Iris Apfel returning to her Park Avenue apartment in 2019.
It’s hard to think that it’s been almost a year since Iris Apfel left us at age 102. She didn’t seem a candidate for death.
Starting Jan. 28, there will be an online auction of some of Iris’ clothes and objets at Chistie’s: Unapologetically Iris: The Collection of Iris Apfel.
They called Iris a “fashion icon” but her resemblance toTruman Capote’s tasteful swans was minimal except for an obsession with dress. No beige or greige outfits in her life.
Iris piled on a riot of textiles and jewelry and hats and belts and scarves and bags. The Metropolitan Museum of Art put on a fabulous show about her in 2005, and she became subject of an Albert Maysles documentary, Iris, in 2014. And from there a woman of fascination here and in Europe.
She says to Maysles’ camera: “There’s so much sameness. Everything is homogenized. I hate it.” After a pause she adds, “Whatever.” And off she goes covered in five(?) strands of big bead necklaces, bangles almost up to her elbows and in a tunic from a tribe, that she notes, comprised a Chinese minority. The tunic came with a hood that she didn’t like so she had it made into a collar.
Outside her condo in Palm Beach, you see Iris and her husband Carl waiting for a driver.
They were debating whose yogurt was sitting in the fridge, just like the loving old Jewish couple they were.
But a spacious and eccentric Park Avenue apartment was their natural habitat. The documentary has scenes of Iris walking through the grand-hotel lobby steadied by her cane.
At left is a picture of Iris coming in from the night in her finery. It was taken by one of the doormen who shared it with me. By the way, her skirt is part of the auction.