MARC’S NEW MAN: Since the fashion industry first began asking “Who’s the blonde girl?” at the Paris men’s shows in June, 19-year-old Serbian Australian model Andrej Pejic has emerged as a poster boy for fashion androgyny. His long, platinum blonde hair and feminine features caught the attention of, among others, Steven Meisel and Mert Alas and Marcus Piggott, who cast him in spreads for French and Italian Vogue, teaming him up with Daphne Groeneveld, Freja Beha Erichsen, Iselin Steiro, Iris Strubegger and Givenchy’s transgender muse Lea T. Jean Paul Gaultier not only booked Pejic for his spring 2011 men’s show, he also cast him in his spring ad campaign alongside Czech supermodel Karolina Kurkova — who posted a photo of herself and Pejic from the shoot last week on Facebook, both sporting matching women’s trenchcoats. Now it looks like Marc Jacobs may also be going the guess-the-gender route for his Marc by Marc Jacobs spring campaign. Pejic recently returned from shooting the ads in Marrakech with Juergen Teller alongside look-alike Latvian (female) model Ginta Lapina. Born in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Pejic and his family fled the war-torn region in the Nineties before settling as refugees in Melbourne, Australia.
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ARMANI’S GIRL: For the first time, Giorgio Armani has tapped model and actress Elisa Sednaoui to front his spring ad campaign. Photographed in London by Nick Knight, the ads for Armani’s signature line will bow in February.
SAVING FACE: Most companies want what Facebook has and not vice versa. But Physicians Formula Holdings Inc. could be an exception. The Azusa, Calif.-based cosmetics company is listed on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol FACE. Should Facebook go public as is thought in 2012 or later, FACE would be ideal for its stock market debut. But Facebook would encounter obstacles if it tried to obtain FACE from Physicians Formula. Regulations prevent companies from selling their ticker symbols. Still, there is another possible route to Facebook nabbing the coveted FACE ticker symbol. In a deal that would be barely detectable on its balance sheet, Facebook, which was recently valued at more than $52 billion, could acquire a mass market leader in mineral makeup and bronzers with a market cap of less than $60 million. One commenter on the Yahoo message boards thinks Facebook chief executive officer and co-founder Mark Zuckerberg will indeed make a play for Physicians Formula to secure FACE. “I am convinced he will buy out this company at whatever cost,” wrote commenter draj1234. With FACE under his belt, Zuckerberg could also have his pick of one or several of Physicians Formula’s products to add some much-needed color to his face of the nonticker variety.
THE OTHER WEDDING DRESS: While the world waits to see the wedding dress — the royal one — make its debut on April 29, they can feast their eyes on another white wonder set to go on show in London this spring. On March 12 — Yohji Yamamoto’s giant white silk wedding gown with bamboo crinoline will go on display in the cavernous Boiler House of the Wapping Hydraulic Power Station, as part of a three-pronged tribute to the Japanese designer in London. The dress, from the autumn 1998 season, will fall from big metal tanks that make up the roof of the Boiler House, and will look as if it is descending into a bottomless tank of water. Visitors will be able to inspect the dress from a small wooden boat, rowed to the center of the space by a boatman. The exhibition will run until May 14, alongside “Yohji’s Women,” which features work by photographers including Nick Knight, Peter Lindbergh and Paolo Roversi, which has also been curated by The Wapping Project. Meanwhile, a major retrospective of the designer’s work will take place at the Victoria and Albert Museum from March 12 to July 10.
ESQUIRE’S PICK: British Esquire has appointed Alex Bilmes editor. Bilmes, who was most recently features director of British GQ, succeeds Jeremy Langmead, who left Esquire in September to take up the post of editor in chief at Mr. Porter, Net-a-porter’s men’s wear Web site. NatMag said that earlier this year British Esquire posted a 10.3 percent rise in circulation in the six months to June compared with the same period last year, with a total average net circulation per issue of 58,151.
BOTTOMS UP: The requests keep pouring in for Esther Perbandt. The Berlin-based fashion designer has been tapped by Scavi & Ray, the official Prosecco suppliers to Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Berlin, to design limited edition zip-on “jackets” for large-format bottles modeled on a silk and leather woven minidress from her fall 2008 collection. Perbandt was also one of five German designers invited to create luxury accessories inspired by the holiday 2010 diamond-cut limited edition of Absolut Vodka, called Absolut Glimmer (along with Lala Berlin, Sabrina Dehoff, Patrick Mohr and Starstyling). Perbant’s creation, a brilliant blue leather wristlet on a silver chain, features an embossed impressionistic diamond effect. The accessories, each limited to a run of three pieces, and priced at 499 euros, or $661.40 at current exchange, are being sold on verypoolish.com, the online shop for Munich concept store, Pool. Finally, Perbandt was asked to design the bar staff uniforms for Berlin’s new Karim Rashid interior-designed Nhow Hotel. The sculptural black looks contrast with Rashid’s amorphous colorful forms in the hotel’s Envy Bar. Nhow’s cocktail master, Christina Schneider, returned the favor, designing The Perbandt for the drinks menu. The eponymous libation includes Ketel One vodka, sake, lychee liqueur, elderflower liqueur and lemon bitters.
SIOUX CITY: Paris label Rue du Mail is hosting an exhibition of photographs by artist and musician Ami Sioux at its headquarters and boutique at 5 Rue du Mail. The selection of self-portraits will be unveiled Thursday with an evening event featuring a concert by Sioux, who is working on a follow-up to her self-released first album, “To Take You Down.” The images will remain on show until Dec. 21.
ON A ROLLAND: Fresh off red-carpet credits for Rihanna, Lady Gaga and Beyoncé for award shows earlier this year, Stéphane Rolland will be the fifth French couturier to get a runway retrospective at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. Forty of his couture dresses will be paraded Dec. 10 as part of the museum’s “Fashion in Motion” program.