Vanity Fair's Best Dressed LOLs

Every year the endlessly pretentious Vanity Fair (just read the title: Vanity Fair? What, a carnival for the egocentric and narciccistic?) publishes an "International Best Dressed" list. This year was a joke.

Completely ignoring the idea that good style can be achieved without wealth--something The Sartorialist caught onto three years ago--the list is essentially a slow trinkling from the wealthiest American socialites at number 1 (the stunningly beautiful Ivanka Trump) to the less-wealthy (and bat-shiz crazy) on the tail end. And by crazy, I'm talking about Fran Lebowitz.

There are some inspired choices, however. Carla Bruni (images on right) is a perpetually tortured underdog, a true survivor in the poisonous web of 21st Century world politics. She's beautiful, married to the most intriguing national figure on the planet, and most importantly, she started out like any other girl. She was a model, a musician--she was not born the First Lady of France. But then again, where else could a former model become a First Lady?

Bruni is one of those women that has completely owned her physical silhouette. She knows her body, as any former model would, and dresses every inch of that body in clothing that clings in the right places and fits loosely in others. Extra points for keeping it simple and chic, too--lots of greys and blacks. (It's surprising how hard it is to actually pull off a darker, colorless look.)

Sarah-Jessica Parker also scored high on the list, which is kind of funny, because I'm not so sure the brilliant stylings of Carrie Bradshaw "carrie" (HA!) over into reality. In other words, SJP may not be so faaaabulous as her Sex & The City counterpart. Nevertheless, I'm a fan of SJP as a person--she's kind and down-to-earth, or so I've heard--and her husband is just as relaxed (I met him in NY two years ago).

Naturally, Vanity Fair has to kiss-[you know what...] to keep the editorial contributions coming (especially after such low sale numbers recently), so they throw in the odd fashion nut every five selections or so. Evelyn Lauder is one of those fashion nuts. Not in a good way. Estee Lauder, yeah, yeah, I get it--big deal. But the picture Vanity Fair selected to represent Ms. Evelyn (pictured left) is hilarious to me. If that is one of the thirty best-dressed women in the entire world, my grandmother could quite literally take the crown on a retirement pension from the University of Texas.

Of the male recipients, there was one truly deserved, and that was of Matt Lauer. I do watch Today on occasion, if the television is near me while I brew coffee, and I always notice Lauer's clothing choices. He keeps it classic but with touches of sartorial brilliance--like his ridiculously brown brown Oxfords and a midnight blue suit. The men around the office teased him, "Why aren't you wearing black shoes with a grey suit?" And he responded, "I just never liked the way it looked."

Spoken like Karl Lagerfield himself.