Synopsis
They glitter, they dazzle, they fool the eye, but one thing is certain: they are all concocted by the world's most beloved and successful designer of costume jewelry, Kenneth Jay Lane.
In Kenneth Jay Lane: Faking It, the designer tells us in his own words about his remarkable career and equally remarkable life. The entertainment begins as Lane recalls his transformation in the early 1960s from a shoe designer for Christian Dior to his rookie period designing jewelry for Hattie Carnegie. Knowing "everybody" was the best way to build a career, and this bon vivant has been fortunate to combine life and work into one seamless string of delightful adventures, all of them wonderfully told.
We learn of Kenneth Jay Lane's friendships with Diana Vreeland and the Duchess of Windsor; with First Ladies Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Barbara Bush, and Nancy Reagan; and with such legendary film greats as Audrey Hepburn and Claudette Colbert - all of whom inspired and wore so many of his jeweled creations and are seen here in period photographs. Not only did women influence the designer, but so did his various travels and his great interest in art. From the markets of India to the Crown Jewels of England and the world's great jewelry houses, Faberge and Cartier among them, Kenneth Jay Lane has found scores of ideas for his celebrated creations.
Paired with Lane's charmingly told anecdotes are dazzling photographs of his jewelry.
Reviews
If you're just a little bored with Tiffany's (a girl can use only so many tasteful diamonds, after all), here's a change: Kenneth Jay Lane: Faking It, the fabulous faker's tribute to himself and his 30-years-plus as a creator of wildly imaginative costume jewelry. Friend and jeweler to First Ladies from Jackie Kennedy to Hillary Rodham Clinton and celebrities from Audrey Hepburn to Linda Evans, Lane has used glass emeralds, plastic turquoise, and gold-plated metals to create eye-popping accessories. Now, writing with Miller, he shares the secrets of his inspirations and creations. (Abrams; $35.00; Oct.; 160 pages; ISBN 0-8109-3579-1; color and b&w photos) -- Copyright ©1996, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Unabashedly, Lane admits in his memoir to having borrowed the designs of Bulgari, Schlumberger, and David Webb, among other precious-jewelry creators, for his fashion-worthy fakes. But to own just a few Lane pieces is to live vicariously in the company of Barbara Bush, the late Jackie O., Madonna, Princess Di, and others, and, more important, to possess the cachet of style. As is to be expected, the breathless reporting in this autobiography (written with a cowriter) flits from one topic to the next, one name to another, as readers try to follow, in some sequence, the exact life of KJL after his graduation from the Rhode Island School of Design. Ultimately, though, most will surrender to admiring the photography of John Bigelow Taylor, enjoying the celebrity tales, and wondering what such a collection would bring at auction. Barbara Jacobs
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