage in one single production in Palm Beach.

Tickets
Advance Ticket sales will be announced and may be purchased on-line from the
International Bel Canto Opera.

Patrons and Members 
A membership drive with information for contributions and financial support will soon be published and sent world wide.
Contact 
Email: tzaimsluksusfrsa@earthlink.net

Tzaims Luksus, FRSA
 International Bel Canto Opera Society

Costumes and Sets
Tzaims Luksus, FRSA is organizing and developing the entire production with staff and crews from the UK and the US and designing sets and costumes fitting for the period of the opera set in 668 b.c 7th Century b.c. Rome and Alba Longa during the invasion of the Etruscans.

Planned for the future:

Giovanni Pacini:
L'Ultimo Giorno di Pompeii
The Last Day of Pompeii
First Premier: Teatro San Carlo, 19 November 1825
First Premier in the Americas:  2017
For a history of the opera go on-line to Wiwpedia of Giovanni Pacini and L'Ultimo Giorno di Pompeii.

Thursday, March 27, 2014

TZAIMS LUKSUS, FRSA & INTERNATIONAL BEL CANTO OPERA SOCIETY

Saverio Mercadante 
ORAZI E CURIAZI
Lyric Tragedy in Three Acts by:
Salvadore Cammarano
After a life long following of opera I have seen and heard perhaps everything being offered on the opera stage, recorded on videos and discs, and this led me to wonder: What about the operas that have fallen between the cracks.  Certainly there are missing links between Purcell and Mozart and especially between Rossini and Verdi.  We know all too much about Verdi and the same goes for Bellini and Donizetti.  Then bang..we get to now what are 'old war horse operas' like La Boheme, La Traviata, The Barber of Seville and of course Don Giovanni.  So where does Saverio Mercadante come in and where does Giovanni Pacini fit into the picture?  What about Agostino Steffani?  OK. Steffani fits in before Mozart since Steffani died in 1728 and Mozart was only born in 1756.  Why are Mozart's opera scores so like Staffani?  HUM...to find out then go hear Steffani's: TASSILONE.  Well that is for later.  
ROSSINI -MERCADANTE-PACINI-DONIZETTI-BELLINI
Let us wonder about Rossini: 1792-1867, Mercadante: 1795-1867, Pacini: 1795-1870, and then Verdi: 1813-1901.  (we will look over Donizetti: 1797-1848 and Bellini: 1801-1835 since they also come in as part of the 'big guns of opera in Italy' in or near the same time but Verdi is just a youngster with his ears filled with these great opera masters.  Historians tell us how Verdi got his initial influences and in all kinds of professions there comes the 'politic'.  There isn't any doubt that Mercadante and Pacini are the real "big guns of opera" between Rossini and Verdi.  Rossini made a comment about both of them.  He praised Mercadante highly without being concerned since Mercadante, although influenced by Rossini did not copy him, but found a method fitting in what was demanded of the audience at the time with Belle Canto (with a lot of Colouratura) and finally Mercadante's last great work: ORAZI E CURIAZI summed up the whole period that one might say ended with Mercadante and the new period of opera that began with Verdi.  It is a know fact that Verdi borrowed a tremendous amount from Mercadante rather than from Rossini (one can hear the elements of Verdi in Mercadante's operas) and together with his publisher Ricordi, Verdi formed a pact to prevent Mercadante's operas to be performed...(it happens that very successful composers do not want the public to know or remember where they got their initial ideas) they did the same to Pacini whose great work: L'ULTIMO GIORNO DI POMPEII - THE LAST DAY OF POMPEII still remains Pacini's great masterpiece.  
OATH OF THE HORATII
Painted by Jacques-Louis David
The picture above of ORAZI E CURIAZI is probably familiar since it is the famous painting by Jacques-Louis-David called: OATH OF THE HORATII and the plot is taken from Livy's: History of Rome.  Go to your New Penguin Opera Guide and OPERA RARA as well as the Wikipedia site for Saverio Mercadante.  I guarantee that you will not only be surprised but thrilled to know about this opera composer and his masterpiece ORAZI E CURIAZI.  Certainly to be added as a main billing with a new world premier at the Palm beach Opera now becoming the foremost opera company in America.
FIRST PRODUCTION IN THE AMERICAS

This opera has never been performed in the Americas and the last time only produced in concert form at the Queen's Theatre in London by Opera Rara in 1975 that made a 3 CD recording of it now out of print.  Now with opera enthusiasts, such as myself, who are not that interested in new operas especially if atonal or too much like the lives we live as much as we are interested in discovering lost operas  left in the cracks of time to be performed so hopefully but as it turns out this new production of ORAZI E CURIAZI is ready to fly. 

ORAZI E CURIAZI.  
Cast:
Tenor for the role of Curiazio;
 Baritone for the role of Orazio;
 Colouratura Soprano for the role of Camilla 
 Mezzo Soprano for the role of Sabina.
 Tenor for the role of Il Gran Sacerdote

Brothers of Orazio and Curiazio, Family of Orazi,
an Alban Messenger, Priests, Roman soldiers, Senators, Alban soldiers,
Alban and Roman Citizens
Members of the Chorus.

This opera takes a large cast with two armies: that of Rome and Alban, a Council of Senators, citizens of both Alban and Rome. 
ROME 
7th Century BC
Circa. 650 BC
 The action takes place in 7 BC Rome before Rome becomes the dominant ruler of Italy during the Tuscan period.  Everything one looks for in Opera is in this work, great drama, romance, competition between powerful rulers, emotional distress, love and war...a great human drama with thrilling scenes and bombastic music fused with tender emotionally charged affection since two families are pitted against one another in the most terrible way.  The Orazi brothers, three, and the Curiazi brothers, three, are chosen to fight to the death.  Not only are the best of friends but are related in marriage through Orazio married to Sabina, sister of Curiazio of the Curiazi family.  Curiazio is to be united in marriage to Orazio's younger sister Camilla, but to end the war between Rome and Alban these six brothers are chosen by the council of Senators to fight to the death.  The last to stand will determine which rules: Alban or Rome.  
CONTRIBUTE TO THE FUNDING FOR MERCADANTE's: ORAZI E CURIAZI

MERCADANTE's: ORAZI E CURIAZI


Final scene with Orazio.  Camilla being held by Sabina
 MERCADANTE's
ORAZI E CURIAZI
SETS and COSTUMES
DESIGNED BY:
TZAIMS LUKSUS, FRSA

Monday, August 26, 2013

Tzaims Luksus & Mrs. Frederick (Isabel Nash) Eberstadt


Mrs Frederick -Isabel Nash- Eberstadt

Isabel Eberstadt was the socialite at the top of the NYC Blue Book's 400 and her husband the greatest fashion photographer in NYC who was also at the top of fashion cum society of NYC in the Blue Book.  Here Isabel is wearing my black and white print silk gown (1965) with Milton Green who arranged this advertisement with him and her both incognito but included himself in the photo.  Milton grew up with Marilyn Monroe on his father's estate (Hollywood Producer) in Greenwich, Connecticut.  Isabel Eberstadt had during her life the largest collection of my silk prints and couture clothes in the world.  

Friday, July 5, 2013

TZAIMS LUKSUS & REBEKAH HARKNESS


LUKSUS PARIS COUTURE
HARKNESS HOUSE PRESS SHOWING

If artists, dancers, designers and musicians aren't sponsored by people who have excessive amounts of money to dispose of then who is going to sponsor them.  I did not come from a family with money nor was in any way a member of high society.  I virtually had nothing other than a $700.00 annual GI college fund for four years after I was discharged from the US Navy of which I used only three years of that funding at an art academy and design school.  When I started designing silk for Sarmi in NYC my job as a window dresser at John Wanamaker Department Store in Philadelphia paid me $25.00 a week.  To make the samples for Sarmi that made a sensation and catapulted me into the limelight I had to borrow $60.00 for the base silk.  I made $300.00 from the samples on that loan and paid it back and was able to use the rest for more silk to fill Sarmi's production order.  From that I made $1,500.00 and using that I managed to make $40,000.00 on accounts receivable but found the demand for fabrics from me on Seventh Avenue was forcing me into costs that I didn't have.  I had to borrow more money from friends mostly from Lawrence Vanderbilt-Morris who considered it an investment [and a corporation was created in Philadelphia that too me to Vermont.]  whom I met due to my immediate success in New York and finally find a textile mill to produce the demand and control design secrecy and quality control.  This I did in Bennington, Vermont with John Griffith McCullough but insisting I put in all my $40,000.00 accounts receivable then taking over my operation with further financial support with the promise that when the company broke even with the mill a success I would receive some stock in the corporation.  So initially I was merely an employee of my own company without any stock holdings and then only promised non-par value.  In addition I was made President so it appeared to the outside world that I was in control of the company.  I was in control of all the design and production but not the financing or decision making so I often had to go over the board of director's heads in order to produce orders on schedule.  After three years I was forced out and left with nothing but my international fame both in textile and fashion design.

Having met Rebekah Harkness under very pleasant conditions I felt it reasonable to see if she would finance a couture operation since my upheaval by McCullough happened at the highest moment of my success and just as the mill broke even.  When Rebekah did it was a gift of great significance not only for me but for the textile and fashion industries in America.  The press had already placed me at the top of fashion design along with Norman Norell and James Galanos so the name Tzaims Luksus was one of the top three fashion designers in America.  I did not suppose or even consider that presenting my couture collection in Paris anywhere near the idea of becoming one of the great designers of Paris but at least competent, however, I was already one of the top ten fashion designers in the world and it made sence to present this Harkness collection in Paris.  I was not upset with anything in Paris nor did I make any statements of which city, New York or Paris, was the fashion capital of the world.  It was the fashion press that kept trying to make NYC the art and fashion capital of the world not me.  I didn't make these differentiations.  New York was New York and Paris was Paris and what was happening in one was likely influencing what was happening in the other.  If you look over the names of my staff at Harkness House you might wonder which country they came from, Romania, Israel, Italy, Germany, Turkey, Great Britain, France with me being both Russian and English even Scot and Welsh and could have been working in Paris just as easily as in NYC.  What is America and the United States if not a collection of people from other countries and besides Paris was also a good place for a fashion designer to show at the time since many showing there were exploratory and controversal and designers came from Spain, Italy, England, Greece...well just from everywhere to show in Paris.  Even Pierre Cardin was actually Italian changing his name from Cardini. 
MADAM GENEVIEVE ANTOINE-DARAIUX

So when I packed up to get back to NYC for the press showing at Harkness House I had no regrets or disappointments about Paris.  I felt it was a great success.  This first Paris press showing was not intended to set up selling clothes in Paris [doing dusiness in France takes a long time organizing and getting permits but showing is easy] although anyone could have called Madame Dariaux for an appointment to do so.  I don't know if anything was sold since that wasn't part of my job.  Pirouette Projects, Inc that Rebekah's lawyers set up listed me as LUKSUS COUTURE PROJECT.  How that was to be further developed depended upon further negotiations between my lawyers and Rebekah's lawyers.  I never initiated any discussions with them nor was I pressured to do so. 

I wasn't involved in the private or business life of Rebekah Harkness.  It would never have occurred to me to do so.  I was not part of her inner circle nor invited to any dinner parties at her Westbury Hotel penthouse, nor invitations to Watch Hill, R.I. and I didn't have access to any of the more splendid rooms at Harkness House.  She never lavished gifts, an apartment, car or anything on me.  Just the initial $40,000.00 capitalization in her new Pirouette Projects, Inc that she owned and acted to pay the expenses for a couture collection that I was designing.  My atelier on the fourth floor of Harkness House was simple and practical for a workshop and even the office that I shared with the conductor of the orchestra was modest and not any little Versailles.  There were two desks in that office that matched and may have been valuable antiques but if so then they were just utilitarian and impressed no one.

So why would the fashion press want to destroy this opportunity for me to revive my textile design mill, maybe now in New York or Rhode Island if not be able to regain my mill in Bennington, Vermont and halt my career designing clothes when in fact they had nothing but praise for them up until I partnered with Rebekah Harkness?  She was an American just as I was.  So why did they trash AMERICAN FASHION?  How was what Eugenia Sheppard more important than these two industries that she fed off of for her living?  Eugenia was crazy.  She lost her sense of reality.  She had a seisure, a fit, a tantrum.  Her mind must have been guided by her libido believing that Rebekah and I had something going behind the scenes that she was jealous of and wanted to break up.  Crazy woman that she was.  She self destructed and didn't know it.  Well I knew now that she was a dangerous killer and she finally proved that she couldn't be trusted and I felt it best now to get out of her way.  Rebekah on the other hand I felt could manage Eugenia Sheppard!

So when I signed up with Pierre Godart and TSM, Inc I changed the name to TSM INTERNATIONAL, Inc. and left New York.  I had arranged that I would work in my own studio in my Vermont house and not make any further personal appearances at any fashion designer's press openings in NYC.  My design studio was in my pocket and I could take it any where I chose any time I wanted and also my contract allowed me per dium and all travel and living expenses paid for three months in Europe in addition to my settled annual income.  It was enough to settle a final purchase of my house in Vermont and although it didn't last for many years it kept me from having to go out seeking financial backing again and away from the fashion press.  When I was working on the prints and fabrics in Europe for three months I was able to travel again to India, Nepal, the Himalayas, Korea, Indonesia and Hong Kong.  I kept designing and making clothes but not for the market.

It is a pity that so much depends upon what a few news reporters think and print.  It is also a pity that a designer or artist must depend upon a retail company or financial supporter to get his goods to market so the public can see what is produced rather than have store buyers decide what they want to sell from a collection.  Their buying power is not to be desired and they also depend upon certain designers to advertise lavishly in magazines and newspapers in order to carry that designer's goods.  Having one's own boutique and retail system is also a problem in that locations cost a fortune and operating them is risky so what chance does anyone have especially if American fashion magazines have editros from London and Paris controlling them and newspapers are owned my Australian comglomerates with vindictive motivation against America?  It is no wonder all manufacturing is done in Communist China.

Rebekah Harkness was a God send for me and the American Fashion Critics became the Devil that not only destroyed my association with her but destroyed her and her Ballet Company and all the good she did as well.  Hatred is what the press expressed and not a fair criticism.  There ought to be a law against their expressing these kinds of actions and statements.

PERCIVAL SAVAGE

Sunday, June 30, 2013

TZAIMS LUKSUS - POIROT- REBEKAH HARKNESS - PIROUETTE

TZAIMS LUKSUS
My association with Rebekah Harkness was based on creating a business venture that would make a profit.  It was not part of the Harkness Ballet, Harkness House or the Rebekah Harkness Foundation.  Neither was it part of the William Hale Harkness Foundation.  The fact that my couture atelier and office was on the top floor of Harkness House was merely convenience and an economical move in order to keep costs down so the investment that Rebekah assigned to my project would not be unnecessarily excessive.  I noted below that when I presented myself to her my own interest was in returning to my design career and I based the cost on what I considered the collection would be.  I did not ask, request or suggest that it provide any salary or money coming to me personally but included a small staff, a house model, with provisions for other models to be fitted for the runway showing and materials.  My proposal did include that what ever Rebekah set up would purchase any fabrics that I designed and supplied from my own textile studio which included my prints on silk.  In this way I was earning my expenses through the sale of fabrics to the overall cost of the collection since my own fabrics were necessary for the success of it.

When all this was clearly understood Rebekah instructed her lawyers to create a corporation, separate from any other operation she had existing with the Harkness investments to cover the initial capitalization going for expenses.  Although I requested that I estimated a cost of $25,000.00 Rebekah formed a corporation with a $40,000.00 capitalization and named it PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC.  She held 100% of PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC., however, in some honorary way I was made President and could sign checks for the account against salaries to my staff and the purchase of supplies which included fabrics, trimmings, buttons, accessories et al that was required for a final showing.  I did not have any suggestions at the time for a permanent location in order to create future collections, with the hope that things would continue and her first suggestion was that I be placed on the top floor of Harkness House where, as I described below, she prepared the necessary room for a small atelier.  This was more than sufficient and was not cramped or under pressure in any way.  We were way up and out of the way of any Harkness Ballet or Harkness House events which continued without my intervention or presence.  The time required to create a collection was perfect provided some of the fabrics ordered from France and Italy could be shipped from there and arrive in NYC before Christmas of 1967 with a deadline of December 31, 1967.  As it turned out only one shipment from France was late but it did not in any way make a dent in the final selection for presentation.

My staff was small.  It consisted of 10 of the finest Union Workers in the New York garment industry:   Due to the small nature of my operation, its importance on the face of fashion in the world and guided by Harkness values the Garment Worker's union waved any rules governing those union workers that came to me at Harkness House.  Most had come from my previous location at 550 Seventh Avenue where I had a union shop.  I believe that rebekah's lawyers managed to satisfy the Union as I found listed some funds going to them on a financial report of Pirouette Projects, Inc.

My staff consisted of:  GEORGETTE KARAKASHIAN, my assistant,  PELLEGRINO & ALFONSA FARRUGGIA, tailor and dressmaker; HILDE HOCHLEITNER, dressmaker; RASHENDE KARACAY, dressmaker; LEVI McNAIR, tailor; MARCELLA STRATTA, dressmaker; HERMAN ZEIGER, tailor; OLGA COHEN, dressmaker;  and JEAN ROBILLARD, bookkeeper/accountant.

The cost as presented to me in a Balance Sheet prepared and deliver to me by Jean Robillard came to around $32,000.00 cost for the entire collection which had other expenses added in the way of  invitations, public relations, postage, advertising, telephone and other expenses not intended to be part of the original $25,000.00 cost for the collection.  In addition, after it was settled that the collection would first be presented in Paris, it was arranged to have a suite at the Plaza Hotel in NYC to present a preview to selected individuals who would not be attending the Paris fashion showings and they included a few members of the press including the New York times and the buyers of Neiman Marcus from Dallas, Texas, the additional amount for the Paris Project was an additional $20,000.00.  The contract with Percival Savage, Public Relations in Paris submitted a final statement for Fr.29,000.00 (French Francs which at the time was around 5 Fr per $1.00 of which he received about half for his personal use and the rest for everything else.  I finally paid the Hotel Crillon bill directly and together with a suite with two bedrooms and four twin beds at $90.00 a day for two models and an assistant and myself with all food and beverages came to $10,000.00 (this was half of the Paris budget assigned by the Harkness lawyers in Paris who handled all the financial affairs for me although giving me carte blanc for signing checks and making decisions covering all financial arrangements.  I must state that these American lawyers handling Rebekah Harkness's affairs were above board and exceedingly honest and helpful.  Those lawyers in NYC, who I had contract negotiations pending were also very helpful and friendly.  I had no reason to believe that a satsifactory contract would not be worked out once I had the time to consider exactly how I wanted my association to be.  I didn't plan to be part of PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC.  That was Rebekah's corporation for funding the project at the beginning.  I had tentative plans for a new TZAIMS LUKSUS, INC set up created in which it would work with PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC but not be part of it and also I had found a location on Madison Avenue to locate that had all the perfect space for street level retail, Couture showrooms, sample and designing rooms as well as production rooms.  I had mentioned the building to Rebekah and she felt it was a perfect investment, however, details of ownership of the building had not been settled or even discussed.  That building today is the flagship store for RALPH LAUREN, who found out about my plans for it and scooped it up as soon as I decided I would not continue with a couture operation with PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC.  I stated that the Harkness lawyers that I met with were Leon Frosin on 5th Avenue, but I noticed in checking over information that at the time Rebekah's lawyer was Aaron Frosch on Park Avenue.  It is possible I got the names mixed up or in fact she had both these lawyers on her staff for different reasons.

I won't go into a great amount of detail in this account covering my business arrangements with Rebekah Harkness at this moment any further than this since I may have covered much of it earlier below.  I can say that I was impressed with Rebekah as a beautiful and intelligent, singularly capable and elegant woman who was perfect for a couturier.  It may be that I came into her life at the most perfect moment for her and Harkness House still an infant and magnificent dream operation for any artist or musician in the world.  She dressed impeccably and tastefully on every occassion and she had a great capacity for listening never losing her temper or raising her voice in any kind of argument.  She would get into costumy things and wear an outlandish wig on occassion for an opering for her ballet but that to me was just her way of having fun and joining in with her beloved dancers who from my observation adored her as did everyone on staff that I met.  There was no confusion nor question of who did what and never was a thing hanging that caused anyone to doubt who was in charge of what.  It ran as smooth as the finest Swiss clock movement. 

I knew little to nothing of her personal life or her children.  I assumed she was a widow and not presently married nor would marry again.  I had thought that William Hale Harkness's first wife had died but I see I was wrong in a recent research and found they had divorced.  I thought that their marriage had produced children, however, I found no evidence of that recently.  I knew that Rebekah and William Hale Harkness had one daughter before he died.  I didn't realize he was so young at his death.  I knew of two other Harkness children and supposed that they belonged to the first marriage but now I know they were Rebekah's children by Allen Pierce.  I didn't known their names nor did I know that she had been married and divorced before William Hale Harkness was divorced.  I knew one of the older children was a boy, the other a girl, but did not know how old they were.  As I was designing my collection I always had Rebekah in mind to wear the clothes, especially the evening gowns and many of the daytime suits and coats would suit her style.  I knew her wardrobe was mostly Mainboucher and though I never saw the extent of her closet I assumed all the elegant clothes she wore were designed by him.  Due to the time period of fashion I complied with the short skirt above the knee with much contemporary tailoring and so my daytime clothes were more in the order of Courrege of Paris and Pertigas of Madrid.  I knew Rebekah wore kept her hemline at the knee.  The more elegant evening gowns were more in the mood of a sober Balenciaga.  These were the strongest influences for me, however, I didn't copy these designers but if one was to associate my style then it would fall in line with Balenciaga, Courrege, Pertigas and adding Luksus.  My own being unique and contemporary American with the quality and construction comparable to the finest Paris could produce yet produced in the United States of America.  My intention of showing in Paris was not, as some critics claimed, a desire to become a great French Couturier nor did I have plans to open an atelier in Paris.  I intended to assign sales in Paris to a French staff under my Paris Directrice: Madam Genevieve Antoine-Darioux formerly Directrice for Nina Ricci also in Paris and the Doyan of Fashion in the world and sell the American couture from New York City to the French as well as the rest of Europe.  How this might develop would depend upon circumstances once I set up a permanent location in NYC.  I did not expect Rebekah Harkness to finance my whole operation but give me this jump-start that I based sales to cover a greater portion of the rest of the initial financing.  I was extremely frugal and cautious in spending her money and I did not race in and become some lavishly ostentation character using and abusing her fortune.  I did invest in what was necessary personally to make a good ambassador for her.  In fact, as I stated below, when the New York press and Women's Wear Daily, considered the Fashion Bible, blasted me personally rather than give a proper accounting and evaluation of my collection in Paris I felt I should withdraw from any further spending of Rebekah Harkness' money or support having proved a disappointment for her and even perhaps an embarrassment. 

There were now many reasons why this was not going to work but too I had put off my own needs financially by focusing on a successful operation under the Harkness wing so if I stepped away then I had to do something immediately to bring in some personal income or face losing everything I owned which included my house in Vermont.  At the time I had a rent control apartment on West. 56th Street, a 5 floor walk-up next to Carnegie Hall at directly behind the Center City stage door under rent control for $75.00 a month and that rent was being covered by Gene Lott and Miriam Kellogg Fredenthal who both had jobs (Miriam I gave my job and salary at FIT so she felt she should help with rent and expenses) we all three shared the apartment.  I had a lease/purchase option to finalize purchase of my house in Old Bennington, Vermont that expired April 30th of 1968 and I needed one third down to close the deal which meant I needed at least $10,000.00 cash immediately (less than two months) or lose all and I had a great investment in the property since my lease was based upon my making all repairs, improvements and maintainance and this over three years came to over $20,000.00 as well as a monthly rent payment that did not apply toward the purchase.

EDITH WEST-HARKNESS
The perfect debutant socialite.

Going back to the collection at Harkness House it happened that one afternoon Rebekah and William Hale Harkness' daughter Edith visited my atelier.  On the same floor next to my office the secretary for Harkness House had her office and when I returned after lunch one afternoon she introduced me to Rebekah's daughter.  I don't know if her name was mentioned but.  "Tzaims this is Rebekah's daughter."  She was very beautiful in a modern American way and very stylish wearing what appeared to be a Courrege, Balenciaga or Pertigas simple cut suit/dress in a wonderful shade of rose.  The fabric appeared to be a Forneris of Rome wool and very smooth, thick but light weight.  I realized immediately that a lot of my collection would be very suitable for her and as she looked over the samples completed and the fabrics being cut and worked was very pleased and liked everything.  She didn't linger and with a polite and friendly smile thanked me for showing her what I was working on.  I believe now that this was Edith Harkness as she was in her late teens or appeared around 19 or 20, however, she could have been 16 or 17 mature, elegant and very MOD in just the right way.  I never saw her again but later heard that she took many items from my collection and I was happy to know that she was wearing the coats, suits, cocktail dresses and gowns.
Now it is only fair to further mention how and why I shifted from Rebekah's financial support so suddenly.  I did indicate that Eugenia Sheppard and John Fairchild principally humiliated me world wide and when Eugenia's scathing report and hate criticizm splashed across the streets of Paris the next day in Women's Wear Daily it shocked the world and I felt pulverized.  This was strange for Eugenia to do even if she hated Rebekah with a passion since all of the European fashion press were very pleased and praised my success.  A little reticense giving me too much credit by Figaro and Le Monde but even so not too bad for the Paris press to admit.  Even in the US there were good reports until Eugenia's bitter bit hit the fan.  I couldn't figure it out but I must say that I was not anxious to return to the US so fortunately arrangements had previously been made that I would have a two week rest between the Paris and NYC showings and Gene and I had plans to go to Venice, Italy, a city I lived in earlier and loved and wanted him to see and this time of Spring in Europe would have Venice bathed in sunlight and no flooding much too early for the heavy tourist season.  We did go and like I promised Gene Venice opened to him as would a dream.

We were packing up to leave at the Crillon with Anoushka and Judy returning with the collection on the next flight for NYC and handling all the custom details getting out and getting in again and Gene and I were planning to take the train to Venice when I received a phone call from Pierre Godart.  He wanted to invite me for lunch and suggested I meet him in the Hotel Crillon Grill.  The Grill was a wonderful place for lunch, just across from the United States Embassy where much of the staff and dignitaries dined.  I accepted and Gene and I met him there.  He proposed a contract whereby I would design fabrics for his US firm called TSM, INC.  He supplied the couture designers both in the US and Europe fabrics of the highest quality, woven and printed in Germany, France, Italy and Switzerland as well as NYC and other mills in the US.  When finished he asked how much I would want and after a little thought, since his offer meant I had to give up couture designing so as not to compete with his fashion designer clientele, I stated $50,000.00 a year.  He smiled and said..."I was afraid you would say $100,000.00 a year." and agreed that we would work out the details when we returned to NYC. 

This gave me an alternative if all went badly with the press showing in New York at Harkness House three weeks from then so Gene and I finished packing up and vacating our Farah Diba Suite at the Hotel Crillon and checked most of our luggage in their storage rooms to be picked up after two weeks and I paid the bill with a PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC cheque provided by the Paris lawyers of Harkness.  Percival Savage wanted me to give him the entire budget set for the Paris event but after a few things, some bills he failed to pay on Harkness' behalf, led me to be cautious and I didn't want any difficulty and in a way I didn't trust him to pay the hotel bill and expenses for the ballroom after our departure.  This upset him but I instinctively knew he would blow the money and the hotel would not get paid and the Hotel was pleased I paid when I checked out and not leaving it up to Percival Savage.  They had many difficulties with Percy over the years who rather lived beyond his means keeping up appearances and knew he could be a risk yet honouring him since he was Dior's most favored boy lover who had named Dior's Men's Cologne after him: Eau Savage.

In any event after I paid the hotel bill Percy then invited Gene and I to a parting Lunch at the Crillon Grill ordering the most expensive items on the menue including white blanched asparagus and dishes with black and white truffles along with a magnum of Dom Perignon.  When we finished lunch he signed the checque and we said our farewells.  I was pleased with how he handled the whole affair and told him so and he was thrilled for working with me and Harkness and looked forward to future Paris events that I would arrange.  I didn't tell him that I could only trust him so far with money but that didn't matter since I was in control of things and learned quickly how to manage under pressure and how far to go with someone.  Nothing went over budget and the trip Gene and I made to Venice and further also to Florence was provided by Gene who used some of his savings and not any money from the Harkness funds.

I will summarize this now and maybe later fill in further details so as to make it short now since I hadn't planned to do a biography in detail of my Harkness Ventures. 

We returned from Venice to the Hotel Crillon to pick up our luggage and the manager presented me with a bill for lunch that Percy had signed after I had checked out.  It didn't occurr to me that he was signing on the Harkness account at the Crillon for the lunch he invited us to and that the hotel would accept that he was still representing me.  I had completed paying all that I was charged two weeks before.  I explained this to the manager and suggested if there were any further bills signed by Savage they were his and not mine since I had paid hm as well as the hotel satisfactorily with nothing outstanding.  I present the manager to consider consulting with the Harkness lawyers in Paris if they disagreed with me.  They accepted this solution knowing I wan't responsible for the luncheon bill but probably thought they could get it out of me if I took this as an embarrassment.  I didn't and had no intention of spending Rebekah's money on what Percy tried to charge us further than appropriate.

Later back in NYC the couture showing of TZAIMS LUKSUS at Harkness House moved beautifully and Michael Avadon, the Harkness House official photographer, took many photographs.  The US fashion press was mixed.  Many were influenced with what Eugenia Sheppard said earlier but added that the clothes were wonderful.  They couldn't resist making comments about me and my personal life all of which was imagined or conjured up to further humiliate me as I had seen them do to Rebekah regularily and especially the Village Voice was clever but cruel in their diatribe about me, my personal character and the clothes.  I had read scathing reviews on other designer collections and those designers survived only to get rave reviews later by the same people so I wasn't too bothered finally but I had to make a decision and decided to go with Pierre Godart and TSM, INC. and met him for lunch before my Harkness House presentation to clear up a few details and see if that was real.  I had to be careful not to leave Harkness and end up having been tricked by Godart into a false contract.  Anything can happen in this textile/fashion industry.  I wanted to remain with Harkness and was reluctant to give up designing couture but I had to be practical so as greatly as this would change my life at least I would not be a hanger-on, financial drain or parasite for Rebekah Harkness and since we hadn't put any real personal relationship or emotions  into this project we ended it gracefully.  The way her lawyers stated in the proposed contract that I could be dropped at any time from designing for Pirouette Projects, Inc with other designers that would be considered to take my place and that I couldn't work for any other firm or do anything on my own for 10 years after I was dismissed it just didn't seem there was any real future in staying with Harkness and thereby we were both free to go our own way. 

The entire cost of the PIROUETTE PROJECTS INC under my direction was on the final statement: $58,302.43 but it included all the inventory of production fabrics on hand, potential sales of clothes, a whole catalog of fashion designs by me to work with and the cost covered much of Harkness employees who handled the showings, press announcements, invitations and public relations.  My own staff of 19 remained on the Pirouette Projects, Inc payroll much to my joy.   After I left I never heard from them again.  Not one complaint nor any kind of dissatisfaction or regrets.  In fact at the final day I was thanked, wished good luck in the future with any venture I decided upon and we parted in good terms.  Only one thing came from Paris some weeks later to me in Vermont and it was from Harkness lawyers informing me that Percival Savage apparently didn't pay the Paris models for the runway show and the models came to their firm for payment.  I replied that they should ignor it based on the fact that Percival Savage was paid in for all his services including payment to the models he arranged and most likely he paid the models and they were only hoping to get double payment so they could share it with Percy.  Besides I reminded them it was a Pirouette Projects, Inc expense should they choose to acknowledge payment a second time.  They agreed with me and sent the models packing back to Percival Savage.  I never mentioned before this that Percy was ordering two bottles of Johnny Walker Black and White Scotch from my room service at the Crillon and walking out of my suite every day with them in the pockets of his big Bear skin coat he wore as his identity.    Percy was quite great so one could forgive his this boyish theft.  None of us drank Scotch nor ever ordered it.  I over looked his tricks since his fee was not exhorbitant and I supposed this was one of the perks necessary to keep him subservient to me, him hiding the fact, made him vulnurable and loyal...if that could be expected.  I am sure Rebekah would have done the same thing or was doing it regularily.  It was the only thing I felt as negative in my dealings with Percy but he put on a great show for us and that we can be grateful so long as it lasted.
ALLEN WEST-PIERCE
The perfect boy.

One last thing, one person I would like to mention.  Allen Pierce.  Rebekah's son from her first marriage showed up in the news many years later.  I had never met him nor knew if he was a Harkness or a Pierce nor what his first name was but he suffered greatly in an unfortunate encounter with a drunk.  The incedent took place in Florida and was greatly disturbing.  After I left Harkness I read that things were going badly for the ballet, the Harkness Theatre and she and her family but this news of Allen to me was the worse thing that could happen to that family.  Now that I know his name and much of the details of his situation I must say I am happy it turned out well for him finally as he claimed and is doing well.  It is one thing that the girls and mother get all the attention even if criticized also get sympathy and the boy gets nothing other than just left in the dust and then only to be mentioned if something bad happened to him which was the case here and not his doing.  My gut feeling was that he had gotten railroaded in the Florida court at the time but like me, if in a similar situation, he expressed the truth as I would but the court doesn't want the truth they want what they want to hear and the best thing to say to them is nothing.  Don't even take the stand.  This was something that I was very upset over at the time.  It has haunted me since.  I read recently that much of his sentence was overturned and he is in his own design company in Florida...or at least was in 1988.  Cheers to you Allen and your family.  Know that I have been loyal and always a friend though we never met if you ever read this.  I hope you are alive and well.  CHEERS!
TZAIMS LUKSUS, FRSA

JAMES WINGFIELD-DRIVER-LUKSUS
TZAIMS 
AT 16 YEARS OLD
CHICAGO 1948












Thursday, June 27, 2013

REBEKAH HARKNESS & TZAIMS LUKSUS

REBEKAH HARKNESS
In 1966 I had the great privilege of being introduced to Rebekah Harkness.  I was at the time enjoying a great success as a fashion designer in New York City with a showroom and atelier workshop at 550 Seventh Avenue...the best building for NYC high fashion designers with windows facing the back of the old Metropolitan Opera House.  I received a letter from the Director of the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, Connecticut requesting that I create 6 ball gowns for their commemorative Paper Ball scheduled for the following October.  I agreed to this request, which was to be a donation by me, providing I was given the names of the ladies that would be wearing the gowns.  They gladly sent the names and to my surprise among them was the name: REBEKAH HARKNESS.
TZAIMS LUKSUS
It was a known fact that Rebekah Harkness never stepped onto Seventh Avenue nor purchased any garments from the Avenue's fashion designers.  So how this would develop was earth shattering.  In the past, according to fashion history, gossip and/or rumour, Rebekah Harkness had been a fashion model for Mainboucher on Park Avenue...far from the madding crowd of Seventh Avenue...where Mrs. William Hale Harkness purchased all her clothes.  It was customary for her husband Mr. William Hale Harkness to accompany his wife during her selection.  Mainboucher was haute couture and not pret-a-porter (ready to wear) and conduced his salon as did the haute couture fashion designers in Paris.  Models would parade out wearing each model for an individual client as was Mrs. Harkness.  Rebekah Semple West, as is her maiden name, was one of Mainboucher's models and this is where William Hale Harkness had first seen her.  As the years went by Rebekah ceased modeling and became Mainboucher's Directrice and managed his couture operation.  One stipulation with Mainboucher was that he never presented a 'press opening' nor 'buyer's showings" for women's specialty shops such as Bonwit Teller or Bergdorff Goodman.  Mainboucher was strictly 'custom' couture and sold only directly to clients of high society and great wealth as was Mrs. William Hale Harkness.

Naturally such an intimate and close relationship between couturier, model, Directrice, client and husband would constitute a solid relationship and trust..a bond of privacy and secrecy which occurs in such privileged circles and when Mrs. Harkness died suddenly her husband William Hale Harkness would naturally turn to the one place or person that had a very close contact with his wife and that was Rebekah Semple West.  As it turned out he proposed to her and they married in 1947 just around the time of Christian Dior's entry into the couture in Paris with his "new look".  Their marriage produced one child: Edith Harkness and their marriage lasted harmoniously for 7 years when William Hale Harkness died 1 October 1954 leaving his entire fortune, that included a major share of Standard Oil,  to Rebekah to do with as she pleased.  Of course Rebekah was in her own right a very wealthy woman having been born into a socially prominent family in St. Louis, Missouri in 1915 so there was no doubt that she could handle the estate, most reasonably, as William Hale Harkness felt best for it.

No one in fashion media or the fashion/garment business in NYC was hated more than Rebekah Harkness since previous to this great fortune she was the one who kept all fashion press editors, fashion writers, gossip columnists and fashion critics away from Mainboucher's collections and now to have married, then widowed, into such vast wealth they all went into a crazy frenzy trying to get at her any way they could but without any  real success.  All this happened long before I came along since I was born in 1932 the year Rebekah graduated from Fermata, a finishing school, in Aiken, South Carolina at the age of 22.   
HARKNESS HOUSE 
ESTABLISHED IN 1965
My career in fashion began just a few years before Rebekah created her Foundation and opened Harkness House for Ballet Arts.  Some co-incidents occurred in both our lives at different times but in 1965 both Rebekah and I became major monuments in New York City.  We both studied dance (ballet) as children with neither of us actually dancing professionally or making it our career, we both were inclined toward the haute couture and high fashion although we came from totally different economic and social backgrounds but both our influence and careers were meteors launched into place at the same time in 1965.  Rebekah opened her Ballet Company setting the Dance World on its peak and I won both the Coty and Neiman Marcus Awards for extraordinary achievements in Fashion Fabric Design creating a whole new trend in fashion art and making the United States a power equal to that of European fabric designers/producers.

As can be imagined these two events in New York City raged like a fire storm across both the fashion and entertainment worlds and although Rebekah was already well known and hated by the fashion press I was on the other hand the darling of the fashion press having been given the first Coty Award also known as the American Fashion Critics Award in Fashion Achievement and the first award for Fabric Design in Fashion.  All this happened for me from 1962 in three years when I reached the age of 30 and Rebekah Harkness was 47 years old.


My operation for designing and manufacturing fabrics was supported by another pair of wealthy backers in Bennington, Vermont spear-headed first by Lawrence Vanderbilt-Morris (son of Cornelia Vanderbilt) and later taken over by John Griffith McCullough of North Bennington, Vermont and also of New York City, whose family was known for building the Holland Tubes. They financed my mill manufacturing in the old Tiffany Mill in the Town of Bennington, Vermont before McCullough brought in additional investors.  I had moved my design studio there from a loft I occupied on Delancy Place near Rittinhouse Square in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania due to demands for fabrics that the local mills were not able to easily produce in time for deadlines necessary to satisfy my clients on Seventh Avenue basically because the orders were small and it was difficult for them to fit my small orders between their larger ones.  This meant in order to keep up deliveries I had to have my own textile mill both for weaving wool and printing silk.  It turned out the old Tiffany Mill was well equipped with textile weaving and producing equipment with a full staff ready to be liquidated and dismantled.  I found it just in the nick of time to keep it going and preserved and it provided space that I could convert into a major silk screen printing production workshop.  In 1965 I was already two years established there and producing and delivering exactly what was needed and thereby earning the Coty and Neiman Marcus Awards.
TZAIMS LUKSUS 
RECEIVING THE COTY AWARD FROM
SENATOR JACOB JAVITS
AT THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART
NEIMAN MARCUS AWARD
SCULPTURE BY GIACOMETTI
PRESENTED TO TZAIMS LUKSUS BY STANLEY MARCUS
IN DALLAS, TEXAS
LAWRENCE RHODES
HARKNESS BALLET 
Giacometti's model for Neiman Marcus Award
In the summer of 1966 little did I know that my Seventh Avenue atelier and my Bennington Mill would come to an end.  If the second wife of John Griffith McCullough was drafting her plans to take it over at that time she certainly didn't indicate anything other than 'keep-on-trucking' so it was arranged that those ladies that would be wearing the original and one of a kind paper dresses to the Hartford Atheneum Paper Ball of 1966 would come in for fittings.  Only one lady requested that I come to her first instead and before she came to me.  Rebekah Harkness.  Rather than an inconvenience I felt it a great privilege since I had little chance to go anywhere very exciting so it was arranged that I would meet her in her studio apartment on the top floor of Harkness House.

I had never been to Harkness House, former ballet dancer wannabe that I was, it was a terrifying experience to see the best that could be created after the St. Petersburgh Mariinski Kirov and Bolshoi Ballet disciplines by French Ballet instructors.  So much was happening at the Rebekah Harkness Foundation with plans for rebuilding the Colonial Theatre into a theatre of Dance and renamed the Harkness Theatre but my arrival at the top floor being lifted by a tiny elevator decorated with fantastic but colourfully childish murals of boys and girls dancing like fairies with glitter sprinkled around amused me since I knew instinctively that this was to entertain and not represent something profoundly serious...rather an elevator to fantasy but no fantasy was it when the simple gray door to Rebekah's private suite at the top opened and revealed a splendid and magnificent, impeccable salon/drawing room all in various shades of Apricot, flesh pink and pale rose furnished with brilliant Louis XV crystal chandeliers, sconces, candleabras and settees upholstered in the same coloured silk satins and all mounted upon a soft cushioned thick carpeting of pale Apricot coloured wool.  Oil paintings framed in elaborate gold leaf frames were mounted on the walls and objet d'art arranged around the exotic inlaid table tops filled the room adding to all the family memorabilia.  Lilly, or so I remember her name to be, answered the door when I knocked right on the proper moment of my appointment.  Lilly was a lovely woman of African American descent, or so I thought since maybe she was from France, ushered me in where Rebekah was comfortably seated in one of her Louis XV silk chairs. The hard soles of my shoes pressed into the thick soft carpeting to the extent that I wasn't sure I could keep my balance walking over to greet her but I managed and she insisted I seat myself across from her and had Lilly serve me a cup of tea in a Limoges porcelain cup and saucer.  Nothing much was said as her eyes searched over me casually and since I hadn't said a word Rebekah called to Lilly saying: "Give him the broach."

A dressing room was just visible through a door at the end of the Drawing Room where Lilly went and picked up an object coming back and plunking it into my open hand.  It was a five tentacled jewel encrusted with diamonds, emeralds and rubies set in Platinum with a huge pearl mounted in the center.  It set there in my palm heavy and weighty seeming to stare at me without any eyes.  "I want you to make my dress to match this broach." Rebekah then presented me with a ribbon colourd blue, Royal and bright blue, and added: "I also want it to have that shade of blue in the design."  We conversed for a short time and it was agreed that she would come to my Seventh Avenue atelier at 550 for a fitting since I claimed that I did not do fittings and only allowed my assistants to make them and in this case I had both a male and a female assistant to do fittings.  She agreed and we set a time and date.  The interview may have taken 30 minutes altogether.

The other prominent ladies of the New York 400 Social set were Mrs. Stanley (Barbara) Mortimer and Mrs. Robert (Ethel) Scull owners of NYC Yellow Cab Co. and ardent modern art collectors.  They both came for fittings without any ceremony but when Rebekah Harkness arrived and parked right in front of 550 Seventh Avenue all the fashion press and photographers were suddenly there flashing and shouting at her.  Who in the world was she going to see at 550 Seventh Avenue, a place she swore she would never show herself for any reason.  Shock waves surged through the fashion industry..."My God..." was heard exclaimed..."she is going to see TZAIMS LUKSUS!"

Well what a rush this was for them but it wasn't my intention to be located on Seventh Avenue.  Like Mainboucher I didn't feel I fit into the Seventh Avenue fashion designers and planned to locate either on Park Avenue or Madison Avenue.  Unfortunately the second wife of John Griffith McCullough, Jane Fiske, insisted on funding a Seventh Avenue address for me and since I had no choice since she had been made Honourary Chairwoman of my two corporations I only insisted that if so then it had to be in the same building as Norman Norell at 550 and so it just turned out that there was a large space vacated and available for me to occupy.  Not what I wanted or needed but not too bad either.

Her bright Royal Blue Rolls Royce pulled up and stopped right in front blocking any other car and remained there the whole time.  Crows gathered around seeking a glimpse of Rebekah as she got out assisted by her chauffeur.  She casually entered the building, got on the elevator and arrived without one incident or any kind of fanfare.  I greeted her in the showroom and my female assistant measured her for her fitting.  I offered her a cup of tea, which she drank, and with only a few words left as unceremoniously as she arrived.  The chaos on the street was frantic and the police cordoned off the entrance of 550 in order for Rebekah to enter her Rolls Royce unmolested by anyone.  Her chauffeur opened and closed the door for her then drove off and that was that.

Each paper gown was measured into paper patterns...no two alike...and then cut from the surgical paper supplied by the Wadsworth Atheneum and I took them to my studio/apartment on Gramercy Park to paint.   This was the difficult part.  I had to do all six in one night and I was already exhausted from a days work.  I just couldn't do it so I went to bed.  My mate Gene woke me up and said..."You have to do this now!"  "I can't do it.!" so he gave me a cup of tea and after an hour or two I woke up and started splashing paint on each piece of each pattern and by dawn all six were finished and I collapsed and woke up at 10:00 AM.  I generally didn't go to my Seventh Avenue atelier before 11:00 AM giving the staff time to get some work done previous so I would see it and either approve or alter it and delivered the painted paper parts to my male assistant who had cut them and knew how to put them together.

I used an acrylic paint generally used by artists at that time: Noland, Olitski, Frankenthaller and that ilk as I had experimented with it in my own painting but though it worked on this surgical paper I didn't like it for fine art painting.  There weren't any further fittings made and the gowns delivered or picked up by each lady previous to the Paper Ball.  I sent my messenger to deliver Rebekah's to her maid Lilly and finally to Rebekah personally.  I made a seventh gown for Miriam and leased a black limo and Miriam, my two assistants and I went to Hartford for the Ball.
REBEKAH HARKNESS
TZAIMS LUKSUS PAPER GOWN
New York Times Press Photo
Hartford Atheneum Paper Ball October 1966

Rebekah Harkness arrived dressed sitting  in her Rolls Royce in her paper gown all the way from NYC to Hartford.  When she arrived she stated to those questioning her from the fashion press that.."I felt since it was a proper gown I should be able to wear it the whole way here and I did without one tear or problem.  It is perfect."  and so it was. She was sparkling and delightful and I cannot imagine anyone having more fun at the event and there were some really disastrous things happening with the fringe of people that attended most notably Rudy Guernreich's model wearing a clear plastic mini dress with circular paste on's covering parts of her nude body.  She passed out from suffocation from the plastic on her body...no ventilation.  Someone in the fashion press couldn't resist on making some false claim that one of my paper dresses tore and had to be fixed with scotch tape...A total lie and fabrication by the fashion press always bent to do something on any occasion after occasion a negativity on anything or on anyone just to justify their insufficient ability to contribute but only watch, observe and comment in their own feeble way that which they can never really share in or be part of.  It is called: "A Fashion Press Occupational Hazard" and stressed on their chains as they force themselves into the private lives of anyone they fancy (Freedom of the Press and First Amendment Rights under the Constitution of the United Stated) that they stretch to the point of breaking, sometimes break, if and when employed and/or engaged under the sanction and protection of a Newspaper or Periodical and not Freelance.  Not all do this but those that do pick out their victim and never let up.  I can name many but so far I was their favorite darling.

After the Ball and a deep sleep we met again at a Connecticut Senator's country mansion for breakfast and afterward Rebekah went off in her Royal Blue Rolls Royce and we went off in our leased black Cadillac Limousine.  

The Paper Ball was October 1st so come December Jane Fiske-McCullough was manipulating my two corporations in Bennington, Vermont and NYC to her own satisfaction and just before Christmas 1966 she demanded that a reorganization of both corporations be made and that I would no longer be the principal of either and that she would hold 80% of my Bennington Mill and 100% of my Seventh Avenue Couture Atelier.  I would merely be her employee bowing to her every demand.  So I withdrew from both corporations with the caveat that she not trade under my name and change the names of both corporations.  Thrilled to take over she agreed and I was free of the McCullough ball and chain.,  Lawrence Vanderbilt-Morris had long before removed himself and gave me his voting power to do with as I felt appropriate.  Was anything lost?  I had nothing to begin with so how could I loose anything especially since now I was free.  Well freedom is a multi-plexed thing to say the least and cut off financially and no power or associates in NYC to assist me in any way, or at least I felt at the time, I did manage to get a couple of teaching positions. One at Maine's Haystack Mountain School of Crafts for a few weeks in August of 1967 and then a consultant teaching position at the Fashion Institute of Technology FIT in NYC...but after one semester at FIT I realized that I didn't want to teach...I wanted to do another couture collection so I gave Miriam Fredenthal my position at FIT and I called Rebekah Harkness asking if she would finance me in a couture collection and reestablish me as a couturier.  It was a daring thing for me to do.  I had her personal phone number and hesitated for a long time but finally I felt that the worse thing is she wouldn't answer or decline.


To my amazement she answered and knew who I was.  I briefly explained my idea and plan and felt it would cost around $25,000.00 to create a collection.  She immediately suggested I come see her and discuss it further.  I based my cost according to the cost of my first collection that caused a sensation and brought me the fame of being the new Christian Dior but I knew to do a proper collection with all the trimmings and jewels that was required it might cost twice as much as just a simple group of silk prints and now after all I didn't have my own fabric mill and had to rely upon other fabric houses in the US and/or Europe for the collection.  We met.  She immediately showed me office space just outside her Harkness House salon that she would vacate for my atelier/workroom and then divided with a folding screen the office of the Harkness Orchestra conductor, Jonathon Sternberg,  so I would have a proper office of my own.  He didn't much like the arrangement but found later that I didn't much intrude on his activities and we got on well together without actually communicating anything verbally to one another.

I brought in all my best dressmakers and tailors but not any of my Seventh Avenue assistants or associates who folded two months after my departure.  One of my Italian dressmakers recommended a Romanian woman excellent in couture pattern making and following instructions for my assistant: Georgette, and I hired her on the spot.  She was a God Send and perfectionist.  We were cramped but comfortable and Rebekah arranged that I have an expense account, the amount of which I never knew, and had her lawyers set up a new corporation called: PIROUETTE INC. with a checkbook that I had absolute authority for signing cheques for anything.  I never asked or was given a salary or percentage of the corporation.  In addition she set up a drawing account in the amount of $25,000.00 that I could use but it was against future profits from PIROUETTE, INC and payable back if no profits materialized.  I never used my drawing account but managed on my expense account instead.  After all I was dead poor since my McCullough connection took everything and left me dead in the water.  Fortunately I wasn't bankrupt or owed anything to anyone so I lived on my expense account that Rebekah provided for me.
The Old COLONIAL THEATRE
that Rebekah Harkness concerted into
THE HARKNESS THEATRE
for
DANCE
Things were happening in both Rebekah's and my life at the time...big things...she was building her Harkness Theatre, the Harkness Ballet was preparing for a grand opening there as well as trials in Indianapolis, Indiana.  I was putting together an haute couture collection set to have a press opening in the second floor ballroom of Harkness House in February right after the Paris Fashion Week.  Everything was working like clockwork for both of us yet we didn't communicate or see one another for weeks.  She set up her staff to take care of my needs and her lawyers Leon Frosin to handle any legal affairs.  No contracts or agreements were made and nothing un-necessary since she and I had decided this was it and anything else was superfluous and not essential. I had Louis Nizer as my lawyer but I never called upon them for any contract nor did Rebekah's lawyers offer me any.  I didn't really like contracts..since John Griffith McCullough claimed to me..."Contracts are made to be broken." and he broke his with with me as well as his verbal gentleman's agreements with me.

The Indianapolis, Indiana trials were to begin and I was given a first class ticket to fly there for the opening of the Harkness Ballet.  Little did I know that I would be sitting next to Rebekah sipping champagne and having lunch 42,000 feet in the air having a long and leisurely chat.  Rebekah was such an elegant, graceful and wonderful woman.  Unique on this earth...privileged, wealthy, powerful, disciplined, intelligent and above all gracious and always impeccably dressed.  I fully trusted her instinctively.  She was a Goddess and a Saint.  I opened up my life experiences to her and she listened intently and shared some of her life and plans with me.  We landed and were escorted to our hotel where only she, Donald Saddler and I were put up since the ballet company were in another hotel a few blocks away.  

There is much to say about this Indianapolis trial event which was a great success but right now it has no purpose to this story.

Rebekah left on an early flight back to NYC the next morning and Donald Saddler and I remained with the ballet company until the next day and arrived in NYC two days after Rebekah.

The next morning I was given two tickets to the opening of the Harkness House Theatre.  This was not the opening for the press or that described by Richard Holden's Biography in Dance magazine.  This was previous to that opening when Rebekah invited the First Lady, Lady Bird Johnson, and a special guest list.  When I arrived with my guest Gene Vestel Lott I found that she had placed our two seats immediately in front of her's and the First Lady.  Taking our seats she introduced us to Lady Bird Johnson but the First Lady knew Gene Lott's father since he was Program Chairman of the Voice of America in Washington, DC.  On Rebekah's left was a beautiful young blond boy, 18 or in his early 20s seated, a dancer obviously and Rebekah's escourt for the evening, smiling confidently and glaring imperiously without being introduced or speaking.  I assume after many years now that he was Bobby Scevers, later to become her lover, 25 years younger then she, and managed to overpower and have authority not only over Rebekah but her children.  At this moment Bobby Scevers didn't really exist in reality for me as I assumed he was only a stand in for the evening as decor for Rebekah. The program had many of the short ballets including Time Out of Mind, Sebastian and Monument of a Dead boy danced by Lawrence Rhodes...and finished with Rouben Ter-Arutunian's production of Stravinski's: FIREBIRD suite which was sensational. I don't think that Clive Barnes was in that opening audience but I can say with authority that every production was perfection.  The thearte was magnificent and certainly meant for the creme de la creme of aristocracy and not one incident anywhere in the building marred the event. Most observers felt the ceiling mural was very amusing.

I should make some comments here concerning things I have read written by Craig Unger and Charles Holden, however, for the moment I think what they have to say has little merit or importance in the greater picture...the portrait of Rebekah Harkness, that I am creating from real knowledge and not hearsay, now in this document.

I don't think anyone knew Rebekah Semple West Harkness as well as I did.  Nor do I believe Rebekah shared with anyone what she shared with me.  I can say that she was a very human and compassionate individual without one hateful thing in her mind or body.  Innocent throughout life and to the end of it.  Giving without needing to receive anything from anyone in return.  Allowing only the finest and best to be achieved in all aspects of human endeavor.  A genius of calculation and circumspect to deliver any and all necessary for success on any level.  A woman of extraordinary vision and virtue and a woman willing to sacrifice body and soul for the perfection of mankind in all that is honorable and essential to find free expression no matter what they choose.  This is, was, the purpose of money.  Rebekah didn't restrict anyone but instead provided them with everything they needed whether they used it to succeed or hang themselves.  She let them do with what she provided what ever they were capable of doing.  And that is why she was often hated and more than necessary condemned as being superficial and tasteless in her choices of people and art but I disagree that that was the case and I can prove my case on her behalf since I know her better than anyone on this earth!  She had some of the best people surrounding her in my time there.

Yes, certain choices in art, might have restricted her.  Dali's Urn of Life was not a suitable vessel for her ashes.  It was a good public presentation that should never jave been intended to be used.  The Octopus broach, with the diamonds, rubies, emeralds and Star of the Sea Pearl was not an Octopus as the press claimed.  It only had five tentacles.  Right there the fashion press got everything wrong about Rebekah Harkness but continued to feed this false information against her to the public but for what intent?...to ruin her...to destroy her.  to humiliate her...she, Rebekah, who could not be destroyed, ruined or humiliated by the likes of Eugenia Sheppard, Eleanor Lambert or John Fairchild at that time or even Craig Unger or Charles Holden not withstanding Barbara Grizzutti Harrison or Bobby Scevers...well nor any other of similar criminal mind.. 

As is universally thought, bright Royal Blue is Rebekah Harkness's favorite colour.  NOT!  Royal blue is her colour for the public!  The colour she displays so they can identify her on sight.  She actually hates bright Royal blue!  I won't say what her favorite colour is to preserve her interests but I can say that she loves all colours.  Rebekah Harkness goes through, like many famous and wealthy individuals or celebrities, situations that make life absolute Hell and as a result if one is intelligent they manage to find ways to simplify their lives so things can move along more quickly for them in situations when there is chaos and confusion.  Airports are a good example and this I learned from Rebekah that getting one's luggage after a flight can be a nightmare since all luggage looks alike.  Of course it does because that is what the commercial industry demands with its advertising of what every consumer should buy from them and what they offer is limited to a thing that is not easily identified in a mass.  LVMH luggage all looks alike so if several celebrities are claiming their baggage they have to look at the tags identifying each and every one.  Well Rebekah Harkness solved that problem for herself and I must say that her solution was so fantastic that I have decided not to reveal it to anyone here.  I did the same, having learned the solution from her, and too I will not say what I did to find my airline baggage without any difficulty.  Lessons learned from brilliant people might be shared but as Gilbert and Sullivan claimed in their production of THE GONDELIERS:  "If everyone is somebody then no one is any body."  And..that is the size of it.  In any case when all of her luggage appeared she and I grabbed it and sent it flying into our Limousine and were off before anyone else could find theirs.  Getting in and getting out is what it is all about.

My collection only had a few weeks to be completed since it was started after the first semester before Christmas and was planned for a press showing in February.  This worked since that was when Spring/Summer/Resort collections were introduced but also it was when Fashion Week started in Paris for Spring collections.  As work progressed it occurred to me that perhaps Rebekah would agree having our first showing in Paris and then showing later in New York so I presented that possibility to her.  She immediately picked up on it and arranged for extra funds to be made for all the Paris arrangements.  The question was who in Paris to work with and although I discussed public relations with Eleanor Lambert she didn't pick up on suggesting anything for Paris so I called one of my avant garde friends, Bill Cunningham and he suggested I call Percival Savage in Paris.  I did and everything was arranged with a showing and stay at the Hotel Crillon with his staff handling invitations and press as well as hosting dinners, arranging photographers, a hair stylist, runway models and a Directrice to meet with clients.  I've written about this many times so I will pass all the details but it all came off smoothly without a flaw.  Well other than Eugenia Sheppard, John Fairchild and Eleanor Lambert chopped me down to pieces and spit me out vehemently.

The press showing in New York at Harkness House also went well but the American press, like Eugenia only picked up on negativities that didn't really exist.  The collection was perfection and everything surrounding it absolutely flawless.  Neiman Marcus praised it claiming it was pure Paris couture.  Never the less the blow was really devastating to my senses.  Not because what was said was so vicious but there was no reason to be so cruel and I knew it had to do with me being associated with Rebekah Harkness.  Rebekah also knew this but was silent.  In fact she flew to her Island Capricorrne in the Caribbean before we left for Paris.  I don't know if she saw the collection at the Crillon or not.  If so then she went incognito.  I wondered about that since the invitations were from her in her name announcing a collection by Tzaims Luksus, however, she may have stayed away knowing if she came the press might single her out and thereby the collection would suffer.  I feel, after many years trying to figure it out, that no matter whether she came or not the press would have sabotaged the collection just for spite.  This gave me proof of how vicious and two faced the fashion press actually was and so I took up an diversion and alternate plan that was offered me in Paris and arranged in New York City and left Harkness House of my own free will.  Rebekah understood my reasoning and made no comment. 

The last time I saw Rebekah was just before Paris.  I know she defended me against the press in New York later but we never had any meeting together.  I was never hired and never fired.  In fact my position was as I chose it to be under her roof and with her financial support but I felt I couldn't continue using her funding when the fashion press had destroyed me and gave no indication of letting up.  There was no discussions concerning it other than I informed my staff that I was leaving.  They were sad about it but continued showing up for work each day and Rebekah kept them on payroll as I had set them up.  Later my assistant Georgette told me that Rebekah took all the couture clothes I had created for herself and daughter to wear with a few things going to various ballerinas.  My atelier remained where I set it up and continued to the end of Harkness House days making clothes for Rebekah and costumes for the ballet company so all the money spent was well spent and I had set up the finest group of dressmakers and tailors that New York City could gather in one couture atelier for her and that she really appreciated.  Like her, I took nothing in return.

Several years later I wrote a long letter to Rebekah thanking her for all she had done for me at a time of great need and when my career was in jeopardy and explaining how she topped it off in the most extraordinary way and how grateful I was for her doing it.  She had completed a dream for me and with that I had no need to continue.  I had done Paris and I had done the press.  I continued designing fabrics in France and Italy for a few years and refrained from making any appearances in NYC other than one Coty Award event which I think was the last presented.  I traveled in Africa, India, Nepal, the Himalayas and Bali instead and have no regrets other than I would like to have met with Rebekah at least one last time.  It never happened and many years later I heard things had gone badly for the Harkness Ballet, Harkness House and resulting with her death.

I cannot say anything against her.  She took people with talent and provided them with all they needed and never once interfered in their lives.  If they had difficulties then it was their own fault and I don't believe that Rebekah herself ever fired anyone but seeing all the competition existing among choreographers, dance teaching staff and administration it is no wonder such chaos was permeating and festering around her.  What is mostly said about Rebekah is actually how people treated her and her things and I saw many instances of how they were taking advantage of her money and then spreading vicious rumours.  What ever was happening in her private life with her children and the unstable Bobby Scevers certainly never got outside their little circle when I was there and what ever he has to say after her death certainly reflects more on his own behavior and attitude than it does Rebekah's or her children.  We can only get so close to another individual and when we do then there must be a sharing of responsibilities and honor.  I know that the press was the worse they could be for no good reason against her but isn't that exactly how they are..finding a small red spot and picking it until it is a monstrous wound and then covering themselves in the blood they draw from their victims.  They are the hopeless and lost having nothing nor lives of their own and are parasites taking everything they can to support themselves.  It is the press that will destroy us, our country and the world in the end all with their warped ideas of their privilege of freedom of speech.

How can one explain a famous person?  It probably isn't possible and critics and the press know this but never the less try.  Getting inside someone else's head is not possible so the critics and press can only sort through what a famous person discards, like garbage, the press and critics sort through it but it is always out of context with the truth...with reality.  Rebekah Harkness was the critic's and press' hardest nut to crack and although they preferred to claim she was a Rhinestone rather than a Diamond...they were wrong...she was Adamant!  Now most people who rise to fame for one reason or another and come from all aspects and/or conditions of life are not much different and I can verify that because I came from a very simple life and ended up just as mysterious, loved and then hated by the critics and press as did Rebekah Harkness.  With all our differences, one quick glance, eye to eye, and Rebekah and I knew exactly how to advance and instinctively knew what was going on and how to handle it.  We were public figures thrust into the limelight without any real grip on anything other than our intrinsic sense of purpose.  We had that anchor in common and knew we faced the fires exploding around us would extinguish us unless we stayed absolutely cool headed.  I didn't have the resources and experience that Rebekah had nor the fortune to fall back on and escape easily as she did but we both knew that fortune or not we could resist, survive and express ourselves as we chose simply by our determination, self determination if you will, and it worked for us.

Now as simple as we were basically we knew the tricks of the trade...what trade is that?  Theatre!  We were trained to face an audience.  That is what dance instruction is all about.  I didn't go to strengthen my legs when I was six years old nor did Rebekah but training in dance is a physical thing whereas facing an audience is another and that involves never looking at them...the audience...that is...nor looking into the lights of the spots shining in your eyes.  One looks over and beyond and not blinded by the light nor affected by an audience reaction anywhere in the auditorium.  Well as the Earl of Oxford expressed in one of his plays credited by William Shakespeare, "All the world is a stage and we are mere actors upon it."  Well some of us also dance and act at the same time on that 'stage of life' and as a result we build up a confidence to face the public knowing that any moment we might break a leg or fall on our face.  It happens but not with Rebekah or me since dance also gave us a sence of balance and poise.  We managed quite well whether alone or as partners.

You reading this might wonder ...what is the point of all this talk written down by me?  Well never mind if you don't know since I can go on with what is easier to understand but I will speculate and try to leave myself out since this is about Rebekah Harkness.  Well first of course this...........

We go through life living many different personalities.  We have a face for every occassion and that doesn't mean being two-faced.  One day we are in a bathing suit, the next in dirty clothes digging in the garden or feeding the hogs and the next night in black tie and in Rebekah's case wearing diamonds and a silk gown by Mainboucher or me.   Being two-faced is something else.  What I am referring to is that we have one face for our own private life and another for the public.  It stands to reason especially in the time of Rebekah and mine that we were not 'reality television characters' but instead real life Stars with talent beyond our ability to express it all easily on earth.  Even with a vast fortune Rebekah had difficulties of being accepted as really credible.  I had no money and found it easy to become credible.  I spent nothing on credibility since the fashion press lavished me with massive colourful credibility but the world expected Rebekah to spend her fortune to prove she was credible. Well Rebekah was absolutely incredible and her fortune only proved that an incredible person with a fortune can drive the world crazy with their God gifted talent that every professional and critic wants to diminsh as mundane and worthless and don't forget that we get our sense of humour from God just as we get everything else.  Rebekah had everything so what can one give someone that has everything.  Oneself!  One gives oneself and I gave Rebekah me.  I gave her myself!  I walked into her Urn of Life like ashes as a novice entering a Monastery with Rebekah as my Mother Superior although for me Harkness House was both a Monastery and a Nunnery.  Rebekah was the Mother Superior and Donald Saddler was the Friar Priest...they both answered the door when the bell was rung the at the gate and I left meself as an orphan infant to be saved from starvation and exposure.

I became her one and only Couturier after Mainboucher but I only had her fitted for one gown, the paper gown for the Wadsworth Atheneum Paper Ball.  Georgette, my assistant, was given all of Rebekah's measurements by me and updated as well (based on the physical form as she was in her photo at the top of this missive) and Rebekah had access to my atelier just a few steps across a hall from her own suite of rooms at Harkness House so she could check everything there anytime and most probably after we all went home, designs, sketches, fabrics, works in progress et al...she owned it all as well as she owned me and I was happy to be owned by her.  So I never actually had to make a dress expressly for her since she could just instruct Georgette or pick something out among the samples completed as to what she wanted or needed from my atelier.  I was an in-house Couturier for Rebekah.  She also gave me herself.  Well of course I wanted to do something specifically for her but that would happen after I proved myself with this first collection and when the opening night of the Harkness Theatre was on us and I took my seat in front of her and Lady Bird Johnson I was a bit shocked to see what she chose to wear to this opening night.  She knew I would be and maybe she wore it to get my reaction or maybe she did it to make her statement for everyone else attending.  Certainly Lady Bird Johnson was in on her little trick that she played on us since the First Lady was her guest at Carlyle House, dined together and were the best of friends before they arrived...this tells me that Lady Bird Johson had an unusual sense of humour, as Texans are known to have, as well and went along with this incredible presentation Rebekah staged that night.  Wondering what it was?  Well you will have to wait a bit more.

As Gene and I took our seats Rebekah and I looked directly into one another's eyes intently for what seemed an eternity in time frozen ...I cannot say how long it was but maybe only for an instant.  In that locked glance I knew exactly what she was up to with her get-up and then I sat down facing the proceneum stage waiting for the curtain to rise.

She chose to wear a tight fitting pink gown with a design similar to a little 12 year old girl's with frills, lace and some crystal beads and seed pearls remeniscent of the 1930s and a blond wig with saussage curls hanging down all around.  To this she added a matching neckless, diamond earrings, bracelets, shoes and a little Shirley Temple hand bag decorated with diamonds and seed pearls with a drawstring that dangled from her wrist.  It was the most outrageous costume I could imagine anyone wearing in public and not on stage as a vaudevile act.  I think she did it just for me and then told the First Lady..."Watch Tzaims' reaction when he sees me."  Well I knew how to be cool and also I knew what she was after and about.  Now of course my reaction, which I suppressed and then felt amused was not what anyone else saw and my first thought was:  "The press is going to hammer her for that outfit if they are here." [I don't think the press saw this since it wasn't a press opening night] but on the other hand I don't know if anyone in the audience paid much attention or all they saw was the First Lady and also since they were all starring at the ceiling mural looking up as well and all having had passed a portrait of her in the lobby in front in another mural of what appeared to be a Dali painter wannabe extravaganza...in full view she managed to actually arrive and seat herself totally incognito...other than of course for me knowing since she placed my seat right in front of her own and I couldn't escape seeing and greeting her.  This one little event could inspire a whole book written on the subject and so I have to stop and go on letting other things surface that I knew made Rebekah Harkness the most clever and amusing woman I could ever hope to meet in my lifetime.

Actually this appearance that Rebekah presented to me did rather upset me and has given me much food for thought all these decades since after this event I saw her only a few times and just briefly when she came and went to and from Harkness House and her suite just across the hall.  Of course the door to this hall was not the main entrance to her suite.  She had a much more elegant one at the other end so it wasn't often she used this one.  Our tight and busy work schedules prevented any kind of fraternizing and I didn't think anything of it.  Out of the blue she asked me to meet her in one of the practice dance studios on the ground floor.  This one was somewhat her private work-out space after hours and the ballet company had left.  She asked that I bring and wear my tights and ballet slippers, which I had and that were black, along with my dance belt.  She knew I had trained in ballet and wanted to dance with me.  It was just the two of us one evening when the rest of the house was quiet.  The studio she used was very contemporary with modern lighting and a fine sound system.  She didn't have her pianist present.  We went through various moves one after another and it was obvious that she wasn't interested in performing on stage but kept working out for the exercize.  We didn't dance a duet touching.  I hadn't trained fully and never experienced dancing with a partner as might be expected so I wasn't trained to support a ballerina as is the custom in most French ballet duets.  I don't think this bothered her.  We didn't have an intimate relationship and there never was any indication or desire for one that I detected.  She was satisfied that I could dance well although I knew I was too old and rusty to do much.  I had given up ballet when I was 18, tried again when I was 26 when I joined the Atlanta Ballet Company, which lasted only a few weeks, when I realized it was too strenuous and difficult and besides my muscles would't stretch easily then and also my toes were always sore and bleeding.  This is an occupational hazard for ballet dancers...sore feet!  Now at an age of 35 I was surprised I could move at all, however, one doesn't ever loose the ability altogether.  It just isn't something one displays to anyone so this was quite the experience doing so for Rebekah Harkness.  After an hour or two we ended our little workout and left the building since it was late at night.

As the date to depart for Paris was soon coming on I heard that Rebekah had left with the company for her place in Watch Hill, Rhode Island and leaving the Harkness Ballet Company there in their training space she herself flew on to the Caribbean where she owned Capricorne Island.  The whole island.  It was used about that time in a motion picture that Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor filmed called: BOOM.  Taylor playing a character similar to Rebekah where a drifter lands on her island and is taken in and kept in luxury as her lover.  As I recall it was a Tennessee Williams play originally or created especially for Burton and Taylor as it was one of those films they cranked out, along with Faust, one a week it seemed.

At the time I was confused since there was no sign that Rebekah would be in Paris since her secretary who also acted as my secretary and generally for all expenses and bookings for travel claimed she had received no instructions to make any arrangements for Rebekah to go to Paris for my opening.  Of course she wouldn't and I should have realized that.  After all my project was brought about very quickly and her schedule didn't fit around it but was already set.  I just expected she would fit it in to her travel plans and was disappointed.  I said to her secretary that I was going to Capricorne Island to see her.  Looking at me astonished she stated:  "You are going to Capricorne Island?  Should I arrange your travel? When are you leaving." but her shocked expression made me hesitate and after a short interval I calmly said: "No.  I am not going." and went back to my workroom to finish up details to leave for Paris.

I only had one incedent that gave me reason the re-evalue my association after that and it had to do with Leon Frosin who appeared one afternoon with Richard Burton wandering around and visiting my atelier and office.  Leon Frosin was Burton's legal advisor as well as Rebekah and all mail and communications went to Frosin before going to Rebekah.  My legal advisor was Louis Nizer whose offices were in the Paramount Building.  Nizer was also Elizabeth Taylor's legal advisor.  I was introduced to Burton and a friendly hello was exchaned along with a handshake.  Later in Paris it was announced that Elizabeth Tayler had arranged the last minute to have her own line and collection of clothes presented at Maxim's in Paris near the same time I was presenting my collection.  It was a group of racy numbers that I heard was a bit like Hollywood and nothing was heard about it after it was shown but it occurred to me that perhaps Burton had been acting as a spy in my atelier and/or maybe planning to have Elizabeth Taylor take over my atelier.  That didn't happen, but the real sizzler was when I received a phone call at home at Midnight, six hours before flight time and departure for Paris when Leon Frosin called me and insisted I come to his legal office on 5th Avenue for a contract discussion.  The first time any contract was mentioned by him.  I called my attorney at home and was advised not to sign anything and that it was not appropriate for Frosin to have any discussion at that hour and without my lawyer present with me and there was no way he could manage to attend at my side.  He just emphasized not to sign anything!  Well I wouldn't have in any case knowing better.  I wasn't born yesterday.

Frosin wanted me to sign a 5 year contract that he had drawn up and I read through it very thoroughly and the clause concerning 5 years under conditions that I felt not at all desirable I handed them back to him. I won't say why as it isn't important here.  It really troubled me and he stated: "Well we can make it for 10 years if you prefer."  and that only made it worse!  One of his associates was also present in the office.  I said that I couldn't and wouldn't sign it under any conditions is when Frosin then stated: "Well forget about going to Paris then."  This I expected.  It was too obvious Frosin bringing up contract negotiations at this moment in time and knowing it was the end I got up and said: "Fine." and walked out of his office.  It was quite a dramatic moment I must say and I felt as though it was a scene out of a motion picture but calm as I might have appeared I was deep inside devastated.  Paris or no Paris there would still be a press opening there in NYC at Harkness House so not everything was lost.  I had been through worse situations and survived. 

As I was waiting for the elevator to arrive the double doors of his offices were flung open and he and his associate came rushing out and said.  :Forget any contract.  Go to Paris.  Good Luck and when you get back we will work out details with you and your lawyers."  and shook my hand.  It was a relief, having been put through this emotional experience, so I left with some concern for my future with Rebekah's lawyers.  But was this just a test?  I suspect it was and although I didn't take it as such at the time I must have passed that test but unfortunately I didn't feel too sure about anything after that.  The bubble had been punctured and although it didn't deflat I felt ill at ease with it.   I knew they had a lot of control concerning her interests and finances but whether she put them up to this or it was their way of conducting business for her was a question not easily answered.  Was it how they handled her affairs when she wasn't present gave me more food for thought but I went on to Paris thinking no more about it feeling relatively safe all would work out once I returned but I needed this success in Paris now in order to support my constitution to continue and cleared my mind of any further concerns.

Anushka, my house model originally from Paris, who modeled for all the great houses there earlier before moving to NYC including Yves St. Laurent, was in charge of all the packing and attending to the collection through customs both ways and when the Harkness secretary asked how many tickets did I require for Paris I asked for four.  One for Anushka and another model Judy and one for Gene, who would assist me, and myself.  There were no questions asked and we were on the plane headed for Paris at 6:00 AM arriving there at Midnight.  Percival Savage met us at the airport and escourted us to the Hotel Crillon and after we settled in he took us to have a bite to eat at a bistro on Rue Princess and to Castel's, a Private Dance Club, across from it for bottles of Dom Perignon Champagne and dancing.  On the way in we ran into Julie Christie and Warren Beatty who were in Paris for the premier of Bonnie & Clyde...Faye Dunaway was no where to been seen.  Percy introduced us and invited them to my opening at the Hotel Crillon.  Castel's is/was a private bottle club and quite elegant and with our jet lag we danced till dawn not feeling at all out of sorts until we had to get up the next morning.

Now I could go on with this Paris adventure and again write a whole book on it, however, it has more to do with me and my entourage rather than of or about Rebekah Harkness.  It is important, however, in illustrating that Rebekah Harkness was partly there with us the whole time and it was obvious that this trip was especially special because of her.  Everywhere we went we actually were Rebekah's representatives and ambassadors.  When they saw us, including Maxim's on a Friday night, they saw Rebekah Harkness in us.  We were her troope and doors opened for us like they opened for no one else.  We had created ourselves in her image and I must say that that image was magnificent and a wonderland opened up for us.  We didn't disappoint either.  We were what fashion in Paris was all about and we mingled in society without any trouble.  Of course I had lived in Paris previous to this but not in this style.  Percival had published that I was of Russian origin, as this was true about my father, so we were invited to Prince Obolenski's reception at the George V ballrooms and met up with all the Russian aristocrats and royalty including Prince Basil Yurievski, the exiled pretender of the throne and accepted present Czar of Russia, who had his guards bring me over to him where we spent the whole evening in a private discussion just the two of us.  Little did I know I was speaking to the Russian Czar at the time.  All I knew was that he was of the Imperial Family and lived in London.  It did surprise me that he seemed to know my surname and treated me like a member of his family.  Was all this set up?  Was I set up?  It would have all gone well but Eleanor Lambert, Eugenia Sheppard and John Fairchild upset the apple cart and sent everything flying into chaos!  "Murder!", they said." and then committed it in Women's Wear Daily the next morning in NYC after the showing in Paris.  An unforgivable act on their part.  I realized, not yet fully, that fashion politics sent its gears into place and became an international affair.  The darling of the fashion press of NYC now became the most hated fashion designer in the world.  It was now Harkness & Luksus and the daggers came flying at me en mass but the deed was done and I have no regrets...well as I said before only one and that is that I never saw Rebekah Harkness again in her life so I never knew what she really felt if actually she felt anything for after all I was free to do as I pleased and that meant free to come and go any way I chose.  It was my doing not to just keep on going with her and Harkness House.  I feel now that I should have just stuck it out no matter the circumstances.  Maybe more was expected of me than I realized and bowing out may have had some effect or at least added to the dissolution shortly afterward of the Harkness Ballet Company.  Could my presence with my couture helped to have held the whole thing together instead of it all crumbling so soon afterward?  It would be interesting to change history.  To go back in time and see what might have evolved had I remained and really took advantage of Rebekah's fortune.  I was frugal and cautions financially.  I might have with my methods helped keep others from draining her finances.  Yet on the other hand there was a deadly trio working at Fairchild Publications and John was dead set to destroy both Rebekah and me and I was black listed and banned from any further press coverage but even worse...erased from fashion history until the age of the computer and the demise of Eleanor Lambert, Eugenia Sheppard and John Fairchild but also too late for Rebekah Harkness and that wonderful land of Harkness House and the Harkness Ballet Company.  What a Wonderland it was!  It leaves me breathless and speechless just conjuring it all up after all these years! 

As Lawrence Rhodes just wrote to me in answer to my email to him at Juilliard:

Dear Tzaims,
How Strange for you to bring up this period with all its difficulties, and its rewards, of meeting Rebekah Harkness.  Perhaps we can have coffee in the Fall?
All the best.
Larry
Lawrence Rhodes
Director of the Dance Division at Juilliard
NYC

Now there you have the first part in a nut shell!