The Cincinnati Enquirer from Cincinnati, Ohio • Page 18

Tuesday. May 20. 1986 THE CINCINNATI ENQUIRER FashionB-3 Fashion photographer's job flash and dash indeed M' get hung up in traffic, the rest of the nation's press waits until they arrive. It was not always thus. Charles led a revolution of sorts about 13 years ago, he says.

Back then, designers made absolutely no allowances for picture-takers. They packed the house with fashion groupies and friends, without a thought to leaving space for pesty camera clods. Things came to a head at a Calvin Klein show when assistants merely shrugged and told the photographers to go stand on window sills or in the back of the room. Charles and the others threatened a walk-out. "And within five minutes, bodies were rolling out of there to make room for us," says Charles.

"I just told them I'm not going to stand to see your show. I'm a professional. I do damn good work. You like seeing yourself in my paper. I'm not asking for a discount on your clothes.

I just want to be treated like a professional. I'm never getting on my knees to see your show again." There is an in-the-trenches kind of camaraderie among the 50 or so photographers who crowd into each show. Maybe it is because they all share the same working conditions. And all photographers have only split seconds in which to capture the pictures they need. "Other photographers will help you if they know you," says Frost of the Sun-Times.

"They'll help me squeeze in, or make room for my shot. Then maybe next time, I'll help them. By loaning a roll of film, you build friends. But of course, the first time in, you have no favors coming." Few writers and celebrities understand the breed. "Photographers are such a strange sort," mused a Ralph Lauren assistant after the herd charged out of the Hotel Pierre following Lauren's show in early May.

"They come in all shapes and sizes, and when they go, they leave little black droppings." Those are the empty film canisters. BY PEGGY LANDERS Knight News Service NEW There's Pauline. I LUFF her. I think she is bee-u-tiful. But she never turns.

"Ack! There! She turned! "Ack! She turned a second time! And now maybe a smile? She never smiles." Romanian-born Dan Lecca is in love. But he must woo his lady from a distance of 30 feet, while standing precariously on top of an eight-foot-long table he must share with 11 other suitors. Each is loaded down with bulky bags, lenses, cameras, tripods. In the end, they win not the model's heart, but her image. Their love affair lasts about 20 minutesthe usual length of a New York designer fashion show.

And then it's onward to the next extravaganza, the next romance or heartbreak, depending on whether the photographer gets an uncluttered view of the show. If the photographer is lucky, he'll be able to hail a cab. If he's not, he hauls his 30-pound camera bag andor backpack full of lenses and hoofs it the 10 or 20 blocks to the next show. (Or, pedals if he's Bill Cunningham, a photographer for Details magazine, who zips from show to show on a bike.) "By the end of the week, you have one lower shoulder," says Jim Frost, a photographer for the Sun-Times of Chicago. Beasts of burden Some photographers cover wars, some cover fashion.

Sometimes, they are not so different. Fist fights sometimes break out among photographers jockeying for position alongside a runway. In a supposedly glamorous business, fashion photographers are the beasts of burden. They get no respect, even though it is their pictures that appear in newspapers and magazines throughout the season. While well-dressed fashion editors and store buyers squeeze past them and delicately step over each other in the jam-packed auditoriums and ballrooms, jeans-clad photographers must battle for territory.

Editors and buyers usually get assigned seats. Photographers usually do not. Many shoot an entire show on their knees, kneeling before the altar-like runway. Or they might click pictures from their perch on a window ledge. And even after homesteading an area, they must play second fiddle to the video cameras of Cable News Network, Vide-com, "Entertainment Tonight" and freelance video companies hired to tape the show.

The sheer weight of their equipment is exhausting. Try climbing on top of chairs and tables and trotting across town with it. Two weeks, 70 shows "To me, it's like gearing up to do a marathon twice a year," says John Bright, 37, a freelance photographer who shoots the fall collections for Essence magazine. He worked seven years for Women's Wear Daily, and even then he would "train" for fashion market week by running five miles a day. To every show and there are more than 70 during the two-week New York market Bright carries two cameras, two lenses, two flashes, 30 rolls of film and a hefty power pack called The Eliminator that will charge as many as 200 flashes.

He also lugs around an aluminum pipe called a monopod, "so I can protect myself with it if I have to. He travels by subways and carries close to $2,000 worth of equipment. Don Hogan-Charles is a 23-year veteran of the fashion front. As the six-foot photographer for the New York Times, he's the guy everyone else moves over for. His deep, booming voice can be heard during a fashion show commanding a model by name to turn around one more Shooting New York fashions isn't as glamorous as it may seem.

At every show, photographers must jockey for position amid crush lining runway. time, just for his picture. And she usually does. When he orders another photographer to ditch a flash or get out of his viewfind-er, the other party had better heed the request. They all do, except the newer ones who aren't yet aware of the unspoken pecking order that rules what is known as "the or the top of the runway, where the best pictures are shot.

"The younger ones who don't want to buy the old system come in a half-hour or 45 minutes early to stake out a place at the top of the says Charles. "But that is reserved for the mainstay papers like the (New York) Times, Women's Wear Daily, Wand the New York Daily News." Getting rightful place Charles is one of the few photographers who has a seat waiting for him at the top of the T. A show won't start until he gets there. If Charles and New York Times fashion writer Bernadine Morris Jams riding new wave of popularity Rejuvenate leather with delicate ironing I4 'Mryn Clothesline V' -is 0M 3 BY KIMBERLY GOAD The Dallas Morning News A two-page spread in Life magazine (circa 1964) featured a group of Russians lolling on the beaches of a Black Sea resort, wearing striped pajama pants and terry bathrobes. About a year later, Dave Rochlen, a systems analyst turned Hollywood stunt man turned lifeguard and surfing enthusiast, picked up on the idea to create swim trunks for surfers.

He called them Jams short for pajamas. Rochlen was running a surf shop in Honolulu when he designed his first Jams, geared to the needs of the surfer. Big and baggy (the better to straddle the board), they had a drawstring waist, a pocket over the hip for surfboard wax and, oh yes, a stitched fly front. Jams quickly became the surfer's uniform, loved for their outrageous South Seas prints on quick-to-dry cotton sateen. Waikiki beachcombers, known as the "Jam set," popularized the look in Hawaii.

But it didn't take long for the comfy, oversized trunks to make it to the mainland, due in part to a pictorial in Life that featured Hawaii's newest export. Eventually there were Jams for women Gal-Jams, to be ex- almost anyone can get smocking help. Many garment patterns are available for all ages, as are design templates (called plates) for the actual smocking. Of course, many of us incorporate smocking into "regular" patterns. Please tell your readers that if their local newspaper or needlework shop cannot supply the name of a smocking guild, they can send a self-addressed stamped envelope to the national organization, and someone there will send the name of the nearest guild.

G.L., Colorado Springs, Colo. ANSWER: Thanks for all your information, and for including the national organization's address. It's. Smocking Arts Guild of America, 1980 Isaac Newton Square South, Reston, Va. 22090.

Readers in the Colorado Springs area might also want to know that G.L. is Georgina Bow Logsdon, of Georgina Bow Creations. Logsdon does pleating, teaching and fills special orders. Marylou Luther welcomes questions for use in this column, but regrets she cannot answer mail personally. Send questions to Clotheslines, co The Cincinnati Enquirer.

Jams were once the surfer's uniform. The baggy, drawstring shorts and pants are summer's hottest look. (calf-length) and Super Jams with pockets and an elastic waist. Perhaps more outrageous than any color or print combination Rochlen has ever come up with is the brand-new Leading Edge Jams collection for spring, including a calf-length dress for men. Hey, what could be cooler for apres surf? loose-fitting trunks, and Jams were more commonly associated with leisure wear than with swimming or surfing.

Which may be the reason Rochlen decided to expand his offerings. This spring, Jams have made a strong reappearance. There are still the original Jams that hit right above the knee, but now there are also the cheater Jams (cut a bit shorter), Judo Jams act which were designed in the same vein as the original men's version but were sold in two-piece "Jamsets" (Jamaica shorts with halter top, calf-length ruffle-bottom Jams with crop top, among them) and, of course, Jamkinis (bikini-cut Jams). When fiberglass surfboards replaced the balsa boards of the '60s, surfers no longer required BY MARYLOU LUTHER QUESTION: In the you have cautioned readers not to dry-clean leather, and once I think you printed directions for handwashing leather. I have a black leather jacket that isn't really dirty, but it's beginning to look rather dull and lifeless.

It is lined and has shoulder pads, so I'm afraid to wash it. Any ideas for rejuvenating it? H.G., Crawfordsville, Ind. ANSWER: I took your question to Alain Jochimek, who makes all of Paris designer Claude Montana's luxury leathers. He says that you can give new life to your leather jacket by pressing it at the delicate setting on your iron. Do not use steam, he cautions, and do use a pressing cloth on top of the leather.

Jochimek says his makeshift pressing cloth is the rayon fabric he uses to line the Montana coats and jackets. QUESTION: What jewelry, scarf, jacket, would make my so-called "little black dress" look like a big fashion winner now? The dress is a basic sheath, and I've always loved dressing it up; or down to suit the mood of fashion, but I'm not sure which accessories to use now. I've been invited to an important cocktail party in early August and would like to make the right impression. A.L., New York, N.Y. ANSWER: Gloves are.

the No. 1 accessory for fajl, and, provide the No. 1 device for updating old clothes. Follow Milan designer Gianni Versace's lead in his designs for Genny and wear your dress with elbow-length black satin gloves embroidered with jewelry. You can apply rhinestones with rhinestone setters or use; the stones from old earrings and necklaces in creating the design motif of your choice.

QUESTION: You have written about dress shields many times, but never about the kind I'm seeking. As you can see from my rough sketch, the shields I want are built into a vest-like top. Kleinert's used to make them, but I can no longer find them. Can you help? H.M., Anamosa, la. If you cannot find this Kleinert's style in your local fabric shop, or in the closet accessories and notions department of department stores, write directly to Alabama, 122 W.

34th Suite 1714, New York, N.Y. 10120, Attn: Barbara P. Patterson. QUESTION: This note is prompted by your response to the reader looking for a pattern using smocking. You would do your readers a real service to let them know that there has been a revival of smocking in the United States in the past 10 years.

Probably the item most responsible for this is the pleating machine. It makes picking up transferred dots obsolete. Since there are more than 14,000 members of the Smocking Arts Guild of America and many more who belong to local 'guilds, a lbs BLOSSOM TIME rL Pick a petal of savings flOD Our flower basket is filled with petals worth S5 to $100. Every petal is a winner on any purchase through-out the store. Please, only one petal per customer.

NOW May 20 to May 24 00 (32303831) (am 2643 Erie Ave.