Style in spades

Elegant Tina Ocampo, dahlings, has been busy as a bee lately, having transformed into a bag lady–a tres glamorous bag lady, mind you.

Apres the Rafe New York affair, the tres fashion- forward Tina O. brought the Kate Spade Spring 2002 collection to town. Naturellement, dahlings, the fashionably au courant know that Kate is a world-famous accessories designer.

Greenbelt Mall’s popular Mix Boutique became the site of another chi-chi cocktail affair, its fashion installation perfectly in synch with Kate Spade’s fabi masterpieces.

Pink and white roses provided counterpoints to Emilio Aguilar’s paintings. Page One provided the books, Flos Steltz provided the lighting and B & B Italia and Citimex provided the designer furniture sets.

And what would a fashionable affair be like, palanggas, without gorgeous models? Joan Bitagcol, Phoemela Barranda, Isabel Roces, Rissa Samson and Raya Mananquil showed off Kate Spade’s gorgeous collection.

Kate Spade created such a stir with her latest collection that fashionistas headed to Mix a day before the opening to be the first to catch the best of Kate’s shoes and handbags. Among those who simply had to have a Kate Spade were glamour gals Mandy Santos; Jay Leung; Nanette Medved-Po; Monique Sison; Liaa Cojuangco-Bautista; Eleonor Aguinaldo; and Theresa Lopez.

Then on the day itself, it was elbow-ing time for some of Cosmo-Manille’s glam gals and guys like Asian Society’s Doris Ho; the eye-catching mother and daughter team of Vicky and Christina Soriano; Tatler’s Anton San Diego; Chris Lopez; Hotel InterCon PR maven Jenny Peña; Shangri-La’s Rochelle Moreno; Ayala Land’s dedicated working team of Rowena Tomeldan and Winnie Nazareth; Mega’s Liza (with an "L") Ilarde; and businessman Elbert Cuenca. Our very own Philippine STAR’s Teresa Herrera with fashion stylist sister Rosario Herrera; Mix manager Tante Flores; and young Prince of the PR Industry Keren Pascual. Amigas from fashion magazines– MTV Fashionistas, E! Philippines, The Kikay Machine as well as F of ABS-CBN–came in full force to cover the event.

Power couple Ricco Ocampo and Tina O. mixed with the invitees who sipped red and white wine courtesy of Anonymous and who enjoyed the excellently prepared cocktail finger food from the popular Kitchen.

Well, palanggas, still wondering why Kate Spade–and her awesome artistry– is real hot these days? Simply drop by Mix Boutique in Greenbelt and find out for yourself!

Right on, Bench!

That brilliant apparel magnate, Ben Chan, dahlings, did it again when he unveiled Bench’s Overhauled super denim line.

The show drew one of the biggest crowds during the 10-day Philippine Fashion Week 2002, despite having been put together in barely two weeks. With a stunning array of male and female models who included some of the hottest and most good-looking young faces, Overhauled, the Bench Denim Fashion Show easily turned out to be one of the highlights of this year’s Philippine Fashion Week.

"Wonder Boy" Ben C. demonstrated anew that he really has mastered the pulse of today’s hip consumers. His Bench T-shirt and underwear line, palanggas, as well as fashion accessories and cosmetics, are snapped up by eager consumers as soon as they are out on the shelves.

Whether the credit should go to its celebrity image models, or Bench’s aggressive and always innovative marketing strategy, there is no doubt that Bench is the Philippines’ leading apparel brand.

With Bench Overhauled Denims, palanggas, Ben proves that versatile and timeless denims have become the universal fabric of the hip, young, and adventurous, palanggas. As with all of Bench lines, the results are a better fit, a better look, and most of all, easy wear-ability.

A major product line like Bench’s Overhauled Denims deserves nothing less than a grand introduction. That was exactly what it had at the Glorietta Activity Center.

Three noted designers with highly-individualized fashion styles, palanggas, were hand-picked by Ben Chan himself to stamp their signature styling on the collection.

Cecile Zamora, influenced by the Japanese avant-garde school, gave an intellectual and non-traditional spin to the Bench Overhauled Denims by clothing movie heartthrob Diether Ocampo in a T-shirt with a print of a fetus. Her styling was severe and celebral, featuring apron tops paired with denims, polos worn with sleeves tied behind the back and–take this–a Bench brief used as a shirt!

Wonder designer Rhett Eala dressed up Bench’s tops and bottoms with his signature chiffon ponchos, giving the garments a trendy, dressy party zing.

Original fashion maverick Ernest Santiago came up with a tribal and ethnic look using accents and details like feathers, fringes and florettes. The result was rock-chic flair and casual glam.

As expected of any Bench event, palanggas, there were celebrities galore on and off the ramp. Other showbiz hunks who showed off their muscles, abs and biceps on the ramp were Bench underwear image models Jomari Yllana and John Hall; beefy actors Antonio Aquitana and Wendell Ramos; Canadian-Filipino VJ Mickey Randall; and that handsome new member of Star Circle, Robby Mananquil. Standouts were the gorgeous Phoemela Barranda; statuesque sisters two, Rissa Samson and Raya Mananquil; and the unsinkable Marina Benipayo.

Easily the eye-catchers in the crowd, palanggas, were the original Bench Man, Richard Gomez with his stunning wife Lucy Torres-G.; Mat and Lynda Ranillo who rooted for their daughter on the ramp; actor John Estrada with pals Mike Gayoso and Jay Heredia; former Bacolod Rep. John Orola with Club Panoly Boracay president James Lau; Ayala Land executives Rowena Tomeldan and CJ Jesena; and past and present members of the Professional Models Association of the Philippines (PMAP) who incidentally put up a retrospective photo montage specially for the show.

The show was superbly directed by talented Jackie Aquino and Annette Coronel-Cruz. Sponsors were FIX Bench Salon, E! Entertainment Television and Fabbri.

Now that Bench has reached out for the market dominated by multinational labels, there is a formidable new player to contend with in the jeans trade. And with Ben Chan’s in-exhaustible ingenuity and marketing pizzazz, it certainly looks like it’s going to be an interesting challenge.

Right on Ben Chan!

Pahiyas in the Park

Think Lucban, Quezon, and the first thing that enters your mind is Pahiyas, dahlings. Every May, the people of Lucban hold the Pahiyas Festival (as if you didn’t know, palanggas), a special tribute and a sign of gratitude to San Isidro Labrador, the patron of farmers, for a bountiful harvest.

During the festivities, house facades and street corners transform Lucban into a fantasy land with elaborate colors, colors and more colors, plus farm produce, yummy native delicacies and the famous edible kiping.

The Century Park Hotel Manila, through the effort of its well-respected general manager Bobby Carpio, brought to the metropolis the beat, the taste and the excitement of the Pahiyas through its superbly prepared Pahiyas Food Festival.

The fiesta opened with a ribbon-snipping ceremony led by such hotshots as Romin del Rosario Jr.; brilliant Adrian Cristobal; taipan Julio Tan; and boy-ish, good-looking Lucban Mayor Serafin Dator, no less, palanggas. These guests of honor received floral wreaths in a putungan dance from members of the Sinag Banahaw Cultural Dance Troupe of the Southern Luzon Polytechnic College in Lucban. Apres came the Sinag Banahaw, performed by the maglalatiks (males dancing with several bao on their chest and back); the binasuan (where males and females balance candles in glasses); and the karatong (where females in baro’t-saya dancing while holding colorful tingting).

During the ceremony, dahlings, the invitees were asked to try the hotel’s attractive kiping decorations (kiping, for those who are not in the know like moi was, are translucent rice molded from kabal, cacao, banana or coffee leaves). These wafers are usually strung together to form mobiles, or chandeliers hung outside to decorate houses.

Apres the cultural performances, everyone headed for the Café in the Park where they enjoyed a buffet of Lucban dishes from ensaladang Lucban platter; to embotidong Lucban; escabecheng maya-maya; pinangat na laing; and adobong baboy na inalamangan sa dilaw.

While we indulged in the gastronomic offerings, finalists of the Lucban pageant walked around the Café modeling clothes by Jayvee Babiera, Lito Gomo and Zsazsa Silvan. The three Lucban designers, palanggas, fashioned their terno outfits from buntal, anahaw and buri, embellished with palay, kiping, wooden beads and wooden flowers.

Other highlights of the fun Pahiyas Food Festival were the crafts display brought by Filemon Casilag and the exhibit of products as diverse as buntal hats, buri wallets, plus, plus, to puto seko and miki Lucban, used to make the famous oh- so-good Pancit Lucban.

Being at the Century Park Hotel was the closest moi ever got to being in Lucban. Next year, I hope to make it, palanggas.

Well, that’s it, dahlings. You can’t go wrong mix-ing it with Bench, n’est ce pa?

See you.