Halle Berry on Wearing Lingerie Like a Parisian and Her New Line, Scandale

Photographed by Annie Leibovitz, Vogue, December 2010

Photographed by Annie Leibovitz, Vogue, December 2010

At 10:30 this morning at Ladurée’s Soho location, Halle Berry had a thing or two to get off her chest. “Since I first grew boobs, I started to wear my bras around the clock. My mother told me that if you don’t want them to start sagging too early, always wear a bra. I’ve done that my whole life and they are pretty good today because of that,” the actress said, and she was at the pastel pastry haven for the U.S. launch of Scandale Paris (soon to arrive at a Target near you!), the lingerie line she has newly invested in. And as it turns out, you don’t spend all of that time in a support garment without becoming something of an expert when it comes to underpinnings. Notes Berry, “If you are going to sleep in them and wear them, and take them off just to wash them, I think you have to wear something really comfortable.”

Married to French actor Olivier Martinez, Berry found herself “tooling around Paris,” eventually discovering the lingerie company Scandale (originally founded in 1932) and becoming a fast devotee of the line, partnering with the brand to develop its innate Parisian insouciance and introduce it to a broader market. The collection consists of ten bras and panties in classic silhouettes, black diamond mesh, crimson, black and nude lace, and the occasional animal print. “I have some friends of mine—who will remain nameless—who wear the same ‘janky’ bras for five years straight! As Americans, we can go there, but what I learned about the French woman is that she is always updating her lingerie,” said Berry. “They aren’t going to be caught in the emergency not prepared and if they cut their clothes off, they are going to be fabulous under there.”

And while a piece of lingerie, especially à la française, can cost a pretty penny, Scandale is launching at Target and Target.com on October 27 at a price that won’t empty your pockets—think bras for $16–$18, and underwear for $7. “I think that it’s really important to bring good quality at this price so that every woman can have a collection of it, you don’t have to have one bra you pay oodles of money for that you wear until it’s dead,” she said. “At an affordable price you can have a collection that you rotate.” And never risk a movie star calling you janky again!​

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Hong Kong police arrest 26 amid street clashes

HONG KONG (AP) — Hong Kong riot police battled with thousands of pro-democracy protesters for control of the city’s streets Saturday, using pepper spray and batons to hold back defiant activists who returned to a protest zone that officers had partially cleared.

Police and activists engaged in running clashes in Mong Kok’s dense grid of streets, scuffling for hours. Several protesters were seen knocked to the ground, and dozens were carried or taken away by police.

The government said some 9,000 people gathered at the scene, repeatedly charging police lines in an attempt to retake roads. Authorities said police arrested 26 people.

Protesters are pressing for a greater say in choosing the semiautonomous Chinese city’s leader in an inaugural direct election, promised for 2017.

Students and activists oppose Beijing’s ruling that a committee stacked with pro-Beijing elites should screen candidates in the election. That effectively means that Beijing can vet candidates before they go to a public vote.

One protester was seen bleeding from his forehead as he was carried to a police van, moments after he was forced to the ground by officers. In scenes repeated throughout the evening, officers used batons to beat back umbrellas used by the crowd of young protesters to defend themselves from pepper spray.

“The police have lost control. They are beating up protesters like we’re animals. We are angry. The students are our future,” said Tommy Lee, a 45-year-old technology worker who was outraged at seeing police handcuff four protesters who appeared to be high school students.

Also detained was Bangkok-based Getty photojournalist Paula Bronstein, who was hauled away by police for standing on the hood of a Mercedes-Benz amid the melee. Hong Kong’s Foreign Correspondents Club issued a statement demanding her immediate release, saying that police have threatened and intimidated other journalists covering the protests.

The chaotic scenes unfolded hours after police had moved in to clear tents, canopies and barricades at Mong Kok, a smaller protest zone across Victoria Harbor from the main occupied area in the heart of the financial district.

Mong Kok’s protest zone had been home to a rowdier, more radical crowd less willing to follow student leaders, making it the most volatile of the three areas occupied since Sept. 28 by Hong Kong democracy protesters.

The dawn operation — the third in recent days by police to retake streets from protesters — came after Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying sought to defuse the bitter standoff with the protesters on Thursday by reviving an offer of talks over democratic reforms in the city.

However, Leung warned that police wouldn’t refrain from clearing protest sites while holding talks. The latest clashes were likely to make it harder to resolve the crisis with protesters, who were already angered by a video of a group of officers kicking a handcuffed activist.

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Joanna Chiu contributed to this report.

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Follow Sylvia Hui on Twitter at twitter.com/sylviahui

• Unrest, Conflicts War
• Politics Government
• Mong Kok
• Hong Kong

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