Karl Lagerfeld on stars in Harper's Bazaar 9/2006 issue

[bag.lover]

Designer Karl Lagerfeld on stars in 9/2006 issue of Harper's Bazaar
(pasted from perezhilton.com)

Jessica Simpson:
"Ecch. I'm not that impressed. I'm not that interested. I'm not that impressed."

The Olsen Twins:
"They don't have a strong enough image. They still have to make the movie that everybody remembers." Does he find them a tad frumpy? "Extreeemely."

Lindsay Lohan:
"Shes somebody you want to protect, because she plays dangerously with her own life. She behaves like an over-grown-up person, and that's what I like about her. It's like she's 45, but in fact, shes 20."

Kate Moss:
"Girls have wanted to look like Kate Moss since she was an emaciated 15-year-old.Kate Moss has a lot of courage in the way she throws her life away in a very dangerous way, but that makes her so touching."

Pete Doherty:
"He's gone. His music - the look - is over now. there's nothing to think about it. It is too late."

Angelina Jolie:
"Stunningly beautiful. She has the kind of mouth other people pay to get"

 

[H_addict]

Jessica Simpson:
"Ecch. I'm not that impressed. I'm not that interested. I'm not that impressed."

I LOVE Karl even more now!!!

 

[PrincessMe]

Me too! Hilarious

 

[Kellybag]

Totally agree on his Angelina comment.

 

[momshell]

^ me too, I love Karl!

 

[bluxcape]

love the comments.. just so right.. hehe

 

[LOOKINGOOD35]

Karl is great

 

[svetty]

Karl is right on Especially his Angelina comment, she is so beautiful!

 

[Swanky]

Awww, Uncle Karl is such a little oddball.


EXCLUSIVE: 'I have no family,' designer Karl Lagerfeld has declared. But his secret American SISTER isn't hurt she hasn't seen him in 45 years - and would welcome him to her rural home town to share a Diet


He is the legendary fashion designer who this week icily declared: 'I have no family.'
Multi-millionaire Karl Lagerfeld said that he saw his entourage of male models as his real 'family' - and that although he had a sister in the United States, he suggested they had no relationship.

Christiane Johnson, 83, treasures her younger brother, and although she has not seen him since the 1970s, follows his career with affection - and keeps his achievements in pride of place in her modest home.
The grandmother-of-six pores over magazines for news of his successes and collecting photos and cuttings about his jet set lifestyle.

Baptiste Giabiconi, Karl Lagerfeld, and Brad Kroenig at a French AIDS benefit in 2010. Lagerfeld says his entourage of young male models is his real family - especially his longterm muse, Kroenig, of St Louis, MO

Christiane Johnson, of Portland, Connecticut, lives modestly but is actually Lagerfeld's closest family member - and keeps in touch with him while following his brilliant fashion career

Paris-based Lagerfeld, 81 - worth an estimated $125 million - told The New York Times last week that he prefers his entourage of male models to his relatives.
He said: 'I see them like family. I have no family at all, so it's good to have, like, sons but without the unpleasant problems sons can create.
'It's a choice, it's not an obligation. There's a big difference. I have a sister in America who I haven't seen for 40 years. Her children never even send me a Christmas card.'
But for his sister, it is just how the brother she is proud of is - and she is not taking it as a slight.
Mrs Johnson, 83, remains hopeful that her brother will one day visit her blue collar hometown of Portland to meet his great nieces and nephews for the first time.
Speaking from her two-bed $260,000 home beside the Connecticut River, Mrs Johnson told Daily Mail Online: 'I enjoy looking through the magazines and looking at the clothes - I've never worn any of them.
'I haven't seen him since the 1970s but people bring me articles and I keep them all.
'I'm not angry, I know he's really busy. He lives over there and I live here - it's just one of those things.
'I have the phone number for his kitchen but that doesn't do me any good. Then there's the six-hour time difference.

Distant but close: 'He lives over there and I live over here,' says Christiane Johnson of her brother, Karl Lagerfeld, whom she has not seen since the 1970s

Treasured: Christiane Johnson remains fiercely proud of the brother she has not seen for 40 years or so and keeps letters and other souvenirs from him, saying he is just 'busy'

Artifacts from her brother's life in fashion cover the walls of Christiane Johnson's Connecticut home and she looks forward to him visiting again, saying she would get him his favorite Diet Coke

'He's knows I've got grandchildren. My children don't remember too much about him. They would like to meet him again - we all would.'
The two siblings grew up in the German city of Hamburg, where their father, Otto Ludwig Lagerfeldt, worked for a milk firm and their mom, Elisabeth, was reportedly a lingerie saleswoman.
Mrs Johnson remembers her brother as a precociously-talented young artist who preferred to paint quietly in the family attic rather than play with other children.
'As soon as he could hold a pencil he would paint,' she recalled.
'He would love to find old pictures and paint on the other side of the canvas.
'He liked to read, he was intelligent and thoughtful. He would be up in the attic painting while I was playing in the street.
'He was obviously artistic but to me he was just a kid brother.'
Lagerfeld left Germany to study at the prestigious Lycée Montaigne in Paris and was hired as Pierre Balmain's assistant after winning the coat section of a 1955 competition sponsored by the International Wool Secretariat.

At 81 Lagerfeld enjoys the trappings of success, including a private jet. His godson, on whom he dotes, is Hudson Kroenig, right the son of model muse Brad, and the boy calls the designer 'Uncle Karl'. But Lagerfeld has never met his great-nephews and nieces, once of whom is four, a year younger than Hudson

He would go on to design for fashion houses including Chloe, Fendi and Chanel, becoming as recognizable for his trademark white ponytail, starched collars and dark sunglasses as his pioneering clothes.
'The first pictures I saw of his designs were when his coat was in the papers after the contest,' added Mrs Johnson.
'He would come back and visit but after he became known in Paris I would see less and less of him.'
Mrs Johnson herself moved to the US in 1957 and became an au pair for a family in Seattle.
There, she met her late husband Robert, a WWII Navy veteran and tax inspector.
The couple relocated to the East Coast to start a family in smalltown Portland, which has a population of 9,000.
They had four children, Caroline, Roger, Paul and a third son - named Karl after his uncle - who died tragically at 18 when he fell off his motorbike.
Mrs Johnson last saw her brother in the late 70s when he flew to the US and swept into tiny Portland in the back of a black limousine, sporting his now trademark dark glasses.
'That was the time when limousines were a bit special,' she recalled.
'The whole town saw a limousine come through - that was really something. I think he had his glasses on.
Portland, CT, has just 9,000 inhabitants - but back in the 1970s welcomed Karl Lagerfeld, who stepped out of the back of his limousine and turned heads as he visited his sister

Welcome: Christiane Johnson, 83, says her brother Karl Lagerfeld would be welcome at any time at her modest home in Connecticut, and she would be happy to get in his favorite Coke for when he comes

 

[Swanky]

The family resemblance, despite their different lives and long separation, is undeniable - especially in the mouth

Souvenir: Last August Lagerfeld sent a letter which included a signed photograph of him with his pet cat

In touch: Despite saying he has no family, Lagerfeld wrote to his sister last year

'He stayed just for the afternoon. I went over to visit him a couple of years later, I think. But it's so long ago now I can hardly recall it.
'Things are complicated. You have to have an airplane to go to France and when they come here it's so programmed that he doesn't have time for anything.
'He's very busy - how else do you make that sort of money? You can only do so much.'
Mrs Johnson and her brother occasionally exchange letters, most recently in August, when the designer posted her a large portrait photo and a note, handwritten in German and headed with his silver embossed 'KL' initials.
But when her husband of 54 years Robert died aged 92 on Christmas Eve she did not invite Lagerfeld to the funeral because she doubted he would be able to interrupt his schedule to attend.
Lagerfeld's productivity is renowned within the fashion industry and despite his old age he still designs 17 collections a year for Chanel, Fendi and his own Karl Lagerfeld line.
He hinted at it in the letter he sent his sister last summer, writing: 'I just cannot believe that you will be 83 and I will soon turn 81.
'Yet I am busier and more successful than ever. That is really incredible. Normally, people like me are retired for a long time but all of my deals (Chanel, Fendi etc.) are for life.'

His inner circle includes long-term muse Brad Kroenig, a married 35-year-old model from St Louis, Missouri - whose son Hudson is Lagerfeld's godson - the British model Jake Davies, 34, and Baptiste Giabiconi, a 25-year-old from France.

Kid brother: Lagerfeld's career begin in Paris in 1954 and since then he has become one of the world's most successful designers - to the pride of his Connecticut sister

Way he was: Lagerfeld as he was in 1973, close to the time he and his sister last met. He is holding a glass which appears to contain his favorite Coke - which Christiane Johnson says she would be happy to serve him

The pile of Karl souvenirs is treasured in her home

Mrs Johnson would love him to share some of his time with her beloved grandchildren - Jessica, 19, Collin, 17, Andrew, 14, Jonathan, 13, Anthony, five and Alyssa, four.
But she refutes any suggestions of bitterness and says her brother is welcome to pop by anytime for a glass of his favorite drink - Diet Coke.
'I read the stories about him in the papers but I don't pay attention to the negative things,' she said.
'He's my brother and I'm proud of his success.
'I know that he only drinks Coca Cola. I will make sure I go get some if he comes to visit.'

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2920488/Karl-Lagerfeld-s-secret-American-sister-says-isn-t-hurt-designer-says-no-family-love-drop-round-glass-favorite-Diet-Coke.html#ixzz3PUg5DT11

 

[FreeSpirit71]

^That's sad.

I think Karl has lost it. The designs at Chanel aren't what they used to be.

Karl is a real piece of work. Occasionally he elicits a laugh from me, but mostly I think he's a real pr*ck and deserves his nickname.

 

[Swanky]

It's time to retire
LOVE LOVE LOVED Chanel around 2006, not since.

 

[ByeKitty]

He and his sister kinda look alike... but they're so different it's hilarious! Her life in Connecticut seems so modest and she doesn't seem to care much about the way she dresses, and then there's Karl....

 

[zen1965]

I agree he should retire. However, what do we know what happened between his sister and him 40 years ago. I would not throw the first stone.

 

[Bag*Snob]

I do not like this man.