16th century King Philip II of Spain is a significant historical figure for me, although I enjoyed more of Cate Blanchett’s 1998 “Elizabeth” than the 2007 sequel “Elizabeth: The Golden Age”, I’m  amused to watch one of my favorite actor Jordi Mollà on the latter playing the part of the king where my country of birth was named in his honour.

With the holy water, I got baptized into Christianity, my spanish name Navo, my mother Elvira and my father Cesar, both names of spanish origins, unlike me, the Philippines has more name changing than a witness on a protection program, the ancient Greeks called the archipelago of 7,107 islands “Maniolas”, Chinese traders named it “Ma-yi”, which means “Land of Gold”, the Portuguese born-Spanish explorer Ferdinand Magellan baptized it “Archipelago of St. Lazarus”,  few years after and another explorer of mother Spain Ruy López de Villalobos renamed the colony “Felipinas” in honor of Prince Felipe (later crowned as King Philip II), later evolved to “Filipinas”, the Americans called it “The Philippine Islands” and at present time “Republic of the Philippines”.

Most people familiar with my work are surprise I’m not a “60 yr old overweight blond caucasian dude” the first time they meet me, another creative or a model, or someone I bump into a line for my venti iced caramel macchiato in starbucks, the top inquiry is, “where is that accent from?” Il’d reply-“Philippines”, they’ll say- “Oh, Manny Pacquiao“, suddenly it hit me, the modern world has renamed the island of my ancestors “Republic of PACMAN”. The ancient Greeks will see the “Maniolas” renamed after the gladiator PACMAN, as America “the United States of Britney Spears” to the middle east, as far as I remember when I was living there. But this is not about Filipino gladiators in the world history of Sports, but the Filipinos who made a name and headlines in the world of Fashion.

It’s fascinating and sometimes appalling to read or watch the news to know that a visionary magazine editor, a notable fashion designer, an iconic first lady, a groundbreaking model, and a controversial Versace murderer has altered and continue changing the course of the world’s fashion history as we speak. Quoting the author Hodding Carter “There are two lasting bequests we can give our children: One is roots, the other is wings.”

Stephen Gan

Creative director at Harper’s Bazaar, co-founder of Visionaire, editor-in-chief of V Magazine and Vman magazine.

Born (1966) and raised in the Philippines, arrived in New York City when he was 18, immediately becoming a prominent NYC club kid Gan studied at Parsons School of Design and began his career as a photographer. In 1986—while he was still a student—legendary Times lensman Bill Cunningham shot a photo of Gan on the street in SoHo, took him for coffee and a cookie, and gave him a quarter to call Annie Flanders, the soon-to-be editor of Details. Gan’s meeting with Cunningham proved fortuitous: Flanders later offered him the position of fashion editor at Details. After the magazine was sold to Condé Nast and Gan was kicked to the curb, he used $7,000 of his severance pay to print 1,000 copies of Visionaire with co-founders James Kaliardos and Cecilia Dean.

In 1999, he launched V Magazine, an offshoot of Visionaire focusing on young art, fashion, and culture. His day job, though, is at Harper’s Bazaar, where he was named creative director in 2001, one of Glenda Bailey’s first hires as editor-in-chief. Gan is also director of Dream Project, a creative powerhouse, with advertising clients such as Calvin Klein, Dior, Fendi, Shiseido, Olay Colour Europe, Tommy Hilfiger, D&G and Missoni.

Monique Lhuillier

Born (1971) and raised in Cebu, Philippines, fashion designer based in the United States. She’s the daughter of Michel Lhuiller, a successful businessman of mixed French Filipino descent, and Amparito Llamas, a society figure & former model of Spanish-Cebuano Filipino descent. Lhuillier’s family is prominent in Philippine society. Lhuillier demonstrated good taste and great imagination at an early age. At 15, she was an outstanding student in Lausanne, Switzerland and hoped to become successful in the fashion industry. Her parents sent her to the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising (FIDM), where she met the man she married, Tom Bugbee. Lhuillier and Bugbee, a young, dynamic husband and wife team, founded their company in 1996 and launched their first bridal collection. The line was extremely well-received by fashion-savvy brides, editors, and celebrities.

The breakthrough came after Monique designed the gowns for her wedding entourage. These captured the fancy of couture circles. Having had a difficult time finding her own gown, Lhuillier, a 23-year-old newlywed at the time, decided to begin sketching her own line of dresses. She made the news with two high-profile celebrity weddings in a row. She designed Christine Baumgartner‘s wedding dress for her Fall, 2004 wedding to Kevin Costner shortly after designing both of Britney Spears‘s dresses for her wedding to Kevin Federline. She’s also designed the wedding gown of US former Vice President and former Second Lady Al and Tipper Gore’s youngest daughter, Sarah G. Lee, for her marriage to Bill Lee, and also Heidi Montag‘s wedding dress to Spencer Pratt. Also, one of her gowns is used by Hilary Duff when she plays Sam in A Cinderella Story. Subsequently Lhuillier added evening wear to her line, and several of her efforts showed up on red carpets before awards shows. For the Fall, 2007 season she branched off into more typical runway collections. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monique_Lhuillier

Anna Bayle

Born (1959) and raised in the Philippines, a Filipina model who achieved success in the late 1970s and 1980s. She became one of the highest paid models of her time.

Bayle worked for numerous New York designers and became a design consultant to some established fashion houses. She did national and international campaigns for fashion houses and major department stores, as well as calendars for Elite Modeling Agency and Shiseido Cosmetics. She was featured in numerous fashion books, such as Mugler, Chanel, Scaasi, Valentino, Versace, YSL, Dior, Fashion Illustrations by Antonio, etc. Bayle was photographed by fashion photographers including Helmut Newton, Norman Parkinson, Sante D’ Orazio, Peter Beard, David Seidner, Olivero Toscani, Arthur Elgort, Patrick Demarchelier, Peter Lindbergh, Skrebneski, Alex Chatelain and Paolo Roversi. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anna_Bayle

Andrew Cunanan (1969 – 1997)

An American spree killer who murdered at least five people, including fashion designer Gianni Versace, during a three-month period in 1997, ending with Cunanan’s suicide, at age 27. On June 12, 1997, Cunanan became the 449th fugitive to be listed by the FBI on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list.

Cunanan was born in National City, California, the youngest of four children to Modesto Cunanan and Mary Anne Shilacci.

In 1981, his father enrolled him in The Bishop’s School in the La Jolla neighborhood of San Diego, California. At school, Cunanan was remembered as being bright and very talkative, testing with an I.Q. of 147, but he was often bullied. As a teenager, he developed a reputation as a prolific liar, given to telling fantastic tales about his family and personal life; he was also adept at changing his appearance according to what he felt was most attractive at a given moment. After graduating from high school in 1987, he became a student at University of California, San Diego, where he majored in American history.
 After graduating from UCSD, he settled in the Castro District of San Francisco. There, he frequented high-class gay bars and prostituted himself to wealthy, older men. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Cunanan

“Still, there was a lot of surface masquerade going on. There was a lot of Andrew Cunanan that Andrew Cunanan did not like. He began to, using author Clarkson’s word, “reinvent” himself almost as a cause celebre. Glamour became the keyword; he wanted to be glamorous. Firstly, he did not like being Filipino, so he suddenly became Latino and acted out the part with the verve of an Antonio Banderas. At the bars he was known as either Andrew DaSilva or David Morales. A chameleon, he changed faces and figures with a pair of stylish glasses or a trim of his sideburns, or through the transformation from a suited Clark Kent to a T-shirt wearing Superman. Even though he was Personality A on Friday night, he could be Personality B at the same spot on Saturday and get away with it. Those who spent hours with him at the bar one night would not recognize him the next.” http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/notorious_murders/mass/cunanan/index_1.html

Imelda Marcos

The widow of former President Ferdinand Marcos, and is herself an influential political figure in the Philippines. Imelda was born on July 2, 1929 in Manila. Her own branch of the family was not political. Her father was a scholarly man more interested in music and culture than in public life. Her mother, Remedios Trinidad, a dressmaker who grew up in an orphanage in Manila, said to have been an illegitimate offspring of a friar.

Marcos’s extravagant lifestyle reportedly included five-million-dollar shopping tours in New York, Rome and Copenhagen in 1983, and sending a plane to pick up Australian white sand for a new beach resort. She purchased a number of properties in Manhattan in the 1980s, including the $51-million Crown Building and the $60-million Herald Centre; she declined to purchase the Empire State Building for $750m as she considered it “too ostentatious.” Her New York real estate was later seized and sold, along with much of her jewels and most of her 175 piece art collection, which included works by Michelangelo, Botticelli, and Canaletto.

After the Marcos family fled Malacañang Palace, Marcos was found to have left behind 15 mink coats, 508 gowns, 1000 handbags and 3000 pairs of shoes. In February 2006, Marcos insisted that her husband acquired his wealth legitimately as a gold trader. By the late 1950s, she claimed, he had amassed a personal fortune of 7,500 tons of gold, and after gold prices climbed in the 1970s, the Marcos family was worth about $35 billion. However, the Bureau of Internal Revenue has no record of the Marcos family declaring or paying taxes on these assets, and the source of their wealth remains open to investigation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imelda_Marcos