Marie Antoinette’s fancy pink diamond ring smashed auction expectations in June, selling for just shy of $14 million. It’s a testament to the public’s enduring fascination with the ill-fated queen, the flames of which will be fanned Saturday at the Victoria & Albert museum’s exhibit examining her influential style.
Today, as the gap between the haves and have-nots widens, Marie Antoinette seems like a muse for the moment and the evening wear designers at New York Fashion Week who cater to an elite class certainly took her on in their spring collections. There were pastels and panniers aplenty, but overall, the feeling was less opulent than you might think – more aligned with Marie Antoinette’s time cosplaying a peasant at her Petit Trianon.
Cotton for evening? No corsetry? Quelle suprise!
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Markarian
Image Credit: Courtesy of Markarian Marie Antoinette never met a flower she didn’t love, though her two favorites included roses — a symbol of her Austrian heritage — and cornflowers, which she cultivated in her garden at Petit Trianon. Both featured in Alexandra O’Neill’s Markarian collection for spring, blooming from a pink and yellow silk dress with a coquettish waist ruffle and a white jacquard mini with a regal train, respectively.
Inspired by her family’s summer trips to Maine, eyelet cotton gave coastal ease to even the most formal silhouette: a pale blue ballgown with pin-tucked pannier hips. “I think it looks really flattering when you have that really narrow dropped waist that hugs your figure and then flares out,” O’Neil said, “it just feels romantic and dramatic.” Ditto for her playful shoulder details, like puff sleeves, shawl collars and caplets that could easily be shrugged off or tucked in, offering various styling possibilities. Every queen needs options.
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Reem Acra
Image Credit: Courtesy of Reem Acra For spring, Reem Acra said she wanted to create a travel wardrobe for international garden hopping. Her showroom was set up with gilded trunk displays of the sort Marie Antoinette might’ve brought along on her bridal procession from Austria to France. Inside each was a feast of confectionery-colored delights, but the standouts were two pannier dresses with bias cut panels. One was long in bubblegum pink taffeta, while the other was mid-length in silver brocade. Both had a vibrant freshness about them and were light as air. Elsewhere, Japonisme, highly collected among courtiers of the Sun King, was reflected in cherry blossom embroidery, standing out on a seductive sheer gown.
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Lela Rose
Image Credit: Courtesy of Lela Rose Underneath the coiffure and crinoline, Marie Antoinette was a really simple girl at heart, escaping the rigors of court life at her little hamlet where she dressed in simple peasant clothes. Lela Rose is a bit the same way in that she’s rarely in New York, often escaping to her own hamlet in Jackson Hole, Wyo.
Rose knows rustic elegance well and she played to it for spring with sturdy cotton and linen fabrics in a Fragronardian palette of green, blush and sky blue. The Chemise à la Reine was one of Marie Antoinette’s greatest contributions to fashion and Rose offered similarly unstructured gowns with subtle gathers and garden prints.
The silhouettes leaned more American sportswear overall (Rose is a western girl at heart), but even an adorable boxer and sleep shirt set was given a French touch with ticking stripes and grosgrain bows. “For me, it’s about creating clothes that feel as special in a woman’s everyday as they do for her most memorable evenings,” said Rose.
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Bibhu Mohapatra
Image Credit: Courtesy of Bibhu Mohapatra The marble parquet floors at the Pierre Hotel gave a Versailles-like atmosphere to Bibhu Mohapatra’s spring runway show. An homage to his native India, the designer used sari draping techniques in a very 18th-century fashion, molding hips at the front and sides like garlands and using excess fabric at the back for busts and trains. “I think it’s a beautiful elongating silhouette,” he said.
Mohapatra’s clients are sometimes weary about adding bulk to that particular body part, but he assures them: “When the hip is more defined, the waist, in comparison visually, becomes much narrower.” This indeed was the case for several elegant gowns in silk embellished with Phulkari-style beading, further combining Indian tradition with Rococo couture.
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Pamella Roland
Image Credit: Courtesy of Pamella Roland A prominent member of the board at the Whitney Museum, Pamella Roland was inspired by its modern art collection for spring, though there wasn’t a lot that felt modern at her show inside the New York Public Library (the Whitney wasn’t available).
The first two drop waist, kick flare dresses were bright spots, decorated with an entire hall’s worth of mirror embroideries. Also mimicking Versailles’ architecture, a golden bell-shaped mini had beaded lines that resembled archways or door panels. But the best look was a bias stretch-sequin gown with a trail of chiffon draped over one shoulder in Marie Antoinette’s signature powderpuff pink.
“Our women love pink,” said Roland, noting her clients gravitate toward ultra-feminine styles, “so we automatically have a Marie Antoinette thing going for us.”
