L'Wren Scott: Cathy Horyn's tribute to her dead friend gets it exactly right
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Version 0 of 1. Speculation around designer L'Wren Scott's suicide has been rife since her death on 17 March. Now Cathy Horyn – a friend of Scott's and the New York Times's esteemed fashion critic for 15 years – has penned a tribute to the fashion designer. Horyn, who announced her retirement from the paper in January, has resurfaced to write a measured, sensible – and sensitive – article, adding insight into Scott's life and death. Called "Memories of a friend, a teacher and a fighter", this is the kind of feature that only someone behind the velvet rope could have written. We learn that it was Scott's warm but professional manner that gained her the trust of a celebrity clientele – Horyn goes as far to say "she'd have an empire if she could talk one-to-one with her customers" – and how she kept her boundaries, not sharing every scrap of information "in an increasingly blabbering world". Horyn reveals how Scott worked hard, starting her business from scratch, but finding it difficult, and stressful to not do everything herself as her business grew. Most of all, Horyn is clear to set any gossips straight. She says that a rumour about a break-up between Scott and partner Mick Jagger is "rubbish". And she confirms that Scott was about to close her business, but that she "wouldn't draw any conclusions [from it] about her state of mind". Evidently, Horyn knew Scott well enough to respect this fiercely private woman, especially after her death. |