Wear and tear : the threads of my life
(Book)

Tracy Peacock Tynan grew up in London in the 1950s and 60s, privy to her parents glamorous parties and famous friendsLaurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, and Orson Welles. Cecil Beaton and Katharine Hepburn were her godparents. Tracy was named after Katherine Hepburns character, Tracy Lord, in the classic film, The Philadelphia Story. These stylish showbiz people were role models for Tracy, who became a clotheshorse at a young age. Tracys father, Kenneth Tynan, was a powerful theater critic and writer for the Evening Standard, The Observer, and The New Yorker. Her mother was Elaine Dundy, a successful novelist and biographer, whose works have recently been revived by The New York Review of Books. Both of Tracys parents, particularly her father, were known as much for what they wore as what they wrote. In the Tynans social circles, style was essential, and Tracy had firm ideas about her own clothing for as long as she can remember. Shopping was an art passed down through the family; though shopping trips with her mother were so traumatic that Tracy started shopping on her own when she was fourteen. When Tracy started writing about her life she found that clothing was the focus of many of her stories. She recalls her fathers dandy attire and her mothers Pucci dresses, as well as her parents rancorous marriage and divorce, her fathers prodigious talents and celebrity lifestyle, and her mothers lifelong struggle with addiction. She tackles issues big and small using clothes as an entréerelationships, marriage, children, stepchildren, blended families, her parents decline and deaths, and her work as a costume designer are all recounted with humor, with insight, and with the special joy that can only come from finding the perfect outfit.