All posts filed under: 19th Century

Rate the Dress: Revealing Regency

Last week’s Charles James Surrealist frock elicited some strong feelings from you raters. Some of you adored it, some of you hated it, and some of you adored some bits and hated others. The pleated front was particularly divisive: half of you were fans of the mastery of fabric manipulation, the other half of you thought it was a scary alien fabric explosion. Whether you liked it or not, James’ green frock was memorable, but came it at a rather bland 7.6 out of 10, which is what happens if you balance a bunch of raving 10s with a few ‘eww’ 3s! One of the things that many of you commented on with the green frock was how terrible the mannequin was, and how much that affected your perception of the dress. With that in mind, I’ve picked a frock that may win the award for worst mannequin styling photo ever: I’m pretty sure that comes straight out of a Dr Who episode… Luckily, there are better images of the dress! And oh boy, for …

Rate the Dress: Maria Fyodorovna in blue

Published by The Dreamstress

Once again I’m being bad and haven’t tallied up the ratings from last week (sorry, my life is eating me alive). I’ll try to be good and get them up today though! This week I present to you Maria Feodorovna, aka Dagmar of Denmark, sister of the famously beautiful Queen Alexandra of England, and mother of the last Tsar of Russia, in something extremely feminine and lacy and ruffly and corsage-y. We were talking about New Zealand designer Trelise Cooper (well known for her frills and furbelows) in my class this evening, so I guess I had such embellishments on my mind (though if this were a Trelise dress it would be made of three different patterned fabrics in pink and orange and teal blue all at once) What do you think of Dagmar in her version of 1870s regal grandeur? I’m sure her lace would have cost a fortune, and I’m also sure it’s the reason the painting is reminding me of a toned-down Maria Christina. In fact, with only her very fashionable velvet …

The ca. 1860 Paisley Petticoat

Published by The Dreamstress

Remember this petticoat? I’ve posted it as inspiration for pretty much every HSF challenge it would qualify for: Under it All, White, Eastern Influence, Embellishment… Clearly I’m madly in love with it, and I’ve always wanted to recreate it, but the dream seemed impossible. I simply don’t have the time to do the amazing handiwork, and what were the chances of finding a similar fabric? And then this arrived at The Fabric Store (yes, that’s actually it’s name): Ah-maze-ing! Naturally, I had to have it. But it wasn’t exactly cheap… I restrained myself for two days, and then had to go back to TFS for a necessity, and I saw that half the bolt was already gone. So I bit the bullet and forked out (brace yourself when you see the price below) and bought four metres of it – which may have been slightly overkill. I didn’t regret it, because I was in the shop again a week later and it was all gone. I’ve been desperate to make it up ever since I …