Kim, Julia shine at Givenchy show on 9/11 anniversary

NEW YORK: Julia Roberts and Kim Kardashian sat front row at Givenchy’s spectacular New York fashion week debut, a meditation on love to the backdrop of Freedom Tower on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
The French giant’s decision to fly across the Atlantic for the first time to unveil a ready-to-wear collection made the hugely ambitious, celebrity-studded show one of fashion week’s hottest tickets in town.
It was held outside at sunset on Pier 26 next to the lapping waters of the Hudson River and before the glittering lights of Manhattan’s skyline, including Freedom Tower, built on part of the site destroyed in the Al-Qaeda attacks.
The meandering set was crafted out of sheets of corrugated metal and wooden crates, which made for rather uncomfortable seats, and conjured up the impression of a bleak or even war-torn landscape.
Rap star Nicki Minaj, dressed in a body-clinging, ruffled animal print dress, was the first A-list star to arrive, closely followed by an elegant Hollywood leading lady Roberts.
But the show kicked off more than an hour late, after the delayed arrival of reality superstar Kardashian, her pregnant belly draped in transparent black lace, on the arm of her husband, Givenchy-loving rapper Kanye West.
Friday was a somber day in the United States — the 14th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people in 2001 at the former World Trade Center in New York, at the Pentagon and in Pennsylvania.
Givenchy extended the theme of inclusivity by inviting more than 1,000 members of the general public to a show that would ordinarily be seen in the flesh by just an elite band of fashionistas.