Category: balls

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I Love Paris in the Late Springtime/Early Summertime…

[Side note:  you are all heathens for not being excited about that Gainsborough portrait!]

So the thing I keep meaning to post about, but then get distracted by how busy life is these days, is… I’M GOING TO PARIS IN MAY!  EEP!  SUPER exciting!  I’ll be visiting Lisa, who lives in Paris, for a week and a half.

Beyond wanting to visit Lisa, and who DOESN’T want to go to Paris?  The thing that is getting this nervous flyer on a plane by herself is…

I’m going to be going to Vaux-le-Vicomte!  Which is the French chateau that was the inspiration for Versailles.  Specifically, to the Grand Bal Costume — a 17th/18th century (required! yay!) costume ball, with dinner beforehand.  The ball will be in the Grand Salon, which sounds very promising; and will have a Baroque musical group, and period dancing. (Side note:  I am amused that the ball goes from 11pm-3am, which is so VERY European!).  There will be fireworks in the garden.  I may die of happiness!

This is the room the ball will be in:

Grand Salon du chateau de Vaux le Vicomte

And then on Sunday, I’ll be going to the Journee Grand Siecle, which is a 17th/18th century costumed afternoon at Vaux where attendees are encouraged to bring picnics, plus there are various demonstrations/activities.

Journée Grand siècle - Château de Vaux le Vicomte

I am BEYOND excited!  I hope to meet/re-meet many European costumers I’ve chatted with online.  And and…TWO COSTUME EVENTS IN NOT JUST PERIOD BUILDINGS, BUT OVER-THE-TOP FABULOUSLY PERIOD BUILDINGS!!!  Where history happened!

Of course, there will be other adventures — I plan to spend as much of a day as I can stomach at the Louvre.  And there’s other costume stuff… but I’ll save that for the next post!

Oh, input desired!  I am going to wear my 1780 polonaise for the picnic day.  Which francaise should I wear to the ball — the peach or the black?  I am purposely NOT stressing myself by trying to make something new for this!

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An Excessively Halloween-y Weekend

I had an excessively Halloween-y weekend the weekend AFTER Halloween.  On Friday night, we had the Lumieres occult dinner, which was spooky & lovely — mediums and aristocrats mingled over yummy French food, champagne, and candelight.  I went as a medium — Mlle Marie Anne Lenormand, who was more Napoleonic than Rococo era but who’s double checking!  I wore my gaulle, which I accessorized with lots of black — black sash, jewelry, and hair ribbons.

On Saturday night was the PEERS Ball des Vampires, which is about 10 min. walk from my house – yay!  I went with Bridget & Katherine — we had great Italian food beforehand (and scared the locals), then walked over to the ball.  There were lots of fabulous costumes (lots of Victorian & 18th century, one sparkly Edward who I had fun teasing, etc.).  I spent most of my time downstairs in the goth-y DJ room (they played Hong Kong Garden, so I got to have my Marie Antoinette masquerade moment!) — only did one-half of one waltz!  I don’t know, I just wasn’t in the mood to jockey for partners.  It does make me want to make the effort to hit the ball scene a bit more frequently (altho that means talking some of my friends into going too) — it’s a great chance to dress up and socialize, even if you’re not in the mood to dance.  I was feeling very “this old thing” about my black francaise (the other option was Nell Gwyn, but it didn’t feel terribly Halloween-y) so I resisted the urge to attempt to make anything new, and focused my time and styling a new wig and making wig accessories.  I ended up making a “cake,” and my rockin’ husband made me a guillotine out of balsa wood (the man is a talent!), plus giving me a scary guillotine-d neck scar.  Jenn absolutely took the cake (ha ha) in her gorgeous black & orange francaise, with black wig that had a jack-o-lantern that LIT UP.  It ROCKED.

A preview of photos is below — you can find the rest of my Flickr account (which I’m going to be using from now on for event photos) — here’s the Lumieres occult dinner and the Vampire ball.

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PEERS Scarlet Pimpernel Ball

Last Saturday was the PEERS Scarlet Pimpernel ball. And you know 18th century = love! So that, plus the fact that other friends were going, encouraged me to go. I so love figure dance (English country, quadrilles, you name it), so it was lots of fun to get to dance, plus there were lots of lovely people to chat with. And it was yet another chance to revamp my 1770s pouf wig — this time with lots of curls in back! And ship! I’ve posted photos.

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GBACG Goes to the Gaskell Ball

I am oh so woefully behind — about a month ago GBACG went to the Gaskell Ball, and I did actually take some pictures! Our theme this year was Victorian fantasy, and only a very few of us dressed up. Bridget wore her fabulous fairy costume, I wore my 1830s evening dress with elf ears and my LOTR circlet, and a woman whose name I’ve forgotten came as the sun (am I forgetting anyone?). Sadness! Next year I may have to just make it no theme, or just pick something along with whatever I want to wear — if I’m the only one wearing it, it should be something I’m excited about! I did think seriously about how much I want to sell off all of my non-natural fiber costumes. This dress is an acetate taffeta, and while it wasn’t horrible because of the low neck/short sleeves, it was definitely uncomfortable. Anyway — pictures!

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PEERS Vampire Ball

On Saturday night I went to the PEERS Vampire Ball. I was so inspired by Marie Antoinette that of course I had to wear my new peach francaise, and finally got the courage to wear my new, huge grey powdered wig. And I finally found the beauty patches that I bought from Jwlhyfer over a year ago, and was excited to find that one was a bat! Yay! And I can report that eyeglash glue works perfectly for affixing patches.

The ball was nice but not fabulous — it was a much better venue than where it’s been held in the past, but it was hot and for some reason I didn’t really get into dancing until late in the evening (but then had some really nice waltzes). I did have a good time just mingling and chatting. There were some really great costumes there — lots of goth-inspired ensembles. I got a lot of compliments on my costume, although one of my friends overheard someone say (in reference to me), “I can’t believe that people would RENT costumes to come to this.” Um, sorry dearie! Handsewed every stitch! But I guess I should take it as a compliment, right?

I’ve posted my pictures, which didn’t turn out too fabulous — I think some of the settings on my camera may have been off. Anthony got a much better picture of my dress in his pictures.