From Philip Lim’s Fall 2009 RTW

One of fashion’s best design trends to enter the current style scene is the element of draping.
Some of you are fanning yourselves wondering if I’ve taken a punch to the head but I tell you, it is a gift to us.
Luscious fabric looped and laying in places you need it to camouflage abdominal imperfections, draped dramatically to show one’s décolletage or side-swept to pull away the eye from areas beyond our control.
Yes, draping.

According to the Institute of Draped Clothes, (there is one), “In the ancient world, whether in Rome, Greece, Egypt, or Mesopotamia, draping was considered the most civilized way to dress. It was the art of the elite to gracefully arrange the folds of elegant togas and other draped garments. This tradition survives today in the unequaled grace of the sari. Yet at the same time, draped clothing has been the daily working attire of ordinary people, from the old ‘great kilt’ of Scotland, to the sarong and dhoti of southern Asia.”

Current fashion draping trends have steered away from the kilt and sari proper but inspiration from the ancient world lingers in pieces from internationally-recognized designers like Philip Lim (above) and here with Donna Karan:

For a more eco-approach to draping I suggest these burgeoning designers who prove that draping can be done responsibly:

Sublet’s Catherine Dress at Greenloop

She-Bible’s Monarch Top at Beklina

Prairie Underground Mothette Light Dress at Embodies

Donna Karan, whom many know as the famously successful clothing designer, has gone far above and beyond her call to duty.

Karan recently donated almost $1 million to Beth Israel Medical Center in New York for a Zen center that will provide holistic healing therapies to cancer patients, USA Today reports.

Her “Urban Zen Initiative” being piloted in Beth Israel Medical Center will feature therapists and caregivers’ integration of yoga poses and breathing techniques taught to cancer patients to ease the pain and anxiety that so often come with their cancer treatments.

Among the participating team is Woody Merrell, Karan’s own physician and the director of integrative medicine at Beth Israel, and her yogis, the husband-and-wife team Rodney Yee and Colleen Saidman Yee.

Karan’s own husband died of lung cancer in 2001, and a close friend died of brain cancer last year. The Urban Zen Foundation is based out of his former art studio.

Her initiative, which reflects the idea of mind-body wholeness, adheres to the belief that by naturally aligning the body, mind, and spirit through meditation, self-awareness and healthy living we’ll have greater personal peace as well as increased mental and physical health.

Beth Israel is hoping this holds true for their league of cancer patients looking for some new treatment options.

“If this is something we’re going to go out and convince hospitals around the country to replicate, we have to be able to show it saves money in the long run or at least is cost-neutral and you end up with happier patients,” says Benjamin Kligler, director of the research at the Medical Center to USA Today.

Karan believes the research attached to the one-year grant will undoubtedly show that hospital stays can be shortened and fewer anxiety drugs administered, which would save the patient and insurance companies money.

The videos – which include Hilary Clinton, the Dalai Lama and Edie Falco – are not embeddable, so visit the site to view them.