Tabs

Years before Choupette Lagerfeld’s reign at Chanel, Tabs was the fashion house’s most fabulous spokescat. His kitty modeling ad campaigns decorated subway tunnels, murals, cat condos and billboards across America and around the world.

Tabs dominated haute cat-ure catwalks for more than a decade and still holds the record for “Longest Feather Boa Worn by a Cat Model” at Milan, New York and Paris Fashion Week.

Here were some of his most iconic Chanel campaigns, many of which are studied by kittens in fashion schools to this day.

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Tabs has been at his new apartment in the sky for a little over two months, and I’m sure he’s throwing some incredible parties up there… Meanwhile, down here on the Earth, July was one of his busiest kitty modeling months, and MAC was arguably his favorite mainstream department store brand. He worked on literally dozens of MAC ad campaigns, including the following, which were among his summertime favorites…

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“First time I saw Tabs in that Dior Jet Ski ad, I knew he’d be an action star. I tried to sign him when we were casting for Transformers, but we couldn’t get the schedules to line up. Really, Shia was available, and Tabs wasn’t. And the rest, as they say, is history. Would have been cool to see what Tabs would have done with the role, though.” — Michael Bay, Producer, Director

“Look at that paw placement and how he angles his tum. I can’t even tell you how many models I’ve tried to teach those specific body placements to, but Tabs just knew how to do it naturally.” – Miss J. Alexander, Model, Runway Coach

“You know, I was inspired to take up dancing because of Tabs. I had a poster of that famous Dior Cat Shades ad on my bedroom wall when I was a little girl, and that picture was my inspiration for ballet. I never would have become the dancer I am if it weren’t for Tabs.” — Misty Copeland, Ballet Dancer, American Ballet Theatre

“At the museum, we keep the tiara and feather boa in a climate-controlled vault to protect them for future generations.” — Jean-Luc Martinez, President-Director, Musée du Louvre

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I saw a tiny tiara at Target the other day and thought about Snowflake. She was Tabs’s longtime…how shall we say this — kitty companion? I remembered the time he took her to Tiffany and said she could pick out anything she wanted, but when she picked out an engagement ring, Tabs looked really nervous. “Oh, um…” he meowed, “anything except a ring.” So Snowflake picked a tiny tiara instead.

Tabs was funny about relationships… He wasn’t a player, but at the same time, he never put a ring on it with Snowflake, even though I thought he should, just because she was such a good cat. Devoted, funny, beautiful, and a stellar kitty model in her own right. They actually worked on several kitty modeling campaigns together, which led the gossip mags to speculate that they’d get married, but they never did.

I asked Tabs about it once, and he said that he had too much going on to be tied down to a conventional relationship, which I think may have been true to a certain degree, but I also think he was just afraid of getting his heart broken.

Snowflake waited patiently for Tabs for several years before eventually moving on. Last time I heard, she had settled down with a cat of royal lineage in Scotland. I think he was a duke or a prince or something. I’m not exactly sure, but he did own a castle. Sometimes I see pics of her in the royal gossip mags across the pond.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

Tabs was many things — pro feline football player, fashion phenom, philanthropist, seafood lover, fabulous chef — but one thing he wasn’t was a skilled fisherman. His lack of fishing skills was his secret shame.

He just didn’t have the patience for it. Sure, he loved fishing fashion, designer sunglasses and lounging by the lake with a bottle of bubbly, but the actual fishing part of it? Not a fan, and he REALLY didn’t like getting dirty pond water on his fur.

That being said, he was an award-winning three-time Novato Birding Champion. It’s just that fishing wasn’t one of his strengths.

One time he came home after a day on his yacht with a tall tale about a 45-pound marlin. He kept trying to convince me that he almost caught it, and he called it “the one that got away.” Quite frankly, I think he was full of catnip.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen