Norma Kamali, redux

I graduated from college in 1981 and started working in what would become a string of motley jobs over the next three years. I never had any money and would go to whatever restaurant I fancied on payday, and then subsist on a diet of Planter's peanut blocks and random birthday (other people's) treats. It wasn't a healthy diet, but I was young.

I coveted this skirt but couldn't scrape up the money to buy one, so I decided to make one myself. I had my mother's 1939 Singer sewing machine, bought a pattern and black sweatshirt material and went to work. I hadn't been in front of a sewing machine since HomeEc in junior high (where, and I am not making this up, my teacher's name was Mrs. Housekeeper) and even then I wasn't very good. I made my skirt and in the dark, dank bars and clubs in NYC, no one knew or cared that I was wearing a homemade Kamali.

Some of Norma's wares are now available at Wal-Mart, although for me, along with peanut blocks and bounced checks, the time has past. Enjoy Norma Kamali in today's NYT