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Roy Halston Frowick was born in Des Moines, Iowa, in 1932, and for a boy from the Midwest he engineered one of the most spectacular rises and falls in American fashion. He began as a milliner, and his break came in 1961 when Jacqueline Kennedy wore his pillbox hat to JFK's inauguration.
By the early 1970s he was the most famous designer in America. He was also a prodigious cocaine user, and he spent staggering sums to support the habit. His glass-and-steel townhouse at 101 East 63rd Street became the site of legendary parties fueled by drugs, hired escorts, and orchids he bought by the thousands of dollars' worth. That lifestyle played a major hand in his downfall.
In 1973 he sold his company, and the trademark to his own name, to Norton Simon Inc. for around $12 million; by today's standards, more than $80 million. He became an employee of his own brand.
For a while the machine roared. In 1975 the Halston fragrance arrived in a teardrop bottle designed by Elsa Peretti, the Italian-born aristocrat's daughter who had left Europe, come to New York, and become one of the most successful jewelry designers of the 20th century at Tiffany & Co.
The perfume was a prestige product, sold through the better department stores, and it was a sensation. But then in the early 1980s Halston signed a mass-market deal with JCPenney, and the prestige fashion world recoiled; Bergdorf Goodman dropped him entirely. He made a fortune and lost his standing in the same stroke.
His friendship with Peretti was intense and challenging. The drug-soaked chaos of his later years strained his closest relationships, and he'd moved to San Francisco in 1988 after his HIV diagnosis to be cared for by his family. His cause of death in 1990 was Kaposi's sarcoma involving the lungs, an AIDS-defining illness, having lost his name, his company, and most of the people who had once orbited him.
These details of Halston's story—so served to me by the 2021 Netflix miniseries on him—stuck in my head during a flower-soaked, brightly colored day of fashion in San Francisco's Union Square.
 Photos by Drew Altizer Photography.
The occasion was the Bloom Fashion Show, now in its fourth year, staged in Union Square Plaza last Friday afternoon. I was exhausted by attending the SF JAZZ gala the night before and missed most of the afternoon. But at it we saw such local political voices like Senator Scott Wiener, DA Brooke Jenkins, and a performance about a recent darling in my reviews, the ODC dancers.
There was an early reception at Top of the Mark in the Mark Hopkins Hotel, and a red-carpet experience for people to snatch up those Instagram likes. It was honestly very fashion and fun, albeit minus some traditional exclusivity we've seen in local Zac Posen or Thom Browne shows.
The With Love Halston Foundation supplied the Halston of it; the Academy of Art University's School of Fashion supplied the students; and the Union Square Alliance folded the whole thing into Union Square in Bloom, its months-long floral campaign underwritten by JPMorganChase, with Levi Strauss & Co. as this year's presenting sponsor.
Ten student designers spent a year studying the Halston archive, then sent ten looks down a runway. A panel of judges picked a winner on the spot. The winning look becomes the "2026 Bloom Dress," and its designer took home a scholarship.
I want to be fair that the intentions with the organizing staff are good ones. The foundation was started in 2022 on what would have been Halston's 90th birthday, by Lesley Frowick, his niece. She worked alongside him at his Olympic Tower atelier in the 1980s; he named her the guardian of his archive himself.
The foundation's stated business is scholarships and fashion-history education, and it runs the same challenge at FIT and at design schools in Miami and Barcelona. A student walked away from last Friday with tuition money, which the foundation said was made possible through the generosity of the Nando and Elsa Peretti Foundation. So the old friends are still linked together, kindly, in death.
These are all real and good things, and not nothing.
But along with that, I'll note that while I am not a Halston expert, many looks did not especially scream his name to me last Friday. His creations were known for minimalism, fluidity, and a kind of luxurious plainness. They skimmed the body and moved with it, often built from a single piece of fabric, cut on the bias or sewn with single seams.
Remember though that Friday's presentation was student work, and even though it wasn't exactly Halston, it was very pretty for an Academy of Art fashion show.
I will also say that I get many fashion PR emails inviting me to different things. I wonder if they expect I will show up and react like I'm an enthusiastic Oprah or Heidi Klum a la Project Runway—at least, when she's in a good mood.
Instead, so often, I awaken my inner Miranda Priestly.
Part of that is San Francisco fashion shows. Many fervently believe we attendees love speeches and full-fledged panel talks. Then, so often, there are a lotta taste issues with what was made and how it was constructed. I am also a designer and fashion enthusiast, and I think that makes me inherently more critical of the work. I keep wanting to see a Milan runway, and instead we just take what San Francisco gives us.
I say all this with love. I've seen several Academy of Art University collections and always come away more impressed than I expected. This is a for-profit school, so the liberal instinct in me is to assume something nefarious. But my main seamstress is also an AAU graduate and, in my opinion, the best in San Francisco.
It is just the subject matter that stuck with me. Oddly. Halston was a force of nature who took American fashion and made it lean, easy, and modern; who put the country on the couture map and dressed everyone from Jackie Kennedy to Liza Minnelli to the women on the Studio 54 floor.
He also was a drug addict, a man who sold his own name, and who died here in San Francisco having lost the company and most of the people who once orbited him. And this particular presentation—I have to add this—asked students to emulate a designer's legacy instead of work on their own.
And yet, honestly: I did enjoy myself. It's complicated! It was a very pretty day, the garments were well-made, and I enjoyed seeing this sort of life in downtown San Francisco.
Saul Sugarman is editor-in-chief and owner of The Bold Italic.
The Bold Italic is a not-for-profit media organization, and we publish first-person perspectives about San Francisco and the Bay Area. We operate under a fiscal sponsorship of a 501(c)(3).
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The Bloom Fashion Show 2026 at a glance
- The fourth annual Bloom Fashion Show, held Friday, May 8 in Union Square Plaza, 1–3 PM
- A free, public outdoor runway show debuting ten original Academy of Art University student designs, created through a year-long study of the Halston archive as part of the With Love Halston design challenge
- A panel of guest judges selected the winning look, named the 2026 Bloom Dress, with a scholarship awarded to its designer
The VIP reception at Top of the Mark
- An exhibition of original Halston pieces from the Halston Archives, shown alongside the winning student designs, plus a student design preview
- Silent auction featuring Alexis Bittar, Daniel George, Rigaud, Halston Archive prints, and more
- Wine tasting from Blackbird Vineyards and Skipstone
- Caviar tasting by Haute Caviar
Partners and organizers
- Produced by the Union Square Alliance, in partnership with the With Love Halston Foundation and the Academy of Art University School of Fashion
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Neil Gilks, executive director of the AAU School of Fashion, led the student program
Sponsors
- Presented by Levi Strauss & Co., as part of Union Square in Bloom presented by JPMorganChase
- Supporting sponsors and partners: Amazon, Bentley, Fabrix, Rae Agency, Blake Charles Salon & Spa, ODC/Dance, the SF Office of Economic & Workforce Development, Mayor Daniel Lurie, and SF Recreation & Parks
Credits
- Photography by Drew Altizer Photography
For a few other takes on SF society
I also recently wrote about the Dress For Success gala. I honestly love this one! But so many speeches.
It's been a very busy couple of weeks going to parties and events. I have several stories to download from my brain and notepads for everyone's reading pleasure, and those should come shortly. I also hope to announce a new event very soon with The Bold Italic. It's a small one, but I've been working on it for months!
If you want to know what else I'm up to in May: It's called sleep, Mary. And hopefully catching The Devil Wears Prada 2.
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