St Tropez Postcard
The beaches, the bathing suits, the looks, the books...
Dearest Readers,
Hello from a delightfully breezy and warm St. Tropez, a town I haven’t visited in fifteen years, but was persuaded to venture to once more by my darling daughter Ursula. After being literally fried alive in the 37 degree heat in Paris last weekend while moving her from her college dorm room in the 5th to her first flat, she suggested we train it down to St. Tropez for a little rest prior to returning to England. I had a date with Substack and Balenciaga at the Cannes Lions festival yesterday (I will bring you the full de-brief here next week, but I’m telling you now the day was amazing and fascinting in equal measure) so it all made sense geographically. Ursula wanted to holiday in France now that she speaks the language, and it has been a blessing to have a brilliant French speaker with me in a country where, although the French insist on speaking in English to the English, they simultaneously politely despise you for not being a fluent French speaker, which, dear reader, I am absolutely not. But more of Ursula’s views on speaking French later. Herewith, crucial notes from St. Trop:
St. Tropez is, according to Ursula, like a Disney resort which is pretending to be a real village, a micro-universe with its own particular rules and customs. The dress code here bears almost no relation to what is going on in the ‘real’ fashion world, and while the trendy set in London, Paris and New York are currently telegraphing their expensive taste via designers who are all about discretion and anonymity, the crowd that promenade in front of Senequier, the famous red-drenched café at the port in front of the mega-yachts are, mostly, dripping with ostenatatious, highly identificable logos. The evening look is a three-quarter length, draped chiffon, halterneck evening dress, cut as close to the bod as is possible to imagine, with all sorts of ties and ruffles at shoulder and neck, accesorised with wedge-heeled espadrilles and a variation on the theme of the $5-$30,000 price bracket purse. (Yikes.) The brand that is clearly doing best here this summer is Chanel, whose black vanity bag with the zip top and long chain is ubiquitous and seems beloved by the gilded teen girl set; second place goes to Hermès, whose miniature Birkins, in colours like deep purple and dark green, are slung off tan shoulders as casually as duffle bags; I award third place to Celine, whose new neo-BCBG gorgeousness has seen ladies flock to their leather-trimmed beach baskets.
Cobbled perfection in a square in the old town. It’s sort of tacky-charming the way St. Tropez somehow seems to be stuck forever in the 1980s, a time when driving a Bentley along the harbour front at 2 miles an hour was considered glamorous, and Ra-Ra skirts were the height of sophistication. There are still masses of Bentley’s slowly on the prowl here, (despite this being the most car-unfriendly town I’ve ever experienced) ditto the Ra-Ra skirts, but my favorite trend has to be the emergence of what I am calling the Ra-Ra Dress, a heavily embroidered, cotton mini dress with ruffled sleeves and neckline, tiny tight bodice and a skirt consisting of layers of frills that barely cover the butt. There are stores here selling only Ra-Ra Dresses, if you can imagine.
