This week’s rate the dress is fall themed, for all you Northern Hemisphere costumers getting excited about Autumn. Perhaps next week I’ll post a spring-y pastel confection for us Antipodeans.
Last week’s sports frock started out strong, and mostly got every ball through the hoop with minimal swings and maximum points – but a few of you weren’t quite so impressed.
In some ways the poor dress couldn’t win. It lost points from some commentators for not being interesting enough, and from others for being too fancy!
The Total: 9.1 out of 10
Not so unbeatable that it completely dominates in its field, but still likely to win most tournaments.
This week: a ca. 1895 dinner dress in shot silk
This week’s ca. 1895 dinner dress is covered from chin to toe, but I’d venture to say there’s still something rather sexy about the dress, despite all the fabric.
The pleated draping and lines of velvet trim imply wrapping – and thus unwrapping. I’m fairly certain that this dress opens in the front, under the pleating. There’s always something a little more sensual about a garment you can get into and out of on your own.
The double-puff sleeves are an interesting variant on the fashionable gigot sleeve of the mid-1890s. Together with the front fastening and muted colour scheme, they give this dress a slightly Aesthetic aesthetic. It’s just a little more artistic, and a little less mainstream.
What do you think? Does this dinner dress tempt your sartorial tastebuds?
Rate the Dress on a Scale of 1 to 10
A reminder about rating — feel free to be critical if you don’t like a thing, but make sure that your comments aren’t actually insulting to those who do like a garment. Phrase criticism as your opinion, rather than a flat fact. Our different tastes are what make Rate the Dress so interesting. It’s no fun when a comment implies that anyone who doesn’t agree with it, or who would wear a garment, is totally lacking in taste.
As usual, nothing more complicated than a .5. I also hugely appreciate it if you only do one rating, and set it on a line at the very end of your comment.
It’s back! For the second year in a row, Toi Whakaari’s Costume Showcase will be livestreamed!
Join us virtually on the 2 October, 6:30 PM NZDT
(that’s 7:30pm Friday the 1st in Hawai’i, 10:30pm Friday the 1st in California, 1:30am Sat the 2nd on the East Coast, 6:30am Sat the 2nd in London, and 1:30pm Sat the 2nd in Singapore).
What is Costume Showcase?
Costume Showcase is the culmination of the years work for the Costume Construction students I teach at Toi Whakaari The New Zealand Drama School.
At the start of the year the 2nd year students chose a costume design to bring to life. It could be something from a piece of art, a costume design done for a film or show, a fashion plate, or something from a video game or anime, etc. They just can’t be something they designed themselves (it’s a Diploma in Costume Construction, not Costume Design), and it has to be a design, not a made costume or garment.
Over the course of the year they research and test different ways to ‘realise’ their design. They apply this research, and the techniques they have learned over the course of their studies, to their ‘Major Work’.
Come Costume Showcase, their creation steps off the page, onstage, and into life, with the help of a student model, and a mainly student cast and crew.
In addition to the Second Year’s individual Major Works, the First Year Costumers show their progress in two group performance pieces: one focused on a historical dress, and one that they have had to pattern and make from a design I create.
Huge amounts of the show are student run. Student costumers, student models, a student stage management team. The lighting design and movement director are both recent graduates. What you see is really the students vision: we just provide support.
We focus on the learning being more important than perfection, but what they put together is still pretty darn fantastic.
What’s this year’s Costume Showcase going to be like?
Amazing! (obviously).
There’s a Queen Guinevere reimagined as a Maori heroine, an exquisitely precise cosplay, a pierrette and a harlequin that are equally adorable in totally different ways, 1950s-does-1570s with attitude to spare, and tree elf that literally looks like it grew from a seed, and a drag queen of seriously epic proportions.
Also, SO many rhinestones!
The First Year’s 1830s dresses are everything you could hope for in the way of bonnets and big sleeves.
Plus, we’re extremely excited to be working with the New Zealand School of Dance and the Set and Props department at Toi Whakaari for the Patternmaking number. Their dance number really brings our armour inspired dresses to life, as do the amazing helmets by Set and Props.
It’s a great insight into the work we do at Toi Whakaari, and what makes our school so amazing and unique. You can see the collaboration between departments, and the specifically New Zealand flavour of the show.
How has Covid & Level 2 in NZ affected the show?
Covid has had such an impact on this years graduating costumiers. New Zealand had its first major lockdown just a little over a month after their course started. They were still settling in, and had to adapt to studying online, in isolation. Costume Construction is not an ideal subject for online teaching!
Then, just when we were getting to the part of the year when the student’s really focus on their major works…we had another lockdown.
So significant portions of this year’s major works had to be done at home, on small domestic machines, with no specialised equipment, in tiny dorm rooms.
To say I am proud of what the students have achieved under the circumstances is an understatement.
Covid is also affecting the show itself. Toi Whakaari is following best practice Covid procedures for Costume Showcase. This means that our audience is limited to people who work and study in the building. Even the costumer’s families can’t attend.
So we really hope that you’ll attend virtually, from wherever you are in the world!
But I want to see the details!
The best part of Costume Showcase is usually at the end, when the Costumers and their works spill out into the plaza, and the audience gets to see everything up close.
We can’t do that this year because of Covid, but we’ve got you covered!
We’ll be showing all the details on the @toi_costume instagram, AND one of our first year costumers is going to be taking over the @toi_whakaari instagram stories to give you a look backstage on Sat eve.
How long is the show?
Half an hour! Perfection is short and sweet!
Just 3ish minutes per Major Work, and two group dance numbers featuring works by the 1st year Costumers.
Hope you can join us for a watch!
To finish up, here’s some photos I took backstage at last year’s Costume Showcase (which is why we aren’t masked in them!)
The last Rate the Dress was rather frilly and, well…pink. To balance it, this week’s Rate the Dress is significantly more restrained, both in colour and silhouette. However, it still has lots of interesting details for you to consider.
A warning in advance. I have absolutely zero brainpower this week. It’s all been diverted to the final push of preparation for Costume Showcase – the biggest event of the year for the Toi Whakaari Costume Construction course. I’ve solved last minute fitting and construction problems until all I do is come home and gibber in the bath until bedtime.
So please excuse any wild misidentifications of techniques. My brain has been doing marathons and is liable to trip over invisible stairs!
Positive comments for last week’s dress, but not brilliant. Quite a few of you felt that the two halves of the dress didn’t quite match: the bodice was lovely, but needed an equally ruffly berthe to match the skirt.
The Total: 8.3 out of 10
Sweet and nice and perfectly acceptable.
This week: a braid trimmed 1870s sports dress.
This 1870s sports dress reflects the growing interest in athletic endeavours for women in the second half of the 19th century.
One-piece sports dress, c.1873 – 1880, linen Chertsey Museum
Sports like tennis, golf, and croquet all became increasingly popular in the later Victorian era. They required simpler, more practical garments: the beginnings of modern sportswear.
Simpler, is, of course, relative. Only very wealthy women could afford dresses designed for such specific activities. A sports dress was thus a status item in the same way a tea gown was. It showed that you had the money to spend on expensive garments that could be worn only as informal attire.
This unbleached linen of this sports dress is appropriately relaxed. The elaborate soutache (or braid) trim, and tiny pleating, which would have been quite a chore for the maid who had to press it, both speak of affluence.
The single triangular pocket is sometimes called a ‘parasol pocket’, and is a point of contention in the historical costuming world. Some historical costumers vehemently object to the name, and insist that the pockets are much too small for parasols. I’m not 100% pro parasol, but I’m not entirely convinced that they aren’t. I’ve worked with a couple of small folding parasols from the 1870s (the Katherine Mansfield House Museum has one), and they would be exactly the right size to fit into these pockets. If I ever find one at a reasonable price I’m going to have to test the idea out…
Pocket conundrums aside, what do you think of this dress? Would an 1870s lady have been perfectly tasteful and attractive in it whilst swinging a mallet or bowling towards the jack?
Rate the Dress on a Scale of 1 to 10
A reminder about rating — feel free to be critical if you don’t like a thing, but make sure that your comments aren’t actually insulting to those who do like a garment. Phrase criticism as your opinion, rather than a flat fact. Our different tastes are what make Rate the Dress so interesting. It’s no fun when a comment implies that anyone who doesn’t agree with it, or who would wear a garment, is totally lacking in taste.
As usual, nothing more complicated than a .5. I also hugely appreciate it if you only do one rating, and set it on a line at the very end of your comment.
