dress me, kate; The whole world craves the contents of her closet.(Kate Moss)

Byline: Mark Holgate

Kate Moss is doing what she does best. Better than feeding the appetites of the tabloids. Better than playing rock royalty, a latter-day Marianne to boyfriend Pete Doherty's Mick. Far better, even, than being the world's most famous and most fabulous model. No, her real talent is that she is able to stay totally, utterly calm while chaos reigns around her, the kohl-slicked eye of a fashion-world storm. The cause of this particular melee is the Mario Testino sitting you see here, A Day in the Life of Kate Moss in microcosm: Parties, Paparazzi, Pretty (and Pretty Fabulous) People. Moss is wearing clothes from her first and-I don't think I am guilty of hyperbole here-hysterically awaited collection for Topshop, the British high-street brand, which will arrive on these shores any day now courtesy of Barneys New York. "It's just stuff that I wear all the time," chirps Moss, zipping herself up into a white Swiss cotton cocktail dress. "Vintage pieces from my closet that I absolutely love, but which I could never really find versions of anywhere else."

Moss is capitalizing (substantially, if those seven-figure-salary rumors are anything to go by) on her own style with the launch of Kate Moss Topshop, which she has agreed to do for at least the next two years. The collection's 80-plus pieces for summer cover every Kate Moss-ism imaginable, from aviator shades to Edwardian jackets, corset belts to tuxedo pants. Her role was to bring along whatever she loved from her wardrobe and then, aided and abetted by her friend Katy England, the creative director of Alexander McQueen, and a Topshop team, rework it to her satisfaction. Celebrities with fashion lines may be a dime a dozen these days-Sarah Jessica Parker is the latest, with Bitten-but signing up Moss was a major coup for Topshop and its billionaire owner, Sir Philip Green. After all, Moss has kick-started almost as many trends as she has had to wear professionally: rock tees, teeny skirts, even teenier shorts, hip belts, gladiator sandals, pirate boots . . . all eagerly copied across the globe. So when everyone is cashing in on your closet, why shouldn't you do the same?

The collection heralds a new phase in fast, cheap fashion: Those being copied are in on the act, too. Until recently, its epicenter, the British high street-Topshop, River Island, New Look, and Primark (nicknamed "Primarni" in the U.K. for its uncanny ability to re-create clothes done first by a certain Italian label)-was renowned for the speed with which it could imitate runway looks. But everything changed as the fashion world sped up beyond the standard two-season structure, and as celebrity style became more important to the women who were shopping in these chic but cheap emporia. At this point, the British high-street behemoths increasingly looked to characters like Moss, who were compelling because of their ability to mix designer and vintage in an utterly intriguing and original manner.

Sienna Miller is another who has the British high street transfixed. "When I first got together with my ex Jude, I was wearing my mother's vintage and old Moroccan bits and pieces that I had found," says Miller. "And then, before I knew it, my look was all over River Island! But that's the way it works in the U.K.: You wear something, and two weeks later the stores are selling the identical thing or"-she starts to laugh-"something better!" And with Topshop et al often churning out new collections at least every six weeks, whatever the likes of Moss or Miller wore was like a runway show every day of the year. The result is that British women-and others passing through London (Scarlett Johansson, Nicole Kidman, Cate Blanchett)-quickly became addicted to Topshop's buy-now-or-you'll-miss-them offerings.

The ...