5 days before show…..

and this is either what’s running through my head or happening. Fed to you in real time, from a Creative Director and Founder

The show is in five days.

A peaceful nights sleep. Anxiety manifests itself in my dreams. I dreamt that Brittany, who runs our PR, invited the football player Malcolm Mitchell, Art curator Nazy Nazhand and 30 runway guests stayed at my home prior to the show. We had just painted the house in Farrow and Ball colors that were a blend of ring 3 shades. The guests brought more guests and they all created Pinterest boards with glue and pushpins on my walls. I called the police but everyone claimed squatters rights.

Please note this dream makes no sense, there’s no underlying Freudian moment happening. I hope.

7:30am: a guy gets on the 4/5 train, he’s holding up a book. He says he’s written a novel about abstinence. It’s $20. You can Venmo him. He seems to have his own reasons for his choices. I’m about to publish a book, and I’m having visions of myself promoting it on the Subway, a backpack filled with hard copies. I give him a $20, he signs it for me. I’m a karma freak in general, but especially around runway time. Someone takes the book and puts it on my son’s chair. Nice.

8:00am: Sarah gets to the office and says some random guy was preaching on the train about abstaining from sex before marriage. I told her don’t worry, I bought the book. She can read it when Gabe’s done.

8:30am: The office is filling up with models. I had some yogurt drink that was in my fridge and it tasted ok so I’m assuming it wasn’t expired.

9am-5pm: model casting, try on looks, argue (discourse amy, it’s just discourse…I tell myself) frequently with Sarah and Traci - we’ve all different ideas on who is in, who is out. And ultimately we find we also have very similar ideas. Those we zero in on.

Throughout day: The Production Team is pounding me with questions. Where’s the lineup (it’s only fucking Monday!), can you approve the bench layouts, the wall won’t fit we can either remove part of the ceiling or use a curtain instead (no. yes.). Production is VERY ANAL. And that’s good, because it takes a lot of assholes to make creativity work. Pun intended.

5:30pm: show venue, test sound, comment on Javier’s music compilation, approve that fucking curtain that should have been a wall but a jackhammer and ceiling removal is neither pragmatic nor creative.

6:30pm: Cassius Cam. We’ve hooked Cassius up with his own camera to let people see RUNWAY week through his eyes. He’s now hooked up like these guys:

And you can check out Cassius’ point of view on instagram at: Tibicreativelab. If you don’t know, that’s the area where the creative team is allowed to run around unfettered and do things and then come ask me for forgiveness instead of permission. ALSO because of the way we’re approaching runway this season, you’ll be able to watch the show LIVE from that site. We’re taking a very creative and pragmatic approach to the show and because of this, it makes more sense to feed it live and raw here - we’ll give you the shiny polished version at Tibi when we are ready. Ok?

7:pm: Reed and I interview a Junior Art Director Candidate. Promising.

7:48: grab dinner at food hall at Grand Central Terminal - a prepackaged Greek salad and then a bonus giant baguette from Zabars because they’re closing for evening and giving it away so that it doesn’t go to waist. I’m very Parisian as I get on my train.

5am: note to Lilly - fuck, did I book flights from London to Vienna yet? Please remind me about hotel also.

I can’t go back to sleep……go make coffee.

5:30am-6:30am: my brain is switched on. I tackle the last chapter, last paragraph of my book - the area where Bria from Penguin has said - “let’s really nail this ending - take another stab.”

6:30am: press send to Bria, I love this. Hope you do too.

6:40am: final touches on marketing brief that Sarah and I will review with store stylists on Firday morning.

7am: Frank awakens and comes down; I’ve had 3 cups of coffee and ask him if he can make a 7:30 am train. I slink away and call an uber to take me to the train station - alone.

8:41am: My train is pulling in to Grand Central, I’m pressing send, right now. On to day 2, I’ll keep you posted.