Insider recalls working at Calvin Klein…
The satan wore Calvins?
“Love Story” — the Ryan Murphy collection about Carolyn Bessette and John F. Kennedy Jr.’s whirlwind New York City romance — is #1 on Hulu, and enamored followers are taking to social media to post images of themselves in her signature seems and going to the campy Panna II Indian restaurant in the East Village.
Alas, don’t imagine all the pieces you see.
The show’s depiction of Bessette’s office at the Manhattan workplace of fashion designer Calvin Klein is hardly like real life, according to one girl who was also there in the ’90s.
Those crimson roses that JFK Jr. (performed by Paul Kelly) sends Bessette (Sarah Pidgeon) at work on the show?
“Love Story” — the Ryan Murphy collection about Carolyn Bessette and John F. Kennedy Jr.’s whirlwind New York City romance — is #1 on Hulu, and enamored followers are posting images of themselves in her signature seems. FX
Calvin would never.
Instead, flowers had to be white — ideally Calla lilies — according to Kara Mendelsohn who, just like the late Bessette, began as a gross sales affiliate at Calvin Klein when she was in her early twenties.
“You weren’t allowed to have personal photos [on your desk],” Mendelsohn, 50, told The Post. “We had strict rules — you weren’t allowed to talk to [Klein], look at him. It really was, unless he asked you a question, you were not to speak to him.”
Mendelsohn took to TikTok Monday to recount her expertise working at Calvin Klein. “Eating in general was off limits. I was chugging a can of Slim Fast,” Mendelsohn told The Post. @kmendelsohn/TikTok
Bessette (Sarah Pidgeon) receives crimson roses from JFK Jr. at her workplace on the show. But crimson roses had been forbidden in the Calvin Klein showroom, Mendelsohn said — along with nail polish and, “generally,” food. FX
The Long Island resident, who now does consulting and content creation for a residing, has been watching the show and sharing her reminiscences — and corrections — with her 84,000 Instagram and 39,000 TikTok followers.
Working for Klein in the ’90s — when the model was well-known for its clean model and controversial underwear advertisements with Kate Moss and Mark Wahlberg — was a Manhattan dream job. It also required minimal make-up, polish-free nails and completely no eating in the presence of the designer, now 83 and retired from his namesake model.
In “Love Story,” viewers see an affiliate unexpectedly clearing a Tupperware of salad off her desk when Klein (performed by Alessandro Nivola) enters the showroom.
“Eating in general was off limits,” Mendelsohn told The Post. “I was chugging a can of Slim Fast.”
Bessette followers are recreating her iconic minimalist seems from the ’90s on TikTok. @zibalennox/TikTok
Fans are also visiting the East Village Indian restaurant Panna II, shown on “Love Story” during a Carolyn Bessette and JFK Jr. date evening. Stephen Yang for NY Post
Her other sustenance? Parliament Lights, sneaked out the window. That is, when she might escape her “office.”
“They had two of us in a closet where the models got changed. Half the time there was a naked girl behind us while we were working because that was the only space,” Mendelsohn recalled of the space that had no home windows or air flow and was always “freezing.”
One factor she says the show will get proper: Bessette painstakingly measuring the space between sneakers displayed in the showroom, recalling Klein used to do the same factor.
“Everything had to be perfect. At night, when I had to leave, I had to clear my entire desk,” she recalled.
Like Bessette, Kara Mendelsohn labored at Calvin Klein as a gross sales affiliate in the late ’90s — and is sharing her reminiscences, and corrections of “Love Story,” with her 84,000 Instagram and 39,000 TikTok followers. Courtesy of Mendelsohn
“Everything had to be perfect. At night, when I had to leave, I had to clear my entire desk,” Mendelsohn recalled of working at Calvin Klein, as portrayed on “Love Story” (above). FX
While Bessette encounters Kate Moss and Annette Bening on the collection, Mendelsohn also stored her mouth shut around celebs — like when she wrangled Gwyneth Paltrow at a fashion show.
“We had to hustle the VIPs into the elevator quickly and to their seats. Gwyneth just won the Oscar for ‘Shakespeare In Love.’ They had her flown into the show. We weren’t allowed to look or talk to her!” Mendelsohn said.
Pidgeon not too long ago told The Hollywood Reporter how her hair and wardrobe had been adjusted after early backlash against images of her filming on the streets of New York City. Mendelsohn said Bessette’s iconic look — including what Bessette’s colorist Brad Johns calls “child-of-the-beach” blonde hair — was how every lady wished to look.
“Everyone’s makeup looked like Carolyn’s. We had very thin eyebrows – it was the ’90s,” Mendelsohn said on TikTok.
Mendelsohn (left) with her former Calvin Klein colleagues in the late 90s. “Everyone’s makeup looked like Carolyn’s. We had very thin eyebrows – it was the ’90s,” Mendelsohn said on TikTok. Courtesy of Mendelsohn
JFK Jr. and Carolyn Bessette Kennedy met via Calvin Klein in 1992, according to Elizabeth Beller’s e book, “Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy,” which impressed the Hulu show, “Love Story.” Getty Images
Mendelsohn never labored alongside Bessette, who rose through the Klein ranks to costume VIP purchasers, then turned the director of publicity and, finally, produced runway reveals. Bessette give up before marrying Kennedy — whom she met on the job — in 1996, three years before they died in a aircraft crash.
While not all the pieces on the show is correct, Mendelsohn said she’s having fun with it and will get why younger girls are romanticizing her past.
“It was the place to be,” Mendelsohn, who stayed at Calvin Klein for two years, recalled of the job. “I worked very late nights making $25,000 — the expectation was, if you don’t want this there’s 100 girls who do. You came, you worked hard, you kept your mouth shut.”
A major second in Mendelsohn’s early profession working at Calvin Klein was when she was requested to escort Gwyneth Paltrow to her seat — and not say a single phrase to her — during a fashion show. Courtesy of Mendelsohn
One priceless reminiscence? No telephones and no social media.
“If you had an event after work, you would go from the office. Everyone was doing drugs and smoking,” she said. “You could smoke in a restaurant. That was something you did with your hands instead of looking at your phone.”
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