Minnie Mortimer's Official Fall '09 Collection Preview At The Cooper Square Hotel

by DOUGLAS MARSHALL · April 15, 2009

[Peter Davis and Minnie Mortimer. Photos by CHANCE YEH for PMc]

When designer, socialite and new mom Minnie Mortimer designs clothes, she designs for herself. “I design things that I want to wear; I don’t think about other people. I’m that selfish,” Minnie shared. She’s a tall, leggy and striking girl about town who creates a practical wardrobe of staples which fit well and look good so that others can buy them; that doesn’t seem so selfish. In fact, there are a lot of people out there that want to be wearing what Minnie is wearing.

It all started with a minor shirt dress obsession – but ones she found from other designers never worked in the way she wanted them to. Minnie hauled over to a shirt maker and had some shirt dresses made up for herself out of very fine fabrics and spared no attention to detail: strategic pocket placement, larger collars and the perfect belt to accentuate a petite waist. People liked the shirt dresses to the point of envy, resulting in Minnie creating some for her friends. Eventually the laws of supply and demand took over and the invisible hand guided Minnie to create her shirt dresses for anyone to buy. This was last summer and the shirt dresses were all the rage. Cut to April 2009 at the Cooper Square Hotel in the Penthouse – Minnie’s first official collection preview for Fall 2009.

As a guy who has thought about wearing a Minnie Mortimer Shirt dress to the beach once or several times in the past, I was eager to see what she came up with for Fall 09. This girl has some serious talent. Her line is very boy meets girls, country meets city and function meets form. The clothes are fun wearable staples that are flattering in cut like the smock dresses, skirts and the double breasted Peter Blazer – named after her dandy brother, Peter Davis. The simple color pallet of khaki, gray, black and navy in supple wools and cottons allows the tailoring to show for itself. Eye-musing surprises like checkered, gingham and plaids fabrics are mixed in and round out the creativity. The line is practical and lovely and it’s not trying to be something that it’s not – kind of like Minnie: Real.

The fete at the top of the all new Cooper Square Hotel was great and of course a designer who doubles as a socialite can really draw a crowd to celebrate her launch. Among her admirers were husband Stephen Gaghan, Peter Davis, Alexis Bryan Morgan, Alvin Valley, Amanda Ross, Andrew Saffir, Daniel Benedict, Tinsley Mortimer, Topper Mortimer, Georgina Schaeffer, Jim Shi, Mickey Boardman, Miguelina Gambaccini, Faran Krentcil, Tatiana Sotiriou and Whitney Spaner.

[Minnie Mortimer's Guide To Style] [Daily Style Phile: Minnie Mortimer]