Lady Duff Gordon Links

[Martin Williams]

Yes, it is very pretty, isn't it? I thought you'd like it, Inger. If the date of 1908 is indeed accurate (I'd be tempted to place it a little later myself), then Lucy was really anticipating the modes of the 1920s by quite some way.

 

[Brian Ahern]

Yikes, that Schiaparelli shoe hat! I'm not a student of fashion, but Schiaparelli's family life was certainly interesting - a colorful blending of fashion, nobility, and showbiz (and, of course tragedy; i.e. the death of her granddaughter Berry Berenson on September 11th).

The 1808 snailshell-like bonnet is quite funky too...

 

[Martin Williams]

Another ravishing confection by Lucile - a black evening gown dating to around 1915:

http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/collection/database/?irn=153293&search=melbourne&images=&c=1&s=

...and, to go with it, the lady of fashion may (if she was very fortunate indeed) have donned a pair of Yantorny slippers:

http://aestheteslament.blogspot.com/2008_10_07_archive.html

Yantorny's footwear was of a quality and elegance far surpassing even that of the modern masters, Christian Louboutin and Manolo Blahnik. He was famously selective with his clientele and turned away many of those who promised him vast sums of money for examples of his art (Lady Duff Gordon records one such episode at length in her memoirs). His most famous patron was the unspeakably fabulous Rita de Acosta Lydig, whose biography reads like the most outlandish fiction and whose portrait by Baron de Meyer adorns the blog entry above.

 

[Inger Sheil]

What a coincidence, Martin - I also have a gown originally from the Chris Jacovides collection! (A 1932 Jeanne Lanvin). The Powerhouse has a fantastic costume collection, and that is a lovely piece.

 

[Martin Williams]

Here are two fascinating archive photographs which serve to illustrate just how rapidly and significantly the general ‘look’ of post-Edwardian fashion changed between 1910 and 1914.

The former shows Lola Robinson and Mamie Stuyvesant Fish at a Newport garden fete in the summer of 1910. Their aggressively corseted and intricately embroidered gowns, further embellished with lace and frou-frou, have long, trailing skirts, which the wearers are required to lift clear of the ground with their tightly-gloved hands. Their enormous cartwheel hats, decked out with lavish plumes and veiling, must have weighed a considerable amount too. The emphasis overall is on extreme femininity with scant regard for either practicality or comfort.

http://www.nysocialdiary.com/i/partypictures/08_18_08/Mrs.FishOlder.jpg

Only three or four years later, we see the same two women striding forth in neatly-tailored walking suits which closely resemble the masculine garb of the period. Although their skirts are hobbled to bring them into line with the prevailing narrow silhouette of 1913 and 1914, they are split and then buttoned at the knee to allow for greater freedom of movement. Their hats have shrunk and are now no larger than toques, with feather decoration much more sparingly applied.

http://pro.corbis.com/search/Enlargement.aspx?CID=isg&mediauid=%7B3CD994A7-92EC-4803-9DF5-7A38A560874C%7D

If fashionable dress is a mirror of change in society as a whole, then the historian could employ these two remarkable images to infer a lot about what had happened between the death of Edward VII and the outbreak of the Great War. The transition from one stereotype to another - from the Gibson Girl of the Gilded Age to the Flapper of the Roaring Twenties - was by no means as sudden as many people believe.

 

[Vitezslav Ivicic]

I just accidentally found this link, showing lot of pictures of Lucile's fabulous gowns:

http://www.thefashionspot.com/forums/f116/1863-1935-lucy-lady-duff-gordon-62332.html

 

[Martin Williams]

http://images.google.com/hosted/life/l?q=lady+duff+gordon&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlady%2Bduff%2Bgordon%26ndsp%3D20%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26start%3D20%26um%3D1 &imgurl=ad35847bd2a24789

Here's a portfolio of photographs of Lady DG from the archives of Life magazine. I don't think I've ever seen any of them before.

Judging from the flapperish style of her dresses, I'd date them to the early or mid-Twenties (and I'd also add that Lucy's wrinkles seem to have been heavily touched up!)