How Much Did Calvin Klein's 40th Anniversary Cost?





(above image via nysocialdiary)

Accounts vary. Of the 40th anniversary of Calvin Klein party on the High Line, the New York Post reported company executives admitted the cost was "well over $1 million." Fashionweekdaily goes even further. Way further. "The good folks at Calvin Klein spent millions (we heard six!) building a gallery space on 10th Avenue that led the likes of Eva Mendes, Claire Danes and Hugh Dancy, David Schwimmer, Halle Berry and Gabriel Aubry, Brooke Shields, Alan Cumming, and models galore onto a nearly two-block stretch of the outdoor park--and we're talking avenues."

Another equally glowing account from NY Magazine's Jada Yuan:

"There are some days when we can't believe we have to drag ourselves to another fashion show, and there are others when we can't believe we have the privilege to even stick our toes in this phenomenal world. Last night, Calvin Klein's 40th-anniversary celebration on the actual freakin' High Line gave us enough moments of childlike wonderment to last for the next ten seasons.

"Imagine an entire museumlike building, designed by architect John Pawson and artist James Turrell, going up in two weeks. A dramatic set of stairs set in the middle of a gargantuan white room take you to a balcony, and that balcony to a catwalk that leads you to the High Line. There, you're in a what looks like a gently curving mile-long garden planted with reeds and 3,000 white roses, each de-thorned and in a little bulb of water so you can take it home at the end of the night. Partygoers last night included Halle Berry and Gabriel Aubry, CK muse Eva Mendes, Naomi Watts, Claire Danes, and eventually most of the ladies of Entourage and Lipstick Jungle, tottering on gravel in towering high heels.

"Rosario Dawson was breathless. She took a call from a friend whose apartment overlooked the festivities. 'He told me he can smell the roses from his apartment,' she said."

Still, six million? For a party with so-so press? That figure sounds, on the surface, ridiculously fucking high, even at the height of this age in Imperial decadence. Six million is twice the reported amount of money that Wall Street buyout King Steve Schwartzman paid for his event which had Rod Stewart as "entertainment." Schwartzman, whose birthday party we described as "the most disgusting display of conspicuous consumption in Western Civilization since Trimalchio's Feast."

Still, spending a figure of $1 to 6 million dollars in a time of war (actually two) calls to mind Truman Capote's appalling "Black and White Ball" at the height of the Vietnam War, where drafted soldiers from the inner cities and the farmlands were fighting and dying so Babe Paley and Lee Radziwill could see and be seen. Then again, accusing Calvin Klein of crassness or of being shallow is at this point is probably stating the obvious.