Chins up, people. Hem lengths, too.

Here we are at the outset of what is shaping up to be a six-week season of grinchiness. Holiday festivities, we are told, are being downsized and will amount to little more than a plate of cold cuts with a lump of coal as the centerpiece. This year BYOB means bring your own bonus.

So we can choose to dress in a manner appropriately morose for the times and prove the timeworn adage that hems fall with the stock market. Or we can throw caution to the wind, as John Galliano did on Monday night, when he arrived at a party wearing the traditional button-covered costume of a Pearly King (the neighborhood monarch who protected the local street vendors of Victorian London). The mother-of-pearl buttons on his suit formed a pattern of vines, and his top hat was trimmed with rings of fresh daisies. The room was hotter than an orchid house.   Read the whole story