Famous Designer Ivy Supersonic Pins 'Shadow Collection' On Walls Of Ridgewood Coffee

RIDGEWOOD, NJ — Upon completing a Jewish mystical teaching on "Jacob's Ladder," Kabbalist Ivy Silberstein, aka Ivy Supersonic, snapped shadow photos of herself wearing platform shoes and bell bottom jeans, and the shadow cast of her profile, she pointed out, looked seemingly like a ladder.

The shadow of Silberstein, a New York City fashion designer, in what, she said, is her everyday wear, is now depicted in framed photos hanging at Ridgewood Coffee on 90 East Ridgewood Avenue.

"The shadows of myself," Silberstein said, "are perfect representations, refections of my life as a fashion designer."

It all started when Silberstein popped in to the coffeeshop on a recommendation Wednesday.

She stirred up conversation with an employee, who happened to be the cafe's art curator. And after an ensuing dialogue, a deal was brokered for Silberstein to hang her Shadow Collection on the walls of the java shop.

"When things are simple like that it's just kismet, of the Divine, meant to be," said Silberstein, a practitioner of Kabbalah, or Jewish mysticism.

Silberstein, who is well known for designing Pamela Anderson's iconic pink hat that she wore to the 1999 MTV Video Music Awards, said this is her first photo exhibition, which features her shadows at Wood Dale County Park in Woodcliff Lake.

Her idea for the collection came, in part, from her reading of the weekly Kabbalah lesson, which, this week, was on Jacob's Ladder, a dream that, the Scriptures say, Jacob had of angels ascending and descending a ladder reaching to heaven.

"Every thing is a message for me," Silberstein said. "'The Universe' is communicating, and is in constant conversation — nonstop."