I am currently making my daughter's prom dress, and she is the most difficult client of all! Celebrities aside, teenaged daughters -- especially those who are much more worldly and sophisticated than me — make for quite a discerning clientele. But her beauty melts me.

After a lost weekend of watching Audrey Hepburn in My Fair Lady, and a season of empire gowns on the runway, we created an inspired white gossamer dress, replete with fresh water pearls and vintage crystals with corset lacing at the wrist, an empire waist and the slightest train of crinkle tissue georgette. I happened to mention that I thought it would be perfect for Courteney Cox — in that pale regal yet spunky gamine sort of way. A friend of a friend of a friend of Courteney Cox-Arquette told me to pack it up and she would see if she could get it in front of her stylist. I packed this particular gown up, plus another simpler black chiffon slip with deep teal chiffon overlay, and off they went in a custom Poeta box -- the packaging as gilded as the gowns themselves. And then I didn't think much about it, just hoping I might see the dresses again someday if she decided not to wear the dress. (We were always sending expensive one-of-a-kind dresses off for photoshoots, never sure if we would ever see the dresses—and all those hours of beading—again.) About a month later, I came home and turned on the answering machine to this message: "Hi, this is Courteney. Not sure if I have the right number, but I have your lovely dresses here, give me a call....."

See Willoughbyphotos.com for lovely archival images of Audrey Hepburn from My Fair Lady

c keith vintage is a clever and poetic line of body care: Coriander Citrus, Green Lavender, and Heirloom Garden. The travel kits will be gifts for everyone I know this year, too darling not to give away en masse.

Since Poeta had a bit of the air of the Belle Epoque, right around the premiere of the film Titanic (noted for detailed costumes) we got a call from an editor of Elle magazine to do a photoshoot for a story around vintage-inspired clothing. Here are some raw images from that day of shooting. We flew in family friend/dancer Jennifer Hanna and recruited the stunning waitress from Gelato Vero on India Street in San Deigo to be our models. Joel Beeson is the photographer. As a documentary photographer, Joel was gracious to consider fashion photography as a favor to me, and it was his insistence that we use non professional models in the documentary style that makes his work so lovely.