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historical costume projects & resources

Court Fashion Exhibit at Versailles

If you don’t live anywhere near Paris, be depressed with me that you are missing what looks like one of the more fabulous costume exhibits ever: Fastes de Cour: Le Costume de Cour en Europe, 1650-1800, currently on exhibit at the Chateau de Versailles. The website is fabulous, I’ve just ordered the catalogue, but I am still depressed. I am even more depressed to miss the symposium in early June. Do check out the website. Make sure you zoom the pictures. Le sigh.

16 thoughts on “Court Fashion Exhibit at Versailles

  1. Let’s crawl into bed and stuff ourselves with petite fours and drown our misery in champagne, ok?

  2. Can I join the petite fours and champagne party? This calls for a serious pity party.

    I couldn’t figure out how to order the book. Not that I can afford it this very moment, but I’ll need to know at some point. I hadn’t realized how rusty my French was!

  3. Well I thought I was ordering the book, but it looks like Amazon.fr doesn’t yet have it. You can get it through FNAC, but it costs more, so hang on a bit and as soon as Amazon.fr really has it, I’ll post a reminder.

    Sarah: I never get to go to Disneyland EITHER.

  4. I am going to Versailles this summer, in time for this exhibit.(Man, when do I ever get to say something cool like that?) *tries to remember how to read French* Alright, I’m scraggling through all the information on the website. My mum pointed this out to me today so I’m making a point to go to Versailles instead of Giverny (not that I wasn’t going to go to Versailles anyway).

  5. (Not that I meant to rub that in everyone’s faces, it’s just that this is the only thing ever relevant to me.) Am I entirely wrong to presume that live photos will be (somewhat) unnecessary seeing as there is a catalogue available? I don’t know about these things. Not that I can find any photography information of the sort. The mentioned copyright seems to entend just to the site itself.

  6. Maeko – no worries, good for you! You should ask when you get there about photos. Probably they’ll say no, but they COULD allow non-flash photography… but probably you’ll get a horrified guard giving you a very French reaction 🙂

  7. Hahaha. I’ll keep you guys updated. It’s gonna be a whirlwind tour so I don’t know if I’ll even be able to get some sketches in or anything, but I’ll try to note everything else. 🙂 This made me about a frillion times more excited about going.

  8. I have a totally brilliant plan for getting to see this exhibit. I shall stow away on the private jet of a young, handsome, French billionaire who is flying back to France from his American vacation. When the plane is unloaded I will be discovered, but he will be enchanted by my courage and ingenuity and we will enjoy a fabulous love affair filled with macerons and diamonds (because he’s rich and will buy me pretty things). During the course of our romantic liaison he will arrange a private tour of the exhibit at Versailles just for me, and I will get to look at all of the costumes close up and without a bunch of other people blocking my view. And we will live happily ever after in a French chateau filled with all the fabric to make all the costumes I could ever dream of.

    It’s a totally foolproof plan, nothing could possibly go wrong.

  9. Yes, I was similarly planning to elope whilst on the Continent in order to get a green card while this is still possible.

  10. Katy – don’t forget that he’ll also be enchanted by your pluck! (Pluck is key). I think your cunning plan is foolproof- sign me up!!

  11. O.M.G. I think if I saw those gowns in person the museum guards would find me in a puddle on the floor.

  12. I have some pictures of the white embroidered gown from the Royal Ontario Museum. If you want to see the pics of that the link is here: http://mala-14.livejournal.com/77121.html It has the link to my album of the pictures and my write-up of some observations.
    That looks like it’s going to be an amazing exhibit. Wish I was going.

  13. CURSES! I went to Versailles a month too early.

    I think I’ll go crawl into a corner now.

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