On models and modes: Perry Ellis, which also produces clothing under the Nike, Tommy Hilfiger and Jantzen brands, is determined to put Miami on the fashion map. A look at the firm's latest show - Reporter's Notebook

South Florida CEO, August, 2002 by Andrea Marks

Saturday night. The Palms hotel. The ever-chic South Beach. Tourists float in and out of the tiled entrance, mixing with buyers, editors and businessmen who arrive on foot and by car for the event. This is not just a party, however. It's a fashion party, with a capital F, and all the props are in place.

There is the check-in: A very official-looking desk decorated with very official-looking clipboards. Smiling young girls (a standard theme at fashion parties) hand out neon gummy bracelets to smiling invitees. A few steps up is a reception area where a group of cocktail waiters offer the now-ubiquitous official drink of fashion events, the Cosmopolitan. All around stand small groups, chit-chatting and sipping their drinks. The New York fashion flock huddles by the bar, easily detected by their perfect Miami summer outfits -- complete with their perfect Miami summer Jimmy Choo footwear. Off to the side is a doorway where a small group has gathered. May we expect another fashion prop? A gift bag? A celebrity? Instead, it's a doorway to something rarely embraced in the fashion world, yet continues to inspire it: History.

The party is for swimwear brand Jantzen. Miami-based Perry Ellis Inc., which recently acquired the swimwear license, has thrown the party (officially known in fashion PR language as the "Hottest Night in Town Gala") to formally launch its 2003 season swimwear line. But Perry Ellis has chosen to focus on the future of the company by looking at its past.

To pass through the doorway from the reception area, guests are granted an admission ticket through a window that replicates an old-time ticket booth. Inside is a living Jantzen archive. For a fashionista it's magic, a veritable museum of swimwear history, a chance to see up close bathing suits that are now only pictures in books.

There are the full one-piece bathing suits that replaced "bathing costumes" -- wool rib-knits that may have weighed as much as 8 lbs. when wet. There is "The Twosome," a one-piece (despite the name) that came with its very own skirt and belt. There are low-leg suits from the '50s, maillots (high-cut one piece suits) from the '80s and every cover-up from toga-like pareos to wide-legged palazzo pants. There is a tree of bathing caps, some so beautifully preserved and well-crafted they look like art. ("Oh my god!" exclaims one guest when she happens upon the cap tree. "My father used to make me wear those every time I went swimming.")

Exiting the mini museum, we are directed to the hotel's garden courtyard, transformed into a playground of Americana. We are welcomed by a pair of models, in vintage bathing suits and bathing caps, dressed to resemble the red-diving-girl Jantzen logo. An ice-cream stand waits in front of a Jantzen-themed gazebo.

More models (this is a fashion party) stand around in groups of three on the lawn, each trio representing a Perry Ellis brand. And as we wander through this maze of swimwear -- the floral patterns, the tiny two-pieces, the red, white and blue of the Tommy Hilfiger collection -- we are struck by a sense of what Miami Beach might have been like before it became South Beach. And we experience a sense of pride in the local fashion industry -- aka Perry Ellis -- for having the guts to forgo the glitz and the glamour of "South Beach" for the innocence and the fun of old Miami Beach. And for acknowledging the 92-year history of a company and its swimwear fashions.

Fake tourists wander about, chatting up guests with a noseful of zinc, Hawaiian shirts and rubber floats. A woman with red curls piled atop her head wanders the party in a '50s dress and full makeup. She finds her partner, a Cuban bandleader in a guayabera, who drags her on to the dance floor to kick off the celebration.

Rounding a corner we are greeted by perhaps the greatest embodiment of sexy swimsuit Americana -- Marilyn Monroe. Monroe, it seems, was a Jantzen model back in the days when she was known as Norma Jean. And as the Marilyn impersonator mugs, we look around at the guests, who mingle with the Lucy and Ricky impersonators, eat at tables scattered about the pool, hit on the swimsuit models.... Hit on the swimsuit models?

There is a vintage-swimsuited model lounging on a pedestal next to the stairs. And there in front of her is a fifty-something man, tanned and well-dressed, chatting away. "You look lovely in that suit. How old are you?" he asks, looking her up and down. "Twenty-one," she smiles graciously.

And in that moment we are transported back to reality. Fashion (and its parties) may evolve. But some things will never change.