Rate the Dress: Maria Terese in masque
Your response to last week’s Rate the Dress surprised me. In the past, you have disapproved of children dressed in adult style clothes, so I assumed you would approve of the childlike cartoon print of the little girls dress, but condemn the elaborate construction and decoration of the dress. Instead, you liked the construction, but found the print frankly, well, ugly. The dress did however, get the ultimate seal of approval: as a four year old, most of you would have loved it! It rated a 6.2 out of 10 Today’s ‘Rate the Dress’ includes a child, but it is the adult who we are focused on. Mignard depicts Maria Theresa of Spain (who is, coincidentally, most famous for having been painted as child by Velazquez) dressed for a masqued ball. She wears a dress of multiple rich fabrics in red, gold, black, and white, elaborately trimmed with ostrich feathers (shades of Sunday’s wedding dress!) and pearls. Maria Theresa, as a Queen of France, actually has a reputation for being exceedingly dull and boring, and …