Tag Archives: design

Hands-On Style Taught by The Best Dressed Woman in the World

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Jacqueline de Ribes on 1983 Town and Country cover by Victor Skrebneski

Jacqueline de Ribes on 1983 Town and Country cover by Victor Skrebneski

Does anyone want to be elegant anymore? If so, the exhibition about best-dressed-woman-in-the-word, Jacqueline de Ribes: The Art of Style featured at the Metropolitan Museum of Art through February 21, is the place to take an immersion course.

As curator Harold Koda noted, even though the garments in the show span several decades, it’s a little difficult to pin any one of them on a specific decade. Jacqueline was all about perfect elegance and creative expression – not just style for style’s sake. Go to our Flickr album to view our favorites from the show and click through the Met’s gallery slideshow.

Although she was photographed incessantly throughout the Sixties, Seventies, and Eighties, Jacqueline was not just a patron of the couture – she was a hands-on designer and style partner to haughtiest of the haute couture.

Her timeless 1988 design looks good from every angle

Her timeless 1988 design looks good from every angle

We’re talking about the likes of Yves Saint Laurent, Marc Bohan, and countless other designers at the top of their game. If Jacqueline wanted one of their dresses, they expected that she would make suggestions to enhance their creation. What about changing those sleeves? Moving that bow? Making it a little more dramatic?

And she wasn’t above a good copy, either. If Jackie O wore something that was truly spectacular, Jacqueline might have Cassini do one for her, too. Duplicates? No problem.

When Yves Saint Laurent announced that he was retiring, she put in an order for multiples of the same stunning dress in different colors.

Knowing one’s limits is important. When she was just starting out, she knew she was great at dramatic conceptions, but terrible at sketching.

Her own 1986 design in which the body and cape are from a single piece of fabric

Her own 1986 design in which the body and cape are from a single piece of fabric

It was her good fortune that she got a recommendation to hire a sketch artist that some older designers thought might work with her to illustrate some of her ideas. His name was Valentino, and he turned out to be a lifelong friend and eventual supplier of some of the best red eveningwear the world has ever seen.

When she began her own dress line, she didn’t rely upon family money. She traveled to New York and raised it herself, like any other up-and-coming designer. The galleries are filled with her own work, which hold up spectacularly well next to the giants of Paris fashion. The Costume Institute genuinely loves her look, style, fabrications, and full-out drama.

Moving through the different galleries of the show, it was clear that Jacqueline chose and designed clothes that looked great from any angle. No wonder someone called her a “living fashion drawing.” In the white-and-black section, there are several stunning creations where the dress fabric is brought up toward the shoulder in a flowing, elegant, dramatic sweep.

Her mix and match Lady Corsaire look with vintage, Cavalli, and Ralph Lauren

Her mix and match Lady Corsaire look with vintage, Cavalli, and Ralph Lauren

In the slide walls, she’s often shown working in jeans behind the scenes to bring a fashion show and collection to life. Although the focus is on eveningwear, there are marvelous mix-and-match get-ups where her love of vintage, ready-to-wear, and one-of-a-kind layering really shows.

It’s a joy to see how she refashioned her Laroche couture coat into masked-ball Mongolian princess costume and to see her mixing separates from the Express or Cache with turn-of-the-century tophats and Cavalli stuff. Yes, she spent a fortune on clothes, but also shows everyone how to cobble runway-ready looks from easily accessible parts if you have loads of creativity and style.

Bravo, Jacqueline!

Her dramatic 1967 silk chiffon and embroidered crystal evening dress by Marc Bohan for Dior

Her dramatic 1967 silk chiffon and embroidered crystal evening dress by Marc Bohan for Dior

Warhol Moved Out So Picasso Could Play

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Bronze She-Goat, 1950, who usually lives outside in MoMA’s garden.

Bronze She-Goat, 1950, who usually lives outside in MoMA’s garden.

To mount the blockbuster Picasso Sculpture show, closing February 7, MoMA cleared out Andy, Roy, Jasper, and all the Judds from the Fourth Floor and let in an array of whimsical animals, personnages, and concoctions. If you couldn’t get in the front door of the show or were discouraged by the crowds, take a look at our favorites in our Flickr album.

The surprise is that every one of the dozen or so galleries is filled with the most delightful Picasso creations. You don’t really need a guidebook or an understanding of the history of modern art. You can just look and smile. Just like Picasso did.

Even he needed a break from his Blue Period, and the first gallery shows two little wooden “dolls” carved in 1906 – a response to Gauguin’s shockingly primitive Tahitian wood carvings that rocked Picasso’s world when he encountered them in gallery. Rough, painted, angular, and shamanistic – a good way to work out the creative kinks at the same time you were creating the Demoiselles downstairs. Pure primitive…no gallery guide needed.

Carved wooden Doll inspired by Gauguin, 1907. From Gallery of Ontario.

Carved wooden Doll inspired by Gauguin, 1907. From Gallery of Ontario.

Next door (directly upstairs from the gallery where the Demoiselles hold court), Picasso’s having his fun with his crazily patterned and painted bronze absinthe glasses, spoons, and fake sugar. The curators have gathered together enough from different collections to have a party. Cubism with a twist of polka-dot fun.

Next, it’s monumental heads carved from plaster. Why do they all seem to be in on a joke? It’s the room where Andy and Roy’s Pop masterpieces usually hang, but Pablo’s big, bulbous curvy heads from the 1930s are just as wry and enjoyable. (See the videos below.)

Already declared “degenerate” by the Nazis in 1937 and featured in their historic touring show, Picasso had his own quiet joke on the oppressors as he lived through the occupation of Paris in 1940-1944. While the Nazis were melting down bronze statuary in Paris to use in their war manufacturing, Pablo somehow managed to sneak into a foundry to make a big, bronze sculpture of large kitty cat on the prowl and other metal works.

Figure, 1938, made of found stuff -- wood, nails, and screws with string, wire, and hardware

Figure, 1938, made of found stuff — wood, nails, and screws with string, wire, and hardware

The kitty, the bicycle-handlebar bull, and the napkin dog are just two among a host of lots of other contraban he defiantly created before liberation.

The rest of the galleries show how Picasso’s wartime scrounging spurred him on to new heights of making something out of nothing and finding delight in transforming somebody’s junk into funny, fool-the-eye sculptures. The She-Goat (usually found hanging outside in MoMA’s garden by The Modern), the car-baboon, a metal owl, goose, and other creatures hold court in the bigger galleries.

Well-wishers crowd around taking feel-good photos and parents show the kids how the artist took everyday objects and turned them into such fun critters.

The stick-people Bathers at the finale are partially made of pieces of painting frames and other found wood, painted and finished with the same rough technique and hand that characterized the “dolls” in the first room. It’s the great Modern Master going rogue channeling outsider art.

The Bathers, 1956. From the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart.

The Bathers, 1956. From the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart.

By the time you get to the model of the monumental head that’s become one of Chicago’s icons (in the last gallery), the crazy sculpture — Picasso’s last —  feels  kind of normal.

It’s telling that MoMA didn’t even put label copy on the stuff. Just a guidebook you can pick up at the entrance, or not. No wonder it’s been the most popular show in New York.

Just when you thought understanding modern art was “hard”, one of the masters comes along, kicks sand in your face, laughs, invites you to do a little beachcombing with him, throws a few sticks together, and asks you to look at what’s right around you in a new way.

Look at a few pieces that MoMA underscores with delightful music.

Buried in New York – Divas and Rare Jewelry

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Henut does Queen Neferu’s hair, 11th dynasty (2051-2000 B.C.) Courtesy: Brooklyn Museum

Henut does Queen Neferu’s hair, 11th dynasty (2051-2000 B.C.) Courtesy: Brooklyn Museum

While New York City is digging out from record snowfalls, there’s some great news about a few items that have been buried for centuries and are none the worse for wear – cosmetic boxes, bracelets, belts, and styling tips of the great divas (male and female) of ancient Egypt. The Metropolitan Museum of Art moved some gems out of the cavernous Egyptian wing – and borrowed a few things from Brooklyn and elsewhere – for its monumental tribute to the 12th dynasty, Ancient Egypt Transformed: The Middle Kingdom, closing today.

Usually buried among the collections on the first floor, the curators pulled out some of our favorites from the galleries (along the way to the Costume Institute) and presented them as the spectacular showpieces they are. It warrants a shout-out to the effort it took to conceive, mount, and present this terrific show. What a way to leverage the collections that are right inside the city limits!

Queen or Princess as a Sphinx, 12th dynasty (1981-1802 B.C.) Once owned by Emperor Hadrian , later by a Cardinal. From Brooklyn Museum

Queen or Princess as a Sphinx, 12th dynasty (1981-1802 B.C.) Once owned by Emperor Hadrian , later by a Cardinal. From Brooklyn Museum

The story of the transformations happening in Egypt’s 11tth to 13th Dynasties (ca. 2030–1650 B.C.) is big (enough to fill twelve galleries), so we’re just highlighting a few of the things we noticed that modern People of Style might enjoy. Check out our Flickr site.

First, Brooklyn is in the house in the gallery dedicated to royal women: off to the side, there’s a limestone relief fragment (normally at the Brooklyn Museum of Art) showing Queen Nefuru having her tresses done by 11th Dynasty celebrity stylist, Henut. The curators point out that a telltale sign of royals (men and women) is the distinctive winged-eye look that her makeup artist achieved in kohl. The styling is incised in limestone, showing the Queen getting ready to emulate Hathor, the goddess of love and romance. In those days (2051-2000 B.C.), only royals could sport the jeweled necklace or eye makeup style.

Nearby, Brooklyn also contributes a beautifully sculpted head, said to be broken off from a larger sphinx statue from the 12th Dynasty – a protective guardian featuring a fantastic coif that only a queen or a princess would sport. It was all wigs, all the time.

372-piece cloisonné pectoral of Princess Sithathoryunet. Gold, carnelian, lapis lazuli, turquoise, and garnet. 12th dynasty (1887-1878 B.C.).

372-piece cloisonné pectoral of Princess Sithathoryunet. Gold, carnelian, lapis lazuli, turquoise, and garnet. 12th dynasty (1887-1878 B.C.).

One of the most spectacular pieces is the 372-piece cloisonné pectoral worn by Princess Sithathoryunet. It’s a 12th Dynasty masterwork (1887-1878 B.C.). of gold, carnelian, lapis lazuli, turquoise, and garnet. The piece is magical and protective, but instead of being inlaid with the name of the princess, it features the name of the king. The idea is that the king himself is being protected when the royal daughter wears it – not the diva herself. You get what you pay for.

She also had another set of formal jewelry — a cowerie shell girdle and matching bracelet of gold, carnelian, feldspar, and crystal. The imitation shells had small pellets inside, which would have made a tinkling sound when she walked. The same is true for the feline-headed set of jewelry of gold and amethyst.

Feline-Headed Girdle of gold and amethyst from 12th Dynasty (1887-1813 B.C.).

Feline-Headed Girdle of gold and amethyst from 12th Dynasty (1887-1813 B.C.).

Sithathoryunet kept these and other treasures in a beautiful jewelry box, which is displayed nearby alongside a cosmetic box. The Met reconstructed the wood boxes by putting the ebony, ivory, gold, carnelian, blue faience, and silver back into place. Magnificent. Look for it all when these spectacular items go back on display at the back of the Egyptian Wing later this year.

By this time in Middle Kingdom culture, the elites started copying the royals, so some of the buried treasures that the Met found on its early 20th century expeditions belonged more to aspirational upper classes than the royals themselves. Check out the cosmetic case and mirror belonging to Amenemhat IV’s royal butler, Kemeni. Or the faience necklace worn by Wah, the overseer who served Meketre, the royal chief steward serving kings in both the 11th and 12th Dynasties.

The Met found a bonanza of fantastic reality art in Meketre’s tomb – so much that only a few pieces were brought up to the second floor for the special show. The show features a real-life depiction of a grainery and sport fishing boat, but if you look on the first floor as you walk through to the Costume Institute, you’ll see many more boats and several more rooms of day-to-day life – all meant to serve Meketre in the next world.

Cosmetic box of the royal butler, Kemeni, with four ointment jars and a mirror. 12th dynasty (1814-1805 BC.)

Cosmetic box of the royal butler, Kemeni, with four ointment jars and a mirror. 12th dynasty (1814-1805 BC.)

The Met has meticulously documented this show online. Spend a snow day (or not) by taking a tour through all twelve galleries on the Met’s web site and listening to the curators’ take on the on-line audio guide, which also features photos of each of the objects. Here’s where you can search the exhibition objects and find more detail.

Hear the behind-the-scenes chit-chat from the curators on the museum’s blog, including how the Egyptians feasted and how the digital team created the replica of the pyramid complex at the center of the show.

MoMA Connects Music and Modernism

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A decade apart – 1957 Stratocaster and Avendon’s 1967 posters of the Beatles

A decade apart – 1957 Stratocaster and Avendon’s 1967 posters of the Beatles

The MoMA Design Department had a brilliant idea – to tell the history of 20th century music culture by pulling out objects and two-dimensional art from the museum’s rich collection. How did modernism and music influence one another? See Making Music Modern: Design for Eye and Ear, on view through January 18.

There’s still time to catch some demos of the Scopitone, the Stratocaster, and the Mechanical Flux Orchestra inside the gallery this weekend.

Although a lot of the buzz in the gallery is over visitors’ recollections of the turntables, radios, and album covers on display, the curators do everyone a favor by putting the mod, mod world into historical context at the start of the show.

Early Edison sound experiments, films of Loie Fuller and Josephine Baker, and a poster of Yvette Guilbert from the can-can era remind everyone that shocking live performances, revolutionary music trends (go, ragtime!), and print designs that pushed the limits don’t belong exclusively to the mod, punk, or techno eras.

Early pop music innovations: sheet music and Edison wax cylinders

Early pop music innovations: sheet music and Edison wax cylinders

Tucked into side panels and corners are photos of costumed interplanetary performers of the Triadic Ballet at the Bauhaus in 1922 and early Russian avant-garde takes on the advent of radio, the broadcast and communications technology that changed entertainment forever.

These were worlds where artists and designers did it all – fine art, typography, industrial design, textiles, and performance. There are even some snippets of early acoustic-enhancing textiles on display, courtesy of Anni Albers. Design and music mixed, right from the start of the last century.

The sleek, streamlined radios, microphones, and Rural Electrification poster from the 1930s are presented as icons of the earliest era of broadcasting, with reminders from the curators that the designs were made to rescue the radio from its early haywire, spaghetti-city look that first appeared on 1920s garage workbenches across the country. Make it look nice, and you can bring it inside, where we can all enjoy it.

Stylish: 1932 Bakelite radio by Wells Coates and a 1939 Unidyne mic by Benjamin Baker.

Stylish: 1932 Bakelite radio by Wells Coates and a 1939 Unidyne mic by Benjamin Baker.

Throughout the Fifties and Sixties, music and design seemed to go hand in hand. Consider the Sixties revolution in turntable and speaker design – everything fit for a super-modern lifestyle of easy listening with jazz and high-concept percussion album covers nearby.

The invention of the Fender Stratocaster guitar revolutionized the sound and look of early rock and roll with its iconic whammy bar and performances that represented out and out rebellion. Although the Stratocaster was invented in the 1950s, it’s appropriately displayed in front of posters of Bob Dylan, The Yardbirds, and Avedon’s Beatles – an innovation adopted by Buddy Holly that inspired the next generation.

Where pop music and art come together – Sixties album covers, including those by Richard Hamilton and Warhol

Where pop music and art come together – Sixties album covers, including those by Richard Hamilton and Warhol

If you really want to dig into the details, there are dozens of famous album covers and posters on display with tribute paid to their designers. Among the luminaries are pop-god Richard Hamilton’s “White Album” for the Beatles, Warhol’s “Sticky Fingers” cover for the Stones, and Rauchenberg’s design for the vinyl disk inside the Talking Heads’ “Speaking in Tongues” album. The chronicle of the Fillmore East posters is a book unto itself.

And Mr. Jobs’ imprint is never forgotten at MoMA. An early version of his iPod is displayed right next to the Seventies invention from Japan that rocked the music world – the Sony Walkman.

If you can’t make it, take a look at the show through our Flickr views. We’ve grouped the items in chronological order.

And check out the excellent MoMA blog posts about the show on MoMA’s “Inside/Out” platform, where curators go to share enthusiasm about the hunt for the Stratocaster, famous rock posters, and other gems from the Fifties and Sixties. Leave your own comments, reflection on music and design, and memories right there on the MoMA website.

Before Walkmans and iPods

Before Walkmans and iPods

Navajo Jewelry Masters Offer Glittering World at Customs House

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Bracelet of coral, opal, suglite, lapis, turquoise, gold, and silver by Raymond Yazzie. Courtesy: NMAI/Knight collection. Photo: S. Franks

Bracelet of coral, opal, suglite, lapis, turquoise, gold, and silver by Raymond Yazzie. Courtesy: NMAI/Knight collection. Photo: S. Franks

If you’d like an immersion into a chamber of glistening silver and gems, enter the National Museum of the American Indian’s exhibition of stunning beauty and tranquility — Glittering World: Navajo Jewelry of the Yazzie Family.

The Smithsonian is providing New York with a unique chance to view 300 remarkable necklaces, bracelets, rings, and buckles from a New Mexico family of artists known for catapulting Navajo symbols, colors, and gems into a modern-art context.

Lapis and gold bracelet by Lee Yazzie, 1984. Photo: E. Aboroso, NMAI.

Lapis and gold bracelet by Lee Yazzie, 1984. Photo: E. Aboroso, NMAI.

The focus is on Lee and Raymond Yazzi, brothers whose award-winning, intricate creations are sought by collectors worldwide. You’ll see five magnificent pieces as soon as you enter, including work by their sister, Mary Marie – representing lifetimes of master craftsmanship inspired by the mountains, sun, sky, spirits, and family in Gallup, New Mexico.

Photomurals inside the door will transport you to the red rock monuments of Navajo Nation, 1950s trading posts along the old Route 66, and maps to turquoise mines that have supplied native peoples with high-end bedazzlers since 300 A.D. The Smithsonian will be returning it all to private collectors after January 10, so be sure to enter this beautiful realm before then.

Watch this testament to artistic inspiration and dedication to beauty:

And take a trip to the Navajo world to hear more on a lifetime of creation:

FIT Honors Transatlantic Nightlife Queen

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1990 Mathu & Zaldy body suit and attached boots that Susanne wore to an Armani party

1990 Mathu & Zaldy body suit and attached boots that Susanne wore to an Armani party

If you think the music and fashion stopped after Studio 54 shut its doors to Liza, Liz, Andy, Calvin, Halston, and Yves, FIT’s club-scene exhibition, Fashion Underground: The World of Susanne Bartsch, presents evidence to the contrary through December 5.

The show features nightlife splendor (with all the trimmings) from Susanne’s clothes-to-be-seen-in archive. Plus, you’ll get the thrill of pretending that you’ve stepped into one of her over-the-top parties, filled with celebrities, outrageous clothes, spectacle, and glitter.

Wielding "the list" in a 2008 Jean-Paul Gaultier jacket and Patricia Fields hat

Wielding “the list” in a 2008 Jean-Paul Gaultier jacket and Patricia Fields hat

Right downstairs at the gallery entrance, you’ll be taken back to a graffiti-splashed Nineties club entrance with a dolled-up doorkeeper sizing you up and holding “the list”. But there’s no anxiety about whether you’ll be let inside…Just walk in and be transported back to 1981.

 As the glittery disco 54 era was coming to an end in New York in 1981, Bartsch arrived from London and opened up a shop in Soho filled with up-and-coming London designers that were creating the “new look” catching on in clubs across the pond.

In the early 1980s, Japanese and British designers experimented with crinkly natural fibers and oversized smocks – which looked fresh and hip after a decade of form-fitting, glitzy disco looks.

The Eighties -- Vivienne Westwood looks with Galliano linen ensembles

The Eighties — Vivienne Westwood looks with Galliano linen ensembles

Susanne sold the oversized, anti-disco baggy look of nightlife trendsetters Boy George and Leigh Bowery, imported dandy mix-and-match men’s and women’s looks from Vivienne Westwood, and featured flowing frocks by London’s Rachel Auburn.

The first part of the FIT show walks down this part of memory lane, including linen frocks by Mr. Galliano. Smocks are punctuated with dramatic hats (decades before fascinators) or beads from Portobello Road.

By the late Eighties, all that had given way to raggedy and accessorized mash-ups sported by the Material Girl and by the Nineties, bejeweled and bedazzled clubwear reigned again. Susanne was regularly hosting parties clad in an ever-evolving array of embellished corsets, fashioned by the master of form and shape, Mr. Pearl.

Two Mr. Pearl corset ensembles (1989, 1991) with 1992 Mugler Cowgirl ensemble, worn by Naomi Campbell Installation view of “Fashion Underground: The World of Susanne Bartsch” September 18 – December 5, 2015 The Museum at FIT New York, New York

Mr. Pearl corset ensembles (1989, 1991) with 1992 Mugler Cowgirl ensemble for Naomi Campbell

In a well-deserved tribute to his creations, FIT has installed a carousel of Mr. Pearl’s work on a turntable in the show’s back room of the show, next to a corner where mannequins form a towering tribute to the magic of Mr. Mugler, another of Ms. Bartsch’s favorites. After she introduced Mr. Pearl to Mr. Mugler, the rest was fashion history.

Fashion designers flocked to her parties and she did justice to them all – working in their hats, jackets, shoes, bags, and separates into her never-ending array of special occasion get-ups. When you peruse the specific looks on display in the show, it’s an all-star line-up of New York, Paris, and London fashion heavyweights.

Gareth Pugh 2015 ensemble of paper, Lycra and leather

Gareth Pugh 2015 ensemble of paper, Lycra and leather

The show screams of creativity and it’s wonderful that curator Valerie Steele put a spotlight on this Queen of Nightlife and her impact on the underground/high fashion scene for the last three decades. A lot of Susanne’s featured clubwear is credited to Mathu & Zaldy, who turned out plenty of over-the-top looks when designer ready-to-wear just didn’t pack enough punch for a special occasion.

Another charming touch in the show is the ensemble of paper, Lycra and leather contributed by Gareth Pugh. Susanne asked him to send something she could (and would) wear.

As always, FIT provides lots of history and photographs of Susanne and friends in action at multitudes of balls and parties on its exhibition website. Spend time looking at Susanne in action and at snapshots of her historic Love Ball. For close-ups of the clothes and costumes, visit our Flickr feed.

Take 360 spin around each room of the show courtesy of FIT’s virtual tour produced by Synthescape. The arrows appearing on the floor will take you to all three rooms.

Do you wish you could have been at the opening of this exhibit? Not to worry – her friends and fans let you in on the party and remember unforgettable nights in this celebratory video. Even Calvin’s there:

Fashion Never Sleeps at FIT

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Show opens with 2014 synthetic knit and nylon jacket and dress by Istanbul designer Arzu Kaprol “Global Fashion Capitals” Museum at FIT June 2 – November 14, 2015 New York, New York

Ensemble by Istanbul designer Arzu Kaprol

Stepping inside Global Fashion Capitals at the Museum at FIT is an around-the-world trip that gives a nod to fashion’s past while presenting style innovators who are thriving in nearly every corner of the world. Right inside the front door of the exhibit is a powerful mannequin duo straight outta Istanbul. Wow!

Turn around and you’ll see a packed International Fashion Week Calendar and an illuminated world map. It’s pretty clear that every hour or so, the sun rises on another hotbed of sartorial creativity. Except for Antarctica, every continent has multiple fashion weeks, fashion bloggers, innovative designers, and fashion followers all their own. Explore through the show’s website, and visit in person before November 14.

Representing London, Alexander McQueen's 2009 dress and corset

Representing London, Alexander McQueen’s 2009 dress and corset

The curators tell the story of the rise of traditional couture centers — Paris, New York, Milan, and London – through selected looks and accessories, dating all the way back to the mid-19th century and the House of Worth, when the fashion system and seasonal cycles were institutionalized. It’s interesting to learn that by 1949, the House of Dior was generating 5% of French export profits.

Of course, after WWII, New York was hot on the heels of Paris. Eleanor Lambert kickstarted New York’s Fashion Week in 1943 and Halston and his designer pals won their place in the pantheon of style by vanquishing the Parisians in the 1973 Battle of Versailles.

Milan took over the mantle from Rome after World War II, and London came into its own in the Sixties and Seventies with the debut of mad Mod, rocker chic, and Westwood’s over-the-top subversions.

Alexander Wang's 2015 dress from Nike's “flyknit” sneaker fabric

Alexander Wang’s 2015 dress from Nike’s “flyknit” sneaker fabric

In each section, the curators are careful to add a look from recent runways – Christopher Kane’s layered silk organza masterpiece and Alexander Wang’s shift made from the same fabric as Nike’s “flyknit” sneakers.

But the remainder of the floor space tells the story of other influential capitals of fashion – the 1981 emergence of the Antwerp 6 in Belgium; Tokyo’s wild ride with Miyake, Yamamoto, and Kawakubo; and what H&M did for Scandinavia as a fashion capital.

Next, the show highlights cities and fashion culture in Kiev, Mexico City, Sao Paulo, Lagos, J-burg, Sydney, Seoul and Mumbai. Click through these fashion histories on the FIT exhibition site, and marvel at Lisa Folawiyo’s bead-encrusted dress (Lagos) and Lie Sangbong’s graphic silk ensemble (Seoul).

Take a trip through the gallery on our Flickr site, and watch an interview with curator Ariele Elia below:

And for more on the Battle of Versailles, courtesy of FIT, click here.

Frida Khalo Extravaganza Ending with Colorful Surprises

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NYBG’s Haupt Conservatory is transformed into Frida’s Casa Azul

NYBG’s Haupt Conservatory is transformed into Frida’s Casa Azul

Ever since the New York Botanical Garden installed its Frida Khalo: Art, Garden, Life show, it’s been a nonstop party and feast for the eyes, ears, and tastebuds.

Not sufficient to import fourteen of Frida’s rarely seen paintings for the formal gallery upstairs in its library building, the creative NYBG team has made environments, commissioned artists, designed apps, booked acts, hosted special events, transformed the conservatory, made a wall of cactus, redesigned menus, and even brought in a taco truck to give everyone an immersion into her sophisticated Mexican lifestyle.

This blockbuster sensory experience is in its last week, going out with a bang with a Dia de los Muertos theme as this traditional Mexican holiday collides with our own Halloween. Sugar skulls and whimsical skeletons are taking over Frida and Diego’s pyramid that serves as the centerpiece of the garden portion of the show.

Tissue-paper dresses for The Two Fridas by artist Humberto Spindola

Tissue-paper dresses for The Two Fridas by artist Humberto Spindola

It’s an appropriate mix, given Frida’s own proclivity to merge the everyday with the surreal in her own works. The Library has an exquisite collection of her self-portrait and still life paintings, featuring flowers, animals, and deep-rooted Mexican myth and culture.

Downstairs in the Britton Rotunda, there’s a stunning installation of The Two Fridas by artist Humberto Spindola – side-by-side mannequins wearing tissue-paper dresses in colors that Frida sported, but with the surreal outer heart that she painted more than once. Visitors approach as if it were a shrine with special powers.

Frida’s workspace

Frida’s workspace

The Haupt Conservatory serves up a riot of color with floating blue containers of vivid flowers, the dynamic blue of the recreated Casa Azul, where she lived, pops of the types of flowers with which she adorned her table and sills, and the intensely painted Mexican-style pyramid in the center of it all.

The sensations are so bright that it’s easy to miss the recreation of Frida’s studio, tucked away in the trees to the left of the main event – brushes, paints, paint sticks, and other tools.

Outdoors, the curators have succulents jammed into every piece of oversize Mexican pottery near a “wall” of cactus, replicating a natural fence that Diego had outside his studio for decades.

Soloist from Capulli Danza Mexicana channels her inner Frida for the crowd

Soloist from Capulli Danza Mexicana channels her inner Frida for the crowd

The “Life” portion of the show’s title is represented by the generous schedule of music, performances, films, and events that the NYBG has featured throughout the show’s six-month run. Dance companies, all-female mariachi bands, chefs, and authors provide sensuous infusions of movement, wit, gaiety, and sophistication that Frida embodied her entire life. Flashing red skirts, exciting beats, fast footwork, dramatic flourishes, and meaty conversation all contribute to the experience of who Frida was, how she lived, and what she loved.

Download the exhibition panel to see all the parts of Mexico City that meant so much to Frida and Diego – images of parks, gardens, markets, and historic sites, including photos of Casa Azul.

Download the app for your visit, and go to our Flickr site to see the photos and a few videos of the dancers in action.

Take a look at what the NYBG team achieved:

If you have time, check out the YouTube of the all-star kick-off symposium dedicated to Frida last May.

 

Sneaker Culture Wows Brooklyn

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Nike’s original Air Jordan I (1985) and the 25th anniversary Run-DMC Adidas brings joy to Brooklyn fans

Nike’s original Air Jordan I (1985) and the 25th anniversary Run-DMC Adidas bring joy to Brooklyn fans

Crowds in Brooklyn are levitating with excitement as they explore their own sartorial history in The Rise of Sneaker Culture, an exhibition running at the Brooklyn Museum through this weekend. Finally, a fashion history and technology show that really resonates with the men in the room!

The hundreds of historic sneakers, mostly from the Bata Shoe Museum collection in Toronto, tell the story of how casual sports footwear came to be so dominant in today’s high-fashion landscape.

Although there are a few examples of women’s footwear – early Keds from 1916 and iconic Reeboks from the Jane Fonda-fitness era – the focus is squarely on the men, their sports, and their athletic-inspired designer footwear.

The history section of the show shows some of the earliest rubberized sports shoes from UK collections, but quickly moves into familiar New York City territory when colorful creations began appearing at pick-up games on basketball courts around the city in the 1970s, and when the tide really turned through sports and music licensing.

No one forgets the first time they saw Reebok’s Shaqnosis in 1995 (reissue)

No one forgets the first time they saw Reebok’s Shaqnosis in 1995 (reissue)

Crowds and docents jockey for space to worship at the altar of Nike’s 1985 Air Jordan I alongside the autographed reissue of Run-DMC’s 1986 Adidas. After Michael Jordan inked that deal and hip-hop video was distributed worldwide on MTV, sneaker fashion went viral. Electrifying images of loosely laced footwear were seen and copied by fans from the Bronx to Kathmandu. The right shoes and lacing style could wordlessly convey to others in the know, “I know what’s going down.”

Beautifully installed, Brooklyn crowds could work their way through men’s footwear history down one side and up the other – the original P.F. Flyers, original Chuck Taylors, streamlined European designs from the 1970s, Adidas’s early fitness shoes with built-in microprocessors, Nike’s Air Force 1, and Magic Johnson’s Weapons for Converse.

Nike’s 2009 limited edition for LeBron

Nike’s 2009 limited edition for LeBron

After the awesome case with the entire evolution of Air Jordans, the curators lined up a riot of color, technology, status, and design with evidence of so many subsequent licensing deals. Kanye’s new Yeezy Boot for Adidas was interesting, but the Reebock’s Shaqnosis and Nike’s limited edition for LeBron really stopped people in their tracks.

High-fashion sneakers by design and art luminaries Damien Hirst, Jeremy Scott, Chanel, Pierre Hardy, Raf Simons, Giuseppi Zanotti, and Rick Owens brought visitors right into the present day – when guys wear sneakers and tuxes to the Emmys, just as Michael Jordan predicted they would three decades ago.

A great touch at the show’s exit was the opportunity for visitors to leave a note about their own personal “sneaker story” and draw their favorite one.

Take a look at our favorite footwear from the show on our Flickr feed, all presented in chronological order. And enjoy this brief presentation on men’s contemporary footwear in this behind-the-scenes peek into the collections of the Bata Shoe Museum with senior curator Elizabeth Semmelhack:

Before Shapewear: Six Centuries of How to Look Good

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Articulated French pannier made of iron, leather, and fabric tape, 1770. Source: Les Arts Décoratifs. Photo: Patricia Canino.

Whalebone corset (1740-1760) above 1770 articulated French pannier that collapsed. Source: Les Arts Décoratifs. Photo: Patricia Canino

If you’ve ever successfully poured yourself into a pair of tight jeans, pay a visit to the Bard Graduate Center Gallery’s townhouse through July 26 to see Fashioning the Body: An Intimate History of the Silhouette, a three-story exhibition of how women – and men — pushed, pulled, and shaped their bodies into the “hot” silhouette of the day.

The show originated in the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in Paris in 2013 tells the story of how fashion divas and dandies utilized undergarments to stiffen, enhance, pad, and pouf themselves to create the iconic shapes we admire in paintings, photos, magazines, and other pre-digital media.

Painted yellow silk taffeta American robe a la Polonaise, 1780-1785 Installation views of “China: Through the Looking Glass” May 7 - August 16, 2015 Metropolitan Museum of Art New York, New York

American robe a la Polonaise held up by wire, 1780-1785. Source: Metropolitan Museum of Art, “China” exhibition.

Corsets (some iron!), farthingales, whalebone stays, panniers, crinolines, bustles, and girdles from the 15th century until today are all on display. You’ll see exactly how those whalebone stays stiffened corsets worn by nearly every woman from the 1500s to 1800s, and be amazed to learn that little children were also strapped into kids’ corsets to help shape “unformed” bodies right up through the 1950s in Western Europe.

Mr. James would approve of all the engineering that the curators reveal for us. Who knew that those wide panniers under 18th century French court skirts had elaborate mechanisms that could collapse to let their wearers squeeze through narrow carriage doors or tight household doorways? Automated models demonstrate just how neatly these ingenious apparatus operated to create the illusion of width just below super-tiny corseted waists.

How were those elaborate poufs created at the back of 1770s court gowns in the “Polonaise style”? Ladies could manipulate wires through eyelets in the voluminous triple-part skirts to create just the right amount of volume, drape, and flash.

Uber-dandy Beau Brummel. Source: NYPL’s digitized George Arents Collection.

Uber-dandy Beau Brummel. Source: NYPL’s digitized George Arents Collection.

And the men! Under the sparkle jackets of 1770s court dress (subject of our previous post), the guys consciously padded chests, calves, and other body parts to give the appearance of a more muscular physique even if they hadn’t been working out. Shapely men’s calves were all the more important since high-end men’s footwear at the time consisted of elevated Louis heels.

For dandies of the 1800s, it was all clothes, all the time, so an even wider array of sartorial artifice came into being—tight men’s corsets, stomach belts, padding, and (more) fake calves. Striking a pose meant everything,

The in-gallery app provides lots of insightful commentary on the items and apparatus. On the second floor, Bard has a line of mannequins that illustrate the changes in female silhouettes. Here’s a walk –through of that part of the installation:

Watch this companion video to see some the collapsible pannier, corsets, and girdles in the show – direct predecessors to the shapewear of today: