Bessettes Friend Exposes JFK Jr.s Shocking Secrets

To the world, she was the mysterious and impossibly glamorous blonde who captured the heart of America’s most eligible bachelor.

But to her best friend, the fashion designer Gordon Henderson, Carolyn Bessette was the mischievous and free-spirited girl who raided his closet and wiled away hours talking and laughing with him on the stoop of his West Village loft apartment.

Henderson, who once ran his own fashion line, But Gordon, and was the first Black recipient of the CFDA/Perry Ellis Award for New Talent, has rarely spoken about his deep friendship with Bessette since she and JFK Jr were killed in 1999 when their plane plunged into the Atlantic.

Now in a rare and exclusive interview with the Daily Mail he has explained: ‘I don’t like to share them [my memories] with other people because death is scary.

‘When it first happened, I somehow didn't cry that much. It wasn't until the year after that I understood that I would never see my friends [again].

‘It still bothers me, the idea of people asking and trying to get things for years. I said, “No, I can't do this.” And I can't do it because it brings things up, but now I feel better doing it.’

Henderson occupies only a minor role in Ryan Murphy’s FX series Love Story, depicted in the on-screen version of Bessette and JFK Jr’s relationship by actor Omari Chancellor.

It’s just one of many inaccuracies in the drama that, he said, greatly diminishes the outsized part he played in Bessette’s real life and failed to capture the essence of Bessette in all her capricious beauty.

Theirs was a friendship that seemed pre-ordained. He began his fashion career as an assistant designer at Calvin Klein after graduating from Parsons School of Design and Bessette worked her way up from being a salesgirl in a Calvin Klein store in Massachusetts to eventually doing PR for the designer.

They did not, however, cross paths until they took a trip with mutual friends to a ranch outside of the city. Henderson remembers being struck during that first encounter by Bessette’s charm, but they didn’t become close until a second serendipitous encounter back in Manhattan.

‘She had just been moved to the Calvin Klein showroom, and she was walking on Seventh Avenue, and I was going the opposite way towards my new showroom,’ Henderson said.

‘She said, “Oh my God, it's you!” And she said something about my Frye boots, which were just my work boots. But that’s when we started becoming friends.’

Henderson and Bessette’s friendship blossomed swiftly. He recalled how they went out to dinner at downtown hotspots like the Odeon, where he had his first Cosmo, and Raoul’s. Another special favorite was the sceney Soho bistro, Balthazar, where he and Bessette loved to perch at the bar.

‘Our favorite place to sit in Balthazar was the bar because it was covered in copper,’ he said. ‘It’s a beautiful place and we would sit there and have great hamburgers and sodas.’

Although Bessette and Henderson made the rounds in the downtown social scene, Henderson’s West Village loft apartment may have been one of Bessette’s most treasured retreats in the city.

According to Henderson, Bessette treated his apartment as her second home, often donning one of his sweaters as soon as she entered, ordering takeout from the local deli and holding court from the comfort of his bed, which she preferred to his sofa.

‘The one thing that Carolyn loved the most is to sit in bed and put a beautiful sweater on, mine of course, and read a book or talk to her friends,’ Henderson said.

‘Not my living room - she'd have them come back to my bedroom! She also liked to sit on the stoop outside because it was shrouded with trees and leaves.’

He remembers when she began dating JFK Jr after fitting him for a suit at the Calvin Klein showroom and witnessing their early courtship. Soon Henderson had become firm friends with John too.

He watched as his friend’s romance with the late president’s son turned Bessette from an ambitious unknown in the fashion industry, to a figure followed by the paparazzi and dogged by intense public interest.

Increasingly, his West Village abode became a place of refuge where she would hide out unbothered – until, that is, Henderson got some new high-profile neighbors.

‘When she met John, that's when the paparazzi started to see her, especially when she would stay in the loft in Tribeca,’ he said. ‘She would come over here to stay instead and talk on the stoop.

‘But the paparazzi found out when Brad Pitt was going out with Gwyneth Paltrow because they were literally two doors away from me.’

Bessette felt so comfortable with Henderson that she crashed at his apartment for six months before moving in with John.

She often helped herself to his clothing and belongings without asking. Henderson remembers during that time he once ran into Bessette on the street in Manhattan, while she was wearing a full look from his closet, from the hat on her head down to his favorite boots on her feet.

Their mutual interest in fashion was a key tenet of their friendship. Henderson said that Bessette had a great eye for shoes, and although she’s often remembered for her minimalism, he said, she didn’t stick to just black and white.

He introduced Bessette to Yohji Yamamoto, the avant garde Japanese designer, whose designs she favored and once described as her ‘armor.’

Henderson purchased Bessette and himself matching Tod Muehling rings that they wore as talismans of their friendship. He also suggested that Bessette wear a slip dress with heels and a ponytail, a look now synonymous with her style.

‘The fact is, she had her way of doing it [dressing] - let me tell you something, she was incredible looking,’ Henderson said. ‘I made Carolyn put on a slip. I said, “Put on your heels and pull your hair back in a ponytail, and then you can tell me what to do.” And it was incredible.’

At times, Bessette took perhaps too many liberties with Henderson’s close friendship.

In addition to absconding with his clothing, she would often do what she pleased, leaving Henderson to pick up the pieces.

Once, Henderson came home to his apartment to find that his new luggage from a trip to Hong Kong was gone and the clothing that was in it was thrown on the floor because Bessette had fancied the suitcases and taken them on a trip to Hyannis Port with John.

Other times, when John and Bessette traveled, they would leave their dog Friday on Henderson’s doorstep without letting him know ahead of time. At times, Henderson, admitted, he was surprised by how oblivious the couple could be.

‘I didn't know they would act like crazy people,’ Henderson said. ‘Sometimes, poor little Friday, I would open the door, and he'd be waiting for me. They knew that I would take care of him…I was like, “Oh no, no!” And at that time, we didn't have the [cell] phones that we have now, it wasn't easy to call them and say, “Come and pick up your dog!”’

The most glaring example of this may be the time that Henderson went to Hyannis Port with Bessette, driving John’s car and, at her behest, took a turn behind the wheel. They were soon pulled over by the police, who, recognizing John’s car, accused Henderson of kidnapping Bessette and stealing the vehicle.

Henderson explained ‘When we got pulled over, I said, “Oh my god.” First of all, we were in John's car, and they didn't know that Carolyn was his girlfriend or that I was a friend of Carolyn and John's.

‘They had to call him and get him on the phone for him to say it was okay that we had had his car. We had a great time driving there, but I said, “Carolyn, I am not going to be in the middle of you and John, I can't do that.”

Neither Bessette, nor John, far less the police who had racially profiled him, apologized to Henderson about the incident.

‘No acknowledgement,’ he said. ‘They should have told me that they were sorry.’

Henderson, however, could never stay mad at Bessette for long and said that although she could be capricious, she was very caring towards him and protective of their deep friendship.

‘She was very protective of me for some reason, I don't know,’ he said. ‘We never had to have an argument.’

Henderson took many other trips to Hyannis Port over their friendship, spending time at the Kennedy compound with Bessette and John.

Bessette always liked having a new place to go and travelled with Henderson too, tagging along for his jaunts to Seattle to visit his mother. Bessette, ever charming, endeared herself to Henderson’s mother.

‘She and my mom became really good friends too,’ he shared.

Henderson’s intimate recollections of Bessette are a far cry from the saccharine portrayal of Murphy’s Love Story.

Nowhere is this more apparent than in the episode about Bessette’s Cumberland Island wedding to JFK Jr. In the show, Henderson barely features.

In real life, he was responsible for planning the entire event - from the whole roast turkeys that were served at each table with full fixings (inspired by the Plaza’s opulent Thanksgiving menu), to the candles in paper bags that lined the pathways of the beach.

However romantic the glow they lent to the wedding, Henderson revealed, there was a practical reason for their presence. Shortly before the wedding he had seen a baby alligator and wanted to make sure that any unwelcome reptilian visitors would be visible to guests.

And while some have assumed that Henderson was snubbed when Bessette chose to have her wedding dress designed by Narciso Rodriguez, another Calvin Klein alumni, in truth, Henderson said, that’s not how it happened.

Henderson said: ‘I said to Carolyn, “Do you want me to do the dress, or do you want me to help you with the wedding?” She showed me this dress from John Galliano [as inspiration] and I was like, “This is a f**king bias dress.”

‘It was very difficult to do. The only reason why I didn't do the dress as well is because I didn't have a studio. And you need a studio, you need a form because if you don’t when you’re making a dress, it’s very difficult. So, she ended up picking the wedding.’

He did, however, design the navy-blue wool suits that JFK Jr and his cousin wore; the suits were an homage to John’s late father, stitched, as they were, in his favorite color.

As it happened, on the wedding day, Bessette’s dress was too tight, having stretched to a tighter, smaller size from being hung up – something Henderson said can be a risk with dresses cut on the bias.

As a result, she had to put the dress on over her head, which presented a problem, as her hair and makeup had already been done. Henderson troubleshooted by placing a silk scarf over her head and slipping the dress over it.

Despite the renewed interest in the zeitgeist in his dear friend, Henderson said he has no interest in watching the series.

He was not consulted by the show, despite his integral role in the lives of Bessette and JFK Jr and having watched a couple of early episodes admitted he was particularly bothered that the show couldn’t nail Bessette’s style and hair color.

‘I looked at the first half [of the series] and it was not good,’ he said. ‘I don't like to see the series when it's not appropriate.’

For Henderson, recreating the aura of Bessette was always going to be an impossible task and inevitably, he believes, the show fell short with the actors they cast. 

He said: ‘If you saw Carolyn, you would be shocked, because they have to understand the idea of what Carolyn looked like. The thing about Manhattan was the most beautiful people in the world were there…they really had to get astounding looking people, and I don't think they did.’

For Henderson there are so many joyful and precious memories of his time with Bessette and John. But the awful memories associated with their tragic accident are inescapable and painful to this day.

He had made the trip to Martha’s Vineyard with them many times in the small plane that John flew. He knew the risks and had often warned Bessette about them. 

‘The thing about Martha’s Vineyard, it's very, it's very hard to land there,’ Henderson said. ‘It's like a bowl. That's why I said to Carolyn all the time when I was not there to have a copilot with you that knows about being there, because several times we had to land the plane twice.’

When Henderson remembers Bessette these days, he likes to linger on memories of their good times together - the times on the stoop and lounging on his bed in his West Village apartment.

His memories are jogged by the scent of her warm amber perfume and the sight of children playing. Bessette loved kids, according to Henderson and he is certain that, had she and John lived, they would have had a family of their own.

‘She was very attached to youngsters, babies,’ he said. ‘She liked kids. She went bananas when she saw them. It’s one of the things that makes me happy. I smile whenever I see them.’