Balboa Island Interior Designer is the Agiest of the Chicest Woman in All the Land

The old money may be on the East Coast, but when it comes to the most, erm, mature of “America's chicest women,” the honor goes to Balboa Island. Or, more specifically, the real estate on Newport Beach's artificial-island triumvirate lorded over by Mary Lou Stockwell, the “60s and up” winner of Harper's Bazaar's “Fabulous at Every Age” contest.
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Inspired by the magazine's monthly Fabulous at Every Age feature, a nationwide search
was launched in August for the woman who is the chicest in the land–in
the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s and 60s age groups, that is. Thousands of online
entries were pored over before finalists were selected.

“The finalists are living proof that
great style has nothing to do with the date on your driver's license,” says Harper's Bazaar
editor-in-chief Glenda Bailey. “Women who look fabulous at every age know the secret is dressing with
confidence and having fun with fashion.”

Stockwell, a local interior designer, received the nod for her age group because she “has an elegant style, powerful in its
understated simplicity, yet full of joie de vivre,” concluded contest judges.

That earned her (as it did each of her younger FAEA's) $5,000, gifts from search sponsor EstNe Lauder and a day of pampering in the Big Apple before being whisked via a black car to the Hearst Tower
in Manhattan for a chic soiree hosted by Bailey, representatives from the makeup company and the face of the company, actress Elizabeth Hurley, who introduced each finalist.

Somerville, Mass., photographer and entrepreneur Trinette Faint, who appears to be the tallest woman in the photo above (third from left), was named the grand prize winner, earning herself an additional $5,000.

Also shown in the photo are (from left): Kariza Chan of Bayside, N.Y. (40s); Valerie Duva of St. Clair, Mich. (50s); Faint; Nicole Otero of New York City (20s); Hurley; Bailey; Stockwell; and Bazaar publisher Valerie Salembier.

Matt Coker

OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.