Archive | 5:23 pm

Marie Antoinette shocks France with a dress!

14 Jan

Detail from one of the most famous portraits of Marie Antoinette, which was painted by Madame Vigée-Lebrun in 1783. This portrait depicts the 27 year old Queen of France in her favourite outfit, a simple ruffled muslin gown, tied at the waist with a gauze sash and teamed with a ribbon bedecked straw hat. She is posed as though picking roses in her beloved gardens at the Petit Trianon and her gaze is both direct and enquiring, although not unfriendly.

This painting caused a sensation when it was displayed at the prestigious Paris Salon of 1783. Marie Antoinette and Madame Vigée-Lebrun, both young women whose minds were full of romance and idealistic ideas of the simplicity and virtue of private life were fixated on the lack of etiquette in the painting, in the lack of heavy court gowns and jewels, in its charm and honesty. The critics and populace at large, however were rather less charmed and saw in the lack of Queenly decoration and etiquette, a quite deplorable lesé majesté that acted as a metaphor for the gradual erosion of the dignity of both France and its royal family.

Before the Storm, 18th January 2012

14 Jan

Just a quick announcement that Before the Storm, my third novel of iniquity and POSH DOOM in eighteenth century England and France will be released for Kindle on Wednesday, 18th January! I’ll be celebrating the release with a very special giveaway!

Based on The Buccaneers by Edith Wharton, Before the Storm is a tale of passion, betrayal and true love set in a period of dramatically shifting social change and follows a close knit group of English friends, Venetia, Clementine, Eliza and Phoebe as they navigate the opulent but often treacherous worlds of Georgian London, Versailles and Revolutionary Paris.

‘It was a blissfully warm day. The worst of the heat wave was now over and a light flower scented breeze blew leaves into the pavilion where the party drowsily lazed against cushions, idling listening as Eugène d’Aigueville played his guitar, his eyes fixed on Venetia, who smiled lazily back at him.

Comte Edmond reclined in between Phoebe and Eliza, none of them spoke but the air around them shimmered with tension as both girls subtly did their best to claim his attention for themselves. Phoebe had long since realised that she was fighting a losing battle though and that although he very much enjoyed flirting with her, it was Eliza that he looked for first whenever he walked into a room.

Eliza did not share this view though and kept thinking about Venetia’s wedding day when Phoebe, radiant with sexual confidence had told her that she wouldn’t let her chastity stand in the way of making a good match for herself. She curled her hands into fists every time Comte Edmond and her friend left the room together and tried not to think about what they might be doing. He’d tried to kiss her once, but she’d shoved him away. Perhaps that was a mistake? She looked across at him now as he gazed up at Phoebe and her heart sank.

‘Who is that woman?’ Phoebe said suddenly, shielding her blue eyes as she looked back towards the house.

Venetia followed her gaze and gave a nervous laugh. ‘It’s your landlady, Eliza,’ she said, with a quick look at Edmond, who immediately sat up and automatically began to retie his loosened cravat. ‘Madame de Saint-Georges.’

They all stood up and instinctively, Eliza, Phoebe and Venetia stood close together as Corisande de Saint-Georges hurried across the lawn towards them. She had dressed to impress in a shimmering, rich lace trimmed blue and white striped silk gown, with wide skirts pulled back from flounced flower sprigged white silk underskirts. A huge muslin fichu was arranged around her shoulders and on her elaborately curled, ringleted and backcombed powdered hair was a vast ribbon and flower bedecked white straw hat.

‘Goodness me, she really means business,’ Venetia murmured as they watched this vision of elegance and high fashion approach. She looked back over her shoulder at Edmond, who was standing uneasily behind them, looking as if he desperately wished he could run away. ‘I wonder what she wants?’ — Before the Storm.

The marvellous Merveilleuse

14 Jan

Nothing could be more French than to allow current affairs to influence fashion (just look at the hairstyles concocted by Rose Bertin for Marie Antoinette and her coterie – battleships, babies being born and balloons taking off are just a few examples) and the outrageously dressed Merveilleuses are the finest example of this.

Les Merveilleuses (‘The Marvellous Ones’) made their first appearance in 1794 and influenced by the victims of the guillotine, they cultivated a highly modish and edgily morbid style that bordered on the gothic. The leaders of the Merveilleuses were the extremely stylish Theresa Tallien and Rose de Beauharnais, both of whom had been imprisoned during the Terror and had barely escaped with their lives.

But what items would have graced the spartan styled mahogany Jacob wardrobe of the average aspiring Merveilleuse? Let’s have a peek inside…

1. In the wake of the Terror’s end the most fashionable hair style was long at the front and shorn very short at the nape of the neck à la Titus in a bizarre attempt to copy the way that the guillotine’s victims had their hair cut by the executioner’s assistants before clambering aboard the tumbril that would transport them to the guillotine. Scented pomades were used to mess up the tendrils of hair and create a sophisticated dishevilled look.

2. A red scarf à la Némesis. This was first worn after the execution of the famous beauty, Émilie de Sainte-Amaranthe, who was rumoured to have been arrested after she spurned the attentions of not just Saint-Just but also Robespierre. Her courage in the face of death and undeniable glamour made her something of a heroine to the fashionable ladies of Paris and they wore red scarves thrown loosely around their shoulders in her honour.

3. A thin red ribbon choker or if you were really dashing (like the lady in the first miniature) one made of rubies that mimicked the appearance of droplets of blood around the neck.

4. Lavish helpings of scented white powder applied to the face and bosom in order to replicate a suitably languishing living corpse look.

5. A selection of thinly diaphanous white muslin and gauze low cut dresses, which were fondly imagined to look like the plain white chemises and dresses which many prisoners, including Marie Antoinette, wore to their executions. The more daring ladies liked to dampen their dresses with water before venturing outside in order to make them cling more becomingly to their figures.

6. The Croix à la Victime, a red silk harness, which was worn like a thin shawl around the bodice, artfully forming a red cross on the wearer’s back.

7. Thin grecian sandals, which looked especially delightful teamed with gold or silver toe rings and painted toe nails.

8. Heady, migraine inducing scents that made your every lazy movement waft jasmine, rose and musk through the air.

They must have made a striking sight on the mean streets of post Terror Paris but I think they probably looked amazing.

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