Charlize Theron at the Oscars

 

Charlize Theron looked absolutely stunning at the Oscars in a backless blue, long sleeved, high necked Dior gown that she paired with Bulgari accessories.

Eleanor Tomlinson at the Baftas

After the excitement of last weeks publication, I'm a week behind on my red carpet dresses, so you'll have to wait to see my picks from the Oscars last night.

Here is my favourite dress from the Baftas a few weeks ago worn by Poldark beauty Eleanor Tomlinson. The English actress showed off her style credentials by wearing a sensational three toned black and pink Ralf & Russo asymmetrical gown to the Baftas.

BAFTA Dresses

Award ceremonies are like buses you wait weeks for another then two come at once! Last night saw the BAFTAs and the GRAMMYs, but as an English rose I watch the former. Here are some pictures from the BAFTA Red Carpet all I need do now is pick some to illustrate.

 

Emma Stone at the SAG Awards

 Emma Stone looked very stylish in Louis Vuitton

at the Screen Actors Guild Awards 2019

Charlize Theron at the Critic Choice Awards

 Charlize Theron looked very glamorous in a metallic silver, one-shoulder Givenchy gown at the Critic Choice Awards this year.

It was quite the challenge to recreate the dress in collage!

Emily Blunt in an Alexander McQueen dress designed by Sarah Burton

Emily Blunt in an Alexander McQueen dress designed by Sarah Burton. This was a heavily embroidered metallic dress and was almost as magical as a scene from a Mary Poppins film. #goldenglobes2019

Penelope Cruz at the Golden Globes

 

Call me shallow, but I love a red carpet dress and watch the awards season every year. I delight in seeing the new creations that the designers dress the celebrities in.


This year to try and get me over the January blues and to keep me creating having completed my 100 days project, I have decided to take a couple of my favourite outfit from each red carpet event and try and recreate them in collage.


This is the first dress I've chosen from the recent Golden Globes and its the dress the beautiful Penelope Cruz wore. Next week I will show you how I made Emily Blunt out of small scraps of paper too!


You can see more red carpet dresses on my Pinterest board.

Penelope Cruz wore an iridescent purple gown by Ralph and Russo

Week 2 - The Stuarts

By the start of Charles I’s reign in 1625, however, the Stuart dynasty seemed more secure and there was less need to follow previous styles. The stiff and constricting shapes of the Tudor era gave way to softer lines. Charles I short in stature and manipulated portraiture prospective or siting on horses to exaggerate his presence.

I think the triptych portrait of 'Charles I in Three Positions' by Antony van Dyck (above) best represents this monarch. In which he appears very Christ like and the three heads could be read as referencing the trinity and certainly express his deeply held belief in the divine right of kings. There is something quite powerful about just a head and shoulder portrait and the multi angles give almost a 3D image, as well as enabling the artist to give an extra layer of detail to the fabrics of the clothes he is wearing.

The painting on the right is thought to be the first depiction of Charles II in his new style of court dress. He is being presented with a pineapple, a new fruit for 17th-century Britain, c1675‒80.

After restoration, plague and the great fire of London, the second half of the 17th century saw many significant events that affected royal and wider fashion. By very end of the century ‒ after regicide, restoration and a further revolution ‒ we start to see fashions and styles that will come to dominate the next century: the mantua and the three piece suit.

Masques were elaborate performances involving music, dance and verse with luxurious costumes and spectacular scenery, popular in the Stuart Court.

Below is a modern day costume I created based on the fashion of the Stuart period.  

Week 1 - The Tudor

Henry VIII was called ‘the best dressed sovereign in the world’ and Elizabeth I equally image-conscious, was once described as being like ‘starlight, thick with jewels’. They used fashion to set themselves apart from and control their subjects, and used portraiture manipulate their pubic image and appearance, very much like we might use social media today to project a public image out into the world. 

Successive sumptuary laws were brought in to regulate exactly what people wore, from fabrics to colours, and their accessories too. After this, people could only wear certain things according to their hierarchical status in society. The Tudors also used the laws to prevent general extravagance and promote trade in English materials like wool.

Black, white and silver were not only expensive colours to produce and to maintain, they also would have contrasted with Elizabeth’s pale complexion, which was a sign of her elite status, and her auburn hair, which was a characteristic feature of the Tudor dynasty.








Elizabeth’s clothing and accessories also often contain meanings that would have been instantly recognisable to her subjects but are perhaps less familiar to us. The intricate lace cuffs and elaborate lace ruffs, for instance, are a sign that she was a woman who did not have to do any physical or manual labour, and the jewel-encrusted gowns are testament to her wealth.

Very few garments from this period of history survive. The frustrating lack of surviving royal items is not just a result of Oliver Cromwell’s royal clear-out, or even because so much perished in the Great Fire of London Fire in 1666. It is the Tudor monarchs, and the Stuarts who inherited their treasures who are much to blame. If the cloth does survive its often been reused as alter cloth or soft furnishing, the value and cost of clothing was much higher than today, and charitable re-gifting was also seen as ‘a good thing to do’. It would seem that the Tudors amongst many things were some of this countries earliest Up cycle devotees!!

I've really enjoyed the first week of the History of Royal Fashion course with Future Learn and Glasgow University. I'm starting learning about the Stuarts today which I'm sure will be just as interesting. I will conclude my last 10 days of #100daysofpapercollage when this five week course is complete.

When Fairytales Come To Life

Today I want to introduce four of my favourite female portrait photographers' which I have long admired: Kirsty Mitchell, Alexia Sinclair, Miss Aneila and Kareva Margarita. I'm not sure how to describe their work, I'm not sure even they do! It's a great weave of surreal narrative and make-believe that speaks of fairy tales and legend, the result goes leagues beyond typical fashion photography, into realm of something that cares a great deal more about the story. It certainly appeals to my theatrical mind (indeed Kirsty Mitchell also studied costume design). I love the way the props and costumes inform the storytelling, they are beautiful pieces of fine art which are shot in whimsical sets that oozes pure fantasy, then digitally manipulated afterwards.

Kirsty Mitchell, who lost her mother to brain cancer and then was driven to create the most breath-taking fantasy land photo series in her mother's memory. The "Wonderland" series has been three years in the making. All costumes, wigs and sets were constructed on a shoestring budget. Some images took up to five months to create. She would often wait an entire year to find the perfect natural setting for her shots. The resulting images looked so hyper-real that it was assumed that they were created in Photoshop...they were not.

Alexia Sinclair is best known for her intense colour photographs portraying historical and allegorical figures. Her elaborate compositions take on the complexities of history painting by depicting a moment in a narrative story. The abundant detail and symbolism in her work are devices that allow her to tell complex stories. Her pictures combine the elegant finesse of contemporary fashion design with the sumptuous aesthetics of the Golden Age of painting.

The Golden Age, 2016 and The Cabinets of Curiosity, 2013

For those not up to date on their old English! The gloaming is that time of day where the soft glow of dusk envelopes your soul. Where the nocturnal gatekeepers take control and anything seems possible. You can (at least Alexia Sinclair does) imagine secret doorways in the trunks of trees or toadstools the size of houses. "It's easy to understand why it's commonly known as the magic hour, anything seems possible and that's where we begin".

Into the Gloaming (2015)

Natalie Dybisz a.k.a Miss Aniela is a UK-based photographer team, globally producing and shooting art, advertising, and #SurrealFashion.

Mixing fine art and fashion, Miss Aniela creates a fine balance of contemporary creativity. Her work centres on a fusion of traditional imagery and digitally enhanced motifs, interweaving in a surreal composition.

Through ten years Miss Aniela has evolved her passion for surrealism in the collection ‘Surreal Fashion’, where she photographs contemporary models with a reference to Renaissance and Dutch masters, shooting in stately home settings across Europe and USA.

Larger-than-life characters dominate a dreamlike tableaux of chandeliers, taxidermy and four-poster beds; motifs for a utopic world of the past that we long to inhabit. Miss Aniela’s recent work also involves the ‘Face’ series, intricate laborious artworks merging large-scale faces with hundreds of paintings from art history.

Photos by Kareva Margarita 

Margarita Kareva is a Russia-based photographer who specializes in fantasy art photography. Her photographs beautifully portray women that have been transformed into fairytale princesses and witches.

She adds surreal elements to her shots that make the photographs really stand out, combining Photoshop manipulation with real props.

Her work is constantly evolving and growing because she took up photography just three years ago. Her portfolio is already full of vibrant, magical and creative images. Kareva’s story proves that it is never too late to take up a new hobby – you just need to “learn every day, all your life”.

Where I See Fashion

With it being the start of London Fashion Week and then next weekend the Oscars, red carpet dresses will be the talk of the town, my thoughts turn to costumes and fashion, so I thought it timely that I share one of my favourite blogs with you.

WISF is a blog curated by Bianca Luini about fashion and everything that inspires it such as art, design, nature and more. It’s a collection of pictures related to each other for different reasons, for instance colours, shapes, sensations, concept.

Here are some of my personal favourite matches:

Christian Dior Haute Couture Fall 2007 | 
Portrait of Betty Wertheimer by Giovanni Boldini, 1902

Details at Julien Macdonald Spring 2015
| Maldives #12 (detail) by Zaria Forman, soft pastel on paper, 2014

Backstage at Francesco Scognamiglio Spring 2016 |

Portrait of a girl amongst blossoms (detail) by George Hillyard Swinstead

Shoes at Dior Fall 2015 | Artwork by Aerosyn-Lex Mestrovic

Chanel Haute Couture Spring 2016 |
 A Pathway in Monet’s Garden, Giverny by Claude Monet, 1902

Details at Atelier Versace Fall 2016 | 
Genevieve’s Wave (detail) by Matthew Cusick, 2014, inlaid maps on panel

Details at Elie Saab Haute Couture Spring 2015 
| The Water-Lily Pond by Claude Monet, 1899

Picture by Clive Arrowsmith, 1970 | Tall Bearded Iris (Iris Let It Rain)