BlackBook Magazine

A story that couldn't possibly be true, although we hope it is true (but probably not): the rumor that Target may sign Alexander McQueen as their next Go International Designer. The popular, inexpensive collection has in the past snagged big names like Luella Bartley, Alice Temperley, Proenza Schouler, and Erin Fetherston. And although they have a deal with Sigerson Morrison in the pipeline, there's never been someone so high profile as McQueen. Neither side would comment on the rumor, though McQueen has been wetting his feet in the discount market recently. In 2006, he started his own lower-priced diffusion line McQ, and he designs footwear for Puma.

Armed with a decent punk pedigree, Joe Corre has opened the doors of Terrorist, his new East London menswear shop. Corre, the son of Sex Pistols manager Malcolm McLaren and punk/new wave designer Vivienne Westwood, says he's simply building on the family tradition of combining fashion with attitude. But Terrorist? Little severe, perhaps? "It's just a word that's used to describe the enemy," Corre says. The clothes are designed by Simon Armitage (AKA "Barnzley") and range from day-glo camouflage jackets to T-shirts bearing the images of Geronimo and Napoleon. The shop is, well, bizarre. Among the threads are an Inuit bow and arrow, chainmail suit, stuffed boar, books, and even a prosthetic leg previously worn by a member of the Hell's Angels. "We have a Hell's Angel's leg here. They're terrorists right?" Right.

"Man, you don't tell someone you're a bad driver," a guy wearing gold chains and enough product in his hair to re-spark the Great Chicago Fire once advised me. So, let's say that if I ended up in a fender-bender on the eastbound side of the 10 in LA, it'd be because of Ruben Ochoa -- not because of how jumpy I tend to get when someone cuts ahead of me on the highway without signaling. A couple of years ago, Ochoa affixed large landscape photographs to a concrete wall that bordered the 10 for a project entitled "Extracted"; he created the illusion that pieces of the wall had been removed, revealing the hills behind it. But his intent wasn't to deceive, but simply to inspire.

In the Hamptons, check out new listings for Springs General Store (basic shack with sublime pies) and La Fondita (a stylized but stylish taqueria). For full listings, see our Hamptons restaurant guide.

Looks like Miss Kate Moss is one step closer to getting that jet, as Topshop -- home of Kate's fashion line -- may be expanding to China. Topshop boss Sir Phillip Green is rumored to have rented space in the Shanghai Superbrand Mall while eyeing other locations in Beijing and Hong Kong. With China's boom economy and Asia's known love for Western culture, this will be big money for Topshop and Ms. Moss as well. Says a source, "For the Chinese teenager with an eye on Western fashions, Kate Moss is pretty much the coolest person on the planet. Philip Green knows that only too well." Industry flacks guestimate that Moss could make "£15million to £25million" for helping tap such a huge market. Not quite enough to buy a new G650 -- they're $59.5 million -- but getting there.

The sordid sartorial scandal continues! Pineapple Express actor James Franco told a reporter that the shark-and-kitty T-shirt he sports in the stoner flick was designed by the film's director David Gordon Green, and not a concept ripped-off from the Brooklyn T-shirt company WOWCH. "What? That's ridiculous," Franco. "We completely created that shirt and that shark. David wanted me to wear a purple Monterey Bay T-shirt with a whale on it. I said I wasn't into the whale shirt, so he came up with his own design, which was the shark." Plagiarism is a publicity goldmine, turns out.

“Patti Smith is such a goddess. I could never talk to her,” Parker Posey confided at a small cocktail reception for the legendary rock ’n’ roll poet last week in the outdoor sculpture garden at the Museum of Modern Art. At said moment, Smith came lunging in for Posey, lavishing praise on the indie queen for her hilarious roles in Christopher Guest movies. It couldn’t have been a better-scripted scene if Guest wrote it himself. Luckily, Posey overcame her goddess-shyness and lit right up in Smith’s presence. The occasion was a screening of Patti Smith: Dream of Life, a poignant biopic from fashion photographer Stephen Sebring that hit theaters this week, after eleven years of filming.

Dulce Pinzon is just one of 36 artists who were selected to take classes at the Bronx Museum of Arts' Artists In the Marketplace program. The program focuses on inculcating its students on the fine print of copyright, law and taxes, along with dishing out lessons on marketing. However, more notable is the exhibition that punctuates the finish of each term. This year, the specter (or perhaps the jowls) of Morrissey looms over the graduating class' show. "How Soon Is Now?" -- like perhaps the aggregation of work from any academically-inclined creative community -- finds the work of its artists incomplete, if never fully-realized. Consequently, the show has had its fair share of critics, like this one and this one. But we adore these critics because they bare their teeth. And years from now, we'll see who among these 36 haven't given up and are still soldiering forward, despite the vitriol.

The machines are rising. A band of crazed winos, astute in the field of microelectronics, have created an artificial tongue whose sole purpose is to taste and evaluate wine. One might wonder what the point is of having an electro-palate evaluate your wine for you, but the tongue is meant to serve more industrious purposes. Wineries send their product to labs for examination, but the process is a slow one. The new device is meant to speed things up. Six chemical sensors measure acid, sugar, alcohol, as well as other wine characteristics. But why use tongue when you can have your very own robot/slave? And this trend isn't simply limited to wine. Electronic connoisseurs are looking to replace professional tasters entirely, one bud at a time.

Graydon Carter -- editor of Vanity Fair and owner/savior/matchbook-maker at the Waverly Inn -- has come to the rescue of yet another beleaguered New York restaurant. Word has leaked that Carter, along with a pair of partners, has purchased the Monkey Bar in the Hotel Elysée.