As the resident Southerner here at Men's Vogue, I would be remiss not to mention the fashion spectacle of the region: any event having to do with horses. The 67th Annual Iroquois Steeplechase in Nashville, Tennessee this Saturday was an example of southern style at its finest. While Good Night Shirt galloped and leapt his way to victory, the guys were overcoming an obstacle of their own. How, for instance, does a man stand out when women are wearing hats the size of flying saucers? These gents are quick to yield to a lady on any other day, but not so on the final lap of the fashion showdown. By all accounts, they held their own.

Hats off to a few of our favorites:

1) Any man can mix a mint julep, but foxhunter Bill Andrews mixed a mint green Paul Stuart jacket with a peach tie and a pink striped shirt. That's something else all together.

2) The word "steeplechase" dates back to 18th century Ireland where horses raced from church steeple to church steeple. And while there were no such markers in Percy Warner Park, the Reverend Joseph Davis turned out in seersucker. "I've spent more time observing fashion than I have observing racing," he said.

3) Los Angles native, Robert Kirk, demonstrates another take on the seersucker staple.

4) Lamont Carter (left) sports his signature pink coat while Huntley Bennington (right) follows up the British pith helmet he wore last year with a slightly disheveled hat and a pair of English Round Frames from Ben Silver. "Fashion's always number one here," Carter says of the balance between the horse and the people watching. "It's not even close."

5) Kevin Churchwell is the very well-dressed CEO of the Monroe Carell Jr. Children's Hospital at Vanderbilt, the proud beneficiary of the Iroquois Steeplechase.

6) As expert reveler Mike Faherty exhibits, madras reigned supreme in the decidedly casual infield. Fresh off the Kentucky Derby, Faherty said the party at Churchill Downs was "a little bit less civilized." Scary thought. But if the Iroquois were to follow in the derby's footsteps and anoint a host of the unofficial party, it would likely be Nashville's Andrew Steffens, who organized a performance by The Chris Weaver Band and snuck a stage in the night before, much to the madras mob's delight. --LIZ McDANIEL WITH PHOTOGRAPHS BY MIMI RITZEN

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One consequence of the web-inspired decentralization of criticism is a glut of the voluble and often-nonsensical language music fans use to pitch their favorites. When folks on Amazon shill a "freak folk" or "screamcore" band, and eMusic, a handy subscription-based free download site, espouses the latest "lo-fi meets math rock record," who could be blamed for wanting to retreat into the familiar confines of one's own collection?

And then, sometimes the music speaks for itself. Two Dark Birds, headed by Steve Koester, have synthesized disparate elements of pop into a record that scratches a half-dozen aural itches, all the while seeming intimately familiar. The singing-songwriting veteran of Punchdrunk and Maplewood, among others, has a taste for everything from alt-country to LA rock to blues, all of which coalesce into something he's dubbed "American Soul."

On this self-titled debut, Two Dark Birds hopscotch from the Wilco-infused "Like New Eyes," to the breezy Californian road trip, complete with jam session, of "Blown," to the latter-day Dylanesque "Cut Down to Size." With folks from bands like the Wrens, Hold Steady, and Guster contributing music and lyrics, Two Dark Birds sounds like a masterful soundtrack to self-reflection. The closing "Ash and Sadness," A reworking of an earlier Koester track, expertly navigates the line between mythic lament and foolish romanticism. Despite the musical surplus vying for your valuable attention, it's the track you'll want playing, long day done and cold beer in hand, every sundown between now and autumn. --NICHOLAS MOSQUERA

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It's hard to imagine wanting to be indoors anywhere in Paris right now, but the Grand Palais is an exception, now that it's unveiled Richard Serra's massive new work, "Promenade." The second annual commission of the Monumenta program, an initiative by the French Ministry of Culture and Communication to bring international work to the Art Nouveau iron-and-glass landmark exhibition space, "Promenade" is a series of five massive steel plates arranged on the axis of the building's nave. (Don't worry, fashion editors: Serra's masterpiece will only remain until June 15; Karl Lagerfeld will return with his next Chanel collection, as usual, during fashion week.) Each of Serra's 17-by-4-meter planes, placed to take up almost the entire span of the hall, rests at an ever-so-slight angle. Despite the fact that five 73-ton slabs of steel can't actually move, walking around and through them creates a series of optical illusions that make them seem as if they just might keep leaning.

Serra has lately focused more on horizontal and curvilinear shapes -- most notably in "Matter of Time," recently installed at the Guggenheim Bilbao, and the phenomenal "Torqued Ellipse" series--so working with a sequence of verticals in an interior space already as rigidly symmetrical as the Grand Palais was "an enormous risk and a challenge," he said. It paid off: the effect of "Promenade" is utterly arresting -- which is no small feat under the webbed glass dome that usually eclipses the art it shields. Serra is rigorously site-specific in his designs, and "one can't really predict scale in a context until the object actually arrives in the context," he said. "It wasn't until the fifth plate went in that I could take a deep breath. I can say now that this piece is as fulfilling to me as anything I've ever done."

"Promenade" and Richard Serra will be celebrated while the work is on site, with a series of colloquia and events that include screenings (Serra's own films, documentaries about him and works by Chantal Akerman), concerts (Serra pal Philip Glass will perform a solo piano concert on June 7), and dance workshops. (Could Serra ever imagine his work inspiring, say, an afternoon of interpretive movement for kids aged two to seven? "You can never predict how your work will be received," he said, though he does think that kids bring the least amount of baggage to art.)

In addition, his 1983 sculpture, "Clara Clara," named for his wife, has just been re-installed at the Tuileries, where it was originally shown after the ground at the Georges Pompidou museum proved to be too unstable to hold it. And, most movingly for the artist, this week also marked his induction as a Commander of the Order of Arts and Letters. It's not his first medal, "though I think it's my most prestigious," he said. "I'll wear this one," he added, before taking the podium and having the green-striped ribbon tied around his neck.

"This country made me a sculptor," he told the assembled audience with tears in his eyes, recalling his first introduction to the work of Giacometti and Brancusi in Paris when he was still a painter in 1964. Well, France clearly returns the love. "France needs Richard Serra," said Christine Albanel, the Minister of Culture and Communication, as she looked out over Promenade from the upper gallery as the assembled guests guzzled champagne. "Look at this piece! Just look at it!"

Yes, why don't you? And be quick about it. You've only got another five weeks. After that, the future resting place of "Promenade" is unknown. --ALEXANDRA MARSHALL

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Summer doesn't officially start until June 21, but with warm weather across the nation, it's time to head to the coast and ride the waves -- in true surf style. Actor Court Young and a team of designers are reviving the "Go Ride a Wave" surfwear line of board shorts and T-shirts. The line was created in the late 1970s by Martin Sugarman and marked a shift in surf apparel with its bright colors and bold patterns. With easily recognizable designs and an unassuming style, the clothes became popular with beach dwellers, quickly dotting the shores of Southern California and Hawaii.

The concept of surfwear began when small businesses designed shirts, shorts, wetsuits, and boots for local surfers. The industry has expanded beyond surfing communities, with some companies like Ugg, Billabong, and Quicksilver growing to an astronomical level and appealing to the mass market. Young's line will be designed and manufactured in the U.S. using organic cotton, and will be sold at Live, a new men's store by Gerard Guez on Sunset Boulevard in Los Angeles starting in August. Whether you're riding a wave or just relaxing on the beaches of Waikiki this summer, the cool and functional "Go Ride a Wave" line may be a worthwhile addition to your warm weather wardrobe. --BRANDON FELDMAN

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If the crowd last night at Christie's Impressionist and modern art evening sale resembled a pastoral congregation, next week's offering of contemporary art should bring back all the maneuvering, sweating, and yearning of Caligula.

Last night Christie's kicked off a two-week marathon of major evening sales in New York that the big auction houses hope will see as much as $1.8 billion trade hands -- a sum the Wall Street Journal astutely pointed out would trump the $1.2 billion J.P. Morgan paid for Bear Stearns. The question on everyone's mind going into May Madness in the art market is whether or when booming art prices will be slapped silly by global economic turmoil.

Last night's celebrity-less affair indicated that the art market might not be going bust but it may be mellowing -- at least in the more polite sphere of Monet, Rodin, and Pissarro. For the first time in four years, Christie's failed to meet its presale estimate, pulling in $277 million against a target of $287 to $405 million.

Still, Christie's set six records last night, including a spot-on $41.5 million for a Monet. Shipping magnate Stavros Niarchos (the grandfather of the Paris-Mary Kate-Lindsay lothario) sold the painting at Christie's in 1988 for $12.6 million to last night's seller, the Nahmad family, auction stalwarts and megadealers with a Geneva warehouse stuffed with thousands of artworks.

Next week will be the true bellwether, with Christie's expecting to break the world auction record for a work by a living artist with Lucian Freud's portrait of a very portly woman, estimated to make $25 million to $35 million.  The record, previously held by Damien Hirst (he of the $100 million dollar skull), is currently held by Jeff Koons whose big pink shiny heart fetched $23.5 million last November. (That's just a fraction of the reported $80 million privately paid this spring for one of Koons's iconic Rabbits as part of a half-a-billion-dollar art transaction involving the estate of legendary dealer Illeana Sonnabend.)

Christie's biggest potential sale this season has been sent to Hong Kong -- a 14-foot tall Warhol Mao the auction house hopes will privately fetch a patriotic $120 million. That leaves Sotheby's with the star lot of the season -- a Bacon triptych it expects might make $70 million, on par with the most expensive piece of real estate  in New York right now -- the former gallery of troubled dealer Larry Salander.

When I recently toured the Met with Salander for an article in this month's issue, he was outraged over what he sees as the blatant market manipulation inflating the prices for contemporary art. He may well go ballistic if the price paid for a Bacon trumps the value of the palatial manse he could never really afford; particularly if Hirst (he of the tank-encased shark that Salander sniffs at) ends up buying the artwork -- a distinct possibility given that the enfant terrible-turned-mogul paid $33 million for a Bacon self-portrait last season.  --KELLY DEVINE THOMAS

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For anyone who was young -- or at least felt young -- in the eighties, the recent news that Polaroid would soon discontinue all production of instant film was akin to being yanked out of summer camp early. What would happen to all the memories? Fortunately, the folks at savepolaroid.com are on the case. The organization's goal is to find another company to keep churning out the insta-presto film packs. Help convince Ilford or Fuji to take up the torch by posting your favorite polaroid snapshots on Save Polaroid's Flickr page, or just peruse the gallery for a nostalgic reminder of what picture taking was like before the age of the four gigabyte memory card. --SARA JAMES

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If you view a leisurely lunch of escargots and roast lamb as the height of civilization -- and there's no reason not to -- then you can look forward to the opening of Benoit, Alain Ducasse's new bistro, where the cooking feels like Paris about a hundred years ago. After taking over the original Benoit in the French capital, where the bistro's been an institution since 1912, Ducasse has established an American outpost in Midtown in the former space of the grand dame of French haute cooking, La Cote Basque.

Bistro cooking isn't about surprise -- it's about executing the classics, and Benoit delivers with a terrine de foie gras, and an expertly turned lobster ravioli. You can also have a roast chicken for two, or pike quenelles, a dish Julia Child always loved. Finish with a wheel of Camembert and a chocolate soufflé and you probably won't need to eat again for at least a day. --David Coggins

60 West 55th Street
New York, NY 10019
(646) 943-7373

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If you're going to a Kentucky Derby party this weekend and you want to sound more like Jimmy the Greek than Derek the Schmuck, here's all you need to know: Forget the favorites. Big Brown -- at 3-1 the shortest price in the field -- breaks from the far, far outside pole. He's more likely to see the Churchill parking lot than the winner's circle. After all, no one has cashed a ticket on a horse coming out of that post since your great grandpappy bet on Clyde van Dusen in 1929. The trendy filly pick, Eight Belles, may earn you some feminism points from the julep-swilling ladies at your fete, but this gal will leave your wallet lighter. Three-year-old fillies just don't run well against a herd of tough colts. My pick is Pyro, the horse with the baddest-ass name in the field. He ran like a mule in his last race, but it was at Keeneland on the funky new Polyturf surface, a mixture of recycled rubber that many horses don't take to. Back on real dirt, he'll be back to his old self, passing tired horses in the stretch. And at odds of around 10-1, he'll have you humming "My Old Kentucky Home" to yourself long after the party's over. If you want to really impress folks, play two longshots with him in exactas -- Denis of Cork and Z Humor, both of which have been training beautifully and are sitting on monster performances. --ERIC BANKS

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(Photo via latimes.com)

I received an e-mail message today from my friend Dion Neutra, the 80-something son of architect Richard Neutra. Dion said he was glad that his dad -- who passed away in 1970 -- "did not live to experience this loss." He was talking about the early-morning blaze that engulfed and destroyed what was left of Neutra's Laemmle Building, a landmark at the northwest corner of Hollywood and Vine going back to 1933.

"The drastic remodels of the Laemmle started already in the early 40s," Dion wrote, "but I always had this hope that the building could have emerged from all the junk with which it had been shrouded for years." Indeed, what was left of the Laemmle Building -- which Neutra built for Carl Laemmle, the president of Universal, and once housed the Coco Tree restaurant -- wasn't all that: Until this morning, it was the home of the Basque nightclub ("4 RED VELVET private VIP rooms"!), along with DanDee Shoe Repair and the Bloodshot Tattoo parlor. In a way, Laemmle was a perfect expression of where this stretch of the boulevard is now, uneasily pitched between regeneration (Sam Nazarian's Starck-designed S Bar and Katsuya are mere steps away) and the kind of picturesque sleaze that Tom Waits celebrated here. As the Los Angeles Times noted, the fire is the fifth in the area in recent weeks. (The paper, however, did not notice the connection between Basque and its surprising architectural provenance.)

Of course, anything truly Neutra-esque about Laemmle was lost years ago in the ebb and flow of this well-traveled Hollywood crossroads. But it is still striking to contrast its fate with that of Neutra's Kaufmann Desert House in Palm Springs, which Christie's will offer at a blockbuster auction on May 13, with an estimate of $15-25 million. "What a great anchor this could have made to the famous Hollywood Walk of Fame," Dion mused, ever mindful of modernist buildings -- his father's and others -- that have fallen to wrecking balls, mud slides, or suspicious fires. --MARK ROZZO

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