East Hampton - The biggest names in fashion turned out to strut their stuff on the red carpet and support Guild Hall in East Hampton last week when nine giants of Seventh Avenue attended a by-invitation-only preview of a groundbreaking exhibit highlighting the East End's influence on their designs.

The designers all have a history on the East End - a place they have come to truly consider "home" or "their second home" since they all spend a lot of time in the city too - working to pay for their house in the Hamptons.

Co-Curator of Art As Fashion in the Hamptons Stan Herman with participating designer Vera Wang.

"I have been trying to get something like this going for years in the city," designer and event organizer Stan Herman said as he chatted in the crowded entrance way at Guild Hall on a hot Saturday evening, "but it wasn't working." Out east, however, something was in the air making it possible for Herman and Pamela Fiore, Town & Country magazine's Editor-in-Chief to pull the whole thing off. The exhibit will run until Oct. 12 giving fashionistas something to do after Labor Day as they eye the fall collections now hitting the stores.

In the meantime, conversation can turn to the designers and the inspiration they derive from the East End, most particularly, The Hamptons since that is where they all have come to live. Many have been here for decades arriving way before they were "really famous."

The list is impressive, beginning with Ralph Lauren, who came to the Hamptons with wife Ricki and his three children more than 25 years ago. Lauren became the face of Montauk using his own beachfront property as a backdrop for many photo shoots promoting his collections. This season Lauren is the face of POLO at the Blue Star Jets Field on Hayground Road in Bridgehampton where he has a "booth" on the sidelines featuring polo shirts devoted to the "Black Watch" team he is sponsoring. The Ralph Lauren Company has taken over a large chunk of Main Street in East Hampton, too, where they now have four shops doing a brisk business. Ralph and Ricki are the new "Mom and Pop" on Main Street.

Elie Tahari arrived on the shores of Sagaponack more than 10 years ago when he transported a 19th century barn to the beach from the hills of Vermont.

Pamela Fiore, Editor in Chief of Town & Country magazine.

Calvin Klein has been on the scene for years achieving the distinction of owning one of the largest homes in the Hamptons, his prized "Dragonhead" on Meadow Lane in Southampton. The 50,000 square-foot house originally built by the DuPont's in the 1920s was demolished this Spring to make way for a smaller 17,000 square-foot contemporary beach house. Klein is downsizing and going green.

Elsewhere on Meadow Lane, designer Tory Burch is planning to demolish her oceanfront home and rebuild later this year. She loves to camp out on the beach with her children. Really, they pitch tents, foregoing the comfort of their beds, preferring the ocean breeze to air conditioning. Burch has been trekking out to the Hamptons for some 15 years now.

Vera Wang claimed Wyandanch Road in Southampton Village as her favorite street in the Hamptons. She used her husband's photographs as a backdrop for her exhibit. And the always upbeat and super fun gal Betsey Johnson loves, loves, loves the Hamptons. Nicole Miller heads out east every chance she gets.

Donna Karan, another long-time East Ender, lives in a sleek bayfront home that reflects her interest in Eastern philosophy and meditation. The designer expressed confidence in the East End's economy when she opened her Urban Zen shop on Bay Street in Sag Harbor in 2007. The store features a luxury line designed exclusively for Urban Zen by Karan.

Reed Krakoff, president and CEO of Coach, scored big on the East End real estate scene when he purchased LaSata, an 8,500 square-foot house on Further Lane in East Hampton in 2007 for $24 million. The house, once owned by the Bouvier family, was built in 1917. Former First Lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis spent summers on the 6.4-acre estate just one block from the ocean when she was a child.

Each designer mounted their own exhibit that they laughingly referred to as "their booth" in this unique collaboration that came about as a result of the joint efforts of Herman and Fiore. Needless to say both have been fixtures of the Hamptons for years.

Besty Johnson and her wedding dresses inspired by love.

The elegant magazine editor roamed the exhibit like a lioness dressed in a dramatic deep tourquoise sleeveless shift punctuated with a large broach on her shoulder. She wore gold mesh mules with very pointy toes. Was this the influence of First Lady Michelle Obama or was it classic Fiore who is often photographed wearing a single strand of 18-inch pearls, with matching button earrings that serve as a counterpoint to a black short sleeve sweater? Herman, in comparison, worked the crowd like a pro, looking sharp in a light khaki-colored summer suit, clearly enjoying every minute of the evening.

Herman and the nine designers were all exuberant about the turn out at the pricey event where tickets cost $500 and tables could be had at a dinner party nearby at the home of interior designers Tony Ingrao and Randy Kemper for $25,000. Guests were bused over to the designers'. estate for cocktails before the dinner where they roamed the gardens as music floated over the grass from an outdoor speaker system.

Ricki Lauren in paint splattered jeans and white ruffled tee shirt both designed by Ralph Lauren.

Karan blithely walked past the line of photographers waiting on the red carpet to take photos without even a wave. She was wearing a black jersey dress with spaghetti straps and flat gladiator-inspired sandals, sporting her now trademark "clunky" jewelry around her neck. She wore sunglasses as she walked in, her long brown hair waving from side to side in her own country Zen moment.

Once inside near her booth, Karan took off her sunglasses and did a few television interviews before she tiptoed over to Klein's minimalist exhibit leading a small throng of photographers with her. Klein's streamlined designs were as ethereal as the sand on the beach, and light as the white foam that washes along the shore. His designs offered a contrast to Karan's heavier look that featured more texture and color. Karan's clothes reflected the jungles where Buddhists build their temples. The rough hewn draped fabric combined with comfort in design had a very "natural" back-to-basics feel.

When Klein was asked to choose his favorite designer given a choice between himself and Karan, he answered without missing a beat. "Donna Karan," he said. It would have been difficult if not impossible to pick a winner under these circumstances since all the designers showcased their talents in a unique stylized fashion.

Johnson's wedding dress collection was fun and fabulous just like her, tireless and reporter-friendly, accommodating the press with her full repertoire eliminating only her famous cartwheels. Miller was elegant in a stylish dress and gladiator stilettos. Wang was shy and somewhat reserved, reflecting the subdued complexity of her clothing design while Burch displayed a colorful beach-inspired collection. Krakoff showed an assortment of tote bags that screamed "carry me around town and take me to the beach." The bags were fashionable, fun and utilitarian.

Tahari mixed and mingled quietly somehow eluding the throng of photographers for the most part. His talents as a designer however cannot be overlooked. He is quiet like most residents of Sagaponack who prefer the sound of the waves to the roar of the crowd.

The show stoppers were Ralph and Ricki Lauren. Ralph Lauren wore a white linen suit with a blue and white stripped sailor shirt. The white suit set off his silver grey hair and at first, Lauren's publicity people said he wasn't taking any questions or posing for photographs -- then they decided he was. His wife Ricki, however, looking beyond the definition of fabulous, was camera ready and posed cooperatively, wearing a pair of white paint splattered jeans reminiscent of Jackson Pollock's paintings. Her espadrilles carried over the seemingly French-inspired attire selected by Ralph for the evening's event.

Lauren paid tribute to Pollock and Lee Krasner noting he first came to the Hamptons more than 20 years after Pollock's passing but was inspired by the artist's creativity and non-conformist bohemian spirit. "I like to think we were inspired by the same things, the purity of the light, the salty breezes, the sand under our bare feet, the endless horizon of water and sky, a simpler way of living that inspires our artistic creativity," Lauren wrote in The Art of Fashion in the Hamptons program.

He spoke for everyone and he said it all.