With a giant exclusive said to be going to Vogue magazine, details about the Kate Moss-Jamie Hince wedding this weekend are being as closely guarded as a top-secret mission to take out a terrorist.
Nevertheless, here’s some of what’s spilling into view. According to a prominent fashion industry insider who knows Moss well, the bride—who’s always had a refreshing indifference to what’s expected of a celebrity—will indeed be wearing a dress by her friend John Galliano, who’s on trial in France for allegedly anti-Semitic remarks he made in a restaurant this year.
The wedding actually will be fairly small, at least by supermodel standards, with somewhere in the ballpark of 150 guests in attendance, and all of them close friends of the bride and groom. Tom Ford? Not going, we’re told. Ditto Karl Lagerfeld and Madonna. But do expect Stella McCartney, Daphne Guinness, Amanda Harlech, and Naomi Campbell. Same for Galliano, in what would be his first major appearance at a fashion event since his arrest. And as has been widely reported, there’s going to be a huge amount of live music, with rumored performances by The Rolling Stones, Shirley Bassey, The Gossip, and Bryan Ferry.
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Whether there will be something of an awkward situation between Ferry and his ex-wife Lucy remains to be seen, since she too is believed to be on the guest list.
Other prominent folks believed to be going are the renowned frontman of the Pogues, Shane McGowan (with girlfriend Victoria Clarke), Tabitha Denholm and Mairead Nash of the Queens of Noize, and Marlon Richards (son of Keith) and Lucy de la Falaise (daughter of famed socialite Lulu).
And British tabloid reports say Vivienne Westwood, Jude Law, and Jade Jagger are also to be on hand, though neither of two Daily Beast sources mentioned them as people whose names were on the list.
But just who is the groom, you wonder?
Born middle class, in Andover, Hampshire, Hince spent his teenage years between Andover and Newbury, Berkshire, according to a recent profile in the Sunday Express. In his youth, he played in a band called Electric Turkeyland and attended art school.
But it’s his involvement over the last decade in a band called The Kills that’s made him famous. Onstage, he thrashes around with bandmate Allison Mosshart, who has a habit of chain-smoking while she sings. According to a profile of Hince in the Sunday Express, when he met Mosshart back in 1999, they bonded over a shared love of Andy Warhol and the Velvet Underground.
In other words, he was easy bait for Moss, who’s always had a love of rocker boys.
Introduced by Moss’ friend, Sadie Frost, sometime around 2007, he was said to have initially said to Moss, “Sorry, what’s your name again?”
At the time, she was coming off a breakup with another bad-boy rocker, Pete Doherty, who is serving a six-month sentence after being caught on film smoking cocaine from a crack pipe.
Though one of Hince’s videos has a shot of him doing a bump of some unknown substance, friends of Moss say that cigarettes aside, the vegan rocker really does have his head screwed on straight. Or, as our spy puts it: “It’s screwed on as straight as you can expect of an Englishman’s.”
The biggest source of controversy surrounding the relationship (if there’s any at all) is what it’s done to Hince’s band. Two years ago, Mosshart took a sabbatical to work with Jack White of the White Stripes, leading some wags to speculate that the supermodel in Hince’s life had come between him and his bandmate. It was a theory that was understandable. As New York magazine noted, the “taut sexual chemistry [between Mosshart and Hince] is key to their appeal.”
But our source swears that reports of a rift caused by Moss are hogwash: “The relationship between Allison and Kate is great,” the person says.
Occasionally, Hince has struggled with the pratfalls of being engaged to one of the most famous women on the planet. Earlier this year, Hince reportedly lashed out against an aggressive member of the paparazzi, dragging the photographer by his jacket and raising his fists to his face, as Moss clutched her fur boa and watched on in worry, looking chic as ever.
Hince made no secret that he finds the tabloid glare troubling, Early in their relationship, he told an interviewer, "It's pretty insane the way gossip is such an incredible thing now. The way there used to be secrets, and people used to be able to build myths and have a private life. It's not the case anymore."
Of course, it’s not going to get any easier once he’s Mr. Kate Moss.
Hince also said: "I do feel a bit of self-disgust about the fashion houses linking up with the music industry. I'm not comfortable with that side of things."
And of course, this marriage is sort of the ultimate fashion house/music industry linkup.
