European Trip Plans!

So in about a week I am headed off for three weeks in Europe! I’ll be spending the first week with my mother in France — we are going on a walking tour in the Dordogne region, with about 1.5 days in Paris on either side of that trip. Unfortunately all of the Parisian costume museums are showing modern couturiers in their exhibitions (like Gaultier), so I’m planning to return to the Musee Carnavalet to track down the Marie Antoinette things there that I missed last time, and then spend some time wandering the Louvre and a few other museums that I’ve seen before, but skipped last time. Most exciting is that I’m going to be meeting a few other costumers for the day at Versailles that I mentioned a few posts ago!

Then it’s over for a week in London, where I plan to wander the V&A (spending some time OUTSIDE of the costume rooms for once! Edited to add: and I’m planning to study that caraco jacket that was giving me such grief!), National Gallery, National Portrait Gallery, Museum of London, and the Tate Britain. I’m going to do a day trip to Bath, to see the Museum of Costume and the Jane Austen Centre (which will be showing some costumes from the recent ITV production of Persuasion). I’ll be spending my final weekend near Colchester with Kentwellians Edmund and Bess; we’re going to do something costumey but we haven’t quite narrowed it down (probably a trip to a National Trust house with a picnic etc. in costume).

The trick is getting costumes over there. For the Versailles trip, I need to just bring this with me. I am thinking my cotton polonaise will pack best, but I’m going to need to also bring shift, stays, bumpad, underpetticoat, petticoat, stockings, and shoes. Plus I can’t imagine wandering around all day without shade — I’d love to bring my big capote, but I think it’s going to have to be the low crown straw hat that I wore to Let Them Drink Wine (although I need to figure out a better way to attach it to my head — I just used one hatpin last time, and it kept blowing up plus sat at a really annoying angle). Does anyone have any advice on how to make those hats bend up in back? I think that would help… I guess I’ll bring foam rollers to sleep in so I can have some semblance of interesting hair — I can’t be taking pictures at VERSAILLES with bad hair, for god’s sake!

For the England trip, I’m not 100% sure what era we’re doing. I may rewear my polonaise, or bring my courtesan dress. We were talking bustle until I realized how badly my red/white stripey would pack. This costume packs easier as there’s no hat. I may ship this one over, or stick my poor husband with shlepping it in a suitcase and leaving it at left luggage. All getting-it-there options suck!