FOLLOW YOUR DREAMS

March 15, 2021 Posted by Vicky Tiel

Do whatever your head tells you to do (IF it’s legal).
I went to Parsons Fashion School in NY and wanted to become a « FRENCH COUTURIER ». The head of Parsons in the sixties did not like my sexy print mini dress, nor my hot pants jumpsuits and certainly not my tight Bordeaux lace jumpsuits with flower applique only on the crotch and the bustier and she told me in no uncertain terms that the school would not recommend me for 7th Ave job but I should definitely try working in Las Vegas.

The head of Sears Roebuck fashion division, Bill Grant, came to Parsons in NY from Chicago at our graduation to choose a junior designer for a new division that Sears was creating and HEAVENS TO BE I was chosen along, with my future design partner, Mia Fonssagrives. We were to start the first Junior Fashion clothing line at Sears. When we told Mr. Grant we were off to Paris he told us all the better, please send the latest youthful clothes to copy and send your sketches and we got paid 25000$ a year plus expenses. That was a lot of money in 1964 for a 20-year-old. I worked for Sears for 15 years and the most fun was shopping for Sears shoes with Elizabeth Taylor in her Rolls with a driver in Paris on thé Fbg St Honoré.

Of course, the mini in Paris became a hit, Mia Vicky were photographed in five pages in Paris for LIFE magazine, and as we dressed Elizabeth Taylor for a film and she became our partner in our Paris store Mia Vicky on Rue Bonaparte, which is now the name my best selling perfume on HSN TV where I work. I spent over 30 years in BERGDORF and NEIMAN MARCUS and now French haute couture is over. I never give up and my best-selling perfume SIRÈNE and ULYSSES are now carried in WAL MART, 56 years later. I did the full fashion circle.
WHAT IF I HAD LISTENED TO THE HEAD OF PARSONS?

Life lesson #1 Always follow your dreams.
Lesson #2 When you are twenty do not take advice from boring 50-year-old women, only wild-ass 77-year-olds like me.

WHAT AM I WEARING? Made in 1968 my Mia Vicky mini t-shirt dress was beaded with couture beads and is covered with a Mia Vicky black chiffon shirt, my lace crochet stockings are French, my black hat is my father’s from the ’50s, my red tennis shoes are now at Wal Mart, my handbag is from Dallas Neiman Marcus in 2000 and I collect the Bakelite 50s bracelets from Palm Beach stores vintage stores.