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SUNDAY 12 SEPTEMBER
Madonna is picking at her sushi at the next table. Minnie Driver and her sister Kate are knocking back champagne. You've just bumped into someone very small and bearded and realised with a shock it's Sylvester Stallone.
Barely has New York fashion week opened when Donatella Versace breezes in from Milan and throws a post-show Versus party so starry it's impossible not to stare in a very uncool way. Before the show season starts - and this time New York is first off before London, Paris and Milan - you ask yourself which show/trend/girl/ party is going to knock you sideways. Well, that's one down, three to go. Madonna's appearance with a team of designer bodyguards, her NBF Rupert Everett and her daughter Lourdes (who at three-years-old already has a wardrobe of junior Versace couture and a passion for catwalk shows) puts a smile on the face of even the grumpiest fashion editor. It's just so glam.
Crash into my bed that night vowing that I'm going to shed a stone, take up Pilates and do something about the shameful state of my nails. There's something about New York women that makes you feel like a scruff. Parties just make it worse.
MONDAY, 13 SEPTEMBER
Haven't shed a stone, have forgotten about Pilates but do get my nails sorted at a Greenwich nail bar (surely one of the best American inventions ever). Dash in between shows and told to "choose colour please" from a library of nail varnish bottles in every shade from shell pink to whore's scarlet and my nails are filed, buffed, creamed, slapped about and blow dried. Fifteen minutes later I'm hailing a cab with sparkling new hands.
Highlight of the day is definitely Marc Jacobs - very downtown New York chic. Adored by fashionistas on both sides of the Atlantic, he is the man behind Louis Vuitton's funky new look. Jacobs' show is polished, clever and wearable. We love the sunburst stitching on his jeans and trails of sequins on cotton jackets and trousers. The show is bursting with the new league of bombshell girls - Estonian goddess Carmen Kass...
