2012 Design Indaba Film Festival: Bill Cunnigham New York

When you are done reading this post, please go to the search box at the top of this page and type in 'Bill Cunningham' and press it. And see how long it has been that I have loved Bill. Bill of the fame of the movie Bill Cunningham New York. I saw the documentary last week as part of the Design Indaba Film Festival and I am totally and forever grateful to them for bringing it to our screens. Because as long as I have loved Bill, I now love him so much more.

He is a wonderful shining smile in a sea of sour fashion faces. He is a giggle and a hop of joy in a field of couture cool. He is a whisper when all around him are a shout. And this was so perfectly captured in a moment in the film when a blogger was trying to get into a Paris show while Bill stood silently by, until a man swooped in a scolded the door lady, taking Bill by the arm and saying, "No! This is Bill Cunningham. He is the most important man on Earth." And so he is for a moment or two in my life.
He is beautiful as a human being. Charming and charmed by the vagaries of fashion. At 82 he is not going to be around forever, but like the Nelson Mandela of fashion, I wish he would be. LOVE.