We first encountered style goddess Olivia Palermo in flowing contrasting florals on the arm of now husband Johannes Huebl at the 2013 Sentebale Royal Salute Cup at Greenwich Polo Club, featuring Prince Harry and Nacho Figueras.
Since then, Palermo — a New York City native who attended St. Luke’s School in New Canaan before going off to the American University of Paris and The New School in Manhattan — has become even more regarded as a “street style pioneer,” says shades company Westward\Leaning, “known for her classic yet modern fashion sensibility.” Indeed while others wear sunglasses as an accent — or merely to shield their eyes — Palermo has been known, according to Westward\Leaning’s website, to use its Malcolm in the Middle line of shades as inspiration for an ensemble, pairing Malcolm 06 Rose Gradient frames with a red coat of lipstick.
So it’s no surprise that Palermo — founding chief creative officer of Olivia Palermo Group in Manhattan — launched a collaboration with the independent West Coast sunglass company, known for its high-quality unisex versatility, last month. Westward\Leaning x Olivia Palermo — featuring four styles, each of which comes in different iterations — enables you to see the world through rose-colored glasses, or virtually any other hue.
The Bristol 04 plays on the popular cat-eye style in a hammered polished rose gold metal frame and rose silver mirrored lenses. (It’s named for Le Bristol Hotel in Paris, a favorite of Palermo’s.) Mayfair 02 — after the posh London neighborhood — is nautical but nice, with a polished navy acetate frame with white acetate accents and navy gradient lenses. Moore 01 — named for the Tribeca street — offers a classic frame of black acetate with standard gray lenses. Seaspray 03 crystallizes Palm Beach memories in bronzed lavender gradient mirrored lenses framed in polished translucent sand acetate.
But Westward\Leaning isn’t Palermo’s only collaborative coup. On Feb. 13, Karl Lagerfeld’s company announced that it was teaming with Palermo on styling pieces for its Fall 2019 women’s collection as well as co-creating five bespoke designs. Five days later, the fashion giant was dead, having transformed Fendi and Chanel, “Sex and the City”-fying the latter’s signature bouclé suits. Lagerfeld left behind a Birman cat named Choupette, who has her own maids, diamonds and Instagram account; a string of controversial witticism on everything from work (a big fan) to curvy models (not so much); and an example of self-reinvention. “KARL LAGERFELD Styled By Olivia Palermo” will launch at KARL LAGERFELD stores, online and via select wholesale partners in June.
“Being able to collaborate with the visionary and iconic KARL LAGERFELD is truly incredible,” Palermo — herself with 5.8 million Instagram followers — said in a statement. “I am so proud to bring our shared vision to life on this project and infuse my own eclectic perspective to KARL’s Fall 2019 collection.”
For more, visit oliviapalermo.com, karl.com and westwardleaning.com.
