Molly Guy

I was walking to the subway a couple of months ago wondering, for the billionth time why, yet again, I was suffering through another cold New York winter. Every year I proclaim that next winter I’m going to head west, or fly south, to avoid this bitter cold and every year I find myself still here, brushing aside style in favor of warmth as I sulk thru 4 brutal months. So there I was grumbling into my giant, may as well be a duvet kind of jacket, when up ahead I noticed this really chic looking girl in a dark navy blue coat and just the right amount of messy, thick blonde hair! Feeling small, round and gross (I’m 5ft 11inches so clearly I have some body dysphoric issues!) I turtled my head into my walking sleeping bag and slunk past her, as ever in a hurry to get out of the cold. Actually that reminds me of another winter I suffered thru, way, way back when I was at art school in London. I had bought an ankle length brown puffa jacket that I thought was just the coolest thing ever. Apparently, my very dear friend Nats thought so as well and went and bought the same one. Being that we were great buddies, we hung out a lot and thus, at best, we became known as the walking Twix bars at worst the two walking poo’s! … Anyways I digress…back to this NY winter and the chic blonde in the blue coat. It turns out she too was heading to the subway and when, on the platform she turned around, I saw that it was non other than my ‘ole co-worker pal Molly Guy from back in the Nylon mag days. We had both worked there

in our mid twenties, she as a paid beauty editor, me as an unpaid contributing fashion editor?! Back in the day we bonded over cigarettes and crappy boyfriends; cut to 2014 and our bonding was of the over 35 years old variety….babies, marriage, no sleep, exhaustion, yoga (she does it, I don’t, wish I did) work and more exhaustion.
Since I had last seen her, Molly had married a hunky writer, become a mum to the adorable little Sunny and has opened what has become one of the most successful wedding showrooms in America… “Stone Fox Bride”. Aghast at the lack of any cool wedding showrooms, when she was getting married, she set about researching how to run a business before launching her own showroom, the name of which was inspired by a quote from the “Virgin Suicides” …. “Who doesn’t want to be a total Stone Fox? ”
A favorite of the hip crowd, Stone Fox has dressed the likes of Ashley Olsen, Lily Aldridge, Jemima Kirks and Sarah Sophie Flicker, to name but a few. However her blog also serves as a sounding board for all the thousands of other

brides out there, as a home for them to tell their own beautiful, romantic stories of engagement and show the world their rings. Brides to be who wish to be dressed by Stone Fox can make an appointment to go to the dreamiest showroom on planet wedding! Draped in a sea of floaty white dresses, flowery accessories and vintage rugs, brides to be can see their dreams become reality in this bohemian heaven high above the tourist filled streets of Soho.
Molly might look like an angel with her bright blue eyes, big beautiful smile and long blonde hair, but don’t be fooled, she is a savvy business woman. Always thinking of ways to make her business bigger and better, energy spills out of her as she multi-tasks her way thru our shoot trying on a dress, speaking on the phone and typing an email, all at the same time..
As our shoot was winding down there was time for one last outfit change. I found this beautiful long veil with a headband of roses. Thoughtful silence fell over us as we pondered some serious styling issue of what to pair it with – and then the penny dropped, Molly decided to wear the veil and only the veil…! So for the last few minutes of our shoot a veiled Molly danced around her show room, free as a bird and as naked as the day she was born before it was back to the computer, phone clamped to her ear, business as usual, sprinkling just the right amount of cool, chic, beautiful fairy dust over her brides summertime weddings.

Who is Molly Guy?!
Still trying to sort that out myself. Circle back to me in the year 2070 — maybe I’ll have an answer by then.

What did you want to be when you grew up?
The hybrid love child of Janis Joplin and Phllip Roth.

How did you get to be where you are?
One day when I was twenty-nine, in the nascent miserable stages of my Saturn Return— after a dear friend made a suicide attempt, the same month my big sister announced her first pregnancy — it occurred to me that I could choose to live or choose to die. I chose to live.

If you could go back in time and give your 16 year old self some advice what would it be?
Girl stop hotboxing your mom’s minivan and start studying for your SAT’s.

If the wardrobe in your bedroom would lead you to another world what would your Narnia look like?
Coco Chanel’s closet mixed with the inside of the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test bus.

By day you are….? I run around below fourteenth street slinging wedding dresses, selling shmattas and hustling to make a buck in my downtown wedding showroom….By night you are? I’m in my Brooklyn apartment in a torn kimono and t-shirt from seventh grade trying to write a book, vacuum and Facetime with my parents while my daughter smears spaghetti sauce on the walls and my husband watches reality TV involving fishermen, crabs and Antartica.

What was one of your favorite past projects?
In my twenties I prided myself on giving many a mean coconut oil handjob, usually to a tattooed thug I met at an East Village karaoke bar only hours before.

What are you working on now?
A book, a dress collection, making a baby.

and what do you dream of happening in the future?
I have a vision of laying on a big blanket on a big beach somewhere surrounded by my kids, my husband and a big German Shephard police rescue dog named Chicago.

What song do you love that you keep secret ’cause it’s too embarrassing to say publicly you like it?
“Live To Tell” by Madonna still gives me chills.

Whose version of ” Young folk” do you prefer Kanye Wests or Peter Bjorn and John Feat featuring Victoria Bergsmans?
My wi-fi is so bad in here do I have to answer? I’d rather just read a book.

Are you a morning person or night person?
Mid-day.

Any advice for peeps just starting out?
Advice: Don’t give it, don’t take it. Always leads to trouble.

Is there a quote or mantra you live by?
I sat next to Jim Jarmusch at a wedding once. We talked for a while and I remember him saying “my religion is my imagination.” I wrote it on a napkin and have been carrying it in my wallet since. It’s a tie between that and a Diane Di Prima quote my mom taped to my bathroom mirror the morning of my high school graduation: “You can have what you ask for. Ask for everything.”

What do you want to be when you grow up?
Honestly I really want to be a high school English teacher. Maybe in ten years or so — after the novelty of wedding rings and white dresses has worn off.