Author: kendra

Posted on

Academy Awards

SO excited that Marie Antoinette won for costume design! Nyah nyah to all the naysayers! I literally did a little dance on my couch. Yay!

And in the one non-costume, but vaguely related, thing I post here, my Academy Awards fashion commentary!

Anne Hathaway – the bow was horrible — it basically made an upside down V, which made her look shlumpy. But I will say that I hate it a bit less now that I’ve seen the coordinating back bow — maybe if it had just had the back bow? I think it’s because it’s reminding me of a natural form dress. Anyway.

Beyonce – at least she wasn’t wearing gold lame for ONCE! It wasn’t my favorite, but I’ll take it. I would have liked it better if it didn’t have the dumb thigh slit. When is that woman going to realize that she’s perfectly attractive without needing to dress like a hoochie mama?

Cameron Diaz – Go Fug Yourself said it best when they said it looked like she was wearing a big napkin. The fit through the waist is bad — it got all wrinkly. She should have transported herself to the Oscars lying down! The brown hair looks better on her, the super dark fake tan does NOT.

Cate Blanchett – everything the woman wears is divine, but this extremely so. I was originally wondering if it was a little too severe, until I saw the jewels at the shoulder and hemline. Gorgeous!

Eva Green – who is she? No idea. I actually quite like the dress — the bodice reminds me of an early 1900s evening gown, although I wouldn’t have wrapped the organdy over the flowers (like it over the midriff and arms, but over the flowers just makes her look like she’s choking).

Gwyneth Paltrow – hands down my best dressed. She’s back, after like 5 years in the land of Hideous! LOVE the color, love the sheerness of the fabric, love the pin tucking and the design placement of the tucks (especially across the collar bone), love the sleeve length. Gawgeous.

Jada Pinkett Smith – I like what the dress is doing from the knees down — beautiful pleats there and the fabric has a gorgeous weight. Knees up – not so much. Despite the seaming/decoration on the bodice, this accentuates the fact that she has no waist definition. She should really try a V waistline with a fuller (A line maybe?) skirt.

Jennifer Hudson – I don’t even have to say it, do I? Apparently she was talked into wearing this by some stylist after having picked another dress — assuming that dress is the one pictured at the bottom of this page, REALLY bad move. The gold dress is stunning!

Jennifer Lopez – love it! Many of the commentators I’ve read have said something like “Love the Grecian dress, hate the 1960s hair.” Um, do they not realize that the whole thing is 1960s-esque? I thought she looked great and retro in an interesting way. The jewels built into the dress are lovely.

Jessical Biel – Malibu Barbie! Nipple alert! The color does work on her, and she certainly has the figure for it, but it just felt too stretch-jersey-comfortable for me.

Jodie Foster — very pretty, matches her eyes beautifully.

Kate Winslet – the girl can do no wrong in my opinion. I love the style and fit of the dress, and the ruching and hanging drape are beautiful. I tend to like her in stronger colors, but this looks very pretty.

Kirsten Dunst – another one everyone’s picking on, but I LOVE it! Yes it combines a lot of different elements, but it works on her in an I’m-young-and-pixie-ish sort of way. I love the collar and sleeves, the color is great, and her lipstick is FABULOUS.

Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts – Nicole: too harsh of a color, I miss her with really red hair, the bow is stupid. Charlize couldn’t pull it off, neither can you. Naomi: good color, pretty hair, the sleeves look stupid and make her look like her bust is very droopy.

Penelope Cruz – not my favorite on its own, but she can really pull it off.

Queen Latifah – not my favorite! She usually dresses really nicely for her figure. I just feel like this isn’t doing anything great for her (it’s not doing anything bad for her, either, but…)

Rachel Weisz – I ADORE this dress. Gorgeous fabric, gorgeous color, love the jewelling in the bodice. The dress (again) reminds me of one of those 1898-1902 champagne satin evening dresses. The hair and lipstick are great – the only thing I would lose is the necklace (competes too much with the jewelling in the dress). My second favorite, after Gwynnie.

Helen Mirren — lovely. I love the style of the bodice and the length of the sleeves (THIS is the kind of thing Meryl Streep should wear!). Very pretty.

Posted on

Queen of Fashion Book Review

Since work and life have been so busy that pretty much NO sewing has been happening, I thought I’d keep things interesting around here with a book review! I recently finished Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore to the Revolution, which in addition to having a fabulous title, was a fascinating read.

After seeing the movie last year, I went back to read Antonia Fraser’s biography (which I’d read about 1/3 of years ago but never finished). Queen of Fashion really compliments a conventional bio of MA; it actually includes a lot of biographical information, but there’s (obviously) lots that it can’t go into. So I recommend reading it after having read one of the major MA biographies.

But I was struck how much clearer my understanding of MA, and particularly why she became such a focus for the revolution, was after reading Queen of Fashion. In fact, I would now argue that it is impossible to really understand MA without understanding her clothing, and the public perception of her fashionable image.

In particular, it is author Weber’s argument that it was precisely because MA abandoned court dress in favor of fashionable attire that she became a focal point for public criticism. By leading the mode, and by leaving Versailles to mix with Parisian society, MA shattered earlier understandings of royalty as godlike. Previously, French queens had dutifully followed court protocol, which kept them wearing very formal attire and kept them physically removed from the majority of the populace. MA, on the other hand, became all too real, both in the fact that you could see her at the Opera or shopping in Paris, but also because she wore what was being worn by other fashionable women of her era. Real equals human, and human equals faults, so while early on she was very popular, when public sentiment began to sour with the current regime, she was a fair target — one who was wearing not only what other aristocratic women wore, but also (to some degree) what actresses and prostitutes wore.

This all helped me understand the Diamond Necklace Affair in a way that I hadn’t previously. After seeing the film The Affair of the Necklace, I went back to Fraser’s bio to try to understand why this incident had such a negative impact on MA’s public image — but just really didn’t get it. Queen of Fashion spends a lot more time (I think a whole chapter?) on this incident. Weber argues that by acquitting Cardinal Rohan, the parlement basically said that it was reasonable for him to assume that MA would spend huge sums of money on a ridiculous necklace, and also reasonable to assume that she would participate in secret assignations — all of which publicly confirmed the popular perceptions of MA.

There’s also lots of interesting costume history interspersed throughout, such as the whole “MA refused to wear a corset” actually was about her not wanting to wear the grand corps, an apparently even MORE rigid and uncomfortable set of stays that only royalty were allowed to wear — not that she didn’t want to wear a corset at all. And there’s lots of discussion of the “pouf” hairstyle and the gaulle, which is the early term for the chemise a la Reine.

I was excited to find, while scanning footnotes (I’m a history geek, I read the footnotes) that while Rose Bertin’s records were destroyed, the records of another dressmaker (Madame Eloffe) that MA used during the revolution have been published (I’m waiting to get these via interlibrary loan). And that the Musee Carnavalet in Paris has a few items from the queen’s wardrobe, including a shoe and a fan that is on permanent display (going to have to hunt these down on my next trip to Paris! I may have even wandered right by them on my last trip).

The only disappointment I had was that there was not more details on the specifics of MA’s wardrobe (oh, for a Marie Antoinette’s Wardrobe Unlocked!), but that wasn’t really the aim of the book and there are few records preserved.

The book is really well written and very readable; if you’re into the topic at all, I highly recommend it.

Next up, I really want to read Sexing La Mode: Gender, Fashion, and Commercial Culture in Old Regime France!

Posted on

Realm of Venus Rose Awards

So I kind of didn’t want to post about this, because I didn’t want to be all self-aggrandizing, but then I realized that I wasn’t the only one and I’m very excited for the other winners, so… that is all preamble to say that the Realm of Venus Rose Awards are in, and hey, I won something! I’m really excited for all the other award winners, especially Jennifer (one my fellow Bella Donna performers). So congratulations to all the winners, and thanks to those who voted for your nice comments!